British TV ‘allowed monarchy to censor coverage of king’s coronation’ | Hacker News Reader

British TV ‘allowed monarchy to censor coverage of king’s coronation’

theguardian.com

14 pointsswores11 comments

Coming in the same week as

> Anti-monarchy protester suing Met chief over coronation day arrest

> Exclusive: Republic’s Graham Smith seeking judicial review of lawfulness of arrest as well as damages

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/12/anti-monarch...

Meh. The real problem with Britain's royals is not this little stuff. It's that the current generations look like grim regressions to the mean compared to the relatively saintly QEII and Prince Phillip. And their inner circles of advisors seem even more short-sighted, small-souled, and self-serving. Europe had plenty of good reasons for dumping ~99% of its hereditary nobility over the past few centuries - and the House of Windsor seems far more interested in being a wretched-but-not-yet-dumped reminder of those reasons than it is the long-term welfare of its realms and subjects.

When you say dumping its nobility, what does that mean? They lose their titles but keep the wealth and properties?

The Bolsheviks were not so kind to the House of Romanov.

And the "House of Romanov" was not so kind to its people. I guess they got what they sewed.

To summarize a lot of history - it ranged from "you are now the former king, best you not be seen or heard too much" to public executions and seizure of everything that the revolutionaries could get their hands on.

I'd say the biggest problem, both during Elizabeth's reign and beyond, is the fact that the royal family can still influence actual laws as they're being made, for example: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/feb/08/royals-vette...

But this story is very significant, the revelation of just how far news organisations bend over backwards to allow the royal family control over the coverage, as while we maybe don't need to care a huge amount about how the coronation itself was covered it does matter a great deal more to think about the fact that similar control will limit the press from covering more important topics relating to them.

Looking at the past ~125 years of British history, and especially Britain's [cough] honest and [gag] competent elected leaders of the past few decades...I'd say you're overly concerned with which petty officer has the lawful authority to rearrange the deck chairs on what parts of the Titanic.

It's possible to criticise multiple things!

Quite true, +1. And the sun never sets on the plethora of serious problems which modern Britain provides for easy criticism. ...But you said "the biggest problem". (Vs. "a bigger problem".) Thus leaving yourself open to obvious straw-man interpretations by every amateur historian and pedant on the web.

But much of Europe kept its monarchies: Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Belgium, Spain, The Netherlands...

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