RadixJournal - September 10, 2022


The Hollow Symbolism of Monarchy

Hosted by
Richard Spencer
Mentioned
King Charles Elizabeth II Charles III Windsor
Prole Rage Everything's A Remix

Episode Stats


Length

8 minutes

Words per minute

129.39

Word count

1,092

Sentence count

56


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode, I talk about the passing of Queen Elizabeth II, the monarchy, and the changing of the guard. I also talk about why I think monarchy is outmoded and almost deceptive in many ways.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 Well, anyway, uh, I was just going to talk a little bit about the, uh, the queen and then, um, we can discuss some other things, um, as you guys will.
00:00:13.820 Um, but yeah, I mean, I, I guess I had some residual, almost like conservative instincts about the queen dying and being sad.
00:00:26.780 Um, you know, I think that's normal and I think I maybe had some kind of reactionary instincts of like, you know, monarchy is great and all of that kind of stuff.
00:00:40.620 Um, I don't think she's, I think Queen Elizabeth II was a good person and so on. I actually think King Charles, I guess he's going to be Charles III.
00:00:51.100 Um, I think he might very well be an interesting leader. Um, he, he has been forthright on some important issues.
00:01:03.320 I actually have this nice book that he wrote or probably commissioned. Um, but it is about like, you know, human centric living and architecture and stuff like that.
00:01:18.180 So he, he cares about environmental issues. He, um, has attempted, you know, kind of failed to a degree, but, you know, attempted, um, architectural and residential projects, um, that are more traditional and human centric and so on.
00:01:39.400 Um, and, uh, I think that is, uh, I think that is, uh, all a good thing. So I, I do admire Charles and, uh, probably less so Elizabeth II.
00:01:50.680 She's, she's kind of been there, but been in the background, almost like a bit like wallpaper.
00:01:57.220 Um, I have not heard, um, I don't, I mean, I am not a royal watcher or a royal historian, so anyone can add in anything.
00:02:07.680 I don't think I've really heard any, read anything that is a serious analysis of her ideology or anything like that.
00:02:18.240 Um, uh, I, I think it is interesting to look at monarchy. I mean, obviously after the glorious revolution, the monarch is not sovereign.
00:02:27.940 Although I did hear that for a, I believe this is how it went. So for a period of one hour, um, there was no prime minister and Charles was king.
00:02:40.500 So he, he had his moment when there was no leader of parliament. So he could have just, he had absolute authority and could have done anything, but nothing happened.
00:02:53.140 Um, I think it is worthwhile pointing out that, you know, England, uh, or, you know, England, Scotland, Wales, they have a monarch, um, a country like, let's say Germany doesn't, and they've both found their way to the same place.
00:03:18.560 Not that England and Germany are identical or anything like that.
00:03:23.140 Um, but, um, they kind of found, each of them found their own path towards the same destination.
00:03:32.140 And, you know, I understand history and we're not living in like a sovereign monarchial situation.
00:03:40.100 Um, but, uh, uh, parliament again is the sovereign body and not the people in England.
00:03:46.000 Um, but nevertheless, it does kind of leave me with a sense of uselessness in some ways of the monarch.
00:03:57.440 And I guess what I was thinking of today was the idea that they're, they're kind of like symbolic structures that are very important, but are, are also outmoded and not irrelevant.
00:04:16.880 Cause I think they are irrelevant, but, um, um, they're outmoded and they're almost deceptive in a way.
00:04:24.100 So everyone who visits London at some point in their life have, has gone to see the changing of the guard.
00:04:33.120 And I would imagine that everyone who is involved in this group, uh, to some extent or another has some kind of, you know, residual, maybe even childish, you know, reverence for monarchy.
00:04:48.780 And so, and it kind of gives us a glimpse to the past.
00:04:52.120 And, and I think that the king or the queen of the king can kind of symbolize the nation in some way or symbolize the continuance of history, et cetera, obviously different.
00:05:06.060 There've been major different, um, families that have occupied the throne.
00:05:10.580 The Windsor family is a German entity, but anyway, you get my point.
00:05:15.440 Um, you can kind of see a little glimpse of Elizabeth the first, you can see a glimpse of, um, the middle ages.
00:05:23.300 And, um, but I, I sometimes think these, these symbolic orders are in, in many ways deceptive and that there's other, there are other more primary symbolic orders that overwhelm these things.
00:05:43.180 To the point that they really are tourist attractions or museums, uh, or something like that.
00:05:51.460 And, uh, I think that's really the proper way to look at these things.
00:05:56.180 I mean, Charles had an hour of time to seize absolute power and, you know, save England.
00:06:04.960 I don't know what he would do, um, kick all the immigrants out and reestablish family unit or something like this.
00:06:13.900 Who knows?
00:06:15.380 Um, but he didn't and nor in a way should he have, nor would any rational person think he would.
00:06:23.940 Um, it's a kind of false, deceptive, you know, symbolic order.
00:06:30.800 And in that sense, it, it is kind of a, a lie.
00:06:35.160 And, um, so I don't know, I, I don't have any, I don't have any of the like American animosity towards royal houses or monarchy in general or anything like that.
00:06:49.620 Um, uh, where, you know, it's, it's some kind of inherent disgrace that, you know, even if the king doesn't have really, any really, any real power, he kind of symbolically conveys that power to his parliament.
00:07:03.500 Um, despite that reality that we should just get rid of the monarchy, it's, it's a symbol of something bad.
00:07:12.080 It's a, maybe even a temptation.
00:07:13.820 Um, I, I don't have any of those instincts or emotions, but I, I do see the, the institution as effectively a lie, a kind of hollow symbol in a way, or, or a deceptive symbol.
00:07:32.180 Um, the king doesn't have authority and he ultimately isn't impactful in the ideological direction of the British Isles and thus having him around.
00:07:50.840 And it, it, it, it, it's a night, it's a quaint, it's a quaint, it's a quaint, it's a quaint vestige of the past, it's furniture, but I think it ultimately is a lie and thus probably shouldn't exist.
00:08:02.800 I think might very well do more harm than good.
00:08:06.800 It, it gives a kind of lie to the fact that there's, you know, there's another England is still around and still, it still holds sway.
00:08:20.780 And, uh, I generally think that, uh, lies, at least of this nature, aren't good.