Why losing the Sussex title could make Meghan Markle a real princess
Lady Colin Campbell made history in 1992 when the Jamaican-born socialite published Diana in Private: The Princess Nobody Knows, the first biography to be issued claims that the princess had suffered from an eating disorder and cheated with her riding instructor James Hewitt.
The title caused a sensation, and while many initially dismissed what initially seemed like a lurid artificial tale, its narrative was soon buttressed by the publication of Andrew Morton's explosive play. Diana: her true story.
Since then, Lady Colin has poked fun at the world of royal commentary and in recent years she has appeared on breakfast television to deliver regular doses of Sussex-related sound bites that make headlines.
Lady Colin has now gone one step further, launching an online petition asking Prince Harry to "voluntarily ask the queen to suspend her royal style, titles and rank." At the time of publication it has more than 39,000 signatures.
Given all the recent revelations from the royal couple regarding suicidal thoughts, shocking racism, neglectful parenting, and royal bullying, Lady Colin's politicking is not particularly inflammatory.
However, we do have to talk about Harry and Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex and her troublesome titles. Because, oddly enough, it might actually be beneficial to them if the Queen intercedes at some point and puts courteous pressure on the Californian couple to stop using their ducal titles.
Bear with me here.
On the morning of the couple's wedding day in 2018, Buckingham Palace announced that the Queen would confer a Duchy (along with the titles of Earl of Dumbarton and Baron Kilkeel) on her grandson and, by extension, her new granddaughter. , how is. standard. (Prince Andrew was made Duke of York on his great day in 1986, while Prince William was made Duke of Cambridge in 2011).
It wasn't long before storm clouds gathered over their particular honorifices, and by the end of 2019, nearly 4,000 locals signed a petition forcing the Council of Brighton & Hove in the royal county of Sussex to debate whether the duo's titles they should be removed. (The trick clearly failed.)
Still, these calls only grew in the wake of the Megxit turmoil. Harry and Meghan, according to this line of thinking, have flown into the royal co-op to make their name and fortune in the U.S. And their continued use of the Sussex designation endangers the royal family by introducing the whiff of trade. in the real medium.
Basically, moolah and monarchy are not meant to mix for free, and apparently even the slightest hint that someone might dare to monetize their royal status is theoretically met with abject horror.
(Let's all politely ignore the myriad of other intersections between cash and crown, such as Prince Charles's Duchy of Cornwall selling over 300 products through the Waitrose supermarket chain, that all royal palaces contain slightly awkward gift shops with replica royal jewels, and you can afford to tour the Queen's vast Norfolk private pile, Sandringham, and the gardens of her Scottish estate Balmoral).
While theirs was not a particularly successful period as active HRH, at least in terms of job satisfaction, Harry and Meghan have made significant business advancements in the corporate world of the United States.
In less than a year, they signed deals worth an estimated $ 180 million with Netflix and Spotify alone, signed with the A-list speakers bureau, the Harry Walker agency, the Duchess has written a book, and the Duke has done the same. that before was unthinkable and left. and he landed a job as an Impact Director at a multi-billion dollar Silicon Valley company.
With each successive commercial announcement, the haunting question about the titles has continued to emerge, a situation that was only magnified in the wake of his March television interview with Oprah Winfrey.
Fast forward to another lengthy interview for the Armchair Expert podcast and then more revelations in the five-part Apple TV series The Me You Can't See, and the question becomes more and more pressing: How could they, in conscience, continue using their Sussex titles when they had no qualms about storming the royal house every time a camera was pointed in their direction?
Backing all of this is the notion that if Harry and Meghan were to take on some glitzy Hollywood event or annual Sun Valley talk festival like the simple Mr. and Mrs. Mountbatten-Windsor, it would diminish their money-making potential and tarnish their celebrity shine.
But I wonder, have we been thinking about this the wrong way?
Could her Majesty exert her diminishing influence over the wayward couple and cause them to relinquish her Sussex titles actually backfire and prove to be a boon to Montecito's more controversial contributors?
For one thing, she would make the 95-year-old monarch look quite petty and vindictive. For those who are directly in the field in favor of Harry and Meghan, this type of move would confirm their view that the Queen is a petty nonagenarian who wants to punish the only biracial member of her extended family.
The Sussexes, in turn, could enjoy a kind of public relations martyrdom that would strengthen their anti-establishment brand of "speaking truth to power."
This would also make her Majesty look like a hypocrite, given that Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York, can still wield her royal title with money-spinning abandon.
Beyond all of this, even if Harry and Meghan were no longer in a position to wear their Sussex titles, they still have their princely status to lean on. He will always officially be Prince Henry of Wales and she, as his wife, has every right to be called Princess Henry of Wales, in the style of Prince Michael of Kent, the Queen's cousin, and his wife, Princess Michael of Kent.
So if Harry and Meghan find themselves without their gifted titles, no problem, they can just go the Welsh route. Not only could they enjoy some moral ground, forced to suffer the slings and arrows of a vengeful palace, but Meghan would have the right to present herself as a princess, a title even higher than that of duchess.
In short, this whole situation is a kind of mutual benefit for the renegade couple.
Strategically, the palace is stuck in a bind and only has what seems like a waste of hands to play with. They can leave the couple and their titles intact, or they can pressure them to bow to their whims and only strengthen the couple's American cause.
Still, if DDD Day comes - Harry and Megan will be stripped of their ducal designation - then fear not. Oprah would surely be available in no time to help them share her true pain with viewers, and Fergie could lend them a copy of her 2001 offer. Reinvent herself with the Duchess of York, although this would be an indignity that not even she has suffered.
