Meghan Markle, the latest woman to have married into the royal family, has faced a roller coaster of varying criticism from all directions since her engagement with Prince Harry.
The idea of a former actress from a popular TV series “Suits”, with ethnic origin and a feminist activism leaning, has set the public buzzing in excitement. Soon after the royal wedding, the wide excitement turned into harsh criticism, negative comments and “bullying” as fans called it.
The media and public, however, are not new to this pattern. Kate Middleton – the first working class woman to marry into the royal family, Princess Diana and Sarah Ferguson had all received their share of the harsh spotlight that media outlets started calling it the “jinx” of marrying into the royal family.
Since her wedding to Prince Harry in 2018, Markle has faced controversies for taking private jets, demanding too much privacy, guest-editing a magazine issue (a feat that previous royals had done before) and even for being a demanding boss to her staff.
During Kate Middleton’s time in the spotlight, she had been rudely nicknamed “Waity Katie” and accused of simply waiting for Prince William to pop the question instead of advancing her working career. Princess Diana faced massive obsession from the public up to the days that led to her death and the heavy attention reportedly made her want to leave Britain.
Aside from the unwritten tradition of “bullying” the latest woman to wed a prince, women in the royal family were always pitted against each other as described by Sarah Ferguson, Prince Andrew's ex-wife.
“Women, in particular, are constantly pitted against and compared with each other in a way that reminds me of how people tried to portray Diana and me all the time as rivals, which is something neither of us ever really felt,” Ferguson wrote in Hello! magazine as quoted by The Telegraph.
In the past year, Markle’s moves and style had often been compared to that of Middleton’s and the media never fell silent about an ongoing feud between Middleton and Markle even without official statements to prove the matter. Reports also circulated last July that motherhood had forged their relationship closer.
The jinx appeared to be passed on to the next woman to tie the knot with a royal family member. As Prince William and Prince Harry has no younger sibling to distract the public with dating and marriage rumors, Meghan Markle may need to bear the curse until Prince George grows up to be old enough to date.
Meghan Markle, Prince Harry and baby Archie are currently on a 10-day official visit to South Africa.
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