The Royal family has a Photoshop conspiracy theory scandal on their hands, and it would be so easy to squash the rumours, so why aren’t they doing that?
The Royal family in England is notoriously private, and this is by design. Queen Elizabeth once said “Never complain, never explain, and say as little as possible”, a mantra which worked wonderfully well for her for over 70 years. But we live in the instant information age, privacy is all but a relic of the past, and people are demanding to know what’s up with Princess Kate, and just exactly what the Palace is hiding.
“If ye fulfil the royal law according to the scripture, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, ye do well:” James 2:8 (KJB)
The fascinating part to me is that how easily the Royal family could squash this thing simply by showing Kate on television, walking around and talking like any other healthy, strong woman her age could do. But they are doing everything but that, leading me to side with the conspiracy theory folks until this matter is resolved. The Palace is absolutely hiding something, the only question is what that something could be. As a Photoshop expert for the past 20 years, I have examined the evidence and find it to be highly edited. But let me give you an opinion I haven’t heard any place else. The weird thing is that it doesn’t look like an amateur like Kate did the editing, to me it looks like someone with a high level of Photoshop skills edited it to make it look intentionally edited badly. Hmm….
How Palace Royal Family handling of Kate Middleton photo crisis fueled yet more conspiracy theories
FROM THE DAILY MAIL UK: To celebrate Mother’s Day in the UK, Kensington Palace released a photograph of Kate Middleton and her three children, Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis. The portrait, taken by Prince William, featured the Princess of Wales sitting in a chair, with one arm wrapped around Charlotte and another around Louis. Behind Kate stands George, who holds his hands around Kate’s shoulders.
It was the first picture of Kate released by the Palace since her abdominal surgery in January, and instead of quieting the online speculation that has ignited around the Princess in recent weeks, it only added fuel to the fire.
Within hours, photo agencies recalled the photograph over concerns it was digitally altered, and stated that no replacement would be provided. (The Palace has not shared an un-edited version of the photo). “At closer inspection it appears that the source has manipulated the image,” the Associated Press said in its advisory, noting “AP does not use altered or digitally manipulated images.”
Then, this morning, Kensington Palace shared a personal apology from Kate Middleton, who wrote, “Like many amateur photographers, I do occasionally experiment with editing. I wanted to express my apologies for any confusion the family photograph we shared yesterday caused. I hope everyone celebrating had a very happy Mother’s Day.” She signed the note, “C,” short for Catherine.
The apology did not end the conspiracy theories around the image; it made them worse. Suddenly, everyone from TikTok accounts with no followers to publications like the New York Times were analyzing the edits Kate supposedly made to the photo—Princess Charlotte’s sleeve disappears, Prince Louis’s sweater pattern is odd, Kate’s hair and zipper are misaligned, and so on—leading to numerous questions about why Kate felt the need to alter the photograph.
Users on social media theorized about the Palace’s decision to release an edited photograph: Maybe they wanted a picture where all the kids were smiling. Maybe Kate, feeling anxious about her appearance post-surgery, wanted to make sure she looked perfect.
But conspiracy theories began to bloom. One TikTok posted by Allyn Aston, a singer and podcaster who usually posts about pop music, alleges that the photoshop was used to disguise the fact that it was actually an older photograph of the Princess and her children. Specifically, Aston points out, Kate, George, Charlotte, and Louis appear to be wearing very similar (if not the exact same) outfits as they wore to volunteer at a Baby Bank in Maidenhead, a town in Windsor, in November. Aston hypothesizes that the sweater Kate is wearing in the photograph is the same Reiss turtleneck Kate wore to that outing in November, just a photoshopped to be a different color. Princess Charlotte, too, seems to be wearing the exact same ruffled neckline as she did to that outing (a red Cyrillus cotton and cashmere sweater)—just with another sweater added via photoshop on top, perhaps explaining the weirdness around her wrist.
The Mother’s Day photo drama is the Streisand Effect, royal edition: The Palace, by trying to quiet online speculation around her health, has seemingly made things worse, and made people who were not paying attention to the British royals suddenly tune in.
Apart from Kate’s apology this morning, Kensington Palace has yet to publicly address the photoshop controversy. When speculation began bubbling up online regarding Kate’s health, the Palace seemingly responded to the rumors, with a spokesman saying “Kensington Palace made it clear in January the timelines of the Princess’ recovery and we’d only be providing significant updates. That guidance stands.” Last week, Prince William, too, seemingly responded to the online discourse, with a spokesperson saying, “his focus is on his work and not on social media.” However, the Palace has yet to explicitly respond to, or even acknowledge, the ongoing conspiracy theories online, and it’s unlikely they ever will. READ MORE
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