An article in the latest issue of New Idea with the headline “QUEEN’S WILL LEAKED: Who’ll Get What?” claims that the family is “in crisis as Her Majesty plans to step down.” Then, in true tabloid fashion, comes the fine print — or in this case, the rest of the story. It turns out to be a rather uninteresting story that is hardly even newsworthy.
Nowhere in the article does it mention “who’ll get what” in her will. Instead, it’s simply a mundane story about Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip isolating at Windsor Castle — a fact the public has known about for three months.
In an attempt to trick readers into believing it’s something important, the tabloid quotes a so-called “palace insider” as saying “We haven’t canceled a load of engagements, but nothing is going into Her Majesty’s diary at the moment.”
From there, the silly story is mostly well-known facts and wild conjecture about when and if the queen will return to normal duties. At 94, the queen is a high-risk individual, so it’s likely she will be out of the public eye for some time. That’s hardly news.
The article’s headline implies that she is stepping down as queen. She’s not and once again, there are no claims that she is in the story. The bogus article is the worst kind of bait-and-switch, where even the top headline about her will is a fantasy.
Though the article does mention the will, it’s from a completely different angle. It asks where the will is kept. Seriously, this article is so stupid, it took no time for Gossip Cop to completely debunk it as a waste of time.
This particular tabloid has a terrible history of using this tactic to entice readers with outlandish headlines and then publishing a story that doesn’t even try to back up the wild claim. In March, the magazine alleged that Prince William and Kate Middleton took the throne amidst the coronavirus pandemic on its cover.
As you might have guessed, there was no truth that headline. It was nothing more than a recap of the latest royal news and Queen Elizabeth going into isolation at Windsor castle, as Gossip Cop explained at the time.
In February, the tabloid alleged on its cover that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle were getting divorced. The palace even confirmed it, according to the headline. There are no divorce papers, and like the queen’s will, nothing was actually “confirmed.”
Instead the article spend many paragraphs wondering what would happen if the Duke and Duchess of Sussex did divorce. It’s shameful, really.