What Really Is Fuelling the UK Media’s War on the Sussexes

By Victor Oladokun

Have #PrinceHarry and #Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, always made the best of decisions? Of course not.

Walking away from their royal roles, the embarrassing interviews, the public airing of grievances, and the not-too-effective brand-building, all invited media and public backlash.

But the sheer volume of the hate-filled coverage in the British press and media still feels out of proportion. 

The endless rants and the splashy front pages still say more about the media than they do about Harry and Meghan.

Why?

Hatred is often a form of denial. A huge amount of the media coverage treats the Sussexes as if they single-handedly created every bit of negativity around them. The narrative that they brought it upon themselves is a neat and convenient story.

In a perverse way it frees the media, particularly the British media, from any sense of guilt or shame. It does not have to look too hard at its own long history of privacy intrusion, the selective outrage, or the subtle and not-too-subtle racial undertones that keep surfacing.

There’s also a status issue that has never quite gone away. Whether the British media admits it or not, Meghan is a biracial American who, in the minds of many critics, stepped into one of the most closed, tradition-bound institutions on earth and acted like she belonged there. For a certain corner of the British media and its audience, this was always going to be too much to swallow. And it has been.

The idea that she has the audacity to claim a place in that rarefied circle, on her own terms, has been a huge affront to Britain’s upper crust, and to others lower down the social ladder who would give anything to be in her shoes.

For years, we’ve seen it unfold. We’ve seen it in the way her ambition gets framed as arrogance, her confidence as entitlement, and her beauty as Hollywood glitz rather than elegant sophistication.

The truth is, the very same traits would look quite different on someone else who fit the expected mould more neatly.

And then there’s the simple matter of what’s to be gained from the frenzy of hatred. What do the newspapers, tabloids, columnists, TV programs, social media, and a chunk of the readership actually gain from the constant vitriol?

For one, a perverse sense of satisfaction. Royal drama sells. Conflict sells harder. Once the Sussexes became reliable villains in the ongoing soap opera, the incentives locked in.

Negative stories perform. They confirm what a lot of readers already want to believe. Keeping the couple perpetually in the “doghouse” is therefore good for social media clicks, good for old institutional loyalties, and satisfying for anyone who enjoys watching high-profile people get cut down to size.

Ultimately, the media-fuelled hate is not just personal dislike. It’s not just social snobbery. It’s not just racism. It’s also a system doing what systems do when the incentives line up.

The mess of coverage is driven by money, tradition, cultural discomfort, genuine disagreement with their choices, and the vicious media habit of going after easy targets.

Once you start noticing how the stories get chosen, who is framing the narrative, how the stories are framed, and the double standards, then the intensity of the hostility makes more sense.

None of this means the Sussexes are blameless. Regardless of what they do or do not do, this is going to be a long battle.

If I were in a position to advise them, I’d say stay out of the spotlight for a while, avoid interviews and public statements, and most importantly, rebuild the broken ties with your family … for your own sake, the sake of King Charles, the sake of the Royal Family, and for posterity.

Dr. Victor Oladokun is a communication strategist & development champion amplifying Africa’s global narrative.