Princess Anne Won’t Shake Hands With Royal Fans (But For A Valid Reason!)

Huh? In the new ITV documentary Queen of the World, Queen Elizabeth’s daughter, Princess Anne, revealed she won’t shake hands with fans at royal events. But before you start thinking that Anne, 68, is just super rude, the royal actually has a totally valid reason for not treating crowds of people to handshakes. 

“We never shook hands. The theory was that you couldn’t shake hands with everybody, so don’t start. So I kind of stick with that, but I noticed others don’t,” she said in a newly released clip for Queen of the World — which is set to air on HBO in the US on Monday, Oct. 1 — according to People. 

“It’s not for me to say that [shaking hands is] wrong. It’s become a shaking hands exercise rather than a walkabout,” Anne continued, referring to members of the monarchy interacting with fans today. She also lamented that modern technology has definitely put a strange barrier between people. “Phones are bad enough, but the iPads — you can’t even see their heads. No idea who you’re talking to,” she said.

“I either don’t bother or just say, ‘Look, if you want to ask… I suggest you put that down,'” Anne continued. “It is weird. People don’t believe they’ve experienced the event unless they’ve taken a photograph.” 

Earlier in the film’s preview clip, a narrator explained that “the public were lucky to get a fleeting glimpse of the royal family as they drove by” in the past but things have changed a lot over the years. 

“Then in the 1970s, the Queen decided to shake things up. She wanted to say hello to the crowds and the walkabout was born,” the narrator added. Since then, modern royals like Prince William, Kate Middleton, Prince Harry, and Meghan Markle have only added to the amount of personal interaction royal fans can get with the Windsors. We can only dream that one day we’ll get to meet a member of the monarchy!

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