I don’t mind the Royals in that they are an interesting historical throwback, and good for the tourist industry, but if they are going to remain, I hope they stop taking notice of what ‘the people’ (according to the tabloids) want. I seem to remember the Queen getting relatively emotive after having been chastened by the tabloids for under-reacting to Diana’s death. If they are keeping up the act of being royalty, they shouldn’t answer to anyone in my opinion, or we might as well get them voted in and out by reality-TV style phone voting.
Hasn’t anyone considered that the OP might be working for The Royal Family ?
Your IPs have been logged and you’re about to get an upclose and personal visit to the Tower of London!
I, for one, welcome our old Monarchal Overlords.
That last bit was a serious answer to the OP
My mother, who tends to see things in black-and-white (for example, she’s a fundamentalist atheist anti-religious fanatic) is a fervent anti-monarchist. I remember having to stop her from making anti-royal comments in public places (like a supermarket queue, not Speakers Corner) when in the UK. “That queen, who does she think she is?”
In more recent years, following the death of Diana, I got the feeling it wouldn’t be a lynchable offence any longer. The fact that Mum is obviously not British by birth (she speaks fluent English but with a Spanish accent) may not act in her favour, though.
On a serious note, the Tower of London is an awesome place, and anyone going anywhere near the UK is well-advised to make a trip to see it.
I literally just fell out of my chair laughing (mostly because I was sort of perched on the very front and it was tipped up on two legs, but still - thanks a lot!) I’m actually known to go into angry rants whenever one of your princes does something invariably idiotic that gets picked up by the American press. When I was living in London, this was apparently a source of fairly endless amusement to my housemates. “Hey, did you happen to see the Sun today?” was like throwing a match on a pile of gunpowder.
But on a serious note - I don’t quite understand how one takes the monarchy seriously. The media coverage, particularly of the younger ones, is like a circus screaming about a bunch of idiots. I remember one incident which was sometime last summer (August, maybe; I know I was in London then) where one of the tabloids published a picture of one of the younger princes feeling up a girl in a club. There were no accusations that it was anything but consensual, and, well, “boy gropes girl in dark nightclub” is not exactly breaking news. Then some people got pissed off and investigated the story and discovered that not only was it not news but it was old not news and the picture was, like, two years old or something. To me things like that indicate that the monarchy is, essentially, a joke to the majority of people - but I’m gathering it’s a joke many of you are at least somewhat fond of?
This is very true.
Mild monarchist. I don’t mind the figurehead head-of-state, so long as we’re in practice a democracy. And public money is spent on a damn sight sillier things than keeping up an old tradition.
(Also, there may be something to be said for the whole “separation of powers” thing … recent PMs [I have Blair and Thatcher specifically in mind] have suffered unduly from inflation of the ego, it might do some good to have a pro forma head of state to whom they nominally have to answer … sort of like the guy who used to whisper “Remember, thou too art mortal” to Roman generals during their triumphs.)
(Forgive me for assuming that you are American). Do you take the office of President seriously?
I am American, and while I don’t really take the current occupier of the office seriously, I do take the role seriously. For starters it takes a lot of work to get there (even if you work is just smooth talking), and it certainly plays an important role in the legislative process (putting pressure on Congress; vetoing/passing bills, etc).
On the contrary, royalty does absolutely nothing to earn that station beyond being born. The monarch, on paper, does have certain powers but I don’t give that the same respect, as if the queen were to ever actually use those powers, it would undoubtedly lead to a major crisis. And the rest of her family has no powers even on paper (beond being incredibly wealthy), making it in my mind a case of “Hello, congratulations on your birth. Have some money as you perpetuate a class-based system of government.”
I apologize if this isn’t entirely lucid and hopefully I’ll be able to explain better tomorrow, but I’m right now in the tenth hour or so of some moderate stomach distress of the “even water is pretty much removing itself from my system rather alarmingly quickly” variety, so I’m a bit out of it.
A) Mild-ish monarchistic Canadian
NinjaChick, forgive me for saying so this somewhat tongue in cheek, but if you think that there isn’t some applicability between your comment “Hello, congratulations on your birth. Have some money as you perpetuate a class-based system of government.” and the American system that results in selection of a head of state, I’d suggest you aren’t really paying attention.
- said George H.W. Bush to his infant son.
What sort of powers do you think she has and what sort of crisis are you thinking of? The only powers that the Queen has that I’m aware of are the sort that prevent crises–such as the power to dissolve Parliament when she is constitutionally required to do so, or when Parliament is provoking civil unrest among the people by not doing what the people want it to do. If she has other crisis-provoking powers, I’d like to know about them–any cites?
Mild monarchist here. I like the tangible link to 900 years of history and tradition, and to change things now, at least in Canada, would lead to yet another Canadian constitutional squabble. We’ve had enough of those. The Queen is fairly harmless, so perhaps it’s best to just leave things alone for a while and let our elected representatives attend to more important matters than talks on changing our head of state.
Slightly republican myself
It’s interesting that none of us seem to feel strongly one way or t’other
(I suspect if I were a Commonwealthian I would be more strongly republican - I can’t imagine having a foreign head of state Gough Whitlam and all that)
Basically, the Royal Family is a bad Soap Opera that I don’t watch.
Their existence does tend to bolster the class system (and the less said about the “honours” system the better - Lord Archer? Sir Mark Thatcher? Fuck off!)
On the other hand there is a reason we ended up putting a tame monarch back on the throne after the regicide of Charles I and passing an act abolishing the Office of King itself.
The constitutional monarchy acted as a stabilising force - a counterweight to political and/or religious zealots, and to the army - not all that relevant now, I guess, but it served its purpose well.
I’m also grateful we don’t have to be seen to get behind whatever chump we’ve elected as PM in times of crisis - seeing criticism of GWB dry up after 9/11 (the precise time his actions should have been under the closest scrutiny) wasn’t pretty. It was like saying “we’ll put this whole democracy thing on hold for a bit, while we treat this guy as infallible, because he symbolises the whole country, a bit like a… well, like a king”.
Having said that, I still think a hereditary monarchy should be abolished in the modern world.
(Maybe we could have an elected king? Michael Palin, say, or Bagpuss)
And I don’t think the monarchy is likely to survive much after the death of Liz II.
That’s my take on it. There’s no way to have a political discussion about the monarchy that won’t eventually branch into a Charlottetown redux which is the last thing we need.
FTR, I don’t like them and wouldn’t object to seeing them disappear.
It’s not even clear the Queen has the power to do that, at least in Canada. The Governor-General dissolves Parliament. The G-G officially represents the Queen, but where does it say the G-G takes orders from the Queen?
A fine distinction, but an important one. I stand corrected, and thank you.
Scottish born Canadian citizen here. Mild monarchist as well. Things are fine the way they are.
FYI, the country gives her about £37M per year. However, she gives the income from the Crown Estates back to the country, that’s about £185M per year. Does that make a difference to your opinion?
Myself, mild monarchist. I think they do some good and no real harm, there’s no great reason to abolish the monarchy. But if it didn’t exist, there would be no need to invent it.
Sure, but that’s not a de jure system. You get that in any society. In American society I don’t like it mostly out of pure jealousy. But when it’s enforced by law that certain people will be magnificently rich for no apparent reason, it bugs me.
The monarch does, in theory, have the power to prevent bills from passing into law. I’m not saying I’d expect it to ever in a million years happen, but on paper the privilege is there. I imagine that if she were to ever use that privilege, there’d be quite a bit of clamor and unhappiness.
I don’t really see this as an argument against a foreign head of state. The Queen wasn’t involved in the Whitlam dismissal. It’s true of course that the Governor-General used his reserve powers as her representative. But an Australian president with the same powers (and this is one of the republic models that has been suggested) could have done exactly the same thing.
**Ice Wolf ** was referring to the costs of the Queen’s representative, the Governor-General of New Zealand. I’d be surprised if any of the £185M per annum that the Queen repays from the Crown Estates finds its way back to the government of New Zealand (or Australia, or Canada…)