Personally, I don’t blame them at all for leaving and at the time I was of the opinion, ‘good on them and best of luck in making a new life for themselves’. I was impressed and I had a lot of admiration for them, I could totally understand they didn’t want to continue with the charity visits for ‘show and tell’ and hand shaking strangers, along with all the restriction and criticism that come with being a member of the Royal family, I can’t think of anything more boring and uninspiring myself. I could understand why a privileged Royal life was not for them, like a lot of people at that time I thought they really were going for independence and a life outside the restrictions and commitments of Royal life, not being owned by the taxpayer who covers homes, security, expenses etc.
But instead of making a new wholesome fulfilling life, within a few short months they presented an image of a bitter and malicious pair, nothing progressive in how they were moving forward, nothing independent about them exploiting Britain and the British RF, and here they are, a few years later, clinging to Royal titles, back doing exactly the RF thing they complained about, but on a much more diminished scale, to the most unpopular royals (bar Andrew, which is no benchmark), the most publicity seeking pair reeking of desperation in their effort to regain the credibility of the RF and the re-acceptance of the British public as Royals, the very institution they detested and which a lot of us lauded them for leaving, so much for living an independent life. Multiple court cases at the expenses of the taxpayer for public money for their personal expenses.
I hope Republic will be out there with their banners and booing for the desperado Royals.