Kate's birthday video "Mother Nature"

[FloridaCheese]

The PR machine is pushing Catherine as being the Queen of Nature, so wholesome and pure, and ending the video with "Mother Nature" just seems so forced to me.

I'm not really sure why she would release a 90 second video of this nature. Anyone else?

Another excellent post, MrsLF, and this is why for some of us it's not so much about the individuals concerned - ghastly as some of them are - as the principle

As you rightly point out, a constitutional monarchy's supposed to operate on the advice and direction of parliament, and we've seen too often that parliament simply doesn't want to know unless it involves handing them whatever they want in return for gongs, preferment or whatever

I haven't talked about Kate's cancer diagnosis, nor have many others on here.

Talking about lifestyles of the rich in Southern California USA (which I can only presume is a dig at Harry & Meghan) is completely irrelevant to this thread.

So my post was stupid was it?

I was responding to multiple posts from @DaphneduM .

I disagree with the few cancer remarks but recollections may vary.

It's not about recollections
It's about facts

They aren't successful as a couple.

They are not independently wealthy, Harry came to the deal as a multi millionaire thanks to inheritances from various members of the royal family.

The business is neither sound nor profitable, as the massive inventory of unsold stock demonstrates.

What evidence do you have of meaningful work? A quick personal appearance by video is not work. Turning up for awards you've paid for is not work.

Where I do agree with you is that Meghan has been spectacularly successful. She actively sought a rich husband and she got one. She is wealthy despite having very little talent for anything, and although she was moderately pretty when she was younger, it took royal money to turn her into a much more attractive woman.

Harry, well his situation speaks for itself.

Edited to say that I realise I've inadvertently derailed by answering this post.

Thank you @Ohpleeeease. Sums it all up 💯.

It may be boring in your eyes but I'd rather see you decrying the posters saying Catherine's cancer is for PR, bigging it up and that she didn't have cancer.

I would say desperate reaching is denial and mocking a woman's illness.

There's a great way for threads not to be quite so derailed by those who want everything on royal threads to be about the shortcomings of a man who left and his wife.

Ignore them. Don't respond.

I don't get why Mumsnet doesn't consider this type of constant derailment as being against talk guidelines.

I don't get why Mumsnet doesn't consider this type of constant derailment as being against talk guidelines.

I don’t get why saying someone is “bigging up” their cancer to name but one vile phrase on this thread isn’t against talk guidelines but here we are.

Seeing as it was a critic of Catherine who brought up Meghan on page one of this thread, maybe start with them.

As identified up thread by @redmangyfox a lot of the references to H&M are not coming to the thread from ‘royalists’ 🤷‍♀️

Thank you. You're totally right. No point in responding to derailers.

Honestly the way this thread was going, the derail was a blessing.

Considering the Dauly Telegraph published an article on 10 Jan with a headline about Meghan making £26m in sales and in the article said...

'Employ­ing simple cal­cu­la­tions, it was deduced that Meghan had sold 862,535 boxes of her “sig­na­ture fruit spread” – given 137,465 units were left and the Duch­ess is thought to have made an ori­ginal pur­chase order of one mil­lion. At $42 (£31) a pot, it meant she’d made £26.7m of sales on the jam alone'

I would say that is pretty successful wouldn't you?

In your opion, not mine.

I can see now why the H&M threads are so popular - seems everyone wants to discuss them 😂

Even when they say they don't!

There's a lot of guesswork there. And those figures are sales, not profit. So I wouldn't be claiming success (or failure) on that basis. (And I don't care either way.)

🥱

I only ever give my opinion on these matters. I can't speak for others.

I think this is naive and wishful thinking.

Many respected royal journalists have described the entire Andrew debacle and books by Lownie and Giuffre as marking a turning point in the way we the public perceive the RF.

It has certainly had a knock on effect and will continue to do so for a while yet.

For example, journalists and the general public alike have been asking questions about peppercorn rents in general,

The debacle has also focused interest on William and Catherine’s new house, oops Forever Home, in Windsor Great Park, and how virtually overnight, or so it appeared to local residents, they have removed public access to 150 acres of previously publicly accessible land, previously enjoyed by dog walkers and others for decades, to create an exclusion zone.

There will soon be questions about Andrew’s finances and his Crown Estate lease from the Public Accounts Committee.

https://news.sky.com/story/inquiry-into-crown-estate-launched-after-controversy-over-andrews-royal-lodge-residence-13478350

“Speaking to the Daily Mail, royal expert Richard Fitzwilliams explained, "There is little doubt that the extraordinary absence of inspections of Royal Lodge, which under the terms of the lease could be periodically carried out, will be seen as yet another example of the sweetheart deal between the Crown Estate and Andrew."

Extraordinary indeed given how the deal with unique terms depended upon Andrew sticking to a maintenance schedule and yet the property wasn’t inspected for twenty-two years!

https://www.marieclaire.com/celebrity/royals/ex-prince-andrew-failure-to-inspect-royal-lodge-high-profile-disasters-expert/

Interest has also focused on why Sophie and Edward get to live in a £30 million pound mansion for much less than the market rate.
Interesting to note how relatively quiet their PR has been of late.

And while the UK government and Leader of the House have shown no spine and have rejected requests from MPs to table questions about Andrew in the H of C and circumvent Erskine May, the Epstein enquiry rumbles on the D of J in the USA and it won’t be going away in a while

https://abcnews.go.com/US/epstein-files-2-million-records-stages-review-doj/story?id=128935822

Personally, what has sparked my interest as an ordinary member of the great British public, is having read lots of accounts of Sarah Ferguson in the past being invited by charities to attend events and the charities paying “expenses” , I would like to look further in to how this system works more broadly with current members of the RF.

I naively assumed that the Royals visited their good causes free of charge, but apparently not, and fwiw, I would like to find out more about how these deals are arranged. As ever with the RF, and this is sheer supposition on my part, I suspect these arrangements are kept quiet for a reason?

It’s down to William that he has been stripped of titles and his home, a taste of things to come when he is King
I read that it was Charles who'd had and William was worried about Andrews mental health. Whatever the truth of either of those stories, it does demonstrate that the 2 PR teams seem to be in competition with each other for good publicity. It seems the way with them. They are a 'family' but not a particularly close or supportive one. The survival of the institution is the ultimate and main goal.

Often what happens is you recover and have to go back to work before they try and dismiss, or move you out of your role. It's fraught with anxiety about whether your illness will return.

It's a nice gesture (the video) but I think its such a personal thing - I don't want to like I did my illness wrong. So I suppose she tried to keep it generic about nature. And it's true your perspective does change.