Harry was known as a party boy before he met Meghan (Image: Getty)
Prince Harry is “embarrassed about his pre-Meghan life” and the “laddish” behavior he indulged in while in the army, according to royal experts.
A new documentary, Prince Harry In Therapy, aired on Channel 5 on Saturday, May 23, in which Royal author Tom Quinn claimed that the Duke of Sussex “would be horrified” by his past self. Harry, 41, was once known as “the party prince” and caused controversy when using a racial slur to describe a soldier from Pakistan.
Tom shared that Harry has “completely shifted now,” adding that “he wouldn’t dream of using a racial slur.” He then explained further, “I’m pretty certain he’s embarrassed about his pre-Meghan life. I think Harry would be horrified now if he looked back at times when he was completely a part of the sort of laddish army, old Etonian world.” It comes amid claims that Meghan is trying to “branch off” from Harry.
Back in 2009, Harry apologized when footage of him describing his Sandhurst colleague, Ahmed Raza Khan, with a racial slur emerged. Harry said he meant no malice after the 2006 recording was released.
Harry explained the incident further in his memoir, Spare, where he said he “heard many people use the word” as a child and “had not seen anyone wince or get upset” so he didn’t think it was racist. He added, “And I didn’t know anything about unconscious biases either. I was twenty-one years old, I had grown isolated from the real world and wrapped in privilege, and I believed that word was the same as ‘Yankee.’ Harmless.”
Harry and Meghan are trying to branch out into new areas (Image: Getty)
Harry also described how he had been in Highgrove leading politicians slam him on national television over the scandal and did not know how to process it. He said his father’s office issued an apology on his behalf, and despite wanting to issue his own he was advised not to.
He said he was told, “Not the best strategy, sir,” to which he said, “F— the strategy.” Harry also confirmed that he had contacted Ahmed directly and apologised. He said he responded by telling him he knew he wasn’t a racist and “nothing happened.”
In 2020 Harry opened up about the “unconscious bias,” he didn’t realise he had for “many years.” Speaking to BLM activist Patrick Hutchinson for GQ, he said, “Unconscious bias, from my understanding, having the upbringing and the education that I had, I had no idea what it was.
“I had no idea it existed. And then, sad as it is to say, it took me many, many years to realise it, especially then living a day or a week in my wife’s shoes.”
Experts claimed Meghan helped to change Harry’s outlook (Image: Getty)
Journalist Bidisha Mamata told Channel 5, “On the one hand, you could say he’s evolved enormously, he’s a man of the 21st century, so different from his army days. You could also see this as the Harry of now, of being just as susceptible to outside influences.
Historian Dr. Tessa Dunlop added, “Sometimes individuals assume the mantra and the philosophy of the individual they’ve married. I think that happened to an extent with Harry and Meghan. It’s like he sees the world through a different lens; he has had an epiphany. Probably all this stuff was beneath the surface, and she’s validated it.”
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