#RoyalBaby

3 Responses to #RoyalBaby

1. Brett says:

   May 2, 2015 at 9:29 pm

   wow so articulate and thoughtful…
2. ablokeimet says:

   May 3, 2015 at 7:51 pm

   Royal babies are predictably popular, but there is a limit. I’d say she’ll set the limit at 3. Then when the kids are teenagers and the parents are middle-aged, there’ll be the Royal Divorce. If, of course, the monarchy is still around. Betty Windsor can’t last forever and Charles will be immensely unpopular.

   Charles’ unpopularity will only be partly to do with the genuine offensiveness of monarchy and only a minority of the people who detest him will be people with a longstanding and principled opposition to monarchy. He will also be the victim of two other factors:

   (a) Sections of the Right detest him for being too politically and socially progressive. This can be detected from the insults directed at many of his pronouncements by quite conservative media outlets. In addition, and with similar dynamics, Camilla is a figure of hate amongst all sorts of Right wing people – precisely because she is the “other woman” who wrecked the fairytale marriage of Charles and Di. They don’t necessarily express it that way, but instead they just find fault with anything she says or does.

   (b) In modern countries, monarchies take on the character of a national soap opera. When a monarch reigns for a particularly long time, as is the case in Britain at the moment, the soap opera dynamic works to do two things. Firstly, it results in the monarch becoming immensely popular, a fixture of the national consciousness without whom people cannot imagine living. Secondly, it produces a “baddy” who serves as a lightning rod for society’s unreal relationship with this distant but ever-present family. In many cases, the “baddy” is the heir to the throne. And in Britain, Charles has been thrust into this role quite firmly. When the monarch dies, it produces a deep crisis for the institution as the despised heir has to make the transition to the new role.

   If you put those two factors together, you’ll see that the ascent of Charles to the British throne will be the signal for a massive rise in republican feeling. This will not be confined to the political Left, because people whose consciousness has been formed with the monarchy as a soap opera will have unstable and shiftable views, while significant elements of the political Right will be less than enthusiastic about defending a figure they detest even if it is to save an institution they worship.

   In summary, I suspect Britain may become a republic in 10 or 15 years time. And if Britain does, I can’t see Australia or any other Commonwealth country not following suit.
3. Futilitarian says:

   May 16, 2015 at 10:43 am

   Ten or fifteen years? Can’t you narrow it down more accurately than that, ablokeimet?

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