Britain's Peculiar Institution

Even though it was always an inevitability, I, like many fellow Brits, could only be in a sober state of mind when news was received that Queen Elizabeth II’s stout heart had finally stopped beating, and thus, the longest reign of any monarch in English history had reached its closure.

It’s an endlessly repeated platitude, but it is certainly true that whatever one’s own position on the monarchy, Elizabeth II’s death does indeed represent the passing of an era. A world, particularly for older generations, that was familiar has now gone - and never coming back. If Winston Churchill’s funeral in 1964 represented the fading of the British empire, then Elizabeth II’s will be the laying to rest of the post-war social democratic order, born in the period of national renewal after the sacrifices endured during the Second World War. An order that was largely dismantled in the past three decades by various governments, both Labour and Tory.

Elizabeth II, in national mythology, was the link between Old Britain and New Britain. She was the constant as Britain morphed from a conservative, officially Christian and (white) Anglo-Protestant imperial centre to a socially liberal, de facto secular, multi-ethnic, cosmopolitan nation. To many Brits, over the course of such a transformation and flux, her long reign was a source of stability, solidity and continuity with the past, even when evolving towards the future. She embodied the myth of the Good Monarch, the beloved matriarch of the nation. She did what she was supposed to do, and executed it with a near flawless dignity, stoicism and self-respect. Thus, making sure the monarchy remained the last vestige of traditional British nationalist pride, while other national institutions were dysfunctional, discredited or expired.

Inevitably, in the wake of Elizabeth II’s passing, the orgy of maudlin sentimentality and zealous adoration has been nauseating and unbearable. As someone who takes the rejectionist position on the monarchy, this has always been one of the more bizarre practices of our culture. Only when the subject of monarchy and royalty is mentioned, do the British abandon every remnant of our supposedly typical stoicism, modesty, humour and reserve. We find it hilarious when North Korea invents fantastical tales of supernatural miracles around the life of their ‘Dear Leader’. Yet, the sight of clouds supposedly resembling the late Queen and rainbows being spotted over Buckingham Palace are widely reported as if it was a sign from the divine himself. We find it sickly when foreign despots give themselves paternal titles and speak of their nation as a family, or a brood, that need their ‘guidance’. Yet, we don’t recognise the sickliness of the late Queen being labelled “everyone’s nan”, as if we, as a nation, had a personal relationship with her.

We react with repulsion and mockery at other countries - usually dictators- where the hysterical veneration of mediocre individuals is part of official culture. Yet, we don’t recognise how unhealthy, how morbid the unwholesome cult of The Windsors is, in, for instance, the ubiquity of images of the late Queen wherever we may go, maintaining the precedence of the monarchy being the nation’s favourite fetish. Even in countries with constitutional monarchies such as Norway, Holland and Spain, you do not see this level of collective psychosis colonise a culture.

Alas, you can’t tell someone they’re not in love when they are. You can’t argue with someone’s faith and the intensity of feeling it arouses. The monarchy, in our very secular society, more or less functions as a quasi-civic religion. A remnant of the sacred, of magic, of mystique, of tradition, of taboo, that many are desperate to cling onto in such a disenchanted world. It seems like a symbol of honest public service against the cynicism of mainstream politics. The flipside of this is a thin skin towards even the mildest criticism towards the monarchy and our society’s relationship with it, as demonstrated by the disgraceful arrest and jailing of a woman for simply holding a sign that read: Abolish The Monarchy!”, for breaking decorum in these sensitive of times.

“As a mark of respect”, many parts of our society feel obliged to go under lockdown, from Premier League football to The Met Office. Protests have been called off. Supposedly ‘radical’ Trade Unions have cancelled scheduled strikes. Party conferences postponed until further notice. Hospital appointments cancelled. So much for the British maxim of Keep Calm and Carry On.

It may not be in tune with etiquette, but there is no better time to rehash the argument over monarchy than now, as the new King, Charles III, is in the infancy of his reign. Arguing against British royalism isn’t always an easy task, thanks to how it adeptly combines haute elitism with the basest form of populism. To oppose this simultaneously makes you a rabbler and a snob. Let me also stress that arguments against the monarchy that obsess over land holdings or it’s traditional imperial symbolism, whilst not invalid, do miss the crucial point.

In essence, the key objections against Britain’s peculiar institution are as follows: It inculcates unthinking credulity and servility. It turns mediocre individuals into objects of idol worship. It ensconces the absurdity that is the hereditary principle. It is a fetter to the objective reflection on our own history and culture. It infantilises our society. Their soap opera, which we are conscripted to participate in as spectators, degrades public life. Simply put, its not a dignified institution. All these points stand firm, no matter how much land The Windsors owned , with or without the British empire. It’s a matter of principle.

It is certainly true, as many royal apologists love to remind us, that the Hanoverian usurpers have to gone to great lengths to ‘modernise’ themselves. They have largely succeeded in renovating themselves from a duty bound aristocratic clan to a bourgeois family - a stereotypically dysfunctional one at that, with the usual quarrels and sexual pathologies. The marriage of Harry and Meghan was supposed to ‘update’ the royal family to keep up with and give it a new lease of life. That hope obviously crashed and burned and is still a long running soap opera, only enhancing the morbidness of the cult of royalism in our culture.

This leads me to one of my favourite, and more silly, pro-monarchist arguments is the belief that the monarchy and its traditions represents a bulwark against rule by bankers and craven meritocratic elites. In fact, it is their Disneyland front piece. The Mephistophelian hand of capital has commodified the British monarchy, turning it into a brand, hollowing it out. The British bourgeoisie has long found the monarchy useful as a status quo preserving force and a social pacifier, which is why any force to disestablish the British monarchy has to be part of a revolutionary upsurge to transform society altogether, or else it will be nothing more than a cosmetic measure that won’t fundamentally reform British politics.

We may not abolish the monarchy by fiat anytime soon, but we can certainly begin to outgrow it. Brits should ask ourselves: do we really want state sponsored superstition, prettified idol worship, sanitised history and media dominated pseudo populism to define the commanding heights of our society and culture? Is this really what we want to project of ourselves to the world?

Brits occasionally love to brag about our ‘ancient’ liberty, and how this distinguishes us from most other countries. But a self-consciously free people understands that their freedom is inherent within them. It isn’t guaranteed by anything outside of them, whether by a monarch, or it’s claim to legitimacy via a supernatural entity. It is ultimately their own responsibility. When we think of ourselves less as subjects and more as citizens, we can begin to transcend our peculiar institution, mature as a society and confirm our status as a ‘free people’ without the necessity of illusions.