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saberience ◴[] No.32769157[source]
It's weird, I've never considered myself a "royalist" but this news has affected me quite strongly. I just burst into tears unexpectedly on hearing this news and I don't quite understand why I feel so very sad. I guess I have grown up and lived my whole life (as a Brit) seeing and hearing the Queen, singing "God save the Queen" etc, and this news made me suddenly feel very old, very nostalgic, with the sense that all things pass in time, which makes my heart ache deeply.
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orobinson ◴[] No.32769695[source]
I feel the same. I think it’s because it really represents the end of an era. The 20th and early 21st century ushered in unprecedented improvements to quality of life in Britain but it has felt of late that that has peaked and the country is facing a serious decline: Brexit, the increasingly visible effects of climate change, the aftermath of covid, the possible break up of the union, rising costs of living, recession, possibly even war. The death of Elizabeth II coincides with the end of a long period of stability and comfort and is not only a poignant point in history itself but a marker for a transitional point in history for our country.
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foobarian ◴[] No.32771142[source]
I think humans have evolved to need rulers and hierarchy to look up to to some extent. Look at what happened to Americans -- once the UK royalty was gone it was replaced with celebrity. It's just human nature.
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jollybean ◴[] No.32772931[source]
The Queen is not a 'ruler' though, she's a figurehead.

Which is fully appropriate where it exists.

I would be 100% against the US having a 'Constitutional Monarch' but I'm 100% in support of the UK Constitutional Monarchy, given that it has come from their long established culture, nearly a 1000-year-old 'contiguous-ish' institution.

FYI in 1258 the Monarch signed documents which required him to 'Confer with Parliament' when changing rates of taxation. That's only 40 years past Magna Carta, and the first reference to 'Parliament'.

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elcritch ◴[] No.32775382[source]
I think the British Monarch could in _theory_ have some political power as parliamentary bills go by the monarch for approval. The Queen always approved them of course.

The romantic in me likes to believe the Queen would step in if the British parliament tried passing some truly terrible bill. Basically acting as a last stop gap of human and British sensibility. Though with Queen Elizabeth II gone I'd have less trust in the judgement of a monarch.

Part of me does wonder if US politics would've been much different with a ceremonial figurehead. And that'd be a fun alt-history where a great-great-grandchild of George Washington is the ceremonial head of the US government and has to deal with intrigues of Washington politics while just wanting to live quietly on the ancestral Virginian home.

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1. jollybean ◴[] No.32775891[source]
The power of the Monarch is kind of real actually, particularly because of the way Parliaments are created and dissolved etc..

There is no clear '4 years to election' as they have in the US.

In my home country, Canada, it gets dicey as we wonder sometimes just what the 'Governor General' (Queen's rep in Canada) will do.

I don't think the Queen is going to be interjecting on any 'legislation' unless there is something fundamentally unconstitutional about how it was passed; but there's definitely some question marks about 'how and when government falls and is formed' - and especially, how 'minority governments' are formed. If there's no obvious winner, then minority situations form, and it can get weird.

That's still a thing.

I suggest the US would have been a better country were the American revolution to not have happened. Sounds totally crazy, but true. I think the US would have healthcare, be a bit more socially minded, slavery would have ended a lot sooner, and the US still have all of the 'good parts' (except a cool national anthem).

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2. iainmerrick ◴[] No.32777318[source]
I don’t think that’s really a thing in the UK. In every election for over a century, when there are disagreements (and there have been many), the parties thrash it out and pick somebody to be prime minister, and that person drives to the palace for the Queen to make it official. It’s entirely ceremonial and I haven’t heard of any instance at all where she was actually involved in the decision.

There has been a lot of speculation over the years about whether Charles might be a more activist monarch, but I’ll be really surprised if he actually tries to exercise any of his theoretical powers. He might be a bit more outspoken in public, and do a lot more lobbying in private, at most.

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3. jollybean ◴[] No.32778606[source]
Yes, there are question marks though that the Queen theoretically fulfills.

Otherwise, we might need a 'Supreme Parliamentary Council' to basically enact those duties, and if any members of Parliament didn't agree on the outcome, they'd take it to the Supreme Court who would rule on it kind of thing. Something that would only happen 'once in a century'.

Where there are Presidents, it's generally straight forward: the Dude with the most votes (of whatever type) is the Dude and that's it. There can be voting shenanigans but generally not outcome shenanigans.

I'm fine the way it is in the UK and Canada, I wouldn't change a thing.

If we want reforms, we can do that at more operational levels, aka 'governance by blockchain' to put it in 2019 Valley terms.