While Americans had their eyes glued to the Grammy Awards on Sunday, our cousins across the pond were tuned into the BAFTAs, the most important British film award ceremony of the year.
It's traditional for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to attend the BAFTAs every year. This year, Kate Middleton's outfit prompted a tense debate about the double standard between the two duchesses.
The Duchess of Cambridge wore a white dress that was both sleeveless and off the shoulder. It's a lovely dress, and fans were full of praise.
But when Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex, wore a similar shoulder-baring dress last year, the internet was all aflutter with criticism. People said Meghan's dress was "inappropriate," and they compared her with Kate, who supposedly "always" wears modest sleeves.
Except that she doesn't. At all! Sunday's white dress was far from the first time that Kate has bared her shoulders since becoming a duchess.
Now fans are pointing out the clear double standard people are holding Kate and Meghan to.
On Sunday, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge attended the 2019 BAFTAs in London, as is tradition.
They looked adorably happy together.
Kate wore a white Alexander McQueen dress that gave serious Princess Diana vibes. It was fitted and off the shoulder, which is supposedly frowned upon by the royal family.
Even though the dress would seem to break the royal rule against baring shoulders, fans and reporters called the dress "gorgeous," "angelic," and "special."
But others couldn't help but remember when Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, was blasted by the media for wearing a similar off-the-shoulder dress.
Meghan wore this pink dress to the Trooping the Colour ceremony in 2018. As you can see, the dress is actually more modest than Kate's BAFTAs dress. But Meghan received a LOT more shade for it.
People claimed that Meghan's dress was highly inappropriate for a brand-new duchess. They called her out for not respecting the royal family's etiquette.
And people also compared her unfavorably to Kate, who would of course never wear a dress that showed even a peek of shoulder to a public event!
Because Kate Middleton always follows the royal rules, don't ya know?
She definitely did not wear this off-the-shoulder dress to the BAFTAs in 2017:
And she definitely also did not wear this other off-the-shoulder dress to Germany in the same year:
She would never!
Well, you get the idea. There seems to be a clear double standard at play here, where Kate gets a pass for bending the rules a bit, but Meghan does not.
A lot of fans on social media were pretty annoyed at the hypocrisy.
They pointed out that Meghan would have likely been criticized heavily for wearing a similar dress. But with Kate, there was not a peep about "protocol."
One fashion expert, Mark Heyes, pointed out that Meghan's off-the-shoulder dress was unusual in part because she wore it to a prestigious daytime event.
He called it "fashion forward rule breaking."
In contrast, Kate's dress was for an evening event with a very different tone.
However, Trooping the Colour was far from the only time that Meghan has been called out for breaking the rules. She's been dragged for everything from skipping pantyhose to wearing dark nail polish instead of pale pink. One time she even (gasp!) wore pants to an official event.
One social media user helpfully posted a side-by-side comparison of recent headlines.
While it might be a bit unfair to compare Kate and Meghan — who are different duchesses with different roles within the royal family — commentators do insist on doing so over and over.
And if you're going to compare them, why not at least hold them to the same standards?
In any case, many of these "royal rules" are more traditions than actual rules. It's hard to imagine that Queen Elizabeth herself actually cares about these shoulder-baring dresses, since she also wore them herself when she was younger!
You can see the Queen herself rocking one such look in this portrait from 1955.
If it's suitable for the Queen's official portrait, it's suitable for a royal event or awards show. Now can everybody stop nitpicking?!
All this rule-breaking might ruffle some feathers, but it also just makes many fans love and sympathize with Meghan even more.
She's definitely not the first woman to bring her own approach to the royal family, and honestly? Both her and Kate's "rule breaker" dresses looked great.
