“Speech is silver, but silence is golden.”

This is a phrase many of us heard growing up, often used as a way to cut the back and forth of an argument short. But does this rather old-fashioned proverb really result in a dignified way to become the ‘bigger person’, or does it sweep issues under the carpet and avoid the root of the problem?

The era of saying nothing was said to be championed by the Queen, whose unofficial motto of “never complain, never explain” took her through almost a century of royal life. However, amid the new era of posting black squares on Instagram to speak out against racism and using the #MeToo movement to speak up for feminism, one can’t help but wonder: has this approach become outdated?

Silence is no longer regarded by many as a mark of dignity, but of ‘compliance’. For these people, the emphasis has firmly shifted to being brave by speaking up for those wronged – not turning a blind eye.

And this shift in attitude appears to have been a key factor leading to the explosion of “truth bombs” from Prince Harry and Meghan Markle – most recently, in the former’s newly released memoir, Spare, and his accompanying interviews with Tom Bradby and various US channels.

“38 years of having my story told by so many different people, with intentional spin,” the prince shared, when asked by Bradby why he decided to write his memoir.

“It felt a good time to own my story.”

It appears that, after years of feeling that the royal family stayed silent – and therefore ‘compliant’ – amid the endless barrage of biased reports and sensationalist source stories designed for quick traffic hits, Harry has simply had enough.

As the appetite for salacious stories increased, fuelled, in part, by a basic desire for a witch hunt, the vicious media cycle spun out of control. And it seems not enough was done to stop it.

The royal family’s alleged silence, so easily misread as indifference – coupled with the good old-fashioned British awkwardness around straightforward communication, appears to have culminated in an escalation of miscommunication, contributing to the hurt that led to Harry and Meghan wanting to set the record straight. And who can blame them?

After all, a ‘dignified’ silence, when it came to the hounding of Harry’s late mother, Princess Diana, arguably also led to the frenzied final months of her life. And communication – allegedly both internally as a royal family, and externally to the press and public – seem to be what has been lacking in recent years.

It’s become not just a story of family versus institution, but for many, the attitude of acceptance versus making a change. These are two very different camps that the older and younger British generation now fall into.

While critics may accuse Harry of ‘going back on his wish for privacy’ by telling his side of the story, that wish appears to have been secondary to stopping the untruths. Privacy was his and Meghan’s attempt to stop the hounding they were experiencing. And, when a year of silence from the other side of the Atlantic didn’t help, they decided to tell their own side of the story.

To them, breaking the silence not only gave them a public voice but also appears to be their final attempt to open communication channels with family members they didn’t feel heard by. And who hasn’t felt gaslighted by a member of their family, shrugging an issue off as an exaggeration?

The era of the stiff upper lip, still a problem among countless British families afraid to address problems head-on, continues to be responsible for the breakdown of many relationships. Because silence simply doesn’t have a place with the most important verb: communication.

Would the royal family’s internal relationships be as fractured as they reportedly are if the art of talking was handed down through generations and practised between Charles, William and Harry? And, if they ‘shared and aired’ successfully, would feelings still have escalated into this same slanging match that was originally supposed to be avoided?

From Harry’s account (so far, the only account), it certainly seems as though not much was learned from Diana’s simple wish to be heard, listened to and stood up for. And Harry is very much his mother’s son: an activist and change-maker, unafraid of ruffling feathers and speaking out for those weaker or wronged.

Communication and speaking out amid allegedly unfair treatment – both the opposite of staying silent – appear to be the simple solutions to avoiding exactly what the royal family wanted: the ‘undignified’ airing of laundry.

Perhaps, then, the dreaded American art of ‘over’ communication, as opposed to the British way of avoidance, is the way forward… at least behind closed doors. 

Harry and Meghan are very much of their era, symbols of a generation unwilling to be treated unfairly – as they see it – and not speak out. And perhaps the royal family needs to learn a valuable lesson from them, too.

Silence is no longer a shining beacon of excellence– indeed, a deathly silence can be perceived as a reminder of the lack of compassion for speaking up for what is right. Speaking out, on the other hand, is the new golden.

Society is moving on from the post-war hangover of suppression to expression, and the institution needs to move with it.

Images: Getty