Why Prince Harry's public comments on Royal Family backfired

Prince Harry’s feud with the Royal Family has got out of his control, according to a family dynamics expert.

The Duke of Sussex has been embroiled in a feud with his family since before he and Meghan Markle stepped down as working royals in 2020. In his memoir Spare, he alleged that his brother Prince William had a physical altercation with him after calling Meghan “rude.”

When they got to America, the Duke and Duchess sat down for an explosive interview with Oprah and claimed that certain members of the family were worried how dark Prince Archie, Harry and Meghan’s first child, would be.

Now, Harry has recently made things worse with his claim that the ruling against him in his security related case was an “established stitch-up.”

Julie Cobalt. a coach, mediator and trainer specializing in family dynamics, has shared how she thinks the Prince should’ve handled the rift.

She told Hello! magazine: "Publicly criticizing your family, especially in a memoir, virtually guarantees defensiveness and further distance.”

"It also strips you of control over how your message is received,” she explained.

“If Harry's goal was reconciliation, a better strategy would have been to work with a conflict coach or mediator. Reconnection requires honest conversation, not public narration," she added.

She argued that making public statements “complicates the path" to reconciliation.

She explained: "You also risk misinterpretation. Photos, headlines, or quotes taken out of context can inflame things further.”

"Public sharing can feel like control and clarity, but it often replaces resolution with reinforcement,” she concluded.

This comes after Harry lost his High Court appeal against his downgraded security, which means he’ll continue to get security on a case-by-case basis in the U.K.

After the ruling, he sat down for an interview with the BBC and made comments about his dynamic with his family.

He shared that King Charles doesn’t speak to him anymore due to the security case. He also noted that he wants to reconcile with his family, but noted that the ruling felt like a "good old-fashioned establishment stitch-up".

In response to Prince Harry’s remarks, Buckingham Palace released a statement, saying: "All these issues have been examined repeatedly and meticulously by the courts, with the same conclusion on each occasion."