The truth is, I feel slightly more ambivalent about Meghan Markle than the other Amber Heard-supporting, misogyny-despising, racism-defeating type social justice warriors I know. Some of my ambivalent feelings are kind of like, I dunno, fair enough, really – I’m a fucking socialist, for fuck’s sake, you guys, are you really expecting me to feel sorry for two millionaires with nannies because their UK-taxpayer-funded accommodation is a bit too cottage-like and humble? Come on. Be serious. There’s hungry kids living on Brexit island, hungry kids, freezing pensioners, people who are born destined for the Job Centre or prison just like posh boys are born destined for Eton, I can’t lose too many tears over the cottage stuff!
The weird thing about the Brits is how we’re obsessed with the royals, even, sadly, those of us who officially want to abschaffen die Monarchie
And – God, I hate to admit this – some of my ambivalence comes from envy. There, I said it. I’m jealous of her. I’ve watched all six documentaries three times each, and I got so jealous and angry I had to pour myself a vodka and Aldi-label coke at one point, like the Euroshop Blanche DuBois that I am. It’s not that I exactly want a prince of my own. Not exactly. But I wouldn’t mind a hot, dumbo Sloane I could convert to Marxism, hanging on my every word – and agreeing with it. I caught myself thinking some Very Bad Anti-Feminist Things while watching the Harry and Meghan doku, the worst of which being, undoubtedly, “She doesn’t even look that hot without eyeliner on.”
Still, for all my ambivalence, why are the British media like this, why didn’t the Royal Family try a tiny bit harder to pretend not to be racist, just for PR purposes, and what the fuck, what the actual fuck, like I mean this on a SCIENTIFIC level what the actual fuckety fuck is Prince William’s fucking problem? What exactly is he playing at? What’s his problem?
My late mother never liked Kate Middleton, by the way. Like the hipster who touched the light-bulb before it got cool, my mum hated Kate years before I did.
“There’s no love lost between those two,” she said one night, as we watched the BBC news.
“You’ve been reading too many tabloids,” I said, indifferently.
“You can just tell Meghan hates her,” my mum said.
“No, you can’t!” I exclaimed. “You’re really falling for tabloid gossip.”
“They don’t get on,” my mum said. “Well, you wouldn’t get on with a sister-in-law like her, would you? Imagine having that bitch as a sister-in-law, it’d drive you mad. Curtseying properly. Goodie two-shoes. It’d make you want to throw up every time you saw her.”
The weird thing about the Brits is how we’re obsessed with the royals, even, sadly, those of us who officially want to abschaffen die Monarchie. (Women are worse than men for this, but sadly lots of republican men post racist or misogynist anti-Meghan memes, so don’t get too smug about it, boys.) And still. We’re not as weird as the Germans, who actually claim to “like” Kate Middleton. I knoooooow…it’s unfathomable.
“I really like Kate Middleton,” my German friend Jens says to me.
“Do you?” I ask vaguely, in a mental state which can only be described as total bewilderment. “But why?”
“I don’t know,” he says. “She seems…sympathisch.”
I caught myself thinking some Very Bad Anti-Feminist Things while watching the Harry and Meghan doku
The crowd of Germans we’re with, who all seem normal enough on the outside, but are obviously total sociopaths on the inside, start talking about how much they like Kate Middleton. I haven’t felt this confused by this country since I whatsapped everyone that Bread Pitt pun in the bakery and they literally all wrote back to me to say yes, this is funny.
“She’s nice,” one says.
“She’s dutiful,” another says.
“She’s pflichtbewusst,” one who can’t speak much English says.
“She always presents herself well,” another says.
“But she’s boring!” I shout out passionately.
“Well, we’re German,” Jens says. “We don’t mind boring.”
I go home and watch Episode 3 of the Harry and Meghan Mini-Series for what is now the fourth time. I always think I am desperately unhappy living in Berlin, but I notice I’m not really because I literally think everyone should move here. Harry, Meghan, Amber Heard, Britney Spears and my friend Jason who had a nervous breakdown last summer.
“All you need is one dumb Sloane to convert to Marxism,” I say to myself softly. “Just one will do. You could take him to socialist summer camp and everything.”
