Or is Meghan Markle making the right choice?

[CaliforniaDream]

I don't know if it actually was her choice or her father's, but it seems to me that it's the right decision for him not to come to the wedding.

He's obviously not at all well and needs to recover from his heart attack. He is also obviously wildly in over his head with the media. I think Kensington Palace have something to answer for there as they should have taken him under their wing from the start and given him more help in dealing with press speculation. But the damage is done and now he has caused himself and his daughter a lot of heartache - that must be causing him stress, and I think he will be happier and more healthy for missing it.

I really feel for Meghan. She obviously had quite a complex and uneasy relationship with her dad. She must feel so betrayed that he went behind her back to have these press photographs taken, and it seems he is also texting gossip fodder directly to TMZ. While there are mitigating factors, he very clearly hasn't been putting his daughter's wellbeing first. If he had, she'd be able to have her dad at her wedding and now she can't.

I hope she still has a great day on Saturday, and that her father recovers, and that she's able to move on from this and have a reasonable relationship with him.

The papers will be clapping their hands with glee, they have years and years of headlines to look forward to with the Markle debacle train.

The Markle cannabis farm is where I would start if I was a snotty researcher.

I wanted a bit more for Harry than this to be honest. Disappointing doesn't cover it.

It's not a legal requirement to go around Windsor in a carriage. His father didn't do it second time around, Princess Anne didn't do it for her second wedding. This is not Meghan's first wedding. It's not. But it is Harry's. You know Harry, son of the heir to the throne, son of Saint Diana, the whole reason it's a royal wedding in the first place.

Insane mismanagement of her family as well. A quiet wedding would have avoided all this drama. Nonsense. Judging by their conduct so far, any wedding between Meghan and Harry would have resulted in them going to the media. There is no way to predict how that calibre of toxic idiot should be handled. Invite them and you risk them selling the details/party gossip. Don't invite them and they act the way they have. That would be the same no matter how the actual wedding day was carried out because their issue is with the status of marrying a prince, not the way it's done.

This was made before the current events but still the most interesting thing e this upcoming Royal Wedding.
www.channel4.com/info/press/programme-information/the-windsors-royal-wedding-special

It may be her second wedding, but it's his first. Why should he have to do the quiet wedding thing because she's been married before?

Her relationship with her family is her own business, as is how often she contacts her father or what contact she makes with him before and after the wedding.

Postponing the wedding would have cost a small fortune, which then would have brought out the complaints of her wasting money and disrupting the plans of people who were involved, attending, or the general public. She would have been tarred as flightly, irresponsible, and not fit to live the demanding life of a Royal with all the charitable commitments, etc. No matter what she did, she'd be criticised.

I feel a bit sorry for her in that regard. Hopefully they will have a long and happy marriage.

AlfredDaButtler It is not the case that every family behaves like this, and therefore would offer the media such a circus in the first place. Most families particularly those that Harry usually hangs out with would not dream of sabotaging a wedding regardless of the bad blood between them, and would simply not attend or behave with dignity.

Not every one will sell gossip to the papers, so it was not inevitable.

Her relationship with her family is her own business

No it isn't, if you marry a Prince fromthe Royal family then you forgo the privacy option. It does not exist anymore. Particularly when the tax payer is paying for your huge wedding and life beyond!

wildgarlicflowers I know that not every family behaves that way. I'd go as far as saying it's highly unusual for any family to be acting so horribly. That's why I said "this calibre of toxic idiot" in reference to the family who have gone to the media.

Oh please. That's not true at all. Just because she marries into the royal family, that doesn't mean we as the public are entitled to know all the ins and outs of her relationships with all her family members. A lot of it will come out due to the press, but we're not entitled to it.

Managed to misquote myself! " that calibre of toxic idiot".

If she’d had a small wedding she would have been accused of thinking she was too good for the British public.

AlfredDaButtler Agreed she is uniquely unlucky to have so many family members willing to sell her down the river.

GingerIvy I have missed something? Her father has just uninvited himself to his daughter's wedding, her brother is writing poison pen letters to Prince Harry and the Markle Cannabis team have just arrived at Heathrow and you are taking about entitlement? I think most of were expecting a happy and enjoyable run up to the wedding, and not this freak show that has pitched up. The public are entitled to have a view, and the view is that this is not the done thing in the UK!

This is not the Kardashians, and if the royal family have a any hope of a future they need to be taking a leaf from the Queen's book and not from Kim and Co.

It is so embarrassing to watch.

Or being "not good enough" for Harry or holding him back from having a "proper wedding" because she was divorced (read that as "flawed" in their eyes).

talking

Don't see the big fuss about her father being there or not.
I no longer have parents, neither do a lot of people. Doesn't make our weddings any less.

A wedding in a Highland castle would have been a proper wedding!
It does not need to be a state wedding to be a 'real' wedding - goodness me, this is just rubbish!

A wedding like that would have been amazing and dare I say it low key. Not this brash freak show that is taking hold, and getting worse by the day.

The Queen is reported to be furious.

I wonder with who? When would one start?

wild She doesn't control her family. How can she be held responsible for their behaviour? Poor you, you haven't got your "happy and enjoyable run up to the wedding." Gosh, maybe think about how upsetting it might be for her and that perhaps she's just putting on a stoic front and trying to rise above it, for the sake of her fiancé. I have a couple family members that would embarrass me greatly if I were in her position, so I can certainly see where she may be just trying to make the best of a tricky situation.

Kind of appalling that people are so quick to jump all over her for something that is out of her control entirely. She's Harry's choice of bride, they seem to love each other, so why are some being so awful and judgemental towards her? Because she's not what you expected? Bummer. Get over it. Life goes on.

Not this brash freak show that is taking hold, and getting worse by the day.

Don't be daft, I expect the wedding itself to be beautiful.

And if they’d had a small wedding the RF would have been accused of being racist.

I wanted a bit more for Harry than this to be honest. Disappointing doesn't cover it.

I think he's pretty lucky. He's marrying her, not her relatives, and she's intelligent, generous, beautiful and talented. And I actually think it speaks volumes of Harry that her family haven't put him off a bit. I think both he and William learned from their own parents how disastrous it is to insist that the royals must marry from 'suitable' stock, and both have married the women they fell in love with. However awful Meghan's family are it's still less of a fiasco than the disastrous marriage between Charles and Diana.

California Exactly. I'd like to think this is the royal family learning from past mistakes. Marry for love, deal with the rest the best you can. Charles was a prime example of how wrong it can go when marrying for "suitability" rather than love.

With all the baggage he brings, it's rather 'convenient' for the royal family that he happens to be having his heart surgery right now. Maybe it's genuine...

GingerIvy SHE is not Harry's choice of bride! I think you will find that she had some say in who she married, it is not the 1800s now you know!

Secondly, yes she can control her family by choosing not to have a media circus in the first place. If they had a small wedding then much of this could have been avoided. We would not have had lists and lists of revolting attendees and then the not invited.. We would not have every last detail or any detail at all. It could have been tightly managed, and that is what most people would do if they had a shitty family that might be happy to see you hung out to dry!!

You would do this anyway, you would especially do this if you were to be marrying Prince Harry. FFS she is not just an innocent bystander, she choose all of this!!!! It is HER wedding after all.

I think Harry should've met him by now. He's got the resources, it was obviously a choice not too and that's not very princely behaviour in my book.

Or perhaps he listened to his fiancee and was guided by her wishes. Imagine the AIBU:

"I'm getting married soon. I'm not close to my father, for what I consider to be good reasons. However my fiance is insisting on meeting him. AIBU to think he should respect my wishes on this?"

wildflowers given the many embarassing escapades the royal family have treated us to over the years, they have little right to be 'furious' over this. Their own behaviour has been far from irreproachable, as the queen well knows.

You seem a tad over invested.