By Romelo Wilson
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, have reached their breaking point when they recently sued the British tabloids. Prince Harry sued the press for hacking into his voicemails while Meghan filed a claim against a tabloid that published an extremely private letter to her estranged father.
Ever since the couple got married, they have been receiving a lot of unwanted attention from the British press. The Duchess of Sussexis the first biracial to marry a royal member, while also being the first American to marry into the Royal Family since 1937, according to Elite Daily. These two characteristics of Meghanare only a few of the reasons why this marriage seems peculiar to the previous royal marriages.
In addition, prior to her marriage with Prince Harry, Meghan was in a different marriage which evidently ended in a divorce. All the signs point against her and gives her an unfair preconceived notion on part of the rest of the Royal Family and other citizens of the United Kingdom.
Queen Elizabeth II doesn’t seem to be a big supporter of the relationship as she removed a photo of Meghanand Prince Harry from her sitting room at Buckingham Palace, as mentioned by US Weekly.
The couple has been dealing with the stress of the tabloids for a while now, feeling that they’re being targeted more than previous family members. Some people say that the unwanted attention comes with the job, which is true to an extent.
Yes, they are now public figures and seen as representatives of the U.K. however, they should still be treated with respect instead of the press actively searching for things to use against the couple.
This is not the first time Prince Harry is dealing with the press attacking the people he loves. His mother, Princess Diana, died in 1997 in a car accident while trying to escape the paparazzi in Paris.
Just reaching a little over a year in her marriage with Prince Harry, Meghan gave birth to her son this past May. She’s still vulnerable in her new lifestyle, and with the British media constantly attacking her and, at times, misrepresenting her, Prince Harry fears that the press is going to have the same impact on his wife as it did on his mother.
In a fairly recent video interview with ITV News that went trending, Meghan revealed that she’s been dealing with so much scrutiny that it’s becoming unbearable.
“Thank you for asking because not many people have asked if I’m ok,” said Meghan to the interviewer Tom Bradby. “It’s a very real thing to be going through behind the scenes.”
Though they’re likely to win the legal battle against the British tabloids, the process of doing so will add even more stress in their lives. In order to proceed with the case, the couple would have to appear in court, which means that they would be first royal members to appear in court in more than a century, as stated by USA Today.
According to the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000, phone hacking is illegal in the U.K., which is Prince Harry’s case. As far as Meghan’s battle with the media goes, the publication of her letter to her estranged father violates a copyright law where the contents of a private letter belong to the person who wrote it rather than the person who received it.
Now the extent of the success regarding this legal fight leads people start to wonder: if Prince Harry and Meghan win their cases, will that change the behavior of the press or will it make the target on their backs grow even larger?
In their recent African tour, the couple spoke candidly on the pressures of being involved in the royal life. They saw the tour as a bit of a break from the British tabloids, but in the end it’s something they can’t truly escape.
Hopefully, the tour helped relieve some of the burden, but instead of shaming them for not being able to “handle” all that comes with the lifestyle, we have to look at what can be done to make their royal life actually seem royal instead of intolerable.
Romelo Wilson can be reached at Romelo.wilson@spartans.ut.edu
