Did people really love Princess Diana that much?

[canjest]

I just wondered as I knew she was well liked but videos like this show brown men crying!

www.instagram.com/reel/CnOCMtSKK_b/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

I believe she absolutely was that well liked. I'm 40 and I remember the day she died vividly and how upset I wss, I only a teenager at the time. I also remember family members being upset. I loved Diana, she was an amazing woman

Her death was sad & shocking in a way most unexpected celebrity deaths are. It amazed me at the time the grief we saw. Her death certainly elevated her to sainthood.

I find it so weird when people still talk about disliking C&C because of what they did to poor Diana. Theres no doubt dhe was treated badly but Poor Diana was no angel & was the OW in several marriages but that's overlooked & at times excused because 'she was unhappy' It was a lifetime ago but people still look at her through rose tinted glasses

I imagine if she'd lived she'd be pretty irrelevant to most of us now. Probably focused on more like when Charles became King but realistically not of great interest to most. I imagine her fans rose tinted glasses wouldn't be quite so rose coloured

I think however she'd have probably stopped the whole Harry nonsense getting to the stage its at. For one thing he couldn't suddenly blame her death for every single thing that didn't go his way.

She'd be heartbroken, as any mum would be, to see William & Harry so estranged

Nobody I knew was that devastated. Shocked, yes, and sorry for her children, but no one in my life cried or went to line the streets for the funeral. The press are hypocrites, hating her one minute then whipping up national grief hysteria for her the next. I don’t think it’d be much different now, say if Meghan were to meet a similar fate. The papers who have always vilified her would suddenly be distraught I’m sure.

There was a similar thing with Jade Goody, though on a smaller scale of course. Generally hated and constantly slagged off by the press, then as soon as she’s dead they’re all tripping over themselves to print outpourings of grief and go on about how wonderful she was.

Well aren't you just lovely

It was as if people had bought into some Disney fairy tale. I'm wondering if any research studies were done on it.

More like bloody Evita. People's princess and all that BS. And it has since been reported that Princess Margaret visited that same hospital for people with AIDs long before Diana, she just did it quietly.

Wtf? I was in my mid 20s and I absolutely didn't cry. I didn't know her and had no interest in her. It's sad for her children, obviously, but in the weeks before she died, there had been a lot of stories in the press about how she was cavorting around on a yacht with Dodi Fayed rather than spending time with her children (not saying this is my view - I had no view at all as she was of no interest to me, but that's what was being reported). After she died, anyone who didn't toe the 'mass grief' line was regarded as cruel and heartless.

A similar mass hysteria and group-think was then repeated during Covid.

Honestly, I think it was an attack of widespread hysteria, prompted by a primitive disappointment that someone so privileged could die such a needless, accidental death, and that the ongoing soap opera that was Diana (shy Sloane, fairytale princess, peoples friend, human interloper in the royal family, hand-holder of AIDS patients, nice mum, wronged wife, emotionally-incontinent bulimic, confessional interviewee, sassy single lady in fuck-off dresses, tragic pap victim etc etc) was now absolutely over, for good. I think it allowed people who never read newspapers and had zero interest in current affairs to feel part of some notional current of national unity, and it was a story with lots of good guys (the dead saint, the motherless children, Earl Spencer) and villains (paps, drunk drivers, Charles, the RF in general), and when the queen was ‘forced’ to return to Buck House and whichever flag was flying at half mast etc, people who don’t feel as if they have any power felt briefly powerful.

I had just arrived to study in the UK and was fascinated!

I really hate when people generalise about stuff like this. She wasn't 'adored' by a single person I knew. Maybe slightly different in Scotland? Not sure. But I do remember us all making the barman turn the funeral off in the pub...

Yes, there was a massive tabloid campaign to force the Queen to return to London to show her face, inspect the zillion bunches of wilting flowers outside BP and emote on the telly. “YOUR PEOPLE ARE HURTING, MA’AM!!” 🤮

She did a lot of things differently.
Very young when she married, quite awkward looking, shy. She really blossomed, did a lot for the British fashion industry and also seemed to find her ground with the things she cared about. The famous photo of her holding the hand of a man really ill from AIDS was astounding at the time. If you’ve watched It’s a Sin, AIDS patients really could be treated that badly. For a Princess to sit on their bed, hold their hand was an incredibly strong message.
Her death was a shock ( as all accidental deaths are) She was young, a mum, had found a new love after being treated badly by her ‘D’H ( who was cheating on her the year Harry was born) She was the human side of the RF.
The road crash was so sudden, so unexpected, and I think it hit a lot of people that those two boys were alone within an institution. I think a lot of people felt if such a horrific accident could happen to her, it could happen to anyone.
it was a strange time after her death.

Nah, people weren't that fussed about her. It was just the sudden death that tipped people into a ridiculous performance of grief that opened the floodgates for all the sentimental public displays of emotion that have become so common in the years since (ranks of tat left in the street, public crying over someone you never knew, etc.)

When she was alive there were the same phases that there have been over Meghan and similar royals. Phase 1: loads of excitement and adoration as we all keyed up for a big wedding; Phase 2: The media cutting down the idol that they themselves had created; Phase 3: The idol fights back - loads of briefings by 'friends of the princess'
But then there was a Phase 4: Diana being reaally seriously over the fucking top in terms of waging a public campaign against the nasty royal family. By which time she seemed seroiusly unstable and everyone was fed up with her. Until she died. Which was great PR.

Yes, this is how I remember it. Late 20s living in Scotland, I didn’t know anyone who really gave much of hoot.

I think a lot of people felt if such a horrific accident could happen to her, it could happen to anyone

A lot of people thought she should have had the nouse to wear a seat belt.

She had a terrible time from the press, who then made out she was England's Rose as soon as she died.

I was around 13 and I still remember people screaming and wailing in the crowds as if they'd been set on fire. It was so embarrassing. It was a really horrible time and I had a cry myself but for fucks sake some people just completely lost all dignity.

Her death was also one of the first events I remember really getting wall to wall media coverage. Any time you switched the tv on it was being discussed on the news, or there was a tribute of some kind on. Maybe I just didn't notice previously, but I remember there being a colossal amount of tv coverage and I think it was more than previous major events which probably fanned the flames. Even if you weren't particularly interested it was hard to avoid it so I think people got sucked in more than they might have done in the past.

DH and I were in our early 20's and totally astonished by the chaos that consumed London.

I don't think most people gave a hoot about her when she was alive and then there was this strange mass hysteria when she died.

We did feel sorry for her kids though.

I completely agree.
Apart from feeling sorry for 2 small boys who lost their Mum I couldn’t care less.
If that makes me “lovely” too then fine

The day before she died people didn't like her. They were greedy for gossip about her behaving badly. They didn't want a nice story of her being kind, they wanted to hear about her partying with her boyfriends etc and preferably worse.

Then she died and the country was whipped up into a sudden "we really cared for her". Partially, I suspect, because of guilt, as if people hadn't been keen to read the sordid stories then the press wouldn't have been pursuing her so much, and partially because Tony Blair saw an opportunity to push himself to the front by calling her "The People's Princess" and being chief (public) mourner.

I think if she hadn't died she wouldn't be popular at all.

I was 23 when she died. I'm in NZ but every woman's magazine cover featured her for years before her death. At the time of her death we had news channels that constantly played coverage of her death and up to her funeral.

I absolutely agree it was suddenly dying that turned her into a quasi saint.
The whole thing seemed very medieval and was most interesting to watch.

The papers must also have realised that one of their best " cash cows" was now gone and they had to fill their pages with pictures , stories etc for a final money making push. Hence the extreme coverage.

Yes, I think most of "Joe Public" liked her. I remember the hysteria around her death. It was an absolute tragedy, I do think she was then raised on a higher pedestal when she died. But most liked her whilst she was alive.

If only it was final, they still use her now all the time. Endless comparisons between her and Kate and Meghan any time they wear something vaguely similar to something she once wore in 1986.

Agree totally.

The bass hysteria came from guilt, everyone who bought a tabloid and devoured the salacious gossip was complicit in her death....it was guilt.

This.

She was seen as a breath of fresh air into the stuffy old Royal Family.
So many people adored her for it.
She couldn't cope with royalty , Charles did what all aristos did... marry for power/money/produce an heir but live elsewhere. It was normal for that class.

The marriage broke down . She went her way.

She died.

The outpouring of hysteria was bizarre. I'm roughly the age she would be now.
People were actually screaming during the procession of her coffin. Much weeping and wailing. Never seen before.

I found it disturbing but its interesting to note that Camilla haters are my mums age , around 80s.
The next generation down are more tolerant.
I feel that my mum's generation fed into the Daily Express narrative ieDiana , the Saint , was wronged but my generation, 50s, realised that Diana was just as at fault as Charles. Their marriage was a sham but her death was tragic.

The hysteria was very disconcerting. I hope to never see it again.