A Billionaire and Two Ex-Royals Sit Under a Shady Pergola by the Ocean to Chat about Victimhood and Oppression

The backdrop? Millions of parents just miles away struggling to make ends meet while their children languish without any school to go to...

I watched Oprah’s interview with Meghan and Harry and I came away thinking that the disconnect between the filthy rich and regular people is bigger than ever. In a year of utter hell for so many across the globe, two ex-royals sat down a stone’s throw from their own $14 million home (the neighbor’s pergola was perfect for TV) and chatted with their other neighbor, billionaire media mogul and former queen of daytime TV, Oprah Winfrey. I grew up on Oprah and was, for better or worse, a longtime fan. Last night, though, was a disappointment largely because the allegations made in front of the world were so vague that they cannot be verified.

How convenient.

The main theme from Meghan was one of victimology and loss — we heard how Kate Middleton “made her cry,” how son Archie wouldn’t get a title, how the British people would no longer foot the bill for their security. Does the dad driving for Uber at night to put food on the table really have it in him to feel bad about any of this? Do the moms handing me coffees and chicken nuggets at drive-thru windows while their kids are home alone doing school on zoom want to hear about these “hardships” of the rich and famous?

Maybe I’m the one out of touch but I don’t see how it can possibly land well with the millions of people across the globe who have lost loved ones, seen their businesses collapse and their paychecks disappear, and wondered if their children will ever throw on a backpack and head off to school again.

Education writer and advocate Laura McKenna captures it well here:

If Meghan and Harry were super unhappy and are happy now, I’m not sure what the problem is. What are they complaining about? I wish Oprah had asked some follow up questions, but since it wasn’t a real interview – just a smart business decision from Oprah – I shouldn’t be surprised. She should have nailed Meghan down on the title issue — Meghan said that she doesn’t care about titles, but then she said she was upset that Archie didn’t have a title. (Even though he will, when older folks die off.) Meh. The whole title thing is so unseemly for an American to care about.

They did discuss a more serious subject, though, that I do think deserves our attention: mental health and suicidality. It may be hard for anyone to believe that a woman who had just been the bride in a $44 million wedding and was literally crowned in diamonds as she walked down the aisle could possibly be holed up in a palace feeling like she did not want to live. But I certainly believe it’s possible and I don’t judge it. We know that Harry’s mother, Princess Diana, went through similar psychological pain when she became a royal and if there is one thing we should able to agree on, it’s that mental distress and illness do not discriminate. If her claim about not being able to get any help even when she asked for it is true, it is monstrous.

She says she was “methodically” thinking about suicide and that is extremely serious no matter who says it. Is there anything more terrifying than having those kinds of thoughts relentlessly rolling around in your head? It is an emergency and should be treated as such for both the princess and the pauper.

But here’s the rub for me: we have watched a huge uptick in adolescent suicidal ideation and death by suicide since the start of the pandemic. Las Vegas schools cite it as the reason they decided to reopen schools. Marin County, Oakland, Indianapolis and my home state of Rhode Island.

Has Oprah said even a word about that?

She literally lives in the epicenter of school closures that have wreaked utter havoc on countless children and families—while 47 percent of students in the United States attend schools that currently offer five full days of in-person schooling, Santa Barbara, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Oakland have kept their schools either entirely or mostly shuttered for an entire year.

Tarja Parssinen @tarjaparssinen

Can you imagine if @Oprah ditched famous royal people and put her incredible power to opening schools and saving the children of America? #openschools #ChildrensRights #schoolsaresafe

I have long believed that Oprah’s achilles heel is her worship, sycophancy even, of celebrities. Rather than push them hard on their questionable and anti-scientific takes—I’m looking at you Jenny McCarthy, Gwyneth Paltrow and Tom Cruise—she invariably provided them with an enormous platform to spew dangerous nonsense (and make gobs of money doing it.) No one can deny that Oprah has done tremendous good in the world with her show and her philanthropy. But she was never as discerning as she needed to be with those whose fame blinded her into what became love-fest interviews instead of hard hitting fact finding missions. That weakness was very much on display last night while she and the Sussexes sat under that oceanside pergola and walked around the rescue-chicken coop.

I was naturally moved by the images of of Meghan wrapping up her son Archie in a hug — but they were on a private beach outside a mansion, deals with Spotify, Netflix and Apple TV in hand. I’m not sure that regular people will be able or willing to embrace the claims of victimhood and oppression that defined their two hour chat with Oprah.

That being said, I certainly wish them well.