No Kings
If no one else will say it, I will say it
The King of the United Kingdom spoke today in Congress. His words do not matter; his presence itself speaks volumes. It is an affront to democracy to invite a monarch, much less one of the Windsor clan, who belongs to one of Europe’s oldest monarchies, to speak in the People’s assembly chamber (the House of Representatives). While the eponymous Charles is not the first monarch to dirty the chamber with his antidemocratic presence, he should be the last.
Yes, America was founded to protect the elite class of domestic merchant interests versus the distant, far-off British monarchy and Parliament (with their own distinct elite merchant class), not out of a prime pro-democratic sentiment. Our domestic political system being in thrall of merchant interests of course continue to this day, and keep our democracy stuck in infancy and stillbirthness. But we are blessed that we do not also have the baggage of thousands of years of the divine right to rule over property (which included a majority of human persons in Europe via serfdom up until the early modern era). Yes, we kept many people in bondage and genocide, but that was a blip, a blink, compared to the generations upon generations in Europe.
Of course, there are thousands of years of human history already present in the American continent, lived through via the Indigenous First Nations peoples. But the American polity, driven by imperial madness, genocided a great lebensraum for itself across the continent, crushing both the Indigenous and their history underfoot, which many rightfully labor to this day to restore and continue (such work must continue, must be funded more and more). Yet despite the restoration work, the consciousness of this pre-colonial history does not yet exist in a majority of American minds (a true tragedy, one that must continually rectified).
For the regrettable majority lacking that consciousness, in their mind the settlers and colonists moved from Europe to the Americas, and shorn themselves of their old property rights, expressed most clearly via their near-universal rejection of inheritable monarchy. And this, despite being often colored in romantic niceties, is true. Wherever monarchy did rear its ugly head, in Haiti, in Brazil, in Mexico, and so on: it lasted for bare decades at most before being swept under the rug of a progressive, humanistic vision for humanity where the right to hold land and people as property divinely granted by God was anathema to the human condition. However that conclusion was arrived at, it is the correct attitude.
What do monarchs have to teach us about governance? That rulership is a coin toss, born out of a single couple’s loins? Damned are we if the child is stillborn, miscarried, or a fool. Damned are we if the past king or his ministers were fools, for that child will likewise become a fool, surrounded by fools. Damned are we even in the best of times, for plagues and floods and famines afflict even the purest of heart.
Democracies suffer these too, but at least democracies have the ability to change leadership, even if in practice it is only a musical chair of elites. Monarchies, even democratic ones like the United Kingdom, are stuck with their chief elite, even if he is a particularly nasty and naughty fellow. As far as we know, Charles is no worse than his mother. But if he had died prior to having children, Citizen Andrew, the pedophile, would be King Andrew right now, with no constitutional recourse (save a Dutch invasion!) to rid the country of ‘heavenly-crown’d’ monarch.
There is a degree of awe and majesty in the throne, in the spectacle and glimmer of gold upon his brow. If that did not occur, then there would never have been kings in human history; we all would have been able to pierce through the false veil of material wealth to see the oft-ugliness beneath. But because the glint of gold blinds and binds, both soul and man, so too are we bound to kings. At least, until the moment we do realize that there is no majesty in those old bones, or that the specific chemical qualities of gold (that the element does not rust like other metals) are not magic or heavenly, but just scientific oddities of our natural universe.
And in King Charles himself, and his disgraced Kingdom, there is no majesty. We speak of a ‘special relationship’ with the island Kingdom. Beyond the immediate European crises of the 20th century, what alliance do we have with such a Kingdom? We share a tongue, true, but everyone speaks English as well as they speak Chinese these days; the internet powers our modern Tower of Babel across 7 billion persons. Do we really want or need a man like Charles, who divorced his beautiful wife Diana (who then died mysteriously) to marry a harlot to teach us on morality and virtue? And Charles’ family is indeed devoid of saints; Earl Mountbatten and now-only-citizen yet who was former Prince Andrew diddled many, many children.
We do trade with the British, yet we trade more with Europe and China. We have military bases on the island, yet we have bases everywhere in the world. Will we invite every petty warlord to Congress, to speak on values and virtues? Under the present morality, perhaps!
Diplomatic alliances should not be based on morality but rather strict national interests. And in our alliance with the UK, we see neither morality or interest but rather a bored disinterest that desires stability over everything else. If the UK is anything, it is a problem child, in every sense of the word. They are a nuclear power, yet their nuclear delivery methods require strict US babysitting. Brexit hurt them and hurt us at the same time, shocking billions upon billions out of capital flows worldwide. Their political system is a total joke, with their moderate parties totally disgraced leaving only the neofascist Reform Party and the neoidiotic (if some of their worst economic policies can be changed, perhaps this moniker change) Green Party in its wake. Their waterways are poison, their people are sick, their bridges and residences collapse yearly for want of repair.
Britain has made itself a middle income country and must be thus treated like one. Like any other problem country in such a category, their political and constitutional frameworks must undergo total reworking and restructuring. Like a corporate merger, the rot must be vanquished out, with the core assets honed in on to deliver a more stable economic footing. While their structural problems are being worked on, their monarchy too must be relegated to the history books alone, with the monarchy’s assets going to pay down the nation’s many, many debts, and the family itself rendered nothing more than citizens.
First things first though: let us never invite a monarch, much less a British one, to speak in our Congress. For even if Charles led a golden age United Kingdom, we should still reject his presence. We would be satisfied to trade with them in that case, even retain a few bases. But why dirty the floors of our Democratic house with his un-and-anti-democratic feet? It makes no sense.
There is nothing Charles can say that cannot be said by an elected government minister. And so it is with every other monarch in the world (excepting some dictators and monarchies without elections, of course). We must ask every person who wishes to speak in the People’s House: ‘do you represent the will of your people, or do you represent the will of an elite class of monied interests’. Indeed, if we asked such questions, we would be left with only 10% of existing representatives! For surely as we turn out the monarchs, we must turn out the rot within. For just as we cannot allow inheritable power to hold sway over our affairs, we must not allow inheritable wealth (which via its wealth always acquires and purchases power) to likewise hold sway over our affairs.
Next time, the United Kingdom should send a member of their Parliament who is actually not a corrupt sock-puppet of their elite interests, or better yet, they should just send us a letter (or an email, if their antediluvian regime want to pretend to be modern).
It would save us all the trouble.