Who is this speaking with a sneer on their lips and contempt in their voice before news of the Princess of Wales’s cancer broke? A monarchist or a republican?
‘Kate’s admission that she had doctored the photograph, and her apology for doing so, were the latest self-inflicted wound by the House of Windsor, for which trust and integrity are fundamental commodities.’
There is a limit to how much of this treatment modern members of the royal family will take
Those who do not know the UK might assume it was a revolutionary who wants to undermine trust in the integrity of the monarchy because they want it gone. Republican sentiment in the UK is indeed stronger than tourists like to imagine and the BBC cares to admit.
Irish nationalists and Brits of Irish descent are wary of the crown. Just 45 per cent of Scots want to keep the royals ‘for the foreseeable future’, with 36 per cent ready to get rid of them as soon as possible. Meanwhile, the constitutional pressure group Republic reports that, for the first time, a plurality of people under 45 favour abolishing the monarchy.
But however greatly they have grown in number, British republicans have little vim and less vigour. They (we, if I am levelling with you) don’t care enough about the monarchy to abolish it, or at least most of us don’t. It’s not a political priority or a practical project.
Republicanism last grew in the UK in the 1990s after the marriage of Prince Charles (as he then was) to Princess Diana fell apart. Jack Straw and other Labour politicians of the day were Republicans in theory. But in practice they imagined cancelling all their other political plans so they could focus on dethroning the Queen and recoiled at the prospect.
Even if a majority of the country favoured a republic (which it never has), an embittered monarchist minority would never forgive the government if they let this happen.
Kate’s critics should be ashamed of themselves
5
0
23.03.2024
Who is this speaking with a sneer on their lips and contempt in their voice before news of the Princess of Wales’s cancer broke? A monarchist or a republican?
‘Kate’s admission that she had doctored the photograph, and her apology for doing so, were the latest self-inflicted wound by the House of Windsor, for which trust and integrity are fundamental commodities.’
There is a limit to how much of this treatment modern members of the royal family will........
© The Spectator
visit website
login
who are we?
contact us
qosheapp
Toi Staff
Gideon Levy
Belen Fernandez
Andrew Mitrovica
Mort Laitner
Rami G Khouri
Ali Fathollah-Nejad
Nikkei Editorial
