To think Princess Di was killed

[Lavenderfarmcottage]

There OK I said it. You hoo, crazy conspiracy theorist over here…

Yes, I know they had an inquiry though anyone high up enough to kill a Royal could snowball an Inquiry or influence the outcome ? I think it’s naive to think the law is this perfect thing.

Ive always found it odd that she was labelled a “loose cannon” by the press and was campaigning against landmines. It was said that it caused a lot of noses out of joint in politics. I would have thought that weapons dealers and the industry would have taken a huge hit.

There aren’t many celebrities or organisations that could have taken on the weapons or arms industry as powerfully as Diana. It was until then an issue that nobody touched.

Since her death there’s still landmines and the issue has never really been addressed.

I wonder if she’d been alive today what she’d be doing. Not hard to imagine her visiting children impacted by war and maybe even Palestinian refugees, beaming images around the world to restore some sanity and humanity.

I dont think we realise the humanity, bravery and brilliance she had. Could have been going to glamorous events and being a Princess but instead she was carrying on even when powerful people were upset.

I wonder how powerful those people were or was it someone British. Men don’t take a liking to women with power and it amazes me more that she wasn’t killed deliberately in the context of this.

What are the chances she would die at such a young age and to not be wearing a seat belt seems bizarre to me. Just too many coincidences.

@JandamiHash He had a thorough medical screening to fly planes a few weeks before, and no sign of liver damage was detected.

So was it the Russians, arms dealers or the Royals who dunnit? You have mentioned all of them.
Or was it a group effort?

I think the circumstances of her death are all totally believable and in line with what happened.

Fast driving, drinking, no seatbelts, nasty people following them - all things we know happened and make the accident that followed likely.

There just isn't any need for a conspiracy to explain it.

If they were going to bump her off I think they'd have done it long before.

She was nineteen when she was engaged fhs! From a very dysfunctional home. She hardly knew what proper love was, so can you blame her?

Charles was thirty-two and I agree that he had dreadful pressures put on him but nonetheless he had a much stronger position in the power dynamic than she did, and was part of an arrangement that allowed a young woman to be used dreadfully and ended up as collateral damage. .

I think everyone is forgetting that at the time, all of this was covered up. The public actually scoffed at the very suggestion that Charles had a mistress! How ridiculous we said! Silly tabloid rumours!

The affairs on both sides were not really the worst aspects of this although, What posters are forgetting is that having discovered the affair, Diana was expected to keep quiet about it and play the role of happy families in public, the children included for the rest of their days? Seriously? Think what that would do to the psyche of a child? And she refused to cooperate and spoke up.

And boy did she pay the price.

I don't believe there was ever any intention to bump Diana off but otherwise I agree.

We are so accustomed in this country to seeing members of the RF and foreign dignitaries being transported from one place to another with military precision and efficiency in a cavalcade consisting of half a dozen outriders and 3 vehicles. It's a small but highly effective ring of steel.

The surreal part of Diana's death for me was the woefully inadequate security she'd been afforded by Al Fayed Snr which in my opinion was the primary cause of her death. Had she chosen to keep her Royal Protection Officers, Henri Paul wouldn't have been the driver; nor would she have had only one bodyguard nor would she have been chased by the Paps.
And who caused Diana to dispense with her RPOs? Martin Bashir, who produced faked documents which persuaded Diana that her RPOs (and others) were spying on her and all so that she would agree to do the infamous Panarama interview. He really is a piece of work that man, he should have been jailed on the grounds of deception.

Unlike Diana though, no-one claims Charles was a fabulous father.

I haven’t read the whole thread yet. I married in 96. Greek wedding, bottles of vodka, whiskey and brandy was usual on the table. Along with wine. Then people (men) drove home. Not the women.

I’m so bloody glad the misogyny and drinking is not as rife as it once was. So yes in some places drinking was not only socially but expected. I railed against having bottles on the table but was vetoed by my dad and FIL.

I agree. As a method of killing her there were too many variables involved. She and Dodi could have decided to stay at the Ritz or not have gone there in the first place. Diana could have put her seatbelt on. Henri Paul might not have been drunk.

Didn’t Diana say Charles was over her like a rash in some interview or have I misremembered?

Neither of those is any indication that he wasn't pissed.

Not all of them.

It really is beyond question that he was drunk. There were independent witnesses that he had been drinking Ricards all day, his blood alcohol levels were three times the French limit, and in addition he was on a cocktail of four prescriptions including Prozac and a drug to try to curb his craving for alcohol. Someone who was his passenger earlier in the day gave evidence that he was a bad driver. Put all of that together with being told to drive fast to try to avoid paparazzi, and you have a recipe for disaster.

Fayed must have had such guilt about Dodi’s death. Ritz car, driver & bodyguard. Natural for him to be looking for someone else to blame.

She was certainly killed. In a preventable accident. Due to poor security decisions for such a major VIP.

Don’t trust anyone but yourself. Hire your own driver. Always wear a seatbelt.

I honestly don't think she would be nearly as popular today as you think if she had lived. Her death and the circumstances around it made her a saint. The press were turning/had turned on her already.

She would have had her choice to either settle down into 'respectability' or still have been courting publicity - which as a 60 something woman would have come across as desperate.

Did that medical include a test or scan for liver damage?

@Allwillbewell2 It’s perfectly possible for 60+ women to be in public eye without being seen as desperate.

And throughout her life, the media weren’t always positive. She was regularly ridiculed and lampooned, e.g. by Spitting Image.

Lots of people had big struggles in the 80s and the RF were a sideshow.

Though, shaking hands with Shane Snape was a gamechanger.

Why is it desperate? What’s the age cut-off?

I think her popularity would have been feast/famine, as it is for any celebrity. The press can turn but they can come back, too: depending on which attitude sells newspapers/drives clicks.

What would have always worked in her favour for PR rehabilitations and comebacks is her status as a fashion icon – she wore clothes really, really well, knew what worked, had relationships with designers, could match the outfit to the occasion. The fashion industrial complex will always support someone who sells clothes and magazines – “Diana’s fall athleisure” is a huge annual trend on TikTok. Older fashion icons are always necessary to get the ‘grey pound’ and Diana would have had continued opportunities for big public appearances because of her position as mother to an heir: she’d have had a fashion showcase opportunity at William’s wedding, at Harry’s. And because she would be there, and later at William’s coronation, it would have been in the RF’s interests to rehabilitate her image if it ever got too damaging. She’s not Fergie, who’s expendable; she’s the current direct heir’s mother.

It’s ‘desperate’ whenever the tabloid media (not known for its positive portrayal of ageing women) decides it is.

Don’t forget she died in another world, in terms of media — in 1999 there were still only 45 million people worldwide using the internet.(Now it’s something in the region of 5.5 billion.) Social media as we know it was in its infancy.

Public appetite for knowledge about Diana was fed by newspapers, and her often-described attempts to drive the narrative by cultivating relationships with some tabloid journalists by doing things like inviting them to lunch, or ‘accidentally’ bumping into them in a restaurant she’d told them to eat at, so she could stop and say hello passing their table, would not be possible now, because everyone in the restaurant would film it on smartphones.

In fact, it’s an interesting thought, whether Diana’s story would have been quite different if she’d been born at a later stage in the evolution of media. She’d have had her own SM channels for communicating, for sure. How would she have ‘competed’ in the world of reality tv stars who are quite open about setting up paparazzi photos because if you’re on Love Island you have a year to cash in before a new crop of instant celebrities comes through?

It must have been unusually clear 1990s-era CCTV footage to show enough detail to be able to determine that he tied his shoelaces "easily".

Also, do you think that "too drunk to safely drive at high speed in a tunnel that has other traffic in it" and "too drunk to be able to tie shoelaces" are the same level of intoxication?

I don't think Fayed was the kind of person who does guilt.

Hence why she didn't wear her seatbelt

Dodi wasn't wearing his either. Being pregnant doesn't mean you shouldn't wear a seat belt!

There was a documentary a while ago showing real time cctv footage. Dodi and Diana were booked into a hotel, where they should have stayed overnight. The driver went on a drink and drugs bender.
Dodi then decided he wanted to go elsewhere, so made his driver bring the car round the back of the hotel- to try and avoid the paparazzi- and off they went.
Diana died because she got in a car with a drunk, drugged up driver and she didn't even put a seat belt on.

She was due back on the 28th the backlash and criticism from the government over her landmine campaign made her decide to stay a couple of days longer

Not all alcoholics get liver damage I knew a married couple of alcoholics husband number one died of liver damage as did number two she died of old age in the end her liver kept going might not have been the best by the end but she was definitely an alcoholic

So maybe he was a binge drinker either way he drank that night because technically he wasn't supposed to be driving he did nothing wrong at that point, then he got behind the wheel of the car