A taxonomy of takes Harry and Meghan’s sit-down with Oprah Winfrey has, as it always would, loosed an avalanche of takes:
You guys, I think the royals might actually be a bit problematic? Understandably, the major revelation of the interview — that a “senior royal” had expressed worry to Harry about how dark his son’s skin might be — got the most coverage. Everyone’s first guess, Prince Phillip (because, I mean, come on), has since been ruled out, as has the Queen.
Everyone involved is a hero Maybe it’s the strange fixation on Harry and Meghan as progressive figures (which, compared with the parasitical ruling class they’ve slowly and reluctantly left, I suppose they are), but there was a tone of hero worship in the coverage, as much directed at Oprah as her interview subjects. The New Yorker is only the most florid:
This instantly iconic artifact of pop culture could not have been without Oprah, a truly singular examiner … She is also something of an emissary, a reactive translator of emotion, a master weaver, pulling disparate revelations into a collective portrait that colonizes the mind.
Everyone involved is scum Equally unsurprising was flat-faced child Piers Morgan’s response:
I’m angry to the point of boiling over today. I am sickened by what I’ve just had to watch. This is a two-hour trash-a-thon of our royal family, of the monarchy, of everything the Queen has worked so hard for. And it’s all been done as Prince Philip lies in hospital.
Won’t someone think of the tabloids Bevan Shields, that magnificent conjurer of bad takes, reached into his top pocket and pulled out the following never-ending handkerchief:
Meghan and Harry regularly and wrongly conflate negative press coverage with racism but their latest claims might prompt some internal reflection from media outlets in the highly competitive British market.
It’s not like in my day The Telegraph in London took aim at Harry and Meghan with a more-in-sorrow-than-anger comparison to Wallis and Edward, the last scandalous Anglo-American couple who also scarpered from the royals:
The saddest thing is that Wallis and Edward, despite being banished, were dutiful and patriotic to the end … Meghan and Harry, who took it upon themselves to leave Britain, seem unlikely to display similar loyalty to the Crown on Oprah tonight.
This is a remarkable observation given what we know, or suspect, of Edward, who certainly wasn’t shy of giving Adolf Hitler a quick wave and may have been privy to a Nazi plot to install him as ruler if Germany conquered Britain.
Corporate compassion Ah there’s nothing like a nominally progressive day for brands to come blundering into the conversation, briefly taking time out from playing a huge part in inequality to condemn it. So it was during the remarkable run of rattlingly empty corporate rhetoric during the height of the Black Lives Matter protests last year, and so it is with International Women’s Day.
Our favourite was from Burger King in the UK which tweeted (since deleted) “Women belong in the kitchen” before revealing they meant, like, in a woke way, because there aren’t enough female chefs.
On behalf of feminists everywhere, can I just say: Burger King, thank you.
Keeping on the Tanya train Running parallel to The Australian‘s campaign against Anthony Albanese is the carefully choreographed dance going on between it and Tanya Plibersek. And don’t think the flurry of huge news stories in the past fortnight has slowed that in any way.
Today former communication adviser for Bill Shorten (so you know he’s good) Dean Frenkel argues:
Plibersek is an excellent communicator and a confident campaigner. She has a powerful media presence, is skilled enough to capitalise on the 10- to 15-second daily grabs while also capable of encapsulating her message into the other formats. Labor has not had this in a leader for a long time.
Poetic justice? Former finance minister Mathias Cormann has — with no shortage of support from the government — made it to the final two candidates to lead the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
We’ve long kept an eye on how his campaign required him to argue for “a rapid transition to a net-zero carbon economic model”, putting him at direct odds with the government he served in a senior capacity for such a long time.
This morning we found out that might end up being too little, too late. Joe Biden’s climate envoy, John Kerry (and perhaps less significantly, UK Labour’s environment spokesman Matthew Pennycook) have both warned the UK not to back Cormann’s nomination.
How quickly the British press/tabloids have forgotten Charles’ disgusting, “tampon-gate”, Andrew’s refusal to be interviewed by US officials regarding disgraced mate, Epstein trafficking young girls for sex, Fergie’s, “toe-sucking” scandal, Diana’s, “3-in-a-marriage” interview, Margaret’s, “torrid affairs”, along with Anne’s “indiscretions”, Kate-the-commoner “plotting from an early age to marry William”, Philip’s racial slurs over the years….blah, blah, blah.
Good luck to Harry and Meghan for telling their truth and exposing the “firm” for what it is.
Guardian Australia has been running some interesting stories on “Queen’s Consent”, which further exposes the Royal Family, and makes interesting reading.
For years I’ve watched various documentaries from reputable networks highlighting the hypocrisies, over hundreds of years, of those born into the Royal Family.
It’s time Australia became a Republic. … especially given the vitriol from our own “Press/Media”, who adored Harry and Meghan on their Australian visit, but turned on them as surely as their British counterparts, shortly after.
I sincerely hope that Harry and Meghan, Archie and their upcoming baby find the happiness and peace they, like all young families deserve.
But that’s just my opinion!
The media in all forms – social, digital and print (all those trashy weekly magazines) have made fortunes by maintaining sleazy unproven innuendos about Meghan. I read them at Dr’s waiting rooms – unbelievable! Seemed to be non stop from before the marriage and probably ongoing. Murdoch and his offshoots? And these magazines were sold in probably every nation. Billions of dollars profit. Not a royals follower and wish them well.
Just a footnote really, but ‘Charles’ disgusting, “tampon-gate”’ does not deserves inclusion as a Royal scandal. It was a private and personal conversation between two consenting adults. The public only knows about it because of yet another illegal phone-hack by Murdoch tabloid journalists. The disgust should be reserved for them.
As I said, Rat …just my opinion…but in talking of , “private and personal… between consenting adults” we could then apply the same rationale to the “toe-sucking” incident and all the others I mentioned, plus the hundreds more I haven’t touched upon, that have been greedily sucked up by our own Aussie media, whether instigated originally by Murdoch’s pack or not. They all grabbed the headlines and ran with it for months on end, and still do. Therefore, they’re all as bad as one another.
Personally, I feel for the children and grandchildren of the Royals, who have had to watch it all being played out across the world, dissected and re-dissected whenever there is apparently nothing better to advise the public of.
As I keep saying, it’s only my opinion, and I certainly don’t expect everyone else to agree with me.
For some of the other instances, yes, they are also entirely unjustified intrusions into entirely private matters of zero public interest. It is quite something to see how the press, between its declarations of love and loyalty for the royal family, generally pursues the various royals like dogs coursing for hares. It is entirely sickening, but the fault surely lies mostly with the press and the public, not the royals. On the other hand some examples in your list are clearly proper subjects for investigation and reporting, for example where crime and/or corruption are involved.
The Guardian‘s recent Queen’s consent report however is something else entirely. What a fine piece of investigative reporting! Private Eye magazine has pointed out The Guardian‘s “exclusive” exposé is just repeating something The Guardian itself has already reported on several fairly recent occasions, in 2013 and 2011 for example. The process is not quite so secret as The Guardian makes out because it is always declared openly in parliament for any bill where it is required. Back in the days when newspapers bothered to report those proceedings it was mentioned as a matter of routine. The Guardian, in its previous guise of The Manchester Guardian, reported the Queen’s consent being granted for a bill at least as long ago as 1878, and so on.
What’s the point of a monarchy in a society that elects its lawmakers if not to be cannon fodder for rumour and scandal? In exchange for a life of unimaginable wealth and privilege, where achievement is getting into your 30s without significantly embarrassing the household name, what other purpose can they possibly serve?
The kindness would be to abolish the monarchy altogether and move into the 19th century. But I’m guessing they’d take the money and power over the powerless anonymity of everyday life, especially given how up in arms they are getting when one family member renounces the madness of the whole thing.
The constitutional point is that while we elect lawmakers we don’t elect the rest. The monarch is the head of state and the crown appoints all the ministers. Get rid of the monarchy and those roles fall to someone else. Who should it be, and why? Let the Prime Minister do it all? While plenty of folks think the monarchy is an obsolete relic, it is arguable the bigger constitutional problem is the extraordinary Crown powers wielded by the Prime Minister – an unelected position, indeed one not mentioned in the constitution. We should think hard before adding to the PM’s power. Of course we might elect a separate HoS, but then how much power would that position have? Being elected, it would have a better claim to legitimacy than the PM, and presumably be able to dismiss the PM. Do we want an executive president? If so, we can do without a PM, and our parliamentary system becomes something quite different.
So there’s a bit of thought needed before we put the Windsors out to pasture.
I think we should adopt the Irish model – it’s very sensible and we have as much Irish heritage as we do English, so it ought to work here
It could work, though I wonder if we have an exaggerated belief in that model simply because the Irish have elected some very fine presidents recently. Here in Australia there are various ex-PMs who would no doubt fancy the job, and I am quite certain Clive Palmer would find it irresistible. Perhaps the answer is the Irish model slightly modified by barring anyone who was ever in a political party from standing.
Yes, that’s a good point. Despite our Irish heritage, we’ve lost something along the way. Even if we adopted the Irish presidential system, we’d still have buckleys of ever getting an honest president. As you suggest, the scum of the politcial system would be queuing up for the job – and frantically kissing uncle Rupert’s arse in a desperate bid to be anointed.
In the UK, the executive IS the legislature. The crown doesn’t play any sort of active role in government, not the laws that are passed nor on the direction the government is going. It has almost no real power, for the Crown would be abolished the second it close to exercise it.
As for us, I agree that a sensible model is needed, but that’s really an academic exercise. Again, the Crown has no real power here, with the Crown’s representative being an Australian government appointee. The Crown plays no real role in government here either, making it entirely superfluous. The British Monarchy is an inert power politically-speaking.
Nonsense. The executive and the legislature are distinct and different despite the obvious overlap. They are not at all the same. And the view that the Crown has no real power or influence is a common but ignorant mistake. The monarch has little power, but the Crown still has great power – the point is that power is exercised by the PM. Who is not elected. Parliament is becoming about as obsolete and ineffective as the monarch; the power of the Crown exercised through the executive is more less unchecked.
The executive in the US has power, but not in the UK. I’m just echoing what the philosopher A.C. Grayling argues for in his book Democracy and its Crisis. The American executive has the distinction built in, while the British system does not. Hence you don’t see the Crown taking on any function that a monarch of old would, or a president in a republic like the US does.
The simplest way to demonstrate this would be to list the ways Queen Elizabeth II has effected the law and governance of Britain during her rain. As much dialogue on The Crown TV series reminds us, that’s going beyond her powers to do so.
No, you are not listening. Reading Grayling has only vconfused you, perhaps you should try again. The powers of the Crown are used by the PM. The PM is head of the executive, not the legislature. The executive runs the country. The US president can only dream of having the power of a PM, because a US president has to contend with a legislature not necessarily under the president’s thumb; whereas in the Westminster system the PM has control of the legislature, not just by having a majority be definition, but by the patronage too, which is not allowed in the US system.
What Mrs Windsor can or cannot do is an irrelevance. The powers of the crown have shifted from the monarch to the PM, they have not gone away.
You’re making my point for me. The powers of the crown aren’t with The Crown – that’s the point. (Indeed, that’s the point Grayling makes. How am I confused on this?) The executive in America, i.e. the president, has particular powers the legislature doesn’t have, and The Crown itself doesn’t have.
Calling them the powers of the crown of a matter of semantics, which conveys nothing as to the point I’m making above about the royal family having no power in governance. The royal family is entirely superfluous.
I’ve suspected for some time that Charlie was silly enough to remark to Lizzie, some decades ago, that when he became king he would abolish the whole thing. Liz certainly seems determined not to die before he does, and clearly has no intention of handing the reins to him and retiring.
I feels so sorry for the Sussexes living in poverty in the tiny $14 million house and it is tragic to hear that the 36 year unemployed cannot rely on his father for money for sustenance.He really should have come to Australia where he could get the family allowance and Jobseeker to tide him through after his mother’s money runs out.
I expect Tanya Plibersek has enough sense when she sees The Australian heaping praise on her to recall the wise words of the Trojan priest:
Timeo danaos et dona ferentes
The Oz stirring up “Labor leadership tensions”? Maybe that will get their Limited News Party’s Morrison government’s problems off that front burner?
ah, the “Trojan priest” should’ve tipped me off, but I had to look it up any way:
Beware of Greeks baring gifts.
I’d like to add one by Sir Humphrey:
“One must get behind someone, before one can stab them in the back.”
roberto –
One must get FULLY behind someone in order to stab them in the back”.
I’m in two minds re Cormann and the OECD job. The idea of such a two-faced hypocritical Janus getting the nod is anathema. On the other hand, he could be obliged to put irresistible pressure on the Morrison Govt to sack Taylor and actually do something meaningful to respond to the climate emergency.
That’s a wonderfully sunny prediction of the how Cormann would use the job. Far more likely, if he sneaks through the door into the OECD, he would use every opportunity to sabotage any proposed climate action. He’s clever enough not to be caught for quite a long time. Leopard, spots, etc.
“Beware of Phlegmish Ozzie’s bearing promises”?