Harry, Meghan interview new frontline in US culture wars
In America’s never-ending culture wars the left has chosen to listen to Meghan’s allegations against the royal family, while the right sides with her in-laws.
More than 240 years after thousands of colonists fought against their rebel countrymen in the American War of Independence the United States is once again divided over the royal family.
Oprah Winfrey’s primetime interview with the Duke and Duchess of Sussex has become the new front line in America’s never-ending culture wars. The left chose to listen to Meghan, while the right sided with her in-laws.
The political divisions were evident from the moment Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, underlined the Biden administration’s admiration for the couple’s frank discussion of their mental health concerns. “For anyone to come forward and speak about their own struggles with mental health and tell their own personal story, that takes courage,” she said. “That’s certainly something the president believes.”
WATCH: Asked if President Joe Biden and the First Lady had watched the Oprah interview with Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki praised the couple for their ‘courage’ to speak about their mental health struggles https://t.co/Uhrqy47b0Dpic.twitter.com/8hna5b151H
— Reuters India (@ReutersIndia) March 9, 2021
Hillary Clinton expressed support for the duchess, saying she had found the interview “heart-rending to watch”, adding that “every institution has got to make more space and acceptance for young people coming up, particularly young women, who should not be forced into a mould that is no longer relevant, not only for them, but for our society.”
Hillary Clinton on Meghan and Harry's interview: Young women "should not be forced into a mold that is no longer relevant" https://t.co/1VUeNH96Ds
— CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) March 9, 2021
Clinton told an event set up by The Washington Post that it was “heartbreaking” that Meghan was not “fully embraced”, not just by “the permanent bureaucracy that surrounds the royal family, but by the media in the UK”.
The centre-left media largely accepted the account of racial discrimination and emotional cruelty at face value.
Karen Attiah, an editor at The Washington Post, wrote that Meghan and Harry had revealed “in stark terms how the racism and white supremacy that the British wielded for centuries to sustain their empire remains very alive”.
Saeed Ahmed, a CNN editor, drew attention to the role of two black billionaires in rescuing the couple: Tyler Perry, the entertainment mogul who let them stay at his mansion while they were looking for a home, and Winfrey herself. “A Black man gave them a home,” he wrote. “A Black woman gave them a platform.”
In The Los Angeles Times Mary McNamara noted that for many viewers the interview was “a confirmation of what they already believe: the British monarchy is an endangered and vampiric institution that survives by feeding on the souls of its members in the name of service in exchange for the frantic flower-waving love of millions and the ability to hunt stag at Balmoral.”
She concluded that the interview raised an “obvious question: how many young women must be driven to near-suicide before Great Britain decides to either end its monarchy or stop throwing its most vulnerable members to the wolves?”
Right-wing media figures took a much more hostile view. “When I’m looking for a quiet peaceful life out of the public eye the first thing I’ll do is call Oprah to do an interview,” Donald Trump Jr posted on Twitter.
In an eight-minute video on Facebook he spoke of his visit to Buckingham Palace two years ago. He said the royal family were “totally welcoming” and described the Queen as “the coolest person, for someone that age”.
The former president’s son described Harry as “brainwashed” and said that Meghan was looking for attention.
Megyn Kelly, the former Fox News presenter, tweeted: “Give me a break. Have you ever seen such privileged people wallowing in their own (perceived) victimhood like this?”
And that means NOTHING SHE EVER DOES CAN BE CRITICIZED! EVERYTHING SHE TOUCHES IS PERFECT!
— Megyn Kelly (@megynkelly) March 8, 2021
The couple’s grievances and actions have the potential to set Americans against each other for far longer than the mild uproar last week over “cancel culture” and the late children’s author Dr Seuss, especially after Winfrey revealed that the full interview was three hours and 20 minutes long, meaning that almost two hours of it have not yet been seen. That is because the clashing perspectives “mirror a difference in world view” that has long shaped American domestic politics, wrote Joanna Weiss, a magazine editor, in a column for Politico. The battle lines are “between the left, with its focus on systemic change, and the right, with its emphasis on individual responsibility”.
She said that “to liberals Meghan Markle was the victim of a problem much broader than her own life” and the resulting rift in the royal family was therefore the “fault” of the institution itself for being unwilling to change. “But many American conservatives had a different point of view: that Meghan should have known exactly what she was getting into – and, in fact, should have been thankful for the astounding privilege that had been bestowed upon her.”
The Times
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