The British people will decide whether or not they want the monarchy to continue. I found the piece very biased. For a number of sentences it continued "under the Queen's government (this happened), under the Queen's government (that happened)" The Queen had no power over what the government did - the people choose their government and whether it is conservative or labour the monarchy must remain silent about what the government chooses to do. My understanding as a Canadian is that the only time the Queen broke from the rule of silence was when Thatcher refused to speak out against apartheid in South Africa. Elizabeth wanted an end to apartheid. The Royals are figureheads only - it is a system that some want to keep and others do not. For me in Canada, I like being part of the commonwealth of nations. We view Americans as our friends but Australians as our cousins. As I watch the crass levels of corruption in the US increasing wantonly I wonder if a royal family as figurehead keeps, in some small measure, the commonwealth countries focused on traditions and 'doing the right thing' in a way in which Americans have no background or understanding. I have no deep feelings as to whether the monarchy should survive - that will be up to the people of the U.K.
Wow! I, too, wondered why a country, the USA, that revolted against British rule and rejected the idea of a monarchy has given so much coverage to the death of the queen. I didn’t realize how far the royal family fell from their projected image. And one wonders why the citizens of Britain would be expected to support this already filthy rich family. The queen seemed like such a nice old lady. But then she knew that the spell would be broken, that the fairy tale would end, if she didn’t live up to the part. It appears she was, in the most part, successful. Thank you, Michael, for sharing this.
The royals need to take their millions and retire to one of their many residences. I’m Canadian. I’ve attended royal visits and met Prince Andrew when he was young and jaw dropping handsome. I have nothing against the royals but I feel that it is an anachronism. Journalists covering a hearse with a casket in the back for hours. Reporting people filing past a draped coffin. This pageantry is being paid for by the British tax payer. Think streets blocked off, traffic disrupted, police overtime payments. The family has to be exhausted. She did her duty and it’s nostalgic to look back on her long life. However nostalgia won’t pay the bills of the people of Britain.
Also maybe only Americans get this nostalgic. As I’m a bred and born Dane and live in the uSA since 1970s, I’ve had the interesting privilege of having experience in both systems, and I can differentiate between expressing my condolences and acknowledge the horrors of inequality.
I think IF EVER the actual history of the uSA was to be laid bare, the parallels and similarities between UK and uSA would be overwhelmingly obvious.
I’d challenge Chris Hedges to research and write a similar essay on the FACTUAL HISTORY OF THE USA!
Don’t go to war with England. That Hedges piece is horrible. Hedges bitches brilliantly and there’s a satisfaction you get reading him -- go Chris, tell it like it is -- but he’s way off base here. This is the comment I left on his piece:
Open your eyes. What kind of ugly Americans are we to slam all those millions of Brits who are in deep mourning for a symbol that holds them together? We can put our shady past next to theirs and damn us all but the thing right now to notice is how that symbolic situation is so meaningful to our British friends and be respectful of that.
This is particularly troublesome in that when I went looking for my comment to cut and paste it for you I found it had been removed from my original posting.
We live in the USA and the UK and maybe other countries too to enable the MEDIA to report. If you listen to the coverage of the Queen, it is pathetic the cliches and repetitions since there is practically NOTHING to say. A figurehead who owned property worth BILLIONS and who got up every morning for 70 years to be dressed in expensive custom made clothes and served breakfast in a residence that even Bill Gates couldn't afford and be waited on by hundreds of "servants" saying Your Highness and Majesty and then being driven in a Rolls to some ribbon cutting ceremony. Not exactly working on the line at Amazon or tied to a sewing machine in Vietnam. WHY can the Media get away with taking up time ? Because citizens only want diversion. Everyone is so impressed that she never voiced opinions!! Probably because she didn't have any!! She is known to have preferred her dogs to her kids. What is interesting was how little she changed-- she is not GLUTEN FREE!- but then never tried to let the colonies be free. THE SUN NEVER SETS ON THE BRITISH EMPIRE!! Meanwhile 60% of the US population will be in very poor health in five years. She lived to 96 despite being surrounded most of her life by smokers. She has genes for living long-- her Mother lived to 104---so guess she chose the right family to provide luxury living and longevity.
I have many of Chris Hedges books and have been educated by his writings and his life choices. I dis-enrolled myself from his Substack account after a while, as I could not bear the steady drumbeat.. I am no ostrich-- I just know myself. I needed a break, and so returned to reading his books, as well as books by Dr. Gabor Mate, and books written by all the musicians I love. Balance keeps me fully alive.
I have been saddened by some absence of respect following the death of the Queen. The mourning of any person, public or private, from any town or hamlet or country is worthy of respect, quiet calm, dignity, reflection and restraint.
Opinions are best kept private, in my opinion. Especially if they have not been asked for at so tender a time. We never know whose heart we may be (additionally) wounding. Death is tough enough on those left behind. Peace.
We are in a period of massive transition world wide change. Learning what it means that we are "one" is a long journey through stages and transitions of the unfolding evolution of the human brain; specifically how we reason. It is most simply described and the movement from law and order, legalisms, all or nothing, black or white. We are leaving that stage of legalism, into a transition past nationalism to the realization that we are one planet, one people and what happens in any part of the world affects us all, regardless of how we identify our place in the world. How reason, how we think, how make sense of the world is changing and the present doesn't work, we are evolving how we see the world and how we be and reason in that world. Not at all easy. In transition, we feel lost, unsure, uncertain, not safe and secure. It took two generations to die off while the Jews wandered with Moses in the desert before Moses could stop leading them in circles and found "the promised" land. This is something like that. The monarchy is an outdated stage of authoritarian rule. Transition of the kind we are in, is like trauma, we have to get it all out for our minds to reason as a citizen of the world, very different from our nationalistic bias. We are all caught in how the mind evolves to reason in a new, to grow the leaders who can, to allow those who won't to die off. to evolve and people who can reason in a new way. Transition is a mess, look at the US, we are scrambling to get it straight again and we are only left baffled. We are unable to draw upon a history totally and unknowing of what this world in change should be like. We are often of 2 identities, what was there and what is to become. I am learning to reason differently or, if I don't, evolution will leave behind more quickly when I close my mind to novelty -to what I don't yet know or understand. As we try to get beyond Trump, Britain will deal with King Charles, who may surprise us. Transition is huge, it challenges or identity, our place in the world, how we see from a comfortable to a very confused and unfinished frame of reference. Or we hold on to Law and Order to save us. And the Supreme Court undoes 50 years of progress with Roe. So many things changing, challenging with change and no change as we grip our present reasoning instead of realizing that even as I grow older, I don't know, I can't suggest, I feel powerless but if I can know there is a transition and the neuroplasticity of my brain has to let go and be open to change, to discomfort, to feeling lost, to be less assured and confident, to newness I don't want "to get". But a new world will emerge, new leadership, new generations will come to power. Huge change, huge transition and the requirement is that I don't close off to novelty and newness but embrace it and learn how to think, to reason in a still new way. The alternative is to refuse, resist and evolution will bury us. The brain is renewed most by novelty, not reasoning that believes in any monarchy as a way of being, but can be sensitive to grieving and loss. Thank-you, Michael.
I love Chris Hedges. I pulled up the article you were reading so that I could follow along. The podcast audio cut out for several seconds during the section where you were likely reading, “A French bastard landing with an armed banditti and establishing himself as King of England ..." right after you said, "blasted the monarchy as a con." Thank you.
Chris Hedges has given me a lot of insight. His book, "War Is the Force that Gives Us Meaning" is insightful and has brought decades of recurring insights into my behaviors, as well as how I understand others. I have learned things I did not want to see about myself. But that learning gives me choices and compassion for myself and for others. Isn't that what it means to Love?
I grew up in the oldest monarchy on earth and the royals are still our best diplomats.
A constitutional monarchy, parliamentary monarchy, or democratic monarchy is a form of monarchy in which the monarch exercises their authority in accordance with a constitution and is not alone in decision making.
I support the royals as I’m also working to save Planet Ocean for future generations and they have the will and means to do it.
Maintaining and preserving their beautiful properties and land for the future is also important to me.
The British people will decide whether or not they want the monarchy to continue. I found the piece very biased. For a number of sentences it continued "under the Queen's government (this happened), under the Queen's government (that happened)" The Queen had no power over what the government did - the people choose their government and whether it is conservative or labour the monarchy must remain silent about what the government chooses to do. My understanding as a Canadian is that the only time the Queen broke from the rule of silence was when Thatcher refused to speak out against apartheid in South Africa. Elizabeth wanted an end to apartheid. The Royals are figureheads only - it is a system that some want to keep and others do not. For me in Canada, I like being part of the commonwealth of nations. We view Americans as our friends but Australians as our cousins. As I watch the crass levels of corruption in the US increasing wantonly I wonder if a royal family as figurehead keeps, in some small measure, the commonwealth countries focused on traditions and 'doing the right thing' in a way in which Americans have no background or understanding. I have no deep feelings as to whether the monarchy should survive - that will be up to the people of the U.K.
Wow! I, too, wondered why a country, the USA, that revolted against British rule and rejected the idea of a monarchy has given so much coverage to the death of the queen. I didn’t realize how far the royal family fell from their projected image. And one wonders why the citizens of Britain would be expected to support this already filthy rich family. The queen seemed like such a nice old lady. But then she knew that the spell would be broken, that the fairy tale would end, if she didn’t live up to the part. It appears she was, in the most part, successful. Thank you, Michael, for sharing this.
QEII was a CONSTITUTIONAL MONARCH! She was not a tyrant!
Aim your ire where it can have more relevance: this free falling country drowning in hatred and corruption and utter abuse!
The royals need to take their millions and retire to one of their many residences. I’m Canadian. I’ve attended royal visits and met Prince Andrew when he was young and jaw dropping handsome. I have nothing against the royals but I feel that it is an anachronism. Journalists covering a hearse with a casket in the back for hours. Reporting people filing past a draped coffin. This pageantry is being paid for by the British tax payer. Think streets blocked off, traffic disrupted, police overtime payments. The family has to be exhausted. She did her duty and it’s nostalgic to look back on her long life. However nostalgia won’t pay the bills of the people of Britain.
QEII modernized the monarchy profoundly --
Also maybe only Americans get this nostalgic. As I’m a bred and born Dane and live in the uSA since 1970s, I’ve had the interesting privilege of having experience in both systems, and I can differentiate between expressing my condolences and acknowledge the horrors of inequality.
I think IF EVER the actual history of the uSA was to be laid bare, the parallels and similarities between UK and uSA would be overwhelmingly obvious.
I’d challenge Chris Hedges to research and write a similar essay on the FACTUAL HISTORY OF THE USA!
The uSA is eminently similar to .......
Unchecked monarchs ! Unchecked uSA presidents?
I hear Charles also likes his shoelaces ironed. And they are.
What else needs to be said about such folks?
Deborah
Chris Hedges read by you? It doesn't get better than that. Thank you!
Don’t go to war with England. That Hedges piece is horrible. Hedges bitches brilliantly and there’s a satisfaction you get reading him -- go Chris, tell it like it is -- but he’s way off base here. This is the comment I left on his piece:
Open your eyes. What kind of ugly Americans are we to slam all those millions of Brits who are in deep mourning for a symbol that holds them together? We can put our shady past next to theirs and damn us all but the thing right now to notice is how that symbolic situation is so meaningful to our British friends and be respectful of that.
This is particularly troublesome in that when I went looking for my comment to cut and paste it for you I found it had been removed from my original posting.
We live in the USA and the UK and maybe other countries too to enable the MEDIA to report. If you listen to the coverage of the Queen, it is pathetic the cliches and repetitions since there is practically NOTHING to say. A figurehead who owned property worth BILLIONS and who got up every morning for 70 years to be dressed in expensive custom made clothes and served breakfast in a residence that even Bill Gates couldn't afford and be waited on by hundreds of "servants" saying Your Highness and Majesty and then being driven in a Rolls to some ribbon cutting ceremony. Not exactly working on the line at Amazon or tied to a sewing machine in Vietnam. WHY can the Media get away with taking up time ? Because citizens only want diversion. Everyone is so impressed that she never voiced opinions!! Probably because she didn't have any!! She is known to have preferred her dogs to her kids. What is interesting was how little she changed-- she is not GLUTEN FREE!- but then never tried to let the colonies be free. THE SUN NEVER SETS ON THE BRITISH EMPIRE!! Meanwhile 60% of the US population will be in very poor health in five years. She lived to 96 despite being surrounded most of her life by smokers. She has genes for living long-- her Mother lived to 104---so guess she chose the right family to provide luxury living and longevity.
Jonathan Freedland wrote a lovely piece on the Queen's death. Sept. 2 in The Guardian.
A fine book on grief "Grief Works" (2017) by Julia Samuel.
Available used at betterworldbooks.com. Also new copies available.
I have many of Chris Hedges books and have been educated by his writings and his life choices. I dis-enrolled myself from his Substack account after a while, as I could not bear the steady drumbeat.. I am no ostrich-- I just know myself. I needed a break, and so returned to reading his books, as well as books by Dr. Gabor Mate, and books written by all the musicians I love. Balance keeps me fully alive.
I have been saddened by some absence of respect following the death of the Queen. The mourning of any person, public or private, from any town or hamlet or country is worthy of respect, quiet calm, dignity, reflection and restraint.
Opinions are best kept private, in my opinion. Especially if they have not been asked for at so tender a time. We never know whose heart we may be (additionally) wounding. Death is tough enough on those left behind. Peace.
We are in a period of massive transition world wide change. Learning what it means that we are "one" is a long journey through stages and transitions of the unfolding evolution of the human brain; specifically how we reason. It is most simply described and the movement from law and order, legalisms, all or nothing, black or white. We are leaving that stage of legalism, into a transition past nationalism to the realization that we are one planet, one people and what happens in any part of the world affects us all, regardless of how we identify our place in the world. How reason, how we think, how make sense of the world is changing and the present doesn't work, we are evolving how we see the world and how we be and reason in that world. Not at all easy. In transition, we feel lost, unsure, uncertain, not safe and secure. It took two generations to die off while the Jews wandered with Moses in the desert before Moses could stop leading them in circles and found "the promised" land. This is something like that. The monarchy is an outdated stage of authoritarian rule. Transition of the kind we are in, is like trauma, we have to get it all out for our minds to reason as a citizen of the world, very different from our nationalistic bias. We are all caught in how the mind evolves to reason in a new, to grow the leaders who can, to allow those who won't to die off. to evolve and people who can reason in a new way. Transition is a mess, look at the US, we are scrambling to get it straight again and we are only left baffled. We are unable to draw upon a history totally and unknowing of what this world in change should be like. We are often of 2 identities, what was there and what is to become. I am learning to reason differently or, if I don't, evolution will leave behind more quickly when I close my mind to novelty -to what I don't yet know or understand. As we try to get beyond Trump, Britain will deal with King Charles, who may surprise us. Transition is huge, it challenges or identity, our place in the world, how we see from a comfortable to a very confused and unfinished frame of reference. Or we hold on to Law and Order to save us. And the Supreme Court undoes 50 years of progress with Roe. So many things changing, challenging with change and no change as we grip our present reasoning instead of realizing that even as I grow older, I don't know, I can't suggest, I feel powerless but if I can know there is a transition and the neuroplasticity of my brain has to let go and be open to change, to discomfort, to feeling lost, to be less assured and confident, to newness I don't want "to get". But a new world will emerge, new leadership, new generations will come to power. Huge change, huge transition and the requirement is that I don't close off to novelty and newness but embrace it and learn how to think, to reason in a still new way. The alternative is to refuse, resist and evolution will bury us. The brain is renewed most by novelty, not reasoning that believes in any monarchy as a way of being, but can be sensitive to grieving and loss. Thank-you, Michael.
Yeah, MIchael, maybe you should have waited until the Queen was at least buried....
I love Chris Hedges. I pulled up the article you were reading so that I could follow along. The podcast audio cut out for several seconds during the section where you were likely reading, “A French bastard landing with an armed banditti and establishing himself as King of England ..." right after you said, "blasted the monarchy as a con." Thank you.
Chris Hedges has given me a lot of insight. His book, "War Is the Force that Gives Us Meaning" is insightful and has brought decades of recurring insights into my behaviors, as well as how I understand others. I have learned things I did not want to see about myself. But that learning gives me choices and compassion for myself and for others. Isn't that what it means to Love?
TY Michael,
MG
I grew up in the oldest monarchy on earth and the royals are still our best diplomats.
A constitutional monarchy, parliamentary monarchy, or democratic monarchy is a form of monarchy in which the monarch exercises their authority in accordance with a constitution and is not alone in decision making.
I support the royals as I’m also working to save Planet Ocean for future generations and they have the will and means to do it.
Maintaining and preserving their beautiful properties and land for the future is also important to me.
Long live the King 🤴#NoblesseOblige
Excellent!