PEOPLE

Dr Taylor Swift just

delivered a powerful
speech to New York
University graduates
about her life lessons

BY CHRISTOBEL HASTINGS1 YEAR AGO

2 MIN READ

Taylor Swi! has just been awarded an

honorary degree from New York
University – and in a powerful
commencement speech, the singer
re"ected on many life lessons about
love, pressure, choices, shame, hope
and friendship.

She’s one of the most proli#c and celebrated

artists of her generation, but when singer-
songwriter Taylor Swi! stepped on stage at
New York University on Wednesday 18 May,
she wasn’t there to belt out one of her chart-
topping hits.

Instead, she was there to receive an

honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degree and
deliver a commencement address to the
school’s graduating class of 2022. And the
newly appointed doctor, who has inspired
and entertained millions with her music,
did not disappoint when she took the mic.

New York University

@nyuniversity · Follow

"I know it can be really overwhelming

figuring out who to be, and when. Who
you are now and how to act in order to
get where you want to go. I have some
good news: it’s totally up to you. I also
have some terrifying news: it’s totally up
to you." - @taylorswift13

12:45 AM · May 19, 2022

188.2K Reply Share

Read 444 replies

In a funny, powerful and inspiring 23-

minute speech, Swi! re"ected on the many
life lessons she has accrued throughout a
career in the public sphere, complete with a
generous sprinkling of song references
(“let’s just keep dancing like we’re the class
of 22”). Delving into topics such as
perfectionism, loneliness, criticism,
mistakes and the importance of having a
passion for your cra!, Swi! talked at length
about the things that have helped her so far
in her life. Let’s take a look at the key
takeaways:

Let things go

Swi! began her speech by telling the crowd

to be discerning in the things they choose to
focus their energy on.

“Life can be heavy, especially if you try to

carry it all at once,” she explained.

! " #
“Part of growing up, and moving into new
chapters of your life, is about catch and
release. What I mean by that, is knowing
what things to keep, and what things to
release. You can’t carry all things: all
grudges, all updates on your ex, all enviable
promotions your school bully got at the
hedge fund his uncle started.

“Decide what is yours to hold, and let the

rest go. O!entimes, the good things in your
life are lighter anyway, so there’s more room
for them. One toxic relationship can
outweigh so many wonderful, simple joys.
You get to pick what your life has time and
room for, so be discerning.”

Learn to live with

your cringe

taylorswift View profile

beabadoobee · See you Soon

Watch on Instagram

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Wearing a cap and gown for the very first time - see you
soon NYU

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“Learn to live alongside cringe,” Swi! told

the crowd in one light-hearted moment. “No
matter how hard you try to avoid being
cringe, you will look back on your life and
cringe retrospectively.

“Cringe is unavoidable over a lifetime. Even

the term ‘cringe’ might someday be deemed
‘cringe’.”

“I promise you, you’re probably doing or

wearing something right now that you will
look back on later and #nd revolting and
hilarious.

“You can’t avoid it, so don’t try to. For

example, I had a phase where, for the
entirety of 2012, I dressed like a 1950s
housewife. But you know what? I was having
fun. Trends and phases are fun. Looking
back and laughing is fun.”

Be enthusiastic

Swi! said that while she was on the subject

of “talking about things that make us squirm
but really shouldn’t”, she wanted to make it
known that she’s “a big advocate for not
hiding your enthusiasm for things”.

“It seems to me that there is a false stigma

around eagerness in our culture of
‘unbothered ambivalence’,” she continued.
“This outlook perpetuates the idea that it’s
not cool to ‘want it. .That people who don’t
try hard are fundamentally more chic than
people who do. And I wouldn’t know
because I have been a lot of things but I’ve
never been an expert on ‘chic’.

“But I’m the one who’s up here so you have

to listen to me when I say this: never be
ashamed of trying. E$ortlessness is a myth.
The people who wanted it the least were the
ones I wanted to date and be friends with in
high school. The people who want it most
are the people I now hire to work for my
company.”

Know that
criticism doesn’t
define you
GRADU

ARTSI
SC TA SCHC
WA T
GRADUATESC SCHC
LIBE

н00.

KIND SWIFT

Taylor then advised the graduates to

embrace the obstacles that will inevitably
appear throughout their life, explaining that
her mistakes have “led to the best things in
my life”.

“Being embarrassed when you mess up is

part of the human experience. Getting back
up, dusting yourself o$, and seeing who still
wants to hang out with you a!erwards –
that’s a gi!. The times I was told no, or
wasn’t included, wasn’t chosen, didn’t win,
didn’t make the cut; looking back, it really
feels like those moments were as important
not more crucial than the moments I was
told ‘yes’.”

“Having journalists write in-depth,

o!entimes critical, pieces about who they
perceive me to be made me feel like I was
living in some weird simulation, but it also
made me look inward to learn about who I
actually am,” she said.

“Having the world treat my love life like a

spectator sport in which I lose every single
game was not a great way to date in my
teens and 20s, but it taught me to protect my
private life #ercely.

“Being publicly humiliated over and over

again at a young age was excruciatingly
painful, but it forced me to devalue the
ridiculous notion of minute-by-minute,
ever-"uctuating social relevance and
likability.

“Getting cancelled on the internet and

nearly losing my career gave me an
excellent knowledge of all the types of
wine.”

Your mistakes
don’t define you

Taylor concluded her speech by o$ering

some #nal words of encouragement to the
graduates about life choices.

“How will you know what the right choice is

in these crucial moments?” she asked the
crowd. “You won’t.”

“The scary news is that you’re on your own

now. But the cool news is that you’re on your
own now.”

“I leave you with this: we are led by our gut

instincts, our intuition, our desires and
fears, our scars and our dreams. And you
will screw it up sometimes. So will I. And
when I do, you will most likely read about it
on the internet.

“Hard things will happen to us. We will

recover, we will learn from it, we will grow
more resilient from it.

“And as long as we are fortunate enough to

be breathing, we will breathe in, breathe
through, breathe deep, breathe out. And I’m
a doctor now, so I know how breathing
works.”

Watch the whole speech below:

Taylor Swift speaks at NYU grad…

Images: Getty

TOPICS

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PEOPLE

Meghan Markle: here’s a

history of all the sh*t she’s
taken from the British
press and public

BY KAYLEIGH DRAY26 DAYS AGO

28 MIN READ

Meghan won’t be attending King

Charles’s coronation, and naturally, the
tabloids are using this as ammunition
to criticise her.

Please note that this article was originally

published in April 2020, but has been
updated throughout.

Meghan Markle really is damned if she does

and damned if she doesn’t.

A!er weeks of speculation over whether she

and her husband, Prince Harry, would be
crossing the Atlantic for King Charles’s
coronation in May, Buckingham Palace
#nally put out a statement earlier this week,
con#rming that while the Prince will indeed
be present at the royal event, his wife will be
staying at their home in California, with
their two young children, Archie and
Lilibet.

You’d think that the tabloid press would be

happy that their persona non grata won’t be
in attendance, having spent the past few
months, no… years, painstakingly detailing
various ways in which Meghan has allegedly
disrespected the institution of the monarchy
and o$ended the British public at large.

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But no. Instead, she’s been criticised. Earlier

this week, The Sun’s front cover featured a
photo of the King (then the Prince of Wales)
walking Meghan down the aisle on her
wedding day. The emotionally charged
headline? “The King was there for you… So
sad you can’t make it for him.”
Talk about a guilt trip. The fact is, we know
exactly how the papers would report the
news if Meghan had decided to come along.
She’d be accused of wanting to steal the
spotlight from her sister-in-law, the Princess
of Wales, or her mother-in-law, Camilla, or
of not fully understanding the scale of this
royal tradition. On the day, her clothing
choice would be deemed inappropriate;
royal watchers would be called upon to
explain how her shoes or her nail polish
broke royal protocol. Her every facial
expression would be policed.

So is it any surprise that she’s opted to

remain at home, away from the paparazzi
"ashbulbs?

Indeed, the Duchess of Sussex has

repeatedly cited intrusive press attention as
a major factor in her and Harry’s decision to
leave the UK, and Meghan’s treatment at the
hands of the tabloids – and her #ght back –
has been well documented.

Following a high court battle, in December

2021 Meghan won the latest stage in her
legal #ght against the publisher of the Mail
On Sunday over #ve articles that reproduced
parts of a “personal and private” letter sent
to her father, Thomas Markle, in August
2018.

The court of appeal rejected Associated

Newspapers’ attempt to have a trial over its
publication of the extracts, which Meghan’s
lawyers had called “deeply personal” and
“self-evidently intended to be kept private”.

A high court judge ruled in favour of the

Duchess of Sussex in the privacy and
copyright case that Associated Newspapers’
publication of the letter was unlawful,
entering summary judgment for Meghan
and avoiding the need for a trial.

On Boxing Day 2021, the Mail On Sunday

then printed a statement at the bottom of its
front page acknowledging that the Duchess
won the legal battle. On page three of the
publication, the Mail On Sunday expanded
on the news story, stating that “#nancial
remedies” had been agreed upon.

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Before that, in March 2021, in what was one

of the most emotional moments of her
famous interview with Oprah Winfrey,
Meghan con#rmed what we’d long
suspected: she and Harry had stepped back
from the royal family last year because the
British tabloids were destroying her mental
health.

“Look, I was really ashamed to say it at the

time and ashamed to have to admit it to
Harry, especially, because I know how much
loss he has su$ered, but I knew that if I
didn’t say it, then I would do it,” she told
Winfrey.

“I just didn’t want to be alive anymore.”

Meghan went on to explain that the

relentless, negative media coverage of her,
as well as the palace’s unwillingness to
refute false stories, caused her signi#cant
distress.

And, while her husband immediately began

working on a plan to help ease the pressure
on his wife, Meghan said that other
members of the royal household told her
"atly that she couldn’t seek psychiatric help
because it wouldn’t be good for the
institution.

Harry, sitting beside his wife during the

interview, held her hand tightly.

“My biggest concern was history repeating

itself,” the prince told Winfrey, referring to
his late mother, Princess Diana, who died in
a 1997 crash a!er her car was followed by
paparazzi on motorbikes.

“For me, I’m just really relieved and happy

to be sitting here, talking to you with my
wife by my side.”

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7 most important revelations

Earlier that year, the Duchess of Sussex won

a privacy claim against the publishers of the
Mail On Sunday a!er they published a letter
she sent her father, and launched a stinging
rebuke to “dehumanising” media
organisations a!er the verdict, saying the
“damage they have done and continue to do
runs deep”.

But, while it is incredibly disheartening, it

shouldn’t be surprising: Meghan and Harry
have long been held up as hate #gures by
certain members of the press for a very long
time now.

Strike that: they haven’t; Meghan has.

Indeed, it’s an indisputable fact that, since

joining the royal family, criticisms of
Meghan have ranged from the o$ensive to
the downright bizarre; remember when she
was dragged into that coronavirus debate?
Or when she was unfairly accused of trying
to “steal the limelight” from Princess
Eugenie when she announced her second
pregnancy?

Don’t believe us? Check out the many, many,

many (far too many) examples below.

1) When Meghan was first

unveiled as Prince Harry’s
long-term girlfriend, the
racist backlash began
At the time, the press attempted to reduce
the talented Suits actor to nothing more
than a divorced older woman (Meghan is
just three years older than the prince). Some
also began questioning her #nancial
background and her ‘motives’ for dating a
member of the royal family.

Perhaps most shockingly of all, however,

were the loaded comments about Meghan’s
ethnicity – and the backlash that this
generated on social media. Many racist
Twitter trolls claimed that the prince should
not be allowed to date a biracial person –
harkening back to the mythical concept of
‘blue blood’ and royal purity. And, as Prince
Harry was forced to explain in a public
statement, the paparazzi began to invade
the privacy of both Meghan and her family,
employing abusive tactics in order to #nd
out more about them.

“Some of it has been hidden from the

public,” explained the prince, going on to
recall “the nightly legal battles to keep
defamatory stories out of papers; her
mother having to struggle past
photographers in order to get to her front
door; the attempts of reporters and
photographers to gain illegal entry to her
home and the calls to police that followed;
the substantial bribes o$ered by papers to
her ex-boyfriend; the bombardment of
nearly every friend, co-worker, and loved
one in her life.”

You can read more about it here.

2) When Meghan wore a pair

of trousers to an event,
morons everywhere lost their
shit
Meghan attended the Endeavour Fund
Awards in an Alexander McQueen tuxedo
(aka the glam Hollywood equivalent of every
woman’s trusted jeans-and-a-nice-top
combo).

Cue a plethora of screaming headlines, all of

which punned the same tired old sexist
trope: “Guess who wears the trousers in
Prince Harry’s relationship?”

Yawn.

3) In the run-up to the royal

wedding, Germaine Greer
announced that Meghan
would “bolt” after marrying
Prince Harry
Staunch anti-royalist Germaine Greer sat
down with 60 Minutes Australia to talk
about Meghan and Harry’s relationship (an
odd choice, as the academic is not a close
friend of the couple). And, when asked what
she thought the future held for the couple,
Greer said: “I think she’ll bolt.”

“She’s bolted before,” she continued,

referring to Markle’s 2013 divorce from
Trevor Engelson. “She was out the door. I
think she’ll bolt.”

4) The press had a field day

when Meghan announced her
father, Thomas Markle, would
not be attending her wedding
Thanks to the bullying circus who followed
her dad in the run-up to her wedding,
Meghan was forced to release a statement
saying he would no longer be attending.

To quote Stylist’s Alix Walker: “Imagine if we

were all judged on the families that made
us. Imagine if, by some god-awful turn of
events, millions and millions of people
pulled out their mean little microscopes and
put your family under their glare, then
began to dissect them cell by cell… imagine
if the world’s media decided, a!er all this
scrutiny, that your family was not the right
#t, that they were a ‘car crash’, ‘trash’ and
‘unhinged’.

“It’s unimaginable, isn’t it? Because no

family deserves to go under somebody else’s
microscope. Every family – yours, mine,
Meghan’s, Harry’s – is complicated. Full of
di%cult truths and half-truths and
unspoken truths.”

You can read her article in full here.

5) Showbiz journalists goaded

celebrities into passing
criticism on Meghan’s
wedding dress
The stream of criticism over Meghan’s royal
wedding dress was positively unreal, with
some showbiz reporters even making a
point of asking celebrities to share their
thoughts on the gown. It was Katy Perry’s
comments, though, which made headlines
at the time.

“I would have done one more #tting. I’m

never not going to tell the truth! One more
#tting, but I love you.”

The Dark Horse singer added that she

preferred Kate Middleton’s 2011 Alexander
McQueen bridal look, declaring, “Kate, Kate,
Kate won, Kate won!”

I can see your eyes rolling, reader: I know

you’re thinking that Perry wasn’t strictly
being mean-spirited (she went on to state
that she loves and supports the duchess “as
another woman”). That sometimes people
do look good, or even not as good, as they
might. That there’s literally nothing more
delicious than discussing fashion choices.
That journalists had most likely asked Perry
to comment on Meghan’s dress, and she was
just playing ball.

However, even if all of the above is true, her

comments were still undeniably damaging.
They fed into society’s outdated cult of
perfectionism, and gave the media’s body
and fashion-shaming machine a much-
needed boost. And, most aggravatingly, they
breathed new life into the most outdated
and misogynist narrative of all: that girls are
“mean”, women are “bitchy” and we will
never, ever #nd a way to just get along.

You can read the full report here.

6) Meghan Markle sat on a

chair – and the world lost its
shit. Again.
A 60-second video, which was shared on
Instagram, was captioned simply: “Harry
and Meghan join the Queen and the Queen’s
Young Leaders for their photo at the palace.”
The footage was banal, at best: Meghan sat
down and talked to a woman sitting beside
her, the Queen ensured everyone was
positioned correctly, Harry adjusted his
trousers… the usual.

Explain, then, the slew of headlines that

followed.

“Whoops!” screamed one tabloid. “See the

EXACT MOMENT Meghan Markle switches
from crossed legs to ‘Duchess Slant’ at
palace party.” Another publication claimed
to have footage of the moment “Meghan
Markle realised she messed up her royal leg
cross”. One more bayed: “Meghan Markle
broke a royal rule at an event with the
Queen.” And there were countless others, all
pointing out that Meghan had done the
unthinkable: she had “crossed her legs at an
event with the Queen.”

It was a painfully obvious example of the

press’s attempt to undermine Meghan and
dress her up as ‘unsuitable’. Naturally,
though, we here at Stylist weren’t standing
for it. Read our hot take on the issue here.

7) Meghan Markle’s bra strap

was visible for less than a
second, prompting ‘wardrobe
malfunction’ headlines all
over the world
Meghan committed that greatest of all
female sins, apparently, when she wore a
bra (ironically, the second greatest of all
female sins is not wearing a bra. Go #gure,
huh?). Worse still, a few zoom-happy trolls
had spotted a whole three square inches of
it – and were more than happy to use it as an
excuse to damn her entire character.

Their tweets were more than enough to

outrage certain members of the press,
prompting them to pen entire articles about
Meghan’s bra strap. The general gist? That,
while nobody was hurt this time, we came
very close to the downfall of our civilisation
as we know it. As always.

8) The endless comparisons

drawn between Meghan and
her sister-in-law, Kate
Middleton

There’s no one headline I can pull out here,

as countless stories have highlighted the
dissimilarities between Middleton and
Meghan’s backgrounds. Others have
promised to reveal “reasons why Meghan
Markle is nothing like Kate Middleton…
from relationship history to fashion sense”,
or picked apart the di$erences between
“their #rst public appearances with their
Princes”.

Stylist’s Moya Crockett previously

highlighted the “obvious undercurrent of
racism and classism” running through these
articles, writing: “By drawing these
distinctions between the two women’s
backgrounds, these articles are sending a
clear message: Kate is more or less the kind
of woman you’d expect a prince to marry,
and Meghan… isn’t.”

You can read her article here.

9) The outcry over Meghan’s

“controversial” one-
shouldered dress
When Kate wore a one-shoulder gown to an
event, she was declared a “true princess”
and “vision in white”. When Meghan did the
same, the press branded her “vulgar”.

10) And Meghan’s

“inappropriate” dark nail
 polish
Yes, really.

11) Also,  Meghan’s penchant

for black clothes
Who doesn’t love wearing black?

12) Then there’s the time

Meghan was slammed for
eating avocado on toast
Here’s a headline for you: woman has
breakfast. Because that’s all that happened
when Meghan caught up with close friend
and longterm makeup artist Daniel Martin
over a brunch of avocado on toast and tea in
London.

“Thank you Meghan for being the

consummate hostess this weekend and still
being the avocado toast whisperer, YUM!”
he wrote on Twitter.

Lovely, charming, nothing to see but two old

friends eating avocados and catching up.

Except for many in the media there was

plenty to see. TenDaily spoke to a chef who
blasted the meal as a “little Tescos value no-
frills” and that it needed “a splash of colour
with a few herbs… [or] a wedge of lemon.”
For The Sun, it was a “posh lunch but trolls
say it looks ‘bland’”.

But it was the Daily Mail who, as ever, took

the proverbial cake. Using some aggressive
capitalisation, the media dubbed the display
“Meghan’s VERY unorthodox a!ernoon tea.”
And in a recent edition of the print
newspaper, they took it one step further. “Is
Meghan’s favourite snack fuelling drought
and murder?”

Ugh.

13) Remember when Meghan

was slammed for sending a
Christmas card?
At Christmas, yes. The scandal.

14) And that time the press

took aim at her for having…
knees?
Why? Because apparently, Meghan’s knees
have become a receptacle for the ghostly
face of her young niece, Princess Charlotte,
of course.

15) Meghan was blamed for a

temporary member of the
palace staff leaving their
temporary job, too
The unnamed Met police o%cer has “quit
a!er being in the job for only about six
months”, according to scandalised
journalists. They were also quick to note
that she’s the “third close aide [of Meghan]
to quit in three months”: the couple’s
personal assistant Melissa Touabti departed
Kensington Palace in December, and private
secretary Samantha Cohen also announced
she was leaving her role a!er 17 years with
the Royal Family (it’s worth noting that she
was only ever intended to #ll the position on
a temporary basis).

However, while most contented themselves

with merely insinuating that Meghan was
the driving force behind these departures,
one tabloid took things one step further,
claiming that her “dictatorial behaviour” has
driven a wedge between her and palace
sta$. That her desire to be seen as “one of
the people” had made things unduly
di%cult for her security team. That she
#nds the constant presence of her
bodyguards to be incredible “constraining”.

This is, of course, in spite of the fact that the

bodyguard is understood to be moving on
from the Metropolitan police entirely, and
that a spokesperson for Scotland Yard has
explicitly denied any sort of personality
clash with Meghan. But why let any of these
boring details get in the way of a juicy story,
eh? And why mention that Prince Charles
and Camilla have seen their personal
assistant resign as well? Or that Kate
Middleton, similarly, lost two members of
sta$ shortly a!er she married Prince
William in 2011? Or that, y’know, people
leave jobs sometimes and it’s literally NBD?

Exactly.

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16) The press also hated the

fact that Meghan was visibly
pregnant
They particularly didn’t like it whenever her
hand dri!ed towards her stomach, branding
it “showy”.

17) When Meghan Markle

closed a door, Twitter went
into meltdown
“She must stop that!” cried one user, as
footage of Meghan closing a car door a!er
herself went viral.

“I’ve never seen an on-duty princess [do

that],” added another.

Anyone else rolling their eyes right now?

18) And they really didn’t like

it when she refused to pose
on the hospital steps
immediately after giving birth
Some criticised her for refusing to cart
Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor out
onto the hospital steps, all so the world’s
press could get photos of him and her, in the
hours a!er his birth.

19) They fabricated stories

about Meghan’s relationship
with the rest of the royal
family
Indeed, according to one tabloid’s (frankly
dubious) sources, the royal family hates
Meghan. Hates her. So much so that certain
members of the clan refer to her by a cruel –
and sexist – nickname: ‘the degree wife’.

Naturally, they didn’t name their sources –

nor did they reveal which royal has been
dropping such suspiciously soundbite-
worthy nicknames. The writer did, though,
explain what is meant by a ‘degree wife’, for
those of us who aren’t up to date with our
royal slurs. Playing on the idea that
university students typically #nish their
degrees in three years, the nickname
implies that Harry will be done with
Meghan by late 2021 – three years a!er their
star-studded royal wedding in 2018.

Jeez.

20) They claimed to have

photos of Meghan in her
underwear
Whilst on tour in New Zealand, Meghan
donned a custom Givenchy skirt cra!ed
from a very #ne navy fabric. A very #ne
fabric, that is, which looked ever so slightly
see-through in some photos. And I really do
mean ever so slightly: if you squint at the
designer number, in the right light, you
might *gasp* #nd evidence that Meghan is
wearing underwear under her clothes. If
you lean even closer, you’ll most likely also
note that she has *double gasp* real human
legs under there, too.

“Meghan Markle has SHOCKED royal fans

with a see-through dress,” one journalist
screamed, presumably a!er taking a deep
sni$ of smelling salts to steady their shaking
#ngers.

“Meghan Markle wore a see-through skirt

and nobody noticed,” con#ded another,
making sure to share a photo of said-skirt in
a bid to rectify the public’s total lack of
awareness.

“Meghan Markle su$ers yet another

wardrobe malfunction, wears see-through
skirt,” wrote another disapprovingly,
presumably still dwelling on the fact that
Meghan recently forgot to cut the tag o$ her
embroidered red dress from Self-Portrait (a
message to this journo: get the f**k over it
already).

“Meghan’s see-through skirt in New Zealand

was her true Diana moment,” insisted
another, jumping at the chance to once
again compare Prince Harry’s new wife to
his late mother (and share a long-forgotten
photo of Diana’s own ‘wardrobe
malfunction’ from the 80s).

It was all pretty desperate, quite frankly.

21) Apparently Prince Harry’s

hair loss is Meghan’s fault, too
“Harry’s hair seems to have got a lot thinner
since he tied the knot with Meghan Markle,”
one tabloid claimed boldly. “Can the hair
loss be blamed on his marriage?”

22) And tabloids couldn’t get

over the fact Meghan had
dated other men before
Harry, either
Whether they’re dubbing her the “divorced
American” or concocting stories about her
past with Matt Cardle, they’re always there,
hammering home the point that Harry
didn’t marry a virgin bride.

23) They don’t like the fact

that Meghan uses hair
extensions
Add it to the list, I guess.

24) They couldn’t stop

themselves speculating about
Meghan’s diet
It all kicked o$ when an online scam used
Meghan’s image – without her consent – to
promote their range of diet pills. Throw in
some fabricated quotes from the royal (one
investigation said that Meghan described
the pills as her “passion project” – the very
same phrase she used to refer to her
Grenfell cookbook) and you have a recipe
for dangerously toxic levels of body-
shaming bullshit.

25) And Piers Morgan  –

actual Piers Morgan  – penned
a scathing attack on Meghan
disguised as “advice on how
to handle the media”
In his column, the professional troll Morgan
asked Meghan to “stop showing o$” her
“unimaginable wealth and luxury”, among
other things.

His 10-point guide, essentially, reads thus:

1. Stop bleating about privacy

2. Share, don’t suppress, basic information
about your life
3. Stop showing o$
4. Don’t take the piss
5. Avoid being a hypocrite
6. Put your wokeness back to sleep
7. Pack in your ongoing PR campaign in the
US media
8. Forgo silly tokenism
9. Make peace with the Cambridges
10. Plant trees, and do your duty

It’s laughable, isn’t it?

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Meghan Markle’s message to the “quiet

heroes” of the Covid-19 pandemic

26) Yes,  tabloids succeeded in

dragging Meghan Markle into
Covid-19 coverage
Last year, HRH Prince Charles was
diagnosed with coronavirus (he’s #ne now,
in case you’re wondering). And, naturally,
the tabloids had a #eld day, somehow
managing to twist this story into yet further
proof of Meghan’s apparent wickedness.

How? Well, they claimed that, upon hearing

of his dad’s coronavirus infection, Prince
Harry desperately wanted to return to
England “straight away.” Meghan, however,
“forbid” him from doing so.

Indeed, as one of the Daily Mail’s ever-

dubious “insiders” put it: “Under no
circumstances is she OK with him travelling
anywhere right now.”

Right. Let’s unpack this, shall we?

Setting aside the fact that this entire story

feels fabricated (Harry and Meghan are
literally in lockdown mode, so who was this
“insider” – baby Archie?), let’s consider
Meghan’s reported concerns: that she
doesn’t want her husband to leave their
home in Canada, board a plane, "y to the
UK, and visit his infected father.

You know what? If by some miracle there is

a tiny kernel of truth to these baseless
reports, then fair enough. Because, if
Meghan really did ask Harry to stay home,
she’s not doing so to be spiteful: she’s simply
following the guidelines put in place by
WHO. She’s working to keep herself and her
family safe, using the social distancing
measures we have all been provided with.

Honestly.

27) Apparently it’s all over for

her and Harry (sigh)
On 15 February 2021, the cover for New Idea
loudly declared “It’s all over!” alongside a
picture of Harry and Meghan on their
wedding day in 2018, edited so as to appear
torn down the middle.

Underlining how ridiculous these baseless

stories truly are, though, the poorly timed
headline hit newsstands on the same day as
an o%cial announcement from the Duke
and Duchess of Sussex that the Duchess was
pregnant. Awkward.

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Meghan and Harry quitting royal duties has

split the internet – is it any wonder they
want to step back?

28) Everyone has been really

bloody desperate to dream up
a feud Meghan and Princess
Eugenie
First, certain members of the press claimed
that Eugenie was ’upset’ that Meghan’s #rst
pregnancy was revealed on her wedding
day. Then, they decided that Harry and
Meghan deliberately decided to announce
their second pregnancy on Valentine’s Day
2021 in order to steal Eugenie’s thunder
once again (the princess had given birth to
her own baby, August, a few days before).

“Meghan and Harry ‘overshadow’ Eugenie

for second time with royal baby news,”
insisted the Daily Express.

“Royal fans claim Prince Harry and Meghan

Markle’s baby news has upstaged new
mother Princess Eugenie AGAIN — a!er
couple announced #rst pregnancy at her
wedding,” declared the Daily Mail, adding
fuel to the imaginary #re with in its own
scandalised headline.

And Australian magazine New Idea leaned

hard into the narrative, stating: “Once is an
accident but twice is a choice. Meghan
Markle and Prince Harry must be choosing
to upstage Princess Eugenie at any
opportunity because this is the second time
they have stolen her thunder!”

Right. And this is in spite of the fact that a)

they would have known about each other’s
due dates, b) sources close to Eugenie have
said the two women are very close, and c)
Meghan and Harry speci#cally chose
Valentine’s Day in order to honour his late
mother, Princess Diana.

Lord, give us strength.

29) She was accused of

manipulating Archie’s birth
certificate
Earlier this year, it emerged two changes
were made to the royal baby’s
documentation three weeks a!er it was
registered. The Duchess of Sussex’s given
names, ‘Rachel Meghan’, were removed,
leaving just ‘Her Royal Highness The
Duchess of Sussex’. And ‘Prince’ was added
to Harry’s name, which was previously
omitted.

Naturally, everyone fell over themselves to

claim this was yet further proof of the
Sussexes’ scheme to market themselves.

Cue a curt response from Meghan’s

spokesperson, which said: “The change of
name on public documents in 2019 was
dictated by the Palace, as con#rmed from
senior Palace o%cials. This was not
requested by Meghan, The Duchess of
Sussex nor by The Duke of Sussex.”

They added: “To see this UK tabloid and

their carnival of so-called ‘experts’ choose to
deceptively whip this into a calculated
family ‘snub’ and suggest that she would
oddly want to be nameless on her child’s
birth certi#cate, or any other legal
document, would be laughable were it not
o$ensive.”

30) And Meghan (Harry too, actually)

have once again been accused of
disrespecting the Queen

Meghan and Harry don’t want to serve as

working royals anymore, for obvious
reasons (see everything above and more).
And apparently, despite the fact that the
Queen is #rst and foremost Harry’s
grandmother, and only wants what’s best for
him, this very reasonable request has been
transformed into an insult by the tabloids.

“It’s been a rough few weeks for the queen,

that’s for sure,” one source tells Us. “The
situation with Harry and Meghan has been
challenging, the queen has had some tearful
moments mixed with anger and
disappointment.”

“They have insulted the Queen,” a royal

commentator added to The Express.

Right. Let’s take another look at

Buckingham Palace’s o%cial response to
Harry and Meghan con#rming that they will
not be returning as working members of the
royal family, shall we?

“While all are saddened by their decision,

The Duke and Duchess remain much-loved
members of the family.”

It’s actually pretty amazing that the press

has managed to spin that into a tale of an
anguished queen, isn’t it?

31) Meghan Markle ‘slammed

door in Kate Middleton’s face’
after she ‘made her cry’
Just days a!er her interview with Oprah
aired on ITV, Meghan was once again
dragged into another needless feud
storyline by the tabloids – this time with her
sister-in-law, Kate Middleton.

“Meghan Markle slammed the door in Kate

Middleton’s face when she tried to apologise
with "owers following a row,” claimed The
Mirror boldly.

It’s another one of those baseless source

stories that sets out to pain the Duchess of
Sussex as a monster. And it stings
particularly badly this time as, during the
interview, Winfrey actually asked Meghan to
comment on a tabloid headline that was
published six months a!er the royal
wedding in May 2018, which (falsely) stated
that she had made Kate cry in the run up to
the big day.

“No, no the reverse happened,” said

Meghan. “A few days before the wedding she
was upset about something [relating to the
dresses worn by the "ower girls].

“It made me cry and it really hurt my

feelings,” she continued. “But she owned it
and she apologised and she brought me
"owers and a note apologising… she’s a
good person.

“If you love me you don’t have to hate her. If

you love her you don’t have to hate me.”

32) She was criticised for

worrying about a fire in her
son’s room
Speaking in the #rst episode of her new
podcast Archetypes with guest (and long-
term pal) Serena Williams, Meghan revealed
that she’d been le! shaken a!er learning
that a #re had broken out in the room that
Archie was supposed to be staying in during
a royal tour of South Africa.

“We dropped him o$ at this housing unit

that we were staying at and he was getting
ready to go down for his nap,” she told
Williams.

“We immediately went to an o%cial

engagement in this township called Nyanga,
and there was this moment where I’m
standing on a tree stump and I’m giving this
speech to women and girls, and we #nish
the engagement, we get in the car and they
say there’s been a #re at the residence.”

Archie was not in the room at the time, and

a!er the incident, the couple had to move
on to complete further royal engagements,
without revealing what had happened. The
duchess said she felt there was an emphasis
on “how it looks, instead of how it feels”.

The anecdote prompted a "urry of

headlines suggesting this was somehow
diva-ish behaviour, along with a slew of
stories disputing her account - and the
hashtag #VoetsekMeghan (or “Go away
Meghan”) trending in South Africa.
However, a South African security has since
backed up the Duchess’s account.

“The heater burnt,” they told The Citizen

newspaper. “The house didn’t burn, the
rooms didn’t burn. I didn’t see the #re itself,
but I saw the heater when it came out of the
room. The plastic was severely melted.”

“We were driving in convoy and all of a

sudden, the convoy with Meghan broke
away. We followed a!er… We weren’t sure
what was going on.”

“When we got to the house, the house-

keeper called me and showed me the heater
that was burnt and told me what had
happened and that the child was not in the
room at the time the heater burnt, they
smelt it, went up and saw the smoke.”

33)  She was called out for not

wanting to share photos of
her children with the media

Since Meghan and Prince Harry stepped

back from their roles as working royals at
the start of 2020, the couple have chosen to
release very few photos of their children:
Archie, born in 2019, and daughter, Lilibet,
born in 2021.

In an interview with The Cut, Meghan

revealed she felt uncomfortable with the
royal family’s traditional process of sharing
images to the British media – a system
known as the Royal Rota – a!er being
consistently targeted and criticised by the
tabloids.

“There’s literally a structure by which if you

want to release photos of your child, as a
member of the family, you #rst have to give
them to the Royal Rota,” she said.

“Why would I give the very people that are

calling my children the N-word a photo of
my child before I can share it with the
people that love my child?” she added. “You
tell me how that makes sense and then I’ll
play that game.” She also suggested that if
they’d continued living in the UK, she would
struggle to pick her kids up from school
without being photographed.

“Sorry, I have a problem with that,” she said.

“That doesn’t make me obsessed with
privacy. That makes me a strong and good
parent protecting my child.” Of course, the
press didn’t see it that way, with plenty of
commentators criticising her totally
reasonable decision not to want her kids in
the spotlight.

I could go on and on, forever and ever, until

the end of time. Because it doesn’t stop
there. How could it? Meghan has also been
criticised or having too much energy. For
sweating like all humans do (bar one Pizza
Express-frequenting individual we shan’t
name here). For having a husband who
wants her to be happy (Prince Harry
supposedly uttered the words “what Meghan
wants, Meghan gets” during preparations
for the royal wedding, sparking a severe
case of handwringing across the country).
For “bewitching” Harry (because apparently
there’s no better royal insult than those
thrown around in Tudor times). For
texting her employees. For being “too
American”. For waking up early. For having
a “formidable work ethic”.

For being, above all else, a “di%cult

woman”.

You get the picture. Essentially, what I’m

trying to say is this: all the worst parts of the
world’s press seem to have 101 problems
with Meghan. And they have made a point
of #nding new ways to make that clear
whenever and wherever they can.

Why? Because Meghan, and all she

represents, frightens certain individuals.
This is a woman striving to be a force for
change, a!er all, and some institutions
prefer that things… well, that things stay the
same. Forever.

“Meghan is poised to
unshackle herself from the
limits and restrictions that
come with life as a senior
royal”

So what did the media decide to do about it?

Well, to quote myself (because I’ve become
something of a Meghan Markle
correspondent, over the past few years),
they constructed a narrative which employs
all of the deeply sexist semantics of
modern-day language to ensure that the
world knows, once and for all, that this
woman is Bad News. That she isn’t con#dent
or self-assured. That she is arrogant, cocky,
bitchy. That she is not a “woman’s woman”.
That she is Duchess Di%cult.

It back#red, though. All of those ridiculous

headlines about Meghan’s so-called bad
behaviour have done nothing more than
prove that the media is afraid of her – and
that, in my opinion, has made her powerful.

Now that Meghan has unshackled herself

from the limits and restrictions that come
with life as a senior royal, she can embrace
that power fully. She can become the
change maker she wants (and has the
potential) to be.

And I, for one, can’t wait to see what she

does next.

Samaritans (116 123) operates a 24-hour

service available every day of the year.
If you prefer to write down how you’re
feeling, or if you’re worried about being
overheard on the phone, you can email
Samaritans at jo@samaritans.org.

Oprah With Meghan And Harry: A

Primetime Special is available to stream
on ITV Hub, Courtesy of Harpo
Productions/CBS.

Please note that this article was

originally published in April 2020, but
has been updated throughout.

Images: Getty

TOPICS

MEGHAN MARKLE PRINCE HARRY ROYAL FAMILY

TABLOIDS SEXISM KATE MIDDLETON

PRINCE WILLIAM

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