Prince Harry, Meghan Markle face devastating number

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have announced a major new project – and it’s gotten a shocking reception for one key reason.

A fact I find endlessly entertaining: YouTube started life as a video dating site. Sometimes things, most especially on the internet, just don’t go as planned.

That’s a lesson that Prince Harry and Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have been busy learning themselves this week after giving their first joint interview in three years.

What was meant to be a soft-focused, softball of a piece about the launch of their new charitable initiative was instead overtaken by a fresh serving of ye olde royal family melodrama.

And the internet … oh, the internet was not impressed.

Last weekend, CBS’ Sunday Morning news show featured the Sussexes à deux, the couple reprising their TV double act for the first time since 2021. This time though they were focused on launching their Archewell Foundation’s Parents’ Network, set up to support mothers and fathers whose children have been affected by online bullying and the dark side of the internet.

“A good cause,” I hear you say. “Important work,” someone at the back chimes in. Indeed. Unless, that is, you ask YouTube users.

At the time of writing, the nine-minute video of the Sussexes’ interview has 31,000 thumbs downs as opposed to just 3400 thumbs ups. I’ve gotten my calculator out and revived my year eight maths, and that works out at around 900 per cent more dislikes.

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s interview with CBS Sunday Morning. Picture: CBS Sunday Morning

For a quick spot of contrast, an interview with Democrat doyenne and former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi from the same show, and even in such a riven political landscape as that of the US, has 8700 likes and only 2000 dislikes. (The Pelosi video had also been watched 170,000 times more than the Sussex one).

Delve into the comments on the Harry and Meghan interview and you’ll find a particularly merciless assessment of the duo and their charitable work with one of the most popular comments arguing that they are “using other people’s tragedies to raise their own profile”.

Another argued that they themselves are “victimising” the parents involved in the new project and who were also interviewed for the segment.

“Need a petition, stop the Sussex,” read another.

The top voted comment, when I wrote this, had garnered nearly 1000 likes was simply: “If Meghan doesn’t believe in royal titles then why does she always put that title forward?”

(It has to be pointed out that here we have two people who are getting an online drubbing for trying to help mothers and fathers whose kids have been harmed by the internet. Someone sound the irony klaxon).

Could they have viewed the interview as a success? Picture: CBS

You have to wonder if the Sussex camp viewed the Duke and Duchess’ Sunday Morning as a success.

While the Duke and Duchess’ outing attracted plenty of media coverage, most of it has only incidentally mentioned the Parents’ Network launch. Instead, headlines and news stories were given over to Meghan saying that she had not yet “scraped the surface” when it came to speaking out about her own mental health struggles while a working member of the royal family.

This all underscores the fact that their post-palace charity careers have been a real mixed bag. In the massive win column we have Harry’s Invictus Games which only goes from strength to strength. Huzzah!

Unfortunately, there is much more on the “uh oh” side of the ledger, with the last few years having seen them voice their support for a number of causes, only for the said same causes to vanish from their plates as they seem to move onto the next thing.

To mark the Duchess’ 40th birthday in 2021 she launched her 40x40 mentoring project.

What’s that? Whatever happened to it? I can’t tell you. It has gone MIA.

They have voiced support for a range of causes, only for those causes to vanish from their plates as they move on. Picture: Andrew Esiebo/Getty Images for The Archewell Foundation

Later that same year, in November, Meghan wrote a letter to Congressional leaders and cold-called Senators to lobby for paid parental leave along with donating $US25 Starbucks gift cards to staff at a not-for-profit dedicated to the issue. And since? Not a word out of Montecito.

In 2022, when the US Supreme Court overturned Roe versus Wade, which offered abortion protection, the duchess and legendary feminist Gloria Steinem spoke to Vogue.

“Well, Gloria, maybe it seems as though you and I will be taking a trip to [Washington] DC together soon,” Meghan said. As far as is publicly known, the former Suits star has yet to set foot in the capital.

What we seem to have are two people who are very good at big ideas and really dialling up the sizzle – but who seem to struggle to actually deliver on the sausage.

And boy, do they need some demonstrable sausage right now, because it would be hard to see how anyone could think things are going to plan for the House of Sussex.

This year has seen Harry hit with a couple of serious fiascos.

Harry and Meghan speak out in their first interview after announcing their engagement. Picture: Supplied

First, guards employed by the African Parks conservation charity, of which he was president for six years and is now a board member, have been accused of rape and torture in multiple countries in a series of lengthy exposés, with a book about this all yet to come out.

Then there was last month’s debacle after he was named as this year’s recipient of the Pat Tillman Trophy at the ESPY awards. Instead of reminding the world of the Duke’s charity career, it prompted a voluble backlash. Tillman’s mother Mary called out the choice of the self-exiled Duke, labelling him “controversial and divisive”, and more than 78,000 people signed a petition urging awards host ESPN to rethink the choice of the 39-year-old.

Let it never be said that Harry’s life and career makes for boring, plodding stuff.

Next month the Duke will celebrate his milestone 40th birthday, on the other side of the world from his estranged family, as he earns a crust making infotainment for Netflix and with YouTube-izens taking he and his wife to caustic task.

And so, for about the 866th time, I find myself wondering, how the hell did we end up here? I wonder if Harry does too.

Daniela Elser is a writer, editor and a royal commentator with more than 15 years’ experience working with a number of Australia’s leading media titles.

Originally published as Prince Harry, Meghan Markle face devastating number