It was a fun day ? but the role of the crown in our democracy is as problematic as it was before
Only a churl would deny that the crowds in London and the wider world have just witnessed a sumptuous, spectacular ? and very peculiarly British ? day. An undeniably affecting wedding between two people who seem nicely primed for their shared future ? though who can really say, after last time? An imperishable setting for the ceremonials. Rolling music, sonorous phrases and moments of piercing solemnity. Some great clothes. A post-wedding parade for the ages down leafy avenues. Large and delighted crowds. Huge international interest. Waves of genuine goodwill and enjoyment. And the rain and the rioters both held off.
The cheers and tears of the long-heralded day were not insignificant. But too much should not be read into them. The day was a one-off. It lacked wider significance. The wedding was not a looking-glass event, reflecting the infantilisation of a subject nation. It was a well-managed show on which the curtain rose and then fell. The circus came and went. It did not change anything. Britain is not now a happier or a safer, a more purposive or a less unequal place than it was before Prince William placed the ring on his bride's finger. Yes, we wish them happiness ever after. Yes, it was a fun day. But the questions, both sweeping and specific, which surround the monarchy and the royal family are no closer to being resolved. The place of the crown in our laws, our established faith, our economy and, above all, our democracy is as problematic and as discordant today as before. No Catholic may wear the crown. No daughter, however old, of William and Catherine can inherit before any son, however young. It is all as silly ? and as wrong ? now as it was before. At the very least, it all needs to change and the changes need to be nailed down before a more wilful and destructive monarch than the present Queen sits on the throne.
There was, all the same, an unmistakable descant to yesterday's cheerfully celebratory spectacular. This was not 1981. It was a recession wedding, not an extravaganza. The difference, though slight in some ways, was there in a palpable touch of austerity in the proceedings. In the choice of the smaller abbey rather than the grandeur of St Paul's. In a beautifully judged wedding dress that, nevertheless, did not seek to outdo and overtrump the frocks and trains of the past. In crowds that, while indisputably large and clearly happy, were neither endlessly stretching nor vicariously hysterical in the way that they may once have been ? a disjunction much remarked on by foreign, especially American, journalists who wanted collective drooling to match their own. True, away from the pomp, the country more or less shut down for a couple of hours yesterday. But then life resumed more or less untouched, as it does after a cup final. Shops resumed business. Streets soon reopened. The tumult and the shouting died after a late lunch. The captains and the kings departed in mid-afternoon. And soon there was only Wallace and Gromit to watch on TV.
Britain in 2011 is simply not the same country that it was when this kind of royal event first took on its modern shape a century ago. No empire, of course. Far less military might. No longer the workshop of the world or the monarch of the seas. Freer from hierarchy and convention than before, though. Above all, Britain no longer sees itself reflected or validated in events like yesterday's, enjoyable and splendidly done though it was. Even the enchantment comes on sale or return these days. This is a country where the economy grew by just 0.5% in the first quarter and declined by that amount in the quarter before. That does not mean this should have been or was a hair-shirt royal wedding. But it does mean there is a pretty sensitive market in what the royal firm have to offer. Judge it right ? and they mostly did so this time ? and we buy. Get it wrong, and we may one day look elsewhere.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/apr/30/royal-wedding-role-monarchy
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