Meghan Markle, Duchess of Sussex, is nothing if not a fearless equal rights activist. Long before she met Prince Harry, she was speaking at the UN about gender equality and doing nonprofit work in India to further girls' education; she says she's been an advocate for women since she was just 11. Having touched down in South Africa for a ten-day tour—just days after flying to Rome for best friend Misha Nonoo's wedding, at which Meghan was the only guest to deliver a reading—Meghan was spotted wearing a string bracelet reading "Justice."
Here she is hugging a little boy in a Nyanga township in Cape Town, South Africa (she's also giving me major Princess Diana vibes, who was famous for eschewing royal tradition to warmly hug the people she met):
I initially thought the bracelet might say "Archie," but a closer look reveals what seems to be the word "Justice":
It's not clear where Meghan got the bracelet; she's wearing it in the first photos of her South Africa royal engagement, so she seems to have acquired it either before or at the beginning of the couple's first stop. It looks homemade, so it's possible a child in Cape Town gave it to her before she was officially photographed?
And it looks like Harry has a matching one:
Like his wife, Prince Harry is a feminist. (I mean, do you think that Meghan would have married him if he wasn't?) We learned this for sure back in January, when the CEO of nonprofit Tomorrow's Women Wirral in the U.K. shared details of a private conversation with Harry: "During a discussion about Tomorrow’s Women Wirral being a women’s only centre Prince Harry, to our delight, declared ‘I’m a feminist’ and highlighted that it is equally important for men to support the movement in female empowerment," she said.
Speaking to the women and girls of South Africa a little later on Monday, Meghan Markle had a powerful message to share: "While I'm here with my husband as a member of the royal family. I want you to know, I am here with you as a mother, a wife, as a woman, as a woman of color and as your sister."
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Jenny is the Digital Director at Marie Claire. Originally from London, she moved to New York in 2012 to attend the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism and never left. Prior to Marie Claire, she spent five years at Bustle building out its news and politics coverage. She loves, in order: her dog, goldfish crackers, and arguing about why umbrellas are fundamentally useless. Her first novel, EVERYONE WHO CAN FORGIVE ME IS DEAD, will be published by Minotaur Books on February 6, 2024.
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