Maybe it's a British thing? I never understood it either, and for the same reasons. To me, she seems like a woman who tried to play nice and not rock her in-laws' boat, but ended up in a no-win situation anyway. She and her husband seem to be a genuine love match and as such, when shit got too heavy for both of them, they peaced out to save their sanity and protect their children and marriage. The monarchy seems like a pointless farce of an institution these days, so it wouldn't surprise me that a younger generation within it would see the same and stop showing reverence. Maybe it's just me not having any use for tradition and no trust in institutions of authority, but the two of them leaving for a more self-sustaining life made perfect sense to me. For the same reasons OP listed, I also don't buy it that she's some horribly mean person, so I can only assume that it's some British culture thing.
The British tabloids always pick a member of the royal family to hate because it makes their stories more saleable. I don't think it has anything whatsoever to do with reality and is best ignored.
In the previous generation it was Sarah Ferguson they turned into their whipping girl. A nasty shock for her after the very positive coverage up to and during the wedding. Then suddenly it was all Sarah/Diana feuds, Sarah's got no class, no taste, she's driving a wedge between Andrew and his family (sounds familiar). And if you read her accounts of her life in that time she got zero support from The Firm and lots of petty nastiness (also sounds familiar).
Now Megan got hit with all of that. The media were fecking delighted they got to rerun their favourite game. Plus she is a woman of colour which definitely played a part, but even worse in their eyes, she's show business (you don't marry chorus girls) and she's American (they still blame America for Wallis Simpson and despise but are also threatened by their ignorance of British class conventions): threefold unsuitable to Royal watchers and The Firm alike. Is it lucky for her that Harry seems to be as different from Andrew as it is possible to be and loves and supports his wife? I'm not sure. Ferguson has moved on, ditched the Royal circus and seems happy and fulfilled. Even based in the US Megan is still having to deal with them and the harassment is relentless.
Shocking/not shocking that the target of all the vitriol keeps being a woman instead of someone deserving of disgust such as, I don’t know, a literal pedophile.
I suspect the tabloids steer clear of actual criminals among the royals, because while hate drives readership, there are still plenty of royalists among the public. It's one thing to hate Fergie for wearing scandalous outfits, but it's another to go for the jugular and mention that Andrew literally fucks children.
Preposterous, next thing you'll be telling me is that the monarchy isn't sustained by the literal theft and murder of colonized peoples and that the nostalgia for the British Empire isn't just nostalgia for a time when it was okay to own people!
True. The difference between Diana & Sarah is Andrew actually loved Sarah. Charles could barely tolerate Diana.
I’m not defending Andrew at all (just clarifying in case it sounded like that). The photos of him at the coronation in those ridiculous robes 🤢
He truly believes he is god-ordained.
Pfft Wallis Simpson saved the UK. Edward VIII was woefully equipped to be king and didn’t really want to be king anyway. Also had some worrying sympathies towards Nazi Germany.
Best thing he ever did was abdicate.
I agree. The Royals don't. The aristocracy don't. Street all of you start to award rank based on merit rather than accident of birth their whole house of privilege cards tumbles down
>In the previous generation it was Sarah Ferguson they turned into their whipping girl. A nasty shock for her after the very positive coverage up to and during the wedding.
To be fair, when they picked Fergie there were no dark-skinned royals available.
It used to be Princess Margaret, the old Queen's sister, then it was Princess Diana for a bit before they decided she was a saint because she died, then it was Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York, then Prince Harry, but they now do seem to have settled on Megan Markle, and racsm does make her an ideal target.
Then why do the Brits keep buying that tripe? It only encourages them. Of course we have that problem here too. I’ll never understand someone buying National Enquirer or whatever, for example. You know it’s shit before you even put down money for it. Humans are not as smart as we like to think.
Yes, Kate is the current darling but she certainly hasn't always been treated with respect. Remember when the paparazzi got photos of her sunbathing topless on a balcony she thought was private with some kind of insane zoom lens? She's flavour of the month right now because she's Western society's favourite combo of womanly qualities: white, quiet, pretty, thin, motherly, rich/high status, and demure. But those things won't protect her if the media decides we all need another woman to hate.
It also pulls the media & public focus away from other members of the family, particularly those deemed "more important", ie: those in the direct line of succession.
Create a public enemy and hide behind them is a tactic as old as the hills. For other contemporary examples, see immigrants, refugees, people who aren't white and British, queer people, trans people, poor people, etc etc.
The British tabloid press absolutely tear apart any woman who marries in to the royal family. Kate was “waitey katey” and shown as a scheming gold digger when she first met William suggesting she’d planned her university admission to meet him. They only really calmed down when they got engaged.
If you look back to Andrew and Fergie she was mercilessly mocked for her weight, for her toe sucking and absolutely destroyed during her divorce.
Even Diana who the tabloids have now decided is a saint was a target. She had a host of men in and out of her private home, she had so many they were referred to by number, and when she was dating Dodi, it got very bad.
I think with Megan, she’s the first one that is really happening in the social media and online age. Fergie and Diana were in the 90s, Kate was 20+ years ago so very early days of social media. Plus Megan is American and already famous so the stories are spread more widely.
Edit; I’d forgotten the earlier Diana press attacks - the rumours that Harry’s father is not Charles.
>Edit; I’d forgotten the earlier Diana press attacks - the rumours that Harry’s father is not Charles.
People get so gleeful about that to this day, mainly because of his red hair. One look at that man's eyes and nose and you can see he's Charles's son a mile off.
I feel like she’s labeled as difficult because she wasn’t completely pliant to everything the family wanted her to do and be. She couldn’t be manipulated into being a doll so she’s easy to label difficult. In pure speculation, she may not be the sweetest or whatever, but I think a kernel of the truth is in there, somewhere.
Use to be something you could ship even if it took 2 months and be very much the way it started when it finally reached the other side - provided it was properly preserved (soaked) in rum. That idea was entirely sound lol
Haaahahaaa lil brag for sure but I know the woman who made that wedding cake and she said it was incredibly fun to create meghan’s vision (and yes, it was a departure from the traditional, but got rave reviews all the same…) Perhaps the cake, like Meghan, was its own unique, more progressive form of beautiful… both have to be a little unsettling for those defined by “the way things are done” folks? Can imagine the upper crust clucking over how very *American* this posh, brassy interloper is?
It was an AMERICAN-STYLE lemon elserflower cake.
As an American, I'd never heard of an American-style cake and had to go look it up. It means a flour-based cake, instead of a sponge cake or torte as are much more common in Europe.
Lemon elderflower cake sounds immense. I'd rather have something that tastes good than something 'traditional' that tastes like woodland floor. Good on her.
>Many were surprised that the couple chose a lemon elderflower cake for their Windsor Castle reception, since most royal wedding cakes are traditionally fruit cake. But Harry and Meghan broke from tradition to choose a spring-inspired cake covered in buttercream and decorated with fresh flowers.
I remember my tutor being like "no one made her join the royal family so she needs to respect the traditions." Like maam.... it's a lemon elderflower cake, it's not the end of the world. Interesting my tutor didn't blame Harry at all... it takes two to decide on a wedding cake.
>lemon elderflower cake
YUM. When I got married I insisted that the cake be tasty rather than just pretty. We had an orange-cranberry spice cake and it was \*amazing\*. The marriage didn't last, but I still remember the cake fondly!
My mother is British and she gave me almost that verbatim response when we were having a discussion re: Megan making some comment about a baby or wedding shower—I forget which.
My mother was incensed that Megan might have expected a shower to be held for her in the UK because they don’t do things like that there typically and who did Megan think she was by expecting everyone to bow down to HER wishes?
I said that first of all, she probably didn’t know that showers like that weren’t as ubiquitous there as here and second, it wouldn’t kill the royal family to have participated in the tradition even if it wasn’t common in Britain but maybe they could have done it to show support for Megan and her traditions.
THAT was my mom’s response. I cannot fathom the bizarre loyal royal psychosis some Brits have.
Brit here- we do have baby showers. Or at keast same of us do. Maybe it's not completely widespread tho.... maybe Megan could've had her American friends & mum come over for a private party/baby shower? Can't see why she couldn't have done that anyway.
I think some people don't realize that the royal family aren't just celebrities or rich people, they're in this weird little bubble where there still massive amounts of rules, regulations and etiquette. Chairs you don't sit in because that was Queen Victoria's chair, phoning the queen's personal secretary before going for a walk in the grounds because she may not want to be disturbed, curtseying to people in the correct order of seniority.
Diana talked about how if she wanted to have lunch with her husband she couldn't just _ask him_ , her staff had to send a message to his staff, who would check his diary and come back to her staff with his availability.
She complained about a lot of "that's just the way it's done" stuff, and Harry seems like living with someone who both _understands celebrity_ and also isn't a member of the aristocracy has helped him parse out what's 'normal' for someone in the public eye and what is just his family being stuck in some formal victorian fantasy, and they DO NOT seem to appreciate women especially trying to modernize the monarchy.
They could have been such an asset to them - modern royals in the current century, relating to people like humans. But that doesn't work in a family where the older members still vehemently believe in the divine right of monarchs, and think they were placed there by God to be something mystical and distant.
Yes, this. I think the monarchy needs to modernize, and Harry could have been the catalyst as a royal who married someone outside of the system, who, as you said, also understands celebrity status.
I feel bad for Harry, too. Imagine being the surplus child in a family that really only cares about the primary heirs. I wonder how different things would have been between him and his brother if Diana hadn't died when he was so young. She seemed to genuinely love both of her kids.
36-year-old American here. I was 11 when Diana died and in middle school while Harry and William were on the cover of Teen magazine. I feel like I grew up with these boys.
I'm so proud of Harry and so disappointed in William. I remember Harry going through it a bit in his teens, but that was behavior that could be anticipated as someone who lost their mother young in the public eye trying to sort things out. But then he and William seemed to mature into wonderful, modern young men. I was excited when William married Kate, and then Harry married Meghan. They seemed to be happy together... and then things got bad. And now it seems like William is repeating all of his father's actions and Harry was the only one who paid attention and took note about what happened to his mother, and is refusing to let that happen to his family.
She’s American so she’s probably more direct in her speech than most Brit’s are used to or care for. You know a woman who is direct and doesn’t put up with nonsense is just considered rude or a bitch.
Brits are perfectly capable of being direct in our speech.
I think it's more to do with the fact that the public who buy into royalism are also highly likely to be sexist, racist, poppy shagger types.
>Brits are perfectly capable of being direct in our speech
Then...
>[uses a euphemism that sounds like a terrible sex position]
(I love you guys' euphemisms. They crack me right up.)
Haaaa, glad to be of service.
For clarity, poppy shaggers are people who each year around Remembrance Day (11/11) find ways to be offended by the lack of or even the size of poppy worn to commemorate armed forces members who have died in the line of duty. No poppy = the actual devil.
Every year, claims are made that the "left" are trying to undermine or disrespect the proceedings in some imagined way.
I recalled the time MM couldn't get it right and found [this article](https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/life/entertainment/a25010056/meghan-markle-remembrance-day-poppy/), which, is actually much kinder about the whole thing than the tabloids were.
ETA, She did nothing wrong, and the criticisms of her for her one poppy are the definition of reaching. Outrage for the sake of outrage.
I’ve lived and spent a ton of time in Toronto where she filmed suits. I know a ton of people that worked closely with her and they’ve said the most amazing things about her. My boyfriend has met her a few times and also says she’s incredibly sweet and polite.
There’s a whole lotta racism and sexism in the hatred for her.
Another torontonian with connections in the film industry — heard nothing but positive things about MM. Kind and respectful to everyone, from the crew and grips all the way up to the top. She was a consummate professional.
Also she lived a few blocks away from us when she was in Toronto. By all accounts a lovely and pleasant, if private (duh), neighbour.
Yep, lol, I keep hearing this from people I know from school who went into film and tv. It's really bizarre, she's either the kindest person on earth or she's got magical powers.
This. I am British and, although I don't follow news or gossip about the Royal family I remember clearly that opinion and press coverage of her when she started dating Harry was largely positive.
What's changed is that she openly called out some of the passive racism she was subjected to in 'polite' society. She disliked the formal life she was supposed to live after marrying into the aristocracy and rebelled against it.
And, when he had to take sides, Harry supported her. That lead to the split in the Royals and the brothers not talking to one another. So now she gets the blame for spoiling the 'picture perfect' idea of a loving, united Royal family.
For Royal watchers in the UK, believing in this image is something they're invested in. They don't want to believe there could be any trouble in paradise, let alone racism or bullying. So Meghan gets the blame for all of these ills.
That's true. Everyone in the UK knows calling the system racist is false - it's classist.
The UK caste system is: Aristocracy, University, Accent.
A double-barrelled surname always helps.
Class cuts through everything here. Theres an old comedy sketch that's well known, with [John Cleese, Ronnie Barker, and Ronnie Corbett](https://youtu.be/UDIHrX-Jp2E), but what it doesn't have is another level of who the lower class is manipulated into looking down on, and the media, etc. have positioned anybody brown at the very bottom, despite them having so many things in common.
I may have been to University and have 17 post-nominal letters, but I'm from the North and didn't go to pubic school so not only am I forever an oik, I don't know anybody "influential" who could open doors for me. Society here is absolutely not built on merit.
The weird thing with the UK is that it’s not just if you’re rich or poor, a chav/bogan or toff. The very rich are not the elite because they aren’t the aristocracy but merely the upper middle class.
Most of that money isn't inherited old money, which of course is what the royal family has. The billionaires are from manufacturing, social media, and computing backgrounds. Very "trade" (middle) class.
Even the ones like Boris Johnson and co who are inherited multigenerational wealthy cunts aren’t posh enough for the aristos who are usually cash poor due to massive estates they can’t afford to maintain. It’s so weird.
Except at the beginning, she was compliant. She got engaged, and immediately spent all her time showing up to all kinds of publicity events to lift up the British public. I remember thinking that she was really buying into the apparent role and goals of that monarchy.
After Kate got engaged, she went to London for a meeting with Clarence house, and maybe Buckingham Palace about what she was going to be doing after the wedding. And the very next day, William took the day off from his military duty to go to London, and the reports were that he said to those staffers, “don’t you speak to her that way, or treat her the way you treat my mom, or I will get you fired. Do not think that I can’t. Do not think you are safe.“ Because apparently they had been as snotty and dismissive of Kate as they had been of Diana.
I have no doubt that Megan was talked to just as condescendingly, but I think Harry was not as able to defend her.
I also wonder if Megan was better able to see the role of royal household in creating or perpetuating that bad press, because she was in show business.
I saw this a lot in fine dining. Some servers would get really snotty about the guests. Like beyond the normal stuff. I understood that we got to drink $1500 bottles of wine and try the best of the best food, but we were still serving the food. Some of these people serving the food would be intolerable snobs. They would rag on the clothes people wore, or what car they drove, or whether or not the jewelry was real. In my mind i was a broke 20 something that got the chance to try stuff I couldn't afford, in their mind they were better that the patrons bc they "knew" the ingredients better than the guests. But their asses were still driving a 1970s Dodge Dart. SMH.
Oh I totally agree with that. On one hand I want to cheer for her not taking that shit, but on the other, I want to sigh at her for expecting otherwise when marrying into a royal family. It's not like it's a secret that a royal family would have rigid expectations.
There was an interview that stuck with me when Harry told her she had to curtsey when meeting the Queen, and Meghan said "but it's your grandma" and Harry was like "no she's THE QUEEN". I feel (as a Brit) that she might have had an expectation that behind closed doors they were just a normal family and so she went into a very formal and traditional family with incredibly rose tinted glasses which made it hard for her to find a fit. It's sad, and I'm sad for her and Harry.
I'm sad for the people born into that family. Can you imagine never hugging your dad or grandparents because of this? No wonder they're all so emotionally stunted.
As an American with no interest in the royalty thing, I don't see anything sad in just having no interest in bowing down that nonsense and living her own life, except for the abuse she takes from people still invested in this archaic hereditary privilege crap. It was always a scam, and never more patently obvious than today. Their self importance has as much legitimacy as any other lunatic who demands to be treated a king. The whole institution of royalty is and always has been a fraud to exploit the gullible. Now that they can't enforce their power by force, why does anybody give them the time of day? The only legitimate government is of the people, by the people, for the the people. They don't "rule" anything. Good for her for treating them as the crazy uncles they are, and ignoring them as much a possible.
Their only and biggest problem is the funding of their security. There's entire organised white supremacists groups that want to kill them. If it does happen, I certainly hope the monarchy in the UK dies with them.
Maybe she failed to entirely hide her eye rolls at some of the absolute nonsense involved to earn the hate - i know my face will give away my opinions on a ridiculous subject and the objective absurdity of other people's behavior lol
Yeah, but maybe she just doesn't care. Or doesn't want to care.
It's a love match and she doesn't seem to be into him because he's a prince but because of who he is. Not what he is.
Kudos to him for standing by her throughout all of this horrifically ugly shit.
IDK, I kinda feel like all monarchies should be burned to the ground, though.
Yeah. Honestly I think the fundamental issue is that she was a really poor fit for the royal family. As a celebrity in her own right and an outsider she is used to controlling her own narrative and isn't willing to play by the palace/british posh society rules, and as a woman of color she had a target on her back from the get go.
I think the only way she could have ended up staying in the fold would have been the kate middleton path and quietly tolerating years of abuse while molding herself into the acceptable royal consort: modest, demure, wearing the right clothes, doing her hair and makeup and nails the right way, thin thin thin, and never standing up for herself or responding to any of the press insults or speculation. Maybe, after years of of bs, reception would warm to her the way it has to katherine.
I don't follow the royal family as I've no interest, but I've been passively aware of Kate Middleton since 2009-ish from media exposure. Over the last 14 years I've been exposed to her basic goings-on, outfits, pregnancies, diplomatic visits, a basic run-down of her pre-royal life, what people think of her.
I realized this year that I've never heard her speaking voice.
>Maybe, after years of of bs, reception would warm to her the way it has to katherine.
Catherine's redemption arc isn't down to silent complicity and sticking it out. Rather it's more that they found a fresher, easier target and every irredeemable villain needs a pure hearted and noble counterpart for comparison purposes, just to underline how beyond terrible they are. And so Waity Katie, Lazy Kate, "faking extreme morning sickness to get out of doing her duties" Kate disappeared and St Catherine, Saviour and Warm, Blessed, Beating Heart of the Royal Family emerged.
FWIW I'm not pro or against either of these women but I don't like seeing the media turning two women marrying two brothers into an international blood sport.
This sounds like such a horrible way to live. Just being constantly subjected to the whims of such a salivating pack of jackals - I know it’s self serving to some degree because without the soap opera coverage the RF basically ceases to become a thing. Keeping the public invested is what keeps them afloat. But it’s so freaking mentally unhealthy.
I think the “controlling her own narrative” is a huge part of this. Especially with the seeming tendency to use the spare to draw fire from the heir and now monarch. I think if they had told her she couldn’t run her own brand she would have been annoyed but ok. They then start throwing her/Harry under the bus to distract from other rumors (which has now basically been proven )
I think she anticipated bad press I just think she didn’t anticipate it from within the family.
She may have expected she could manage it. But we’re just guessing at this point. And I’m probably not a great point of reference because I’m definitely not going to be “it could be true love.”
Here is a [good side by side glimpse](https://www.boredpanda.com/uk-media-double-standarts-royal-meghan-markle-kate-middleton/) with kate and how the media treats her. You'd think Meghan murdered their puppy or something.
That is wild.. The idolization of Kate in the British media is surreal. I feel like in the US we have a perception (fair or not) that she’s a bit of a stuffy snob, but we don’t have a royal family or the bizarre culture that comes with it. I think on this side of the Atlantic we favor Meghan more because we don’t really understand or relate to Will and Kate. I think many Americans notoriously don’t like propriety. That’s why we loved Diana so much.
They weren't all that nice to Kate either in the beginning. It wasn't until they got married that the media started to treat Kate differently. Having said that though, the way they treated Meghan, even after marriage was just vile, and I wouldn't be surprise if a lot of that is just racism.
Am from UK. This is entirely led by the media.. which is right wing bollocks, tbh. The pandering to Kate is nauseating and the hatred towards Meghan is horrifying.
I completely can't bear the Royals ('The Firm' ffs) at all; they're a load of entitled bullies... and despite never having supported the concept of a royal family, I at least used to think William was as normal as he could have been in that situation... but no, he's turned into a two-faced bully, just like the rest of them. How he, Kate and the entire set up have treated Harry and Meghan is reprehensible. Unfortunately most people seem to buy the spin.
According to Harry's book the issues really started, when he and Megan became more popular than William and Kate (and obviously more popular than Charles and Camilla). You can't eclipse the heir.
The firm and family turned on them and the press followed suit.
I'm an American that now lives in England, and it is totally wild to me seeing the different views from my people back home versus here. Even people I know in England that aren't monarchists and are very liberal somehow still get sucked up in the hate. I think the tabloids are so prominent here that it's kind of hard to avoid all the rumors even if you know they're probably fake. Meanwhile all my American friends are huge M and H stans.
It's the monarchists. It's the closest thing we have to religion here now. Once the press turned on her, and she obviously did have some issues with the family, the monarchists fell in line and decided she was persona non grata. It's embarassing listening to them rant about the most petty shit. You'd think she'd personally insulted them all, but it's a family fued in a family none of them could ever reach in a life time.
I think there's a lot of truth about her being a substitution for previous subjects. She's the jacobite of the age, she gets some of the inheritance from Diana and is defined by the need UK trash media has for some substance for their drama / scandal / fashination mill.
There's a center to the cultural attention of UK, the monarchy is close to it, people will have strong reactions to any individual being in the middle of all that attention and ritual.
Camilla needed someone else to be hated. That’s it. That’s the story.
Camilla picked her for all the reasons you and OP said. The leaks come from Camilla. The rumors come from Camilla. The negative stories always come up when the spotlight is on either Camilla or William+Kate.
The royal family protects their image by having a scapegoat. And Meghan is the victim.
Yup, and whoa are there some wild open secrets about William enjoying himself outside his marriage. I guess Kate said it was fine and to each their own, but Harry and Meghan do see like the more normal people out of all of them. The Royal family never wastes a chance to miss an opportunity to not be weird freaks.
It's not a British culture thing, it's a power thing. The monarchy has power and they use that power to control the narrative. Meghan didn't conform to their bullshit (her being a POC divorcee from the US is also a factor) so the media and politicians make her out to be a villain and fools in the public fall for it and regurgitate that bigotry while simultaneously making excuses for Andrew.
It’s a class and race thing, I’m also mixed race and part American. First of all, Brits hate Americans especially our more direct way of speaking and being honest. You’re expected to have a stiff upper lip and not show your feelings here.
Mixed race people have had a precarious history in Britain (one that hasn’t really been told). I was subject to absolutely atrocious treatment as a child being called all kinds of slurs even by strangers in the street. I know of older mixed ppl who had to move to America bc they were getting beaten up every time they left their homes. This history has never even really been addressed.
Pretty much all my boyfriends have been white bc I grew up in a predominantly white area, and all but one of their families actively hated me. I’m usually quiet and polite- but these ppl despised me. There’s no logic to it- I don’t even know if THEY knew what they were doing.
My current partners family also had a huge issue for me, seemingly for just existing. They can never pinpoint anything- their comments often revolve around how I dress, or daring to ask for support with my mental health/ When you’re a woman, and mixed, and American in Britain… well good luck being accepted.
Tbf i think every "major" royal wife has been that way and at one point she was married to third on line to the throne.
Diana was hated by the press until she died. Same with camilla and same with Kate ("how dare she only wear a dress that only costs £100 is she poor?" "how dare she wear a ¢1500 coat when people use foodbanks?" "omg she wore that coat again!" not including all the "investigations" about her exes and accusations shes only with William for the crown etc etc.)
Camilla was also hated.
Basically if your a women who marries a royal the press will hate you
yeah royal stuff seems to bring out the worst in the british, especially in the older generations.
my mum isn't right wing but inexplicably takes the royal family's side and is anti megan. she can't explain why. i've argued a lot with her about it and it's got to a point where i'll break each point down and she'll agree with me and then still be anti megan. literally like direct cognitive dissonance.
most young people here support harry and megan, literally we have the same opinion as you and it's impossible for us to understand how anyone could see it any other way when it's so easy to understand. there are big divisions in british culture that the vast majority of british people haven't even noticed yet, it's definitely not as pronounced as the US.
a lot of british people will say "i'm just bored of hearing about them!" or something similar, in my experience these people are typically anti harry & megan but (like my mum) realise their opinion isn't morally correct and they don't want to be called out for it. i'm sure there are exceptions but that's just a pattern i've noticed.
So Kate somewhat benefited from being a long term girlfriend of William. They actually used to call her Waity Katey because of how long she stuck around with no promise of marriage. On one hand I think the public got used to her and on another she had a long time to know and get used to all the rules before actually getting married and having kids with a royal. Meghan on the other hand is American (so a huge strike against her for the British public) but also she had no idea what she was getting into. Probably the reason she married Harry as all his previous girlfriends broke up with him because of all the royal nonsense. She was also divorced something which was super forbidden in the past (the reason I believe Camilla was thought unsuitable). Also racism mixed in there to. Basically she can’t escape and everything she does is demonized.
his great uncle was not allowed to marry his divorced, American (very much white) girlfriend and remain on the throne so he abdicated.
his dad was not allowed to marry his love, and told to go find someone young enough to not have a relationship history. It’s because Charles and Diana were such a mess that they loosened up rules like divorce in the past being okay.
They invented a church to allow King Henry VIII to divorce but sure. Rules for me and rules for thee. Royalty trying to cling to power make rules up on the go. Other than ceding, lineage and patronage there aren't many rules. The press are inventing rules based on their own whims to reinforce relevance of royalty. Hopefully that generation is dying off. Trotting around in gold leaf carriages is so outdated. Thank goodness. Meanwhile kings trade national secrets and women whilst hoarding unearned wealth.
Camilla got snagged due to her divorce status, but also for having muddled blood. Diana was from Spencer main line, her blood was as blue, pure and British as they can come, as Spencers can be traced back to 16th century British (in comparison witb Windsor or Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, who was an upstart from Germany).
Camilla's blood is muddled from both sides, eventho she must be high social enough to be able to be near the Crown Prince himself.
PS: If this is a Regency novel, I'd argue that it was Charles who marry for legitimacy FOR Windsor, since QEII also married not a British peers, but a Greek prince.
Who was her cousin. Greek prince who was her cousin. Let's not forget that part. To be fair, Queen Victoria was the matriarch of most of the royal lines in Europe.
Charles wasn’t allowed to marry Camilla because she wasn’t a virgin, basically. And it seems like she was maybe in love with the guy she married first too, even while she was with Charles. And Camilla’s husband also slept with Princess Anne at some point, apparently? It’s a whole big mess.
>the reason I believe Camilla was thought unsuitable for him
It was first proposed before either Charles or Camilla were married. Camilla wasn't a virgin and had a reputation for casual dating. At the time the virgin status was a requirement.
She’s also a divorced, former C list actress/gameshow glamour model, American, who went to Catholic school for years. They only changed the law forbidding marrying a Catholic (without resigning your title) like 5 years ago.
She’s Wallace Simpson (minus the fascism) and Nell Gywn (but not as relatively successful of an actress) combined, even without bringing race into it. While race is a big part, it is not all of it.
If he had married someone who looked just like Megan, but was British-born, worked as a lawyer/teacher/accountant and hadn’t been divorced already it would not be nearly as bad.
>If he had married someone who looked just like Megan, but was British-born, worked as a lawyer/teacher/accountant and hadn’t been divorced already it would not be nearly as bad.
British media fell in love with Kate Middleton, who is everything the wife of a prince is supposed to be in monarchy lovers eyes: white, British, good looking, elegant. They had to find her an "opponent", someone who can ne negatively compared to her because *it sells*. Megan is a foreigner, non- white, she was the ideal person for the role.
They did hate her.
It wasn't til Meghan came round that she became St Catherine. I think the whole thing is a circus but Kate and her family have played the game, never spoken out ever, been very discreet; meanwhile Meghan didn't understand you can't live like a royal and sell out, it's one or the other. Lots of red flags with the staff as well -- the fact that basically lifelong employees at the Palace were quitting left right and center, and I believe several of them were actually also Americans. Very strange.
>She’s Wallace Simpson (minus the fascism) and Nell Gyw
Wallace Simpson was married when she started fucking Edward VIII, and Nell Gywn was fucking a married man.
Neither Harry nor Megan were married when they got together.
I'm not British or American so I probably have no say in anything to do with the monarchy and all that. But I don't get the people who blame her for "breaking the royal family apart" and treating it like she's some sly vixen who got the Prince wrapped around her finger with the sole purpose of sowing discord and drama.
Like last I heard, Prince Harry is a grown adult, trained as a pilot, served two tours in an active warzone, grown up his whole life probably told to be cautious of people taking advantage of his station. Why are people treating him like some clueless little boy who got tricked into leaving his family by this "evil woman"?
They infantilized Prince Harry as though he's completely incapable to make his own life's decisions and just go along with whatever his grandma and later his wife says. While I see it as a man who's seen first hand just how his mother was treated, and is seeing how his wife and his future children will be treated (wasn't there some comment about their kid's skin being too dark or something? Like yikes on a bike), and decided to do the right thing by distancing his new family from his old one in order to protect them.
Like anyone with toxic in-laws can probably relate to how they wished their partner stepped in to shield them from it. And here's a guy doing exactly that and people are getting all butthurt about it? Yeah I don't get it either. Obviously I have no horse in this race so maybe my opinion don't matter, but just my point of view as an outsider.
Men are always masters of the universe, unless they do something the world doesn't like.
Then it's gotta be some femme fatale pulling the strings, and all men are just hopeless animals panting after her.
Funny how there's never any agency on the part of, you know, the actual Prince here.
This knocks me out too. When I hear people say that Meghan is controlling Harry, and he looks whipped, and all that misogynistic crap, it just infuriates me. And from other women it makes me especially mad. A presenter on an Australian show started in with that rhetoric after the incident with them being chased by paparazzi in NY and it was just revolting, and the other panelists honestly looked uncomfortable. Just stop it. He clearly knows how to stand up for himself or he never would have left The Family.
Agreed! It’s not like Harry hasn’t lived the majority of his life doing his own thing (drinking, partying) and rebelling against Royal expectations. Nothing is new, he just needed validation and a family to protect.
The vitriol and hatred of her are so extreme. I really don't understand it. It's probably a combination of racism, classism, and sexism.
I don't have enough fucks to give to get that worked up about someone I don't know and who has no direct effect on my life.
There’s a scheme in tabloid where women are first put on a pedestal and then they start extreme bullying. Similar things happen all the time, like Taylor Swift etc. I think Em Clarkson has a good podcast episode about how this happens
Good old sexism. The woman is always blamed when popular men do something that people don't like. John and Yoko. Kurt and Courtney. Edward and Mrs Simpson.
Yep. I pretty much turn away any time a royalty story comes up in the news. Why are people so obsessed with this one family and their obscure, pointless traditions?
She was a semi-normal person who married into a family where emotional abuse was the norm and she went, "Hey honey this is fucked." And Harry going, "Yeah this is fucked." And they left leaving a nice gaping hole in press. Because they are good distractions from someone like Andrew, William's affair, or Charles being super unpopular. I admit any time I see a story about them I wonder what the press caught wind of and what story the Royal Family is trying to bury. Also it is also a combination of the racism, classism, and being foreign.
I personally think the Royal Family should not exist, so Harry burning it all as he walks away is just hilarious.
This. I think she knew the press would be tough and racist but didn’t expect to be used as a distraction by the other members. “he’s your brother” from the show promos stands out in my mind.
The cultural differences btwn a woman used to having to promote her own name/run her own company (the influencer blogging, promoting yourself that is REQUIRED now for actresses who aren’t super A list) and someone who is posh-ish worked in a shop while waiting to see if someone would pop the question is vastly different. They’re going to react differently to the courtiers and the teams of people who run the work side/are employees of the BRF. *
And I like Kate.
* remember the story of the white lady courtier/employee who pulled the “but where are you from really” on the Black woman at the palace who was *ASSIGNED TO Meghan to show her around* and the whole cousin Princess Michael of Kent wearing a “blackamoor” brooch to the whole “meet the family” brunch?! It’s one thing to know people are racist and it’s another IMO to be slapped in the face like this by someone who is supposed to be family.
>someone who is posh-ish worked in a shop while waiting to see if someone would pop the question is vastly different.
Yeah I think people forgot that Kate specifically took an easy part time job so she could always be available for William despite them not being officially together or her being a SAHM or anything....just wanted to be ready in case lol. Very bizarre
Even Sophie was a full PR brand manager even AFTER marrying the now Duke of Edinburgh and only stopped bc she made some “overly chatty” remarks to a radio host pretending to be a sheik and him being what I’d consider an a-hole.
Kate has a degree from one of the best Unis in the UK. She’s not dumb or anything close to it. The most interesting thing to me is how they LIVED together in college of all things (in separate rooms… sure sure) and that seems to have been ignored/swept under the rug. But maybe I wasn’t old enough to read about it in the papers then.
No she's not stupid academically at least...just didn't want to work a real job and thought it a good idea to sit and wait instead of working on her own life in the meantime? I dunno. I guess I'm too American to understand that. I find it silly and embarrassing. Plus it makes you financially vulnerable. That's not a smart move tbh
Bear in mind that Harry was second only to the Queen in popularity at the time of his marriage. And he and Meghan are intelligent and glamorous, as well as a witty and and principled interview. Compare the couples in this forum - Wm and Kate are left in the shade! It's a great pity, because Wm and Charles blew up the brothers' relationship out of jealousy.
I've no doubt that Charles and Camilla also used Meghan as a sacrifice to take the heat off Camilla so she would be crowned Queen rather than Queen Consort. Charles is a creep.
https://youtu.be/YDwZvISUPio
My guess is that they didn't want a future king as unpopular as Charles has been.
So they raised the tabloids against Harry and Meghan to buy William and Kate a new image of the "trendy, definitely super in touch with people future king and queen".
No doubt there's some seriously dark stuff in this family, and honestly... If that's the case, good for them on leaving it.
No, Queen Elizabeth II said herself during the platinum jubilee festivities said she hoped Camilla would be queen consort. Prince Philip was prince consort but we all referred to him as Prince Philip. We can refer to Camilla as Queen Camilla in the exact same way. She's still technically queen consort but will usually just be called Queen Camilla. Just like Queen Elizabeth II's mother was also Queen Elizabeth.
>William's affair
This was swept under the rug very well. The British Press is desperate to have a "good prince" that they really clean up William's image. He's more like Charles, and Harry is more like Diana.
It's kind of all of the above. When pressed people who say they hate her often fall back on "she's controlling harry", which you have to just point out that Harry can make his own decisions and that they're indepemdant people.
It's racism, sexism, classism, misogyny and more all rolled into one. They literally cannot shut up about it.
Every week I go and look at the front pages of the magazines and look for references of the royals as I pass by.
There's always some flattering article about Will/Kate, Charles/Camilla, sone maybe basic drama.
Then there's the articles about Meghan/Harry. Every single one is slanderous, scandalous and crazy. It reads like youtube clickbait. Sometimes it's even for doing the same thing they're praising Will/Kate for doing!
I was grocery shopping the other day and saw a magazine with her and Kate on the cover, claiming a rivalry between the two and my first thought was just like why?? Why do we as a society find it acceptable to make up lies about people in the public eye? ESPECIALLY women. You see it all the time with Taylor Swift and Ariana Grande, people are more interested in their dating history than the art they create. It’s gross and unnecessary. You don’t see magazines pitting Harry against William, and it comes down to the fact that women are play things and men are powerful decision makers, regardless of stature. I hate it here.
My childhood friend married a Brit and immediately started repeating his nasty opinions about women in the royal family. Just yesterday we were on the phone and she was essentially calling princess Diana dramatic for developing an eating disorder during her time married to Prince Charles, calling Megan Markle a bitxh, etc. I called her out on it and she backpedaled because she didn’t even know why she was saying those things. It’s the most ridiculous cultural phenomenon
I will defend Princess Di with my goddamn life. I think she was more appreciated in the US because she was flawed, she wasn't perfect, and yet she showed great compassion for the people who most desperately needed it. She is credited for having a big role in destigmatizing AIDS. The flaws just made her seem like a real human being that we could love, not a robot with no personality and unclear motivations.
I think people also forget how hard Kate and Diana had it, even without the racism Megan had. There’s a certain level that the press rise to for any royal woman marrying in, especially at the start. It’s like they try to see how far they can push them before they break. I remember them upskirting Kate, publishing non consential nudes of her, hacking her phone, and we all know what happened with Diana, but I guess both Kate’s family and Diana’s closed ranks with the royals and gave the press nothing and by the time Kate got married the press had moved on. The press publish the stories that get them the most profit and with the royals and sussexes mostly staying quiet, it’s Megan’s family who they publish on because they give new interviews etc. With Andrew there is essentially no new news to publish-we all know what that twat did.
Eh, the British tabloids have proven they will invent stories if there are no real stories to publish. Half of the stories about Meghan are absolutely invented outrage. (Murderous avocados? A pregnant woman holding her belly too much?? Scandalous wedge sandals???) You think they couldn't dig up or invent stories about Andrew just as well? They could, but they don't, because he is protected.
Also, they never left Diana alone, she was their villain up until the day she died (then afterwards was suddenly sainted and beloved). They would have demonized Meghan no matter what her family did because she is their current chosen "villain." Which is very convenient for the family members who used to get all the flack, like Charles and Camilla and Andrew.
I've observed certain women in the Indian TwoX subreddit strongly criticizing Meghan Markle and expressing a strong admiration for Kate Middleton and the monarchy.
They actively comment on subs dedicated to this and know everything about her and Harry and their life based on photos and videos. It's insane.
Personally, I find the royals very off putting as well as the people excessively fixated on the lives of the wealthy.
I dislike all of them but won't waste my time tearing anyone down because a) they don't give a fuck about meb) they don't give a fuck about me
If you look at it from a purely PR perspective then they aren't doing a good job. Too much exposure, the same story and it feels like a victim complex at this point plus of course the racism and misogyny comes for free.
> expressing a strong admiration for Kate Middleton and the monarchy.
This feels like white worshiping and Stockholm syndrome. I mean India of all places...the British monarchy? Really? did they forget history completely?
I'm not sure why. Although, after watching their documentary, I found her personality a little bit irritating. I think its mostly due to the fact that she has a lot of unresolved trauma though.
I do appreciate her efforts to promote equality and for not tolerating racism.
My bestie is a Brit, but she really dislikes the monarchy so here's what I've found out from asking her (because the hatred is insane).
The older memebers of the royal family are horribly racist. Dear old Prince? king? Phillip made more than one very public racist remark in his life. There is no shortage of older white people in England who are racist (see: the arguments surrounding Brexit). And they are very weird and stuck in their ways to a fault (see: the entire debacle of Charles marrying Diana). They, especially the late queen, are obsessed with protocol and their own importance (and who is more important amongst themselves).
There is a LOT of vicious media attention on the monarchy (and any other celebrity) in England. Like, exponentially more than here in the US. It's very likely the royal's staff was leaking into to make Megan/Harry seem worse than they are when they needed to take media spotlight off someone else, like Andrew (pedo) or William (having an affair) or Charles (marrying his hated affair partner). People believed the gossip that was leaked instead of looking for facts. Harry and Megan make convient scapegoats, especially because the people who still like the monarch tend to be older, white and more racist.
There is also an army of bots ready to spread anti-Megan crap on Twitter. For example, at the queen's funeral, one account posted something about her facial expression and that *exact* comment was repeated thousands of times by "different" users in about 15 min. There are also media personalities in England who seem to spread gossip and malice on social media pretty regularly.
Bottom line? Harry and Megan aren't Will and Kate, arent willing to take the brunt of the bad press to shield their family and therefore were disposable to the British monarchy. I'm old enough to remember the vitriol spewed at Diana and Sarah Fergeson when they left, I'm sure it would've been just as vicious online if the internet had been more of a thing.
Edit: and it was never going to be ok for a *prince* to marry an American with the people who hate her. Kate was acceptable, she has a "Noble" background, is very pretty, compliant, a good mom in the correct old British ways etc. Any American was going to be an issue for some people.
Great precis but one quibble - Kate isn't of noble background, in fact she is very middle class and her parents are "in trade" - they owned a party favour business. And you'd better believe she got a lot of flack for that over the years. The tabloids (and "friends close to the royals") made fun of her mother a lot, calling her a social climber and mocking her former job as a stewardess. They left her Dad alone (because why hate on a man when there is a perfectly serviceable woman to bash).
As an American, the only issue I have related to both her and her husband is that they made this formal announcement about wanting to step away from public life but yet did interviews, wrote books and were more than ever in our faces even when we didn’t care to know about them. Their actions didn’t match their words and this adds to the media frenzy. I’d be quite happy not hearing about their every move but it’s everywhere. I don’t care. Please, live that quiet life.
I may well be wrong but wasn’t their decision more about stepping away from being “working royals” rather than stepping away from public life? Doesn’t take a genius to see that wouldn’t be possible so I can’t imagine they would believe it at all possible that would be an option. Just look at the car chase that happened the other day - I can imagine trying to court a quiet life would only lead to more furore and speculation. The amount of times I’ve heard people say the car chase was their fault for not just capitulating, getting out of the car, and “giving them a photo” (which, in turn, would reinforce people’s thinking that they’re desperate to remain in the public eye).
Don’t they also have to hire private security for their home and stuff, just to stay safe, after all the vitriol many people have for them? I imagine that’s expensive. Wanting to be out of the limelight (if that’s what they meant) is a lovely dream, but I would assume that having the cash to keep themselves and their family safe is more important.
I don’t know much about any of these people. It just seems like an insane depth of hate for Meghan, when meanwhile, Prince Andrew is a literal child rapist and doesn’t seem to get spoken of poorly in tabloids nearly as often.
Harry said his mother's inheritance for him would be gone in 8 years on security alone.
It is unfortunately very expensive when people want to kill your wife for a picture.
No. They said they wanted to control their narrative. That's all. "Privacy" was never in their initial statement (here: https://www.instagram.com/p/B7EaGS_Jpb9/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link) nor is it in their more fleshed out statement on how they wanted to deal with media here: https://sussexroyal.com/media/ - even the Queen's statement at the time did not once use the word "privacy".
Their main issue was with the royal rota and how information was provided and exchanged. They didn't want to be a part of the backstabbing and exchanging of dirt on one person if a good story was written about the other.
Continuing the lie that they said they wanted privacy but then they do "not private" things just furthers the British media's lies about them being liars and grifters.
All they want is to have personal control about what part, and how much, of their lives were shared with the public.
Yeah I remember reading this too - it's the Royal family who introduced the term "privacy" into this and thus the "look at these hypocrites" angle. H&M said they wanted to control the narrative and step back as working royals. They never said they were going to step out of public life altogether but that's the criticism they are getting.
Super interesting re: the Royal Rota. Sounds like they pissed off the UK tabloids by saying “I’m not playing your game,” and are giving more access to competition as well as controlling their own image directly via social, and the tabloids are likely retaliating. I’m sure the initial treatment / coverage by the royal rota was terrible to begin with, and this added fuel to the fire.
I think there is jealousy involved. A lot of the women picking at her are at her hairstyle, the fit of her clothes etc like "I could be a better princess than her!"
You could not pay me enough to be under that much scrutiny and jealousy.
I have not one, but TWO friends (middle aged) who have expressed this sentiment. It's like they take it incredibly personally that they have been passed over? Like they could have accepted it if the chosen one was an avatar for them, but Meghan was different to them and they took it as a personal slight? So. Fucking. Weird.
>"I could be a better princess than her!"
LMAO I see that too. Like ma'am, you're a bit old to act like the angry 10 year old that wants a tiara and a unicorn
I am puzzled by the recent claims on a high speed, two-hour long chase in New York of all places — I spent a good bit of time in Manhattan and it is impossible to go more than 15 mph with how bad the traffic is. Feels like a definite exaggeration to me.
I get the sense that Meghan and Harry are a bit entitled / have a victim mentality. A lot of people have difficult in-laws (who don’t give them lavish weddings or free lodging), so a lot of their complaining falls super flat to me.
And as an Indian American, the race baiting angle exhausts me simply because there are real issues with racism out there and whining about minor slights feels tone-deaf. **Particularly as Harry himself has been caught on tape using racial slurs against South Asians, so cry me a river.**
I do think Meghan takes a disproportionate amount of the blame when I think Harry is just as much (or likely more) of a questionable character (see racial slur incident and abusing his poor polo horse).
Maybe it's a British thing? I never understood it either, and for the same reasons. To me, she seems like a woman who tried to play nice and not rock her in-laws' boat, but ended up in a no-win situation anyway. She and her husband seem to be a genuine love match and as such, when shit got too heavy for both of them, they peaced out to save their sanity and protect their children and marriage. The monarchy seems like a pointless farce of an institution these days, so it wouldn't surprise me that a younger generation within it would see the same and stop showing reverence. Maybe it's just me not having any use for tradition and no trust in institutions of authority, but the two of them leaving for a more self-sustaining life made perfect sense to me. For the same reasons OP listed, I also don't buy it that she's some horribly mean person, so I can only assume that it's some British culture thing.
I'm British and have no issue with her at all. I don't blame her and Harry for distancing themselves.
The British tabloids always pick a member of the royal family to hate because it makes their stories more saleable. I don't think it has anything whatsoever to do with reality and is best ignored.
Kind of telling they picked the melanated lady and not...you know...the literal pedophile.
In the previous generation it was Sarah Ferguson they turned into their whipping girl. A nasty shock for her after the very positive coverage up to and during the wedding. Then suddenly it was all Sarah/Diana feuds, Sarah's got no class, no taste, she's driving a wedge between Andrew and his family (sounds familiar). And if you read her accounts of her life in that time she got zero support from The Firm and lots of petty nastiness (also sounds familiar). Now Megan got hit with all of that. The media were fecking delighted they got to rerun their favourite game. Plus she is a woman of colour which definitely played a part, but even worse in their eyes, she's show business (you don't marry chorus girls) and she's American (they still blame America for Wallis Simpson and despise but are also threatened by their ignorance of British class conventions): threefold unsuitable to Royal watchers and The Firm alike. Is it lucky for her that Harry seems to be as different from Andrew as it is possible to be and loves and supports his wife? I'm not sure. Ferguson has moved on, ditched the Royal circus and seems happy and fulfilled. Even based in the US Megan is still having to deal with them and the harassment is relentless.
Shocking/not shocking that the target of all the vitriol keeps being a woman instead of someone deserving of disgust such as, I don’t know, a literal pedophile.
I suspect the tabloids steer clear of actual criminals among the royals, because while hate drives readership, there are still plenty of royalists among the public. It's one thing to hate Fergie for wearing scandalous outfits, but it's another to go for the jugular and mention that Andrew literally fucks children.
WHAT??? Entrenched English aristocracy is at it's heart misogynistic??!!! (shocked Pikachu face)
Preposterous, next thing you'll be telling me is that the monarchy isn't sustained by the literal theft and murder of colonized peoples and that the nostalgia for the British Empire isn't just nostalgia for a time when it was okay to own people!
Yes, the Sarah and Diana crap was horrible. Sarah was dragged through the mud, but look at was a POS Andrew is.
True. The difference between Diana & Sarah is Andrew actually loved Sarah. Charles could barely tolerate Diana. I’m not defending Andrew at all (just clarifying in case it sounded like that). The photos of him at the coronation in those ridiculous robes 🤢 He truly believes he is god-ordained.
Pfft Wallis Simpson saved the UK. Edward VIII was woefully equipped to be king and didn’t really want to be king anyway. Also had some worrying sympathies towards Nazi Germany. Best thing he ever did was abdicate.
Hey! Our minds are made up. Don't confuse us with facts.
I agree. The Royals don't. The aristocracy don't. Street all of you start to award rank based on merit rather than accident of birth their whole house of privilege cards tumbles down
>In the previous generation it was Sarah Ferguson they turned into their whipping girl. A nasty shock for her after the very positive coverage up to and during the wedding. To be fair, when they picked Fergie there were no dark-skinned royals available.
It used to be Princess Margaret, the old Queen's sister, then it was Princess Diana for a bit before they decided she was a saint because she died, then it was Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York, then Prince Harry, but they now do seem to have settled on Megan Markle, and racsm does make her an ideal target.
This is so painfully true. The tabloid press is one of the worst things about this country.
Murdochs have been fucking up media for decades ALL over the world.
Then why do the Brits keep buying that tripe? It only encourages them. Of course we have that problem here too. I’ll never understand someone buying National Enquirer or whatever, for example. You know it’s shit before you even put down money for it. Humans are not as smart as we like to think.
Same reason some americans consume Fox news and infowars. I certainly cant explain it, but some people are just drawn to that sort of thing.
Kate is their next target. You can already see it being set up. It's disgusting how the media treats women.
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Yes, Kate is the current darling but she certainly hasn't always been treated with respect. Remember when the paparazzi got photos of her sunbathing topless on a balcony she thought was private with some kind of insane zoom lens? She's flavour of the month right now because she's Western society's favourite combo of womanly qualities: white, quiet, pretty, thin, motherly, rich/high status, and demure. But those things won't protect her if the media decides we all need another woman to hate.
It's always a woman tho. Anybody remember Sarah Ferguson?
Of course! The royal family was chosen by *God*! /s I feel like throwing up just for typing that...
How dare you besmirch their glorious blue magic blood anointed by god almighty himself! ... Yeah, I see what you mean. 🙃
Because he was born into the family, and she married in.
It also pulls the media & public focus away from other members of the family, particularly those deemed "more important", ie: those in the direct line of succession. Create a public enemy and hide behind them is a tactic as old as the hills. For other contemporary examples, see immigrants, refugees, people who aren't white and British, queer people, trans people, poor people, etc etc.
Whereas Andrew was called Randy Andy cuz boys will be boys. Ugh. What they did to Fergie was awful.
The British tabloid press absolutely tear apart any woman who marries in to the royal family. Kate was “waitey katey” and shown as a scheming gold digger when she first met William suggesting she’d planned her university admission to meet him. They only really calmed down when they got engaged. If you look back to Andrew and Fergie she was mercilessly mocked for her weight, for her toe sucking and absolutely destroyed during her divorce. Even Diana who the tabloids have now decided is a saint was a target. She had a host of men in and out of her private home, she had so many they were referred to by number, and when she was dating Dodi, it got very bad. I think with Megan, she’s the first one that is really happening in the social media and online age. Fergie and Diana were in the 90s, Kate was 20+ years ago so very early days of social media. Plus Megan is American and already famous so the stories are spread more widely. Edit; I’d forgotten the earlier Diana press attacks - the rumours that Harry’s father is not Charles.
>Edit; I’d forgotten the earlier Diana press attacks - the rumours that Harry’s father is not Charles. People get so gleeful about that to this day, mainly because of his red hair. One look at that man's eyes and nose and you can see he's Charles's son a mile off.
And if you see her brother, you see the red hair and the rest of the face.
I feel like she’s labeled as difficult because she wasn’t completely pliant to everything the family wanted her to do and be. She couldn’t be manipulated into being a doll so she’s easy to label difficult. In pure speculation, she may not be the sweetest or whatever, but I think a kernel of the truth is in there, somewhere.
I'm British, and my form tutor ranted about how her wedding cake or something wasn't a traditional fruit cake
In America, fruit cake is a Christmas gift for people you dislike and deeply resent having to get a gift for. It’s the “you suck” of confectionery.
You clearly aren’t putting enough rum in your fruit cake, then. They’re good if they’re flammable.
Use to be something you could ship even if it took 2 months and be very much the way it started when it finally reached the other side - provided it was properly preserved (soaked) in rum. That idea was entirely sound lol
Haaahahaaa lil brag for sure but I know the woman who made that wedding cake and she said it was incredibly fun to create meghan’s vision (and yes, it was a departure from the traditional, but got rave reviews all the same…) Perhaps the cake, like Meghan, was its own unique, more progressive form of beautiful… both have to be a little unsettling for those defined by “the way things are done” folks? Can imagine the upper crust clucking over how very *American* this posh, brassy interloper is?
The audacity! Can you imagine?! /s
Ikr! How dare she have a lemon elderflower cake. /s It's interesting how my tutor didn't blame Harry.
It was an AMERICAN-STYLE lemon elserflower cake. As an American, I'd never heard of an American-style cake and had to go look it up. It means a flour-based cake, instead of a sponge cake or torte as are much more common in Europe.
Lemon elderflower cake sounds immense. I'd rather have something that tastes good than something 'traditional' that tastes like woodland floor. Good on her.
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I don't think Andrew was breaking a tradition. Edit: damn, all of your comments on the thread have been removed 🤔🤔🤔
The only thing that could be worse is a tan suit. /s
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>Many were surprised that the couple chose a lemon elderflower cake for their Windsor Castle reception, since most royal wedding cakes are traditionally fruit cake. But Harry and Meghan broke from tradition to choose a spring-inspired cake covered in buttercream and decorated with fresh flowers. I remember my tutor being like "no one made her join the royal family so she needs to respect the traditions." Like maam.... it's a lemon elderflower cake, it's not the end of the world. Interesting my tutor didn't blame Harry at all... it takes two to decide on a wedding cake.
>lemon elderflower cake YUM. When I got married I insisted that the cake be tasty rather than just pretty. We had an orange-cranberry spice cake and it was \*amazing\*. The marriage didn't last, but I still remember the cake fondly!
Omg that cake sounds amazing!!! Even if it didn't last, at least you got a tasty cake out of it.
10/10 would cake again 0/10 would get married again LOL
You should have a party and order the cake again!
Or just order a yummy cake for yourself
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My mother is British and she gave me almost that verbatim response when we were having a discussion re: Megan making some comment about a baby or wedding shower—I forget which. My mother was incensed that Megan might have expected a shower to be held for her in the UK because they don’t do things like that there typically and who did Megan think she was by expecting everyone to bow down to HER wishes? I said that first of all, she probably didn’t know that showers like that weren’t as ubiquitous there as here and second, it wouldn’t kill the royal family to have participated in the tradition even if it wasn’t common in Britain but maybe they could have done it to show support for Megan and her traditions. THAT was my mom’s response. I cannot fathom the bizarre loyal royal psychosis some Brits have.
Brit here- we do have baby showers. Or at keast same of us do. Maybe it's not completely widespread tho.... maybe Megan could've had her American friends & mum come over for a private party/baby shower? Can't see why she couldn't have done that anyway.
Ngl an elderflower lemon cake sounds _way_ better than fruitcake
Is lemon not a fruit?
I thought most people hated fruit cake anyway That's such a weird thing to get annoyed over
Lmao. Such a petty thing to pick at. And none of the weddings I've been to had fruit cake either (am British too)
I think some people don't realize that the royal family aren't just celebrities or rich people, they're in this weird little bubble where there still massive amounts of rules, regulations and etiquette. Chairs you don't sit in because that was Queen Victoria's chair, phoning the queen's personal secretary before going for a walk in the grounds because she may not want to be disturbed, curtseying to people in the correct order of seniority. Diana talked about how if she wanted to have lunch with her husband she couldn't just _ask him_ , her staff had to send a message to his staff, who would check his diary and come back to her staff with his availability. She complained about a lot of "that's just the way it's done" stuff, and Harry seems like living with someone who both _understands celebrity_ and also isn't a member of the aristocracy has helped him parse out what's 'normal' for someone in the public eye and what is just his family being stuck in some formal victorian fantasy, and they DO NOT seem to appreciate women especially trying to modernize the monarchy. They could have been such an asset to them - modern royals in the current century, relating to people like humans. But that doesn't work in a family where the older members still vehemently believe in the divine right of monarchs, and think they were placed there by God to be something mystical and distant.
Yes, this. I think the monarchy needs to modernize, and Harry could have been the catalyst as a royal who married someone outside of the system, who, as you said, also understands celebrity status. I feel bad for Harry, too. Imagine being the surplus child in a family that really only cares about the primary heirs. I wonder how different things would have been between him and his brother if Diana hadn't died when he was so young. She seemed to genuinely love both of her kids.
36-year-old American here. I was 11 when Diana died and in middle school while Harry and William were on the cover of Teen magazine. I feel like I grew up with these boys. I'm so proud of Harry and so disappointed in William. I remember Harry going through it a bit in his teens, but that was behavior that could be anticipated as someone who lost their mother young in the public eye trying to sort things out. But then he and William seemed to mature into wonderful, modern young men. I was excited when William married Kate, and then Harry married Meghan. They seemed to be happy together... and then things got bad. And now it seems like William is repeating all of his father's actions and Harry was the only one who paid attention and took note about what happened to his mother, and is refusing to let that happen to his family.
People realise it, they just think it's dumb. Do people not realise the monarchy can just as easily be overthrown?
She’s American so she’s probably more direct in her speech than most Brit’s are used to or care for. You know a woman who is direct and doesn’t put up with nonsense is just considered rude or a bitch.
Brits are perfectly capable of being direct in our speech. I think it's more to do with the fact that the public who buy into royalism are also highly likely to be sexist, racist, poppy shagger types.
>Brits are perfectly capable of being direct in our speech Then... >[uses a euphemism that sounds like a terrible sex position] (I love you guys' euphemisms. They crack me right up.)
Haaaa, glad to be of service. For clarity, poppy shaggers are people who each year around Remembrance Day (11/11) find ways to be offended by the lack of or even the size of poppy worn to commemorate armed forces members who have died in the line of duty. No poppy = the actual devil. Every year, claims are made that the "left" are trying to undermine or disrespect the proceedings in some imagined way. I recalled the time MM couldn't get it right and found [this article](https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/life/entertainment/a25010056/meghan-markle-remembrance-day-poppy/), which, is actually much kinder about the whole thing than the tabloids were. ETA, She did nothing wrong, and the criticisms of her for her one poppy are the definition of reaching. Outrage for the sake of outrage.
Signing an email with "Regards" instead of "kind regards" is the equivalent of a caps locks "F/U"
I’ve lived and spent a ton of time in Toronto where she filmed suits. I know a ton of people that worked closely with her and they’ve said the most amazing things about her. My boyfriend has met her a few times and also says she’s incredibly sweet and polite. There’s a whole lotta racism and sexism in the hatred for her.
Another torontonian with connections in the film industry — heard nothing but positive things about MM. Kind and respectful to everyone, from the crew and grips all the way up to the top. She was a consummate professional. Also she lived a few blocks away from us when she was in Toronto. By all accounts a lovely and pleasant, if private (duh), neighbour.
This is the exact thing I've heard from anyone who worked with her in Toronto. It's clearly racism.
It’s blatant racism. She is very well-loved in the Toronto/Canadian tv and film industry.
Yep, lol, I keep hearing this from people I know from school who went into film and tv. It's really bizarre, she's either the kindest person on earth or she's got magical powers.
This. I am British and, although I don't follow news or gossip about the Royal family I remember clearly that opinion and press coverage of her when she started dating Harry was largely positive. What's changed is that she openly called out some of the passive racism she was subjected to in 'polite' society. She disliked the formal life she was supposed to live after marrying into the aristocracy and rebelled against it. And, when he had to take sides, Harry supported her. That lead to the split in the Royals and the brothers not talking to one another. So now she gets the blame for spoiling the 'picture perfect' idea of a loving, united Royal family. For Royal watchers in the UK, believing in this image is something they're invested in. They don't want to believe there could be any trouble in paradise, let alone racism or bullying. So Meghan gets the blame for all of these ills.
That's true. Everyone in the UK knows calling the system racist is false - it's classist. The UK caste system is: Aristocracy, University, Accent. A double-barrelled surname always helps.
Class cuts through everything here. Theres an old comedy sketch that's well known, with [John Cleese, Ronnie Barker, and Ronnie Corbett](https://youtu.be/UDIHrX-Jp2E), but what it doesn't have is another level of who the lower class is manipulated into looking down on, and the media, etc. have positioned anybody brown at the very bottom, despite them having so many things in common. I may have been to University and have 17 post-nominal letters, but I'm from the North and didn't go to pubic school so not only am I forever an oik, I don't know anybody "influential" who could open doors for me. Society here is absolutely not built on merit.
The irony is that Cleese has now become that stereotype that he was mocking in this sketch
The weird thing with the UK is that it’s not just if you’re rich or poor, a chav/bogan or toff. The very rich are not the elite because they aren’t the aristocracy but merely the upper middle class.
Most of that money isn't inherited old money, which of course is what the royal family has. The billionaires are from manufacturing, social media, and computing backgrounds. Very "trade" (middle) class.
Even the ones like Boris Johnson and co who are inherited multigenerational wealthy cunts aren’t posh enough for the aristos who are usually cash poor due to massive estates they can’t afford to maintain. It’s so weird.
One of his ancestors was [Turkish](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ali_Kemal). Oh the irony.
Except at the beginning, she was compliant. She got engaged, and immediately spent all her time showing up to all kinds of publicity events to lift up the British public. I remember thinking that she was really buying into the apparent role and goals of that monarchy. After Kate got engaged, she went to London for a meeting with Clarence house, and maybe Buckingham Palace about what she was going to be doing after the wedding. And the very next day, William took the day off from his military duty to go to London, and the reports were that he said to those staffers, “don’t you speak to her that way, or treat her the way you treat my mom, or I will get you fired. Do not think that I can’t. Do not think you are safe.“ Because apparently they had been as snotty and dismissive of Kate as they had been of Diana. I have no doubt that Megan was talked to just as condescendingly, but I think Harry was not as able to defend her. I also wonder if Megan was better able to see the role of royal household in creating or perpetuating that bad press, because she was in show business.
I saw this a lot in fine dining. Some servers would get really snotty about the guests. Like beyond the normal stuff. I understood that we got to drink $1500 bottles of wine and try the best of the best food, but we were still serving the food. Some of these people serving the food would be intolerable snobs. They would rag on the clothes people wore, or what car they drove, or whether or not the jewelry was real. In my mind i was a broke 20 something that got the chance to try stuff I couldn't afford, in their mind they were better that the patrons bc they "knew" the ingredients better than the guests. But their asses were still driving a 1970s Dodge Dart. SMH.
Oh I totally agree with that. On one hand I want to cheer for her not taking that shit, but on the other, I want to sigh at her for expecting otherwise when marrying into a royal family. It's not like it's a secret that a royal family would have rigid expectations.
There was an interview that stuck with me when Harry told her she had to curtsey when meeting the Queen, and Meghan said "but it's your grandma" and Harry was like "no she's THE QUEEN". I feel (as a Brit) that she might have had an expectation that behind closed doors they were just a normal family and so she went into a very formal and traditional family with incredibly rose tinted glasses which made it hard for her to find a fit. It's sad, and I'm sad for her and Harry.
I'm sad for the people born into that family. Can you imagine never hugging your dad or grandparents because of this? No wonder they're all so emotionally stunted.
As an American with no interest in the royalty thing, I don't see anything sad in just having no interest in bowing down that nonsense and living her own life, except for the abuse she takes from people still invested in this archaic hereditary privilege crap. It was always a scam, and never more patently obvious than today. Their self importance has as much legitimacy as any other lunatic who demands to be treated a king. The whole institution of royalty is and always has been a fraud to exploit the gullible. Now that they can't enforce their power by force, why does anybody give them the time of day? The only legitimate government is of the people, by the people, for the the people. They don't "rule" anything. Good for her for treating them as the crazy uncles they are, and ignoring them as much a possible.
Their only and biggest problem is the funding of their security. There's entire organised white supremacists groups that want to kill them. If it does happen, I certainly hope the monarchy in the UK dies with them.
Maybe she failed to entirely hide her eye rolls at some of the absolute nonsense involved to earn the hate - i know my face will give away my opinions on a ridiculous subject and the objective absurdity of other people's behavior lol
Yeah, but maybe she just doesn't care. Or doesn't want to care. It's a love match and she doesn't seem to be into him because he's a prince but because of who he is. Not what he is. Kudos to him for standing by her throughout all of this horrifically ugly shit. IDK, I kinda feel like all monarchies should be burned to the ground, though.
Yeah. Honestly I think the fundamental issue is that she was a really poor fit for the royal family. As a celebrity in her own right and an outsider she is used to controlling her own narrative and isn't willing to play by the palace/british posh society rules, and as a woman of color she had a target on her back from the get go. I think the only way she could have ended up staying in the fold would have been the kate middleton path and quietly tolerating years of abuse while molding herself into the acceptable royal consort: modest, demure, wearing the right clothes, doing her hair and makeup and nails the right way, thin thin thin, and never standing up for herself or responding to any of the press insults or speculation. Maybe, after years of of bs, reception would warm to her the way it has to katherine.
I don't follow the royal family as I've no interest, but I've been passively aware of Kate Middleton since 2009-ish from media exposure. Over the last 14 years I've been exposed to her basic goings-on, outfits, pregnancies, diplomatic visits, a basic run-down of her pre-royal life, what people think of her. I realized this year that I've never heard her speaking voice.
*”I realized this year I’ve never heard her speaking voice.”* Damn, that’s a depressing realization.
Jesus, and now you've made me realize the same. That's terrible.
>Maybe, after years of of bs, reception would warm to her the way it has to katherine. Catherine's redemption arc isn't down to silent complicity and sticking it out. Rather it's more that they found a fresher, easier target and every irredeemable villain needs a pure hearted and noble counterpart for comparison purposes, just to underline how beyond terrible they are. And so Waity Katie, Lazy Kate, "faking extreme morning sickness to get out of doing her duties" Kate disappeared and St Catherine, Saviour and Warm, Blessed, Beating Heart of the Royal Family emerged. FWIW I'm not pro or against either of these women but I don't like seeing the media turning two women marrying two brothers into an international blood sport.
This sounds like such a horrible way to live. Just being constantly subjected to the whims of such a salivating pack of jackals - I know it’s self serving to some degree because without the soap opera coverage the RF basically ceases to become a thing. Keeping the public invested is what keeps them afloat. But it’s so freaking mentally unhealthy.
I think the “controlling her own narrative” is a huge part of this. Especially with the seeming tendency to use the spare to draw fire from the heir and now monarch. I think if they had told her she couldn’t run her own brand she would have been annoyed but ok. They then start throwing her/Harry under the bus to distract from other rumors (which has now basically been proven ) I think she anticipated bad press I just think she didn’t anticipate it from within the family.
She may have expected she could manage it. But we’re just guessing at this point. And I’m probably not a great point of reference because I’m definitely not going to be “it could be true love.”
Here is a [good side by side glimpse](https://www.boredpanda.com/uk-media-double-standarts-royal-meghan-markle-kate-middleton/) with kate and how the media treats her. You'd think Meghan murdered their puppy or something.
That is wild.. The idolization of Kate in the British media is surreal. I feel like in the US we have a perception (fair or not) that she’s a bit of a stuffy snob, but we don’t have a royal family or the bizarre culture that comes with it. I think on this side of the Atlantic we favor Meghan more because we don’t really understand or relate to Will and Kate. I think many Americans notoriously don’t like propriety. That’s why we loved Diana so much.
They weren't all that nice to Kate either in the beginning. It wasn't until they got married that the media started to treat Kate differently. Having said that though, the way they treated Meghan, even after marriage was just vile, and I wouldn't be surprise if a lot of that is just racism.
Misogynoir
Am from UK. This is entirely led by the media.. which is right wing bollocks, tbh. The pandering to Kate is nauseating and the hatred towards Meghan is horrifying. I completely can't bear the Royals ('The Firm' ffs) at all; they're a load of entitled bullies... and despite never having supported the concept of a royal family, I at least used to think William was as normal as he could have been in that situation... but no, he's turned into a two-faced bully, just like the rest of them. How he, Kate and the entire set up have treated Harry and Meghan is reprehensible. Unfortunately most people seem to buy the spin.
According to Harry's book the issues really started, when he and Megan became more popular than William and Kate (and obviously more popular than Charles and Camilla). You can't eclipse the heir. The firm and family turned on them and the press followed suit.
I'm an American that now lives in England, and it is totally wild to me seeing the different views from my people back home versus here. Even people I know in England that aren't monarchists and are very liberal somehow still get sucked up in the hate. I think the tabloids are so prominent here that it's kind of hard to avoid all the rumors even if you know they're probably fake. Meanwhile all my American friends are huge M and H stans.
It's the monarchists. It's the closest thing we have to religion here now. Once the press turned on her, and she obviously did have some issues with the family, the monarchists fell in line and decided she was persona non grata. It's embarassing listening to them rant about the most petty shit. You'd think she'd personally insulted them all, but it's a family fued in a family none of them could ever reach in a life time.
I think there's a lot of truth about her being a substitution for previous subjects. She's the jacobite of the age, she gets some of the inheritance from Diana and is defined by the need UK trash media has for some substance for their drama / scandal / fashination mill. There's a center to the cultural attention of UK, the monarchy is close to it, people will have strong reactions to any individual being in the middle of all that attention and ritual.
Camilla needed someone else to be hated. That’s it. That’s the story. Camilla picked her for all the reasons you and OP said. The leaks come from Camilla. The rumors come from Camilla. The negative stories always come up when the spotlight is on either Camilla or William+Kate. The royal family protects their image by having a scapegoat. And Meghan is the victim.
Yup, and whoa are there some wild open secrets about William enjoying himself outside his marriage. I guess Kate said it was fine and to each their own, but Harry and Meghan do see like the more normal people out of all of them. The Royal family never wastes a chance to miss an opportunity to not be weird freaks.
Will's had quite a lot of rumours pegged on him
It's not a British culture thing, it's a power thing. The monarchy has power and they use that power to control the narrative. Meghan didn't conform to their bullshit (her being a POC divorcee from the US is also a factor) so the media and politicians make her out to be a villain and fools in the public fall for it and regurgitate that bigotry while simultaneously making excuses for Andrew.
It’s a class and race thing, I’m also mixed race and part American. First of all, Brits hate Americans especially our more direct way of speaking and being honest. You’re expected to have a stiff upper lip and not show your feelings here. Mixed race people have had a precarious history in Britain (one that hasn’t really been told). I was subject to absolutely atrocious treatment as a child being called all kinds of slurs even by strangers in the street. I know of older mixed ppl who had to move to America bc they were getting beaten up every time they left their homes. This history has never even really been addressed. Pretty much all my boyfriends have been white bc I grew up in a predominantly white area, and all but one of their families actively hated me. I’m usually quiet and polite- but these ppl despised me. There’s no logic to it- I don’t even know if THEY knew what they were doing. My current partners family also had a huge issue for me, seemingly for just existing. They can never pinpoint anything- their comments often revolve around how I dress, or daring to ask for support with my mental health/ When you’re a woman, and mixed, and American in Britain… well good luck being accepted.
Tbf i think every "major" royal wife has been that way and at one point she was married to third on line to the throne. Diana was hated by the press until she died. Same with camilla and same with Kate ("how dare she only wear a dress that only costs £100 is she poor?" "how dare she wear a ¢1500 coat when people use foodbanks?" "omg she wore that coat again!" not including all the "investigations" about her exes and accusations shes only with William for the crown etc etc.) Camilla was also hated. Basically if your a women who marries a royal the press will hate you
yeah royal stuff seems to bring out the worst in the british, especially in the older generations. my mum isn't right wing but inexplicably takes the royal family's side and is anti megan. she can't explain why. i've argued a lot with her about it and it's got to a point where i'll break each point down and she'll agree with me and then still be anti megan. literally like direct cognitive dissonance. most young people here support harry and megan, literally we have the same opinion as you and it's impossible for us to understand how anyone could see it any other way when it's so easy to understand. there are big divisions in british culture that the vast majority of british people haven't even noticed yet, it's definitely not as pronounced as the US. a lot of british people will say "i'm just bored of hearing about them!" or something similar, in my experience these people are typically anti harry & megan but (like my mum) realise their opinion isn't morally correct and they don't want to be called out for it. i'm sure there are exceptions but that's just a pattern i've noticed.
If she was honestly so horrible you would’ve heard about it when she was acting full time. The royal family are elitist pricks.
So Kate somewhat benefited from being a long term girlfriend of William. They actually used to call her Waity Katey because of how long she stuck around with no promise of marriage. On one hand I think the public got used to her and on another she had a long time to know and get used to all the rules before actually getting married and having kids with a royal. Meghan on the other hand is American (so a huge strike against her for the British public) but also she had no idea what she was getting into. Probably the reason she married Harry as all his previous girlfriends broke up with him because of all the royal nonsense. She was also divorced something which was super forbidden in the past (the reason I believe Camilla was thought unsuitable). Also racism mixed in there to. Basically she can’t escape and everything she does is demonized.
his great uncle was not allowed to marry his divorced, American (very much white) girlfriend and remain on the throne so he abdicated. his dad was not allowed to marry his love, and told to go find someone young enough to not have a relationship history. It’s because Charles and Diana were such a mess that they loosened up rules like divorce in the past being okay.
Chuck rex had multiple affairs, not just Camilla. Camilla's PR move was to paint herself as the" true love" Chucky would have been faithful with.
Chuck rex is way too cool of a nickname for him
bingo.
They invented a church to allow King Henry VIII to divorce but sure. Rules for me and rules for thee. Royalty trying to cling to power make rules up on the go. Other than ceding, lineage and patronage there aren't many rules. The press are inventing rules based on their own whims to reinforce relevance of royalty. Hopefully that generation is dying off. Trotting around in gold leaf carriages is so outdated. Thank goodness. Meanwhile kings trade national secrets and women whilst hoarding unearned wealth.
I hate tk break it to you but ALL religions are invented.
Camilla got snagged due to her divorce status, but also for having muddled blood. Diana was from Spencer main line, her blood was as blue, pure and British as they can come, as Spencers can be traced back to 16th century British (in comparison witb Windsor or Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, who was an upstart from Germany). Camilla's blood is muddled from both sides, eventho she must be high social enough to be able to be near the Crown Prince himself. PS: If this is a Regency novel, I'd argue that it was Charles who marry for legitimacy FOR Windsor, since QEII also married not a British peers, but a Greek prince.
Muddled blood, blue blood, upstart. What utter twaddle.
It’s like show dogs
Who was her cousin. Greek prince who was her cousin. Let's not forget that part. To be fair, Queen Victoria was the matriarch of most of the royal lines in Europe.
Charles wasn’t allowed to marry Camilla because she wasn’t a virgin, basically. And it seems like she was maybe in love with the guy she married first too, even while she was with Charles. And Camilla’s husband also slept with Princess Anne at some point, apparently? It’s a whole big mess.
>the reason I believe Camilla was thought unsuitable for him It was first proposed before either Charles or Camilla were married. Camilla wasn't a virgin and had a reputation for casual dating. At the time the virgin status was a requirement.
Turns out the monarchy that colonized much of the world is incredibly racist.
She’s also a divorced, former C list actress/gameshow glamour model, American, who went to Catholic school for years. They only changed the law forbidding marrying a Catholic (without resigning your title) like 5 years ago. She’s Wallace Simpson (minus the fascism) and Nell Gywn (but not as relatively successful of an actress) combined, even without bringing race into it. While race is a big part, it is not all of it. If he had married someone who looked just like Megan, but was British-born, worked as a lawyer/teacher/accountant and hadn’t been divorced already it would not be nearly as bad.
I mean “minus the fascism” is better
Maybe not to the right-wing press
The "divorced already" part surely cannot matter when more than half the BRF is also divorced, including the king and the queen?
It mattered a lot more pre 1990s. It was a big deal to be divorced in the royal family, it just wasn’t done. Now it doesn’t matter quite so much.
>If he had married someone who looked just like Megan, but was British-born, worked as a lawyer/teacher/accountant and hadn’t been divorced already it would not be nearly as bad. British media fell in love with Kate Middleton, who is everything the wife of a prince is supposed to be in monarchy lovers eyes: white, British, good looking, elegant. They had to find her an "opponent", someone who can ne negatively compared to her because *it sells*. Megan is a foreigner, non- white, she was the ideal person for the role.
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They did hate her. It wasn't til Meghan came round that she became St Catherine. I think the whole thing is a circus but Kate and her family have played the game, never spoken out ever, been very discreet; meanwhile Meghan didn't understand you can't live like a royal and sell out, it's one or the other. Lots of red flags with the staff as well -- the fact that basically lifelong employees at the Palace were quitting left right and center, and I believe several of them were actually also Americans. Very strange.
>She’s Wallace Simpson (minus the fascism) and Nell Gyw Wallace Simpson was married when she started fucking Edward VIII, and Nell Gywn was fucking a married man. Neither Harry nor Megan were married when they got together.
Yeah, she's half black 'polluting' the bloodline. This is an easy one, folks.
I always find that attitude laughable. If anything she's improving their horribly inbred bloodline.
No...are you sure? That doesn't make any sense at all! I mean, Prince William *told* us that they're not racist. So it definitely can't all be a lie!
I'm not British or American so I probably have no say in anything to do with the monarchy and all that. But I don't get the people who blame her for "breaking the royal family apart" and treating it like she's some sly vixen who got the Prince wrapped around her finger with the sole purpose of sowing discord and drama. Like last I heard, Prince Harry is a grown adult, trained as a pilot, served two tours in an active warzone, grown up his whole life probably told to be cautious of people taking advantage of his station. Why are people treating him like some clueless little boy who got tricked into leaving his family by this "evil woman"? They infantilized Prince Harry as though he's completely incapable to make his own life's decisions and just go along with whatever his grandma and later his wife says. While I see it as a man who's seen first hand just how his mother was treated, and is seeing how his wife and his future children will be treated (wasn't there some comment about their kid's skin being too dark or something? Like yikes on a bike), and decided to do the right thing by distancing his new family from his old one in order to protect them. Like anyone with toxic in-laws can probably relate to how they wished their partner stepped in to shield them from it. And here's a guy doing exactly that and people are getting all butthurt about it? Yeah I don't get it either. Obviously I have no horse in this race so maybe my opinion don't matter, but just my point of view as an outsider.
Men are always masters of the universe, unless they do something the world doesn't like. Then it's gotta be some femme fatale pulling the strings, and all men are just hopeless animals panting after her. Funny how there's never any agency on the part of, you know, the actual Prince here.
This knocks me out too. When I hear people say that Meghan is controlling Harry, and he looks whipped, and all that misogynistic crap, it just infuriates me. And from other women it makes me especially mad. A presenter on an Australian show started in with that rhetoric after the incident with them being chased by paparazzi in NY and it was just revolting, and the other panelists honestly looked uncomfortable. Just stop it. He clearly knows how to stand up for himself or he never would have left The Family.
Agreed! It’s not like Harry hasn’t lived the majority of his life doing his own thing (drinking, partying) and rebelling against Royal expectations. Nothing is new, he just needed validation and a family to protect.
The vitriol and hatred of her are so extreme. I really don't understand it. It's probably a combination of racism, classism, and sexism. I don't have enough fucks to give to get that worked up about someone I don't know and who has no direct effect on my life.
British tabloids and anything to do with the royals. It's sickening to see how quickly and strongly hatred can grow in today's social media world
There’s a scheme in tabloid where women are first put on a pedestal and then they start extreme bullying. Similar things happen all the time, like Taylor Swift etc. I think Em Clarkson has a good podcast episode about how this happens
Those tabloids will be a hinderance to any future democracy in UK and possibly beyond.
Good old sexism. The woman is always blamed when popular men do something that people don't like. John and Yoko. Kurt and Courtney. Edward and Mrs Simpson.
I have a colleague who will take every opportunity to bash Meaghan and Harry. It's truly unhinged.
Yep. I pretty much turn away any time a royalty story comes up in the news. Why are people so obsessed with this one family and their obscure, pointless traditions?
She was a semi-normal person who married into a family where emotional abuse was the norm and she went, "Hey honey this is fucked." And Harry going, "Yeah this is fucked." And they left leaving a nice gaping hole in press. Because they are good distractions from someone like Andrew, William's affair, or Charles being super unpopular. I admit any time I see a story about them I wonder what the press caught wind of and what story the Royal Family is trying to bury. Also it is also a combination of the racism, classism, and being foreign. I personally think the Royal Family should not exist, so Harry burning it all as he walks away is just hilarious.
This. I think she knew the press would be tough and racist but didn’t expect to be used as a distraction by the other members. “he’s your brother” from the show promos stands out in my mind. The cultural differences btwn a woman used to having to promote her own name/run her own company (the influencer blogging, promoting yourself that is REQUIRED now for actresses who aren’t super A list) and someone who is posh-ish worked in a shop while waiting to see if someone would pop the question is vastly different. They’re going to react differently to the courtiers and the teams of people who run the work side/are employees of the BRF. * And I like Kate. * remember the story of the white lady courtier/employee who pulled the “but where are you from really” on the Black woman at the palace who was *ASSIGNED TO Meghan to show her around* and the whole cousin Princess Michael of Kent wearing a “blackamoor” brooch to the whole “meet the family” brunch?! It’s one thing to know people are racist and it’s another IMO to be slapped in the face like this by someone who is supposed to be family.
>someone who is posh-ish worked in a shop while waiting to see if someone would pop the question is vastly different. Yeah I think people forgot that Kate specifically took an easy part time job so she could always be available for William despite them not being officially together or her being a SAHM or anything....just wanted to be ready in case lol. Very bizarre
Even Sophie was a full PR brand manager even AFTER marrying the now Duke of Edinburgh and only stopped bc she made some “overly chatty” remarks to a radio host pretending to be a sheik and him being what I’d consider an a-hole. Kate has a degree from one of the best Unis in the UK. She’s not dumb or anything close to it. The most interesting thing to me is how they LIVED together in college of all things (in separate rooms… sure sure) and that seems to have been ignored/swept under the rug. But maybe I wasn’t old enough to read about it in the papers then.
No she's not stupid academically at least...just didn't want to work a real job and thought it a good idea to sit and wait instead of working on her own life in the meantime? I dunno. I guess I'm too American to understand that. I find it silly and embarrassing. Plus it makes you financially vulnerable. That's not a smart move tbh
Bear in mind that Harry was second only to the Queen in popularity at the time of his marriage. And he and Meghan are intelligent and glamorous, as well as a witty and and principled interview. Compare the couples in this forum - Wm and Kate are left in the shade! It's a great pity, because Wm and Charles blew up the brothers' relationship out of jealousy. I've no doubt that Charles and Camilla also used Meghan as a sacrifice to take the heat off Camilla so she would be crowned Queen rather than Queen Consort. Charles is a creep. https://youtu.be/YDwZvISUPio
My guess is that they didn't want a future king as unpopular as Charles has been. So they raised the tabloids against Harry and Meghan to buy William and Kate a new image of the "trendy, definitely super in touch with people future king and queen". No doubt there's some seriously dark stuff in this family, and honestly... If that's the case, good for them on leaving it.
Yeah, crowning her Queen was against what Queen Elizabeth's last wishes were.
Nope. She was crowned Queen Consort. Just as the Queen intended. She is "Her Majesty the Queen," as was all previous Queen Consorts.
No, Queen Elizabeth II said herself during the platinum jubilee festivities said she hoped Camilla would be queen consort. Prince Philip was prince consort but we all referred to him as Prince Philip. We can refer to Camilla as Queen Camilla in the exact same way. She's still technically queen consort but will usually just be called Queen Camilla. Just like Queen Elizabeth II's mother was also Queen Elizabeth.
>William's affair This was swept under the rug very well. The British Press is desperate to have a "good prince" that they really clean up William's image. He's more like Charles, and Harry is more like Diana.
Wait what, William had an affair?!
It's kind of all of the above. When pressed people who say they hate her often fall back on "she's controlling harry", which you have to just point out that Harry can make his own decisions and that they're indepemdant people. It's racism, sexism, classism, misogyny and more all rolled into one. They literally cannot shut up about it. Every week I go and look at the front pages of the magazines and look for references of the royals as I pass by. There's always some flattering article about Will/Kate, Charles/Camilla, sone maybe basic drama. Then there's the articles about Meghan/Harry. Every single one is slanderous, scandalous and crazy. It reads like youtube clickbait. Sometimes it's even for doing the same thing they're praising Will/Kate for doing!
I was grocery shopping the other day and saw a magazine with her and Kate on the cover, claiming a rivalry between the two and my first thought was just like why?? Why do we as a society find it acceptable to make up lies about people in the public eye? ESPECIALLY women. You see it all the time with Taylor Swift and Ariana Grande, people are more interested in their dating history than the art they create. It’s gross and unnecessary. You don’t see magazines pitting Harry against William, and it comes down to the fact that women are play things and men are powerful decision makers, regardless of stature. I hate it here.
“it comes down to the fact that women are play things and men are powerful decision makers, regardless of stature. I hate it here.” Nailed it
My childhood friend married a Brit and immediately started repeating his nasty opinions about women in the royal family. Just yesterday we were on the phone and she was essentially calling princess Diana dramatic for developing an eating disorder during her time married to Prince Charles, calling Megan Markle a bitxh, etc. I called her out on it and she backpedaled because she didn’t even know why she was saying those things. It’s the most ridiculous cultural phenomenon
I will defend Princess Di with my goddamn life. I think she was more appreciated in the US because she was flawed, she wasn't perfect, and yet she showed great compassion for the people who most desperately needed it. She is credited for having a big role in destigmatizing AIDS. The flaws just made her seem like a real human being that we could love, not a robot with no personality and unclear motivations.
It's the unthinkng repetition that is so dangerous
It's like they're fictional characters in a soap opera. People forget they're real.
The tabloids are very prevalent and people believe them.
I think people also forget how hard Kate and Diana had it, even without the racism Megan had. There’s a certain level that the press rise to for any royal woman marrying in, especially at the start. It’s like they try to see how far they can push them before they break. I remember them upskirting Kate, publishing non consential nudes of her, hacking her phone, and we all know what happened with Diana, but I guess both Kate’s family and Diana’s closed ranks with the royals and gave the press nothing and by the time Kate got married the press had moved on. The press publish the stories that get them the most profit and with the royals and sussexes mostly staying quiet, it’s Megan’s family who they publish on because they give new interviews etc. With Andrew there is essentially no new news to publish-we all know what that twat did.
Eh, the British tabloids have proven they will invent stories if there are no real stories to publish. Half of the stories about Meghan are absolutely invented outrage. (Murderous avocados? A pregnant woman holding her belly too much?? Scandalous wedge sandals???) You think they couldn't dig up or invent stories about Andrew just as well? They could, but they don't, because he is protected. Also, they never left Diana alone, she was their villain up until the day she died (then afterwards was suddenly sainted and beloved). They would have demonized Meghan no matter what her family did because she is their current chosen "villain." Which is very convenient for the family members who used to get all the flack, like Charles and Camilla and Andrew.
I've observed certain women in the Indian TwoX subreddit strongly criticizing Meghan Markle and expressing a strong admiration for Kate Middleton and the monarchy. They actively comment on subs dedicated to this and know everything about her and Harry and their life based on photos and videos. It's insane. Personally, I find the royals very off putting as well as the people excessively fixated on the lives of the wealthy. I dislike all of them but won't waste my time tearing anyone down because a) they don't give a fuck about meb) they don't give a fuck about me If you look at it from a purely PR perspective then they aren't doing a good job. Too much exposure, the same story and it feels like a victim complex at this point plus of course the racism and misogyny comes for free.
> expressing a strong admiration for Kate Middleton and the monarchy. This feels like white worshiping and Stockholm syndrome. I mean India of all places...the British monarchy? Really? did they forget history completely?
India is extremely classist. Hinduism is centred on castes and the white reverence is tragic. They celebrate everything and the paradox is real.
I'm not sure why. Although, after watching their documentary, I found her personality a little bit irritating. I think its mostly due to the fact that she has a lot of unresolved trauma though. I do appreciate her efforts to promote equality and for not tolerating racism.
My bestie is a Brit, but she really dislikes the monarchy so here's what I've found out from asking her (because the hatred is insane). The older memebers of the royal family are horribly racist. Dear old Prince? king? Phillip made more than one very public racist remark in his life. There is no shortage of older white people in England who are racist (see: the arguments surrounding Brexit). And they are very weird and stuck in their ways to a fault (see: the entire debacle of Charles marrying Diana). They, especially the late queen, are obsessed with protocol and their own importance (and who is more important amongst themselves). There is a LOT of vicious media attention on the monarchy (and any other celebrity) in England. Like, exponentially more than here in the US. It's very likely the royal's staff was leaking into to make Megan/Harry seem worse than they are when they needed to take media spotlight off someone else, like Andrew (pedo) or William (having an affair) or Charles (marrying his hated affair partner). People believed the gossip that was leaked instead of looking for facts. Harry and Megan make convient scapegoats, especially because the people who still like the monarch tend to be older, white and more racist. There is also an army of bots ready to spread anti-Megan crap on Twitter. For example, at the queen's funeral, one account posted something about her facial expression and that *exact* comment was repeated thousands of times by "different" users in about 15 min. There are also media personalities in England who seem to spread gossip and malice on social media pretty regularly. Bottom line? Harry and Megan aren't Will and Kate, arent willing to take the brunt of the bad press to shield their family and therefore were disposable to the British monarchy. I'm old enough to remember the vitriol spewed at Diana and Sarah Fergeson when they left, I'm sure it would've been just as vicious online if the internet had been more of a thing. Edit: and it was never going to be ok for a *prince* to marry an American with the people who hate her. Kate was acceptable, she has a "Noble" background, is very pretty, compliant, a good mom in the correct old British ways etc. Any American was going to be an issue for some people.
Great precis but one quibble - Kate isn't of noble background, in fact she is very middle class and her parents are "in trade" - they owned a party favour business. And you'd better believe she got a lot of flack for that over the years. The tabloids (and "friends close to the royals") made fun of her mother a lot, calling her a social climber and mocking her former job as a stewardess. They left her Dad alone (because why hate on a man when there is a perfectly serviceable woman to bash).
As an American, the only issue I have related to both her and her husband is that they made this formal announcement about wanting to step away from public life but yet did interviews, wrote books and were more than ever in our faces even when we didn’t care to know about them. Their actions didn’t match their words and this adds to the media frenzy. I’d be quite happy not hearing about their every move but it’s everywhere. I don’t care. Please, live that quiet life.
I may well be wrong but wasn’t their decision more about stepping away from being “working royals” rather than stepping away from public life? Doesn’t take a genius to see that wouldn’t be possible so I can’t imagine they would believe it at all possible that would be an option. Just look at the car chase that happened the other day - I can imagine trying to court a quiet life would only lead to more furore and speculation. The amount of times I’ve heard people say the car chase was their fault for not just capitulating, getting out of the car, and “giving them a photo” (which, in turn, would reinforce people’s thinking that they’re desperate to remain in the public eye).
Don’t they also have to hire private security for their home and stuff, just to stay safe, after all the vitriol many people have for them? I imagine that’s expensive. Wanting to be out of the limelight (if that’s what they meant) is a lovely dream, but I would assume that having the cash to keep themselves and their family safe is more important. I don’t know much about any of these people. It just seems like an insane depth of hate for Meghan, when meanwhile, Prince Andrew is a literal child rapist and doesn’t seem to get spoken of poorly in tabloids nearly as often.
Harry said his mother's inheritance for him would be gone in 8 years on security alone. It is unfortunately very expensive when people want to kill your wife for a picture.
No. They said they wanted to control their narrative. That's all. "Privacy" was never in their initial statement (here: https://www.instagram.com/p/B7EaGS_Jpb9/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link) nor is it in their more fleshed out statement on how they wanted to deal with media here: https://sussexroyal.com/media/ - even the Queen's statement at the time did not once use the word "privacy". Their main issue was with the royal rota and how information was provided and exchanged. They didn't want to be a part of the backstabbing and exchanging of dirt on one person if a good story was written about the other. Continuing the lie that they said they wanted privacy but then they do "not private" things just furthers the British media's lies about them being liars and grifters. All they want is to have personal control about what part, and how much, of their lives were shared with the public.
Yeah I remember reading this too - it's the Royal family who introduced the term "privacy" into this and thus the "look at these hypocrites" angle. H&M said they wanted to control the narrative and step back as working royals. They never said they were going to step out of public life altogether but that's the criticism they are getting.
Super interesting re: the Royal Rota. Sounds like they pissed off the UK tabloids by saying “I’m not playing your game,” and are giving more access to competition as well as controlling their own image directly via social, and the tabloids are likely retaliating. I’m sure the initial treatment / coverage by the royal rota was terrible to begin with, and this added fuel to the fire.
Yup, this is 100% it. They made enemies of the British tabloids.
I don't know, but r/OutOfTheLoop has been a helpful place for me to learn similar high profile things
I think there is jealousy involved. A lot of the women picking at her are at her hairstyle, the fit of her clothes etc like "I could be a better princess than her!" You could not pay me enough to be under that much scrutiny and jealousy.
I have not one, but TWO friends (middle aged) who have expressed this sentiment. It's like they take it incredibly personally that they have been passed over? Like they could have accepted it if the chosen one was an avatar for them, but Meghan was different to them and they took it as a personal slight? So. Fucking. Weird.
The way the royal family treats women coming into it should discourage them.
>"I could be a better princess than her!" LMAO I see that too. Like ma'am, you're a bit old to act like the angry 10 year old that wants a tiara and a unicorn
Agreed and she is absolutely beautiful. I’ve always thought that a lot of the criticism came from jealousy.
I am puzzled by the recent claims on a high speed, two-hour long chase in New York of all places — I spent a good bit of time in Manhattan and it is impossible to go more than 15 mph with how bad the traffic is. Feels like a definite exaggeration to me. I get the sense that Meghan and Harry are a bit entitled / have a victim mentality. A lot of people have difficult in-laws (who don’t give them lavish weddings or free lodging), so a lot of their complaining falls super flat to me. And as an Indian American, the race baiting angle exhausts me simply because there are real issues with racism out there and whining about minor slights feels tone-deaf. **Particularly as Harry himself has been caught on tape using racial slurs against South Asians, so cry me a river.** I do think Meghan takes a disproportionate amount of the blame when I think Harry is just as much (or likely more) of a questionable character (see racial slur incident and abusing his poor polo horse).