As Ever #2 Whatever

[PrettyFlyforaMaiTai]

I noticed the old thread is almost full so thought we could start a new one to carry on the discussion about the rebrand and merching.

Are you an ‘As Ever’ or ‘Whatever’?

link to the old thread: www.mumsnet.com/talk/the_royal_family/5277002-as-ever

You've listed lots of things she's done and called them hustling!

I've said whether her hustling has been successful is a different argument from whether she's hustling.

I thought it was generally agreed that she left the RF to build her own brand and cash in? That's hustling. Getting royal status then using it.

The racist Oprah interview was hustle. She thought the victim narrative would help them. Race hustling as it's known. It didn't work for them though.

Invictus she's hustling. Her fake tours are hustle for her brand. Her insta and As Ever are now pure hustle with the faux humanitarian /compassion screen now removed.

Harry I guess hustled his private trauma for money but he seems to have run out of road or ideas.

It's hilarious to me that some posters on here can't even bring themselves to acknowledge she's a hustler if the positive view of that is posed.

She's a shameless hustler who is still hustling.
She's spectacularly messed it up yet she's still trying, that is an unusual characteristic worthy of note.

I agree it's not going well.

It's hilarious to me that some posters on here can't even bring themselves to acknowledge she's a hustler if the positive view of that is posed.

I think people just have a different idea of what 'hustling' means.

I don't think anyone disagrees that she was something of a hustler pre marriage, and you could say marriage to Harry was the highly successful outcome of that hustling.

Since then though? No, I disagree.

As someone above said, having companies compete to offer you lucrative contracts because of your family connections is not 'hustling'. The 'brand' that she is now trying to create is part of her contract with NF, one for which both she and her husband have failed to produce. It clearly isn't her Plan A or she'd have started it 5 years ago.

She's spectacularly messed it up yet she's still trying, that is an unusual characteristic worthy of note.

I don't think it's that unusual, and I also don't think she's trying that hard. Her promotional efforts for her upcoming show and brand consist of a lacklustre Instagram. No interviews, no TV appearances, no magazine covers. Not much 'hustling' there.

I think the word hustler can mean different things to people. I think the original definition has somewhat changed. It was someone making a career by fraudulent means but now I think most people take it to mean people aggressively selling themselves and their business, with little to no expertise in the area, with no disguise that they are thirsty for cash. You see them all the time online.

In that sense, Meghan now touting herself as the new Martha in order to sell some tat to the masses, she is a hustler. I do think Americans appreciate that get up and go and respect someone going after something they want even if that’s just the pursuit of money. Even the NF and Spotify deal was hustling. They were holy unqualified but were prepared to sell out their family for money. Where I think Americans have turned on them, is while they respect people going after the mighty dollar, they expect hard work. Americans work incredibly hard and they can see Meghan and Harry don’t do much. Hence the Family Guy scene when a butler hands over wads of cash with them by the pool, for doing absolutely nothing. There’s no respect in that.

I also agree that hustling is seen as vulgar in UK but that’s probably because of the complexities of the class system etc.

For all the criticism she’s gets, and I’m first to say something. I do have a smidge more respect for Meghan than Harry, that’s she’s out there hustling. I mean, it’s going disastrously wrong and I’m here for the entertainment of it but Harry seems more than happy to do nothing and have everything done for him. There’s no respect in that.

Is she trying because she wants to or because she is backed in to a corner and needs the money though? With all the advantages they had when they left the RF they could have lived happily and comfortably and made good money. I don’t admire her for hustling when she didn’t need to. I don’t think it’s a positive quality in that sense. She is only hustling because she spectacularly messed up. I see what you are saying with regard to her continuing to try and hustle but I don’t see that as a good thing. Most people have to earn a living. She didn’t need to hustle to do that if she had played her cards right 🤷‍♀️

It's hilarious to me that some posters on here can't even bring themselves to acknowledge she's a hustler if the positive view of that is posed.
She's a shameless hustler who is still hustling.
She's spectacularly messed it up yet she's still trying, that is an unusual characteristic worthy of note.

She's doing the same stupid things over and over again, getting the same shit result and expecting praise for it. That's not admirable. That's a form of narcissism.

I agree with all this.
I think the US might have admired their hustling if they hadn't played the victim as a hustle. They thought racism was hot and cashed in but the fact it was family they were attacking made it unpalatable.
And now the victim and race hustle is over for everyone in the USA.
It's MAGA time.

She's now switched to a wholesome home maker hustle but it's not working after the 5 years of victim hustle.

She keeps switching her hustle and it's not working.
But she is still going.

As everyone says frequently on here they could downsize their lifestyle and ambition and live well but they don't.
Meg just keeps hustling.

It's fascinating to see when/ how/if she'll ever go quiet and stop the hustle.

@IcedPurple She's not 'furthering' herself. She's going backwards.

Forget the symbolism re Harry , aren't hummingbirds the only birds who can fly backwards 😀

Well she has got a title and a mansion, so she's not totally failed. But it's not going well recently.

But yes I suspect the best hustlers are narcissists and I'm sure she is.

It's not admirable in a virtue sense, but it is unusual and sets her apart from most of us.

She’s both. The two aren’t mutually exclusive, in fact you probably need to be a bit of a narcissist to make it in business/hustler.

The amount of knocks backs etc that normal businesses have, those self employed. It must be hard to keep going sometimes.

That’s where meghans narcissism kicks in. She lives in a deluded world where she thinks she knows best and just doesn’t give up.

I mean take just this year alone. Completely mocked for the NF trailer, disaster tourist, vanity Fair article saying that staff need long term therapy, ARO is dead, rebrand that’s likely to only last a few months before another rebrand. It’s a shit show

Most normal people would see, that they aren’t cut out for it. Nope, not meghan! She keeps humiliating her self over and over again.

But that’s what you need to be a hustler. It’s the sheer brass neck of it that I kind of have a respect for. Plus, it ensures she will always supply content for this thread 😂

I agree with all this.

This is why she is both fascinating and entertaining.
I'm loving watch this all play out.
The individual psychology interacting with the culture.

I think hustler also used to mean pretending you couldn't do something (usually with something at stake like a money bet) then totally acing it (and collecting the financial rewards). The Paul Newman movie The Hustler is based on this. Meghan unfortunately has got it the wrong way round and pretends to be good at something then it turns out she’s not at all good at it, resulting in all bets are off the table.

Yeh, I think the meaning has changed over the years.

I think the one thread that carries through to be a hustler ….is that it’s an act, what you see is an illusion.

I think of hustler as someone who looks to game every situation for their own advantage.
Always looking for the next step up.

I wonder what Vanity Fair thought it meant when they called them hustlers?

It's a snappy headline for a high brow celebrity magazine.

I wouldn't read any more into it than that.

Perhaps we've all missed the biggest con. Maybe H&M don't need any more money. Maybe ARO and AE are just ways for M to draw attention to herself, with no intention of making any money.

It was the headline, there has to be some meaning behind it.

Also, if H&M ever decided to sue them for defamation, then VF would have to illustrate why it’s true. The reasons that make them hustlers.

The Queen drew the new duchess to one side, and murmured sternly but gently into her ear, 'in this family, Meghan, we take our carrots in the julienne style only.'

Meghan gazed at Her Majesty in unabashed horror. 'B .. b ... but ... not even grated? Honey glazed? Roundels?'

'Roundels are considered frightfully vulgar, my dear. Now let us never speak of this matter again.' Her Majesty beckoned for her sedan chair to carry her aloft to her plotting chambers, and as the sound of the steps of buckle-shoed footmen receded into the distance, the young duchess was left alone in the draughty corridor, once again ... silenced.

'I will have carrots many ways!' she cried skywards. 'As God is my witness, as God is my witness they're not going to lick me. I'm going to live through this and when it's all over, I'll never be hungry for carrot and truffle gratin again.'

It was widely discussed on here and elsewhere as this being a devastating headline for them.

It was obviously chosen for a reason.

It really doesn't.

And the headline was 'American Hustle'. Not 'American hustlers' so they weren't actually calling them 'hustlers'.

Anyway, I'm not going to get into an argument over a headline in an upmarket version of 'People' magazine.

Personally the first thing I thought of was a reference to the relatively recent movie “American Hustle”. Read into that what you will.

I’m sorry. It frankly ridiculous to believe a media outlet is attaching a headline to a story, that bares no resemblance to the article at hand.

The reason why the chose that particular title, was to let the reader know the story was about their business endeavours; that once looked into-illustrated that they were completely unqualified, couldn’t deal with staff, didn’t have any ideas. Thus marking them as hustlers.

You don’t just pluck a snappy title out of nowhere, if it isn’t to do with what you are writing about.

The problem here is simply that in the U.K. the term hustler is not complementary! It's akin to grifter !
If as you say in the US being called a hustler is complimentary then that's fine but here it's not it's insulting.

Also those involved in a hustle….are hustlers.

Exactly. If she was styling it out to get to the top, "fake it 'til you make it" style, then that probably would be an admirable "hustle". She's starting at the top though. With $100m deals. There's literally nothing you can do to fail from the top, when you have the resources (as they do) to hire all the help you need to stay there, unless it's self sabotage. That's not admirable hustling, that's just insanity.

For example, they insist on being executive producers of their own output (Harry & Meghan docusoap, Polo). Why? Do they know what this means and the responsibility it imparts? Probably not, because in both cases they have gone on to moan about how they are the victims of others' production decisions. So they look like complete dicks. And they didn't learn from the first time round that you can't complain about the product you are holding yourself out as having executive control over.

For example: Harry and Meghan docusoap about their homelife filmed in a rented location, not their own home. Everyone cries "inauthentic!" Do they learn? No. She films a lifestyle show, where she's supposed to be showing us how she curates her home, tend her gardens and grows her own, and entertains, in another rented space. So once again, it's going to be completely fake.

For example: Spotify. If you want to be regarded as an authentic, confident, feminist voice, then be authentic: be the person doing the interviews, don't leave it to a (lowly, female, probably shouted at) producer who will later blab about it and call you a shirker because you've dubbed yourself all over her hard work. Don't do clap backs on your own show because you have no sense of humour or self awareness. Don't be a patronising mean girl to your guests. Don't choose some stupid fucking title that makes no sense and everyone laughs at. Don't do a big publicity splash about signing on for series 2 with a new host platform (Lemonada), and then tell them you can't actually give them anything.

For example: Once you've royally messed up for IP/TMs/domain name registrations on one product, prematurely launched a name without protecting it first, pissed off existing companies with similar names, and spawned lots of opportunistic pisstakers stealing it and selling their own products under it, make sure you don't do it again and end up looking like an idiot for the second time. You have pots of money, hire a decent IP lawyer. You look even more amateurish than you did the first time round, and there's absolutely no excuse for this, other than your own hubris.