Lily Cole has blasted cancel culture

She told inews.co.uk: "The emphasis, culturally, of singling people out and saying what they've done wrong or what they're doing right, even glorifying them, is really problematic because it shouldn't be about individuals. That's almost a distraction from the conversation we need to be having.

"We are becoming increasingly polarised as a society, especially because of social media and filter bubbles. There isn't much appetite for discourse and debate. We bracket people politically into two camps, the left and the right. It's kind of crazy. As if politics was that simple."

Lily has been working on the book 'Who Cares Wins: Reasons for Optimism in Our Changing World' for the past few years but admitted she almost axed the whole project after worrying about how it would be received.

She said: "I really freaked out. I suddenly thought, 'What are you doing, Lily? You've spent all this energy and time and you're probably going to get torn apart.'"

However, Lily's 12-year-old cousin convinced her to change her mind.

She said: "She was like, 'I just wish the politicians would do what's right rather than worry about what people think of them.' That really hit home. I remembered that the gravity of the situation is more important than me worrying whether I'm going to get some criticism. So, I decided to just go ahead.

"I'm not perfect, so people telling me I'm not perfect is not going to change my world view. I've come to my own peace with that, so yeah... life is short."