When ESPN announced that Prince Harry would receive the Pat Tillman Award for Service, everyone who follows royal gossip knew that walls were being punched over at Kensington Palace. While I have zero evidence of this, I absolutely believe that Prince William is behind some of the contrived “backlash” to the award, especially in the British media. I wondered if we would get anything more directly from Camp Huevo. Well, wouldn’t you know, a “friend of the royal family” ran to the Daily Beast’s Royalist columnist Tom Sykes for yet another bitchfest. This “friend” sounds like the same one who rage-shrieked about how William “f–king hates” Harry and Meghan and that the next time William would speak to Harry, it would be at their father’s funeral.
Friends of the British royals and military sources have described Prince Harry’s decision to accept a “retail” award at a glitzy ceremony as “a clear symbol of his desperate need for attention,” “pathetic,” and “sad.”
One friend of the royal family told The Daily Beast: “I’m afraid it’s just a clear symbol of his desperate need for attention. The irony of the whole of the last four years is that Harry and Meghan said they were leaving the royal family so the media would leave them alone. And now, here Harry is, literally picking up retail awards on live TV. It’s pathetic.”
The harsh comments came after a source in Harry’s camp reportedly said that a backlash to Harry being awarded the Pat Tillman award, spearheaded by the mother of the late NFL star-turned war hero, had left Harry upset. Harry’s office declined to comment to The Daily Beast. However, his camp are understood to have been left gratified by former winners of the award, such as U.S. Marine Jake Wood, praising the presentation of the award to Harry.
A military source who worked with Harry in the army said, “If you get a medal in the army, you don’t brag about it, so the idea of turning up at a televised awards ceremony to be honored would be utterly embarrassing to most military people. It’s really sad to see Harry, who was an amazing guy who everyone respected, doing this kind of stuff.”
Earlier this year Harry, who completed two tours of Afghanistan as an Apache helicopter pilot, was given an award for being a “Living Legend of Aviation” at a glitzy ceremony in Beverly Hills, California. The military source said, “That was arguably worse. If other people want to compare him to Buzz Aldrin that is their business, but Harry shouldn’t be endorsing that kind of crap being said about him by turning up at the ceremonies in his dinner jacket.”
“I’m afraid it’s just a clear symbol of his desperate need for attention.” We haven’t seen Harry in more than a month, right? Harry and Meghan regularly disappear for months at a time. I think this tantrum is also about the Invictus service in London two months ago – that was a celebration of the tenth anniversary of the Invictus Games, and it was celebrated by Invictus competitors, the Spencer family, NATO and Britain’s military community and veteran community. The Windsors made a point of snubbing the Invictus service and they threw a tantrum about Harry’s visit, but they never stooped so low as to say that Harry was attention-seeking for attending the service. What’s the difference here? Don’t tell me, I know. The problem for the Windsors is that every award Harry picks up in America shows that Harry was right to leave the UK, and that their completely unhinged hate campaign against him has not worked.
“Picking up retail awards on live TV.” An award honoring the sacrifice and legacy of Pat Tillman is a “retail award” to William and the left-behinds. Meanwhile, King Charles spent decades passing out knighthoods to anyone who gave him a suitcase full of cash. Talk about a retail award.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.