That is entirely possible. Based on some conversations I’ve had with some furrin’ acquaintances lately, maybe I am seeing offense where none is implied. It’s entirely possible that the only thing wrong here is that I hate her voice, same as I do with Hillary Clinton. They both grate like hell on my ears, and it’s possible that when they say one thing, I hear another because the very pitch of their sound conveys something else to me.
The general consensus here is that I’m out in left field, that’s ok. It wouldn’t be the first time.
While it’s true she didn’t serve in combat (woman didn’t then) she did serve in the Auxiliary Territorial Service as 2nd Subaltern Elizabeth Windsor in 1945. She trained as a driver and mechanic along with other women. She was the first (& only) royal women to ever actualy serve in the military and had to beg her overprotective father to allow her to serve.
Quite. The only reason this got any attention in the UK at all was that the BBC broadcast a trailer for the full program showing the Queen apparently walking out of the photo session in a huff, whereas in fact that was how she walked in, so it got written up as if Leibowitz had pissed off the Queen so badly that she stormed out. Ludicrously, the controller of BBC 1 was forced to resign over the “scandal”. It’s a dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb world.
jjimm, I had to google “tonsilloths”, and … argh. Those would impede my irony too.
I’m pretty defensive of the Queen in particular, and monarchies in general. (They’re my favored form of government.) I commend you for reversing your stand because as ready as I was to jump on the photographer, she really was quite proper and respectful.
Thanks, Lib.
I think to m’self, if I can’t be pretty or smart, I’d damn well better try to be reasonable.
My tone was rebutting, not snide. In the first quote, I said in effect that I had no respect for a hereditary government office - a position which I apply universally to all countries. I did not criticize you in any way. However, black_rabbit admonished you with “Are you fucking kidding me?”, a quote you seemed to have completely not addressed, to instead attack my post as “snide.” :dubious:
In the second quote, well, you didn’t even know that as head of State Elizabeth does in fact have an authority and power which is fairly significant to the whole issue of respect. Should we just let that go on a message board where the motto is “fighting ignorance”, and let you keep posting incorrect information, to spare your feelings? It may be the Pit and not GQ, but FFS it is also the Straight Dope Message Board. In fact, since all I said was “You may not be as familiar with the Monarchy as you believe.”, I don’t know how I can say it more mildly.
In the last quote, I’m trying to tell you that you need not worry about Leibovitz because she’s no more important than a large number of people, and people who think badly of the US as a whole because of things like this are ignoramuses. Again, I am not being snide to you; on the contrary, I’m rebutting you saying “no, you don’t need to worry, it’s not that big of a deal.”
Re-read both posts. You didn’t, but nor did I say you did.
How unfortunate. First you single out my post, ignoring others that are actually admonishing you, now you put words in my mouth. I have a lot of respect for Elizabeth as a person and as a ruler, and in no way said anything about her being a “doddering old fool.” I have no respect for the office because the office is an artifact of a birth-based classist system perpetuated by a long line of criminals and psycopaths (present leader and a few others in history excepted) that should have been removed as part of the Democratic process decades ago.
I have to type and run, so someone may have pointed this out already, but… the other thing to consider is that those robes are terribly, terribly heavy.; we’re not talking cheesecloth and tulle here. It’s almost certain she would have been feeling the strain of the weight and awkwardness of the clothing.
Asking an 82 year old woman to put on very heavy, cumbersome robes and then saying that it’s all a bit dressy? If I were the Queen, I’d be miffed too.
It’s a photo shoot. Leibovitz is the photographer.
Gotta go with you and Liberal on this. A mountain out of what a mole would be ashamed to claim.
It was those two same kooks from that one stupid photo shoot.
I agree that Liebovitz simply seemed like a professional on a very tight deadline. She was essentially given 15 minutes to conduct a photo shoot.
As far as the tiara goes, it might have been sparkling in the sunshine, which would have detracted from the subject. Or maybe Liebovitz only wanted one focal point and thought that too much was going on in the photographs. I seriously doubt it was done to tick off her Majesty.
As far as respect goes, of course you act respectfully towards the Queen. Whether she was appointed or elected or born into her position is completely irrelevant. However, there’s a big difference between respectful and deferential. Liebovitz was perfectly respectful. She was not deferential.
They didn’t broadcast the trailer. It was part of a presentation that the controller of BBC1 was making to journalists at a press event for the forthcoming season of programmes on the BBC. The BBC also wasn’t responsible for the editing together of the footage (or progamme itself) that was German company RDF who thought spicing up the trailer for the forthcoming series was a good idea.
Then you accept the premise that this person’s family background sets her4 aside from and above the rest of humanity and entitles her to expect their automatic grovelling deference ? Even from such persons as weren’t born into a culture where that assumption of hierarchy was imposed on the “lessers” from an early age? Because it’s a pretty bizarre and offensive notion to me in the first place, and that it still has any currency among the people who actually have to live with it --much less the citizens of a foreign nation who aren’t answerable to fictive authority and superiority conveyed by accident of birth – is a manifestation of one of humanity’s traits which I neither understand nor wish to.
What? The “putting in its place” of an insolent underling who has to actually work for a living – is that what you’d have found enjoyable?
And of course the input of a professional photogrpher, with many years of acquired knowledge and a real eye for the image she’s trying to capture, is negligible compared to the photographer’s imaginary position vis-a-vis the subject of the picture.
It wouldn’t have mattered much anyway. Leibowitz has been photographing world renowned performers, high society parasites and other high-strung, self-regarding individuals – many with real talents and accomplishments to back up their inflated ideas of themselves – for a long time now, and she’s been all over the world doing it. If The Queen had mouthed off to her, she’d have handled it. She’s a pro, that Annie Leibowitz.
On one side of the scale, we have a gutsy, creative woman who by her stunning talents and hard work has achieved world-wide acclaim in her field, and placed the iconic images of divers events and celebrities in the public mind’s eye. On the other side is a pampered pedigree dog of a woman, born into luxury and the unearned adulation of strangers, and even now expecting to be treated with defernce bordering on servility.
Indeed, if it were our place to rank other humans’ perceived value, Leibowitz would be placed a lot higher, because she has made some real. worthy contribution to human culture.
Three cheers for Annie Leibowitz then – she refused to acknowledge the imaginary superiority of a mortal woman like herself, and declined to play along with an insulting charade based on acceptance of that hieerarchy, expressing her disdain within the enforceable sanctions of protocol – which is visibly about coercion of compliance to that demeaning and indefensible power relationship. It was more honorable to express her disdain within thoseregulaations, much morde so than letting them stand as consensus. I’m glad there’s just no way I’ll ever be placed in a similar position; my response to the demand that I grovel and cringe before so-called royalty might get me sent to the dungeon for life, or taken out and shot.
That is bullshit. Nobody is entitled to be treated with deference and servility by everyone around them – especially if this is thought to be their due simply by dint of being born into a hothouse family of other useless, entitled monstrosities. If you don’t swallow the concept of royalty being somehow superior to the rest of humanity, where does it follow that one is obliged to play along with it? I give the idea of “royal blood” and “good lineage” about as much credence as I do Cargo Cults and Reptile Shape Shifters – indeed I see it as much more negative, because actual harm has come about because of this belief, and legal sanctions require some acknowledgement of it by anyone with the misfortune of exposure. That the Brits still respect such a reulsive notion makes me sad for them, but hey – their country, gtheir game, their rules. We weren’t born and raised to fall to our bellies for the crown, so when a Yank goes all kiss-ass about it, it’s just incomprehensible and disgusting and infuriating.
There is a certainly a heightened sense of propriety surrounding the Queen, even among family members. You don’t have to grovel, but there are certain rules you should expect to follow because that’s the way it’s done. If you don’t want to accept those rules, then you should excuse yourself from any invitations you might receive from her. That would include Liebowitz if she felt opposed to the protocol and expectations.
But she acted perfectly acceptable IMO.
Anybody else catch the 20/20 special on the House of Windsor? Her Majesty laughed after Leibovitz said “less dressy”. Sounds more like a sense of humor than a sense of superiority.
and at the end of the day, the Queen *paid Annie * for her work.
I routinely ask the question, when these controversies about the English monarch crop up, which is what will you do as an alternative? The monarch costs each Brit about 60 pence a year, and you are going to replace that with what? A president? Now you’ll have to pay for new periodic elections, or else allow an appointment to the office — the same “underserved” status you’re now complaining about. And without even the history or culture behind it. Nothing? No head of state at all? Who will greet foreign dinataries and ambassadors? Travel on behalf of your government? Tend to the innumerable mattes of state that are handled by whole bureaucracies in Republican countries? You people remind me of the dog chasing the car. Once you finally catch it, then what? Look no further than the US for what can happen when one person is both head of government and head of state. Last year in our capital, there was your Queen and our Clown standing side by side on the White House steps. I would have been delighted if you had left her and taken him back with you.
I did watch it, and I found the exchange pretty funny myself. Annie was acting pretty much as I would expect her to…she was business like and a little abrupt, but not overly so. She seemed like a typical New Yorker to me! 
I thought the Queen’s reaction to the comment that removing the tiara would make the whole thing less dressy was priceless…she did that double take and gestured to her costume like “you want THIS to be less dressy?”
I was a little surprised to see how much the Queen laughs when she is having various conversations with people…that special really humanized her.
Personally, I don’t have much of an opinion as to whether or not England or any other foreign country should have a monarchy, but if they are going to have one, I am very impressed with the way the Queen has devoted her life to what she considers her duty, even though word has it that she, like her father, really wanted no part of it when they were put in the position to occupy the throne. Frankly, I think all that ceremonial bullshit looks boring as hell, and I wouldn’t want to spend 60 years or so doing that kind of thing all the time.
And, in a way, I agree with Liberal about having a ceremonial head of state…why not? For better or worse, someone has to do all that stuff…why not have a queen or king to do it, since that’s their tradition anyway. I don’t think their democracy suffers too much from it.
Whether I know or not that she can dismantle parliament is kind of irrelevant. Pigs would have to fly and learn to sing in farsi before that happened. Really, I mentioned that I’m not an expert on the modern incarnation of the royals.
I responded to your posts and not the one(s) saying things like, “Are you fucking kidding me?” Because I’ve kind of learned to filter out the noise of posts like that. I don’t have a personal problem with them, or you for that matter. Clearly, some posts ago, I conceded that perhaps I needed to rework my thoughts on the matter, and so I have. Lotta people here are right. I don’t wholly disagree with you, nor do I think anyone should save my feelings. I know where I posted this, and it comes with the territory.
You didn’t say anything about doddering. WileE brought that up, and I made the mistake of not separating it out. If you weren’t being snide, I’ll take you at your word and assume that it was the media by which we’re communicating that loses something in the translation.
All things considered, I still hate Annie Leibovitz’ voice. Apparently, that’s what makes me hostile.
Oops, I forgot I even posted here and thought I’d better check back and see if I was getting flamed. This is not a flame but I just wanted to point out that I didn’t call the Queen doddering, I called Barbara Walters doddering. I just called the Queen a cranky old lady and I think we need to make allowances for that because sometimes the elderly just can’t help it.
I haven’t seen enough of the Queen to know if she is really a doddering old fool but I see Baba on tv a lot and I see her stumble to find the right word and go off on weird tangents and often have no idea what she’s talking about. When she retired from 20/20 she should have retired from everything. It’s kind of sad, actually.