Elizabeth II

[rogue06]

As you later stated you did not bow regularly to either your mother or your grandmother so your comment that:

Elizabeth was viewed by many in the same fashion they viewed their own mum or gran.

was entirely irrelevant.

If you actually paid attention, I never said anything about my mother.

And again, whether I ever bowed to my mother or grandmother, is neither here or there when it comes to the feelings of the British regarding Elizabeth.

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

Another interesting development and a comment on it:

I’ve kept my mouth shut until now about the Queen and everything surrounding it, but I’ve just seen that stewards are giving out blankets to people in The Queue and I’m appalled. Where is this care and concern for the thousands of homeless people sleeping on those same streets?

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

You asked what I would do and I replied it is irrelevant. None of your typical blatherskite will change that.

As you later stated you did not bow regularly to either your mother or your grandmother so your comment that:

Elizabeth was viewed by many in the same fashion they viewed their own mum or gran.

was entirely irrelevant.

[rogue06]

You quoted the following extract from my reply to @firstFloor:

And made this comment in part of your reply:



Which led to my asking you:

The extract you cited from my quote was primarily concerned with bowing and curtseying to a corpse in a coffin.

So yes, you are quite correct your initial reply, and this, are both entirely irrelevant.

You asked what I would do and I replied it is irrelevant. None of your typical blatherskite will change that.

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

I've been hearing a lot of yammering from Brits (and other commonwealth locales) getting upset by American criticism about all the fanfare and anti-royalty comments.

So I'd just like to say for the record: I don't care what obsession people overseas might have with some specific family. I'm just sick of hearing about it constantly in a location where the subject is completely irrelevant.

Amen to that! As Suzanne Moore noted:

The snivelling sycophancy currently on display on every channel is a real turn-off. Not one critical voice is allowed, so the coverage is repetitious beyond belief – a simulated unity where there is none.

Will there be this same freaking international blather when one of the Scandinavian royals kick the bucket?

Or King Wilhelm of The Netherlands? Very unlikely.

I am reminded of a scene in The Queen [movie] where, following the death of Diana and the media demands, Elizabeth is angsting about her role and whether she should step down. Her mother makes the following remark to her. [my emphasis].

"My dear, you are the greatest asset this institution has. One of the greatest it has EVER had. The problem will come when you leave, but that’s not for you to worry about - and certainly not today."

That seems remarkably prescient give that [as Charles has demonstrated in the last few days ] peevishness does not sit well with the aura of mystical power.

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

I for one am curious concerning what form any monuments will take.

Spitting Image style perhaps?

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

Basically, it is irrelevant what I would do, and would in any case be a bit odd since one was dead well before I was born and the other has been gone 40 years now.

You quoted the following extract from my reply to @firstFloor:

No. A realist. And why are people curtseying and bowing to a corpse in a coffin? The alacrity in which British feudalism has reasserted itself is quite ridiculous and also alarming. This is a nation fixated on its past.

And made this comment in part of your reply:

Elizabeth was viewed by many in the same fashion they viewed their own mum or gran.

Which led to my asking you:

Did you make a habit of bowing to you mother or grandmother? And did you do so even when they were in their coffins?

The extract you cited from my quote was primarily concerned with bowing and curtseying to a corpse in a coffin.

So yes, you are quite correct your initial reply, and this, are both entirely irrelevant.

[rogue06]

There is no protocol for this situation. People are doing what they feel like doing, sometimes influenced by what the person or people in front did. None have done anything like this before.

Importantly, they are doing it for themselves (in their memory of the late Queen), not for the King and not for the late queen herself, who being deceased does not participate.

All funerals are like this, about the dead but for the living.

When people talk about afterlife, it is usually about the memory of the dead in the minds of the living. Durability is purchased by building monuments - expect to see some soon.

I for one am curious concerning what form any monuments will take.

[rogue06]

Did you make a habit of bowing to you mother or grandmother? And did you do so even when they were in their coffins?

Basically, it is irrelevant what I would do, and would in any case be a bit odd since one was dead well before I was born and the other has been gone 40 years now.

[Ronson]

I've been hearing a lot of yammering from Brits (and other commonwealth locales) getting upset by American criticism about all the fanfare and anti-royalty comments.

So I'd just like to say for the record: I don't care what obsession people overseas might have with some specific family. I'm just sick of hearing about it constantly in a location where the subject is completely irrelevant. Will there be this same freaking international blather when one of the Scandinavian royals kick the bucket?

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

There is no protocol for this situation. People are doing what they feel like doing, sometimes influenced by what the person or people in front did. None have done anything like this before.

Importantly, they are doing it for themselves (in their memory of the late Queen), not for the King and not for the late queen herself, who being deceased does not participate.

All funerals are like this, about the dead but for the living.

When people talk about afterlife, it is usually about the memory of the dead in the minds of the living. Durability is purchased by building monuments - expect to see some soon.

An interesting article by Stephen Reicher, who specialises in crowd psychology, from yesterday's Guardian newspaper. Sections quoted below:

https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...mourning-queen

Britain is in mourning. This is affirmed every time we turn on the television and see the huge numbers of people watching royal processions, or willing to queue for long hours to file past the Queen’s casket. They have gathered, we are told, “to pay their respects”. They are there “to thank the Queen”. Above all, they are “united in grief”. In this way, a picture is built up of a homogenous national community defined by its love of monarch and monarchy. But things are not that simple.

I am part of a team of social psychologists who have long been interested in collective behaviour, and we are investigating the crowds at the various ceremonial events in Edinburgh and London. We are interested in why people gather, how they experience these gatherings and the consequences – both for the individual and for society – of their presence. The first thing we have learned is that any attempt to reduce crowd participation to a single, universal motivation is a distortion. People come along for many different and mixed reasons, not all of which involve allegiance to the monarchy.

Of course, substantial numbers do feel that allegiance. Those who identify strongly as British, and who see the Queen as the embodiment of Britishness, are attending for the simple reason that they see it as an obligation to do so. Attendance is an affirmation of who they are, and not attending would be a denial of their identity. Moreover, as with any pilgrimage, the fact that it is gruelling is not offputting. It is precisely what makes it a meaningful sign of commitment and belonging. For these people, the loss of the monarch is experienced as a personal death. It is grieved profoundly.

Others may not have the same level of investment in the Queen, or the same intensity of emotion. But they recognise the commitment, the service, the lifelong work ethic of the Queen – values they endorse even if they don’t necessarily endorse what it was she served. They attend in respect. After all, in our culture, there is a strong normof not speaking ill of the dead.

But then there are those, whether royalist or not, for whom the royal family constitutes a canvas on to which they project the issues of their own lives – be it painful rifts or tensions or moments of joy and celebration. What happens in the lives of the royals evokes events in their own lives. The death of the Queen makes them think of the death of their own family members and others close to them. These people may grieve through the Queen, but not necessarily for the Queen.

And then there are many whose presence in the Queen’s mourning crowds has precious little to do with the Queen. They simply recognise that these are events of major significance. If the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace brings along spectators to view the spectacle, the changing of the monarch brings them along in spades. They want to be able to say: “I was there. I am part of history.”

Linked to this, people want to be able to say: “We were there.” Parents can tell their children in later years: “You and your granny were both at the Queen’s funeral procession,” after Granny herself has died. Shared attendance at such a meaningful event serves to bind families together across the generations.

All this only begins to scratch the surface of what people are telling us about why they are at the processions and in the queues. Yet, as I argued at the outset, the media constantly replace this plurality of voices with a narrative of universal respect. If ever a dissenting voice is heard, it is as an exception that reinforces the general rule. Thus, reporting on a protest against King Charles’s accession in Edinburgh stressed that this was atypical and contrasted with all the other thousands of people gathered, supposedly, in grief and gratitude.

What makes this all the more significant is that it is not just the crowds who are unified in fealty. The crowds are represented as the concrete embodiment of the national community. “They” are “us”. The fact that they are mourning means that Britain is mourning. We are a nation united in support of the monarch. [...]

This has a chilling effect. It means that certain things (such as challenging the hereditary transfer of power and wealth) cannot be said, not only through direct repression (as in the arrest of those expressing republican views) but also through self-censorship. For if we are led to believe that everyone else loves the monarchy, and demands due deference to the monarch and the monarchy, we will be more reluctant to challenge such views for fear of a backlash; and that in turn will reinforce the impression that these views are universal – what has been called a “spiral of silence”.

He does have a point. As do various others who are making their views known within sections of the media.

Of course the other interesting psychological aspect to all this is what happens on Tuesday when everything returns to comparative normality? The anti-climax after twelve days of "national mourning", the end of the euphoria rush, the come-down as problems [personal and global] bring so many crashing back to reality.

[firstfloor]

Did you make a habit of bowing to you mother or grandmother? And did you do so even when they were in their coffins?

There is no protocol for this situation. People are doing what they feel like doing, sometimes influenced by what the person or people in front did. None have done anything like this before.

Importantly, they are doing it for themselves (in their memory of the late Queen), not for the King and not for the late queen herself, who being deceased does not participate.

All funerals are like this, about the dead but for the living.

When people talk about afterlife, it is usually about the memory of the dead in the minds of the living. Durability is purchased by building monuments - expect to see some soon.

[Hypatia_Alexandria]

Elizabeth was viewed by many in the same fashion they viewed their own mum or gran.

Did you make a habit of bowing to you mother or grandmother? And did you do so even when they were in their coffins?

[rogue06]

No. A realist. And why are people curtseying and bowing to a corpse in a coffin? The alacrity in which British feudalism has reasserted itself is quite ridiculous and also alarming. This is a nation fixated on its past.

It's called showing respect which is obviously an alien concept for you.

Elizabeth was viewed by many in the same fashion they viewed their own mum or gran.

[firstfloor]

The tv people have to fill air time with something but comments from the general public are mostly garbage. Best not to watch or listen to folks telling us again and again how much they loved the Queen. We know already.