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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

diana - that interview - good thing or not

47 replies

ll31 · 02/05/2011 02:21

just interested to hear your opinions, like many people I used feel sorry for Diana - married prob too young, Charles having relationship perhaps with Camilla etc... but she lost any sympathy I had for her when she did that interview on bbc I think - the "there were 3 people in marriage" interview - - - I still understand how awful that realisation must have been for her - but - why did she do that interview when her children were so young, in school and likely to hear about it from their school friends ? I thought it was v bad decision to do that interview as a mother ,, So - aibu - you decide!

OP posts:

AgentZigzag · 02/05/2011 02:30

You've certainly got good timing starting a bunfight at 2.30am

Original poster

ll31 · 02/05/2011 02:45

I know .. but I just don't want to go to bed! And genuinely it always puzzled me how people didn't get upset that she said all those things in knowledge of possible affect onher kids.... so I'm sad clearly cos that interivew must have been what - sixteen yrs ago or something like that!

OP posts:

Tortington · 02/05/2011 02:51

oh i can't tell you how much i don't give a shit.

she left traditioanl royalty and entered into celebrity. and then you get what that entails

Chil1234 · 02/05/2011 07:37

People did get upset. There was another thread around recently on 'what would we think of Diana now had she not died'... I paraphrase. Truth is that, shortly before her death, she wasn't universally liked, there were some unkind headlines printed about her travelling habits and love interests and she was becoming the butt of jokes on topical comedy shows. The ping-pong of newspaper stories coming out from the respective Diana and Charles camps was like a mild, early version of Jordan and Andre. Once she died, of course, it all stopped and sainthood was assured. I think, if she were still alive, opinion would be split down the middle... some seeing her as a tragic victim of an arranged marriage, others seeing her as a manipulative attention-seeker.

Bucharest · 02/05/2011 07:41

I think that interview showed us just how paranoid and deranged she really had become. Loose cannon indeedy.
And the whole Bambi eyes theatrics was appalling to watch.

I think in all honesty, the only person to come out of it OK was Charles. Because people started to understand his POV.

mummytime · 02/05/2011 07:46

There was a drama on TV with a 50 year old Diana in it, and I think it was quite close to what could have happened.

As it was she died and I for one felt guilty, because we had treated her like a made up TV character. Lets be honest if she hadn't been followed by paparazzi everywhere she wouldn't have died like she did.

Lets also be honest at the time there was enough awful stuff out there, that the interview was the least of it. I mean like the two sets of recordings of mobile phone conversations. I would not like to know my parents had been having those kinds of conversations.

cantpooinpeace · 02/05/2011 07:52

Am I the only one who didn't read to much into her but felt like she was a lovely lady who'd been treated like shit over the years. I'm not necessarily a Diana or a royal fan but always felt a warmth for her and think it's a crying shame she isn't still here!

Groovee · 02/05/2011 09:27

My cousin's DP worked as a driver for the Royal Family and he said Diana often spent time with the staff as Charles would lock himself away. He said she came in fresh as a daisy and within a very short time had been left as lonely could be within the family. The Queen Mother often worried about her as she thought she'd been manipulated into the marriage. No wonder she had an eating disorder with everything she went through.

lljkk · 02/05/2011 10:49

I thought it was good Diana did that interview.
I thought she was a decent person but flawed.
The same for Camilla + Charles. I like them all the better for their evident humanity.

GKlimt · 02/05/2011 10:53

chilli maybe she was both a ''tragic victim of an arranged marriage'' and ''a manipulative attention seeker''? The 2 aren't neccessarily mutually exclusive with the prime exception of the tabloid press who don't do complexity and then influence 'the unwashed masses' opinion.

groovee IMO she was already vulnerable to developing an eating disorder from her emotionally abusive childhood - her derangement wasn't all due to the RF. Tho' the Spencers wouldn't be holding their hands up to having any responsibility, would they.

squeakytoy · 02/05/2011 10:56

She had engineered the "celebrity status" herself though and was quite the attention seeker.

ApocalypseCheeseToastie · 02/05/2011 10:56

I think it's about time you started getting over this. It was a looooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnnggggggggggg time ago and won't happe again because she's dead.

HTH

breathing · 02/05/2011 10:57

Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad move

She was labelled as a bit of a crazy lady after that, all with her made eye makeup and suchlike.

gogo678 · 02/05/2011 10:57

I was young when she did that interview and I remember thinking at the time that I was glad my own mum was nice and normal and not all little girl like.

ZZZenAgain · 02/05/2011 10:58

it was disturbing to watch. I always find it distrubing though when people flood you with their emotions. I had the feeling she had been pushed into the background and had been expected to suffer in quiet and that is something she was not really made for - it had all come welling up, flooding any barriers and she felt the need to do the exact opposite of suffering in silence and have it all "out there". It isn't something I think I could have done myself so I find it a bit difficult to understand. She was obviously very hurt - regardless of whether or not there was a manipulative quality to it, I think when you remember her eating disorders and so on, she was obviously a deeply unhappy, hurt woman.

People were all expecting her to be some fake plasticy figurehead and she knew she wasn't, she was a real human being, pain and warts and all and she wanted it to be felt.

sausagesandmarmelade · 02/05/2011 11:02

If we'd been through what she had been through then perhaps we would have wanted people to have known the truth.

Yes she had flaws....but I think that was part of her charm I think. People empathised with her.

I feel she was a good person at heart who made lots of mistakes(but also did a lot right) and is now dead.....but of course why should her death be any reason to exempt her from a MN slagging off eh?

Chil1234 · 02/05/2011 11:04

"chilli maybe she was both a ''tragic victim of an arranged marriage'' and ''a manipulative attention seeker'' " I'm sure she was but, as you can see from the few responses so far, people are rather more black and white on this sort of thing. They take sides.

electra · 02/05/2011 11:05

I think it's impossible to know what really happened - there are quite a few stories out there. If you don't know someone personally you will get only a view through various genres of media, including interviews like the one she did.

The story I found most believable is that she and Charles were both quite neurotic and as such couldn't take care of each other because they were both quite needy, emotionally.

GwendolineMaryLacey · 02/05/2011 11:29

I'm just watching it now, didn't bother at the time. It's a bit boring...

breathing · 02/05/2011 11:31

When she said "queen of hearts" there was a collective cringe in our house

JimmyChooChoo · 02/05/2011 11:33

I watched it yesterday.She had such a lovely way about her.How refreshing to see such honesty.Such a beautiful woman.

GKlimt · 02/05/2011 12:01

ZZen - I agree with the 'disturbing' and 'flooding quality' of the interview - I found it both entrancing, unreal and repulsive at the same time, like the experience of listening to someone recounting their experience of being abused. FWIW, I think she had a borderline personality and have some inside knowledge of her situation to support this assertion. In common with many therapists and other mental health professionals who have borderline-y personality traits, I feel her lack of boundaries did make her very empathic and explains why the sick and needy had a different experience of her.

Also, think her powerful personality amplified by the media partly explains the histrionic, unrestrained outpourings of grief after her death which resonate with our rather 'borderline' society.

ZZZenAgain · 02/05/2011 12:03

that's interesting

Chil1234 · 02/05/2011 12:26

The histrionic outpourings of 'grief' were to commemorate the world's greatest reality TV soap star, which is what she had effectively become. It was a sad end to the story and the grief was on a par with the tears shed in the cinema at the end of a sad movie. I'm sure there were some who were genuinely upset but I witnessed far more wailing and tearing at their clothing for show, buoyed up by the mass hysteria.

GKlimt · 02/05/2011 14:15

At the risk of upsetting folks here - chil1234 do you think that it was people who were already vulnerable, attention seeking and needy who got caught up in the mass grieving? I only saw it on the TV & in the newspapers, so have no firsthand experience -and it all seemed to be far removed from where I was living at the time.

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