The Duke & Duchess of Sussex and Family, News and Events 4: April-June 2021


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Do you get Coronation Street in America? Britain's most famous soap opera, been going since 1960. A character recently solemnly told two other characters that they each needed to "tell your truth", and a fourth character overheard and burst out laughing. That's what Harry and Meghan are here now - a laughing stock. And it's a shame, because they had the chance to do a lot of good.
 
It looks that way..too bad he was wearing a beanie. It would have been nice to see his hair color.

Did you not see the beachvideo? He has very dark brown or black hair.
 
I wonder if this picture was taken earlier this spring? The weather in California is in the 60’s and 70’s - a bit warm for hats, sweatshirts and coats.

Here in Southern California, the 60's is considered "cold weather" believe me!:lol:

Last weekend it was 90 degrees and we were headed for the beach. This week it has been overcast and in the low 60's. We are bundled up.
 
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And announcing it publicly just as the procession was starting and making sure to include just how thoughtful it was to the world completely takes away from the actual thoughtfulness of it, even if HM didn't immediately understand what the flowers meant. It just makes her and the rest of the family more annoyed at the publicity when everyone else kept their wreaths private. Given that Harry and Meghan shooting their mouths off publicly is part of the problem it was an own goal even if the intent was to communicate with the family and not the entire world.

Why is everyone so sure that Meghan called, texted, emailed, wrote to Scobie about the minute, particular details of that wreath? Isn’t it much more likely that an employee of the florist would be privy to the meaning behind each bit of flora and greenery and take it upon her/himself to ‘share’ with the media? Or is it just much more satisfying to blame the Duchess?
 
Here in Southern California, the 60's is considered "cold weather" believe me!:lol:

Last weekend it was 90 degrees and we were headed for the beach. This week it has been overcast and in the low 60's. We are bundled up.


Moonmaiden-Did you see the forecast for possible rain on Monday? For anyone else living outside of SoCal, rain in April is unusual as are temps in the low 60's.


So I agree with Moonmaiden that seeing Meghan and Archie warmly dressed in the 60's would be normal for natives.

Why is everyone so sure that Meghan called, texted, emailed, wrote to Scobie about the minute, particular details of that wreath? Isn’t it much more likely that an employee of the florist would be privy to the meaning behind each bit of flora and greenery and take it upon her/himself to ‘share’ with the media? Or is it just much more satisfying to blame the Duchess?


If it was the florist, then they would have had the authorization from their paying client (the Sussexes) to release the information about the wreath they'd ordered and purchased. I sincerely doubt that they'd risk the loss of a high profile repeat customer (again the Sussexes) by sharing this information with media without their direct consent.


Honestly I thought the wreath was spectacular and I find it very much in keeping with Meghan's preferred floral style. She wrote about floral arrangements in her former blog the Tig and personally I find it sweet that she's so interested in the meaning of the flowers in relation to the DoE.



My disappointment in the statement is that this information was released on the day of the funeral and just when the procession was to begin. Had the media release been made on the day after, I believe that would have been more respectful and appropriate.
 
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Leaks about paying clients are NOT at all unusual. The head of the firm wouldn’t do it, but one of the underpaid shop assistants certainly might.
 
Leaks about paying clients are NOT at all unusual. The head of the firm wouldn’t do it, but one of the underpaid shop assistants certainly might.

What would be the point?
 
Why is everyone so sure that Meghan called, texted, emailed, wrote to Scobie about the minute, particular details of that wreath? Isn’t it much more likely that an employee of the florist would be privy to the meaning behind each bit of flora and greenery and take it upon her/himself to ‘share’ with the media? Or is it just much more satisfying to blame the Duchess?

The florist had kept secret the fact that they had done Archie's Christening flowers for two years without bragging about it.

It wasn't just Scobie that had the details. The Telegraph ie not a tabloid quoted "Sussex Sources" that sounded very much in line with other "press releases" from them over the last few years including "The Duchess is known for her keen interest personal calligraphy" that I doubt a florist is going to include. If she was the one that leaked, she almost certainly had the go ahead.

The Sussexes who had been so secretive about Archie's Christening didn't kick off about details being leaked about that. It also came along with a barrage of other info from Scobie and Gayle King about Meghan's apparently closeness with Philip and how she was watching the funeral, there in spirit and was mourning a beloved family member too. We didn't get any other details about missing family members also watching on TV, although I'm sure they were.

But yes, what Scobie/Gayle says is now rightly or wrongly seen as coming directly from the Sussexes mouth or what they want out there via third party. That's what happens when you collaborate with someone on a tell all book, do a tell all interview and have friends that say they've been authorised to talk to the media.

It also wasn't part of the post funeral corrections/denials/meetings that Scobie issued via Harpers Bazaar.

When your "authorised friends" talk to the media so often, when you issue official denials and sue the media a lot any story that isn't shot down gains more credence. That's the lesson they fail to learn.

I thought it was a very thoughtful wreath but the releasing the information on it made it less so and the timing was tacky.
 
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Leaks about paying clients are NOT at all unusual. The head of the firm wouldn’t do it, but one of the underpaid shop assistants certainly might.
This has happened plenty of times in the royal world!
 
A number of media outlets have confirmed that the information about the wreath was sent out by the Sussex spokesperson. The DM also mentioned it in their coverage.

In California, Meghan issued a press release to announce that she was watching the funeral from home.

It was sent out by her and Harry's 'Global Press Secretary' and read: 'I can confirm that The Duchess will be watching from home as she was hopeful to be able to attend, but was not cleared for travel by her physician at this stage in her pregnancy.'

It went on to list Harry's achievements in his ten-year military career, including two tours of duty on the front line in Afghanistan...

The announcement struck another slightly jarring note by noting the wreath the Sussexes laid for Philip in St George's Chapel – and including a heavy plug for its maker.

Buckingham Palace had declined to discuss floral tributes from members of the Royal Family, saying they were 'personal and private'.

Source
 
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When your "authorised friends" talk to the media so often, when you issue official denials and sue the media a lot any story that isn't shot down gains more credence. That's the lesson they fail to learn.

I thought it was a very thoughtful wreath but the releasing the information on it made it less so and the timing was tacky.

This is the point that I have made on this forum on more than one occasion, once you start to issue denials or sue it then opens up which stories have an element of truth to them.

That is one of the reasons the palace let a number of stories go unchallenged, they are not going to deny a true story or a partly correct story so once you go down the road of denials , it leaves you open to a ' that must be a true story then'
I also personally think it gives the story oxygen, here we are still talking about who made who cry three years after the event and we still do not really know what took place.
 
I remember personally getting up to 15 verifiably false claims and most of the newspapers claimed at least 12 plus. Then there are the ones like the "I talked to HR and they refused to help and let me go to an in treatment place" which are unverifiable but seem completely off the wall and had no follow up like "because HR can't help a royal because they aren't employees and Harry didn't talk to his family and I didn't talk to my OB".

My personal favourite is Harry specifically mentioning taking Archie on the back of his bike which his Dad never did and the press immediately pulling out dozens of photos out of the archive of Charles doing just that. There are plenty of things that he probably didn't do with the boys but it really crystallises "their truth" and "recollections may vary".



But Scobie has been at pains to assure us that Meghan and Archie were (allegedly) zooming with HM before the funeral. Surely she could have mentioned the thoughtful symbolism of the flowers then? Or included a private handwritten letter of personal condolence to HM that included why she chose those flowers and how very fond she was of Philip. HM knows the language of flowers, her own wreath had a lot of symbolism on it.

And announcing it publicly just as the procession was starting and making sure to include just how thoughtful it was to the world completely takes away from the actual thoughtfulness of it, even if HM didn't immediately understand what the flowers meant. It just makes her and the rest of the family more annoyed at the publicity when everyone else kept their wreaths private. Given that Harry and Meghan shooting their mouths off publicly is part of the problem it was an own goal even if the intent was to communicate with the family and not the entire world.


That’s right, I’d forgotten about the bike stuff! Harry really did want to make his dad seem like a villain: never did things with him as a kid, cut him off, refused to speak speak with him. Add that to his comments to James Corden about how comfortable he is with the Crown - despite how we all know that that despicable show treats his father unfairly and DOES portray him as a villain - and I’m not sure I care if Charles and Harry ever reconcile. Now I’m livid on Charles’ behalf.

If you have to tell people how thoughtful and kind and caring you are, you’re not genuinely any of these things because it’s all about appearances.

Do you get Coronation Street in America? Britain's most famous soap opera, been going since 1960. A character recently solemnly told two other characters that they each needed to "tell your truth", and a fourth character overheard and burst out laughing. That's what Harry and Meghan are here now - a laughing stock. And it's a shame, because they had the chance to do a lot of good.

I don’t see them as a laughing stock..Over here, no one really cares, but you can see that they did an enormous amount of damage. People who never paid attention to Royals and still don’t now believe they are racist, among other things. Even from what I can tell in the UK, many more people than I thought would believe them DO believe them, or at least wonder about the BRF. They’ve done serious damage over there as well.
 
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This is the point that I have made on this forum on more than one occasion, once you start to issue denials or sue it then opens up which stories have an element of truth to them.

That is one of the reasons the palace let a number of stories go unchallenged, they are not going to deny a true story or a partly correct story so once you go down the road of denials , it leaves you open to a ' that must be a true story then'
I also personally think it gives the story oxygen, here we are still talking about who made who cry three years after the event and we still do not really know what took place.

This makes a whole lot of sense to me. Once you start denying or confirming everything that's been printed about you, you are seen to be "playing to the media" and they know it and that starts the party. It tells them you're paying attention to them and if they can get you to react, all the better as that makes another story good for a long time that never gets forgotten about.

There's a reason the BRF have a royal rota. Those people make a living out of following the royal family, their activities, their engagements and whatever else happens to come along. The press go to them. It's the opposite with the Sussexes at this time. *They* have to go to the press and release statements on things to be noticed and "seen" and have "people" to make sure they're in the public eye and not forgotten about. They *pay* people for this. Of course the royals do have their PR departments and communications department but the express purpose of those isn't to call up the press and release statements. The press calls them for comments and clarification on things and often we read that "the palace has not responded to our request for comments". :D

This, my friends, is the difference between being royal and being celebrity.
 
People are angry with them for behaving so disrespectfully towards the Queen, and then telling a pack of lies on the Oprah interview, but I don't think too many people take them seriously. They're embarrassing.
 
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One of the comments made in the interview was with regards the parties that the palace hold for the press, what I have read is that there are get togethers when they are on tour for coffee or drinks to allow whichever royal it is to put over what the tour is there to promote whether it be trade, conservation or whatever.

I also read very recently, although the event was several years ago, that before a press conference for an engagement announcement the press were invited early for coffee / get together to meet the new fiancé. To build up a rapport.

Not sure if Harry and Meghan became involved in this type of event, maybe missed a trick there.
 
People are angry with them for behaving so disrespectfully towards the Queen, and then telling a pack of lies on the Oprah interview, but I don't think too many people take them seriously. They're embarrassing.

Embarrassing is a good word to describe them right about now. I think the main difference in the way I think about them and anything that they may do going forward, no matter how "kind and compassionate" they may try to put themselves across as being, is that I know they're in this for themselves first for profit. That's actually how they have to to be now to "survive and thrive" but I definitely don't see it as "being of service".

The ancient Greeks had six different definitions of the word "love". To be of service such as the British royal family aims to be, to me, would be a form of the word for love the Greeks called "agape". Unconditional love with no thought of return. In contrast, the word that I'd apply to the Sussexes at this time is philautia. "The Greek's sixth variety of love was philautia or self-love. And clever Greeks such as Aristotle realized there were two types. One was an unhealthy variety associated with narcissism, where you became self-obsessed and focused on personal fame and fortune."

The contrast between the British royal family and the methods the Sussexes are using are really starting to stand out starkly for me.
 
One of the comments made in the interview was with regards the parties that the palace hold for the press, what I have read is that there are get togethers when they are on tour for coffee or drinks to allow whichever royal it is to put over what the tour is there to promote whether it be trade, conservation or whatever.

I also read very recently, although the event was several years ago, that before a press conference for an engagement announcement the press were invited early for coffee / get together to meet the new fiancé. To build up a rapport.

Not sure if Harry and Meghan became involved in this type of event, maybe missed a trick there.

They didn't. This is from Camilla Tominey's recent article about covering the Sussexes:

The royal press pack is the group of dedicated writers who cover all the official engagements and tours on a rota system, in exchange for not bothering the royals as they go about their private business. It was a shame this ragtag bunch, of which I am an associate member, was never personally introduced to Meghan when the couple got engaged in November 2017.

I still have fond memories of a then Kate Middleton, upon her engagement to Prince William in November 2010, showing me her huge sapphire and diamond ring following a press conference at St James’s Palace with the words, ‘It was William’s mother’s so it is very special.’

I replied that she might want to consider buying ‘one of those expanding accordion style file holders’ to organise all her wedding paperwork. (Reader, I had given birth to my second child less than four months earlier and was still lactating.)

Not meeting Meghan did not stop royal commentators like me writing reams about her being ‘a breath of fresh air’ and telling practically every TV show I appeared on that she was the ‘best thing to have happened to the Royal Family in years’.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/royal-family/2021/03/27/harry-meghan-truth-royal-reporter/

She also said that Harry's interaction with the royal rota changed a lot in those years.

Omid Scobie, co-author of Finding Freedom, a highly favourable account of the Sussexes’ departure from the Royal family, written with their knowledge last summer, would later insist that the couple knew the story of their relationship was coming out and were well prepared for it.

I can tell you categorically that they weren’t, since I did not even put a call into Kensington Palace before we went to press for fear of it being leaked. (I did later discuss this with Harry, when I covered his trip to the Caribbean in November 2016, and to be fair he was pretty philosophical, agreeing it would have come out sooner or later. But that was before the former Army Captain decided to well and truly shoot the messenger, latterly telling journalists covering the newly-weds’ tax-payer-funded October 2018 tour of Australia and the south Pacific: ‘Thanks for coming, even though you weren’t invited.’)

There also weren't "holiday parties" for the press but the palace did invite them to meet the comms teams for each office at the beginning of the year in a professional networking sense. Which is also very standard for Hollywood.
 
Leaks about paying clients are NOT at all unusual. The head of the firm wouldn’t do it, but one of the underpaid shop assistants certainly might.
What would be the point in doing so? I seriously doubt that an shop assistant would do this because while they might be in your opinion "underpaid" this is a small industry and discretion is key to obtaining and retaining clients.



Had this not been authorized by the Sussexes, I would have expected a denial by the couple who have demonstrated that they're more than willing and able to issue these types statements. And I would also expect one with an apology by the florist who would want to retain their business and that of other current and future clients. No one is going to want to do business with someone who is indiscreet.



Again, I don't have an issue with a description of their beautiful wreath. It was all in the timing of their statement. Had they delayed it to the next day, it would have been respectful. Unfortunately it was issued right when the funeral procession was beginning. :sad:
 
A number of media outlets have confirmed that the information about the wreath was sent out by the Sussex spokesperson. The DM also mentioned it in their coverage.


Thank you soapstar for sharing that it was media outlets who confirmed that the wreath information was issued by a Sussex spokesperson.



So now we all know that it was not an underpaid florist assistant secretly informing the press, but rather a statement released with the Sussexes' consent.
 
They didn't. This is from Camilla Tominey's recent article about covering the Sussexes:



https://www.telegraph.co.uk/royal-family/2021/03/27/harry-meghan-truth-royal-reporter/

She also said that Harry's interaction with the royal rota changed a lot in those years.



There also weren't "holiday parties" for the press but the palace did invite them to meet the comms teams for each office at the beginning of the year in a professional networking sense. Which is also very standard for Hollywood.
Interesting, I didn't know about the prior introduction to the press.
 
Thanks for this info! Very different from 60’s weather in the mountains of North Carolina ;). It was really nice last week but colder and raining today.
 
Thank you soapstar for sharing that it was media outlets who confirmed that the wreath information was issued by a Sussex spokesperson.



So now we all know that it was not an underpaid florist assistant secretly informing the press, but rather a statement released with the Sussexes' consent.



It wouldn’t have made much sense for another reason: When you place an order, you tend to place an order. Not explain why you’re doing it.

I find it distasteful that an occasion such as this was apparently seen as an opportunity to generate positive PR. I see no other purpose to making this public. If Meghan wanted to convey her thoughtfulness to the family alone- Scobie has made it clear she’s spoken to the Queen. And a nice handwritten letter would have done it too. Plenty of ways to accomplish that privately.

It’s also an odd thing to do when one of the issues between you and your in laws is privacy.
 
A number of media outlets have confirmed that the information about the wreath was sent out by the Sussex spokesperson. The DM also mentioned it in their coverage.

I want say something about this but I really cannot find words....the hubris, the narcissism...to release such a statement at all let alone minutes before the funeral?! Based upon their history, I should not be shocked but I am.
 
All that signifies to me that the Sussexes can only ride on the coat tails of the remaining members of the BRF to stay relevant. They have yet to show that they have anything of importance to be noticed in their own right.

I think they're trying too hard to show and prove that they're still "in" with the British Royal Family where the truth actually is that they're "out". As in left field in a land far, far away removed from anything of importance that the BRF and it's "Firm" does.

Considering the wide and expanding coverage these days, they seem to be full fledged royals to the rest of the world. At least in this alternate universe as media darlings. The decision to leave the UK has dramatically improved their lives as far as I can tell. Thus, they may be in a special category of some kind. Sacrifice of their actual royalty has paid off in a way few could've predicted.
 
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So in Oprah's mind, broadcasting the "truth" made it necessary to alter headlines because she couldn't find enough real headlines to back up the Sussexes claims.

Oprah is also congratulating herself on publicizing a smear of the entire royal family (except the Queen and Prince Philip) by allowing the allegation to be aired without naming the actual individual supposedly involved. A decision that is made even more indefensible after Harry and Meghan couldn't even agree on the basic facts.

Oprah also let many lies go unchallenged, such as Archie wasn't a prince because of his heritage, their taxpayer funded security ended because of racism, etc.

Oprah also failed to press Meghan to respond to the bullying allegations but allowed Meghan to claim, without evidence, that Harry's family was leaking false information about her.

Oprah should stick to what she knows: entertainment, which is about creating appearances not revealing facts or even "truth.".
 
Considering the wide and increasing coverage these days, they seem to be full fledged royals to the rest of the world. At least in this alternate universe as media darlings. The decision to leave the UK has dramatically improved their lives, as far as I can tell. Thus, they may be in a special category of some kind. Sacrifice of their actual royalty has paid off in a way few could've predicted.

They obviously still need the kudos of being royal, why else would they continually tout their connection to the Queen and Philip, photographs coming out of Archie. Considering they were calling the family all sorts of names just over a month ago, it seems strange all this stuff is coming out.

If anything it looks like they want back in the club, not to come over here to live and work doing royal duties but they still want to be in the gang and be associated with it, which tells me something about there target audience.
 
What would be the point in doing so? I seriously doubt that an shop assistant would do this because while they might be in your opinion "underpaid" this is a small industry and discretion is key to obtaining and retaining clients.

Publicity. For the same reason why when it is discovered who makes an outfit or handbag a royal wears- that item usually sells out shortly after.
I'm sure Willow Crossley has seen a huge uptake in sales having their names seen in so many publications

However, unlike with other royals' floral tribute, a few publications were given an explanation of the meaningful reason behind the choice of each flower included in the stunning wreath sent by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.
These publications did not state whether these details had been provided by the Sussexes' press office.

https://www.express.co.uk/news/roya...on-prince-philip-funeral-flowers-royal-family
 
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I don’t doubt that they could have released the information themselves, at an inopportune time, but I haven’t seen anything that was an actual quote. It’s like a game of telephone; several papers just seem to say it happened. Surely there’s an actual quote attributed to someone, and not just a “sources say.” The Archewell site is apparently closed for a few days. I’ll keep looking and provide a link if I can.
 
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