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Prince Harry is right, and it's not just a matter of royal gossip

2023-01-25T20:38:50.790Z


Britain's most revered institution plays into the hands of one of its most disgusting institutions, even if its relatives are hurt.


Any close follower of the British media should not have been surprised that after

Prince Harry

fell for

Meghan Markle

, the biracial American actress, years of vitriolic and even racist coverage followed.

Bashing hate and spreading lies - even on topics far more consequential than a real romance - is a specialty of Britain's atrocious but politically influential tabloids.

People like me, who don't care for celebrities, shouldn't dismiss the hoopla around Harry's memoir as mere celebrity chatter.

Prince Harry during an interview with "Good Morning America" ​​co-host Michael Strahan in Los Angeles.

(Richard Harbaugh/ABC via AP)

She has made credible, even documented, claims that her own family refused to stand up to her ugly and sustained attacks on Meghan.

In other words, it appears that Britain's most revered institution, funded by tens of millions a year from taxpayers, is playing into the hands of one of its most

loathsome institutions.

At the very least, it seems clear by now where some senior members of the royal family stand on all of this.

Among those in attendance at a Christmas luncheon in mid-December were

Camilla,

Queen Consort of Great Britain;

Give me Judi Dench;

Dame Maggie Smith

;

and some less luminous celebrities, such as the acid-tongued columnist Jeremy Clarkson and the broadcaster and columnist

Piers Morgan.

Both Clarkson and Morgan have been among the main participants in the multi-year media evisceration of Camilla and King Charles's daughter-in-law, Meghan.

Clarkson has previous ties to Camilla.

Her farm was featured in an issue of

Country Life

magazine that she guest-edited.

A few days after that Christmas meal, he lashed out at Meghan when he wrote in his column for The Sun:

"At night I am unable to sleep as I lie gnashing my teeth and dreaming of the day she will be paraded naked through the streets of every city in Britain while crowds chant 'Shame!' and hurl chunks at her. of excrement".

The palace did not comment on the matter.

Clarkson

publicly apologized

for the column after a fierce public outcry.

As for Morgan, he has called Camilla "a class act."

stories

More than a decade ago, when many in Britain were still resisting her becoming queen consort because of her adulterous relationship with Charles, Morgan wrote in her Daily Mail column that "I really can't think of any other woman in the world." world

more suitable,

or more experienced" to be queen.

Morgan left his ITV morning show in a huff in March 2021 after being roundly convicted for saying he did not believe Meghan's claim that she was suicidal during her first pregnancy and "wouldn't believe her if she read me a weather report".

It wasn't his first such tirade about her, nor would it be the last.

But he said Camilla soon "demanded to know

when I would be back on TV

."

Clarkson and Morgan are just two actors in a morass of commentators and tabloids that are intimately tied to the royals they cover.

Just before the death of

Queen Elizabeth II,

Carlos received the editor of

The Sun

, something that, according to the editor, was usual.

He wrote that he was always "jovial and cheerful" with her.

And Carlos and Camilla have recently hired a former deputy editor of

The Daily Mail

as communication secretary.

What might Carlos and Camilla think they are conveying by having a

camaraderie

with a tabloid press that has behaved so noxiously towards members of their own family, with articles that have been so ugly, and even racist?

In 2016, days after Harry and Meghan's relationship went public, The Daily Mail called Meghan, who lived in Los Angeles as a child, "(almost) straight out of Compton," alluding to Harry's hip-hop album. 80s and later movie.

The Mail described his family's quaint Los Angeles neighborhood as "gang scarred."

For years, the royals have had to fend off tabloid attacks.

But the vitriol that has been applied to Meghan, and the double stick to which she has been subjected, is palpable.

On one occasion, after avocado toast was served at a luncheon hosted by her, The Daily Mail ran an article headlined "How Meghan's favorite avocado snack - beloved by all millennials - is fueling rights abuses." humans, droughts and murders".

The Daily Express similarly proclaimed: "Meghan Markle's favorite avocado linked to human rights abuses and drought, millennial shame."

The same tabloids ran approving stories associating Prince William and Princess Kate with avocados, without mentioning human rights abuses.

When Kate was seen holding her pregnant bump, The Daily Mail said she was doing it "tenderly".

When Meghan did so, it was described as an act of vanity and "virtue signaling" implying that "the rest of us sterile harpies deserve to burn alive in our cars."

And what is more insidious, Meghan has been presented as a threat to other members of the royal family, even children.

The Daily Express claimed that Meghan could have put "Princess Charlotte's life in danger".

I eat?

Including in your wedding

lilies of the valley

, which should not be eaten;

however, they were also used at Kate and Princess Eugenie's weddings without disapproval.

Queen Elizabeth was also portrayed as a victim of Meghan.

Especially after Harry and Meghan stepped down from their royal duties, tabloids repeatedly claimed that Meghan had

endangered the Queen's health.

Harry has said that he pleaded with his family to publicly condemn this ugly campaign.

But instead, Harry recounts in his book "Spare," the couple were ordered to keep quiet,

even against outright lies.

"Never complain, never explain"

was the royal motto.

But the royal family isn't always

so accommodating.

When a plastic surgeon claimed on his Instagram account that Harry's sister-in-law Kate was receiving

Botox

, Kensington Palace officials issued an official condemnation and denial.

Apparently, they got at least one tabloid to pull a story claiming Kate was wearing

hair extensions.

William and Kate issued a strong statement and threatened legal action against

Tatler magazine

after it called Kate "dangerously thin".

Apparently, "passage strips" that the palace had objected to were removed from the article.

Even less prominent members receive explicit protection.

On one occasion, the palace advocated that Prince Edward, Charles's brother, use a private jet instead of the available train.

Harry has claimed that, while the royal family remained silent about the media's abuse of his wife, behind the scenes

he leaked, planted or influenced

stories with the worst elements of the Royal Rota - representatives of the news organizations that cover the palace in a preferred press pool - in exchange for favorable coverage for them or distractions from their own brewing scandals.

After telling only his immediate family about the plans he and Meghan were making to travel or distance themselves from royal obligations, Harry says in "Spare," those plans appeared in the tabloids attributed to anonymous sources.

It's not just Harry's suspicions.

Daily Mail columnist

Dan Wootton

has said that "much of the negativity towards the couple comes from within the royal family".

The royal family, and royal family staff, are the ones who very often leak these stories to the press."

Other leading members of the Royal Rota agree.

Robert Jobson, royal editor of The Evening Standard, told Australia's morning show "Sunrise" that "they can deny it all they want until they turn purple, but there have been so many leaks, especially from Kensington Palace," the office of William and Kate.

On Twitter, the Daily Express's Richard Palmer reported early rifts between Harry and his relatives, saying the royal family "and their advisers recognize the value of a

symbiotic relationship

in communicating with the paying public."

I'm not sure Harry does."

Another journalist, Omid Scobie, claimed in an interview for an ITV documentary in 2021 that Guillermo was

planting stories

about his brother's mental health in the press.

Apparently, the chain received a legal threat from Guillermo - that was as far as the policy of silence came - and deleted Scobie's statement from the program.

British journalist

Andrew Marr

, a self-confessed fan of Queen Elizabeth II, says Harry's statements are important.

After all, Marr said it well: "Either well-known journalists are making a lot of stuff up, sitting at their laptops at the kitchen table making up the details of private feuds and confrontations, or there's been a form of

anonymous information

particularly rough for trust".

Perhaps they could be part of an investigation similar to the one carried out after the Rupert Murdoch tabloid phone hacking scandal.

This type of relationship of royalty with the media is not new, of course.

In a BBC documentary, Carlos' former press secretary said Guillermo was furious because when he was 16 The Sun published details of his first meeting with Camilla.

The author of the story said the source was Mark Bolland, Carlos' assistant private secretary and public relations adviser.

It was all a transaction.

Sandy Henney, a former press secretary, said of Carlos:

"When I joined his office in '93, he was coming under some pretty virulent criticism:

'Bad father;

unloving husband'.

I think he was pretty hurt." He said Bolland worked to change Charles' image.

Leaking information to the media was a way of currying favor.

"A brilliant manipulator," Henney said of Bolland.

"

He got the result he wanted

."

(Bolland denied these allegations.)

Bolland was also accused of approving a

News of the World

article claiming that a 16-year-old Harry had used drugs, in exchange for praise from Carlos for taking Harry to a rehab center, illustrated by what the tabloid He said they were photos from the visit.

Harry writes that the seven-page tabloid post left him disgusted and horrified, and that the photos were from a previous official visit he had made to the center.

Bolland later admitted that the sequence of events was distorted to make Carlos better off.

The coverage, after Diana's death, turned the portrait of Carlos around.

"No more cheating husband," as Harry says in his memoirs.

"Pa would now be introduced to the world as the bullied single dad."

I think I have already made the case that Harry and Meghan have been

badly off.

And I haven't even mentioned that in response to all this vitriol, potential violent actors have emerged.

Neil Basu, a senior British law enforcement official, recently confirmed that Meghan had received

credible threats

on her life, specifically from the far right.

Even so, shortly after leaving Britain, Harry and Meghan suffered a sharp withdrawal from their official security.

Harry says in "Spare" that his father didn't step up then to help pay for the replacement, even though he now reportedly plans to chip

in £3m a year

to provide security for his brother

Andrew,

accused of sexual exploitation of young women and girls (something he has denied), after Andrew's official security ended, and whose £12m settlement with an accuser was also reportedly partly paid for by the Queen.

The way the tabloids can spread unhinged claims, generating a sense of urgent threat to create a social frenzy, can be used for targets other than misguided royals.

In the run up to the Brexit vote, among other big lies, the British tabloids yelled that, thanks to a secret conspiracy hatching in Brussels, the European Union would allow hordes of Turks to invade Britain, commit crimes, have too many children and bankrupt social services.

Turkey is not even a member of the EU nor is it close to being one.

Brexit

won by a narrow margin, with damaging consequences still unfolding for Britain.

My impression from his memoirs is that Harry wants to crusade applying sunlight to the

corrupt practices

of the media and his family's involvement in them.

If he succeeds in fighting the vile forces that he believes contributed to his mother's death and endangered his new love, he could bring a greater sense of decency to Britain, and perhaps even reduce power. of the worst practices in the media.

Good luck.

c.2023 The New York Times Company

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Brits aren't the only ones with real drama: A look at other scandalous monarchies

Source: clarin

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