To think Prince Harry should now do whatever it takes to cancel his book contract?

[FromageRouge]

And withdraw his book?

A rapprochement looks possible if he meets the RF halfway.

I do think a lot of people are conflating how the media treated them and how the royal family treated them. Harry really liked the Queen and she ran the show.

I also think some of the specific RM complaints from Meghan don’t add up, Meghan was unable to help mental health help? I’ve got a private doctor app on my phone for £50 a month? I’m sure she could have afforded that. She’s undermined her story with these lies.

I don’t doubt they had a tough time and Meghan probably didn’t want to open a water treatment plant in Coventry, I think she assumed it would be as it is in films. The truth is the royals work hard, the queen’s schedule was gruelling, I was in the armed forces and saw her at events a few times.

Harry needs therapy and private conversations with those that aggrieved him, not a book.

I reckon Harry could be having a few squeaky bum moments about his book now, given his Grandma's unfortunate timing.

The awful thing is that so many people will rush out and buy it and it will be 95% boring old guff that no one cares about. ll be content with reading the tiny number of slightly scandalous "headline" details in the papers.

I agree with this. They are all doing what needs to be done in public but I don't think it goes any further than that.
Hostilities will resume shortly I reckon.

I'm just reading a book "The History Of The English Monarchy" by Gareth Russell. He has a podcast too. Highly recommend.

His missus won't let him !
It's all about her don't forget

So what, empire is still within living memory for the countries we colonised, and still have a commonwealth. Ending an empire (not through U.K. choice we were pushed out) and apologising/making reparations for it are two different things.

I think Meghan throws statements out, the RF are rascist etc which sadly sticks and none can prove it’s just “ her truth” , to me Charles walking her up the aisle etc showed the opposite and looked like welcoming her in to the family.
We all thought she was going to be a great match for fun loving Harry. Sadly it’s completely changed, Meghan has a victim complex and encourages a “me and you” against the world attitude with Harry.
I remember the day after the Oprah interview when the press were shouting at William and he looked so stressed and said we are not rascist ! I felt very sorry for him, it was very telling Kate walked a good bit away from them when they were together looking at the flowers for the Queen.
I doubt he will drop the book, Meghan was never going to be happy with being second to William and Kate and thinks she can be the Royal family of the USA , how she can turn up for these huge events while calling his family all sorts of things is beyond me.

@IrisVersicolor
So what, empire is still within living memory for the countries we colonised, and still have a commonwealth
That's completely irrelevant to the topic. The original point by PP was that M was suffering at the hands of "an institution built on white supremacy".
I was just pointing out that you cant conflate monarchy and empire

@IrisVersicolor I don’t blame my German neighbour for world war 2. The queen saw decolonisation and sought to help, through mutual agreement, her commonwealth countries. Look at the commonwealth leaders coming to her funeral, they’re happy with the relationship.

Yes it should be stopped.

But unfortunately it’s Meghan who has always steered that relationship in her direction and soft boy follows.

We’re all aware of her extremely broken and dysfunctional childhood and family, so realistically what could we expect.

This is the same Kate and William who entertained the Obamas with a slave painting on the wall, with its label “the negro page” hidden by a plant pot. The same K&W who embarked on a cloth-eared tour of the Caribbean that was by all accounts excruciating to watch.

I’m not accusing them of being overt racist - I have never met them - but they have proven themselves to have zero racial awareness.

So agree. All they've done is tell their own story, they haven't hobnobbed with sex traffickers and possibly worse. It says a lot about the RF that they appear find H&M's behaviour more of an embarrassment than PA's.

I see that PA was wearing military uniform last night, despite being a "non-working" royal. I wonder if the principle will be extended to PH when he attends the vigil tonight?

I had forgotten about 'recollections differ'.

Meghan was never going to be happy with being second to William and Kate

I think this is a large part of it as well. There is absolutely a hierarchy in the RF - some people are literally 'more important' than others. I still think Meghan came along and thought that her and Harry could be at least equals to W and K, but that was never going to happen.

It's toxic shite obviously, but it's the way it is in that family, and probably explains a lot of the dysfunctionality. But Meghan was very naive about how it all worked and definitely thought she could change things. They clearly still thought that after they left, given the Oprah interview etc.

I had forgotten about 'recollections differ' - very good!

More dysfunctional than the Royal Family? Lord have mercy!

No they’re not happy as they keep saying, if you were paying attention. But empire obsessed monarchists want to ignore feedback from anyone who’s not white.

Your neighbour wasn’t in power during WW2. The German people rehabilitated themselves by taking full responsibility for everything that happened in their name. This country and our monarchy still has not taken responsibility or apologised.

More dysfunctional than the Royal Family? Lord have mercy!

How was it better?

I do believe Harry went through a lot, but also, Charles is very hurt. William is very angry.

I see elements of my own family's behaviour in this mess. Perhaps Charles should have made more effort to HEAR Harry out over the years but a lot of people aren't emotionally up to that, especially when they haven't had it easy either and nobody's listening to them

I feel sympathy for both parties. For Harry at not being heard. And with the rest of them that it was taken on TV.

"His" book is being ghost written.

I think, unlike pp, the Queens death (and subsequent inheritance to Harry) will mean that the gloves will very off re: the RF.

He won't be stupid enough to criticise the Queen or DofE I don't think but it'll be open season on everyone else.

Meghan will have lots you talk about in her new podcast 🤷‍♀️

Contrary to many pp I don't think that the brothers have ever been that close and no one in the RF trusts H&M now - sadly with good reason.

Hard to have a relationship with someone who you don't trust and don't really like.

I did wonder if publication may be pushed back to next year?

@LondonWolf
I wouldn't bother with these two (who strike me as socks). On page 11 I basically put to bed both their paper thin arguments. They've had to let those lines of discussion go and return to the more soundbitey "but racism!" with new posters. Ignorance paired with vitriol is an exhausting combination 🤭

Hopefully the social capital of being royal means he has a better chance than most of striking a deal with the publishers?

Trouble is it's that same "being royal" that makes them worth so much to the publishers, so it seems a double edged sword
Certainly the family could make it worth their while to keep quiet - they've done it before with others - but that amounts to blackmail, which usually causes even more resentment and lack of trust in the long run

Overall though, perhaps folk are piling too much hope on H&M's normal behaviour this last week? None of us know what'll happen when they get back to the US and with the book, so we can only wait and see

@IrisVersicolor They’re not happy? They’re free to go.

The Lazy Empire argument gets old. We were the first to abolish slavery (1808) and even after Africa and the USA wanted to keep to keep it going (until 1985 and in reality much later) our navy at great expense tried to police this and stop the ships leaving. They were called the West Africa Squadron and men died and we lost ships, trying to protect slaves.
.

Have you not been on this planet for long?

Yes, people will be racist about a child with three white grandparents - because of the one who isn't. The concept was even placed into laws in more than one country over the last century.

You might like to think that these beliefs don't exist, but they most certainly do, here, in the US, Europe, Asia - everywhere. It doesn't matter to racists whether somebody's appearance makes it obvious or whether it doesn't - as soon as racists know that somebody has that ethnicity as part of their heritage, it's there. It comes externally and from family. Pretending that it doesn't exist is disingenuous.

Do you really believe that mixed-race people don't experience racism?

Fffs, it was even incorporated in US law under the "one drop" rule. And my MIL still refers to people of mixed heritage as "half-caste". 🙄

Seriously speaking to be forced to be less than who you are and to be abused by their attack dogs to achieve it says a lot about Kate and William.

It’s not Meghan’s fault that these two are unremarkable and dour. Harry always outshines his brother and we’ll, Kate has never done anything of note.

It is hugely embarrassing for them that they are compared to Harry and Meghan and are always found wanting. They are then forced to behave like Harry and Meghan - more relatable in public. They end up doing the very things Harry & Meghan are criticised for - showing more affection in public, guest editing magazines, hugging the public, speaking at the UN, etc.

Harry and Meghan was always going to be more interesting than boring and unremarkable William and Kate. In stupid and meaningless made up Royal protocol yes they would have to walk in processions and hand waving behind William and Kate. However, in actual impact and interest, the world over have been far more interested in the younger brother and his wife. Look even at the British Media: they are obsessed with Harry and Meghan, not William and Kate.

Who are younger people of all colour most interested in? The majority of William and Kate’s supporters are middle age and older white men and women with a certain disposition. Likewise in the US. Their strongest supporters are MAGA diehard fans. Now tell me this; is this the sort of crowd a modern, forward looking monarchy wants to be associated with as its biggest fans?

Your neighbour wasn’t in power during WW2. The German people rehabilitated themselves by taking full responsibility for everything that happened in their name. This country and our monarchy still has not taken responsibility or apologised.

Nearly all of that can be applied to the UK people too. Billions - judged by today's exchange rate were spent on stopping the slave trade, many - not necessarily officers but working class sailors of low ranks, lost their lives policing the seas and trying to prevent others from continuing slavery. Arab slavers would throw all the imprisoned slaves overboard rather than allow the British to save them. Of note here is that the reason you don't see slave descendants in Arabic nations now is they they were all castrated on arrival - often dying during that brutal process. Was the rooting out and crushing of slavery perfect and done as well as we of today judge it should have been? No, but there was a staunch and majority contingent who knew it was wrong and wanted it stopped and knew that they had to make it financially viable for those who wanted to continue the practice, to give up their slaves. If that's not taking responsibility then I don't know what is.

If half as much energy was put into preventing modern day slavery as is put into picking apart history and trying to force people in this time to accept responsibility for the actions of people who just happen to look like a minority of (rich!) people of that time, we might actually be able to really abolish it, world wide.