More on the Royal Renegades

The Duchess of Sussex. If you met her at a party, would it even occur to you to classify her as "black"?
Would this be somehow significant?

I make a point of not following the private lives of celebrities. That’s generally calumny. I do not follow closely the life of the royal family either. But the royal family is a special case. Their private life has public importance. They are a unifying symbol of the nation. So what happens in their private lives is not private.

One reason why Meghan Markle may have found the life too trying.

I have heard a variety of explanations for what turns out to have been a dramatic royal split.

One is racism.

I cannot discount that possibility. But false charges of racism are as socially and personally damaging as racism itself. In fact, false charges of racism ARE racism itself, in an especially pernicious form. Such charges should be avoided, when there are obvious alternative explanations.

When Harry’s engagement to Meghan was announced, my spontaneous reaction was that it was a bad idea, and that they were bound for trouble. Not because she has some genetic coding that originated in Africa—it is hard to believe that is significant to anyone. Because she is a divorced actress.

While common enough nowadays, marrying a divorcee was once enough to force Edward VIII to abdicate. Our ancestors were not total idiots; there was reason for this concern. It implies problems in forming a stable relationship, surely.

Worse was her being an actress. Anyone can see that actors and actresses have a particularly terrible track record in maintaining stable relationships.

And so it seems to have turned out.

It is not, as some suppose, that they have inflated egos and require attention. Just the opposite. Anyone with a large ego is not going to make it as an actor, because their whole job is to pretend to be someone else.

Had Meghan desired attention, nothing could have suited her better than becoming royalty. But that is not what actors actually want. They want to be someone else, and not to be noticed as themselves.

The problem is that actors live in their imaginations. Again, they have to, to be able to play a role. So they can have too-grand expectations of a relationship, and crash into depression when it turns out not to be as fairy-wonderful as supposed.

Worse, playing a role is very different from living a life. The wonderful thing about a role is that you can stop being yourself for a while, and nothing counts. But when you then cannot take off the role—ever—you are going to feel trapped.

Meghan Markle was going to feel trapped in any settled life; but a royal life is more confining than almost any other. Now EVERYTHING counts.

I have to feel very sorry for Meghan, very sorry for Harry, and very sorry for Queen Elizabeth. I hope they can sort this out.

Canada and some acting jobs for Meghan may well be the solution. Perhaps she gravitated to returning to Canada because that was where she last acted.