"They don't just report the news, they create it": on Meghan, Harry and the Press

[MrsMaxDeWinter]

The much trumpeted story of the Dior deal is such a classic tabloid creation, isn't it.

I enjoyed this Grazia article that lays bare the utter nuttiness.

First the tabloids report the rumours as though they are true.

"Meghan to sign with Dior!"

No sources, just speculation based on Meghan and Harry wearing clothes by Dior a handful of times.

Then when both the Sussexes and Dior report that the rumours are not true, (Dior spokesperson said they are "nonplussed" about where the rumours came from) they spin it into "Meghan Rebuffed by Dior!"

This has also happened with Meghan's much rumoured run for the presidency: Robert Jobson actually wrote, with a straight face, in his book published in April 2023, that she was absolutely, certainly and most definitely going to run for president in 2024.

I mean any critical person would realise that the timelines don't make sense, she would have needed a fundraising Super PAC by the time the book was published, and in any event, Democrats don't normally challenge a sitting president ... but hey ho, Meghan is running for president in 2024 because a "Royal Correspondent" said so (and they are so knowledgeable about the American presidency) and a tabloid published it.

And it's the same with The Tig. She is going to launch it any day now. She wants to rival Gwyneth Paltrow! Story after story, based on nothing but speculation.

Rumour after rumour, speculation published as "news" to create media stories about a woman whose plans are not known to the tabloids because she and her husband made it crystal clear even when they were in the UK that they don't engage with the tabloid press.

And there are no "palace sources" who can speak with any kind of plausibility about the Sussexes, so the tabloids make it up as they go along, whipping up headline after headline, driving their readers into a frenzy over things they create ...

While ignoring the important news, like the damning questions by the judge in the Mirror Group case, who asked why the journalists, among them Piers Morgan, have not come to court to testify in the phone hacking trial ...

Oh no, that's not as important to report on as Meghan's fictitious Dior deal, completely implausible rumours of her presidential ambitions, and the speculated upon plans to best Gwyneth Paltrow!

https://graziadaily.co.uk/life/in-the-news/meghan-markle-smear-campaign-dior-spotify-faking-interviews/

I don't think that on its own explains the number of threads and the posters who seem to make it a hobby to dissect and criticise them. It's a quirk of human nature that we tend to engage more with stories or issues that are perceived negatively, and to choose scapegoats as 'legitimate' targets to receive a disproportionate amount of animus and criticism. Obviously it's also a conscious choice, at least insofar as we can recognise the phenomenon and decide whether or not to participate in it.

Great discussion on the latest poll!

I am curious though -- until when will they keep making Meghan and Harry part of the polling?

At some point will they add their kids too?

it annoys me when people say H changed and blame M. most people change when they marry and start a family. its called growing up.life isn't carefree once you have children. if your family have been not nice to your spouse, you will defend your spouse(hopefully)
look at the threads on here, someone posts about their inlaws being mean, the first question seems to be what did your DH do to support you.

yes, it isn't something that just happens to Meghan, as she says herself, its a common misogyny-based criticism of women only. These poor idiot men are seduced and corrupted by the devil-women. It's embarrassingly juvenile for people to continue with this boring claim in this day and age.

Yes, those people were in the poll as well. Camilla came above all three yorks.

Yes, when they're adults. Edward's children will the next to be added.

Fantastic news for the King and Queen - no need then for people to obsess over people so uniformly disliked.

I now think he has actually always been difficult and hard work and his family have managed his anger for years ( and probably happy it’s not their responsibility anymore) but I think that’s why Meghan is more disliked ( arguably unfairly)

This is very interesting - I always view his family as very abusive!

Especially Prince Charles.

He reads particulary bad to me as he wrote a book about our late Queen and Prince Phillip. He said dreadful things about QE11 and DoE, about the way they raised him, how cold they were and so on.

It seems he has turned around and done exactly the same thing in spite of having every resource under the sun.

He seems greedy, selfish, petty and mean.

They're not universally disliked, though. On the contrary, Charles and Camilla's popularity has risen. Although, I guess it'll go up and down according to what's in the news.
Gotta say, though, I doubt anyone obsesses over them. 😄

I think you have misunderstood @skullbabe comment 😂

You’ve misunderstood - I’m saying that it’s good news for the King and Queen and in the press/British public that Harry and Meghan are so uniformly disliked. People can now stop talking so much about H&M seeing as they can be reassured of their unpopularity.

You’ve misunderstood - I’m saying that it’s good news for the King and Queen and in the press/British public that Harry and Meghan are so uniformly disliked. People can now stop talking so much about H&M seeing as they can be reassured of their unpopularity.

Oh, I see. It looks to me like Charles and William have made some sort of peace and I love it that there's no constant barrage of bad articles coming out as in Charles and Diana times which was horrible and unsettling It's much more relaxing now.

Any stories that stir up trouble have come mainly from Harry. So I, too, wish the press would stop reporting his crap. They're a bit like an addiction, the longer you go without, the less you miss them. 😄 So I wish the press would give us a chance to go through a withdrawal. Although I have to say, none of my family or friends ever talk about Harry or Meghan. That's why I have to come on here for my fix. 😆 You're on here a lot so I guess you're the same.

I’m really happy that the RF and the media establishment can now rest easy with these polls that there is no risk to them at all by the 2 who left and can get on with it and leave them to it now. Hopefully this spells the end of the endless reporting about them.

From your typing fingers to god’s ear skullbabe :)

@MrsMaxDeWinter glad to see you back here, and thank you for starting this thread( ( off topic but just wanted to say I finally got around to looking up Cornel West today and yes - he’s a very interesting man with some wonderful ideas. Next to no chance of being President - unfortunately. I intend to read more about him. If he can lift and widen the debate that’s a win for America).

Back on topic, Iwantcakeeveryday mentioned earlier in the thread that it seemed that many people didn’t realize the extent of the Murdoch media toxic empire - so for those who are interested, here’s just some of his media interests (sourced from wiki). It’s not all he owns (and don’t forget his internet news arms - huge).

Through his company News Corp, he is the owner of hundreds of local, national, and international publishing outlets around the world, including in the UK (The Sunand The Times), in Australia (The Daily Telegraph, Herald Sun, and The Australian), in the US (The Wall Street Journal and the New York Post), book publisher HarperCollins, and the television broadcasting channels Sky News Australiaand Fox News (through the Fox Corporation).

This is just one of the powerful media magnates (NGN) Harry and others are taking on. Of course Murdoch is going to come after Harry (and Meghan also, as we’ve seen) in a big way. So are the other media he’s suing - MGM and AP. And many media interests who are not being sued by Harry are proving happy to jump on the money making bandwagon of hating Harry and Meghan - it’s very profitable for them with people hate-clicking on any articles about them. I absolutely agree with MrsMax that we are now seeing the media construction and implementation of a narrative of failure for H&M. I am seeing even broadsheets indulging in tabloid standard articles about them.

You’re absolutely right that the broadsheets are jumping onto the bandwagon now. It’s a shame because of course reputation is essential to building business relationships and the overwhelming negativity would make even the most positive partnership team nervous. However they’ll be alright.

And the Wall Street Journal (murdoch owned). has just had a swipe at Meghan and Harry., I read.

It’s been mentioned on RF threads before, that King Charles considers taking on the media to be a ‘suicide mission.’ In a way this is proving Charles might be right. But hopefully what will ultimately come of this is that more and more people will become aware of the power and ever growing perniciousness of some sections of the media. I believe in a free independent press, but I believe a free independent press must also be a responsible press. We are seeing a great deal of ’free and independent’ but not much of the ‘responsible.’ Journalistic integrity is being throttled by these big media owners - it must be so depressing for the journalists who want to do a good job and produce proper investigative journalism.

Someone else on here said that today, Woodward and Bernstein could not investigate Watergate. I agree. Media magnates would not allow it, unless it suited them.

The Wall Street Journal article is definitely a Murdoch stable hit piece.

How many startups expect instant success?

Three years in and Meghan and Harry are branded frauds, failures, shysters, grifters ... in circumstances where other entrepreneurs would be given much more grace and space to succeed, and in circumstances where actually, their projects are successful, and certainly more successful than many of their peers (Spare, Docuseries, even the podcast!)

I don't think you can blame the grifters comment on Rupert Murdoch. 😂😂
Who called them frauds and shysters? I missed that.

There's no grace when you're being paid 10s of millions of dollars. This is the real world of American business. You get paid big. You're expected to perform big. They received $20m and in 2½ yrs they produced 12 episodes. Harry hadn't even got an idea of a podcast. These are businesses worrying about their bottom line. If people don't produce, they're gone.

I think if M and H had wanted to be a normal start up and just like everyone else , that’s exactly what they should have done. Learnt the skills , worked quietly, practised , started small etc
but they did the exact opposite and hence the criticism now.
which they can’t really complain about as they are the ones that took the £20 million deal. They could have said, look we are inexperienced and not worth that much, but we want to learn and will start small like everyone else and taken a much smaller deal.
They could have a growing audience rather than a collapsing one.

I for one believe it's the first time I hear a no1 podcast that remained within the top 10/20 even in non English countries being called a failure.

WSJ was weird in reporting this. Now, I see someone has explained they are part of Murdock empire.

What's funny to me is how Harry and Meghan somehow, let media empires reveal themselves more and more.

No doubt everyone rolls their eyes at comments from the Sun/Mail etc. We are used to it, another H&M blast, no one takes them seriously. However, they then had to move on to broadsheets like Times/NYP/Fox. Ok so we already knew that Fox/NYP are right wing hacks.

But, am I the only one who was rather surprised that Valentine Lowe from the Times seemed rather doggered in his harassment of Harry and Meghan - I didn't even know the times reported on the royals let alone, have some kind of royal correspondent. He later had a book out, I guess after seeing how much money the royals bring in.

I guess the times learned from Camilla Tominey - with her niche columns bashing Meghan, that in fact a lot of money is made, for little work and research - ie, you can make it up and twist it as you go and have humungous profits for it.

They don't have a collapsing audience. Not even close. Every event they do is sold out, every book /doc/ podcasts at no1.

Other people are making a lot of money in their name.

I guess the times learned from Camilla Tominey - with her niche columns bashing Meghan, that in fact a lot of money is made, for little work and research - ie, you can make it up and twist it as you go and have humungous profits for it.

The Times learned from Tominey that a lot of money is made for little work.
And then apparently, Harry and Meghan learned that from The Times. 🤣

But it’s considered a failure as it’s come out of a £20 million deal. In that context a 13 episode podcast is a failure. There’s many podcasts out there that produce weekly content for years that don’t have such a lucrative deal.
if it had been a £500k deal it would be considered a success.
it’s the deal itself that makes it a failure in the same way that a marvel movie that brings in £ 55 million first weekend is a flop as it cost £100 million. But a small indie film with a £2million budget would be considered a huge success if it made that much opening weekend.
and that’s where M and H went wrong imo. Going for the biggest deal possible rather than starting small and building a brand upwards.

Which is good on them, considering everyone is making money on their backs. Atleast Harry and Meghan are not twisting things and lying to force that money out.

@MarcelProust

The Times and Sunday Times are Murdoch papers too.😁

There is no escaping him.

In the US he owns Fox News, WSJ, the New York Post, and its offshoot Page Six ...

All of them have been uniformly negative about Harry and Meghan.

Valentine Low is one of the commentators who seem to be itching for something horrible to happen to Meghan so that Harry can return to the UK alone.

"While she has breath in her body," he once declared. "her kids will remain with her and for that reason, Harry will not return to the Uk".

Okay then!

They could have said, look we are inexperienced and not worth that much, but we want to learn and will start small like everyone else and taken a much smaller deal.

Nobody does that in a capitalist system and it’s very odd that you would expect them to. People should be paid the highest amount that a company is willing to pay them. That’s how it works. Did Spotify take a gamble? Yes and now they’ve had to lay off large amounts of staff and downsize e side they’ve overextended themselves in many ways but you cannot blame the people Spotify invested in for the amount Spotify invested in them.