I don’t know which aspect of Jade Goody’s hopeless-seeming battle with cancer is most depressing. The reality television star appeared in the third series of Big Brother, in 2002, and endeared herself to the nation by being big-hearted, guileless and incredibly stupid; fame secured, she then went back onto Celebrity Big Brother in 2007. It all went horribly wrong – she was pilloried as a racist bully who insulted Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty, caused a national outcry and was sent home in disgrace.

The giddiness and lack of self-editing, which had seemed so funny and endearing a few years before, now seemed vile. No allowances were made for the fact that Goody, who is mixed race, was the first underclass television celebrity. Her father was an addict and a criminal; he served time for robbery and died of an overdose aged 42. Her mother is a one-armed lesbian who used to be addicted to crack; Jade has spoken about mothering her own mother when she was little.

Jade’s childhood was tough, let’s say. So her failure to behave as though fresh out of charm school should hardly have come as the world’s greatest surprise. But the tranche of society to which she held up a mirror only wanted to see itself – and its aspirations – reflected positively. Jade Take 1 did this brilliantly: she showed them that anyone could be famous and rich and on telly, regardless of intelligence, opportunity, class, race or background. She was a survivor and she was from a dump. The public loved her for it.

But when Jade Take 2 came along in 2007 she showed another side, on camera, in real time and live from the dung-heap: prejudice and ignorance, kneejerk name-calling, lumpen gracelessness, inarticulate rage permanently just below the surface. People began to hate her – really hate her. Today, several websites are devoted to her illness and gleefully anticipate her demise; one is called When Will Jade Goody Die? A satirical website wonders whether Goody will be the first “chav saint”.

The lucrative contracts and television series she had secured fell away; she gave contrite but uncomprehending interviews, weeping face swollen, unable to grasp that we only wanted her to “be herself” up to a particular, manageable, not-revolting point. Her private life was a mess. She separated from the father of her two young sons and took up with Jack Tweedy, a shifty type who didn’t inspire confidence. (Tweedy has recently been let out of jail, having served a sentence for GBH.) And then, hoping to make amends, she agreed to go on India’s version of Big Brother to show that she wasn’t really a racist bully. During filming she was told – on camera, at her insistence – that she had cervical cancer. Goody is so loathed that internet rumours instantly started circulating about how this was a publicity stunt.

It wasn’t. Following chemotherapy, radiotherapy and a radical hysterectomy, last week Max Clifford, Jade’s publicist, confirmed that the cancer had spread to her liver, bowel and groin. The treatment has left her bald. Her hopes of survival are slight. She remains vocal about the minutiae of her life and keen to express herself via newspaper and television interviews, for which she is paid. These are almost unbearable to watch, read or listen to: whatever you may think of her, the fact remains that Goody is a young woman of 27, with two small children, who probably doesn’t have long to live.

The survivor has finally turned into a victim and it’s making everyone uncomfortable. Lacking the articulacy of writers such as Oscar Moore, who chronicled his dying of Aids in a newspaper column, or of John Diamond or Ruth Picardie, who wrote about dying of cancer, Goody’s pronouncements have a traumatic artlessness about them: she’s frightened and in pain and she loves her kids and she doesn’t want to die. “I’m in a nightmare,” she told The Sun, crying throughout the interview – and we’re not talking pretty, lace handkerchief crying, but great racking sobs.

The general feeling is that Goody has said enough, shown enough, exposed enough – both about herself and about the society we live in – and the seemly thing to do would be to go away and die quietly somewhere where there are no microphones and no cameras. But seemliness is the one thing Goody was never about. It is impossible to will her away: you can’t gorge on chocolate and then become outraged when you have a stomach ache.

The Jade phenomenon exists because we created it – because we found it interesting and mad and sort of hilarious: ha ha, thick fat bird from Bermondsey, ha ha, showbiz folly, ha ha, isn’t it gruesomely fascinating and what can it possibly mean?

Goody isn’t rich or famous because she won the lottery: she’s rich and famous because we bought all those papers and magazines and ghosted books with her on the cover, because we watched her television series, because we cheered when she was good and booed when she was bad, because we sat around discussing her over lunch. Now she’s dying, she’s making us all feel bad so we want her to go away, like a broken toy that’s stopped being fun.

Goody’s treatment is, inevitably, being filmed, in a sort of postBig Brother take on the snuff movie. “People will say I’m doing this for money,” she said last week. “And they’re right, I am. But it’s not to buy flash cars or big houses – it’s for my sons’ future if I’m not here. I don’t want my kids to have the same miserable, drug-blighted, poverty-stricken childhood I did. If cancer has taught me anything it’s that big houses aren’t important, being rich isn’t important. It’s my sons who are important – it’s being alive that's important.”

I think sticking by her is important, too. She’s right about wanting to accumulate money: what else is she supposed to do and in what other way? It’s not just that you don’t call a dying person names, but also that she is society’s creature as much, if not more, than she is her own. The idea that she is so stupid that we should protect her from herself is kind and compassionate and humane – it’s just a shame that nobody had it seven years ago.

It’s too late now. We’re stuck with her and she is stuck with us, careering wildly down the hill waiting for the crash.

+ The actor Christian Bale had an epic strop on the set of the forthcoming Batman movie, Terminator Salvation, which happily found its way online last week.

A director of photography called Shane Hurlbut accidentally wandered into Bale’s shot, which caused the actor to bellow, “I’m gonna kick your f****** ass! I want you off the f****** set, you prick. No, don’t be sorry. Think, for one f****** second. What the f*** are you doing?” and goes on from there. All is delivered at top pitch, hoarsely, in a tone of hysterical rage: he sounds as if he is literally foaming at the mouth, like a mad person.

It’s an awful way to speak to someone, obviously, but the rant is nevertheless magnificent. Actors only speak as themselves when they are doing publicity for their films and they seldom have anything remotely interesting to say, which is hardly surprising when you remember that the good ones are only good because they are empty vessels waiting to be told what to say, how to say it, how to move while saying it and what facial expression to put on as they move.

Bale’s loony rant is a refreshing corrective to all that and means that at least one thesp is now officially worth watching when he parks his bottom on a TV show near you. Having had such a splendid turn, he’s hardly going to get away with the usual guff about how costumes make you sweat and doing your own stunts is exciting.

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