Prince Harry is in the United Kingdom, his former stomping ground, for the court cast against ANL, the newspaper group being sued for breach of privacy. However, he, Sadie Frost (the ex-wife of Jude Law) and Elton John are all accusing the company of phone tapping and invading their privacy, as per the report by Channel Nine Australia.
While this is not the first time a newspaper company has been sued for phone tapping and invasions of privacy (look at the now-defunct News of the World), this is quite possibly the first time Harry has ever been in a courtroom. Royals don’t go to court. Ever. As per the Guardian, Princess Anne did in 2002 for a dog attack where she pleaded guilty to one of her dogs attacking small children. However, she did not go to prison, though she was fined £500 under the Dangerous Dogs act. She also had to pay £250 in compensation and £148 to the magistrates’ court. The dog, Dotty, was not put down after being assessed by a dog psychologist, who said the dog was “placid and playful.”
Princess Anne In The Court Room Should’ve Been A Wakeup Call To Harry
Having Princess Anne go to court showed at the time that no one, not even royals, was above the law. Harry, however, has so many lawsuits going on simultaneously that it’s hard to track which is which. I’m not doing that as I haven’t been focusing on him and Meghan as I’m trying to build up the actual entertainment aspect of this site. However, it has become apparent that the Sussexes cannot read a room.
I’ve said this before. Harry is a lost cause. Unless he can pull himself together, he’s done. He’s just another celebrity who thinks he’s above everyone else. I say he’s a ‘celebrity’ because that is what he has been reduced to. The only difference is that he has a title that he can use to get ahead. However, his adopted home country, the United States of America, doesn’t formally recognise titles. The moniker they recognise is president, vice president and senator, but even those are a stretch.
While I support the celebrities’ suing ANL, I disapprove of all the attention being on Harry. He’s only a blip in this case. As someone who uses Daily Mail as a source for things I write about, even I can see what they did is wrong.
From A Blogger’s Perspective
Before I jump back into the Harry and Meghan stuff, I want to address the court battle and the reason why ANL is in this predicament, to begin with. So, much like News of the World, outlets associated with ANL, which is short for Associated Newspapers Limited, employed their journalists to go to extreme lengths to break news stories. Tactics included doing whatever was necessary to invade the privacy of the rich and famous, which meant tapping their phones and hacking emails or whatever else they were told to do.
As a writer/blogger/journalist, I know this is wrong. If I were employed by someone who told me to hack someone’s emails or tap their phone, I would tell them to get stuffed, as I have morals I refuse to break. If this had been done in Australia, that person’s career would be over the second they were exposed.
Media law in Australia is much tighter than it is in, say, the U.S., where they have the first amendment. So, for example, there was a podcast episode by the Age newspaper which spoke to one of the journalists that broke the Harvey Weinstein sexual assault story for the New York Times, and she was told by the Australian journalist they wouldn’t be able to print a high-profile report like that without being shut down.
Big corporations in Australia can go to a judge and have a story stopped. I don’t know how it works in the U.K., but journalists can do whatever they want until they get caught. I would have thought they would have looked back at the News of the World situation and corrected their methods, but apparently not.
The Not-So-Accidental Bump Of A Photographer
There was an “incident” where Harry ‘bumped’ into a photographer on his way into the courtroom. I’ve watched the footage multiple times, and it was no accident. Check these photos out:
Harry walked right into the photographer. Who knows what happened, but he looks off his face. He also looks smug, but when doesn’t he? Harry encapsulates everything Meghan has taught him. He could have walked around the photographer. But he didn’t. Also, Harry has his arm out before he makes contact with the guy while having bodyguards around him who don’t attempt to block the photographer. So, what gives?
Harry And Meghan, Please Read The Room
All press is good press. That’s a mantra that has been going around for years. However, Harry and Meghan keep digging their graves by playing media games. All the court battles with them now show that neither can read a room. They have overplayed their hands by constantly suing everyone they think is slighting them.
The tides are starting to turn. Samantha Markle, Meghan’s half-sister, is suing for defamation—also, the U.S. media have started depending on them too. Yet, they’re to blame their egos for realising anything is different. Do they have supporters? Yes, they always will, but they can’t grasp that everything they do is tone-deaf on a massive scale.
One example is Harry’s constant talk about doing recreational drugs and how they “helped” him. Many of his followers are young, and given his platform, it might be wrong as they could try to take the same drugs and be like him. While he’s not straight out saying, “Take these drugs, they’ll help you like they did me,” people fear the implications. Parents of kids who have died from the same drugs Harry has used have said what he is doing is dangerous.
Finally, we get to Meghan. Her tone-deafness is on purpose. For example, when she did that Harlem visit, she wore that ill-fitting suit that made her look like Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker. Her outfit was something close to $50,000, more than the teachers made in a year. Then, there was the visit to the homeless shelter, where she wore more than the pregnant mothers there had ever dreamt of making. She does not care about people, she cares only about herself. She goes once to get headlines. Harry is not much better
