A Throne with No Game

As a power user of information, I have a highly developed sense of “NewsQ” (i.e., what news is relevant, and what isn’t, when it comes to moving markets). In fact, the term “NewsQ” is one that I invented to describe this skill. And as a power user of information, unfortunately, I cannot escape gossip. That’s especially true of the gossip from across the pond regarding the British royal family.

As valiantly as I try, I have failed to evade the latest barrage of news about Princess Kate and her “troubled marriage” with Prince William, her recent health issues, the breach of her medical records and the latest gossip dustup, the digital alteration and enhancement of royal family photographs. Then, of course, there’s the health of King Charles III, who has been diagnosed with an undisclosed form of cancer, and that’s about all that’s been released regarding his condition.

One of the publications I read regularly for international NewsQ is The Guardian. A recent piece by the excellent columnist Zoe Williams titled, “The one thing we’ve learned from the Kate photo scandal? There’s no such thing as a fairytale life,” gives us the following insight on this issue of the royals and their current place in the collective psyche:

“A small but growing number of us wish they would simply desist, become normal, stop costing so much. A sizeable middle doesn’t care one way or the other, and those who do watch these lives with fascinated admiration need them to be perfect. We can talk loftily about William and Kate’s missteps — how could they have been so stupid as to Photoshop an image, and so amateurishly? Don’t they know the first rule of lying, in public life, which is: stop doing it and tell the truth? But they haven’t been stupid at all, they’ve behaved exactly as humans do, trapped in a deal they can’t uphold. They cannot lead the perfect, trouble-free lives that they have to lead in order to make sense.”

Williams points out here the folly of trying to lead “perfect, trouble-free lives,” as there’s no such thing, and no one can hold up that end of a deal — or that ideal.

Source: Shutterstock

Now, after reading the Williams piece, I was reminded of the wider issue of the royals and what the concept itself actually represents. And far from being an ideal, it’s actually extremely caustic and destructive.

In September 2022, I addressed this subject in detail in my article, “Reject This Game of Thrones.” Today, I want you to read that piece again, and do so in light of the latest royal gossip. It will give you a deeper sense of the real issues at hand here, and why they matter to the world.

As you’ll learn, it’s still time to reject this game of thrones, and the latest disfunction just shows how this throne has no game.

Reject This Game of Thrones

If you’ve tuned in to TV news anytime over the past six days, you’ve been inundated with coverage of the death of Queen Elizabeth II. Indeed, the mostly fawning treatment of the Queen’s passing, her role in history, her record long reign, her succession, the celebrity and death of her firstborn son’s former wife, her other son’s sexual scandals, her grandsons and their personal drama and the sycophantic weeping of her “subjects” in the media has been something of a personal irritant to me.

Yes, I certainly understand the media’s desire to cover every moment of this situation. After all, the media is all about ratings, because ratings equal revenue, and news is a business, and the royals make for big ratings. And as a radical for capitalism, I endorse that.

However, as a man who abhors the notion of monarchy and its roots in such despicable ideas as the “divine right of kings,” I find the pageantry rather loathsome. In fact, I am someone who has a visceral sense of nuisance whenever I see a picture of the royals, and the reason why is because I’m opposed to concepts such as one human having political province over others simply by accident of birth.

Now, I know I am viewing this issue through a decidedly American lens, but I was taught from my earliest reading of government that “all men are created equal.” Yet in monarchies of any kind, even the timid version such as that of Britain, the sovereigns are thought to be created better than their subjects, and therefore they have the right to tell other humans what to do, how to live and who to serve.

Stated in starker terms, in most historical “absolute” monarchies, subjects don’t own their lives, the king or queen does — and that makes people slaves of the state.

Of course, Britain is not an absolute monarchy any longer. The country has long been a “constitutional monarchy,” which is a system of government in which a monarch shares power with a constitutionally organized government — and this is indeed progress.

Yet in the case of Britain, King Charles III now is not only the titular and ceremonial head of state, but he’s also head of the Church of England and the head of the armed forces. Talk about being born with a silver spoon in your mouth.

Now, some writers/intellectuals that I admire, in particular Andrew Sullivan, have written eloquently about Queen Elizabeth II and the virtues she embodied. Here he writes, “With her death, it’s hard not to fear that so much she exemplified — restraint, duty, grace, reticence, persistence — are disappearing from the world.” Fair enough, as I am all for virtues such as grace, reticence and persistence.

But then a few paragraphs later, Sullivan goes on to defend the Crown by enlisting the help of writer C.S. Lewis, who once said: “Where men are forbidden to honor a king, they honor millionaires, athletes or film stars instead; even famous prostitutes or gangsters. For spiritual nature, like bodily nature, will be served; deny it food and it will gobble poison.”

Think about this for a moment. In Lewis’s view, we should honor a king, who ascended to his lot simply by virtue of birth, but we shouldn’t honor millionaires, athletes or film stars — people who have actually put the hard work into it and have done what is required to achieve their status in life?

This is my biggest issue with the notions of royalty of any sort. To be honored and endowed with position, privilege, wealth, admiration, power and respect by accident of your birth, and not because of the hard work it took you to become a millionaire or a standout athlete or a film star, is a perversion of reality that needs to be called out now — especially while the world is mired in an orgy of royal worship.

Yes, as Lewis says, spiritual nature, like bodily nature, needs to be served. But I say that bestowing virtues on a person because of their birth, and not because of their actions, is gobbling up the worst kind of servile poison — poison that inevitably leads to subjugation of the ugliest sort. And if you don’t believe me, read up on the violent atrocities of empires throughout history.

At the root, you’ll find the structural servility of men under the authority of monarchs — and to toward that poison, I say reject this game of thrones.

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Pinch Me

On an evening such as this
It’s hard to tell if I exist
If I pack the car and leave this town
Who’ll notice that I’m not around?

–Barenaked Ladies, “Pinch Me”

A sense of existential dread is always lurking in the back of our minds. And no matter how certain you might be with regard to your place in the universe, none of us really knows what it all means or what, if any, “purpose” there may be to it all. Because of this, it’s incumbent upon us to make our own meaning, and to do whatever we can to imbue our lives with purpose, right here, right now. So, pinch me, and make sure I’m still asleep, because I have meaning in this world to create — and so do you.

Wisdom about money, investing and life can be found anywhere. If you have a good quote that you’d like me to share with your fellow readers, send it to me, along with any comments, questions and suggestions you have about my newsletters, seminars or anything else. Click here to ask Jim.

In the name of the best within us,

Jim Woods