Busting the William and Catherine “Protected by the Press” Myth

Looking back at two decades of media attacks

This substack is one that has been sitting in my drafts folder for a long time and been floating around in my mind for even longer. As the royal news silly season approaches rapidly, as the media attacks (including on his birthday) on William ramp up again, I’ve decided it’s time to finish this one properly. My purpose here is to bust the myth that the UK media has somehow protected and “gone easy” on the current Prince and Princess of Wales. In fact, in my opinion, the exact opposite is true.

The sheer amount of gaslighting on this issue has been incredible in the past five or six years - from Harry and Meghan themselves, to their favoured journalists and right down to the bottom of the self-titled “Sussex Squad”. If you spend any time on social media—particularly in the darker corners of the Sussexverse you will be fed a very well rehearsed lie: that Prince William and Catherine, the Prince and Princess of Wales, have always been the “Golden Children” of the British press. You will be told they have been protected, shielded, and coddled by the media while others were thrown to the wolves (a direct quote from The Duchess herself). This is total, complete and utter bullshit.

As someone who has been a “royal watcher” for over three decades, I have a very long and clear memory of how the media has treated William and Catherine -both individually and as a couple. I remember the vicious headlines. I remember the paparazzi videos. I remember the extremely aggressive door stopping of a young woman who must have been terrified. I remember the snide, classist, and downright cruel attacks that were levelled at Catherine Middleton (and her family) for nearly a decade before she even married William.

So today, I’m taking a look back. I am looking at the twenty year long war that the press has waged against the Waleses - and let’s be clear, this is ongoing. It has not stopped. Because if we are going to talk about “media intrusion” and “bullying,” we need to look at the full picture—not just the selected parts that fit a Sussex led narrative. And let’s be clear - I’m not talking about legitimate criticism (you know, like when William landed a helicopter on the Middleton’s back lawn 😬🤦🏻‍♀️), I’m talking about click bait trash.

1. The “Middleton-Bashing” Era (2004–2010)

Let’s begin with the narrative that Catherine was a “press darling” from the start. That is a flat out lie. From the moment that she was “officially outed” as William’s girlfriend when the couple were photographed during their skiing trip to Klosters in 2004, Catherine became a target.

The British press didn’t just target Catherine, they also targeted her family (and again, this still continues. This disgusting false narrative was amplified in The Crown). We all remember the sneers about her mother, Carole Middleton, being a former air hostess. The press - specifically The Daily Mail and the now-defunct News of the World - couldn’t go a week without a reference to “Doors to Manual,” a phrase allegedly whispered by William’s “aristocratic” friends to mock Catherine’s background.

These headlines weren’t reporting, they were designed to belittle Catherine and put her in her place. In the eyes of the press, Catherine was not an independent woman with a degree, with interests, with a life of her own. Instead she was portrayed as a social climber who had no identity outside of her relationship.

The Headlines were relentless: “Waity Katie” in particular was the worst - This wasn’t just a nickname; it was a weapon used by almost every tabloid for years to imply she was a woman with no ambition, just sitting by the phone waiting for a Prince to deign to marry her. It must have been extremely painful for Catherine to hear that nickname coming out of the mouth of her sister in-law twenty years later - especially when it was being used to minimise her experience.

Then there was the physical harassment. In 2007, on her 25th birthday, Catherine was besieged by a mob of photographers outside her flat in Chelsea. There is a video (which can still be found online if you’d like to watch for yourself) where she is trying to get to her car, and dozens of grown men are shouting at her, thrusting lenses inches from her face, and blocking her path. This was a private citizen. She had no security. She had no official status. Where was the so called press protection then?