The British Media Is Trying to Frame This As Kate vs. Meghan. Don't Fall For It.

Distracting from the actual issue is the name of the game

For about a year now I have done a segment on my TikTok called “The Royal Appointment” (roll those R’s). It’s a breakdown of the Royals newsletter by The Telegraph, which is often bananas and, as was the case today, far too predictable.

I jokingly messaged a friend before this week’s edition hit my inbox that my predictions for this newsletter were: Draw a sarcastic comparison to Meghan’s SXSW speech, tell wild conspiracy theorists off for bullying Kate, maybe a small consolation about how KP needs to do a better job, and let’s throw South Park in there too.

The only part I got wrong was the South Park bit.

Image Source: The Telegraph

In a piece for The Cut, Tanya Gold writes, “The contortion of monarchy is not suited to a modern world that is too knowing to be ruled by kings but desperate for something beyond the grubby politicians who rule them in actuality.” It’s also not suited—or agile enough—for the current state of news media. Gone are the days when British merchants could cut out articles about King Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson’s relationship from American papers before selling them to the British public. The fact that it took so long before this latest event with Kate to illustrate the lack of control the monarchy has around their own story and importance, “might be described as a PR feat”, writes Culture Critic, Anne Helen Petersen. She goes on to write:

“Or, perhaps more accurately, as a story long agreed upon: between those in power and those who benefit from it, between those who put on the costumes and those who reveled in the distraction, between those who drew the curtain and those who politely turned the other way.”

How some of them both produce and revel in the distraction.

In her book Running the Family Firm: How the Monarchy Manages its Image and Our Money, author Laura Clancy uses the concepts of a ‘front-stage’ and 'backstage’ for the British Monarchy. There are the media representations the public is meant to see (front-stage) while institutions, like the media, help obscure what’s happening ‘backstage’ to protect their mutually beneficial relationship. This produces public consent and the monarchy marches on.

Who benefits from the straw-man argument that the real issue is that Catherine, the Princess of Wales, is being bullied? (I’m sure you can find corners of the internet doing so, but that is not the primary issue being discussed by media outlets all over the world.) Or, the media combing through photos of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex in a rush to prove a double standard (laughable considering the history here)— which The Sun and other outlets attempted to do with disastrous results today over Misan Harriman’s pregnancy announcement for Prince Harry and Meghan Markle when they announced they were expecting Lilibet.

The British media benefits because negative articles about The Sussexes drive traffic and sell better than positive ones about any member of the royal family. Kensington Palace benefits because it takes some of the heat off of them. After three different attempts by the palace to go on record about this, which journalist Ellie Hall emphasized in a Neiman Lab piece, “how out of character” it was that, “a royal press team went on the record in response to what is essentially gossip.”, KP finally did one thing right in a series of blunders and shut up Tuesday and Wednesday.

Both the media and the palace benefit from people moving on and reducing this to some fever dream involving an online cabal of Sussex Squaddies paid in unlimited packages of Clevr Blends lattes and homemade lemon cake that a reporter understands could have maybe possibly been served at Archie’s 4th birthday last year according to an L.A. based party planner who didn’t plan the party two hours away in Montecito.

Was this a case of incompetence or bravado on the part of Kensington Palace? Perhaps a bit of both, but one cannot discuss it without acknowledging the circumstances that led to this moment. Royal Comms. Teams (separate for each senior royal couple) are not used to getting sustained pushback from royal reporters—especially with the memory of Princess Diana looming large and the effect that a barrage of negative press had on then-Prince Charles popularity. The public needs a hero and villain and the villains cannot be the person first in line to inherit the throne—or their partner.

How absolutely brazen it was for KP to send a digitally manipulated photo of Catherine with the kids on Mother’s Day in the U.K. to international news agencies knowing full well the guidelines for photo editing. A generous take is that it was oversight on the part of the team. Or, they knew and they did it anyway. They knew—as various Photoshop experts have remarked—that it was a composite of several photos and thought they could get away with it. Because they usually do. KP knew they could release a statement in January about the Princess of Wales’ surgery and convalescence till Easter and royal reporters would simple accept it. This is not about privacy and who deserves it—although I think that is an interesting conversation to have in regards to taxpayer funded individuals and institutions. What’s remarkable is that a media system—that has a track record of running stories based on little more than unnamed sources, gossip, or worse, illegal information gathering—stayed silent. I’ve written at length about British media silence and the British Royal Family, including the alleged Turnip Toff scandal involving Prince William, Catherine, and Rose Hanbury, the Marchioness of Cholmondeley. (Side note: It’s been an absolute DELIGHT watching the internet find out you pronounce Cholmondeley, Chum-lee. Yes, like the guy on Pawn Stars, your dad’s favorite show until he discovered Gold Rush on the Discovery Channel, which has been running for nearly FIFTEEN years.)

We collectively fall for the British media’s “made you look” game every time and I wonder if some of that is because it plays into the worst parts of us as a society. People excitedly retreat to their online camps to produce clues and well-worded barbs to best the presumed enemy of their favorite royal. Anything remotely negative is a chance to pounce and enjoy the exquisite hit of serotonin that only rage that feels deeply justified brings. Digital pillories. This online behavior extends far beyond the Royal Family. But, in the case of Meghan and Kate, I don’t see how that makes anything better. I have a hard time seeing how that doesn’t replicate the same storyline that the British media weaponizes: That a royal woman cannot exist without favorable or negative comparison to another royal woman. Like a soap opera with well-worn storylines—inserting new characters every few years or so—royal reporting has a track record of women vs. women storylines served up to an audience that gobbles them up and demands seconds. I'm guilty of this. Most of us are guilty of this. We do not have to have the same conception of change, but I really wonder what constitutes serious, sustained change in this case. Is the media turning on someone else a win? (Note: This does not take away from the unique experience Meghan Markle had with the institution, the family and the press because of racism. That is an issue that still needs to be addressed, especially for the monarchy to continue. It also doesn’t negate the classism Kate experienced early on. It’s the double standard in how they were protected and the continued acceptance of the media treatment that I see as a glaring issue. I do not want to take away the rage that I know, especially WOC, feel around the treatment of Meghan. Your feelings are completely valid and what everyone told you, you weren’t seeing play out in real time, it was.)

This is a scandal surrounding Catherine, Princess of Wales, but it’s not really about Kate. Yes, there are people who want a proof of life photo—out of genuine concern, which was amplified when Kensington Palace legitimized and fueled conspiracies over her well-being with a doctored photo. It’s the Communications Team for the future King and Queen losing the trust of not just the public, but of international news agencies. Based on prior experience, they can reasonably anticipate that their silence will buy them an eventual pass from most of the British media. Royal reporters will probably be relieved when they don’t have to go any further than asking questions of the palace in articles that are most likely produced in order to satiate the public, rather than force the hand of The Firm.

It’s a problem that any powerful institution that is, in part, funded by taxpayers can operate in this much secrecy, with the press largely unable (and/or unwilling) to maintain a check on power. None of this is new, but like Petersen said, maybe what’s really shocking is that it took this long.

-Meredith