Kingly matters

It may have reached your notice that there’s going to be a Rather Big Event in London on Friday. If it has escaped your notice then you won’t be reading this post in your monastery in the Urals.

Prince William, third in line to the throne of Great Britain, is getting married, ya great wally. To a commoner. But a really good looking one.

But the RBE has apparently stirred some discussion amongst Brits about whether Wills should succeed his grandmother directly, with his father, Prince Charles, either left out altogether or abdicating in favor of his son.

After all, Wills is much better looking, and taller (although he’s obviously inherited dear old dad’s thinning hair, and he not yet 30). And so far he hasn’t espoused any fringe causes like promoting organic farming and opposing modern British architecture. (Everyone’s ignoring those incidents of William taking out the RAF helos for joy rides, since that can be marked down to youthful exuberance and the RAF is practically the Windsors’ anyhow.)

Naturally the media are all over this like a bad British haircut, taking polls and getting professional Royals Watchers (I’m not making this up—they exist) to pontificate on why the son is just way more popular than the old man. The idea is that William would be more, you know, kingly, and that would be Better for Britain.

Of course, it would take a constitutional upheaval; but since the Brits don’t have a written constitution, I don’t know how much of an impediment that would be.

But I find this skip-the-king thing fascinating because the whole point of a hereditary monarchy is that you take what comes up in the generational gene pool. The people do not get to say they don’t want Prince X because he doesn’t look as good as Prince Y—or even that Prince Y is more with-it than Prince X. (And the law of primogeniture means that it's most likely going to be the person with the royal Y-chromosome.) Lord knows, there have been weaklings, murderers, adulterers and raving lunatics on the British throne. One as recently as 101 years ago.

And that was in the day when the Monarch of Britain wielded some actual power.

The customary road to royal rule is genetic inheritance. Except for when someone whacks the monarch and seizes the throne. That's perfectly acceptable.

So it’s interesting to me that apparently some Brits want to enjoy the tradition of a dynastic monarchy, but still get to make the sitting king/queen a popularity contest.

Kind of an appearance-over-substance thing. But if they keep that up, they’ll end up with David Beckham and Posh Spice in Buckingham Palace. And, in the end, I’m not sure they would bring in the tourists and their money like the Windsors do.