Prince Harry's New Clothes!

While Britons shrugged of Prince Harry's nude sojourn  in Las Vegas as a boys-will-be-boys thing, the Royal family and section of the media seemed upset and outraged 

Prince Harry. Picture courtesy NDTV

By Francis Adams

Reports of Prince Harry [christened Henry Charles Albert David] cavorting with friends in a Las Vegas VIP suite somewhat reminded us about the 1837 short tale "The Emperor's New Clothes" that we read in school.

  It could have been that the Prince --  like the emperor in the tale who cares for nothing -- had hired friends who hoodwinked him into believing that he was wearing a new set of clothes. The section of media, here, is like the child in the tale, crying out, "But he isn't wearing anything at all!".

  The latest reports on the matter spoke of the Royal family warning newspapers in the United Kingdom --through the Press Complaints Commission -- not to publish any of the nude pictures to avoid being sued for breach of privacy as the two images were captured in a private suite. Unarguably, the entire media in UK heeded to the warning, including The Sun which could not resist running a spoof of one of the Prince's purported two nude images, with a journalist replacing Harry in the image along side the headline "Harry grabs the crown jewels."

  A google news search will, however, reveal at least two publications, New York Daily News and Hindustan Times in India, apart from celebrity gossip website TMZ that first published the pictures, displaying one of the two images that shows the prince covering his genitals with his hands.

  Among the most hilarious of the reportage on the Prince's naked partying include the Los Angeles Times that headlined the story "Prince Harry takes jewels home; palace uninspired to comment" before commenting that "Clarence House, office of Harry's father, Prince Charles, had no comment on the photos, which would suggest a big royal "meh" in classifying these pictures as scandal."

   The Christian Science Monitor, ever so disciplined, wrote "In case you have not seen this news yet, the royal goods are making their way around the Internet today after a partygoer leaked photos from a recent, um, gathering in the Prince of Wales’s VIP hotel suite in Las Vegas." before listing out the Dos and Don'ts for party-going teens.

    The UK's leading publication, the Guardian was scathing in its reaction to the incident. Headlining the report/blog "Time to strip Prince Harry of his title", the publication said: "Vegas? Naked? Strip billiards? Our flame-haired young buck is just too embarrassing – so we should invoke the opt-out clause."

   The BBC chose its traditional no-nonsense reportage by referring the incident through a profile on the prince. It said: "Prince Harry is stepping up his royal responsibilities as the third in line to the throne, but continues to have colourful incidents in his private life."

    And then went the distance in chronicling his deeds and misdeeds and how "The Royal Family has been attempting to distance Harry from his past image as the "party prince" over recent years."

    Among the most insightful and interesting reads on the prince's persona was the CNN's Robert Jobson, with the Editor's Note saying that Jobson is an award-winning royal correspondent and author of William & Kate: The Love Story and Harry's War (biog of Prince Harry), both published by John Blake. 

  In his article titled "Cheeky Prince Harry vs dull brother Wills" Robson has drawn similarities between Prince Harry and his mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, writing "Like his late mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, he is flawed and that makes him interesting. People love his madcap ways and seem able to forgive him when he gets it wrong." 

  In comparison, Robson wrote that Prince William has been one who "not for the first time, simply suffered in silence" in reference to a joke by Harry aimed at his older brother during a charity mission to Maseru, the capital of the poverty-stricken African Kingdom of Lesotho.

  The Huffington Post was among a handful of publications that said the prince is likely to be reprimanded by the British Army with whom he is a serving captain. 

Spare a thought: To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all of the miseries of life.   W. Somerset Maugham