In March, Kensington Palace published a “Mother’s Day photo” of the Princess of Wales and her three kids. The photo was obviously manipulated, a frankenphoto pieced together from at least two separate pics, and edited in the most ham-fisted way. Over the course of Oscar Night, the outrage brewed over as several photo agencies issued kill orders on the Mother’s Day pic. It was one of the biggest debacles of the year, and the Wales-fans have been desperately trying to push the scandal onto other people, mostly Prince Harry and Meghan. They tried claiming that Misan Harriman manipulated his photos of Harry and Meghan. Harriman whipped out his original pics to show that he only changed a color photo to black-and-white.

Well, now that the Sussexes have released their Christmas card, those same Wales-fans are trying desperately to claim that the small, blurry photo of Archie, Lili and the dogs is somehow manipulated or edited. Nevermind that the Christmas card is nowhere near the same kind of thing as Kensington Palace releasing a heavily manipulated frankenphoto AS PROOF OF LIFE FOR A MISSING PRINCESS. The dregs of the internet were called upon to provide conspiracies, and the Daily Mail obviously published as many as they could. Perhaps the Mail knew they were playing with fire, because they describe the conspiracies in their headline as “baseless” and they even noted in their story: “One leading Photoshop expert told MailOnline today that it looked genuine, although the size and resolution of the picture makes it hard to know with complete certainty.” That’s all I’m going to cover about that mess. But I did enjoy this Mail column, written by Amanda Platell, about how the Christmas card is bad because something something California!

How utterly adorable is Harry and Meghan’s ‘Happy Holidays’ greeting card? The devoted parents’ arms are outstretched towards their joyful children Archie, five, and Lilibet, three, while their three dogs frolic around them.

It was a rare sighting indeed of the Sussex family. Even so, due to their concerns about privacy, we don’t see the faces of their children.

The card – which offers recipients ‘a very happy holiday season and a joyful new year’ from the couple’s private office, the Archewell Foundation and Archewell Productions – reveals only the backs of Archie and Lilibet’s heads. But how lovely that both seem to have inherited their dad’s striking ginger hair.

Let’s just hope the personal Christmas cards they send to the children’s grandfather, King Charles – who has privately revealed he longs to meet them – actually shows their faces.

This intimate picture only reminds us of the terrible chasm that now exists between the Sussexes and the Royal Family, who will be celebrating Christmas oceans apart. It does nothing to disguise the fact that 2024 has been the Sussexes’s annus horribilis – the year in which the world rumbled Meghan.

[From The Daily Mail]

The rest of the piece is just the latest drivel about how everyone in America hates Meghan and why did she even bother marrying Prince Harry, they should get a divorce, blah blah blah. I just found it funny that a Mail columnist was like “oh, a Sussex Christmas card, they better send photos of the ginger children to KING CHARLES!” The same King Charles who has made zero effort to see his Sussex grandchildren in over two and a half years? The same Charles who evicted his grandchildren from their home in the UK? The same Charles who won’t even extend invitations to the Sussexes for any holiday? This is supposed to be a guilt trip – how dare Harry and Meghan keep the children away! No one can admit that Charles is a dogsh-t father and dogsh-t grandfather who doesn’t want to know his grandkids.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Archewell, Cover Images.