God Save The King!
It’s a public holiday and that is enough for many of his subjects to rejoice for. The magical exuberance and privilege to have a sitting regent, whose majestic reign stabs back to times when warlords, bandits and pirates took land, rallied warriors and pillaged the land until they themselves realised that the real booty and bounty is to be found in the permanency of government. Taxation. And, the God granted right to rule, to subjugate the peasantry. To bless useful and otherwise wealthy men as lords, to own populations, as slave, serf and then in time citizen subject. To codify rule into laws, bound in tradition and entwined in uncommon language, legalese and Latin sounds smarter, to own others, with the mystic writ granted to man by God.
God Save the King, even the atheists of state cheer.
The welfare state perhaps saved the Crown. It’s an easy remark to call royalty themselves, welfare queens, but the worlds fetish for sovereign extravagance and the ever evolving traditions that marry religion-state-privilege seems universal. The Royal Family, inc do in fact cost the tax payer and government a lot of money. They also generate it. As landholders, they are able to tax tenants, but they also bring in tourist dollars and make money from royalties, no pun, and merchandising. The mob seem to love them, even if at times they sneer, “he’s not my king’ oh but how they worship the government by which he sits upon, even as a symbol.
King Charles III, formerly Prince Charles, Lady Diana’s cheating husband is not as revered as his dear mother was. It’s hard for spoiled boy kings to be as appealing as their dear old mothers. Elizabeth II and Victoria, ruled for long periods over important eras in British history. Victoria’s reign was at the height of empire, she could look out her window to see no sun setting over her dominion, it is said that 25 percent of the planet was bathed in the pink ink of the British Empire. Her empire. It was an age defined for her namesake. Victorian Era. The Queen ever in black, mourning the loss of her dear Albert. A woman of prudish traits, who exemplified the majesty that only her position could afford. She was empress, prime ministers wrote to her affectionately, foreign leaders could her mother or aunt, she was the mother of imperial dominance.
In her time, pretty little Elizabeth II became queen while the British Empire was in decline. Having barely survived the second world war, and scandals pertaining to the family, the Royals had a new regent. The House of Windsor in the previous war, lost it’s German name, marriage to an American commoner and peace feelers with the Nazi’s all converged to sour the once revered family. In the age of democratic socialism, the NHS and welfare became as much a focus of government as holding onto parts of empire.
Britain rebuilt itself into a command economy, based on the principles of Keynes and war time austerity-planning, was there room for the Empire? The Cold War and insatiable hunger of the welfare state meant that some colonies needed to be kept. You see, these great empires need to steal and plunder the resources of foreign lands in order to maintain their welfare policies. Public education and health is only affordable so long as Malaya and Kenya are robbed. The modern French state is a master at this balancing act, keeping a form of economic empire while satiating the gorged neosocialism at home.
But alas, the colonies became dominions, independent and members of the Commonwealth. British managers and bureaucrats from the civil services helped to steer and guide some into nationhood, while others crumbled into wars of independence. Turns out when Europeans invent nations on a map, arbitrarily the traditional borders soon bludgeon into violent realisation. Elizabeth II reigned over this period, watching her empire decline. Then her nation fumbled into economic ruination. Post War debt to the former colonies of North America, and with a decline in aviation, automobiles, machines and weapon manufacturing. The once mighty industrial bastion became a basket case that only central planning and mass dependency could invigorate. God Save the Queen, for she represented a dignity of a before time. Labours winter of discontent, garbage in the streets, then Thatcherism and the glory of reclaiming the Falklands gave the UK a reprieve for British pride and the dignity of royals.
The rise of the Murdoch press ensured that the establishment and upper toffs were not above reporting. Their dirty laundry and scandals were all public fodder. Advertiser friendly for papers and magazines. Then the shining smile of Lady Diana bought in the tabloid gorged public into the loving fold of the Royals. A return to tradition, a fairy tale. Happy Ever After. Until years later the paparazzi chase Diana into a speeding tunnel, killing her. To live and die by the tabloids.
Lady Diana, Prince Charles had selected wisely. He picked his then underage future wife with devious intentions of making her a Princess. Turns out, for Lady Spencer, it was not a Disney ending despite many attempts at making such a life appealing. The couple adorned magazine covers, just like a Disney poster, one with wide Dumbo ears, the other wearing the pretty pearls of royalty beneath a smile of practised insincerity, the deceit of public navigation. Like a bulimic who pretends to digest, the dear princess understood the need for deception before the public.
It was true love.
Except that true love for our dear prince was another man’s wife. His former teen sweetheart, Camilla Parker Bowles. There is no doubt that they truly love one another, he even once proclaimed his want of being her tampon. The obligation and privilege of royalty meant that their love was denied. True love, was too powerful and despite the contract obligated by the very laws that his rule validates, they betrayed the mythic and magical vows made inside the church that he is the figurehead of. And, love prevailed. Rather human, common even.
Instead of loving them for their love, at risk of exposing the charade of the royal and public good, the then future king was seen as a villain. Lady Diana, the victim. It was with her unfortunate death in 1997 that she achieved a very public martyrdom. A death that the royal family fumbled with their public relations, further harming the brand a little more. Charles invested himself as a father, a lover to Lady Camilla and spokesman to many causes. The tradition of royalty for many is a going through the motions of obligation, a burden of habit. The affection for Elizabeth II and even the late Lady Diana are no longer present, hope was once invested in the prince’s Henry and William now less adored than they once were. Thanks in part to their marriage selections and the public perceptions of them as men, being Mummy boys and all that. Which strangely seems to be a common feature for modern British Kings.
Her Royal Highness, Elizabeth II reigned when Sir Jimmy Savile, rapist and paedophile Knight was at their royal service, it can be reasoned and rationalised that Royals never knew. But, many did know and because of such a man’s fame and public esteem, he was kept dearly protected. Protected by the very public health system, broadcaster and police that have mandated that they are the monopoly of the land. Protected by the British government and due to his closeness with Charles and Diana, by the Royal Family. The truth of power is encapsulated inside of this scandal, as depicted by this one vile man and his many victims.
The establishment, that which needs the common person to validate all it’s power, will trample and disregard the common person not only to retain power but to avoid a slant against it’s credibility. In doing so, it has no credibility. But as an employer, a welfare feeder and with the magic of tradition, reputation and credibility does not matter.
Sir Jimmy became an adviser of sorts. Not as a jester, rather as a high court degenerate in chief.
He helped them with public spin, guided them with charm and how to navigate the fickleness of the mob. He was able to raise money for charity. He did this well and for all of his viscous acts, their seems to be a part of him that sought redemption through deed. The Janus mask of his persona, a conflict between a darkness of degenerate rape and sexual violence, balanced by the philanthropic energies, a light, to help many in need. Because of this greater good reasoning, the intimate turmoil and misery of his victims became hushed out of any public light, the light of his good deeds illuminated upon them with dismissive indignity. Such is power. Such is government. Such is the divine right to rule.
Just like royal family confidant Savile, the Duke of York, Prince Andrew, also likes them young. A man who has his own indulgent tastes, how young and how consenting some were, we are yet to know. Regardless, it’s a very royal thing. The modern world and the confused nature of what is moral and what is not, muddies the waters when viewed through the historical lenses of nostalgic glory. The Kings and the aristocracy of the past were indeed far more degenerate and vile actors. It seems that the modern inheritors are merely abiding in the tradition that they are known for, loved for. The Epstein files, a well known list of public people who may have indulged in the rape or sex acts that could compromise their reputations, includes the Duke of York who has somewhat been cancelled by the family. The Duke was a bonafide hero during the Falklands, flying combat and rescue missions as a helicopter pilot, what glory he may have gained then, remains in the 20th century, where it once mattered.
In the past, the inventor of the Christian sect known as Anglicanism, King Henry 8th, had his own particular tastes and ambitions to breed. It was his right. He famously had his six wives, a morbid series of abuse and state sanctioned murder-divorce enshrined him into greatness. He became the head of a nationalised church, could do as he pleased in so far as how marriage and relations went and God, his God, was fine with it all. The morality is in the writ of law, and the religion becomes credible once time and enough followers accumulate. The victims of such a man and his killers, rapists, buried beneath the legalese and legacy of time. His perverse thrusts into royal victims, sanctioned, thus moral, because he is the King.
Scandals are rife among those who live in public life, even before the internet and smart phones, some incidents were recorded and spread among the court and to the common folk. Public brawls like that between King George III and his then drunk playboy son, or the alleged lesbian affair between Queen Anne and Sarah Churchill. King George V’s son being a murder suspect or the murder scandals that reach back hundreds of years. The Royal’s are human beings but through the belief of the common person they are granted a magical lifestyle than transcends anything common. The problem is not in the King or the many Royals, but in the people who make them that. From the guards who are disciplined into robotic discipline, obeying customs of absurd martial tradition that it’s adored because it is a military form. Or the many officials, whether they believe or not, make sure that the government and the Royalty functions, or retains existence. While you may not need the King, he sure needs you. Because you, keep him and others like him on that throne.
