I listened to the interview pretty carefully, and I give Meghan and Harry the benefit of the doubt here. The tabloids have, in fact, been dog-whistle racist in their attacks leveled at Meghan, and I saw no reason to disbelieve her or Harry when they say that they felt unprotected by the Palace when it came to their physical safety. Harry had every reason to believe that Meghan's bi-racial heritage and their children's inheritance of that should have been considered a real asset to the Commonwealth, and being told when Meghan was first pregnant (without a reasonable explanation) that she and Archie would not be given the same status, and much more importantly, security protection every Royal of their station would normally receive must have been deeply painful.
I think Harry is his mother's son. Diana tried to explain to the world how life inside of the "Firm" is not the fairy tale people would like it to be. The only ones who really know what their lives are like are the members of the Royal Family themselves. Harry pulled back the curtain a little, and it's understandable that people might not want to hear that life within the gilded cage can be even life-threateningly stressful.
It would be nice to think that the members of the Royal Family consistently have each others' back when one member is non-stop attacked in the tabloids. But Harry's explanation of the kind of unhealthy symbiotic relationship between the Palace and the Press rang true to me. The Royals are responsible for ensuring that the Monarchy continues, and out of fear, to do that they apparently have to be willing to allow a family member to be thrown under the bus now and then. I don't blame Harry and Meghan for wanting to tell their side of the story.
As this thread illustrates, people like us will look from the outside and make our own minds up of who to believe. We're going to filter those assumptions through our own life experiences, and we're going to disagree with each other and none of us really know. I certainly don't know any more than anyone else does. I just tend to believe Harry and Meghan when they say that their physical and emotional safety was something they needed to protect, and they couldn't do that within a structure that is designed to value the life of the institution far above the health of the individuals who make it up.
