Why Meghan’s Children’s Book Is Proof Of Her WHITE Privilege Over BLACK Writers Like Me

I almost didn’t write this essay, because yesterday’s breaking news of Meghan releasing a children’s book made me a little upset. I remember a few weeks ago Sharon Osbourne saying that Harry is the poster boy of White Privilege. Well, his wife Meghan is the poster girl of white privilege. In fact Meghan is even more privileged than white women, because she has her black side on standby should she ever be called out for anything she does wrong. Imagine if a fully black woman in a position of leadership had told the lies Meghan has told on Oprah. Imagine if a fully black woman had done the things Meghan has done. When a black woman is accused of even bullying, the consequences are normally nasty, to say the least. I remember a feisty young black X-factor contestant Misha B being accused of bullying on national TV by X-factor judge Tulisa, the consequences were cruel for her. Misha B was booted off the show, received death threats, her life was completely destroyed, she became so depressed she almost took her life.

But what happens when Meghan Markle is accused of bullying, with the accusations being actually TRUE. She sues the UK tabloids then she quits the country in a hissy fit. And if that’s not bad enough, she goes on Oprah and tells blatant lies. She then tarnishes her in-laws and their country by slanderous accusations which bears serious consequences.

Then when we think we have seen it all, before the dust of the shameful interview has even settled, she releases a children’s book about father and son relationships, when she made her own husband publicly humiliate his own father, the heir to the British throne by accusing him of being trapped. She disowned her own father and has made her husband shame his. The crazy thing is both Meghan’s father and Harry’s father did nothing but bend over backwards for their WHITE children, sent them to the best schools, fed them with not only silver spoons, but with golden spoons. And yet as rewards for being good fathers, Thomas Markle and Prince Charles are not only shamed publicly by their selfish privileged entitled grown children, they are also slapped in the face with a book by Meghan preaching to the world about the importance of father son relationships. Oh the irony.

The craziest thing is, instead of these two selfish human beings facing the consequences of their actions, they are actually rewarded for their despicable behaviour. If that is not white privilege, I don’t know what is. And the thing is not many white people today enjoy any white privilege, that’s a thing of the past, because most of them are down here on earth with the rest of us. If anything, it’s people like Meghan and Harry who keep white privilege alive. With the things that Meghan has done, especially in the last few weeks, if she was a black woman she would never get away with publishing a book. If she was also fully white, like Duchess Sarah Ferguson, she would have never gotten away with such mad behaviour.

Whilst her husband is the poster boy of white privilege, Meghan is the poster girl of what it means to have MORE than white privilege. If she was fully black or fully white, there is no way she would publish a children’s book in the wake of her Oprah interview aftermath. And to think she has the nerve to call herself The Duchess of Sussex. How shameless!

You see my readers, the subject of children’s books is something that is very emotional for me, because I know that if I had been as privileged as Meghan Markle, today I would be a very successful novelist, and also a children’s writer.

I am a nappy haired blue black woman who has been to the moon and back, trying to make it as an author.

I spent half of my adult life sending manuscripts to UK publishers, I had a list of the biggest UK publishing houses, and I was always printing my children’s books and sending off manuscripts. This was way before the email digital era. Each time I posted my manuscripts, I would pray that it would be my big break, then a letter would come in the post, that my type of material was not what they were looking for. Then my heart would crush, and I would wish I was connected, because I knew that to make it as a children’s writer, especially being a nappy haired blue black woman, I needed something more than just the talent of my pen. My last attempt to try and get published was in 2013, I told myself that if I am rejected by this publisher, then I would never send anyone my manuscripts ever again.

After the final rejection came, I then decided to go down the route of self publishing, something I never wanted to do. I do have a wealthy father in Zimbabwe as he is of royal lineage. I may have suffered poverty and homelessness in the UK, but in Zimbabwe my father walks and dines with the creme of the Kingdom. He has helped me here and there with money, but unlike Prince Harry a multi millionaire grown man who mourns that his father, if we should even call him that, has cut him off financially, I left my father’s house, refused the crown he offered me, so I chose not to claim anything from him or be entitled to his wealth. However when I had to publish my book, the self-publishing company Author House was demanding thousands of pounds, so I turned to my father for help. He did pay some of the money, then I used some of the backpay of child benefits to pay the rest.

During the time I was trying to get my book published, I was separated from my ex-husband, and was going through a sexual assault court case with Walter Masocha.

Then once Napolia went live, my ex-husband sabotaged the book, hacked into my account and was sending countless malicious comments on the site, using my own email and name. It was such a awful time. I regretted publishing the book. I was in such a sad and painful place.

Then when all hope was lost, UK based Girl Child Network Founder Betty Makoni offered to host an event for me, where I would sell copies of my book. I then purchased about 100 copies of my own book from Author House to sell at the event.

However my ex-husband was there to cause maximum pain in my life. When my book was published, I had left the women’s refuge to go back to my house with the children. My ex-husband was asked by social services to move out so I could move back in with the children. I felt like I didn’t need to suffer in a women’s refuge with my children when I owned a big 3 bedroom house. The police and social services helped me and made sure my ex-husband, his family, and the church members stayed well away. But my ex-husband was not going to let me stay in the house, so he arranged for the house to be repossessed.

So a few days before the event Betty Makoni had arranged for me, I was evicted out of the house, and my children’s inheritance and home was repossessed. The copies of the books I had ordered for the event were locked in the house, all I was able to leave with was a handful of clothes for myself and the children. After the eviction, I couldn’t access the house to get the books or any of my possessions.

By the time the event happened, I was homeless, (yes I have been homeless more than once in the UK) and the saddest thing for me was I didn’t have my books. I never got the books, because I moved towns after the house repossession, and could never afford to go back for my possessions. I was so grieved, not for the furniture I lost, but I never knew what happened to all my drawings and journals.

I lost hope as an author, in fact I told myself I would never publish a book again, because I felt life was so unfair. The “bad luck” was just too unreal. I also never heard from Author House, even though a few people here and there were buying copies on Amazon, I never got a penny or anything, I felt completely robbed off my pen for a long time I could never bring myself to mention the word, Napolia.

Then when I had completely forgotten about Napolia, I had a message on Facebook from a young white Scottish boy, who had bought a copy. I love Scotland you see. It’s the most enchanting land on earth with so much compelling history. So Napolia was inspired by my trips to Scotland. So when a Scottish teenager contacted me about Napolia, I was really touched.

He was the first official reader of Napolia, and as a boy with ADHG it was the first book he ever read. That meant so much to me. He loved Napolia so much he thought the book should be part of the Scottish Educational curriculum. He wanted to be the real life Zuza, because he was in love with a 15 year old Zimbabwean girl called Princess, who had also been sexually abused by Walter Masocha, so he was a lovestruck white teenage boy on a quest to save his black Princess . He saw himself in the book. It was the most rewarding feedback for me as a writer, I thought maybe I wrote the book for the boy, and that was enough for me. It balanced all the damage my ex-husband had done to the book.

The boy gave me the strength to fight for my book. When he read it, I was inspired to read it too. So I bought a copy for myself, and also for him as he requested a signed copy from me. God knows who I bought the book from on Amazon, or where the money went but for the first time after it was published, I read Napolia.

But to my horror, I was mortified to find out that even though I paid £500 to Author House for proof editing, the book went into print without being proof read. At the time when they told me they had proof read the book, I believed them and had no time to go through everything as I was in such a bad place. Then when I read it years later, as a perfectionist I could not believe that my book was actually published with all the errors. I stopped reading the book in fear of finding more grammar errors.

I wrote to Author House, and called them out for the scam that they are.

The craziest thing for me was, after I lodged the complaint with Author House, all I got was a cheque of £10. For all the thousands I paid them, and giving them my book, all I got back was £10.

That was the final straw for me as a writer. As I said, I don’t have the publishing privilege of Meghan Markle. I write my books still, I wrote some books still, but they are for the birds of the air, because no publisher would ever consider my novels worthy enough, and will never put myself through the trauma of self publishing.

My favourite author is Bernadine Evaristo. She’s a woman I wish to meet one day.

Unlike Meghan, Bernadine is an author in her own right, and as a biracial woman, she has always identified with her black as well as white side. Even though her mother is white, because her father is a black man, she relates and identifies with the struggles of black female writers in the UK.

Sometimes Bernadine gives me hope that maybe one day I can be a successful published author. I have listened to Bernadine on BBC radio and she’s moved me to tears. Sometimes her encouragement to black British female writers provokes me. As the first black woman to win the Booker Prize, I am looking forward to reading her memoir about “Never Giving Up.”

When I look at my children, especially Charo who so takes me back to the little girl in me, because each time I am writing she is the who comes to sit next to me and asks me when I’m done writing, I tell her that one day, “Mummy will have her books in the Asda book shelf.”

Meghan is not fit to be a children’s writer who inspires any child, especially children of colour. She is such an appropriator of black culture and struggle, it makes me so angry. To think she had the nerve to drop in a black father and black child in her so called children’s book to make black people happy. And to think with the best publishers the world can offer her, the grammar in her so called book is still all over the place.

Gosh I can not stand the nerve of this selfish privileged woman of perdition, that’s why every sabbath I burn incense and pray for her to fall. And my God, who always answers my prayers with FIRE, always reassures me, that only PRIDE goes before the FALL…

The Genesis of The Revelation By

Mary-Tamar was Jean

PS, As a mother of 7, still nursing a baby, I have no time to revise my essays to perfection, so please be kind and always forgive any grammatical mistakes.