Meghan Markle joined in this year’s virtual Girl Up leadership summit to deliver a brief but inspired speech to young women everywhere. In her remarks, the Duchess of Sussex commended the young women on the change that they’ve already helped create and then encouraged them to keep going and pushing toward an equal world.
See below for her full speech – video & transcript:
“It’s such a joy to speak to you today to young women around the world who aren’t just poised to change the world but who have already begun changing the world. Last month, I had a chance to speak to the 2020 class at my high school alma mater which is an all-girls school in Los Angeles. And I said they shouldn’t see their graduation as an ending but rather as a beginning, the beginning of a journey where they can harness their work, values, and skills—all the skills that they’ve learned—to rebuild the world around them.
Now many of you have already spent years embodying and yes, even enacting the change you’ve like to see in the world. The opportunity that lies ahead for you is the same one that those graduates and millions of young women around the world have as well. I want to share something with you: it’s that those in the halls and corridors and places of power, from lawmakers to world leaders to executives, all of those people, they depend on you more than you will ever depend on them. And here’s how I know this: But I know all of you at a younger age than any modern comparison are setting the tone for an equitable humanity—not figuratively, literally.
This is a humanity that desperately needs you to push it, to push us forcefully in a more inclusive, more just, and more empathetic direction and to not only frame the debate but to be in charge of the debate. Upraising justice on gender, climate change, mental health and well being, on civic engagement, on public service, on so much more, that’s the work that you are already out there doing. Girl Up members are organizing Black Lives Matter protests around the world. You’re creating films. You’re creating films that encourage your peers to become activists leaders. You are reforming the criminal justice system. You are telling your school boards we need more mental health resources for all ages. You’re leading coalitions to end gun violence. You are standing up and demanding to be heard, yes. You are also demanding to own the conversation.
Another thing about those lawmakers and leaders and executives that I mentioned earlier: Now many of them that are worse, they don’t listen until they have to because the status quo is easy to excuse, and it’s hard to break. But it will pull tightest right before snapping.
Women have always historically gotten a lot of “that’s not how it’s done,” “yeah, that’s a good idea but we’re going to do this instead.” But when do we hear that as women? We hear that in the moments that we challenge the norms. So if that’s the case, I say to you, keep challenging. Keep pushing. Make them a little uncomfortable because it’s only in that discomfort that we actually create the conditions to reimagine our standards, our policies, and our leadership—to move toward real representation and meaningful influence over the structures of decision-making and power.
Despite what some might say, this reimagining, it’s not a zero-sum game where one side wins and one side loses. It’s not at all. It is mutually beneficial and better for everyone. Because of that, that path to get us there will take all of us. It will take girls and women; it will take men and boys; it will take those that are Black and those that are white collectively tackling the inequities and structural problems that we know exist. I believe we are on the precipice of transformation.
We can accelerate the pace of change and you know what? We don’t have to be satisfied with the current speed of progress. What’s more, I think that it’s really important to acknowledge the paradox of how this progress is both aided and impaired by our digital space. Your generation is often referred to as the digital natives. And you understand that our online world has the power to affirm and support as much as it does to harm. But we’re not meant to be breaking each other down. We are meant to be building each other up. So use your voices both on- and off-line to do just that: Build each other up, support each other. There will always be negative voices. And sometimes those voices can appear on the outside and sometimes they can appear to be painfully loud but you can use your own voice to drown out that noise. Because that’s what it is: It is just noise. But your voices are those of truth and hope, and your voices can and should be much louder.
I know you’ve already done [work] to make people’s lives better. The moment we’re living through now asks all of us to do more. It’s a moment where your voices and your action have never been more urgently needed. And we can take inspiration from women like Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern who brought New Zealand together to swiftly and boldly tackle COVID-19. Or there’s Maya Moore, the WNBA star who sat out from professional basketball since 2019 to free a man who served 25 years in prison for a crime he did not commit. And those were just two examples. As you well know, there are so many others.
Believing in true equality is not enough. It’s going to take more than belief. We have to work for it everyday when it’s hard, even when it makes others feel uneasy, we have to speak up for ourselves and we have to speak out for others who struggle to be heard. Like them, I know all of you will use your voices courageously, and I also know that all of you will use your voices compassionately. Now compassion doesn’t mean we shouldn’t feel outrage when we feel blatant injustice all around us. I mean, of course we should! But I challenge you to broaden that feeling. The Dalai Lama famously said, that “compassion is the radicalism of our time.” Compassion means seeing the pain and suffering of others and knowing that it’s our duty to help relieve it. Continue to believe in yourselves. Believe in what makes you unique and don’t be afraid to do what you know is right even when it’s not popular—even when it’s never been done before or even if it scares people and even if it scares you a little.
Now under normal circumstances, we would’ve come together in person for this and I wish we could. Yet there’s something interesting about each of you being in your own community right now because our communities are drop points of change. They are where your values and beliefs can be manifested and molded into something tangible. Look, sometimes it’s not obvious what to do. And often it’s fear that paralyzes us and stops us from being brave and being bold. But don’t underestimate that you have some of those answers within. Don’t underestimate your ability; push through the fear. You have rooted in your conditions the ability to craft a world that you know is just and kind. And your gut will tell you what’s right and wrong, what’s fair and what’s unfair. The hardest part, and it was the hardest part for me, is to chase your convictions with action.
You look at the breadth of the issues we are facing right now, it is easy to get overwhelmed, I understand. So be where you are: The growth and the change that you’re pursuing might not feel like anything on a day-to-day. But when you look back, I promise, you will see that it all adds up. We make better communities and a better world for ourselves step-by-step. And the pace of those steps is getting quicker. It’s in looking at the aggregate, looking at the big picture, that you can see how far we’ve progressed. I am extraordinarily proud of what you’ve already accomplished. Please continue to honor the convictions and the compassion that’s awoken within you. I will be cheering you on. So will my husband and so will Archie as you all continue marching, advocating and leading the way forward.”
Sources: Mail Online & Elle US
One of Meghan Markle’s first official public engagements, since she and her husband Prince Harry stepped down as senior working royals, has been announced.
The Duchess of Sussex will be a special guest at the three day 2020 Girl Up Leadership Summit, which is being conducted virtually this year from July 13 – 15.
The former actress joins an impressive roster of speakers including former First Lady Michelle Obama, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Nadia Murad and COO of Facebook Sheryl Sandberg.
Meghan will also be joined by her longtime friend Priyanka Chopra Jonas, who has been hailed as a ‘changemaker’ and is on the bill alongside The Good Place’s Jameela Jamil and Euphoria’s Storm Reid.
The summit connects empowering and inspirational women to future female leaders around the world.
Girl Up is a United Nations derived organisation, founded in 2010, focused on developing, mentoring and coaching adolescent girls around the world to become much-needed future leaders, to achieve gender equality around the world.
Since relocating to Los Angeles and cutting off their funding from the royal family, Meghan and Harry have continued with charity work while working on their new foundation Archewell, behind the scenes.
However, most of engagements and visits have not been announced in the typical way they would have when the couple were members of the royal family and carried out duties and engagements on behalf of the Queen. Instead, it’s later been revealed on social media that Meghan and Harry paid a visit or delivered a speech to a particular organisation. Such was the case when Meghan gave a rousing virtual graduation speech on racism to her old high school or when the couple prepared food with former gang members and offenders at a rehabilitation charity Homeboy Industries in LA.
Source: Elle UK
Harry and Meghan take Hollywood: Archewell trademark application reportedly includes ‘television shows’ and ‘motion picture films’.
With the Duke and Duchess of Sussex having left royal life behind them and settled in Meghan’s former home of California, the stage seems set for the Duchess to make a return to the industry where she first became known. And new reports suggest that this might be just the couple’s intention, as they have allegedly applied to trademark the name of their planned foundation, Archewell, for ‘television shows’ and ‘motion picture films’.
According to Richard Eden for the Daily Mail, the Duke and Duchess have listed an extensive range of potential ventures in their application to the Intellectual Property Office in London, encompassing everything from ‘digital entertainment content’ to a platform ‘featuring information in the field of nutrition, general health and mental health’.
An unnamed ‘source close to the Sussexes’ told Eden: ‘Archewell is going to be huge. Harry and Meghan will use it to support lots of causes that they feel passionately about. It will be a global organisation with international ambitions.’
The name for the foundation stems from the Greek word arche, meaning sources of action, which also inspired the couple’s decision to name their son Archie. The pair had formerly established the basis of a non-profit organisation named Sussex Royal, but were prohibited from using the word ‘royal’ after departing from official royal life at the end of March.
The ambitious plans for the new charitable foundation have, however, been put on hold amid the pandemic and the Black Lives Matter movement, with the couple having stipulated that they ‘look forward to launching Archewell when the time is right.’
Before rising to international fame as a member of the British Royal Family, Meghan worked as an actress, becoming best known for the role on the American legal drama Suits. Since departing from official royal life, the Duchess has made some small forays back into the world of Hollywood, having narrated a Disney documentary about elephants.
Source: Tatler
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have joined a campaign calling for large companies to withdraw advertising from Facebook until the platform takes action to stop the spread of hate speech.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have given their support to the #StopHateForProfit campaign, backed by Coca-Cola and more than 100 companies that have withdrawn advertising from social media platforms that fail to rein in offensive material online.
Coca-Cola has boycotted Facebook for 30 days, despite Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive, announcing policy changes on Friday, including a promise to label, but not remove, political posts that violate its rules on misleading and dangerous content.
The Baltimore-based civil rights group NAACP tweeted thanks to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle for “their leadership” and “commitment to truth, justice, and equality”.
Stop Hate for Profit accuses Facebook of turning a blind eye to incitements to violence and voter suppression and says the changes will not “make a dent in the problem”.
Mr Zuckerberg had declined to act as recently as last week, until Unilever withdrew its adverts from Facebook, Instagram and Twitter for six months. Honda, Ben and Jerry’s, the US telecommunications company Verizon and Lululemon, a sportswear brand, are also supporting the boycott.
About 98 per cent of Facebook’s $70 billion annual revenue comes from advertising. On Friday, its shares fell 8.3 per cent, shaving $7.2 billion off Mr Zuckerberg’s personal wealth.
Speaking about the duke and duchess’s involvement with the campaign, a source told Town and Country magazine: “As we’ve been developing Archewell, one of the areas the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have been keen to address is online hate speech, we’ve been working with civil rights and racial justice groups on it.
“They have been working to encourage global CEOs to stand in solidarity with a coalition of civil and racial justice groups, which are calling for structural changes to our online world.”
Last year Facebook was fined a record $5 billion by a US regulator after Cambridge Analytica, a UK firm, harvested the personal information of tens of millions of users without permission.
The pressure to moderate hate speech has grown in recent weeks after Facebook refused to flag President Trump’s suggestion that looters would be shot during anti-racism protests, prompting a staff walkout. Mr Trump’s post remains live on the platform.
“I’m optimistic that we’re going to be able to make progress on these challenges,” Mr Zuckerberg said.
Critics said that the changes are inadequate, only five months before a US presidential election ripe for foreign and domestic interference.
Jessica Gonzalez, of Change the Terms, a coalition of civil rights groups, said: “We need more enforcement, not words that remain unfulfilled.”
Source: The Times
Hello everyone,
On Tuesday, the Duke & Duchess of Sussex visited the nonprofit Homeboy Industries, in Los Angeles, helping out in its bakery’s kitchen. You can find 03 photos of the hair-netted and masked royal couple as they prepared food for its #FeedHOPE program.
Aimed at helping gang members ease out of that life for the last 32 years, Homeboy has been largely shut down during the pandemic and faces a $1-million shortfall. The organization’s tattoo removal service and cafe temporarily closed, but its bakery and electronics recycling service are running.
Appearances & Engagements 2020 | 23.06.20 – Visit of Homeboys Industries, Los Angeles
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, who are settling into life in Los Angeles, have signed on with the New York-based Harry Walker Agency for speaking engagements, according to a person familiar with their plans.
The couple, whose professional interests and every move have been scrutinized, will be engaging in moderated discussions and keynote speeches with trade associations, corporations and community forums, said the person, who declined to be identified.
They will focus on social issues such as racial justice (which the former Meghan Markle recently addressed with students from her L.A. alma mater), gender equity and environmental concerns. They will also speak on mental health; Prince Harry has shared his own struggles with grief and has championed emotional health initiatives and organizations in recent years.
The appointment of Harry Walker, tasked with fielding and sourcing speaking opportunities, heralds the couple’s return to public platforms as they seek to promote their philanthropic foundation Archewell. Fans and critics alike have been waiting to see how the couple will deploy their significant cultural capital and which causes they will support since stepping back from front-line royal duties in the U.K.
Since leaving the U.K, the couple’s appearances have largely been in private. Prince Harry spoke at a private JP Morgan event in Miami — where he reportedly discussed mental health — and both he and his wife have participated in video calls with charities they support. As the coronavirus health crisis moves into a new phase, with the reopening of many aspects of public life, the couple could now return to speaking on stages.
By choosing the Harry Walker Agency to represent them, they join an A list of Hollywood entertainers as well as some of the world’s most sought-after Democratic politicos: Michelle and Barack Obama, Hillary and Bill Clinton and rising party star Stacey Abrams.
It’s a high-profile signing for Harry Walker, which was acquired by last year by Endeavor, the parent company of WME.
The speaking agency also represents other close connections of the couple, including Oprah Winfrey and Jane Goodall.
Speaking can be extremely lucrative and the proceeds from Harry and Meghan’s bookings will be part of their move to become financially independent from the British royal family. President Obama reportedly earned $400,000 for one 2017 speech, while the Clintons averaged $250,000 per appearance in 2014. It is unclear what speaking fees will be for the Duke and Duchess, who will speak both together or individually.
Source: LA Times
Hello Guys,
I hope you’re well? I continue to update the gallery and I have added 114 photos of the Duke & Duchess of Sussex attending the annual WellChild Awards, in London, on 15th October 2019.
For this event, which took place The Royal Lancaster Hotel, Meghan wore a Parish dress, teamed with a camel coat by Sentaler, a pair Manolo Blahnik heels and a tortoiseshell bag from Montunas.
Appearances & Engagements 2019 | 15.10.19 – WellChild Awards, in London
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle sent a letter to thank StreetGames charity staff for delivering Hubb Kitchen meals to vulnerable people.
Sports charity Street Games, an organisation supporting disadvantaged communities in London, took to Twitter to share a picture of the note they received from the Duke & Duchess of Sussex, who are currently residing in LA.
Wow! Thank you so much Harry and Meghan for your kind words and your continued support for StreetGames and the brilliant local organisations working to support their communities in these challenging times pic.twitter.com/4h9bMGTuTR
— StreetGames (@StreetGames) June 21, 2020
Hi Guys,
I have added a new appearance in the gallery and you can now discover 98 photos of the Duke & Duchess of Sussex from 7th January. Meghan looks amazing in her tonal outfit!
For their first outing of the year, Meghan & Harry stopped by Canada House in London. Afterward, the couple visited the Canada Gallery to view a special exhibition by Skawennati, an indigenous Canadian artist.
Appearances & Engagements 2020 | 07.01.20 – Canada House Visit in London
Hi Guys,
I hope you’re well? I have just created our Twitter account so please don’t hesitate to follow us! xoxo
