The save the wild life so that I can shoot it merchant has retired, oh wow.

[Anchorman]

Lizzie's mother - the less than saintly Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon - thought Phillip's mother a foriegn destabilising influence. Her visceral hatred of anything whic would change her vision of monarchy dates from the lothing she retainwed for her brother-in -law - whom she refused to acknowledge for decades in a less than Christian gesture.

[Robbie]

We know some of that Anchor. How is it relevant to anything? We can't help how we feel and the late Queen Mother was no different to anyone else.

I didn't know what she felt about the 'destabilising influence' of Prince Philip's mohter, not heard of that,but doubt she carried that feeling to the grave if indeed she ever felt it or voiced it. In any case the Queen was in charge, not her.

The Duke of Windsor business is a different matter & no-one can blame her for wanting no more to do with him, he and his wife were hardly nice to her after all. However none of this is a really large issue now. You are barrel scraping.

[Anchorman]

We know some of that Anchor. How is it relevant to anything? We can't help how we feel and the late Queen Mother was no different to anyone else.

I didn't know what she felt about the 'destabilising influence' of Prince Philip's mohter, not heard of that,but doubt she carried that feeling to the grave if indeed she ever felt it or voiced it. In any case the Queen was in charge, not her.

The Duke of Windsor business is a different matter & no-one can blame her for wanting no more to do with him, he and his wife were hardly nice to her after all. However none of this is a really large issue now. You are barrel scraping.

Thanks, - you've made my point, Robinson.
If Elisabeth Bowes-lyon was "no different from anyone else" as you put it, then her daughter is equally so - and therefore does not deserve allegiance, oaths of loyalty, unearned titles and the like.
If Elisabeth Mountbatten-Windsor wants to be 'in charge' of her clan. then that is the affair purely of her clan , and should be none of our concern, since she is "no different from anyone else".
No-one has yet given me a single argument as to why I, or anyone else, should acknowledge Elizabeth Mountbatten-Windsor as in any way superior, or for that matter, as head of state.

[SusanDoris]

Sassy - It is really nice to read one of your posts and agree with it. Well said.

[Robbie]

Thanks, - you've made my point, Robinson.
If Elisabeth Bowes-lyon was "no different from anyone else" as you put it, then her daughter is equally so - and therefore does not deserve allegiance, oaths of loyalty, unearned titles and the like.
If Elisabeth Mountbatten-Windsor wants to be 'in charge' of her clan. then that is the affair purely of her clan , and should be none of our concern, since she is "no different from anyone else".
No-one has yet given me a single argument as to why I, or anyone else, should acknowledge Elizabeth Mountbatten-Windsor as in any way superior, or for that matter, as head of state.

No different to anyone else when it comes to feelings, health etc. They all have blood and have to go the toilet.
Very different when it comes to duty & then we see personal feelings put aside!

You don't have to think of any of them as superior or bow down whatever. Please yourself what you think but try to leave personal prejudices aside.

I felt as you do in my teens and early twenties.

Sassy - It is really nice to read one of your posts and agree with it. Well said.

Agreed, it was a good post.

[Nearly Sane]

No different to anyone else when it comes to feelings, health etc. They all have blood and have to go the toilet.
Very different when it comes to duty & then we see personal feelings put aside!

You don't have to think of any of them as superior or bow down whatever. Please yourself what you think but try to leave personal prejudices aside.

I felt as you do in my teens and early twenties.
Agreed, it was a good post.

So there is some group of people who are superior in your obviously  non personal non prejudiced opinion when it comes to 'duty'.

BtW I used to think the way you did when I was 6 years old. The question is whether that is relevant in any way?

[Gordon]

No different to anyone else when it comes to feelings, health etc. They all have blood and have to go the toilet.
Very different when it comes to duty & then we see personal feelings put aside!

But very different when due simply to birth they enjoy lifetime privilege along with a state-funded sinecure: the institution stinks and has no place in an allegedly modern democracy.

You don't have to think of any of them as superior or bow down whatever. Please yourself what you think but try to leave personal prejudices aside.

You do: many years ago Charles & Di were visiting a site where I worked and we given official instruction (by an official of some sort) on how to 'behave' should one of them decide speak to us, including when to bow or curtsy and what to call since presumably ordinary social interaction would be deemed unsatisfactory. I wasn't aware my social skills were so inadequate!

[SusanDoris]

But very different when due simply to birth they enjoy lifetime privilege along with a state-funded sinecure:

How do you know they enjoy it?   

[Gordon]

How do you know they enjoy it?

Enjoy is the sense of something beneficial being provided for them by default: such as the various privileges they enjoy.

[Nearly Sane]

How do you know they enjoy it?

it was used in the sense of 'possess and/or benefit from" obviously.

[SusanDoris]

Enjoy is the sense of something beneficial being provided for them by default: such as the various privileges they enjoy.

I know you used it in that sense! But it also sounded as if you think they enjoy it in the usual sense.

[Nearly Sane]

I know you used it in that sense! But it also sounded as if you think they enjoy it in the usual sense.

So you lied about what was said?

[Robbie]

They do 'enjoy' privileges of various sorts (even if they don't always 'enjoy' them in the fun sense, a lot arduous and terminally boring, involve extensive travel which isn't all wonderful and the Queen can't afford to have an off day; her recent respiratory illness was an exception), but they really do have to earn them. Not many of us would want their lives even even with all the money and perks. There are plenty of people around who have even more in material terms which they do little to earn as well as having an obnoxious sense of entitlement.

NS Susan hasn't lied FGS. Just difference in understanding. People so keen to accuse others of lying! When will it be my turn I wonder? There's little leeway here.

[Nearly Sane]

They do 'enjoy' privileges of various sorts (even if they don't always 'enjoy' them in the fun sense, a lot arduous and terminally boring, involve extensive travel which isn't all wonderful and the Queen can't afford to have an off day; her recent respiratory illness was an exception), but they really do have to earn them. Not many of us would want their lives even even with all the money and perks. There are plenty of people around who have even more in material terms which they do little to earn as well as having an obnoxious sense of entitlement.

NS Susan hasn't lied FGS. Just difference in understanding. People so keen to accuse others of lying! When will it be my turn I wonder? There's little leeway here.

Except it is entirely obvious, as Susan has admitted, what Gordon meant. She chose to ignore that, hence lying.

[Gordon]

They do 'enjoy' privileges of various sorts (even if they don't always 'enjoy' them in the fun sense, a lot arduous and terminally boring, involve extensive travel which isn't all wonderful and the Queen can't afford to have an off day; her recent respiratory illness was an exception), but they really do have to earn them. Not many of us would want their lives even even with all the money and perks.

Which is special pleading.

There are plenty of people around who have even more in material terms which they do little to earn as well as having an obnoxious sense of entitlement.

Which seems like tu quoque

[Robbie]

I'm no hypocrite Gordon but will bow out of this conv as i can see it going around in circles & sooner or later I'll be accused of lying, i'll leave it to others.

[Anchorman]

But very different when due simply to birth they enjoy lifetime privilege along with a state-funded sinecure: the institution stinks and has no place in an allegedly modern democracy.

You do: many years ago Charles & Di were visiting a site where I worked and we given official instruction (by an official of some sort) on how to 'behave' should one of them decide speak to us, including when to bow or curtsy and what to call since presumably ordinary social interaction would be deemed unsatisfactory. I wasn't aware my social skills were so inadequate!

-
Been there - though it was actually a Kirk Garden Party at General Assembly Week.
I was a youth observer that year - coincidentally the year of Thatcher's infamous 'Sermon on the Mound' diatribe.
We were given a similar, rather intimidating, lecture by some twit from Holyrood House.
Luckily, John Bell - the irreverent Reverend - was with us (We'd just come from a Christian CND demo at Faslane); his words?
"If they come to you, treat them like that couple of old codjers you gave the money to on the street corner this morning.
The  vision of Liz and Phil drinking meths and sleeping on a park bench was somehow sustaining.........

[Anchorman]

They do 'enjoy' privileges of various sorts (even if they don't always 'enjoy' them in the fun sense, a lot arduous and terminally boring, involve extensive travel which isn't all wonderful and the Queen can't afford to have an off day; her recent respiratory illness was an exception), but they really do have to earn them. Not many of us would want their lives even even with all the money and perks. There are plenty of people around who have even more in material terms which they do little to earn as well as having an obnoxious sense of entitlement.

NS Susan hasn't lied FGS. Just difference in understanding. People so keen to accuse others of lying! When will it be my turn I wonder? There's little leeway here.

-
I understand that the 'firm' work hard for what they perceive as their 'duty', Robinson.
However, neither you nor anyone else has as yet given a reason why I should defer to them as head of state, or acknowledge rank, style and status gained through accident of birth, or marriage into a family.

[SusanDoris]

They do 'enjoy' privileges of various sorts (even if they don't always 'enjoy' them in the fun sense, a lot arduous and terminally boring, involve extensive travel which isn't all wonderful and the Queen can't afford to have an off day; her recent respiratory illness was an exception), but they really do have to earn them. Not many of us would want their lives even even with all the money and perks. There are plenty of people around who have even more in material terms which they do little to earn as well as having an obnoxious sense of entitlement.

NS Susan hasn't lied FGS. Just difference in understanding. People so keen to accuse others of lying! When will it be my turn I wonder? There's little leeway here.

Thank you, Robinson.

[ippy]

In what way is it fair to have one of the top jobs in our country given exclusivly to certain members of one family and to no one else?

ippy

[SusanDoris]

In what way is it fair to have one of the top jobs in our country given exclusivly to certain members of one family and to no one else?

ippy

No-one said it is 'fair'.  It is, however, a system that works and does not need fixing.

[Bubbles]

In what way is it fair to have one of the top jobs in our country given exclusivly to certain members of one family and to no one else?

ippy

Yes just think, we could have Donald Trump instead ( sarcasm)

[Gordon]

No-one said it is 'fair'.  It is, however, a system that works and does not need fixing.

I'm still struggling to see how it 'works' since it seems dysfunctional in every respect.

[SusanDoris]

I'm still struggling to see how it 'works' since it seems dysfunctional in every respect.

Well, I suppose I could ask a sort of variation of the NPF and ask you to define howit is dysfunctional! Intellectually , I can accept that there are probably some dry, colourless logical reasons why, but I still think the abandonment of the monarchy would take away something special, a historical part of the fabric of the indefinable specialness of the UK.

We know that the monarch stays in the post until death, unlike elected leaders who come and go and, generally speaking, leave only  books and chapters in history, and, again, colourless. We have a non-politically-biased affiliation to the person and family of the monarchy which I do not believe we would have to some president who would be elected.
 

[Anchorman]

Well, I suppose I could ask a sort of variation of the NPF and ask you to define howit is dysfunctional! Intellectually , I can accept that there are probably some dry, colourless logical reasons why, but I still think the abandonment of the monarchy would take away something special, a historical part of the fabric of the indefinable specialness of the UK.

We know that the monarch stays in the post until death, unlike elected leaders who come and go and, generally speaking, leave only  books and chapters in history, and, again, colourless. We have a non-politically-biased affiliation to the person and family of the monarchy which I do not believe we would have to some president who would be elected.
 

Er.....what 'specialness about the UK', Susan?
Its' history?
Not much there - only three centuries if you believe it's' own propaganda - and less than 90 years in truth, since Ireland gained her freedom.
A shortbread tin mionarch who is 'second; of nothing -except England and Wales.
A Parliament whic claims to be a thousand years old, and, in that claim, dismisses the parliaments of the nations it absorbed like a slug?
Daft pomp and ceremony, most of which was invented by a German prince consort married to a German queen of a UK, who spoke with a German accent till the day she snuffed it?
An opening of Westminster parliament which simply underlines the fact that the said institution ignored the Act of union signed by an alcoholc traitor (Anne)?
No, the system only works for those who are blind to the mess it portrays.