Posted on 03/08/2021 7:56:39 AM PST by Kaslin
The interview was loaded with apparent revelations. But there's absolutely no way around the he-said-she-said dynamic that characterizes this conflict.
Regardless of how many sit-down interviews they grant or how real their reality show gets, we’re destined to observe the royal family from afar. Oprah Winfrey’s interview with Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, which aired Sunday night, ostensibly peeled back the curtain on their troubled relationship with the House of Windsor.
Of course, we don’t actually know that it did anything of the sort. The newly minted Californians coordinated the primetime special to tell their side of the story. That’s how this goes. According to Harry and Meghan, who left their roles as senior members of the royal family, they did “everything [they] could to make it work.” The queen may have a different take. (Although we likely won’t hear it in a splashy TV interview.)
Markle told Oprah she’d experienced “suicidal thoughts,” explaining, “I went to the institution and I said that I needed to go somewhere to get help…and I was told that I couldn’t.”
“I went to one of the most senior people to get help. I was told I couldn’t because it wouldn’t be good for the institution,” said Markle.
Harry on his father Prince Charles:
There is a lot to work though there. I feel really let do. He’s been through something similar.
He knows what pain feels like.
And Archie is his grandson.
I will always love him but there is a lot of hurt that has happened#OprahMeghanHarry— Chris Ship (@chrisshipitv) March 8, 2021
Harry on Prince William: The relationship is one of "space at the moment" and time heals all things hopefully.
Meghan: I regret believing them (the Palace) when they said I would be protected.#OprahMeghanHarry— Chris Ship (@chrisshipitv) March 8, 2021
“I’m comfortable knowing we did everything we did to make it work.”
Both Harry and Meghan tell Oprah they did everything they could to make their roles work, but ultimately the institution and family let them down.#OprahMeghanHarry
— Omid Scobie (@scobie) March 8, 2021
Prince Harry says the Royal Family cut him off financially at the start of 2020 (after announcing plans to step back from royal roles) but says he was able to afford security for his family because of the money his mother, Princess Diana, left behind.#OprahMeghanHarry
— Omid Scobie (@scobie) March 8, 2021
Harry: If it were not for Meghan, I wouldn’t not have been able to leave. I felt trapped as well.
I was trapped but I didn’t know I was trapped.#OprahMeghanHarry— Chris Ship (@chrisshipitv) March 8, 2021
Harry says the royal family has an issue with race “For this union and the specifics around race there were opportunities for my family to show some public support. No one from my family ever said anything. That hurts.” #HarryandMeghanonOprah #MeghanAndHarry
— Roya Nikkhah (@RoyaNikkhah) March 8, 2021
Meghan: They took away Harry's security. I wrote letters to his family – I accept that I couldn't;t have it. But I said "please keep keep my husband safe. Please don’t pull his security. And they said it’s not just possible".#OprahMeghanHarry
— Chris Ship (@chrisshipitv) March 8, 2021
The couple said they felt “trapped” as royals. Meghan said she begged unsuccessfully for Harry’s security to remain. Harry said his family “literally” cut him off, and he’s living on money left by his mother.
In reference to rumors swirling around her wedding, Markle claimed it was actually Kate Middleton who made her cry, despite reports to the contrary. Harry said his relationship with Prince William involves “space at the moment.”
They were married in a private ceremony three days before their public wedding. They’re now expecting a baby girl in the summer, but want only two children. Floating a huge allegation, Markle said before the birth of her son there were internal “concerns and conversations about how dark his skin might be when he’s born.”
The interview was loaded with apparent revelations. But there’s absolutely no way around the he-said-she-said dynamic that characterizes this conflict.
The crown wants to protect itself. Harry and Meghan want to protect themselves as well. Given the necessarily public nature of their spat, both sides must now manipulate the media in their favor to succeed. Whether you love Markle or hate her, what you’re seeing is a curated media character striving to achieve an illusion of authenticity.
I confess to being viscerally irritated by Americans’ palace intrigue over the royal family. Women project onto royals because their privilege makes it seem okay, so controversial royals are incredible gossip fodder, like homecoming queens and trust-fund princesses. British tabloids are a different beast, but it seems inevitable that Markle’s admitted struggles with fame-induced mental health problems will spark comparisons with Britney Spears.
For the public, it seems like a trade-off. Markle and Spears get fame and money, so we get to joke when they gain ten pounds or have an off day. We get to speculate about their family drama and they get to jet set. Is it fair? Tabloid culture is certainly a response to demand. Demand is not always or even often broadly moral.
Markle is notoriously sanctimonious. She lectures the world from her position of immense power and privilege. She has the vapid politics of a Zinn-chugging liberal arts graduate. Depending on which rumors you believe, she’s not very nice either. But who knows what’s real in a battle for the narrative? It’s not possible, so you might as well just stop investing in the fight.
At play here are deep international dynamics, the trading of literal royalty for America’s decadent version of it in Hollywood. Emotive millennials pointedly bucking their conservative family’s tradition of stoicism, swapping dignified roles and their inevitable constraints for self-indulgence.
We’re all projecting a lot onto this couple. The comment that struck me most was Harry’s claim his family is “scared” of British tabloids and acts accordingly. Powerful people being scared of the free press? What an incredible concept.
Here in the states, where Harry and Meghan have chosen to make their home, reality star Bethenny Frankel deleted a critical tweet that read, “Cry me a river…the plight of being a game show host, fairly unknown actress, to suffering in a palace, w tiaras & 7 figure weddings for TWO WHOLE YEARS to being a household name w @Oprah on speed dial, fetching 7 m for interviews, hundreds of millions in media deals.” For a couple with the world at their fingertips, it’s true that Harry and Meghan do a lot of whining.
After blowback from users and outlets like TMZ, Frankel deleted the tweet and added, “I watched M & H sit down. Emotional distress & racism must feel suffocating & powerless. I’m a polarizing, unfiltered(often to a fault)flawed person w a voice. When I heard of the interview, during a pandemic, it felt like a surprising choice. I’m sorry if it hurt or offended you.”
American tabloids defend rich and powerful celebrities as long as they cloak themselves in vague wokeness. That makes California a much warmer home for Harry and Meghan for reasons beyond the weather. Here, they can have their cake and eat it too.
For all our personal and cultural projections onto the couple, “Harry and Meghan” is always just our interpretation of the family’s media tug-of-war. We have little access to the reality at hand, which is carefully clouded by the resources of enormously powerful people. Why bother squinting?
Don Draper said it best. Love her or hate her, the best approach to Meghan Markle is simply not to think about her at all.
You might want to watch the interview. Gotta admit, I was fairly impressed with this couple. Came across as likable anyway. I don’t hold royalty against Harry, just the way he was born. Not his fault.
I dont think she realized what her claim about a private ceremony was going to do
Not to mention how it would hack people off that they spent that much money on a wedding that wasn’t even legal by Church standards.
this story claims they designed the baby. not sure they can design it further than gender
https://blindgossip.com/the-calculated-baby/
Frankel was probably threatened; she sure changed her mind.
And to the topic: I always liked Harry; he refused special treatment when in war. Sadly, he hitched his wagon to Meghan Markle and he lost far more than he otherwise would have had.
Plus Oprah? $7 MILLION DOLLARS??? The woman should market her own line of toilet paper, made up of Ones (real).
Somehow she’ll make gazillions from that.
‘There is no “royalty” in the USA.’
Our royalty seems to be unelected bureaucrats that have positions in the alphabet agencies who can break any law, commit any crime, spy on anyone they want & work against anyone they feel is a threat to their power. They go unpunished & are handsomely rewarded by Leftists with 7 figure book deals & high paying jobs. Even when they are duplicitous, incompetent, contradictory boobs. IE: Comey, Brennan, Dr. Fauci....
And the $100 million they got in their Netflix deal. I weep for them.
Honest to Christ. I was unaware she was half black until they made a big deal out of it. You could never tell by looking at her.
The question what was the kickback to Harry and Meghan for the interview?
Yep. I have a daughter and grandson that had that problem, and wearing patches for a while fixed the problem.
How far we've devolved in the 40 years since. Other than spending a lot of money on the wedding, there was no pretense of class, grace or dignity between Harry and Meghan and they've only devolved from there.
If they took their Millions , started a business and had actual jobs , the press would lose interest .
Bottom line
Meg is black
Harry was
“I went to the institution and I said that I needed to go somewhere to get help…and I was told that I couldn’t.”
So she didn’t have pre-natal care, couldn’t talk to her doctor? Couldn’t ask her ob/gyn if hormonal depression was normal in her fifth month of pregnancy? No, the Duchess of Wannabe went to Human Resources at the “institution”, and she did that to create a record of her complaint of racism, which is how it would have been done in the systemic racist country of the USA.
I didn't bother...can read all about it on internet. Neither of them impress me at all..Was wondering where her Mother is, and does Harry love her and hate his own family? Happens in many families...really doesn't matter..
Both of them “aired their dirty laundry” to the public...causing many of us to have less respect for them than ever before.
She said they only want two kids...of course, she is 40 this Aug. and her clock is burned out...She is a produce of a black parent and a white parent, race will always be a part of her life and she uses it as do most Black Americans...nothing new with that...What ever...I really don't give a rat's a$$ about them...but they are certainly concerned about money and fame...smh
LET'S MOVE ON...
how, in the name of God, did the Firm EVER let that picture be released to the subjects? dear God, she looks like she is about to be admitted to, or was just released from, a mental institution...
Could be said.....this is Meghan telling the rest of the world It's okay to race mix with blacks,....You can be a divorced old woman who hit the D list celebrity wall but you can still land a literal prince....and walk away with a bank by selling your story.
3-2-1.....Book next!
Unimportant people trying to be important. Whatever family issues they have are no one’s business and are not worthy of agreeing to an interview, even by the vacuous Oprah.
It’s Hell to grow old.
There’s an important point people are missing trying to compare Megan and Diana.......Harry doesn’t get it either.........Diana’s husband was having an affair right from the get go. That would change any equation in a Marriage and within a family.
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