To feel sad for Prince Harry

[OldManRivers]

Have been looking at the photos today of Harry in the car being driven from the airport in America back to his home. He looks so sad. It must be very difficult for him to attend a huge family occasion like that with his role drastically changed, and to see all of his family but now he's on the sidelines popping in so very sporadically.

Also I can't help but think he must feel sad to think his children won't grow up around their cousins, and extended family. Meghan doesn't have any family except her mother so they don't have any in America either.

Originally he and Meghan wanted to carry on being part of the royal machine and do appearances etc but also have some independence so it's not as though this life was their original plan, where it seems like they're sidelined and alienated. AIBU to think regardless of what's gone on it must be very hard for him to be in another country, away from his ailing grandmother who he is very close to, and feel like a bit of an outcast?

@Knittingchamp - his mother's death was a real tragedy but she was killed by a drunk driver. Let's not rewrite history.

It is very sad to see him alienated from his family yes. Charles and the boys always seemed very close.

Was the MM racism always there in the press from day one? I don’t read the red tops (maybe it was also there in the broadsheets) - was it bubbling under subtly and then gathered a head of steam?

Can anyone pinpoint an event / timeline when the either the tide turned or was it a slow build?

I thought that there was so much positivity around MM being a woman of colour in the RF in the press (assumed from the RF?) in the early days? Did something change or was it always there and just slowly amplifying. Does the racism come from the British press directly or is it pushed by the RF? Or both?

I'm late to the latest 'poor Harry' thread. Have we already gone over why it's Meghan's fault and how Harry is vulnerable???

I don't feel that sad for him. It's very sad that he lost his mother so young, I think the press have been way over the top with their hatred towards him and Meghan, but aside from that he's a very well off, privileged healthy man.

Let's face it, none of us know the real truth of what has gone on in the family. As much as we'd like to think we do. It's all speculation no one knows if he feels sad, how close he really was to his brother/father and what skeletons they had in the closet.

Plenty of people move abroad and move far away from their families. Either because of a long distance relationship, or for work, or for a different lifestyle.

How silly to “feel sorry for” a man who seems happily married with two healthy children and such good connections to carve his own family’s path.

I don’t feel sorry him one bit.
I really admire him for taking the necessary steps to protect his family.

For people who have always lived round the corner to family, all their lives, it must be hard to imagine. However, plenty of people live a long distance away from their family and can still have lovely relationships. People did that when only phones where available. The internet is a wonderful thing.

Look at the Commonwealth service in 2020 as the issues were clearly there by the lack of interaction between Harry and his db. This was after the announcement on Sussex Royal that they were scaling back their duties as working Royals.

It was agreed when they married that Meghan would join Harry as a working member of the RF. Clearly when she was struggling Harry could have arranged a break for them while their baby Archie was small. So while he wanted to support his wife he needed to do it in a way that didn't alienate him from his family.

It's clear that he was close to his cousins and they seem to have maintained that relationship with him. But leaving the UK and his friends must have been hard and I think the time might come when he wants his children to know their cousins in the UK. They renewed the lease on Frogmore so he has a home at Windsor.

Was the MM racism always there in the press from day one? I don’t read the red tops (maybe it was also there in the broadsheets) - was it bubbling under subtly and then gathered a head of steam? Can anyone pinpoint an event / timeline when the either the tide turned or was it a slow build?

From the tabloids, yes I think so. The "Straight Outta Compton" Daily Mail headline was from 2016, and was the first headline to overtly reference a racist stereotype, and the same year the Mail published an article referring to Doria's "exotic DNA."

Harry's statement against the racist bullying in the press was all the way back in November 2016, and the statement claimed they'd been dealing with defamatory articles on a daily basis, as well as having to call the police over pap break-ins. So even in the very early stages of their relationship, it was evidently pretty bad.

The Daily Mail responded to the engagement news in 2017 by publishing a headline saying "Yes, they're in love. So why do I have niggles about the engagement photo" where the word NIGGLES was right over her face. And before people start complaining that niggles is a perfectly ordinary, non-racist word; yes it is. Of course the word niggles is not inherently racist, and people use it every day in non-racist contexts. But context does matter. Niggles is an odd word choice to use in this context, and it seems pretty obvious that plastering a word that's one letter different from a racial slur all over Meghan's face was a goady dog whistle.

The following year the Daily Mail published a headline reading, "Meghan's seed will taint our Royal Family" - the headline was actually a quote from a text that the girlfriend of a UKIP MP had sent, which had resulted in her being suspended from UKIP. But the Mail initially chose to use just that as their headline, and later edited it to read "UKIP leader's girlfriend suspended over racist texts.

A lot of it was subtle, dog whistles and things with racist undertones, rather than very overt racism. This can actually be more problematic and insidious than overt racism, since it leads to black women being gaslighted and told they're being oversensitive, or that they're imagining racism.

Regardless of the racial component, there was certainly an extraordinary amount of abuse and hostility towards Meghan in the press, pretty much from the start.

Nope, you can’t have it both ways.

He has made his choice, let’s hope he will be happy in America but unfortunately I don’t think he will be long term.

Is it true that there were boos from the crowd when they left St Paul’s? I do feel sorry for them if so.

I agree. I wish only the best for him. It seems meghan is offering him support and love that he always seemed to have missed since his mum died.

I think H&M feel wronged and that, to them, the Oprah interview was setting the record straight. They feel entitled to an apology.

the family feel that they have been unfairly smeared and put under suspicion with vague claims about racism and who the right people might be around the Queen. They might expect Harry to prove he can keep their confidence and not sell private family details to the highest bidder before they trust him again.

it’s a big gulf when both sides feel like the wronged party.

on a monarchy basis, H&M can’t be seen to gleefully participate in all the pomp and ceremony that they rejected as feeling “trapped” in. The royals are protecting themselves and closing ranks to a skimmed down monarchy. i presume M&H were invited to events on the same basis of the York’s and Tyndalls, but wouldn’t want to have left the kids with a nanny on Lilis birthday and sit there having every hand gesture and blink analysed by the tabloids.

they probably made the right decision, but it must have left them feeling cold.

No, the press was never over the top racist and 99% of it wasn't even a little bit. THat Oprah interview they did had to pull headlines from totally different countries, or edit them, to get anything like that.

Most people were very positive and seemed quite pleased about the whole thing, including in the press. The tone changed because people came to dislike her. Which may not have been fair but it wasn't a race thing.

I suspect going to Hollywood to get out of the limelight and live a quiet life isn't all it's cracked up to be.

There's a bit of a King Lear quality to his predicament.

I always thought the press were positive towards Meghan, there was none of the porky comments that Fergie got, or the Waity Katy comments that Kate got.

They generally saw Meghan from a relatively normal background and mixed race was a breath of fresh air to the RF.

Charles appeared welcoming too, escorting her down the aisles and if I remember rightly taking her mother's arm too.

I think that there was racist media coverage of her and I think that there was racist behavior towards her from certain quarters. You could see it in the comments sections. The thing about it is it doesn't have to be universal in order for it to be hurtful when it is present. I do have sympathy for her in that regard.
I don't have sympathy for them for the Oprah interview. I think it was in very poor taste to have engaged in that mud slinging exercise while his grandfather was dying. I also consider them to be attempting to cash in on their RF connexion. I think their Archewell Foundation is a crock and their attempts to follow in the Kardashian footsteps to be tacky and grasping.

Prince Harry has serious mental health problems,his second tour in Afghanistan really screwed him up. He was an Apache gunner over Helmand,where he killed many people.

His family is dysfunctional ( how many are not) and he comes from the upper class,who are dysfunctional too.

He married and had children very quickly with someone from a different country and more importantly a different social background( a very different view on key issues which come out even more when you have children,which is why KM was seen as not posh enough for PW)

He has made some serious errors ,the Oprah interview being the worst so far. Now his family and his friends from the upper class can not trust that anything he says wont be used against them.

He saw this weekend that he,and by extension,his children,are no longer in the circle of trust. They will probably never will be. This isn't just in the RF,but his previous friendship groups.

His children will not grow up with all the good parts that he had. They will never be part of the British upper class,even of he wanted them to. These families all inter marry and the children know each other and so on.

He would have known this,but he really saw it these weekend.

For him,he may see it as a good thing. But I fear he has jump from the pan into the fire. He will be burnt by the fickle nature of California,and that his wife isnt actually part of the social circle he would fit into naturally,such as the other polo players wives. He is as lost over in the USA as he is in the UK.

I feel sorry for him as he really needed to get his head sorted before he married and had children,like anyone really!

Counterpoint: it may be better for his mental health in the long run to have married someone who is not a part of the British aristocracy because it, along with the RF, is a toxic institution.
I think that it was the right choice for them to have removed themselves but I also think that they have made some missteps and alienated people and succumbed to the lure of Fame and fortune. I think they will be better off living a private life in California and enjoying their beautiful children and letting the monarchy wind itself down without their contribution. As it inevitably will. The world is full of people whose families used to rule other countries. It's vaguely interesting but of no real consequence.

The Daily Mail responded to the engagement news in 2017 by publishing a headline saying "Yes, they're in love. So why do I have niggles about the engagement photo" where the word NIGGLES was right over her face.

I had never heard of this. Just looked it up and the word isn't right over her face at all.

@Boxowine I agree. I was always surprised anyone would want to marry him tbh with what previous wives and girlfriends have had to endure coming into the royal family!

I think his mental health would improve if he really did live the quiet life,not the celebrity type life that is seems to be morphing into in the US,I just hope his wife would be happy for this.

People have always loved to gossip about the royal family,for centuries! It's odd but understandable in some ways. Its a real life soap opera / Truman show that never ends.

Oh and it's not even the word "niggles" either but the phrase "niggling worry".

I do think the message about not creating drama is getting through to H and M. Releasing the very sweet photo of their daughter after the Jubilee was a bit more considered that some of their past behaviour.