Why do any of us post anything on these threads? We dissect, discuss, offer new information, recall history, contextualise. To what end? Why are any of us so concerned about this couple, beyond “I don’t want my taxes to pay for their security”?
It’s gossip about a royal couple, in the way plebs have always gossiped about royals. Tittle tattle. That’s partly what they’re for, part of the deal. Hence all the (completely inexplicable, to me) cries of “at least give us a photo of the newborn baby!”. People feel entitled to a piece of these queens and princesses and princes, sometimes the most intimate parts of life that they themselves wouldn’t share with strangers.
This is the crux of the problem, for H&M and for their generation. In order to remain relevant to modern life they need to be closer to the people (Queen of Hearts, biographies, TV interviews, Instagram fgs, sneak peek inside the homes of, staged paparazzi shots etc) in a way that opens them up to being revealed as people with potentially more and/or worse flaws than any one of us. It foretells the demise of the monarchy. There’s no logical, rational justification for their expense, if they’re just spoilt, rich, damaged, hypocritical, arrogant, petulant, pampered, literally entitled people through birth or marriage alone.
This is where the tension arises. To reveal themselves as relevant and therefore justifiable, is to open themselves to scrutiny in a way that’s objectively unreasonable. Harry is absolutely right. There are plenty - PLENTY - of far richer (through inherited wealth) people than he, with access to a lifestyle he can but dream of, who lead entirely private lives and get away with anything. The media (which is us) eviscerate royalty until they’ve somehow proven themselves, at which point they become your best friend. Fuck that for a game of laughs, he must be thinking, not standing for that. Not after what happened to my mum.
But the media will win, ultimately, because the media is food for the millions of people who pay for them. You don’t bite the hand that feeds you. Harry hasn’t understood this. He proved it with those ludicrous statements about trying to be financially independent and the we’re-not-talking-to-the-tabloids-anymore guff. Savvy royals have understood they need to tame the beast; respect its power; form a sort of symbiotic parasite-host relationship.
To call theorizing about the possible outcomes of this or that lifestyle move “ghoulish speculation” is imputing an intention to the remark that never existed. Nobody wants it. It’s an observation, as valid as any other. Life can be ghoulish. History can be tragic. No more so, arguably, than in royal families past and present. Poke the bear and it will bite.
Royalty is gross, rancid beneath a veneer of refinement. Those with any sense know this, so they either play the game or walk away.