Meghan Markle’s Buckingham Palace Photo Op Blunder: ‘They Didn’t Do a Good Enough Job’ Says Commentator of Royal Family
Although she was used to public appearances as a TV star, Meghan Markle was a newbie to royal life. Therefore, a blunder occurred when posing on the Buckingham Palace balcony with other senior royals in 2018. According to a royal commentator, this error puts the blame squarely on the House of Windsor.
Meghan Markle’s 2018 Buckingham Palace balcony appearance caused quite a stir
After marrying Prince Harry in May 2018, Meghan Markle was thrown into royal life. Shortly after her lavish wedding in Windsor, she made two consecutive Buckingham Palace balcony appearances.
Her first was for Trooping the Color. The second to mark the centenary of the Royal Air Force.
Both times, Meghan was scrutinized for her fashion choices. Body language experts read into how she behaved alongside other royal family members.
However, it was her second appearance that left royalists scratching their heads. Royal commentator Daniela Elser discussed the silent stir caused during that event.
“Look at the photos of that RAF event, and tell me if something unusual jumps out. I’ll wait. Did you see it?” Elser asked.
“Standing right next to her late majesty is Meghan,” she wrote. “You must understand here that positioning on said balcony is not some haphazard, stand-wherever-you-fancy, higgledy-piggledy situation. Where they stand is approximately dictated by seniority.”
Elser continued, “Looking at those photos of Meghan beside her late Majesty in 2018. I think that while the royal family might have tried, I do not think they tried enough. They did not do a good enough job.”
Meghan Markle’s positioning is critical in the royal family’s balcony appearance
Less than a month after marrying Prince Harry, Meghan Markle’s critical positioning during her second 2018 balcony appearance is key. That placeholder generally belonged to her son, King Charles, or Prince William and Kate Middleton.
Elser says Meghan’s spot for the flypast was a behind-the-scenes move by the royal family to welcome Meghan in a silent but significant way. “And what I think is worth reflecting on here, looking at those images of Queen Elizabeth and the duchess, is what was going on behind the scenes about that time. When the Sussexes still seemed like the monarchy’s number one, sure-fire, shining hope for the future.”
The royal commentator continued that in the early days of the couple’s marriage, “The Firm tried. They tried to make it work for the duchess, who had been fast-tracked from Toronto single gal living to palace balcony-waving in about seven months.”
However, Elser believes that despite the monarchy’s best intentions, all assistance to help Meghan assimilate into their world didn’t do much to help her truly navigate royal life.
What Meghan needed and what the royal family provided were reportedly two different things
In her editorial, Daniela Elser explains that Meghan Markle needed more than royal etiquette lessons when she joined the storied clan. She suggests that helping her assimilate should have been the goal and that “all that trying” didn’t necessarily need to occur.
“Where was the person dispatched who could help her with how she must have felt trading a relatively normal, free existence to inhabit the extremely surreal, discombobulating strictures of royalty?” Elser wrote. She claims that in the early days of Team Sussex, Meghan, and Prince Harry presented the promise of a revitalized monarchy more adaptable to current times.
However, the royal commentator concluded that the royal family “did not do a good enough job.” And, “Perhaps the bigger takeaway here – it didn’t have to be this way.”
Today, royal family protocol dictates that only senior members of the royal family will now make balcony appearances. This means neither Meghan Markle nor Prince Harry will be seen for any new Buckingham Palace photo ops anytime soon.
