RiffBlog

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle should stop using their Sussex titles, writes Daniela Elser. Photo / Getty Images

OPINION:

Something is clearly afoot in the monarchies of Europe. In only the last few years, in Norway, in Denmark, and in Spain, members of the Kings and Queen’s families have been losing titles and royal privileges faster than Prince Harry lost his wash-and-wear corduroy trousers in Las Vegas.

In 2019, King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden announced that he was removing five of his grandchildren from the royal house and then in September 2022, Queen Margrethe of Denmark set a cat amongst the pigeons announcing she was stripping the titles of her four grandchildren from younger son Prince Joachim.

Come November of last year and it was Norway’s Princess Martha Louise’s turn, with it being revealed that she would no longer represent the royal house. A very clear line was drawn by King Harald: While his daughter could keep her title, she most definitely could not use it in conjunction with any commercial ventures that she and her shaman fiancé Durek Verrett might cook up from their new California home.

(Lord, how many Euro royals who can trace their lineage back to Queen Victoria are currently wandering around the oat milk aisle of Santa Monica Wholefoods?)

There is one very obvious thing that unites all of those affected by this title pruning… they are all spares or the children of spares.

The obvious question here is, how much longer can the Spare and his wife hold onto theirs, especially in light of the coronation decision?

This week the world learned that while Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex will be booking himself a first-class seat, low-carb meal please, to London for his father’s King Charles’ upcoming coronation, his wife, Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex will be staying put at their home in California.

Handily, their son Prince Archie turns 4 on the very same day thus giving Meghan something of a flimsy excuse. (After all, why spend the $22,000 a British Airways ticket currently costs so you can be pointedly blanked by your in-laws on live tele?)

However, their decision for Meghan not to go could have serious repercussions, not least when it comes to their Sussex titles.

Because here’s the crux of the matter: In making the choice to not go and to not show her support for her father-in-law, to not be there for one of the biggest moments for the monarchy in the better part of a century, she is making her position in regards to the institution pretty damn obvious.

So too, Meghan seems to be taking an abundantly crystal clear stance on what sort of relationship she wants to have with her husband’s family, i.e., pretty much none.

Despite the then-Prince Charles stepping in to save the day and walk the former Suits actress down the aisle in 2018, the duchess would not seem to be overly enthusiastic about returning the supportive family favour.

(I know, supporters would make the case that she has every reason to want to cold shoulder the bunch of dentally-challenged, human icicles and lifetime subscribers to Horse & Hound - jeez how many clichés can I squeeze into one sentence? - but that’s beside the point.)

Bottom line is: Meghan would seem to be drawing a line in the sand in regard to her feelings about the whole Buckingham Palace box and dice. Fine.

However, if the Duchess of Sussex is seen to be turning her back on the monarchy, how much longer can Charles let her and Harry hold onto their biggest gift from the said monarchy?

Talk about quid pro whoa….

Basically, with this coronation move, are the Sussexes boxing Charles into a corner when it comes to their titles?

It was only last weekend that extracts from Robert Jobsons’s new book Our King: Charles III were published, revealing: “The idea of stripping Harry of his Duke of Sussex title has been discussed at the highest level. The King is said not to be in favour, but other senior royals are less indulgent.”

While the “not in favour” part is good news for the Montecito’s most famous residents, what should ring alarm bells is that he would not seem to have ruled it entirely or dismissed the idea as nonsense.

We have now passed the two-year mark since Harry and Meghan’s Oprah Winfrey interview, which in hindsight was them just firing the starting gun on their quest to vent and vent some more about his family. Since then, their dirt-dishing has only become more polished and high-def but the meat and potatoes remained the same: The royal family? They’re a bunch of cold-blooded, self-interested sorts who suffer from unconscious bias and are too chummy with the media.

Harry and Meghan have taken family feuding and gone pro, all the while still merrily identifying with said family given the awesome money-making pulling power of a royal title.

How can His Majesty let them keep using what was a gift from the sovereign to help hawk their wares around Hollywood when their bread and butter these days, commercially, is churning out anti-Firm content?

Interestingly, the King has recently been putting on an unexpected display of backbone.

Within 24 hours of Spare being released, reportedly, His Majesty decided to turf the Sussexes out of their UK home Frogmore Cottage. It was a handy move given that at some point he had also made the eminently sensible decision of cutting his brother Prince Andrew’s allowance, thus effectively evicting him from his vast estate, Royal Lodge, he will no longer be able to afford the upkeep. (Good luck though, Your Majesty. This week Page Six reported that the King is “furious” with his younger brother’s refusal so far to vacate his current grand home.)

These real estate moves would suggest that the King has no intention of tip-toeing around feelings or worrying about upsetting the family’s troublesome dukes in the quest to make the royal family seem both an efficient outfit and to not tolerate the shenanigans of the spares.

And that could bode very badly for the Sussexes if they continue to suffer from bouts of anti-Palace Tourette’s syndrome.

In light of the King’s recently acquired taste for pretty pragmatism, what once seemed like a truly extraordinary, no-coming-back-from move on Charles’ part, stepping into strong-arming the couple into no longer using their Sussex appellation, today does not seem that outrageous at all.

The way things are shaping up, if the next two years of Sussex media outings look anything like the last two years’ worth, there may well come a day when His Majesty has no choice but to do his job and to protect the monarchy, therefore no more indulging his toy-throwing son and daughter-in-law.

(Yes, I know technically that Charles can’t strip Harry of the Sussex dukedom, only parliament can do that, but I’m sure there must be mechanisms available to him to take action on this. He could also let them keep their titles, as with Märtha Louise, but somehow force them to longer use them in conjunction with any money-making projects.)

I could also at this point write a fairly lengthy thesis on the pretty awesome hypocrisy of Harry and Meghan in all of this too but some of us have laundry to do. What boggles the mind is how in good conscience they can earn millions for bagging the monarchy while still loudly identifying as members of said institution. The cognitive dissonance is enough to warrant us all needing to have a good, long lie down.

But we are here to talk about Charles and how he could approach the troublesome, headache-inducing, “is it too early for a whiskey?” Duke and Duchess of Sussex. Might we see him follow a similar path to King Carl Gustaf, Queen Margrethe, and King Harald and decide that some spare title pruning is required?

When Charles is crowned next month, he will be promising to protect the crown and the monarchy and that could require him to make tough calls that as a father he might be loath to make.

Meanwhile, perhaps Harry, Meghan, Martha Louise, Durek, Washington-based Joachim and the maybe-relocating-to-LA Princess Eugenie should think about setting up some sort of US support group. I’

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