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Ulrika Jonsson admits she's ‘imperfect' as she hits back at ‘nasty comments' about her appearance

Ulrika Jonsson admits she's ‘imperfect' as she hits back at ‘nasty comments' about her appearance

Yahoo2 days ago
Ulrika Jonsson has passionately hit back after she received a string of 'nasty' and ageist comments following a recent podcast appearance.
Earlier this month, the 57-year-old former Gladiators presenter spoke to Spencer Matthews about her sobriety on the Made in Chelsea star's Untapped podcast.
However, after footage of the podcast was shared on social media, Jonsson was hit with a wave of negativity from trolls who said she was now 'over-tanned'.
Jonsson chose to address the criticism on her Instagram, claiming that she doesn't notice many mean comments and often chooses to 'send people love' instead.
Jonsson explained that she opted to go without make-up for the podcast, as she partly 'forgot', but also because she's 'not a fan' due to wearing 'heavy make-up on screen from 5am for years'.
She added: 'Most crucially, though, since childhood I've suffered from eczema. On my body – the creases of my arms and legs – on my face, eyes and lips. Make-up has always been the enemy because it's been agony to wear.'
Ulrika Jonsson on the 'Untapped' podcast (Untapped)
While she thanked people for the positive feedback that she's received for discussing her experiences with addiction and sobriety, Johnsson said that there was a 'considerable amount' of comments about how 'old' and 'tanned' she looked.
Jonsson said that she is an unashamed sun worshipper and 'will no doubt pay the price for that'. The presenter also said she has 'uneven pigmentation, doubtlessly not helped by ageing' and also uses filters in photos of herself because 'it's easier than foundation and less painful'.
The former Shooting Stars team captain added that she rarely sunbathes anymore, constantly works on her garden and hasn't been on holiday for seven years.
Jonsson concluded her post by saying: 'So, I understand that an over-tanned, imperfect and ageing face offends you. But try to listen to the words rather than constantly judging women's appearance. You might learn something. And making people feel s*** doesn't make you a hero.'
On the podcast, the mother of four said that staying sober is now her main focus in life. 'For me, now sobriety is my priority, even though I used to say 'Oh my children are my priority'. Without my sobriety, I can't be there for my children, or something awful might happen, or whatever else.'
In a post which coincided with the beginning of her sixth month of sobriety in December, Jonsson revealed she reached a point where she could 'no longer recognise [her]self' just before she decided to quit drinking.
'On the 5th June 2024, I had the gift of desperation and reached out for help,' she wrote. 'I no longer recognised myself and I surrendered.'
'Many people have asked me how I've done it and all I can say is that no woman is an island – I have not done this alone,' she continued.
'The willingness to give up alcohol came from me, yes, but without support of friends, family and my new tribe, I would not have made it this far.'
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Comedian Nish Kumar on why Trump isn't actually 'good' for comedy: 'He's not one of your crack smoking mayors'
Comedian Nish Kumar on why Trump isn't actually 'good' for comedy: 'He's not one of your crack smoking mayors'

Yahoo

time25 minutes ago

  • Yahoo

Comedian Nish Kumar on why Trump isn't actually 'good' for comedy: 'He's not one of your crack smoking mayors'

Nish Kumar reflects on political satire, social media and the evolving global reach of stand-up comedy ahead of his Just For Laughs shows in Montreal LONDON, ENGLAND - MAY 21: Nish Kumar attends Day 1 of The Podcast Show at the Business Design Centre on May 21, 2025 in London, England. (Photo by Alan Chapman/) As the Just For Laughs comedy festival continues this week, shows from comedian Nish Kumar are sure to be a highlight of the Montreal summer staple. While Kumar sells out stand-up shows around the world, and for good reason because he's one of the best, he said that he has a "sentimental fondness" for taking part in a festival. "The shows are always really good fun. ... There's an international circuit of comedians that do these things, that do Montreal, that do Edinburgh, that do Melbourne, and ... it's a really great opportunity to catch up with some friends, and also get to see some cool stuff as well," Kumar told Yahoo Canada. "I watch a lot when I'm in town and I've seen some unbelievable shows." This isn't Kumar's first time in Canada this year. The British comedian was doing a show in Toronto in February, just as U.S. President Donald Trump's tariffs came into effect. ADVERTISEMENT "That was a particularly febrile time," Kumar recalled. "I think I was hoping that things might have calmed down a little bit, but obviously they were never going to calm down." "It's a fascinating experiment in what happens when a country, for seemingly no reason, out of nowhere, reverses centuries of diplomatic relations with its neighbour, with whom it shares a land border." Kumar's February show was also just months before Canada's last election, which saw Mark Carney get elected prime minister after previous holding the position of Governor of the Bank of England. "It obviously is very strange for a British person that Mark Carney is [the Prime Minister]. I know he's Canadian intellectually, but to me he only exists as a character in British news from 2016 and 2017," Kumar said. Nish Kumar: Trump isn't good for comedy But while some have frequently assumed that Trump is "good" for comedy, Kumar stressed that "he's not." ADVERTISEMENT "He's not one of your crack smoking mayors, ... the idea of regionally powerful politicians that make national news for being buffoons is maybe something that I can see as being good, but with Trump ... he poses this huge existential threat. Especially with his total hostility to climate science," Kumar highlighted. "I think what you have to try and find the balance with is engaging with the seriousness of what's actually going on and what the ramifications of a lot of these guys are, and also ... you're trying to find the balance between jokes that make people laugh. ... If it looks like you're not taking it really seriously enough people will just will get annoyed. I don't think the people that I'm performing to are interested in hearing like, he says 'bigly,' or look at him, isn't he orange. I think if I went out and did that kind of stuff the people that I'm performing to would be furious. I'm always trying to thread that balance between jokes that are funny, but also engage with the seriousness of the stuff that a figure like Trump is capable of." What that has also meant is that Kumar has to be especially adaptable to respond to what's happening in the world, U.S. politics, Trump and beyond, which he's been able to navigate with real finesse. "Since 2016, I've always kept a bit of room in my shows for stuff to change constantly," Kumar said. "You try and make sure that ... 80 per cent of the show is set in stone, ... and then the other 20 per cent you have to be loose and you have to keep writing while you're touring." "The silver lining of that is that you're never bored with the show. I've had to kind of retool the show as I've been touring, because I've been touring it for nearly a year now, and so that 20 per cent has just changed." LOS ANGELES - FEBRUARY 29: AFTER MIDNIGHT, airing Thursday, February 29, 2024, with host Taylor Tomlinson. Pictured: Nish Kumar. (Photo by Sonja Flemming/CBS via Getty Images) The good and the bad of social media A big shift in comedy consumption around the world has been things like social media and podcasts allowing people to get exposure to comedians they otherwise wouldn't engage with, also helping to create an invested audience for things like comedy festivals, as Kumar highlighted. ADVERTISEMENT "I think the internet is sort of supercharging these things, rather than taking away from them," he said. "A British comedian of my standing 20 years ago would not have been able to casually come to Canada and America and sell out tour shows, that didn't exist. It's only because of the internet and podcasting and Taskmaster, specifically. ... I think there's a lot of negatives that it has for our industry and the art form more broadly, but from a perspective of getting people to come to shows and live comedy and festivals, I think it's actually really helped." But engaging on the internet, specifically on social media, can be a tricky exercise, with Kumar describing his relationship with the platforms as "not always healthy." He has spoken about receiving death threats for years. "I think the problem with it is that it's not exclusively bad," Kumar said. "I'm grateful to the internet and social media for what it's done for my career in terms of the live audience. I think in terms of having access to everyone's opinions about a thing that you've made is not always conducive for getting it made. Having the ability to see what every single person thinks of you can, at points, be paralyzing and I've definitely gone in waves with it." "I don't want to praise him ever, really, but the one thing I will say is Elon Musk buying Twitter has been really great for me, because it means that I've stopped using it, I think like for a lot of us. ... It's like a reverse Raiders of the Lost Ark, where he just opened this box and just Nazis went everywhere. And I think that, that had made a lot of us examine our relationship with it. Is this all part of a long game for Elon Musk's attempts to improve all of our mental health? No, it definitely isn't. But I genuinely think there's something fundamentally unhealthy about all of it." Kumar stressed that Canadian Naomi Klein's book "Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World" has "rewired" his brain in terms of engaging more critically with how he conducts himself on social media platforms, and more "empathetic" to "victims of these algorithms," while angrier about the perpetrators. ADVERTISEMENT "There's this illusion that's been created that we've got a lot of critical thinking applied to what we would call legacy media, or mainstream media," Kumar said. "And that's good and healthy. And we should have been considering who the gatekeepers were the whole time. ... However, there is a flip side to it, which is we have lost the ability to realize that there are gatekeepers to the internet, and you'll see people say, 'Well, you've got to question everything' and then repost something about, for example, the COVID vaccine that they've engaged absolutely no critical thought to at all." "There's this idea that social media platforms are purely democratic and if something is blowing up on social media it's just a pure exercise of democracy. And again, that doesn't really take into account the algorithms that govern these websites, and the fact that it's not necessarily qualitative, it's just that you've done something that games the algorithm in a particular way." From his evaluation of politics, societal structures and beyond, Kumar continues to be one of the best and essential voices in stand-up comedy. Nish Kumar has shows on July 23 and July 25 at the Just For Laughs comedy festival in Montreal

Ozzy Osbourne, the Lovable Prince of Darkness
Ozzy Osbourne, the Lovable Prince of Darkness

New York Times

time26 minutes ago

  • New York Times

Ozzy Osbourne, the Lovable Prince of Darkness

No dark lord of heavy metal was ever more lovable than Ozzy Osbourne. From his days as the helium-voiced conjurer of demonic wars and time-traveling iron men to his signature pop-culture role as a dotty reality TV star, Osbourne, who died on Tuesday at 76, was perhaps rock's most beloved mascot of excess. Damaged by years of drug abuse, and more recently by a variant of Parkinson's disease, Osbourne was long diminished from his peak performances of the 1970s as the lead singer of Black Sabbath, which more than any other band defined the sound (loud and molten), look (gothic black) and attitude (sneering) of heavy metal. But his persistence, even in a weakened state, only made Osbourne more beloved. That was poignantly clear this month, when Black Sabbath made its final appearance at a charity concert in Birmingham, England, where the group was founded, called Back to the Beginning — with Metallica, Guns N' Roses, Pantera, Anthrax and even the other members of Black Sabbath apparently happy to play second fiddle to Osbourne. Dressed in glittery black and seated on a black throne, Osbourne swayed his arms above his head as he led the crowd in 'War Pigs,' the vaguely satanic antiwar epic that opens the band's influential second album, 'Paranoid' (1970). 'Thank you from the bottom of my heart,' he told the crowd. For longtime fans, the image of Ozzy — everybody called him Ozzy — from the Birmingham concert echoed his most familiar posture from Ozzfest, the touring music festival that Osbourne led almost annually from 1996 to 2018. There, worshiped by a multigenerational faithful, Osbourne only had to raise his arms and mouth a benevolent grin to make the audience go wild. Tommy Lee, the drummer of Mötley Crüe, recalled in a recent interview with The New York Times Osbourne's 'signature move' to rally a crowd. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.

Comedian Nish Kumar on why Trump isn't actually 'good' for comedy: 'He's not one of your crack smoking mayors'
Comedian Nish Kumar on why Trump isn't actually 'good' for comedy: 'He's not one of your crack smoking mayors'

Yahoo

time34 minutes ago

  • Yahoo

Comedian Nish Kumar on why Trump isn't actually 'good' for comedy: 'He's not one of your crack smoking mayors'

Nish Kumar reflects on political satire, social media and the evolving global reach of stand-up comedy ahead of his Just For Laughs shows in Montreal LONDON, ENGLAND - MAY 21: Nish Kumar attends Day 1 of The Podcast Show at the Business Design Centre on May 21, 2025 in London, England. (Photo by Alan Chapman/) As the Just For Laughs comedy festival continues this week, shows from comedian Nish Kumar are sure to be a highlight of the Montreal summer staple. While Kumar sells out stand-up shows around the world, and for good reason because he's one of the best, he said that he has a "sentimental fondness" for taking part in a festival. "The shows are always really good fun. ... There's an international circuit of comedians that do these things, that do Montreal, that do Edinburgh, that do Melbourne, and ... it's a really great opportunity to catch up with some friends, and also get to see some cool stuff as well," Kumar told Yahoo Canada. "I watch a lot when I'm in town and I've seen some unbelievable shows." This isn't Kumar's first time in Canada this year. The British comedian was doing a show in Toronto in February, just as U.S. President Donald Trump's tariffs came into effect. ADVERTISEMENT "That was a particularly febrile time," Kumar recalled. "I think I was hoping that things might have calmed down a little bit, but obviously they were never going to calm down." "It's a fascinating experiment in what happens when a country, for seemingly no reason, out of nowhere, reverses centuries of diplomatic relations with its neighbour, with whom it shares a land border." Kumar's February show was also just months before Canada's last election, which saw Mark Carney get elected prime minister after previous holding the position of Governor of the Bank of England. "It obviously is very strange for a British person that Mark Carney is [the Prime Minister]. I know he's Canadian intellectually, but to me he only exists as a character in British news from 2016 and 2017," Kumar said. Nish Kumar: Trump isn't good for comedy But while some have frequently assumed that Trump is "good" for comedy, Kumar stressed that "he's not." ADVERTISEMENT "He's not one of your crack smoking mayors, ... the idea of regionally powerful politicians that make national news for being buffoons is maybe something that I can see as being good, but with Trump ... he poses this huge existential threat. Especially with his total hostility to climate science," Kumar highlighted. "I think what you have to try and find the balance with is engaging with the seriousness of what's actually going on and what the ramifications of a lot of these guys are, and also ... you're trying to find the balance between jokes that make people laugh. ... If it looks like you're not taking it really seriously enough people will just will get annoyed. I don't think the people that I'm performing to are interested in hearing like, he says 'bigly,' or look at him, isn't he orange. I think if I went out and did that kind of stuff the people that I'm performing to would be furious. I'm always trying to thread that balance between jokes that are funny, but also engage with the seriousness of the stuff that a figure like Trump is capable of." What that has also meant is that Kumar has to be especially adaptable to respond to what's happening in the world, U.S. politics, Trump and beyond, which he's been able to navigate with real finesse. "Since 2016, I've always kept a bit of room in my shows for stuff to change constantly," Kumar said. "You try and make sure that ... 80 per cent of the show is set in stone, ... and then the other 20 per cent you have to be loose and you have to keep writing while you're touring." "The silver lining of that is that you're never bored with the show. I've had to kind of retool the show as I've been touring, because I've been touring it for nearly a year now, and so that 20 per cent has just changed." LOS ANGELES - FEBRUARY 29: AFTER MIDNIGHT, airing Thursday, February 29, 2024, with host Taylor Tomlinson. Pictured: Nish Kumar. (Photo by Sonja Flemming/CBS via Getty Images) The good and the bad of social media A big shift in comedy consumption around the world has been things like social media and podcasts allowing people to get exposure to comedians they otherwise wouldn't engage with, also helping to create an invested audience for things like comedy festivals, as Kumar highlighted. ADVERTISEMENT "I think the internet is sort of supercharging these things, rather than taking away from them," he said. "A British comedian of my standing 20 years ago would not have been able to casually come to Canada and America and sell out tour shows, that didn't exist. It's only because of the internet and podcasting and Taskmaster, specifically. ... I think there's a lot of negatives that it has for our industry and the art form more broadly, but from a perspective of getting people to come to shows and live comedy and festivals, I think it's actually really helped." But engaging on the internet, specifically on social media, can be a tricky exercise, with Kumar describing his relationship with the platforms as "not always healthy." He has spoken about receiving death threats for years. "I think the problem with it is that it's not exclusively bad," Kumar said. "I'm grateful to the internet and social media for what it's done for my career in terms of the live audience. I think in terms of having access to everyone's opinions about a thing that you've made is not always conducive for getting it made. Having the ability to see what every single person thinks of you can, at points, be paralyzing and I've definitely gone in waves with it." "I don't want to praise him ever, really, but the one thing I will say is Elon Musk buying Twitter has been really great for me, because it means that I've stopped using it, I think like for a lot of us. ... It's like a reverse Raiders of the Lost Ark, where he just opened this box and just Nazis went everywhere. And I think that, that had made a lot of us examine our relationship with it. Is this all part of a long game for Elon Musk's attempts to improve all of our mental health? No, it definitely isn't. But I genuinely think there's something fundamentally unhealthy about all of it." Kumar stressed that Canadian Naomi Klein's book "Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World" has "rewired" his brain in terms of engaging more critically with how he conducts himself on social media platforms, and more "empathetic" to "victims of these algorithms," while angrier about the perpetrators. ADVERTISEMENT "There's this illusion that's been created that we've got a lot of critical thinking applied to what we would call legacy media, or mainstream media," Kumar said. "And that's good and healthy. And we should have been considering who the gatekeepers were the whole time. ... However, there is a flip side to it, which is we have lost the ability to realize that there are gatekeepers to the internet, and you'll see people say, 'Well, you've got to question everything' and then repost something about, for example, the COVID vaccine that they've engaged absolutely no critical thought to at all." "There's this idea that social media platforms are purely democratic and if something is blowing up on social media it's just a pure exercise of democracy. And again, that doesn't really take into account the algorithms that govern these websites, and the fact that it's not necessarily qualitative, it's just that you've done something that games the algorithm in a particular way." From his evaluation of politics, societal structures and beyond, Kumar continues to be one of the best and essential voices in stand-up comedy. Nish Kumar has shows on July 23 and July 25 at the Just For Laughs comedy festival in Montreal

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