Prince Harry wants ‘healthy’ social media in wake of U.S. Capitol attack, Markle scrutiny
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Prince Harry says social media misinformation contributed to the U.S. Capitol attacks and long-standing “harassment” of Meghan Markle.
The royal, whose move to California with Markle and their 1-year-old son Archie rocked the British monarchy last year, participated in a Friday Q&A with Fast Company talking everything from politics to Big Tech and family life.
Harry’s stake in responsible social media comes from a lifetime in the public eye — first as a member of the royal family, then as he and brother Prince William grieved the 1997 death of their mother Diana, Princess of Wales, also a media fixture. Recently, Harry-and-Meghan mania led to the couple trading royal life for a quieter existence in the United States.
“I was really surprised to witness how my story had been told one way, my wife’s story had been told one way, and then our union sparked something that made the telling of that story very different,” the 36-year-old told Fast Company. “That false narrative became the mothership for all of the harassment you’re referring to. It wouldn’t have even begun had our story just been told truthfully. But the important thing about what we experienced is that it led to us hearing from so many others around the world. We’ve thought a lot about those in much more vulnerable positions than us, and how much of a need there is for real empathy and support.”
Leading up to their 2018 wedding, Markle, whose father is white and mother is Black, was targeted in sexist and racist online attacks, which Harry addressed in a public statement. In it, he warned that a line was crossed from fair reporting to harassment and defamation.
But Harry’s personal life is not his only motivation — the Jan. 6 attack by former President Donald Trump supporters, which aimed to overthrow President Biden’s administration was justly troubling. “To their own degree, everyone has been deeply affected by the current consequences of the digital space,” he told Fast Company. “It could be as individual as seeing a loved one go down the path of radicalization or as collective as seeing the science behind the climate crisis denied.”
He continued, “We are all vulnerable to it, which is why I don’t see it as a tech issue, or a political issue — it’s a humanitarian issue.”
Following the historic security breach, Trump was banned from Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Twitch on the grounds he played a part in inciting the violence. The bans further divided the public, some of whom asserted that Trump’s free speech rights were violated.
“....We should avoid buying into the idea that social media is the ultimate modern-day public square and that any attempt to ask platforms to be accountable to the landscape they’ve created is an attack or restriction of speech,” said Harry. “I think it’s a false choice to say you have to pick between free speech or a more compassionate and trustworthy digital world. They are not mutually exclusive.”
In March, Harry and Meghan abandoned their own Sussex Royal Instagram account writing, “While you may not see us here, the work continues.” That work is the Archewell Foundation, the couple’s non-profit which partners with mental health and medical research companies, along with technology that offers “innovative and healthy platforms.”
“We need to support them, not only because it’s the right thing to do, but also because it can make commercial sense,” he said. “And we have to look at the state of competition and ensure that the landscape doesn’t indiscriminately squeeze out or incentivize against fresh ideas.”
Right now, Harry and Meghan’s relationship with social media is on pause. Asked if his relationship to the networks have changed, he responded, “It’s funny you should ask because ironically, we woke up one morning a couple of weeks ago to hear that a Rupert Murdoch newspaper said we were evidently quitting social media. That was ‘news’ to us, bearing in mind we have no social media to quit, nor have we for the past 10 months.”
Harry added, “We will revisit social media when it feels right for us — perhaps when we see more meaningful commitments to change or reform — but right now we’ve thrown much of our energy into learning about this space and how we can help.”
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