Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have talked before about how tabloid stories and social media comments — which were often overtly or intrinsically racist and sexist, in addition to plain voyeuristic — damaged their mental health and contributed to the couple's decision to step back from their royal duties almost two years ago.
Now living in California, the Duke of Sussex called out one phrase popularized by British media outlets following his and Meghan's departure from Buckingham Palace in early 2020, and he acknowledged that it's inherently misogynistic in recent comments made during a panel hosted by Wired.
It's possible you're already familiar with the phrase. "Megxit" — a term so widely used, it has its own Wikipedia page — pulls from the word Brexit, which refers to the UK's withdrawal from the EU, and it started to appear in news headlines and Twitter threads after Harry and Meghan announced their move to North America.
While speaking on Wired's Internet Lie Machine panel, Harry noted that "Megxit" is an idiom steeped in sexism. As publications across the world have previously pointed out, the expression mirrors the general tone of tabloid media coverage about the the couple's relationship in that it unduly targets Meghan.
"Maybe people know this and maybe they don't, but the term Megxit was or is a misogynistic term," said Harry during the panel.
"It was created by a troll, amplified by royal correspondents, and it grew and grew and grew into mainstream media," he continued. "But it began with a troll."
His comments came on the heels of a BuzzFeed News report, based on data released by the Twitter analytics service Bot Sentinel, which uncovered a coordinated effort by a concentrated group of users to drive online hate against the Duchess of Sussex.
Harry responded to the findings at Wired's panel. "Perhaps the most disturbing part of this was the number of British journalists who were interacting with them and amplifying the lies," he said. "But they regurgitate these lies as truth."
