After the Duke and Duchess of Sussex filed their lawsuits against the Mail on Sunday, The Sun and The Daily Mirror, I said I was surprised by the lack of follow-up reporting on Harry and Meghan’s headspace and whether they’re really prepared for what could be a lengthy, multi-front battle against the people (mostly men) who believe they are the gatekeepers of all things British, right and royal. So far…that reporting still hasn’t happened. But both Us Weekly and People Magazine are trying to cover some aspect of it. Us Weekly says all of this is about Harry protecting Meghan:
Taking a stand. Prince Harry and Duchess Meghan’s decision to take legal action against the British media wasn’t “about one negative story or incident,” a source reveals exclusively in the new issue of Us Weekly.
“It’s an accumulation, and Harry refuses to sit and do nothing as the British press scrutinizes Meghan and invades her privacy,” the source explains. “Meghan comes across as a strong woman, but she’s been deeply affected by the negative stories about her.”
The source adds that the 35-year-old prince is ”worried that the recent escalation of press intrusion has an impact on his relationship with Meghan, as well as their relationship with the royal family and the public.”
About two months ago, we were being told that Meghan didn’t read the tabloids and she didn’t pay any attention to whatever the smear of the day was at any given time. I didn’t believe that. And it turns out I was right to not believe it. Meghan has been paying attention, and I don’t think Harry’s statement would have been that “burn it all down” if Meghan hadn’t been so deeply affected by all of the sh-tty stories. People Magazine says basically the same thing: this is all about Harry trying to protect Meghan.
Prince Harry is taking care of his family by taking on the press. Last week, the royal dad slammed British tabloids for their “ruthless campaign” against his wife, Meghan Markle.
“He is looking at ways to protect Meghan and he is worried about Archie,” a royal insider tells PEOPLE in this week’s issue. “He wants to protect his nest, and this is the only way he can think of doing so.”
The royal couple’s aggressive moves have come as a surprise to even palace aides, including those who work with other members of the royal family. Some insiders said the timing distracted from the positive work Meghan, 38, and Harry, 35, achieved during their 10-day tour of Africa.
“This is a separate and private issue that has been willfully introduced and has sabotaged some of the great work they were doing,” says historian Robert Lacey.
But for Harry and Meghan, who are funding the legal actions themselves, there was no choice. “To stand back and do nothing,” said Harry, “would be contrary to everything we believe in.”
I’m still enjoying all of the breast-beating about how It Distracted From The Tour. News of the lawsuit came out in the last 30 hours of a 10 day tour, and Meghan and Harry continued to do their jobs and pose for photos and meet with people and all eyes were on them because of the lawsuit, even as the reporters were bugging out. As for Harry protecting Meghan… yep. That’s absolutely what is happening. But if I can give the Sussexes a free tip: it’s not an argument about “privacy.” It’s an argument about bullying and racism and sexism in the press.
Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Avalon Red, cover courtesy of Us Weekly.
Good. The british press have no chill and Harry and Meghan have shut up while taking abuse for three years.
Ben Stokes has now also launched legal action against the Sun for invasion of privacy for when they turned up unannounced on his mother’s doorstep in NZ pressing for information in a 31 year old family tragedy…. Byline Investigates has the story.
Why doesn’t he call it what it is? I agree with you – what Meghan has been experiencing at the hands of the press is not about privacy.
Because legally that’s not actually a case. The lawsuit itself IS about privacy. He is going after them with what he can and in legal matters you have to make it as clear and straightforward as possible. The issue specifically being brought to court is about the publication of a private letter. If he wants to ensure they win he can’t muddy the legal waters and give the Sun and DM a cause to say “see, it’s not about the letter at all.”
No, I get that the suit is about privacy. I just meant that the press is so blatantly racist, why not call them out on it? Maybe just remind them that he and most everyone recognizes racism when they see it.
“Most everyone recognizes racism when they see it.” Not to be unkind, but what planet were you raised on? Many, many people do not recognize racism, particularly if they themselves are not the focus of it.
The RRs have been called out on their blatant racism, stereotyping, and microaggressions time after time after time. They play dumb, play the victim, and claim there’s no racism in what they’re doing.
Well, I’m thankful you chose “not to be unkind.” If many, many people on this planet do not recognize racism then that’s all the more reason why it should be called out … again and again. In my humble opinion as an earthling.
Are they actually “leaving England forever” as the cover claims? ( leaving for… Scotland? Wales? Ireland?)
I’m curious to see how it plays out – he seems to have found himself a public role and a cause with this, not just a lawsuit.
Before he was known as the “spare” and the party boy and the romantic prince who married an actress. This – after the unholy terrible mess they were dragged through – allows him to be perceived as a serious man in public. It may be the making of him, from a public standpoint.
No, of course not. Meghan can’t legally leave until her British citizenship comes through and that takes time, no matter how many strings they pull to try to speed it up (and I’m certain they’d release the info publicly if/when her citizenship comes through).
Us Weekly just makes everything up.
According to Us Weekly, they’re moving to Canada lol it’s nonsense. Everything out of Us Weekly is nonsense now.
US(eless) Weekly! LOL!
Lies & Style
We had funny names for all of them at some point!
Does anyone remember the Weekly World News?! They were the best.
Harry’s being smart.
The role of the spare is a poisoned chalice and it only worsens with time.🙁😟
Difficult to believe now, but Andrew was the heir/spare and war-hero hearthrob, he was actually preferred to Charles – look at him now.
Princess Margaret was not only a spare and sister to a Queen & daughter of a King, lived the life of a wastrel and was a figure of pity/contempt in her later years.
Seeing how the press have been salivating over the ‘perfect Cambridges’, while taking salvo after salvo against the Sussexes, is only the beginning of how this’ll playout.
And like other spares, Harry will be collateral damage and roadkill for the press to pick on.
Harry is a different spare. Contrary to Andrew and Margareth, he is a smart influencer, a keen lobbyist and an effective projectmanager. He gets things done! Backed by his cosmopolitan wife he will be able to solidify his popular status as a humanitarian and royal ambassador on the global stage.
Andrew and Margaret were also ‘different spares’ for their respective time.
The wheels are already turning in UK, esp against his ‘cosmopolitan wife’ by an agenda driven press.
Even the press I considered sane, responsible, reads like The Sunday Times.
It’s only going to get worse.
In the beginning after the wedding I believe Meghan avoided her press, but after we found out she was pregnant it’s been relentless and then her father’s behavior probably affects her most of all.
I agree. The press has been vicious and sadistic with their need to humiliate Meghan. I believe that her father betraying her and working with the tabloids probably hurt Meghan more than anything else.
Yep.
It’s not just privacy and racism, it’s the personal vendettas that many seem to have towards them. They are furious that the Sussexes haven’t played all and are fighting against them. So they sabotage and incite hatred. They tried to to that with the vogue cover and Harry’s Travel project. It’s like they’re personally upset that Harry isn’t “theirs” anymore and they’re vilifying his wife to get back at him. It’s almost pathological, how obsessed the press are with them. I thought it was just Piers that had an obsession but it’s many of them that do.
They’re publishing it outright. Remember the Telegraph article just a week ago? “Meghan, please don’t force Harry to choose between you and us”
That was disgusting. Who was the “us,” anyway? The witch who wrote that article might as well have said what she really meant: “Black girl, go away and let Harry marry a white English rose instead! Shoot, not even English, any white girl will do!” Like Harry has no ability to make decisions for himself because he’s under the spell of Meghan’s “rich and exotic DNA.” Look at all of the “Is Harry mentally ill” crap these racists are spewing now because they can’t (or won’t) understand why a man would want to protect his wife.
That article was ridiculous, and it made me realize the unhealthy obsession some people have with the BRF. They are treated as characters on a tv show instead of real people with feelings. Some of those royal reporters and photographers behave as if Harry was their boyfriend and Meghan seduced him away from them. There are some really sick minds that worship the royal family.
Of course this is about protecting Meghan and his family. They really aren’t attacking Harry all that much. They’re going after Meghan.
And I agree that the privacy argument is tricky. Like someone said up thread, the lawsuit itself is about privacy – publishing a private letter, hacking private voicemails, etc. But Harry’s statement to the press wasn’t about privacy. That was about decency and not being racist sexist bullies.
Personally, I didn’t believe Meghan never heard any of the bad press, and that was clear when she said that comment about them “not making it easy” to Pharell, but i do believe she wasn’t actively reading all the bad gossip, and i believe she is strong enough to take it and keep doing her good works, and that’s probably why they have waited so long to launch this defensive attack.
That being said, I’ve always believed the negative “press”/outrage And outright lies reported against Meghan (and sometimes Harry), are what actually could have an effect that “sabotages” the great work they are doing, if people believe these lies (and i have met genuinely smart people in real life who despite all logic do believe them) it might make reaching out and influencing the public to be engaged in their work and charities much much harder, and that doesn’t benefit anyone. Also, we’ve seen the effect that happens when easily manipulated people get all riled up by unhinged leaders and press, they can absolutely be dangerous, and the Sussexes do a lot of public events, so I think it’s important for them to fight against these lies so that they can be safer, and so that they have more positive effect for the works and charities they start and support.
hear hear! spot on.
The thing is, it’s old racists who are reading this crap. How many young people read tabloids, anyway? Most of them get their news from social media, where Harry and Meghan are doing a great job! I think the racist reporters are so shook because they are learning how little they matter. They can write all the garbage in the world, and people still come out in droves to see the Sussexes! All of their projects have been successful. Circumventing the traditional media is the best thing they can do!
@MTEC I agree with every word.
@Lanne you’d be surprised— there are plenty of younger people on social media who have bought into this hate campaign as well.
I never believed that she didn’t read any of the coverage. She’s human. How could she not? Especially for someone like her who was clearly very active online, with her own blog, and accounts on multiple platforms. Also, she might want to read a lot of it herself because if she sees exactly what’s being said, she has a better chance of figuring out where some of the “leaks” and smears are coming from.
Agreed @MTEC. The aim is to sully their reputation and sabotage their projects and of course write Harry down in history as the more problematic son of the heir. Also see Princess Margaret and Prince Andrew.
Comparing Harry to Andrew is gross and inappropriate. I’m just saying.
If you love your family you will do everything possible to protect them. The tabloid reporters have been cruel towards Meghan and so many other people. They take pleasure in tearing down and destroying lives.
I also don’t get the argument that Meghan and Harry don’t deserve privacy because they are funded by taxpayers. Taxes pay for politicians, police, firefighters, etc. I don’t see anyone demanding photos of Boris Johnson’s children. I don’t see anyone demanding the medical records of police officers. So this insatiable need to hound Harry and Meghan is coming from a sinister place.
That’s a really good point regarding the other publicly funded people still afforded their privacy.
Very good point, must remember this next time Piss Moron is on about tax payers funding again…
Firefighters and nurses are funded by taxpayers, but they in turn pay taxes and don’t receive free housing, luxury travel, security, staff, etc all on the taxpayers dime. They also perform a vital role in society; the royals do not.
None of this is to say that H&M deserve to have their privacy invaded because they are funded by the taxpayer. I just don’t agree that their situation is in any way comparable to other taxpayer funded roles.
And let’s always remember that in the eye of the shitstorm, the Cambridges decided to do a PR stunt budget jet photo shoot. They are scum.
Yes! And how on earth is it ok for the Rose Hanbury story to magically disappear and yet Harry and Meghan to be relentlessly pursued? It must be so painful for both Meghan and Harry to watch their families treat them so cruelly
I definitely feel that Thomas was the tipping point. The press using her father against her was just vile. I’m sure the ridiculous articles bothered her as well.
And, horribly, her father being willing to participate. He has hurt her so many times.
And even now, he’s still defiant. Utter trash.
The press is going nuts there is good chance MoS could lose and they are afraid Bad Dad will be called as a witness because HE turned over the letter to the Fail. Under cross examination Dad could spill some illegal activity, like the Fail sets up to listen to Dad’s call from Meghan and report it arguing Dad gave permission. Piers is pushing the phone call too; and with the hacking mess that happened in the past I can see they are trying this again through another tact.
I agree. There is no doubt in my mind that Piers/The Daily Mail purposely sent someone to Thomas to “groom” him and make him basically an informant for juicy gossip on Meghan. It wouldn’t surprise me in the least that every time Thomas tried to get a hold of Meghan, there was a third party listening in. After Thomas spoke to the press about the private details of he and Harry’s phone conversation, there was no way in hell Meghan would take his call again. Hence, the letter.
+1
I think it’s been a long time coming. What he’s doing will have positive effects for the RF as a whole, even if the people who currently benefit from the positive press at the expense of H&M’s negative coverage don’t see it just yet.
I haven’t read any legal papers so all I have to base this on is coverage. But the Fail didn’t steal the letter. They were given it by the lawful recipient. That’s not illegal from what I can tell. “Invasion of privacy” is a mushy cause of action but it usually means stuff like trespassing and engaging in wrongful behavior. When Meghan sent that letter, a court might find she had a reasonable expectation that it would be shared once it was out of her hands.
Maybe Harry has some libel claims, which are based on lies. But implications and tones aren’t the basis of libel.
It is illegal based on all the legal info I’ve read about the case. The MoS did not have the right to publish the letter because they did not have permission from the writer of the letter.
@Becks1: thank you!
Signed, another lawyer
@Mumbles she might have the reasonable expectation that Thomas could “share” the letter as in, maybe, show it to his girlfriend or something, but not sell it to be published worldwide. Meghan is absolutely right here.
If you write a letter to someone, you still technically hold the copyright to that letter. It may “belong” to the sender, but you own the words. Having worked with copyright clearances, for publication in an academic work you need the permission of the writer, even if you found it in someone else’s archival collections.
It’s a huge grey area, when it comes to news stories, but Meghan does hold the copyright to that letter (at least in US law).
The MoS lawsuit has been public knowledge for about a week, so I find it hard to believe anyone even slightly interested in the case has not read an explanation of why the copyright is owned by the Duchess of Sussex.
When my brother’s first child was born, he morphed into a person I’d never seen before… protective to the extreme, he’ll walk through fire to protect his family. I remember the nursing staff getting a bit short with him because every time they’d come to take my new niece for some testing, he’d insist on going along…he flat out said his daughter wasn’t leaving his sight. Up until then I’d just seen him as my little brother, so getting to know him as a man who puts his family first now and always was pretty amazing. God help the first boyfriends my nieces bring home, though, LOL.
I agree with Esme’s comment above about the change in your priorities that comes when you take on new identities of husband/wife/partner/parent, and also how he may be perceived in the future. I do genuinely feel bad that Harry can’t unleash hell like a private citizen would…I guess they’d have to cut themselves off from the royal fold completely to do that. But he must feel like it’s a potential of history possibly repeating itself. I can’t even imagine if my mother had died while being chased (literally and figuratively) by the very same group that is trying to set up his wife and child up for the very same possibility.
As he should. Everything good about Meghan the press spins into a negative light. I think she should do the opposite of whta the press labels her, they call her brash– be subtle, they call her eccentric– be standard and routine… that way they have no case no story, she wins.
…she will win because she is conforming to what they want? Even if she does conform, they’ll just move the goalposts.
I agree, Lady D.
Mtec, very good points, especially about an unhinged leader weaponizing his followers. We in the U.S. have had an uptick in threats, bombs sent by mail, KKK aggression and killing, etc. Harry is absolutely doing the right thing and I think he’ll win in his press fight. It’s b.s. the criticism that Harry is undermining the good he’s doing by the lawsuit. The other poster (forgot the name) made an excellent point about the spare royal. Harry and Meghan will write their own narratives and support from the world will only help them.
There is a difference between not reading the press by seeking it out and being aware of what is in the press. Everytime her father speaks to the press or some other story her staff still has to go to Meghan in order to fact check. Meghan and Harry are also obviously aware when the press have proactively tried to sabotage a project, whether it was the Vogue issue or the press suddenly making private planes an issue out of the blue because they knew Harry had an event to launch the travel program. The press actively trying to sabotage their actual work with help from sources in the Royal Family was probably the last straw.
I definitely think they were trying to sabotage their work. The Vogue thing backfired and got it more global attention and support. It was just vicious and they hadn’t even gotten advanced copies. The Travel initiative fizzled and think the plane timing was suspicious and deliberate. SmartWorks was impeccable so they really couldn’t. I think the press is mad and holding back on nasty stories for now. Their whole post tour narrative was disrupted so they have nothing to write now. Hope the Sussex’s feel less under siege so they can focus on more positive aspects of their work and patronages.
I like how US Weekly says “unprecedented” about H&M’s lawsuit when other members of the BRF have sued over press stories. Fits in with their “going rogue” theme. *eye-roll*.
Actually on Blind gossip this is sbout something else.
what do you mean?
There’s a blind gossip item saying that the announcement of the legal action was made when it was to try and prevent nude photos and a sex video with MM in being circulated. Eye roll, eye roll.
Her haters aka dangerous psychopaths have been gleefully crowing about her sex tape ‘being released any minute now’ for 2+ years.
I have seen these blind items about Meghan and is pretty much the reason why I stopped reading these sites. The same people behind the smear campaign against the Sussex’s Clearly have all corners covered. It’s funny cos I don’t think they hardly do any Cambridge blind items, which pretty much confirms who the source is.
The funny thing is that we’ve seen nude photos of a Windsor wife but Meghan isn’t the one who’s had her breasts and ass all over the front page.
If there WAS a sex tape of Meghan, it would have been released the day of the wedding.
I think her Father should be the one getting sued and the friends that had it too. This is a bunch of publicity again, and again. Need to back off. I see it turning very ugly. And you can not compare Megan with Diana. Diana was killed in a crash with two others that had been drinking. It seems like the two of them are going down the wrong road.
Telling racists and abusers to back the fuck off is ‘going down the wrong road’?
It never ceases to amaze me how cavalier certain people are about racism. That’s privilege in a nutshell. To be able to blow it off and pretend it’s nothing is easy if you’ve never experienced it.
Meghan’s been Black her whole life and has a Black mother, so she knows what racism is. But I can’t imagine what Harry must have felt the first time he saw his newborn baby compared to a monkey. He must have felt like the world had tilted upside down. Harry is getting a tiny taste of what people of colour experience EVERY FUCKING DAY.
I’m not surprised that Harry’s going to the mattresses on this. My only question is, why did it take so long? Did he honestly think that if he and Meghan showed that they were really good people who meant well that the racists would back off? Shit, they killed Martin Luther King!
Harry has learned that you can’t change racists. I don’t think there’s any point in trying. The best you can do is teach them not to fuck with YOU!
Oh those blind items. At some point, commenters on one site discovered Blind Gossip, and are you ready, CDAN/Enty Lawyer!
More sites on the KP payroll. I don’t know how William can afford it all. I used to find enty somewhat entertaining, but he became repetitive. Everyone is cheating or a drug addict.
Every single time an article is written and published about Meghan, the reporter contacts their communications secretary for comment. That person would then take the info to Meghan. She’d know what was being said just based on that .
The press know this, and honestly I think certain reporters WANTED verification that they were getting to her. So their handwringing and feigned outrage now is transparent.
Besides, there’s an obvious lack of ethics in the UK press, especially when there are supposed “mainstream” newspapers regurgitating the same tabloid machinations as fact.