If life was fair and people rational, photos like Meghan celebrating her daughter’s birthday would jolt even the most venomous naysayers out of their trances

To coincide with her daughter Lilibet’s fourth birthday, Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, has released a photograph of them together: seemingly on a boat, the picture shows the little girl slumped in her mother’s arms, heavy with the total surrender to safety that parents everywhere will recognise.

It’s a beautiful image – beautiful enough, you’d hope, to pull the public up short in their ongoing crusade against the duchess. But while I’m crossing my fingers, I’m not holding my breath.

Under the Mail Online article about the photo, a witch’s brew is already stewing: “Just making sure she keeps the attention on her. Meghan saturation,” says one commenter. “Couldn’t help herself could she,” adds another. On it goes: “What’s wrong with this woman? Nestling a small child for publicity.”

It would be ludicrous if it wasn’t so appalling. At the time of writing, there are more than 3,000 comments, largely in that tone. I wonder whether their authors would dream of posting something in the same spirit under another celebrity’s post with their child, or even a friend’s – and if the answer’s no, if it would occur to them to wonder why.

In fairness, everyone has something that makes them fly off the handle. Generally, this is because it taps into a deeper anxiety, which is what they’re really reacting to. For instance, I am disproportionately mean about small towns, I think because I fear living a small life. I have a friend who splutters at the mere mention of AI, because subconsciously – I suspect – she fears being replaced by a hoard of soulless robots (fair).

But while some such phobias are highly personal – and therefore, easy to spot – others tap into more universal fears and values, afflicting huge swathes of the population. The resulting behaviour is no less odd just because it’s common – still, ubiquity lends it a cloak of normalcy. A vessel for our most fetid subconscious biases – racism, misogyny, class anxiety – since she married into the British royal family in 2018, Meghan is a perfect case in point.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex as they leave St George’s Chapel in Windsor Castle after their wedding in 2018 (Photo: PA)
Much has been written about her treatment at the hands of the press and public alike, but it bears repeating: at the height of Meghan-hate, when she and Harry were withdrawing from royal duties precisely because of scrutiny and criticism, she could barely breathe without eliciting the kind of bile society normally reserves for its most heinous criminals.

Of course, her only crimes were being female, mixed race, and American – but as the world’s reaction to her proved, they were more than enough to get millions frothing at the mouth, whether they know it or not.

These unconscious beliefs work both ways: just think of Captain Tom Moore, the centenarian Second World War veteran who walked around his garden to raise money for the NHS during Covid. We might have thought we were reacting to a nice old man doing something charitable, but our frenzied behaviour (cakes of his face, balloon sculptures, unhinged Facebook posts) revealed there was more to the story. Put it down to pandemic panic, NHS loyalty or nostalgia: Captain-Tom-mania took on a life of its own – much like the hideous one that continues to swirl around Meghan.

British vilification of Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, has reached parody

Positive or negative, the common ingredient in these fervours is delusion. No one thinks, “I’m scared that everyone I love will die, but that’s too frightening to face so I’m sublimating it into support for this old man who’s raising money for hospitals”. Or “I can’t admit that I resent women and people of colour, so I’m concentrating that into abstract hatred for this public figure who just so happens to represent both groups”. What comes out instead is less honest but more socially acceptable, turbo-charged by the (barely) suppressed real emotions; see above, or practically any tabloid comments section.

If life was fair and people rational, photos like Meghan celebrating her daughter’s birthday would jolt even the most venomous naysayers out of their trances – instead, they get incorporated into their warped world view, proof of the duchess’s narcissism rather than a touching glimpse into a young family.

What can be done? I’m afraid that if we accept this behaviour has roots in the deepest parts of ourselves, it’s going to take more than a gentle talking-to to change things. On the other hand, perhaps it can be some comfort to those on its sharp end – like Meghan – to know that no matter how immensely personal such criticism might seem, it has almost nothing at all to do with them.

Meanwhile, hopefully modelling some less insane responses will speed the national rehabilitation process along: Happy birthday Lilibet! What a lovely photo of you and your mum.

See? That wasn’t so hard.