People celebrating at the Diamond Jubilee: why do they all care?The British Monarchy

There is nothing more fundamentally depressing than watching a clip of parents ogling over their babies’ filmed play-date with the royal baby. Actually, nope, there is: the post-play-date interviews with the parents being broadcast on national television as “news”.

“He’s big, and certainly knows what he wants – definitely knows his way around the room,” the parents gush, red-cheeked and flustered to be in the same room with this baby that frankly appears to be unidentifiable within the swarm of comparatively worthless toddlers. Fancy that.

If I had a free pass to suspend the laws of physics to do anything at all, it would be to reach into my screen and give those parents a good flick on the head. Where is your child?! Do you even remember his name? Why are you here? Don’t you have day jobs?! All of this, good reader, is indicative of the irrefutable awfulness of the royal family.

I won’t waste time on nuanced arguments about the supposed indispensable value that the monarchs offer us mere commoners; I count on, well, nobody for that. The day I hear a compelling argument for this is the day I give up on the notion of logic as a whole. But I will say that questioning their place in society is not a matter of indifference.

Many have questioned the Green Party's policy on abolishing the monarchy as a clear digression from the real issues of crippling urgency; the crumbling NHS, austerity, the EU, the list goes on, but I don’t think urgency should dictate all policy. They are right, at the very least, to strike up a debate about how we as a society want to organise and perceive ourselves in the long term.

It isn’t necessarily the valuing of people for arbitrary reasons such as birth that annoys me. For instance, I have a thing for Frances Bean Cobain for no other reason apart from good ol’ Kurt – sure it’s pathetic, but there’s no harm in it. It’s the devaluation of all truly good things – which follows from making the monarchy our (purported) source of national identity – that irks me.

It has become normal for members of the royal family to accept posts at universities, medals of honour, even military ranks – all, by and large, unearned. It is even more tragic how few are vocal about how little sense this makes, and how much it debases and devalues the work of individuals in this country who do much more for nowhere near as much recognition.

But then again, you probably already knew all that. The better question is why we as young people should care and engage with this problem. Britain, I think, is going through a pretty awesome value shift – thanks to things like the Internet, media, and most importantly, millenials like us, we’re becoming less and less tolerant of societal injustice. We have an interest in alleviating arbitrary inequalities, recognising privilege, and evening out the playing field for the most disadvantaged through appropriate measures.

Thirty years ago, people were much less willing to engage in open discussions about LBGT+ communities, separation of church and state, and even abortion. Yet oddly, the taboo which we seem unable to shake off is the depressing permanence of Queen Elizabeth II and all her spawn. The bleak tradition of the Windsor-Saxon-whatevers should not be exempt from rigorous discussion about class in the UK – no matter how much goddamn money they inject in to the economy from tourism (which I’m pretty sure was the most frequently said thing ever in 2012, ugh).

Ultimately, a critique of their unearned privilege is a critique of Britain’s misguided class system. Naturally, people are going to disagree about class. All I’m saying is we shouldn’t use familiarity as an excuse to not talk about it. 

And if none of that did anything for you, here is a list of things that the Queen can do, that you can’t:

1. Use the royal prerogative to: command and deploy military troops in to overseas conflict zones

2. Make and ratify treaties with foreign nations

3. Independent of the Royal Assent, veto bills in parliament (including bills on vested royal interests e.g. estate legislation and higher education – kind of like that time in 1999 when she vetoed a bill to transfer the power to authorise military strikes against Iraq from the monarchy to the parliament)

4. Be granted absolute exemption from the Freedom of Information Act (pssh, like we care about your texts anyway)

5. Make everyone legally inferior, by making anyone plotting her death guilty of 'treason'.

The list goes on, ad infinitum.

My only request is to urge all you foul-mouthed, wonderfully pedantic and stubborn millenials to subject Her Royal Majesty to the absolute scrutiny that is her God-given right.