The Case of the Missing Princess
In a photo in People Magazine, Kate Middleton looks puzzled and frustrated. I don’t blame her, to be honest. If there were so many conspiracy theories boiling around my own photos, I’d look this way too. And there seem to be quite a few at the moment, ranging from silly to stalking. Kate Middleton is dead. Kate Middleton was kidnapped. Kate Middleton fled the family shed. William is cheating and trenches for a new War of the Waleses are already dug. This is the tip of the iceberg of speculations regarding the Princess of Wales after what is now dubbed Photogate. If only this woman were so charismatic to warrant such a level of obsession in the first place, but have a closer look. Apart from make-up, there’s nothing really captivating in those eyes. If your private life were your job description as well, you might find this relatable though.
It’s a new addition to numerous gates of the Royal Family that have nothing to do with architecture. The most famous of all, of course, was the King’s own Tampongate from the 1990s. It certainly raised awareness about female hygiene products among men in the general public. Brands like Tampax should pay him for all the free marketing they got through the royal scandal. If you had no idea what those little things are that your girlfriend puts into place the that you have an exclusive access to, the veil of mystery was finally lifted. How I wish I were younger. The new generation didn’t live through the tabloid tsunami unleashed by British tabloids back then. It culminated in the famous Panorama interview. Diana, peaking through her razor-sharp eyelashes, lift the lid on the embarrassing emotional threeway her marriage had famously turned into.
Kate’s photogate is the aftermath of a family photo that turned into a PR disaster when major news agencies discovered it was edited, instead of the original. After her surgery and lengthy recovery period, it was supposed to be a gesture of gratitude for the support of her humble subjects. Or that’s what would have happened if the public had any idea what the issue was about. In it, we see her with her three children, smiling for the camera. As usual, dressed like preppy business class frequent fliers instead of heirs to the most famous crown in the world. Someone remarked you can’t possibly make children of that age pose so peacefully. When the shit hit the fan, she admitted to editing it herself. There are detailed analyses of what exactly looked shady. Someone is actually paid to do that, believe or not. But it didn’t help to fix the crack in the wasp’s nest that’s still buzzing.
In some subreddits, some probed even deeper into distasteful dilemmas that had nothing to do with alleged alterations. The face of prince Louis supposedly shows hints of the autistic spectrum, for example. Who cares? By now the story of Prince John, who suffered from severe epilepsy and lived a sheltered life at Sandringham is a known fact, though he was originally kept in the shadows. It could have been a mixture of the social stigma associated with the condition and the unwritten rule of a stoic public image that wasn’t allowed to show any cracks of vulnerability. In the 1990s, this backfired colossally due to the equally stoic response of the Queen to the outpouring of public grief after the death of princess Diana. The damage control tactic was a touching TV tribute to her. It worked.
Fortunately health is no longer a taboo at the Palace, especially since the King’s disclosure of his cancer diagnosis. Instead of following this simple and most effective approach, William and Kate refused to share the original picture. Soon there were photos of the couple in a car, also promptly dismissed as fake. If they wanted to put the affair to bed, it rather added gasoline on the fire that’s now getting out of control. The biggest casualty of the story is public trust where the virus of fake news crept into the royal bowels. The late Queen’s politics of the necessity of visibility was ditched by the couple regarded as the bright future of a monarchy. And that’s exactly what they need, after the antics of Prince Andrew and Prince Harry’s relentless efforts to turn his privacy quest into a lucrative marketing deal.
William’s last-minute decision to drop out of the memorial service for King Constantine of Greece didn’t help put this hilarious hysteria out of its misery. I really couldn’t care less what’s going on here and if Kate is targeted by Jewish space lasers that MAGA minstrels like Marjorie Taylor Greene are all about. Or if she had Alice over for a five-o-clock and shrinked after eating a magic scone before falling into a hole and landing in Lewis Carroll’s Wonderland full of white rabbits wearing top hats. This is actually an indicator of something much more mundane. If the future Queen is pilloried for a harmlessly edited family photo, it’s just a sign of a serious syndrome we all share. It equally applies to all social classes.
We use various editing tools like Photoshop to help us look prettier or more polished then we actually are off camera. Marko Grubnić, a media personality and stylist from Croatia, admitted to doing this. In every photo, his teeth appear so white as if he were using Donald Trump’s bleach instead of a mouth wash. In the past, he was accused by foreign photographers of photoshopping himself into their pictures of exclusive establishments in exotic resorts or cities like Paris and New York. Of course, his image or status don’t come anywhere near the Princess of Wales who’s travelling the world with a her own team for hair and make-up. And that Taj Mahal she’s posing at for the cameras is actually in Agra, not a photo from Unsplash.
Tiktok nation is already well skilled in digital distortion of reality. Sometimes it makes me feel a little bit scared. If you can’t trust your own eyes, everything you see is a source of distressing doubts. It would be a lie to say you’re surprised that a botched royal photo can cause such a fuss. But that essentially a question of context: embellishing your face with a shade of fake tan to look better in vacation photos is one thing. Most people dabbling in it are individuals whose actions won’t snowball into front page material when things get suspicious. It means when you do it, it’s little more than a filter. However, if your face is on a royal Christmas card, a move like that is a lie raising quite a few eyebrows. Hence the “kill photo” order which sounds like an arrest warrant from a crime tv show.
Many of us, after all, use generic photos with all sorts of filters in our articles on Medium. It’s perfectly ok and can be rather humorous when used in a benign, humorous context. Remember Bernie Sanders and his mittens at the Biden inauguration that sparked a thousand memes and you get the picture, quite literally. Then there are paparazzi shots of celebrities without make-up, dragging a bag with their groceries. If it’s supposed to make them look real, it’s not doing the trick because people outside their fan bubble hardly care for whatever they’re doing when not on stage or on the screen. The Windsors are a rare exception because constant visibility comes with the territory into which they’re born instead of elected.
The King is known for his idea of a slimmed-down monarchy where everyone apart from those in the immediate line of succession are reduced to an occasional supporting act. While that sounds like a good idea for an institution that’s completely anachronistic in the 21st century, losing the veneer of ceremonial pomp, exxagerated splendor and circumstance could reduce their public appeal to the one Scandinavian royals are known for. In fact, so much so that I have a problem remembering what exactly they’re famous for in the first place. The Dutch king Willem-Alexander had a coronation without a crown on his head. Instead, they wrapped him into that big cape that looks like a rug from your local carpet cleaner’s shop.
Compared to those, a family of foot fetish duchesses, pearl-clutching princesses, serial cheaters and alleged criminals is much more appealing. As long as you don’t have to fund it, which is still the case in Britain. It’s cheaper to buy Daily Mail if you want to invest some attention into that lot. More affordable than a suppository and much more effective for severe constipation. Admittedly, when your head of state looks like a human suppository, you’ll likely get your money’s worth. Now I’ll go back to photoshopping abs on my beach bod and enjoy the fact no one really cares if it’s real. They are indeed, you just don’t see them. A little faith goes a long way when you want to fool yourself your torso is as flat as a doormat. The average Joe’s merely looks equally frazzled. I’ll just filter the rest away.
