The Kate photos: When conspiracy theories meet the royals
This Is Why
Sky News
4.0 • 552 Ratings
🗓️ 19 March 2024
⏱️ 23 minutes
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Summary
Speculation on social media about Kate's health and whereabouts have been rife in recent days – despite Kensington Palace announcing she would be recovering from abdominal surgery until Easter – and suspicion has now spread from edited photos including the princess to photos of other members of the Royal Family.
So how has their brush with TikTok conspiracists impacted the royals and does the palace need to rethink its public relations strategy in the age of social media?
On the Sky News Daily podcast, Niall Paterson speaks to our royal correspondent, Rhiannon Mills, who has spent the day with Prince William in Sheffield, and to the late Queen's former communications secretary, Simon Lewis, about why he believes time is on the palace's side.
Senior podcast producer: Annie Joyce
Podcast producer: Rosie Gillott
Assistant producer: Iona Brunker
Interviews producer: Melissa Tutesigensi-Charles
Promotion producer: David Chipakupaku
Editor: Philly Beaumont
Transcript
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| 1:01.0 | I'm Neil Patterson. |
| 1:02.7 | Welcome to the Sky News Daily. |
| 1:05.5 | What in the botch Photoshop is this? |
| 1:08.7 | The photo and video of Kate Middleton is fake and even... You may have heard this theory that Kate's face in this photo is actually a direct rip-off off of a Vogue magazine cover. A conspiracy theorists out there thinking that this is in fact a body double, that is her walking, that it's not some AI-generated thing, that is Princess Kate. I don't really care that these pictures are photoshopped. I just think it's interesting to see how they choose to portray themselves to the world. |
| 1:27.9 | Those are but a handful of the tens of thousands of TikToks currently doing the rounds. |
| 1:33.4 | Now, if you have absolutely no interest in the speculation and conspiracy theories about the Princess of Wales |
| 1:39.1 | following her doctored Mother's Day photo, then you are certainly not alone. But the social media frenzy, |
| 1:47.0 | it just isn't going away. Even though a video of William and Catherine, shot by a member of the |
| 1:52.3 | public in Windsor, has been published by the Sun newspaper. Still, people are suggesting |
| 1:57.7 | that something unto Ward has happened and the House of Windsor is covering it up. |
| 2:02.7 | That we now know, a picture of the late Queen with her great-grandchildren was also edited, hasn't |
... |
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