Right now, like As I write this, it is clear that something is wrong with the royal family.
To recap: after a hasty announcement in January that she would undergo abdominal surgery, Princess of Wales Kate Middleton has not been seen in public, prompting intense online speculation as to her whereabouts. In response to conspiracy theories, the royal family released a photo of the princess and her three children for British Mother's Day, which was quickly discovered to have been digitally altered, prompting news outlets to retract the photo and thereby magnify the situation at least a hundredfold . . Kate's subsequent explanation – “Like many amateur photographers, I occasionally experiment with editing,” she wrote on X's accounts – did them no favours, as the likelihood of a member of the royal family having an Adobe Photoshop account, let alone Knowing what it is, it is probably impossible for anyone.
Kate's absence from public life has drawn a barrage of criticism from royal watchers, many of whom have used the Palace's Benny Hill situation as a peg to discuss the monarchy's irrelevance, hypocrisy and corruption. Faced with a PR crisis without real precedent, and unable to silence the normally malleable British press, the Palace responded in the worst possible way, refusing to adopt any appearance of transparency or accountability to the public, even when the situation was so clearly the demands (and this arguably goes doubly so if Kate is in fact in significant danger or extremely poor health, as some have speculated). With Queen Elizabeth II dead and King Charles battling prostate cancer, #Kategate has raised extremely valid questions about the long-term viability of the monarchy and why a small group of expat Brits are held to higher standards than the rest of the world.
And yet, while public opinion of the royal family has arguably never been lower, we can thank it for one thing: Kate Middleton's disappearance has sparked serious conspiracy theories and wild speculation (including far-right kooks who have wandered into the days of speech were slow to share their belief that he died of “vaccine injury”), but it also sparked some of the best memes on the internet.
Kategate memes can basically be categorized into three ascending tiers: There's Tier One, which places the princess in the context of other popular news or cultural phenomena, such as the suggestion that she plays the role of the Unknown or surprised Oompa-Loompa in the Glasgow Wonka experience; or that she is the mystery guest on Lil Nas X's new album; or that it is in travail of a disabled person World of Warcraft addiction; or that it is stuck in Barbieland helping a doll version of herself through an existential version.
There's Tier Two, which focuses less on timely explanations for jokes and more on the actual conspiracy theories floating around about her absence, such as the suggestion that she's in a coma from complications of abdominal surgery or even dead. “To everyone mocking Kate Middleton's photoshop skills, I'd like to see how well you edit family photos when you're dead,” says one viral tweet. Another refers to the belief that she is in the process of divorcing her husband Prince William, who has long been rumored to be having an affair with the couple's friend Rose Hanbury, the Marchioness of Cholmondeley, who bears a striking resemblance to Middleton. “I'd be a gone girl too if my bald husband cheated on me with someone who looked just like me, but more resentful,” says one tweet. (The royals have not publicly commented on the rumors, but a lawyer for Prince William did at one point say the Daily Beast was “false and extremely damaging.”)
And then there's the third tier, the most complicated tier, where the joke isn't so much about Kate or any other ominous theory concocted to explain her whereabouts, but the royal family's utter inability to quell the growing tide of antipathy towards them. In one viral TikTok, a woman speaking with an Eastern European accent stands in front of an illustration of a “castle from England,” pretending to be Middleton speaking formally on behalf of the Palace, as she looks off-camera at an unseen person feeding her lines. “All three of my biological children have 10 fingers, 10 toes, and a skirt,” she deadpans, referring to the Photoshop controversy. “Basically what I'm saying is that everything is fine!” Another tweet uses the clip from Succession failson Roman Roy, clicking on his notifications after watching a rocket launch project he had overseen explode, with the caption, “The Royal Family's social media manager thinks they did a good job editing Kate Middleton's photos.”
Aside from the central mystery of Kate's disappearance, this was the most exciting thing about the whole debacle: watching the perfect artifact the Royal Family built crumble to the ground. Having been read in dirt for unsuccessfully trying to snooker the media and the public at large, there is no longer any reason for anyone to take anything the palace says seriously — and, by extension, no reason to take the Royals seriously. Good. Whatever Kate is going through and whatever the true explanation for her absence is, she deserves the respect and privacy afforded to any other person going through difficult times. But that doesn't amount to representatives of the Royal Family outright lying to a population they think is stupid, and now that they've been called out for it, there's no reason not to call them out for their very existence.
from our partners at https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/missing-kate-middleton-memes-royal-family-1234987474/