How Meghan’s pregnant twerking fuelled a bonkers conspiracy theory

These, too, were extensively analysed, with anonymous users claiming her stomach was too “shiny” and looked like a prosthetic, and that the ultrasound picture, which did not have a date or name on it, was faked.

These wild theories first emerged online in 2019 in the period before Prince Archie’s birth. Photos of Meghan cradling her bump, which were regularly mocked by the tabloid media, sparked the outlandish hypothesis that she was wearing an inflatable belly. Trolls pored over videos of Meghan on official royal duties for any slips, folds or odd movements as proof.

The conspiracy theory initially appeared “on some obscure social media platform where people were congregating who hated Meghan and then made its way into the mainstream,” says van der Linden.

“There’s an element of unfamiliarity here with pregnancies of women of colour in particular – there is less representation in the media and on TV shows and there’s no clear benchmark. You see the same with Beyoncé, for example [who was subject to similar trolling]. If there’s some uncertainty in terms of what people expect to see, there’s more potential for rumour and exploitation.”

The couple continued to break with royal tradition, as Archie was born at the Portland Hospital on Great Portland Street, rather than the Lindo Wing at St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington, where Prince Harry, the Prince of Wales, and Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis were all born.

Meghan and Harry initially kept Archie’s birth a secret – even from Buckingham Palace officials – and also did away with the time-honoured royal ritual of a photoshoot on the steps of the hospital, prompting the scurrilous online rumour that Meghan hadn’t actually given birth at all.

When they did have a photoshoot at Windsor two days after Archie’s birth, some went so far as to claim the newborn shots were faked using a hyper-realistic doll, and that Kensington Palace posted a hastily deleted tweet announcing he was born via surrogate. Meghan later revealed that this pregnancy was marked by mental health struggles, making the cruel rumours an especially bitter pill to swallow.

When it comes to wild theories about their family life, the couple’s quest for privacy has become a double-edged sword. Carefully curated personal revelations, along with family photos and videos they share, are subjected to intense and feverish scrutiny.

When they uploaded Meghan’s twerking video, even if it wasn’t meant as a response to the bizarre rumours, the couple must have known social media vigilantes would comb through it for clues.

For most of the rest of us, though, it’s the cringe factor of the video that stands out above all else.