Goodbye Queen Elizabeth

 

Many people have been affected by the death of Queen Elizabeth.

The newspapers and websites are filled with material which has long been prepared. There is something comforting about that - in the idea that there has been some kind of plan in place for years. That Operation London Bridge is there to smoothly keep the cogs and wheels of Britain and the Commonwealth running. Goodness knows if there are any other plans in operation. 

The BBC will stop all comedy for some reason – because when you grieve, laughter is not acceptable to some. We live on a strange island.

There were many worse monarchs than Queen Elizabeth. Of course, when a monarch dies, everyone is a royalist to some extent. Freedom of expression has its limits after all, for both republicans and royalists. She surely won the award for being the most popular monarch.

They say that as soon as the Queen died, Charles became King. They say this because they rightly fear that the time between the death of a monarch and the coronation of the new one is a time of social instability. Certain forces, the kind of forces that Queen Elizabeth hinted at during her long reign, will become opportunists. People fear terrorism. Instability. Journalists and writers are called on to keep the peace. We are to write words of comfort and words which keep the wheels and cogs of the system oiled.

People will miss her. She received a lot of prayer and was among the world's most well-known Christians. We got used to her.

Perhaps she could have been more proactive. But in the history of kings and queens she was reasonably benevolent. Episodes of The Crown probably did more for her public image than all the PR of the palace.

We are in new territory. So where do we go from here? What can we say to comfort each other? Millions of words will be written from here on. All kinds of words, and those of us who were raised on Spitting Image, with its caricature of Queen Elizabeth, will wonder at some of them.

And all the plans of Government and the other forces, and the long ago written newspaper material and the plans of church and state... and agitators... will swing into motion like a machine.

You want my advice at this time? Do what you have always done. Survive. But don’t carry on as if nothing has happened. Don’t just keep calm and carry on. It's not business as usual. Even in war, the advice was to keep calm and carry on as much as possible. There was some acknowledgment that there would be some significant ripples felt by people. Sometimes you just can’t carry on as normal. 

So survive. Look around. Read the blogs, watch the changes. Think a little about it all. See the royalists, watch how they act and what they say. See the republicans and listen to their complaints about the constraints on free expression. Watch the news, listen to the journalists. Try not to read too much David Icke.

Take it easy Britain, somebody loves you.

Think happy thoughts.