News Royal Wedding Of Prince William Of Wales and Kate Middleton

[garyw]

I agree with you in principle that the money spent on this event may be galling to people who have recently lost their jobs. However, although I don't have the figures, I suspect it is mere pennies compared to the cash we are throwing at the 2012 Olympics. Billions of pounds for a couple of weeks of running and jumping at a time of national austerity.

At least with the Olympics you'll have sports centres and other infrastructure left behind. With the royal wedding all you get is some slightly tacky plates and mugs.

 

[Urwumpe]

At least with the Olympics you'll have sports centres and other infrastructure left behind. With the royal wedding all you get is some slightly tacky plates and mugs.

And a potential successor for the head of state.

 

[Dambuster]

I don't have anything against the wedding itself, but I do have a problem with the way certain elements in the media are drooling over ever single detail of it.

As for the economics of it, I find it hard to believe that when the increased tourism is taken into account, that there won't be a net positive effect on the economy. As someone told me recently: 'If the Royal Family is a company, it definitely makes a profit'.

 

[Krys]

We have been getting 'normal' coverage here. Luckily the wedding is on ANZAC day, which is quite subdued so that will calm the media a little.

Well they didn't really pick the right day to get married did they?

I don't get it. What is with all the hating? :huh:

I don't hate the royal wedding. Garyw thinks I'm strange for being a royalist, but to be honest, the Queen and her family do a lot of goodwill, bring in a lot of tourism and overall give England that little something special that many modern day countries lack.

Worse, the Americans, Chinese and Australians will take all your gold medals

Yes, yes we will! The Russians will take the gymnastics though.

 

[garyw]

Maybe I'm just jaded because I've been through a Royal Wedding before (Charlie and Diana) so 'been there, seen that' type of thing. It was much quieter for Charlie and Camilla of course.... :lol:

 

[Urwumpe]

Our German nobility is sadly mostly a poor sight, like our former minister of defense... or already very happy with just being quiet hard working agricultural managers.

 

[streb2001]

Maybe I'm just jaded because I've been through a Royal Wedding before (Charlie and Diana)

Ah yes, remember it well. I was striking camp at Angle Tarn in a blistering heatwave and heading for Great Gable and a well-earned pint in Borrowdale. I had just finished my O Levels. Happy days.

 

[RisingFury]

From what I heard, the royal family costs 20 cents per year per every person in UK.

 

[streb2001]

From what I heard, the royal family costs 20 cents per year per every person in UK.

Yes, about 50p each per year. Not a bad price for a constitutional monarchy. I dread to think what state we would be in now if Tony Bliar had been declared "El Presidente".

 

[Belisarius]

Of the various forms of government which have prevailed in the world, an hereditary monarchy seems to present the fairest scope for ridicule.

Edward Gibbon

The monarchy is finished. It was finished a while ago, but they're still making the corpses dance.

Sue Townsend

 

[T.Neo]

Yeah. Because, let's see... the prime minister and the parliament of England (or whatever exists up there, I don't know the exact specifics) is nonexistant, and Queen Elizabeth has made every major decision for the UK since her coronation...

Wrong. The queen is a figurehead. The monarchy is about tradition, about the heritage and culture of the British people. And frankly, that sort of identity can be a pretty important thing.

The same thing happens in places like Japan or Sweden. Queen Elizabeth is the symbolic head of state, while all the democratically elected politicians make the real desicisons and literally run the country.

As to whether either of those people do those things properly is another matter entirely.

I don't know why people hate the 'royal wedding' so much. Yes, it's overrated, but come on, if all the hype gets annoying, just ignore it.

As it's supposedly part of my heritage I have vague interest, but it isn't like I'm going to have my eyes glued to a TV set all day (well, I'll have my eyes glued to a TV set for about 10 minutes, but obviously for something else ). Or I'm going to buy a Royal Sickbag. Or a Princess Kate bobblehead. But I don't hate on these people, that is a real waste of effort, they're just people and they can't help it if they're royalty or monarchy or human-skinned lizards ( ) or whatever.

From what I heard, the royal family costs 20 cents per year per every person in UK.

I wouldn't mind paying roughly 6 Rand per year to support a Monarchy, as a yearly figure it is quite low...

 

[Urwumpe]

It is the same with the "Großer Zapfenstreich" / "Big Tattoo" of the German army... you can hate it, but it is a deep part of German tradition, older than the reasons critics cite against it.

And, if you have really a worthy person for it, usually also a pretty good show, since the song selection is pretty personal for the person that leaves office.

For example - for the former Minister president Roland Koch... a pretty surprising selection by him, since he is more famous as conservative hardliner (and less as good friend of the Dalai Lama)

 

[Eli13]

Honestly, I find it fairly interesting to see how many Americans are interested in the wedding (ahem, my mother being one of them :shifty. I don't care that much but again it's kinda interesting to see how the US and the world is so into this. Thats just my opinion.

 

[Tex]

No hating, just wondering - why does England even need a king and queen anymore? In today's world of politics, it seems like they're almost redundant? :shrug:

 

[Eli13]

They are just simply public icons, a more subtle form of propaganda almost.

 

[Urwumpe]

No hating, just wondering - why does England even need a king and queen anymore? In today's world of politics, it seems like they're almost redundant? :shrug:

Why do you need a white house? Or why do you spend money for Mount Rushmore?

They are essentially like the German president - politically powerless figureheads, with huge moral power...or as we in Germany say: The power of the warm words. They are also diplomatic figureheads.

You don't know such entities in the USA, since you project these duties on your president, who is pretty much just the more powerful version of our chancellor or the British Prime minister. Which doesn't mean you have more than we have, or are better and more modern by not having it. Your president will always be tainted by party politics. Even if he says the truth and mentions the right national emotional problems, he will always have the tiny scar of being first of all figurehead of a political party.

The constitutional monarchs or most presidents in Europe are not - while the presidents usually come from party cadres or have relations to parties, they are always considered independent, and often turn out to be the strongest counterpart to the ruling party. Chancellor Kohl would have been unbearable, if he didn't have president Weizsäcker as intellectual conscience. As president, you are also at the end of your political career, you maybe need to fight for a reelection once, but at least in your final turn, you are really free of all party obligations - it is extremely hard to impossible to remove an elected president here, if he doesn't suit you. Simply because he has no power. And because he has it.

Something that you might not easily understand, but then, it makes historically sense to be that way. Hindenburg in Germany for example was a very powerful president, who wasn't convinced of democracy and simply removed it. Against the will of the majority of the nation in that case.

---------- Post added at 11:16 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:15 PM ----------

They are just simply public icons, a more subtle form of propaganda almost.

Pretty poor propaganda then.

 

[Eli13]

Never said it was good propaganda either.

 

[streb2001]

No hating, just wondering - why does England even need a king and queen anymore? In today's world of politics, it seems like they're almost redundant? :shrug:

It's just the way we do things in Britain. It may seem quaint and old-fashioned but it has served us very well for over five hundred years. We tried civil war republicanism back in the seventeenth century but we didn't like it and so brought the monarchy back.

 

[Eli13]

Again, I learned something new today.

 

[garyw]

In the US you have the President, Congress and House of Representatives. So you've got a triangle of power. No one group can command everything.

In the UK we've got the house commons (full of people who sprout hot air) and the house of lords (full of people who snore hot air). The queen fills that third gap in the power triangle and she actually has a lot of power but rarely uses it. One of her more well known powers is the power to disolve parliament during an election.