A Group of Female British Politicians Just Came Out in Support of Meghan Markle
Ever since Meghan Markle and Prince Harry opened up about the state of their emotional and mental well-being in the documentary, Harry and Meghan: An African Journey, messages of support have flooded the internet—and, as always, they have their critics too. Fans of the Duchess of Sussex even started a hashtag campaign #WeLoveYouMeghan to show the American royal how much they care.
Now, a group of 72 British female MPs (Members of Parliament) have joined forces to draft an open letter in support of Markle as she battles the tabloids. Holly Lynch, a member of the Labour Party, shared the letter on Twitter. “Women MPs from all political parties have put aside our differences to stand in solidarity with the Duchess of Sussex today and are sending her this open letter,” she wrote.
“As women MPs of all political persuasions, we wanted to express our solidarity with you in taking a stand against the often distasteful and misleading nature of the stories printed in our national newspapers concerning you, your character and your family,” the letter states. “On occasions, stories and headlines have represented an invasion of your privacy and have sought to cast aspersions about your character, without any good reason as far as we can see.”
“Even more concerning still, we are calling out what can only be described as outdated, colonial undertones to some of these stories,” it continues. “As women Members of Parliament from all backgrounds, we stand with you in saying it cannot be allowed to go unchallenged.”
They say they recognize that the duchess’s public life looks different from their own, yet there are some similarities. “Although we find ourselves being women in public life in a very different way to you, we share an understanding of the abuse and intimidation which is now so often used as a means of disparaging women in the public office from getting on with very important work,” they say in the letter. They then pledged their solidarity against people who are “seeking to tear a woman down for no apparent reason.”
On this subject, Meghan Markle previously said in the documentary, “I never thought that this would be easy, but I thought it would be fair. And that’s the part that’s really hard to reconcile.”
As is usual with the royals, the Sussexes have not commented on the letter.