Saturday 30 April 2011

Tyranny As Well As Tyrants Come To Britain

Not content with inviting a host of tyrants be they fellow Monarchs, or just the run of the mill dictatorial equivalent, all with blood on their hands, to attend the Royal Wedding of Britain's own symbol of privilege and medievalism, the same kinds of police state tyranny common in those countries also came to Britain yesterday.

Hat tip to James Bloodworth, for this story. According to RT, today a UK peace activist was also arrested in the dawn raids that the Metropolitan Police launched to round up anyone they thought might use thier democratic right to voice their disaproval of the day's events, and thereby destroy the carefully constructed consenus view of the British love of everything feudal.
RT also reported in their TV coverage that this person's girlfriend had tried to find out what had happened to him, but he seemed to have disappeared into the bowels of the Met.

According, to the Guardian,at the same time that Chris Knight and others, who were intending to stage a mock guillotining,were arrested, a Channel 4 News crew who were filming the Unofficial Royal Wedding, had some of their equipment confiscated.

RT, also interviewed a former MI5 intelligence officer, ­Annie Machon, who said she found the police action in mounting dawn raids very disturbing, and compared it with the actions of the authorities in Syria.

The reason such measures are needed is apparent. There is a lot of the Emperor's New Clothes about the British attitude to the Monarchy. No one wants to be seen to be standing out against something, which we are told is such a popular institution. Opinion polls show around 70% support for the Monarchy. Yet, opinion polls done by Newsnight prior to the wedding showed a majority of people had no interest in it. That is apparent from the lack of support despite massive prompting, for people to engage in street parties. Yesterday, I made a point of going out for a nice walk to avoid all the crass news coverage, and was pleased to find as I walked over the M6 bridge that the motorway was full of other people who had found better things to do with a Bank Holiday. Indeed, as I walked around the Park that was formerly part of the estate of the Duke of Sutherland, there was no shortage of people there enjoying the Spring sunshine.

But, you would not have thought that possible had you watched some of the talking heads over the last few days like Simon Schama who came out with the most abysmal apologism for the Monarchy on Newsnight, or if you'd listened to the garbage spouted by the awful Richard Madeley and Judy Finnegan on "This Week". Its interesting that the Monarchists quickly go on to the defensive, however, especially with the favourite "But they bring in lots of money from Tourism" line. No they don't! I'm going to do a separate blog post nailing that argument, but for now I'll summarise it like this.

Most tourists, like most British people never see the Queen! So, she can't be the cause of the Tourism. But, if the argument were correct, here's a thought. When she dies, why don't we have her stuffed, and mummified and stuck in a glass case like Stalin did with Lenin.
The, like Lenin, she might really be a tourist attraction. In that way, we don't need any future Monarchs as she'd remain in that state for decades, if we got the Russians to provide us with their expertise. We could house the glass exhibit case in Buckingham Place, and make it completely open to the Public. We could then give the other Royals a job on Minimum Wage as Tour guides, and ticket sellers. In fact, if we really want the Royals to be a Tourist attraction, why don't we open Buck House completely on that basis with the Queen doing book signings and autographs for people on the door?

After all we keep being told that the main reason for their existence is as tourist attractions don't we?

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