God Save The Queen

I decided to write this out of confusion and frustration. Half of Britain is (or was; I posted this a couple of weeks ago on Tumblr.) jumping for joy over the queen’s diamond jubilee, and I don’t know why. I mean, what has she done for you lately?

I don’t hate the royals. Really, they seem like pleasant enough people. I bear them no ill will. But I can’t say, truthfully, that I think we need a monarchy.

Now, this isn’t exactly a popular opinion. Tell someone you’re not a fan of the monarchy and you’ll most likely be accused of being bitter at best and unpatriotic at worst.

The thing is, I’m not so sure that a person is unpatriotic just because they don’t worship the queen. As far as I can tell, the royal family isn’t particularly helpful to us.

I would understand it if the royals were in charge, but they are not. We have a democratically elected government to make decisions and create laws. I’m not saying they’re doing very well, but they do fulfil a purpose. The royal family, as I see it, does not. They are the remnants of a bygone era.

Of course, one can argue that they help with tourism. There may be some truth there. I’m sure plenty of people visit Britain at least in part becuase of the royal family. It’s so very British. Now , all this tourism does of course bring in money. But, in case you weren’t aware, the royal family spends a bazillion pounds - of the taxpayers’ money - a day. Okay, it might not be a bazillion pounds - that’s probably not even a number - but it is a lot of money. So, when all is said and done, they probably don’t contribute significantly to the economy.

What I’m really trying to say is this; we have a monarchy, and I don’t see the point. I just don’t. And I’m usually pretty good at understanding both sides of an arguement. But with this…I’m sorry, I can’t do it.

For all that, I’m well aware it doesn’t matter a damn what I think. Even if every person in Britain voted to get rid of the monarchy, to demote them, if you will, it would never happen. Britain is really old. We’ve had royals for ever. And so much is based on that idea. Loads of stuff - mostly boring, official stuff, mind - is done in the name of the crown, especially in England. It would be no easy task to restructure things to make Britain a monarch-less country. Just think about the government for a moment. They can’t reform anything. Certainly, they can’t do a good job of it. *cough* NHS *cough* No, neither this government nor any other in the foreseeable future would be up to the task of sorting things out if the monarchy was dethroned. But in any case it doesn’t matter much. We’ll never get rid of the good old royal family.

But we probably should, because they aren’t doing us any favours.