american riviera orchard - what was that all about then?

[Tenmus]

It seems to have gone the same way as their Sussex Royal site. I don't know much about social media or PR, but this all seems pretty odd and ineffectual.

I think Harry is in deep denial. Something will one day force him to confront reality and then everything will start to come tumbling down.

He's had years to do that. He's had the money and rhe opportunity to sort it out, and move forward. It's a choice.

I think a lot of it was sheer stupidity with Harry . Not understanding the impacts of his actions, doing as he pleases, saying what comes into his mind, with no filter, a feeling of entitlement, thinking he was funny sometimes, resenting any over sight.

with Megan from what we know it was much more sinister, she was rude, superior, belittling, demanding, insulting them . The way she spoke to the staff. The reports were damning. That she was screaming at staff, calling them repeatedly at home, insulting them, that she bullied two PAs to quit, that she felt it was insulting to have to deal with anyone junior, a very different animal to Harry.

the report was paid for privately by a member of the royal family , I assume Charles or the queen, conducted by a law firm, and then held confidentially, it looked into how they handled this, tightened procedures and made it a workplace people could speak up. The allegations themselves were accepted as so many witnessed it, she was spoken to about it multiple times by the royal family.

and that for me says a lot. I don’t bully people; I don’t shout and scream at them, I don’t harasses them by phoning every ten mins at home at night when I’m pissed off, I don’t know anyone who does. And if I did I’d not associate with them.

and when we look at how badly this has went wrong from pretty much rhe start I think understanding rhe true reality of the characters of both of them is really a key part.

Yes, I've enjoyed catching up this morning too - there are some really incisive and interesting posts that have been made in the past 12 hours.

M&H's constant verbal diarrhoea over the past four years has revealed them in all their narcissistic, entitled, bullying, bitter and manipulative glory. Before, there was just rumour and anonymous sources talking to the press, but they've given us chapter and verse about what really happened and it paints them in an extremely unflattering light.

Thank you for some very interesting posts.

Both H&M remind me of someone I once worked with. It’s all about them and they cannot see how their actions have hurt and affected others.

A reconciliation with the family? Honestly I can’t see it - how can the RF ever trust either of them again.

I think Charles did his best, but he was an older dad

Not really - he was 33 when William was born and 35 for Harry. We think of him as "older" because Diana was much younger than him (19 on engagement, 20 on marriage and 21/23 when she had the DC).

My mother married 'above herself' in the 1930's and her prospective MIL took her to posh restaurants in London, just the two of them, to ensure she knew how to conduct herself (it was nearly 100 years ago!). My mother instilled in us, as passed on by her MIL, that you treat anyone who is serving you, waiting on you or working for you with the utmost respect as they have no come back for fear of losing their job. This is a lesson that some social climbers (aka Meghan) seem to miss out on. Harry? Well, he was thoroughly spoilt by his mother who led him to believe he could do no wrong. I admire Meghan's work ethic and I hope her new venture is a success (as they need the dollars to come rolling in) but she will need to address her management skills to keep loyal staff.

I’ve never understood why the Palace did not release the outcome of the bullying report, if they were never going to release the outcome why announce to the world there was going to be an investigation in the first place? I can only presume that the report confirmed Meghan was a bully but the palace looked the other way to her behaviour so they themselves have come out in a poor light. if Meghan had been vindicated we would have known, as she would insist it was released and would probably have made a statement herself even if the palace refused to confirm her vindication. It was the perfect opportunity to reveal to the world her true character and in fact may have even buoyed their subsequent behaviour, they must have felt untouchable.

I admire Meghan's work ethic

I don’t think Spotify do! and according to their own Archewell report didn’t it say she only works an hour a week?

I’ve never understood why the Palace did not release the outcome of the bullying report, if they were never going to release the outcome why announce to the world there was going to be an investigation in the first place?

I guess they just didn't want to throw more fuel on what was already a raging dumpster fire!

The right events haven’t happened so far to force him to confront things. Perhaps they never will, but I suspect when his father dies there might be some fall out.

I completely agree with you. I also think MM wants to step on the dead head of Diana and become her - as usual letting other people do the leg work and she jumps on the band wagon. I think she clearly drops people who are noise, bullies, lies and is both manipulative and deceitful.
I also heard the dog bowl was about the bullying and rather suspect that incident was very different to what was said by Harry, much like the fall out with Kate. The whole bullshit about finding MM on the floor crying - who does that?! Nobody is on the floor crying over a row - talk about drama llama
I think the racist card comes out whenever she feels like she needs to not be questioned too. She's constantly got an empty smile on her face and grabbing out at Harry's hand - pathetic behaviour - stinks of a 12 year old behaving like they feel an adult should behave
Their whole demeanour and attitude is all fake and lies

I’ve never understood why the Palace did not release the outcome of the bullying report, if they were never going to release the outcome why announce to the world there was going to be an investigation in the first place?

It's possible that they wanted to protect the professional reputations of the staff. Everyone has different standards and tolerance levels. Some of the conditions people experience in high pressure jobs and think is normal would break other people who are just not used to it. Also, there is so much nuance and "had to be there" detail that critics just wouldn't get. Eg, doing a really hard task for a fantastic boss who appreciates you can be very different from doing the same really hard job for someone you know can't be pleased and will criticise you regardless.

Revealing the report would have resulted in it being picked apart in the media and at the water cooler, and there would inevitably be commentators saying that the staff were not up to the job, rather than the job being rendered intolerable. Anyone who has experienced or know people who have been in constructive dismissal situations knows how the victim often doesn't not want what happened to them following them around to future employment; even though they did nothing wrong, their reputation can still end up being tainted in the eyes of prospective employers as not worth the trouble/not having the strength of character for the job.

I would add that the Palace might well have been protecting the reputations of M and in particular H as well. Whatever they claim, the RF has always done just that for Harry, and went to unprecedented lengths to protect Meghan. Maybe they thought revealing the report would be fanning the flames of their discontent at a time when they hoped the relationship was salvageable.

The 'recollections may vary' statement also made clear that any issues would be discussed in private. I assume that approach also covered the bullying report - sensibly in my opinion, otherwise it gets into a tit for tat playing out in the media, and no-one comes out of that unscathed.

No organization would want to release a bullying report as contents would surely be confidential? Particularly given how weighted this nasty reputational battle became.

It's like the (really telling and hilarious) bridesmaid's dress spat narrative. Who made who cry - just gloriously demented; I love it.

Who you believe is entirely based on which side you are on rather than 'facts'.

But I do think, not that it's important, that the bridesmaid's dresses looked lame and ill-fitting and that they should have had tights. KM is a child dressing ass kicking boss by world standards, you can kind of see why she wanted to influence how her dd looked in public as it reflects on her family's image. But maybe she didn't think she should get a bridesmaid's attire formal legal prenup as she clearly needed in hindsight. 😅

The crying and flowers narrative appears to me to be the tip of the iceberg of how much KM & MM were a culture clash curdle. That is sister in law beef you can see from space.

Excellent post!

No organization would want to release a bullying report as contents would surely be confidential? Particularly given how weighted this nasty reputational battle became.

I get all that and @Mymilkshakebringsallthepapstomycar post, I just don’t see the point of an announcement that there was going to be an investigation into the bullying claims in the first place if there was no intention of the findings being released, the Palace could of kept it completely private and the world would have been none the wiser, I find it really odd.

I just don’t see the point of an announcement that there was going to be an investigation into the bullying claims in the first place if there was no intention of the findings being released

Looking at the recent furore over Catherine I very much doubt that would have gone down well, BigWillyLittleTodger, but it's completely valid to keep the result private if only to protect staff

Unfortunately, as we've seen so often, H&M have an unusual take on privacy which takes the form of their own being sacrosanct and that of others up for grabs/$$$$, so while I try to avoid assumptions I have to agree there's simply no way we wouldn't have heard about it had a report vindicated them

@BigWillyLittleTodger the palace is an employer. It would've been seriously remiss of them, to say nothing of very bad for their image as employers, to not have a proper investigation into serious bullying allegations.

You accused the palace up-thread of allowing Meghan to get away with bullying members of staff (09:54 Meghan was a bully but the palace looked the other way), which is incorrect, as you yourself point out, because they held an investigation into the claims of bullying. Clearly the results showed that Meghan had bullied staff, because if she'd been exonerated don't you think that she and Harry would've been singing that from the rooftops and using the bullying claims as evidence that they themselves had been bullied?

"I think Charles did his best, but he was an older dad"
There is video footage of Charles hugging Harry, and that was in public.
if you read the Housekeepers diary, you realise that Diana was very good at manipulating the boys.
Away from the RF there are many examples of one parent 'grooming' their children against the other, so no reason why this could not happen in the RF as well.
That said, it was previously Harry that was closer to Charles rather than William.
In my view he has rewritten the past to fit in with his current position.
Harry stated in his book 'Spare' that his staff were crying at their desks, and after the stories that came out after the Australia tour, I believe the bullying was true

I also these 'real' relationships between father and sons are also at the same time constitutional, institutional and factional relationships.
No interaction can ever be simple or uncomplicated as a good personal interaction could have a bad factional outcome and vice versa.
I think this is what makes it interesting. It's highly political/personal/paradoxical so juicy to watch while eating popcorn.

I'm fascinated that the shameful Andrew has managed to hang on to that massive pile at Windsor when it's clear his bro wanted to kick him out and give it to William. Fanastic real estate sibling beef. But godfiorsaken Andrew appears to have warded off eviction.

The palace can’t publish the bullying report, any more than red bull can publish on Horner or any other company dealing with grievances, they are always held confidential. However the investigation was into the processes to ensure staff had a platform to speak out , without fear of retribution or dismissal. Not to suffer it in silence.

i suspect there never has been a case of direct bullying in the palace from a senior member of fhe royal family like this before, so their processes fell short when it was at that level of seniority,

I understand the bullying claims themselves were not specifically investigated as such, more accepted as they were not in doubt, the other senior royals had witnessed it and William himself had tried to put a stop to it, which resulted in him pushing Harry, goodness knows what Harry said to him. But it’s confirmed other members of the royal family, senior members, spoke to Megan about it before it got to this stage.

it really does appear a given that Megan was abusing and bullying the staff from day 1, and the palace have failed to act fully, they simply spoke to them both about it, and then when it all came out, they carried out an independent investigation into their processes to ensure it doesn’t happen again. They didn’t turn a blind eye, but they also didn’t act fully to stop it. And that’s the gap they closed with the investigation.

It's not necessarily incompatible though. They RF announce they are investigating so as not to leave the impression (through silence) that they don't care about their employees or are actively aiding and abetting violations of employment law by members of the RF; they don't publish the findings because to do so would be to violate the employees' privacy. As long as the employees have been taken care of for any wrongdoing they experienced, it's not necessarily a matter for public consumption otherwise.

I agree with a lot if what you posted, but I think it has emerged that Harry is also an entitled bully.

Harry wrote in Spare about his protection officer (“Billy”):

“When Billy the Rock escorted me back to the hotel, I tried to pick a fight with him. I growled at him, swung on him, slapped his head. He barely reacted. He just frowned like an ultra-patient parent. I slapped him again. I loved him but I was determined to hurt him. He’d seen me like this before. Once, maybe twice. I heard him say to another bodyguard, ‘He’s a handful tonight'.”

Photos also exist of Harry lunging at photographers.

And, just a reminder, the judgement in Harry’s case against RAVEC which came out in February recorded that Harry had thrown his weight around, looking for an individual he could “blame” for declining him permanent security: “[Prince Harry] asked who would be willing to put him and his family in a position of extreme vulnerability and risk …“ I would like that person’s name who is willing to take accountability for this choice please …”.