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B
Y
J
OE
F
LINT
Interview
Attracted
Millions
Of Viewers
whether racism drove the couple
to relocate from the U.K. to the
U.S. last year, Prince Harry re-
plied “it was a large part of it.”
Buckingham Palace didn’t
comment on the interview. A
number of opposition Labour
Party lawmakers called for a
probe by the palace.
“It is bigger in a sense than
just the royal family because
that experience of racism, I
am sad to say, is too prevalent
still in 21st-century Britain,”
said Keir Starmer, the leader
of the Labour Party.
Prime Minister Boris John-
son
declined
to
discuss
whether the palace should
launch an investigation.
The interview is a damag-
ing denouement to what was
could have been one of the
monarchy’s great modernizing
acts, analysts say.
The entrance of Ms. Markle,
an American actress who has
been divorced, into the House
of Windsor in 2018 could have
represented a new chapter in
efforts by the monarchy to
make it more accessible, a pro-
cess that started in the wake of
Princess Diana’s death in 1997.
However within two years the
Duke and Duchess of Sussex
announced they were quitting
as front-line royals and moving
to North America. Last month
they were stripped of all royal
patronages and titles.
“The royal family really blew
it on this one. It could have
been a PR coup like no other,”
said Gregory Claeys, a profes-
sor at the University of London.
“For the country as a whole it
is sending a message that is
retrograde and xenophobic.”
The fallout is playing out
against the background of last
year’s Black Lives Matter pro-
tests, which proved deeply di-
visive in the U.K. as it grap-
pled over whether the country
should apologize for its empire
and role in the slave trade.
Several statues of promi-
nent people linked to slavery
were pulled down in British
cities, but Mr. Johnson said
Britain shouldn’t “edit or cen-
sor our past.”
Polls find that a majority of
Britons don’t regard their coun-
try as racist—an Ipsos Mori poll
last year showed that 89%
would be happy for their child
to marry someone from another
ethnic group. But Black people
in the U.K. feel they aren’t
treated equally, surveys show.
A report commissioned by
the U.K. parliamentary human-
rights committee in the wake
of George Floyd’s May 2020
death in Minneapolis police
custody found that more than
75% of Black Britons don’t be-
lieve their human rights are
equally protected compared
with white people.
Black people represented
just 1.5% of managers and se-
nior officials in the U.K., ac-
cording to research last year
by Business in the Community,
a members group created by
the Prince of Wales. About 3%
of the British population is
Black. Sixty-five out of 650
members of Parliament are
from ethnic minorities.
“In the U.S. there is history,
the conversation is way fur-
ther down the line” than in
the U.K., said Kenny Imafidon,
the managing director of
ClearView Research, which
conducted the polling on be-
half of the parliamentary
group. The fact that racism is
less overt in Britain “can make
people believe that those is-
sues don’t exist.”
During his interview with
Ms. Winfrey, Prince Harry said
that he believed Britain isn’t a
bigoted country, but criticized
the British press as such. “Un-
fortunately if the source of in-
formation is inherently cor-
rupt…then that filters out into
the rest of society,” he said.
Soon
after
the
couple
started dating in 2016, Kensing-
ton Palace made a rare public
statement on behalf of Prince
Harry asking the press to leave
Ms. Markle alone, citing “the
racial undertones of comment
pieces: the outright sexism and
racism of social media trolls.”
Members of the British
monarchy repeatedly have
condemned
racism.
Some
royal watchers said the allega-
tions are unlikely to harm the
royal institution.
LONDON—An interview by
Prince Harry and Meghan Mar-
kle, in which the couple said a
member of the royal family
asked how dark their unborn
child’s skin would be, has
thrust the British monarchy
into the center of an uncom-
fortable discussion over the
role of race in British society.
In a two-hour interview
with Oprah Winfrey, Prince
Harry and Meghan Markle,
known by their titles as the
Duke and Duchess of Sussex,
said they experienced racism
before and after they were
married. The conversation
stirred questions as to whether
the British monarchy and the
country they represent have
done enough to tackle discrim-
ination against Britons of color.
The Duchess of Sussex, who
is biracial, said before the
birth of her son Archie that
there were “concerns and con-
versations about how dark his
skin might be when he’s born”
with a member of the royal
family. Neither she nor Prince
Harry identified the person.
Asked
by
Ms.
Winfrey
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