Meghan Markle's Recent Selfie With a Controversial Figure Has Critics Pointing Out a Glaring Irony
Meghan Markle clicked a selfie with Wille Rydman during a dinner in Geneva, inadvertently creating a PR crisis.
Meghan Markle has been trolled and called out for her actions consistently after she left the royal family with Prince Harry. The Duchess of Sussex has left behind a trail of PR disasters in her wake over the past few years, one worse than the other. The most recent blunder on the list is her new selfie with Finnish politician and Minister of Social Affairs and Health, Wille Rydman, in Geneva. While the selfie in itself was not the issue, the person with whom Markle clicked the picture was.
Markle and Rydman had reportedly attended a dinner hosted by the World Health Organization in Geneva, where this ill-fated selfie was clicked. The right-wing politician posted it on X, writing, "A dinner with Meghan." Markle could be seen smiling in the picture. Incidentally, Rydman has previously been accused of sending racist messages and sexually harassing young women and girls. Clicking a selfie with him is definitely not a good look for Markle, who has always been a strong voice against sexism and racism. To add to that, his party is reportedly opposed to same-sex marriages, EU integration, backs the curb on immigration, and values that Markle does not stand for. It certainly is a PR mess for the Duchess.
Markle was in Geneva to speak about the dangers of online bullying on children and the importance of creating safer digital spaces. Before that, Markle had posted a picture of her and her daughter, Princess Lilibet, helping her out with her footwear, on Instagram, which many social media users found ironic given the content of her speech. However, the new selfie-gate might just trump that PR issue.
Royal expert, Tom Sykes, had reportedly reached out to Sussex's representatives asking whether Markle "was aware of Rydman’s past" when she clicked a selfie with him. "A spokesperson said that Meghan was approached during the dinner by several attendees for a photograph, which she often 'politely obliges,' and that she was not aware of Rydman’s past," Sykes wrote in his Substack essay, The Royalist.
The spokesperson for the Duchess further added, "Understandably, vetting the background of every person who asks for a selfie is not possible". Sykes noted that it is being reported that Markle and Prince Harry have been trying to make a position for themselves on a global platform, through quasi-royal tours, Harry's speech in Ukraine, his recent op-ed on religious intolerance and now Markle's speech in Geneva. But the recent new picture with Rydman could very well derail those aspirations, irrespective of whether the Duchess was aware of his past or not, as Sykes wrote, "A photo with a politician mired in scandal is not the ideal way to set the tone."
Apart from a PR issue, many fans took to social media earlier to claim that not many people had turned up to hear Markle's speech in Geneva, comparing it to the thunderous response that Kate Middleton received when she visited Reggio Emilia in Italy last week.
