Prince Harry, Meghan, racism and self-loathing Nigerians

If you’ve been paying any attention to the happenings, you’d have heard about Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s interview. I’m hoping of course you’re not asking: ‘Who are these people?’ Anyhow, last Sunday March 7, Prince Harry, the second son of Prince Charles, the first child of Queen Elizabeth II and heir to the British throne, spoke to media mogul Oprah Winfrey in a 2-hour interview. He was with his wife, former Suits actress Meghan Markle. The two married in 2018 and barely two years later, decided to step down from their roles as senior royal members. If we depend on the British press alone, ‘Megxit’ as they dubbed the couple’s decision to step down, was caused by Meghan. Even at the best of times, one only had to read the headlines to see that Meghan was treated differently from her sister-in-law Kate Middleton, Harry’s older brother Prince Williams’ wife.

There’s a whole catalogue of examples where exact same situations are reported differently for the two women. Kate Middleton in one of her three pregnancies craved avocado and this was the headline from Daily Express: “Kate’s morning sickness cure? Prince Williams gifted with avocado for pregnant Duchess.” Fast forward to Meghan being pregnant with her first child, from the same Daily Express: “Meghan Markle’s beloved avocado linked to human rights abuse and drought, millennial shame.”  In another example, when Kate Middleton chose to spend Christmas with her family, the headline was: “Carole wins the granny war. Duke and Duchess of Cambridge will spend second ‘private’ Christmas with the Middleton family rather than joining the Queen at Sandringham.” But for Meghan: “Doesn’t the Queen deserve better than this baffling festive absence? Richard Kay examines the impact of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s decision not to spend Christmas with the royal family.” These are just a few examples. What reason (s) could there be for this clear case of bias and discrimination? Is this because Meghan is American or because she’s mixed-race with a Black mother and a white father?

If there were ever any doubts, their interview on Sunday situated racism at the centre of their problems with the family. There were other revelations: That Meghan had suicidal thoughts at some point, that Prince Harry was basically cut off financially, his security was withdrawn, that their son Archie wasn’t given a title when he was born… I suppose that last bit was to be expected considering that before he was born, conversations were supposedly had about how dark his skin tone was going to be. Well, this is not an attempt to rehash the entire interview. I may have even let the noise pass were it not for the reaction from some Nigerians. Thanks to social media, reactions started pouring in immediately after the interview. In fact, the commentaries began once the promo for the interview was aired and clips from the interview were made public. The fact that none of us knows what transpired hasn’t stopped anyone from airing their opinions.

Some people thought it was time for Prince Harry to move on from his mother’s harrowing death and stop using it to curry sympathy. One Twitter user said words to the effect: “No, he doesn’t get to do that.” His own mother! Imagine one random Nigerian telling a member of the royal family-or anybody for that matter-how to react to events involving his mother. Of course, this invariably led to comparisons with his brother. Why can’t he carry on like his older brother Prince Williams, was Princess Diana not his mother too, they asked.

Well, another fallout from the Harry and Meghan interview is that we got to see who Nigerians considered family. To some, wives were not to be thought of as their husband’s family. Many castigated Harry for betraying his family. Is Meghan not part of his family as his wife? The Bible says the two will become one and all that leaving and cleaving? I know the royal family isn’t your typical family, still… Perhaps one reaction that stood out, that of former (Big Brother Africa) BBA winner, Uti Nwachukwu who tweeted: “Family first! Always! U see this love thing, if it makes you turn your back on your family, then hmmmm watch out!! Even if Clifford Orji was part of my family, I would neeeverr!! Join anyone (esp a romantic partner) to bring down and condemn my family..never! #loyaltyiskey.” Clifford Orji for those who don’t know was a convicted kidnapper and cannibal who was arrested in Lagos in 1999 and died in prison 13 years later in 2012. The sheer lack of intelligence exhibited in this one tweet is breath-taking. That Uti would prefer to proudly stick by his cannibal uncle than stand by the woman he’s pledged ‘till death do us part’ says a lot. A whole cannibal?

The next day, after he’d supposedly watched the show, Uti dug in deeper praising himself for his earlier tweet. I mean why would he stop digging when he hadn’t yet hit gold? In saner climes, he’d be afraid of the repercussions from brands he represents.  Earlier, he’d tweeted: “Lol the funny thing about most of these Africans applauding Megan & Harry is that if it happened to them and their son or brother left with his wife AND turned his back on and publicly exposed/shamed their family, THEY WOULD BE QUICK TO CALL THE WIFE A WITCH!/HOME WRECKER!..SMH.” At no time did Mr Nwachukwu address the issues that were raised in that interview. Not the racism claims. Not the double standards. Not the mental health implications. I didn’t really expect Nigerians to care about this. There’s nothing in the way we treat ourselves or the way the government treats us as citizens that shows we truly care about the welfare of fellow Nigerians.

Now to the main issue: How are we as Black people who have had to endure all kinds of discrimination not seeing (even) the racism? How are we not able to relate to what’s so obvious? And why are we so insensitive? Even if one cannot imagine or understand all the issues, whatever happened to showing human empathy? I lived in Manchester for a year, 2009-2010, and was often depressed by the British press. I had to make a conscious decision to overlook the incendiary headlines. I recall how England’s team to World Cup 2010 was reported. In their penultimate match, Daniel Defoe scored the only goal of the match which sent England to the quarter-finals. The newspaper headlines the next day didn’t show Defoe. One front page had three white players but none of the scorer of the winning goal, the only goal. Then when England lost their very next match at the quarterfinals against Germany, the next day two smiling Black players made the cover pages. The headline was “These two think England losing is funny” or words to that effect. Do you know how much work or how inbred racism would have to be for a newspaper to look for pictures like that almost as default?

During this same period, I saw the treatment of footballers like Ashley Cole as against people like John Terry and Frank Lampard. Even though Terry and Lampard were caught in more scandals, the British press managed to make Cole the love rat because he exchanged inappropriate texts with a woman, not his wife. John Terry slept with and impregnated his teammate Wayne Bridge’s son’s mother and made her terminate the pregnancy. And Terry was married. What about Wayne Rooney? If Rooney were Black, I doubt that we’d have been allowed to forget how he paid a prostitute £1, 400 a night (this was in 2009 by the way). In today’s Naira, that’s about N938k at N670 to £1. While this was over 10 years ago (not that Rooney didn’t get into more scandals), did it really affect the way the British press treated Rooney as a player? Can you compare that to the flak Black players like Raheem Sterling are receiving now?

I don’t think anyone really needs convincing that Britain, the former and not so former colonisers think of Black people in a certain type of way. In spite of the so-called Commonwealth (whose wealth?), the British are not doing enough in the new reality that some other countries are making efforts and attempts at diversity. Their press, even less so it seems. But the question still remains why some Nigerians, even otherwise educated people and supposedly intelligent people, can’t see through this. You don’t have to like Meghan Markle. You do not even have to like her style. Whatever you think of her, it should bother you that she was so blatantly racially profiled. If in spite of Meghan’s relative celebrity status before she married Prince Harry she was that badly treated, worse can happen and is happening to lesser-known Black people.

There are many possible explanations why some Black people are not seeing the racism. They’re even acting as attackers. But those possible reasons all must fall under the one umbrella of self-hatred. It may be unconscious but there’s that inferiority complex that makes people automatically choose the other side.

Onoshe Nwabuikwu, AIRTIME columnist is a renowned TV/Film critic, and Film scholar. She also has experience in Advertising as a senior Copywriter and Corporate Communications as Communications consultant.