Why This Royal Hates Social Media

The royal family is quite tech savvy, including Queen Elizabeth who is so adept at using Zoom that some people think she may never return to the public. The royal family even has official Instagram and Twitter accounts, proving that the monarchy is truly part of the modern age. There's one royal, however, who refugees to get on board the social media train: the queen's only daughter, Princess Anne.

While the Princess Royal will hop on a Zoom meeting if she absolutely has to, it's not her preferred method of communication. In the documentary Anne, The Princess Royal (via Express), the royal revealed what she really thinks of social media. Princess Anne said that connecting with people online is "not quite the same" as interacting face-to-face. "The ability to meet people, that's what makes the difference," she said.

Contrary to viewing social media as a boon of modern technology, Princess Anne thinks it may actually make life more difficult for the younger royals "The pressure that is applied to the younger members of the family is always worse, because that's what the media is interested in and that's, you know, hard sometimes to deal with," she said. "But there was no social media in my day. So it probably has made it more difficult."

Princess Anne may not like social media, but she won't let that stop her from carrying out her royal duties. Right now, that means that it is sometimes necessary for her to virtually connect as COVID-19 has made it harder for people to interact in person.

In June, Princess Anne and her mother took part in a Zoom call in honor of the United Kingdom's Carers Week, in which four caretakers spoke about their work during the coronavirus pandemic (per Harper's Bazaar). In July, Express noted that she participated in a Zoom call for the Riding for the Disabled Association, of which she is president.

Princess Anne may Zoom when she needs to, but don't expect her to start tweeting about it. "I mean, I know what Twitter is but I wouldn't go anywhere near it if you paid me frankly," she said in the documentary. "But that's a slightly different issue."