Meghan’s racism claims come as no surprise to Black Britons
Explosive allegations by Meghan, Duchess of Sussex that she faced racist attitudes from both the palace and the U.K. press have sent ripples of shock around the world. But they came as no surprise to many Black Britons.
Whether it’s the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on people of color or the lack of non-white faces at the top of British media and politics, ethnic minorities in the U.K. say racist attitudes and structures of discrimination are pervasive — and all too often denied by society at large.
“This is a country that doesn’t want to have an honest conversation about race,” historian David Olusoga, who presented the TV series “Black and British: A Forgotten History,” said Tuesday.
In a TV interview with Oprah Winfrey, the former Meghan Markle said isolation and a lack of support from the royal household after her marriage to Prince Harry drove her to thoughts of suicide. She also said an unnamed member of the royal family expressed “concerns”
to Harry about the color of her unborn child’s skin — a statement that drew an astonished “What?” from Winfrey.
Tiwa Adebayo, a communications consultant and journalist, said the couple’s revelations in the interview bore out her worst fears.
“When Meghan joined the royal family, every person of color in the U.K. was worried,” she said. “This is an institution that is rooted in colonialism. It’s based on white supremacy. I mean, for me, it kind of seemed like ‘How could this possibly end well?’
“I expected there to always be that undercurrent of racism,” she added. “But to hear it so outright, it’s really scary. It’s very shocking. And it’s hard to see how the royal family is going to come back from this.”
It’s a long way from the optimism that surrounded Harry and Meghan’s royal wedding in 2018. The relationship between a grandson of Queen Elizabeth II and a biracial American actress was hailed as evidence that, in modern Britain, skin color and background no longer mattered.