The Royal Treatment
The news of the week is Meghan Markle’s tell-all with Oprah. I've heard the interview called everything from revelatory to attention-seeking. No matter your opinion, two elements are universal:
The Princess Diaries got a lot of things wrong…
Oprah is still the best in the biz.
I don't have much of an opinion on Meghan Markle - truthfully I'm not up-to-date on any of my monarchy news. That said, her gripes with the Royal Family come at a time when the world is lending a sympathetic ear to women in the media. Whether or not you think this interview was self-serving, it's clear that Meghan is addressing larger issues.
For example, suicidal ideation, tabloid bullying, and racism.
The Royal Family is archaic by nature. You can't have a longstanding bloodline of rulers and also be forward thinking. That's a contradiction in and of itself. The main point of a monarchy is to keep power within a family. Remember that the Queen and Prince Philip are distant cousins. Marrying an outsider can be touchy, so it’s not in the least bit surprising that Meghan experienced racism from relatives.
It’s disappointing to see that racial tone extend throughout UK media coverage. The tabloids consistently take creative liberties that are questionable at best. Honestly they give the best TV writers a run for their money.
Harry said it himself, “I’m way more comfortable with The Crown than I am seeing the stories written about my family or my wife or myself."
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Over the years Meghan has been blamed for Harry's hair loss. Her love of avocados has been said to fuel murder. She's the wicked woman who didn’t want Harry to visit a different country during a pandemic. One time Meghan wore pants and was slapped with a series of "guess who wears the trousers in the relationship” headlines.
And, of course, speaking out against this treatment caused a full meltdown of tabloids. Meghan reveals she was contemplating suicide and articles immediately pop up claiming the interview was a "childish snub" that should strip both her and Harry of their citizenship.
This isn't the standard "weight of the crown" or a natural consequence of a public lifestyle - this is a battle royal of media bullying. And for what? It's a harsh amount of scrutiny for someone who will never actually take the throne. What would happen if we just left her alone?
You'd think we'd have learnt our lesson after what happened to Diana….
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Miss Bad Media Karma
The racist undertones in the tabloid coverage are often fuelled by a comparison between Meghan Markle and Kate Middleton. If Kate is the model wife, Meghan is everything she isn’t. Kate wears a one-shoulder dress and is a "true princess", Meghan does it and is called "vulgar".
As readers, we’re asked to choose who we like better. We're fed "who wore it best?" articles and fabricated feuds that force us to pick a side. God forbid you have respect for both women....
In the Oprah interview Meghan even says "[i]f you love me, you don't have to hate her. And if you love her, you don't have to hate me." Alas, it's never been that simple.
Female comparison is nothing new. We constantly pit women against each other - blonde vs. brunette, girl-next-door vs. seductress. If no obvious comparison exist, there's always an ideal or former version we can use. We'll say "she used to be skinnier " or "when did she start being so reckless?"
I consider Framing Britney Spears to be mandatory viewing - not only to understand the context of her conservatorship, but as a reminder of how women were treated in the public eye until recently. We saw, through archival footage, interviews, and headlines how this woman was bullied to the extent of her composure. Britney was loosing grip, and we couldn't get enough content of her descent. It was a game for us to watch her fall from grace while she cried to be left alone.
Her pleas on made us laugh harder.
It bothers me to know that, as an avid Britany fan, I guffawed along with everyone else during her breakdown. I soaked in the jokes about her being crazy and bald. Frankly thought it was hilarious at the time.
Looking back, I was a teenager being brought up on the scraps of other women. I think most millennials were. Now we're completely accustomed to smear stories and female criticism. From Anna Nicole Smith to Amy Winehouse to Princess Diana, we’ve consumed anything and everything we could until their last breath - and often longer. Their public lives were entirely formed around our entertainment.
More and more videos are being surfaced of the abhorrent ways we watched celebrities like Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton get ridiculed by interviewers. Twitter is out for blood, cancelling aggressive hosts and sending out apologies.
Having remorse is great. We aren’t, however, completely reformed.
Meghan is voicing her concern with media treatment and Harry left his family to support her through it. We should take that seriously. It might not be as horrendous as it was 10 years ago, but it's not perfect. There's room for all women to thrive without being cast as rivals, and we should take notice of when we're being asked to choose.
If Rob Schneider and David Spade can have distinct careers, we can let Kate and Meghan exist without comparison.
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God Save The Queens
If you were stunned that the Royal Family has racist undertones, I have some bad news for you. Racism happens everywhere - even in the most inclusive place on earth, Ru Paul’s Drag Race.
Mark and I love to say that Ru Paul deserves a Nobel prize. He's produced 13 seasons highlighting drag as an art form in prime time. Beyond that Ru radiates joy, self acceptance, and a love of stupid fun.
A queen through and though.
Outside of the show, the fandom is its own beast. Queens have come out with videos and statements sharing their experiences with racist fans. Many have received death threats and been called slurs while on the show.
Honey Davenport, a Season 11 contest, spoke out about the aggression of fans before the show even aired. After being announced as a cast member she got dozens of Instagram messages telling her to kill herself and calling her the n-word.
Ironically, drag has long been a refuge for gay people of colour. By opening up the stage to new fans, the floodgates have opened for discrimination and hate speech that's unprecedented in the community.
It seems unthinkable that fans of such an inclusive show could be racist. We think we live in a dichotomy where everyone is one side of the issues, or the other. Unfortunately it doesn’t work like that. The reason they’re called 'issues' is because there are a bunch of them, and each one has a side you can land on.
Somehow that means you can love Drag Race and also throw racial slurs out on social media. It seems as far fetched as the 55% of white women who voted for Trump in 2020.
Both, depressingly, are real.
It doesn't matter that Ru Paul is a force for good. The audience has taken matters into its own hands and ostracized these queens of colour. Once you're in the public sphere, your image isn't your own. You might be worshipped, slandered, demonized, or held to someone else's standard.
The fans will decide your fate.
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Sunday Worship
Clearly impassioned fans are dangerous. Tabloids thrive only because we’re reading. We live for the competition, trashy headlines, and ultimate celebrity demise.
Fans feed on the drama.
Many researchers have looked into the compulsion of celebrity gossip. Generally speaking a healthy interest in the lives of the rich and famous is totally normal. Intense following, however, can be indicative of neuroticism or psychosis. Moreover, when we shift focus from our lives to that of someone else, it can lead to depression, anxiety and low self esteem.
All the articles I found on celebrity worship talk about the negative effects on the worshipper and ignore the worshipped. Some researchers go as far as to call fans "victims" of comparison. We're fed these larger-than-life images of famous people and take it out on ourselves. Celebrities cause our body image problems and self esteem issues purely by existing.
That's true in part, but it’s the other way around too. Fans eat these people until they shatter. We call them fat if they gain weight and then feel comforted in our own body struggles. We take and take until they can’t leave their homes or are contemplating suicide, and then we put them on Oprah and beg for updates.
We’ve all seen Misery right? There’s harm in obsession. We project what we want onto these people and are furious when they don’t follow our script. If you’re Meghan, one misstep turns you into a Satan figure. Or, as it turns out, you'll get cast into that role if you're not as white and polished as your sister-in-law.
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Good Vibes Only
At its core, being a fan is giving energy.
Over the pandemic I’ve read a lot of self-help books (don't judge me). A lot talk about the power of positivity and the Law of Attraction. Basically, like attracts like. When you’'re sending out good vibes into the world, good vibes come back.
It’s like the most basic form of karma.
You can take it a step further in using affirmations. By switching the way you talk about yourself, you can impact your own behaviour. For example, start saying "I rock" instead of "I suck" and see what happens. The trick with repetition is that, if you hear the same thing enough, eventually you start to believe it. And, when you believe it, you'll radiate a more positive energy.
Generally I’m on board for a lot of this theory. I’ve mentioned Shawn Achor - the happiness expert - before. His research shows that, by changing small elements of our behaviour, we can actually rewire our brain to be more positive. When we become more positive, we also tend to become more successful.
It’s not a stretch to think the same can happen outwardly. Being around someone in a good mood can put you in a good mood. Telling someone they're worthless over and over will eventually make them feel worthless.
Now imagine the power of the collective. If you’ve ever been a crowd you know this feeling. A good crowd makes the whole space feel alive, a bad one feels nervous. We’ve all walked into a room and felt the energy. Sometimes it’s great. Other times it’s immediately uncomfortable. There’s a reason the cliche “you could cut the tension with a knife” exists.
Energy is palpable.
Hypothetically, what if everyone in the world decided to love one person. Do you think that person would feel love around them? Now what if the opposite were true?
Beyond the emotional turmoil of seeing your name slandered across the news, I wonder if there’s a physiological element to public scrutiny. How much negative energy can one person take?
When Britney shaved her head she said that she wanted everyone to stop touching her. There’s a literal truth to that - hairstylists, handlers, herds of paparazzi - but there’s something deeper too. Across the world we were all clambering for more and more news on her stuggles.
Anecdotally there's a historical thought that photos fragment your soul. Dr. Sresanathaswammy Venkataramananaan,a paranormal sciences researcher, has taken this theory to heart. He states that cameras grab light from their subjects and, by extension, steal parts of human auras (the energy that radiates around us). Dr. Sresanathaswammy Venkataramananaan extrapolates that "If you continue to get photographed after completely losing your aura, the camera will take a toll on your soul next.”
That’s a bit far out for me, but you get the idea. When everyone wants a piece of you, there’s only so much you can give. If the world is convinced you don’t belong in the Royal Family, maybe it encourages you to leave.
Now that these women, Meghan included, are getting some retribution for the way they were treated, I like to think that they can feel a shift in the energy around them. Wherever Paris is DJ-ing and Britney is dancing, I hope a small weight lifted off their shoulders as the world's opinion softened.
I don’t believe in an afterlife, but, for those who do, let’s hope Diana is also taking a breather.
