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Well if they want to pretend they still "own" all of the UK they say they do then I suppose there is always the French way of doing things

 Pacific wrote:
finally the fact that it's widely publicised that he is a bit of an imbecile. And not in the 'aww isn't he sweet' level of stupidity that seems to endear us to Homer Simpson or Londoners to Boris Johnson.

Does it matter how imbecilic he is? The Queen\King hold no actual functional power, do they? Honest question, I have no real idea.

Like I said, I don't think it could be done short of a revolution.

feeder wrote:
Well if they want to pretend they still "own" all of the UK they say they do then I suppose there is always the French way of doing things

They don't pretend anything of the sort, you merely like to prefer to claim they do as an excuse to post ignorant drivel.
Most of the accusations of being out of touch are totally unfounded, HM has a very good finger on the pulse.
But the truth doesn't give the opportunity to stir up any bile, so the myth of arrogant aloof manipulators persists..

If you want to find the real out of touch arrogant scum who think they own everything, try looking in the House of Commons.

 Ratbarf wrote:
Like I said, I don't think it could be done short of a revolution.

I know a few good merchant ships full of Tea you could commandeer!

It should go to Charles, there's been worse... *cough*Edward II*cough*

 Orlanth wrote:

feeder wrote:
Well if they want to pretend they still "own" all of the UK they say they do then I suppose there is always the French way of doing things

They don't pretend anything of the sort, you merely like to prefer to claim they do as an excuse to post ignorant drivel.
Most of the accusations of being out of touch are totally unfounded, HM has a very good finger on the pulse.
But the truth doesn't give the opportunity to stir up any bile, so the myth of arrogant aloof manipulators persists..

If you want to find the real out of touch arrogant scum who think they own everything, try looking in the House of Commons.

"Ignorant drivel", nice one mate. Let's not make this personal, eh?

I never said anything about being any of them being out of touch, I should fething hope the HM has a "finger on the pulse", she has an army of aides to hold it there for her!

The arrogant scum at the House of Commons, differ from the Royals in one key aspect: they worked their ares off to get there. They had to wheel, deal, backstab, lie and fool enough people into voting for them to earn their spot on top of the gakheap.

A Royal is born, feths around, does no real work, drinks and smokes for free, and makes the news when something embarrassing happens to them. They are chavs with better housing.

feeder wrote:

 Orlanth wrote:

feeder wrote:
Well if they want to pretend they still "own" all of the UK they say they do then I suppose there is always the French way of doing things

They don't pretend anything of the sort, you merely like to prefer to claim they do as an excuse to post ignorant drivel.
Most of the accusations of being out of touch are totally unfounded, HM has a very good finger on the pulse.
But the truth doesn't give the opportunity to stir up any bile, so the myth of arrogant aloof manipulators persists..

If you want to find the real out of touch arrogant scum who think they own everything, try looking in the House of Commons.

"Ignorant drivel", nice one mate. Let's not make this personal, eh?

I never said anything about being any of them being out of touch, I should fething hope the HM has a "finger on the pulse", she has an army of aides to hold it there for her!

The arrogant scum at the House of Commons, differ from the Royals in one key aspect: they worked their ares off to get there. They had to wheel, deal, backstab, lie and fool enough people into voting for them to earn their spot on top of the gakheap.

Yep, ignorant drivel was a fair assessment.

feeder wrote:
[
A Royal is born, feths around, does no real work, drinks and smokes for free, and makes the news when something embarrassing happens to them. They are chavs with better housing.

Confirmed.

Charles won't last long unless they make some sort of life enhancing elixir. Gives WIll some chill time to pop some sprogs with Kate

I get kind of confused by any kind of talk about who should be the monarch. The only qualification for being the monarch is that they're the next in line, and the old monarch just died. That's it. Whether they had a much publicised unhappy marriage or not, whether they're slightly oafish in front of a camera, they're still next in line. That's what the monarchy means.

Start questioning that and you don't really have a monarchy anymore, you've just got another popularity contest, albeit one with absolutely nothing at stake, as the royal family wields no actual political power. Which is, of course, why they're so popular. Whenever they actually held power people hated them.

They're kind of like the Liberal Democrats in that regard.

 Ratbarf wrote:
Pff, you do realise they own ridiculous amounts of land, not only that, but the government derives its legal authority from the crown. If you got rid of the Royal Family that would erase every law on the books, as well as dissolve parliament.

I'm not even sure they could legally get rid of the monarchy without the assent of the current monarch.

Umm, countries have left the Commonwealth without ending up in Thunderdome. You just write a constitution that says 'everything is like it was before, except instead of the head of state being the Queen it's whoever we elect to the position' or something like that.

I think the Canadians, Kiwis and Aussies should take the death of the Queen as a signal to finish severing all ties with the UK.

The sun will finally set on the remnants of the British empire

As to the actual question why bother? I mean the crown's just a figure head right? One blighter in a fancy gilded hat's no different then any other are they? I mean William might be able to wave at the peasants slightly more vigorously but that's about it.

How about some good old Shakespearianeque regicide? William offs Charles and all that. Then he goes and consults some witches. Yeah!

Basically, what sebster said. Why should he abdicate due to popular opinion? You've either got a monarchy or you haven't.

 sebster wrote:
I get kind of confused by any kind of talk about who should be the monarch. The only qualification for being the monarch is that they're the next in line, and the old monarch just died. That's it. Whether they had a much publicised unhappy marriage or not, whether they're slightly oafish in front of a camera, they're still next in line. That's what the monarchy means.

Start questioning that and you don't really have a monarchy anymore, you've just got another popularity contest, albeit one with absolutely nothing at stake, as the royal family wields no actual political power. Which is, of course, why they're so popular. Whenever they actually held power people hated them.

I'm not even sure they could legally get rid of the monarchy without the assent of the current monarch.

Yes of course that is the proviso. Like Edward before him, the option remains for Charles to abdicate.

I think it's also important to consider the internal pressure placed on the family, from other members within the royal family itself - it is very much an institution. So Camilla, who was deemed 'not good enough' to be Queen previously (when Charles wanted to marry her) is hardly going to now be the desired option, especially considering the scandal that surrounded them and culminated in Diana's death.

So you're right - it's not a case of a popularity contest, but more the reality of internal power and control within the royal family itself. They have exercised that power many times in the past (with Charles himself in fact - preparing the arranged marriage with Diana, despite what his own wishes might have been). I see no reason to suppose that they won't do so again, and in this sense you can imagine that they won't be immune to the negative public perception of Charles, and the positive public perception of William.

 sebster wrote:

 Ratbarf wrote:
Pff, you do realise they own ridiculous amounts of land, not only that, but the government derives its legal authority from the crown. If you got rid of the Royal Family that would erase every law on the books, as well as dissolve parliament.

I'm not even sure they could legally get rid of the monarchy without the assent of the current monarch.

Umm, countries have left the Commonwealth without ending up in Thunderdome. You just write a constitution that says 'everything is like it was before, except instead of the head of state being the Queen it's whoever we elect to the position' or something like that.

I don't believe that any of those nations separated without the monarchs writing off on it, unless the power change came about because of revolution.

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:
I think the Canadians, Kiwis and Aussies should take the death of the Queen as a signal to finish severing all ties with the UK.

The sun will finally set on the remnants of the British empire

As to the actual question why bother? I mean the crown's just a figure head right? One blighter in a fancy gilded hat's no different then any other are they? I mean William might be able to wave at the peasants slightly more vigorously but that's about it.

Personally I want the British Empire back, they did a lot of good in their time, and I think they could fix a lot of the issues with certain areas of the world if they were willing to take them back and enforce good British values and legal practices upon them. Well maybe not the values, but the legal practices and the ability for a higher more powerful authority to deal with the rampant corruption and human rights abuses that is inherent in many of the old colonies would likely be welcome. Just look at what the Malians are saying about the French, it seems they want to be re-colonised because they recognize that the French government is much less corrupt and a much more humanitarian government then the strongmen they've been subjected to since achieving independence.

Just my two cents.

 Ratbarf wrote:
I'm not even sure they could legally get rid of the monarchy without the assent of the current monarch. Which means that if they don't want to sign off their own oblivion the government can't do anything about it unless they stage a revolution.

Second English Civil War? I call royalists.

I'm pretty sure if there was a revolution the politicians would be first up against the wall.

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:


The sun will finally set on the remnants of the British empire

Congratulations, you've completely misunderstood the meaning of that phrase. Also, Ratbarf is correct. There are a significant number of countries that would be better off back under British rule, some of whom have publicly acknowledged this.

 Albatross wrote:

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:


The sun will finally set on the remnants of the British empire

Congratulations, you've completely misunderstood the meaning of that phrase. Also, Ratbarf is correct. There are a significant number of countries that would be better off back under British rule, some of whom have publicly acknowledged this.

Its almost like independence for the sole benefit of independence isn't a very good reason to be independent

 Albatross wrote:

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:


The sun will finally set on the remnants of the British empire

Congratulations, you've completely misunderstood the meaning of that phrase. Also, Ratbarf is correct. There are a significant number of countries that would be better off back under British rule, some of whom have publicly acknowledged this.

From my understanding it was based on the massive colonial occupations of the Empire world wide, so the sun literally never set because it was literally day in some part of the empire at any given time. With her final "colonies" abandoning her, then yes. The sun would finally set.

Personally, I'm fine with Britain trying to reconquer the world. Just ditch the royals first, the less monarchies we have in the world the better.

I never got the royal hate. They don't really do much do they? They're more of a living museum which I can appreciate. So really who cares if they're still around.

I take royals over celebrities any day...

Most definitely, the worst the Royals get up to is pretty much whatever Prince Harry is doing at any given moment. Which is quite tame compared to what American celebrities seem to get up to.

 d-usa wrote:
I take royals over celebrities any day...

American Celebs just need a proper spay and neuter program.

Harry actually seems okay except for that whole "Nazi uniform" incident. I give the man credit for deploying to Afghanistan and literally having to be dragged back when the word broke he was overseas.

feeder wrote:
A Royal is born, feths around, does no real work, drinks and smokes for free, and makes the news when something embarrassing happens to them. They are chavs with better housing.

So Prince Harry, despite being deployed to Afghanistan, doesn't have a real job?
Besides which, the queen is an 86 year old woman who perform as many as 400 public engagements a year.
That's a fair bit more than "fething around, doing no work"

So yeah, ignorant drivel does cover the original comment quite well actually.

Heck, sounds like some of the royals are doing a lot more than a lot of our politicians.

 d-usa wrote:
Heck, sounds like some of the royals are doing a lot more than a lot of our politicians.

Sure but when our politicians do anything it is inevitably bad for everyone, thus we like them as inactive as possible.

Ratbarf wrote:Personally I want the British Empire back, they did a lot of good in their time, and I think they could fix a lot of the issues with certain areas of the world if they were willing to take them back and enforce good British values and legal practices upon them. Well maybe not the values, but the legal practices and the ability for a higher more powerful authority to deal with the rampant corruption and human rights abuses that is inherent in many of the old colonies would likely be welcome. Just look at what the Malians are saying about the French, it seems they want to be re-colonised because they recognize that the French government is much less corrupt and a much more humanitarian government then the strongmen they've been subjected to since achieving independence.

Just my two cents.

Yeah lots of good, like wiping out indigenous populations "for their own good" because they were "subhuman". Why don't you find some Maoris and Aborigines you can tell of all the good the British Empire did back in the old days eh?

LordofHats wrote:I never got the royal hate. They don't really do much do they? They're more of a living museum which I can appreciate. So really who cares if they're still around.

They get hate, because some people are smart and realise the only reason they are the head of state is because their ancestors used "God" as an excuse to opress other peoples ancestors, the sooner they are dead and done, the better.

 Krellnus wrote:

They get hate, because some people are smart and realise the only reason they are the head of state is because their ancestors used "God" as an excuse to opress other peoples ancestors, the sooner they are dead and done, the better.

Then and there, here and now.

[insert almost any group] used [insert any excuse] to opress other peoples ancestors, the sooner they are dead and done the better.

We could cover almost the entire population of the planet with that statement.

 Krellnus wrote:

Ratbarf wrote:Personally I want the British Empire back, they did a lot of good in their time, and I think they could fix a lot of the issues with certain areas of the world if they were willing to take them back and enforce good British values and legal practices upon them. Well maybe not the values, but the legal practices and the ability for a higher more powerful authority to deal with the rampant corruption and human rights abuses that is inherent in many of the old colonies would likely be welcome. Just look at what the Malians are saying about the French, it seems they want to be re-colonised because they recognize that the French government is much less corrupt and a much more humanitarian government then the strongmen they've been subjected to since achieving independence.

Just my two cents.

Yeah lots of good, like wiping out indigenous populations "for their own good" because they were "subhuman". Why don't you find some Maoris and Aborigines you can tell of all the good the British Empire did back in the old days eh?

I don't recall them doing it, "for their own good" unless you mean for the good of the British Settlers. Also, I would think that if the Maoris, Aborigines, Indians (not east indians) and various other peoples who were pulled out of subsistence farming and constant tribal warfare by the British were given the choice to return to their pre contact state or their current state but told to quit their bleepin the vast majority would stfu about the whole thing.

Secondly, much of that so called genocide was merely the introduction of diseases to native populations. A thing that the British cannot be rationally blamed for, and the warfare that broke out between the native inhabitants and the British gave them cause for subduing the native peoples.

Thirdly, most of the initial colonialism was driven by the promise of increased economic gains, but was later driven by population expansion. If the British hadn't expanded into the territories of other peoples they would have had massive famines/wars in their home nation. Just look at what overcrowding did to the Irish.

Fourthly, if the various governments that used to be under British rule and oversight were currently under their rule I think it's fair to assume that they would not have such rampant corruption or human rights abuses, and they would in all likeliness be much more advanced both socially and economically. The loss of both social and economical capital that came resulted from the various nations separation from Britain was a huge blow, and would have stymied growth substantially even if those nations had managed to achieve a modicum of political stability. Which most of those that I am aware of didn't.