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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   16048 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 19, 2022

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The only deranged people are the ones defending her. She's blatantly a social climber, acts like a typical WAG, and worse than all that, she's American. She refused to engage with the duties of her position, has been by all accounts an absolute nightmare diva to be around, and tried to commercialise their titles. It would be stranger for anyone not to despise her. She's almost as unpopular among Brits as Prince Andrew, who is widely believed to be a paedophile.

Contrast with Kate, who also had her time as a media punching bag, but got her head down, did the work and got on with it, and now she's beloved.

When called on all of this, she retreated to stereotypically-American accusations of racism. Despite looking no darker than a typical fake tanned slag you'd see on high streets up and down the country on a Friday night. Not a single person I know pegged her as non-white before being told. It has nothing to do with her race and everything to do with her being a thoroughly reprehensible breed of human.

The obvious solution is to #AbolishTheMonarchy. Then we never have to hear about Meghan or the Royal Family again. Sounds like a win-win to me!

No. There's no reason to break the chain of tradition, to abolish the ceremonies and rituals that connect us back through the mists of time to our distant ancestors. This ancient and storied land survives on such things. Maybe it takes your country having a history of its own to appreciate it. But in any case, no.

Steady on fella, I know we play things up for the Yanks a bit, but we're not bloody Avalon.

I'd keep the Royal Family, but let's not go overboard here, they're not pulling swords out of stones.

Maybe it takes your country having a history of its own to appreciate it.

Ah, yes, the ancient British family of Saxe-Coburg und Gotha.

Who took over from the German Hanovers who took over from the Dutch Orange-Nassaus...

The whole Windsor thing makes sense in agnatic terms but given that the grandmother of Europe ruled in her own right, it doesn't quite follow in Theseusian terms that her issue are from a different legacy.

It's not about the family, they're almost irrelevant. It's about the customs, traditions and institutions surrounding the crown itself.

Being a social climber doesn't make her reprehensible though. The Monarchy are the very definition of social climbers, they just did it a long time ago. I don't think she is a very nice person, but given my work in the civil service I had some exposure to the palace, and I can believe pretty much all of the claims about what went on.

The joke was: "If the establishment wants advice on having someone bullied and buried in a passive-aggressive deniable way they come to the civil service. When we want that advice we go to the Royal Household."

It's a hive of backbiters, status seekers, social climbers, hangers on and rent extractors. Markle's only crime that I can see is that she wasn't subtle enough about it, so the knives could easily be turned upon her. She's no different aside from that than half the household.

The image of the Royal Family is carefully crafted, looking behind the curtain is an eye-opening experience.

Markle's only crime that I can see is that she wasn't subtle enough about it

Yes, face and appearances are like 90% of the game. She waded in with... typical American subtlety.

Just as old money resents the nouveau riche, wouldn’t the formerly social climbers jealously defend their station?

Sure, nothing wrong with that. Neither of them are reprehensible though. Social climbing is part of our nature.

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