Harry and Meghan’s West Coast Christmas

It was revealed last week that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have been in Canada for the holidays and now it’s being reported that they’re on the West Coast in British Columbia, spotted on Vancouver Island in Greater Victoria, in a municipality called North Saanich, about 20 km from downtown Victoria, the province’s capital. Victoria, the city, was named after Queen Victoria, great-great grandmother of Harry’s grandmother, Queen Elizabeth. A statue of Queen Victoria stands just outside Windsor Castle where Harry and Meghan of House Sussex were married. So there are all kinds of connections here for Harry and Meghan to be spending the holidays in a Commonwealth country and in a city with so many British connections. When you think about it that way, it becomes clear that the decision about where to spend the holidays, if it is to be away from England, was properly considered. Whether or not that’s acknowledged is another matter. 

The British tabloids certainly haven’t acknowledged the deeper meaning. Instead the Daily Mail tried to create a scandal out of the Sussex Christmas card. As posted the other day, Harry and Meghan sent out digital Christmas cards this year to their patronages and friends. The Queen’s Commonwealth Trust Twitter account was the first to post the card and it is the original:

As you can see, Archie is in focus, the prime subject of the photo while Harry and Meghan, in the background, are out of focus. But some online troll ended up taking that image and tweaking it, making Meghan’s face much more clear. This is the photoshopped – and unsanctioned, unauthorised – version that somehow ended up making the rounds:

The Daily Mail published the doctored photo and brought in “experts” to analyse what was happening, accusing the Sussexes of committing fraud. So Meghan’s friend, Janina Gavankar, who took the photo, showed them their ass in Instagram:

Note that the Daily Mail is one of the publications that the Sussexes are suing for their fabricated stories. And here’s another example – this should NOT have been an issue. Had they just went with the image that Queen’s Commonwealth Trust posted, this would not be a thing. The Daily Mail’s article, however, about Harry and Meghan photoshopping their photo is still up on their site. And their post about Janina releasing the original photo of course does not include the part where she trashes them for being trash. Instead they attempt to explain themselves like this:

“The card was not officially released through any official royal channels, and first appeared on an unverified Twitter account called The Queen's Commonwealth Trust.” 
 
So it’s the Queen’s Commonwealth Trust’s fault for not having a blue checkmark beside their name on Twitter. And this is the bullsh-t that the Sussexes have been up against with, quite possibly, an assist from inside the palace gates and the courtiers and aides who keep selling them out. Which only fuels the nutjobs out there who think that Archie is the biggest fake of them all. That’s a thing now, did you know? These are people with the same DNA as the Twi-Hards who think that Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson have been secretly married all these years and raising two (or is it three now?) secret children. In Harry and Meghan’s case, their haters think she faked her pregnancy and that Archie doesn’t exist. The extra layer to that madness is that it’s a gross and sinister attempt to not recognise a biracial baby. Considering the history of that family, probably not the first time?