Dani Garavelli: Public has power to stop royals" paparazzi IT IS ironic that the photographs of Kate Middleton wearing a modest white dress and headscarf for her visit to a mosque in Kuala Lumpur should have so closely mirrored those taken of Princess Diana on a trip to Lahore 16 years ago, because hours later the Duchess of Cambridge found herself the victim of exactly the kind of invasion of privacy her mother-in-law's death was supposed to have put paid to. No wonder William was angry. With the publication of topless shots in France's Closer magazine, his wife had fallen prey to the long lenses and unfettered voyeurism that plagued Diana from the first shot of the sun shining through her flimsy skirt to the infamous car chase which culminated in the crash that claimed her life - and in the very same country where the tragedy happened. Having fought for his right to privacy throughout his late teens, having survived St Andrews University with only minor incursions, he must have been shocked to find himself back where he started: watching a woman he loved brought low by the paparazzi. There is a school of thought, of course, which even now - post-Diana and post-Leveson - insists the royals are fair game. We fund these people's lifestyles, the argument goes, so we have a right to know what they are up to 24/7, particularly if they appear to be having fun at our expense. Even those of us with more temperate views on the monarchy tend to be curious as to what the royals get up to when they're off-duty. Like little children who believe their teachers live at school, we are amused by the notion they might do everyday things such as dunk their biscuits in their tea or read their newspaper on the toilet. This is ridiculous. We should be past the stage where we view monarchs and their descendents as role models, who should at all times exhibit the probity, ­restraint and flawless manners which are the hallmarks of good breeding. Topless sunbathing is hardly risque these days, particularly in France. But even had Wills and Kate been engaged in sexual role play involving a French maid's outfit and a feather duster they should have had the same rights as anyone else to do so without being spied on by a bunch of professional peeping Toms. Laurence Pieau, the editor of Closer magazine, claims it is the very normality of the images which convinced her to publish them. These photos are not "degrading" like the ones of Harry in Las Vegas, she says, although it's pretty degrading to have them plastered across several pages, with a caption which describes Kate "offer[ing] her breasts to the soft caress of the Provence sun." To my mind, however, taking clandestine pictures of someone naked on private land is more than tasteless, it is bordering on criminal. Because really, what's the ­difference between hanging around a women's changing room to take illicit photographs for your own sexual gratification (which would earn you a conviction) and hanging around a remote house to take illicit photos for the sexual gratification of others? When Buckingham Palace last week accused Closer magazine of having "turned the clock back 15 years," it wasn't being entirely fair. If you think back to the onslaught of saucy images in the 1980s and 1990s - Fergie having her toes sucked, Prince Charles standing naked at the window of a chateau near Avignon - the ones of Kate seem relatively tame. And if Prince William can take any comfort from the incident, it is that no British publication was interested in using them. Still, the frenzied way in which our tabloids have covered their publication elsewhere gives the lie to the idea they are no longer interested in royal tittle-tattle or titillation. The Sun, which carries pictures of topless women every day, may have engaged in a spot of moral grandstanding over its decision not to print them, but it's only a few weeks since it defended its decision to run the Las Vegas images on the grounds that everyone had already seem them. True, there were ethical distinctions between the two cases - Harry was snapped by an opportunistic stranger he'd chosen to strip off in front off, whereas Kate was targeted by professionals - but the only distinction the Sun was interested in was that, with the Harry photos, they figured they'd get away with it. British newspapers have modified their behaviour in the face of the Royal Family's wrath, but there has been no sea change in attitudes towards privacy or the non-consensual display of women's flesh. ­Every day it is possible to gawp at Madonna's cellulite or Emma Watson's "wardrobe malfunction" in the pages of celebrity magazines. We can blame the journalists, but the Daily Mail's website with its diet of celebrities being praised for looking slim and sexy or berated for having a bad hair day is the world's most popular online newspaper. So yes, I think Wills and Kate should sue. It will send a shot across the bow of celebrity magazines. But Closer is likely to have a fighting fund to cover any fines it may be ordered to pay. And even if you clamp down on foreign publications, there's always the web. What's really required is for ordinary people to stop caring what the royals get up to. It wasn't until homosexuality became widely accepted that the tabloids stopped "outing" gay pop stars. In the same way, only when the public lose interest in ogling Kate's breasts or Harry's bottom will such photos lose their market value and disappear forever.