Harry and Meghan - OP updated with Threadbanned Users 4/5/21

Bollox they do. You forgetting about the millions in rental property they own, and their special ability to grant themselves tax carve outs ?

So hereditary grifters, sitting on billions of pounds worth of land that by rights should be owned by the State.

The government, British people, the public etc. Whatever pedantry you want to dive into, spare me. The monarchy do nothing except leech public funds and dodge taxes. The idea that they bring in tourist money, like there's tickets being sold to see Prince William standing behind glass like a zoo animal, is laughable.

Listen, serious question - do you think all the cousins are in a WhatsApp group wondering wtf is going on?

A suggestion now the car photo from yesterday is a fake too!

Car pic included here.

I see Meghan won against her sister's defamation case. It was dismissed with prejudice because

https://www.express.co.uk/news/royal/1876697/meghan-markle-samantha-defamation-case

Exactamente!!

Nothing to do with H&M if the palace or whoever are playing Nancy Drew mysteries.

A senior member of the royal family is openly lying to a public who pay for her opulence.

If she is trying to make complete mugs of people who fund her existence than that is newsworthy.

Meghan being blamed for climate change or whatever because she eats an avocado isn't.

Well, once the genie is out of the bottle, it’s important recognise what’s happened and react accordingly. I’m nothing if not pragmatic.

Highly unlikely they're a laughing stock, I'm sure the majority of the US couldn't give a **** about how or why William took a photo of his family.

Social media eh? The latest ones are that Kate tried to commit suicide at Christmas and "they" have been trying to manage her ever since. Like Diana throwing herself down the stairs. Like Meghan feeling suicidal. A misogynistic institution. Another is that she asked for a divorce at Christmas and William beat her up so badly she has been recovering ever since. Or that her face from a former cover of Vogue was used to superimpose on the Mothers Day picture. Or that a picture of them leaving in a car recently has some bricks in the background that differ from the window and above the car. It's all going the way that Kate could do a walkabout in a few days or weeks and social media people will claim it is done with AI and CGI.

People in histrionics because a sleeve was misaligned. The people who churn this stuff out are to my mind no different from those who have been scrutinising the Sussexes for hidden mics or doing hour long videos on body language. It is a grift, there is money to be made from such madness and clearly there is an audience for it all. Social media is awash with a lack of critical thinking, a distrust of institutions (in this case the British Monarchy) and a refusal to listen to facts i.e. this Rose affair still having legs. W&K have done engagements for decades but you'll still get such people rigidly believing they are divorcing, beating each other up, that they hate each other etc. It's akin to people still firmly believing Obama, for example, wasn't born in America, is a Muslim...etc. How do you manage that? How can you even try? You can't reason with people who haven't used reason to begin with to establish their beliefs. A YouGov poll taken a week back (of people who fund the monarchy) found that half of respondents back in reality land felt that the details of Kates illness provided were sufficient.

Make no mistake, Kensington Palace dropped the ball here. They should have been aware of the litany of conspiracy theories and speculations. Dropping a photo with errors only threw petrol on a bonfire on social media. Everything comes under scrutiny to feed biases. CNN doing a review of previous pictures. Crazy. A professional shot should have been done but, importantly, even that wouldn't sway or satiate those who despise W&K, the monarchy etc. It's a lessons learned job and warning about what is coming. Funnily enough, despite the good natured intention, it didn’t take a propaganda, mis/disinformation or conspiracy photo for me to learn about what a KILL NOTIFICATION in the media is. It took a mothers day photo to do that.

Another thing this fiasco has taught me is that this notion of Williams supposed quid pro quo dealing with the Devil of the media concept is blown away. Quite the opposite. They have been hammered. Over, of all things, an edited mothers day photo. The media have embarrassed themselves with the ridiculous amount of coverage given to this. I never gave much thought to William/Kate/KP having copyright over images. I have no in depth knowledge of such copyright law but I believe there is financial repercussions for the media in KP having control of such images (e.g. the Mothers Day one with tens of millions of views/clicks). They don’t own the images, can’t sell them. A big FU from William who may well hate the media himself. I think there has perhaps been such a pent up resentment regarding access and control that the media have lost their minds when given half a chance to go in studs showing. The royals are a money spinner. H&M and their life and PR provides ample and ongoing fuel for spinning that money e.g. I don't recall any KILL NOTIFICATION when Misan Harriman superimposed a tree into the "Notting Hill" B&W image when Meghan was pregnant with Archie. Most could care less. People understand that images are edited, altered. Think Harry and his full head of hair. No one sane or rational loses their minds. One thing about this is that a royal family at peace is not a good thing for the media. H&M have been fuel for this concept and are covered so extensively as a consequence.

W&K have control. Presumably they want to retain control. The same protection of their family that the Sussexes are lauded for. The media would love to have the access to a future Queens illness and recovery. Warts and all. They haven't been given that and it has been a dilemma as to how to manage it. They are P&POW, a future King and Queen and so are public facing people. Where is the line as such for access. Given that they will soon be King and Queen given Charles' advanced age then I think this has been a media gambit to chink their defence and bully back some control. If anything I think their overreaction to an edited photo will mean less access and an increased animosity, an animosity which will be more than happy to spread and share the utter manure stemming from social media.

I think much like social media you are overthinking it TBH.

The Palace are parroting the line Kate is fine.

Then they release a fake photo to prove it, which Kate had to apologise for.

It is certainly newsworthy at least in Britain.

At best they are making mugs out of the paying British public.

It's not going down well, even the staunch dribblers are starting to turn.

SNL have been mocking your beloved Harry for years. Its not a new thing that the royals are a punchline.

How would a press team and private secretaries react to a senior royal saying she wanted to convalesce in private and until they were ready I suppose. To do engagements and be visible is asking a sick woman to perform but that woman is the Princess of Wales and a future Queen so I would deem how this was managed as akin to a compassionate failure i.e. the longer the recovery went on the bigger the social media powder keg got. Hindsight is wonderful and no one was expecting Kate to do full on engagements straight after a suregry but, to stem the whole Where is Kate? histrionics then maybe, once she felt up to it, some patronages and charities could have been engaged with via phone calls or Zoom calls with their social media channels disseminating the details. Like what they did during the first Covid lockdown. And with professional photographs! People like Chris Ship will always still say that the foliage is too green but some things just can't be managed. She was seen out recently so I think this is maybe what they'll do now to fill the void between recovery and back to full duties. It was a void which they allowed speculation and conspiracies to reach a frenzy point.

Harry isn’t a working Royal. He’s not representing Britain diplomatically abroad and doesn’t have anything to do with ‘The Firm’ at this time. This is all primarily William’s mess via Kensington Palace PR and for once they’ve nowhere to hide and no Harry and Meghan or indeed even Kate to throw under to bus to hide his own incompetence. They have tried to use Kate as the fall person but I don’t think blaming a sick wife who hasn’t been seen in months is going to work out well for them, do you?