Sky News contributor Sophie Elsworth says it has been reported Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor is forcing his very few staff to address him still as “sir,” despit...
Laws are needed for a civilized society. but civilization is a safe area we’ve created for ourselves in a dangerous jungle. When we step outside of our civilization we’re in a lawless place and we’re just surviving based on or abilities and judgement. There’s no legal way to eliminate the jungle, it will always be there. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t bother to have nice things when living in our civilized society.
A lot of these hypotheticals and real world scenarios are just people going out from civilized behaviour to the edge of the jungle. Whether it’s a King making commands or a President ignoring the court, these are things that shouldn’t be done based on the norms and laws of our civilization. So we’re in jungle rules, we have to figure out how to deal with the problem based on just our abilities and out judgement.
I see your point that “if we all agree he has no power, any exercise will clearly be a problem” … except the monarchy is in constant contact with the governor general. You won’t know why the GG makes her choices.
Parliament would know. Their job is to represent the will of the people. If the GG or King weren’t doing as they were told by Parliament, the PM has able opportunity to say to the country “that’s not what I wanted them to say.”
Or consider this situation: https://donshafer1.substack.com/p/the-day-37-british-columbia-mlas . Imagine the King has business interests in BC and would benefit from this financially. He calls the GG, who calls the LG of BC to say “get this moving.” If the LG (or GG) went public, she’d lose her job. So she’d quietly do it.
There were 50 MLAs that voted against that. How would the LG be able to do this quietly without the 50 people that voted against it knowing about it? When legislation gets royal assent, it’s done so publicly. Someone reads it out in Parliament and the Governor gives it a nod. It’s all a formality really, but who would be the person in parliament reading out legislation that didn’t pass to a Governor in the first place? You’d have to have the Parliament’s Clerks in on the scheme and not have them leak it to the the representatives, And they would be fired if caught doing any of this. Laws obviously have to be published so people like your self can use them in court. How would a GG, LG, or the King himself be able to do something without the elected representatives who voted against it knowing about it?
And I think you have it backwards. If something like this were to happen, there would be no more King. Even if the King were to force laws to come into being somehow (don’t know how it would happen, so it wouldn’t be the normal process, therefore very obvious) people would know and either the King would have to undo the action and abdicate or we’d just cease to be a monarchy. We’d be in the jungle and we’d be acting on our abilities and judgement.
I’m not sure I like this jungle analogy, but in the analogy, I guess my point is that some laws “expand” civilization and “shrink” the jungle. They reduce the accessibility of “lawlessness” on the part of the government. You’re right, they can always still get there, but they make the jungle further away, make it harder to get there.
It’s simply not true that we’d know if the GG was being influenced by the monarch. If the GG decided to use reserve powers (or consider using them and decide not to, like they did in 2008) we would have no way of knowing whether the King of England was behind it or not. And if your thought is “it doesn’t matter we’d remove any GG or LG that tries to use any power at all” you’re obviously incorrect about that :P
I’m not saying a law, like the proposed one to abolish the HRT, would be passed in secret. I’m saying the political pressure would be secret. Of course the law must be passed publicly, and you’d have all kinds of yelling on both sides about it. In the alternative, if parliament passed something and the GG refused to give royal assent, likewise that would be very public. The influence on the GG, however, would not be!
I would love to imagine that any constitutional crisis would be resolved immediately in favor of democracy and not on the basis of the underlying issue but I think that’s very hopeful. I’m not sure how to make it more clear…I could come up with more hypothetical situations to demonstrate where the king could exercise undemocratic influence, but I don’t know why that would help! I’ll try one more and then I’ll leave it if this doesn’t help explain what I’m talking about:
Let’s imagine a parliament with a thin liberal majority, but it’s expected to flip soon due to some unpopular decisions. Parliament narrowly passes a law that the residence at the Citadel of Quebec is going to become a public museum operated by the federal government. The Conservatives hate this because they consider it a waste of taxpayer dollars. The King privately opposes it because he quite likes having a vacation home in Quebec (and the GG actually uses it, so maybe she feels the same way). The GG doesn’t give royal assent, but says it’s for some technical deficiency, expecting an election to remove the issue…or alternatively simply says outright that the Conservatives are correct and the government can’t afford it…or somesuch mildly-plausible excuse that the milquetoast canadian middle class will accept (I only suppose the thin liberal majority in order to make this plausible excuse, but you could certainly imagine others if the liberal hold on parliament was strong). If the GG does not give royal assent…you think we’d go into a constitutional crisis? I don’t think anyone would think it’s worthwhile (which, of course, means that such a law wouldn’t pass…which is its own kind of influence being exercised passively by the Crown!).
You’re overestimating the value of laws. Laws don’t create civilization, the civilization creates laws. The jungle is always there, we just generally avoid it because going to the jungle means our survival is down to just our abilities and judgement. It’s far preferable to stay in civilization where we have our best chance of survival.
Your hypothetical examples all depend on people being weak willed in the face of a constitutional crisis. If people are weak, there being a King or not a King makes no difference. The US has no King, but people are weak towards Trump, and it’s the same result as your hypotheticals, just different titles.
And why would the King risk his cushy life to do any of these things? Why would someone who is in a position like that for the rest of his life risk it all for some short term gain?
So corruption can happen in a republican, and it seems to me it’s more obvious when someone doesn’t give royal ascent, and it’s very unlikely a King who has guaranteed housing in a palace for life being waited on hand and foot would risk that for a small bump in his stock portfolio. It seems you’re imagining the King behaving like a corrupt politician, but you’re not explaining how replacing the King with an actual politician makes that less likely to happen? If anything a term limited politician is more likely to do any of these hypotheticals, get that money in the limited time they’re in the position to get it. And the people that voted for that politician are more likely to look the other way than if a King started doing shenanigans.
As I said, I think the “jungle vs civilization” analogy is a little weird. I don’t think laws create civilization. But I do think laws matter for fascists. If they didn’t they wouldn’t need to pack the supreme court. Project 2025 wouldn’t be so focused on laws and the judiciary. They’re not meaningless…at the edge of the jungle? I guess? in this analogy?
So, when you talk about people being weak willed, you’re saying that a fascist coming to power is a kind of personal moral failing of the individuals in a society. I think that’s pretty absurd, and takes all responsibility away from the systems that shape people’s “willpower,” as well as their understanding of what is and is not overreach. If that’s true then there’s just nothing to be done? Just let the fascists have all the places with people who have weak wills? lol
Okay, so I don’t know why you will not engage with a hypothetical as a means of seeing the problem I’m talking about. Obviously the king isn’t going to upset the balance of power in the Commonwealth for his vacation home in quebec…if you can’t generalize that to something more important (such as, in Australia, the cold war), then there’s no point in talking about hypothetical situations…the point is to generalize from them. But that’s fine, it doesn’t really matter.
And for what it’s worth, his cushy life isn’t going anywhere whether the commonwealth crumbles or not. The king of england could cease to be the king of canada and it wouldn’t cost him anything (except, I guess, a vacation home in quebec he never uses). I’d be thrilled if the UK decides to guillotine them, but they won’t and I guess I have to make peace with that.
I’m not proposing replacing the king, I’m proposing kicking the king out. Just don’t have a king. If we must have a king, I would prefer to have a Canadian monarch and to stop legitimizing the genocidiers, looters, and pedophiles in the house of windsor…but I don’t see that we need a king. We could still just have a governor general appointed by the PM…make the system actually and definitely work the way you say it works (and I agree it works 99% of the time…but why the fuck are we leaving 1% on the table just to glorify those assholes? Like…we know it doesn’t work that way 100% of the time given the handful of examples I’ve shared).
Honestly though, why? Like…I haven’t seen you say anything in favor of having a king, or of having this king in particular?
Like…I haven’t seen you say anything in favor of having a king, or of having this king in particular?
I have but you haven’t been paying attention. If you don’t have a King, people will create one. The US technically doesn’t have a King, but they’ve created on in Donald Trump in all but name. You don’t seem to think about any potential of a politician doing the things that you mention in all of these hypotheticals, but you worry greatly about an actual King doing them. And that’s the problem, a politician can become a tyrant without anyone noticing. If the King became a tyrant everyone would notice.
You label the King as a “genocidiers, looters, and pedophiles” even though he has not personally done those things. His brother has done some crimes, and he’s being prosecuted. When will Donald Trump or any of the billionaires in the US get prosecuted? Probably never.
And are you accusing the King of everything his ancestors have done? Sounds to me like you really believe in lineage stuff way more than I do. Seems unfair to judge someone for what their ancestors did. If there was no King would you be devoting time to researching what Mark Carney’s ancestors did and unfairly judging him for those things?
The monarchy acts as an emotional lightning rod for many people. All the emotional garbage whether it be grievance over things from the history books, nostalgia, or just a love of pomp and pageantry gets focused on the monarchy who are apolitical. That separates the emotional garbage from politics. Allows people to think about the actual policies the politician is proposing rather than some historical grievance or how “Presidential” they look. Americans keep voting in old coots out of nostalgia for some good times when Ronald Reagan was President. We still get a touch of that with Justin Trudeau benefiting from nostalgia over his father, but you’ll have a tough time arguing people had loyalty to him like he was a King.
Americans feel like they’re supposed to be loyal to the President and because of that they won’t remove a President from office even when he commits egregious crimes. The Prime Minister gets some degree of respect for the job, but a vote of no confidence is something much more likely to happen as it won’t seem disloyal to the country. For those that feel they must show subservience to a person to prove their loyalty to the country we have a King who’s apolitical. In the US, the subservient must show loyalty to the President since they have no king.
There are many many reasons to have a King, not least of which was the reason Pierre Trudeau brought up: It would take a lot of effort to remove the King and it wouldn’t really change anything. Why bother removing the King?
The only reasons you have to go through that effort is hypotheticals (which would also apply to a President) and your belief that there’s something wrong with the Royal lineage. Which is… hmmmm.
Laws are needed for a civilized society. but civilization is a safe area we’ve created for ourselves in a dangerous jungle. When we step outside of our civilization we’re in a lawless place and we’re just surviving based on or abilities and judgement. There’s no legal way to eliminate the jungle, it will always be there. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t bother to have nice things when living in our civilized society.
A lot of these hypotheticals and real world scenarios are just people going out from civilized behaviour to the edge of the jungle. Whether it’s a King making commands or a President ignoring the court, these are things that shouldn’t be done based on the norms and laws of our civilization. So we’re in jungle rules, we have to figure out how to deal with the problem based on just our abilities and out judgement.
Parliament would know. Their job is to represent the will of the people. If the GG or King weren’t doing as they were told by Parliament, the PM has able opportunity to say to the country “that’s not what I wanted them to say.”
There were 50 MLAs that voted against that. How would the LG be able to do this quietly without the 50 people that voted against it knowing about it? When legislation gets royal assent, it’s done so publicly. Someone reads it out in Parliament and the Governor gives it a nod. It’s all a formality really, but who would be the person in parliament reading out legislation that didn’t pass to a Governor in the first place? You’d have to have the Parliament’s Clerks in on the scheme and not have them leak it to the the representatives, And they would be fired if caught doing any of this. Laws obviously have to be published so people like your self can use them in court. How would a GG, LG, or the King himself be able to do something without the elected representatives who voted against it knowing about it?
There’s a lot of process and ceremony involved in this: https://www.ourcommons.ca/procedure/our-procedure/LegislativeProcess/c_g_legislativeprocess-e.html How would you slip some secret laws through all of that process?
And I think you have it backwards. If something like this were to happen, there would be no more King. Even if the King were to force laws to come into being somehow (don’t know how it would happen, so it wouldn’t be the normal process, therefore very obvious) people would know and either the King would have to undo the action and abdicate or we’d just cease to be a monarchy. We’d be in the jungle and we’d be acting on our abilities and judgement.
I’m not sure I like this jungle analogy, but in the analogy, I guess my point is that some laws “expand” civilization and “shrink” the jungle. They reduce the accessibility of “lawlessness” on the part of the government. You’re right, they can always still get there, but they make the jungle further away, make it harder to get there.
It’s simply not true that we’d know if the GG was being influenced by the monarch. If the GG decided to use reserve powers (or consider using them and decide not to, like they did in 2008) we would have no way of knowing whether the King of England was behind it or not. And if your thought is “it doesn’t matter we’d remove any GG or LG that tries to use any power at all” you’re obviously incorrect about that :P
I’m not saying a law, like the proposed one to abolish the HRT, would be passed in secret. I’m saying the political pressure would be secret. Of course the law must be passed publicly, and you’d have all kinds of yelling on both sides about it. In the alternative, if parliament passed something and the GG refused to give royal assent, likewise that would be very public. The influence on the GG, however, would not be!
I would love to imagine that any constitutional crisis would be resolved immediately in favor of democracy and not on the basis of the underlying issue but I think that’s very hopeful. I’m not sure how to make it more clear…I could come up with more hypothetical situations to demonstrate where the king could exercise undemocratic influence, but I don’t know why that would help! I’ll try one more and then I’ll leave it if this doesn’t help explain what I’m talking about:
Let’s imagine a parliament with a thin liberal majority, but it’s expected to flip soon due to some unpopular decisions. Parliament narrowly passes a law that the residence at the Citadel of Quebec is going to become a public museum operated by the federal government. The Conservatives hate this because they consider it a waste of taxpayer dollars. The King privately opposes it because he quite likes having a vacation home in Quebec (and the GG actually uses it, so maybe she feels the same way). The GG doesn’t give royal assent, but says it’s for some technical deficiency, expecting an election to remove the issue…or alternatively simply says outright that the Conservatives are correct and the government can’t afford it…or somesuch mildly-plausible excuse that the milquetoast canadian middle class will accept (I only suppose the thin liberal majority in order to make this plausible excuse, but you could certainly imagine others if the liberal hold on parliament was strong). If the GG does not give royal assent…you think we’d go into a constitutional crisis? I don’t think anyone would think it’s worthwhile (which, of course, means that such a law wouldn’t pass…which is its own kind of influence being exercised passively by the Crown!).
You’re overestimating the value of laws. Laws don’t create civilization, the civilization creates laws. The jungle is always there, we just generally avoid it because going to the jungle means our survival is down to just our abilities and judgement. It’s far preferable to stay in civilization where we have our best chance of survival.
Your hypothetical examples all depend on people being weak willed in the face of a constitutional crisis. If people are weak, there being a King or not a King makes no difference. The US has no King, but people are weak towards Trump, and it’s the same result as your hypotheticals, just different titles.
And why would the King risk his cushy life to do any of these things? Why would someone who is in a position like that for the rest of his life risk it all for some short term gain?
So corruption can happen in a republican, and it seems to me it’s more obvious when someone doesn’t give royal ascent, and it’s very unlikely a King who has guaranteed housing in a palace for life being waited on hand and foot would risk that for a small bump in his stock portfolio. It seems you’re imagining the King behaving like a corrupt politician, but you’re not explaining how replacing the King with an actual politician makes that less likely to happen? If anything a term limited politician is more likely to do any of these hypotheticals, get that money in the limited time they’re in the position to get it. And the people that voted for that politician are more likely to look the other way than if a King started doing shenanigans.
As I said, I think the “jungle vs civilization” analogy is a little weird. I don’t think laws create civilization. But I do think laws matter for fascists. If they didn’t they wouldn’t need to pack the supreme court. Project 2025 wouldn’t be so focused on laws and the judiciary. They’re not meaningless…at the edge of the jungle? I guess? in this analogy?
So, when you talk about people being weak willed, you’re saying that a fascist coming to power is a kind of personal moral failing of the individuals in a society. I think that’s pretty absurd, and takes all responsibility away from the systems that shape people’s “willpower,” as well as their understanding of what is and is not overreach. If that’s true then there’s just nothing to be done? Just let the fascists have all the places with people who have weak wills? lol
Okay, so I don’t know why you will not engage with a hypothetical as a means of seeing the problem I’m talking about. Obviously the king isn’t going to upset the balance of power in the Commonwealth for his vacation home in quebec…if you can’t generalize that to something more important (such as, in Australia, the cold war), then there’s no point in talking about hypothetical situations…the point is to generalize from them. But that’s fine, it doesn’t really matter.
And for what it’s worth, his cushy life isn’t going anywhere whether the commonwealth crumbles or not. The king of england could cease to be the king of canada and it wouldn’t cost him anything (except, I guess, a vacation home in quebec he never uses). I’d be thrilled if the UK decides to guillotine them, but they won’t and I guess I have to make peace with that.
I’m not proposing replacing the king, I’m proposing kicking the king out. Just don’t have a king. If we must have a king, I would prefer to have a Canadian monarch and to stop legitimizing the genocidiers, looters, and pedophiles in the house of windsor…but I don’t see that we need a king. We could still just have a governor general appointed by the PM…make the system actually and definitely work the way you say it works (and I agree it works 99% of the time…but why the fuck are we leaving 1% on the table just to glorify those assholes? Like…we know it doesn’t work that way 100% of the time given the handful of examples I’ve shared).
Honestly though, why? Like…I haven’t seen you say anything in favor of having a king, or of having this king in particular?
I have but you haven’t been paying attention. If you don’t have a King, people will create one. The US technically doesn’t have a King, but they’ve created on in Donald Trump in all but name. You don’t seem to think about any potential of a politician doing the things that you mention in all of these hypotheticals, but you worry greatly about an actual King doing them. And that’s the problem, a politician can become a tyrant without anyone noticing. If the King became a tyrant everyone would notice.
You label the King as a “genocidiers, looters, and pedophiles” even though he has not personally done those things. His brother has done some crimes, and he’s being prosecuted. When will Donald Trump or any of the billionaires in the US get prosecuted? Probably never.
And are you accusing the King of everything his ancestors have done? Sounds to me like you really believe in lineage stuff way more than I do. Seems unfair to judge someone for what their ancestors did. If there was no King would you be devoting time to researching what Mark Carney’s ancestors did and unfairly judging him for those things?
The monarchy acts as an emotional lightning rod for many people. All the emotional garbage whether it be grievance over things from the history books, nostalgia, or just a love of pomp and pageantry gets focused on the monarchy who are apolitical. That separates the emotional garbage from politics. Allows people to think about the actual policies the politician is proposing rather than some historical grievance or how “Presidential” they look. Americans keep voting in old coots out of nostalgia for some good times when Ronald Reagan was President. We still get a touch of that with Justin Trudeau benefiting from nostalgia over his father, but you’ll have a tough time arguing people had loyalty to him like he was a King.
Americans feel like they’re supposed to be loyal to the President and because of that they won’t remove a President from office even when he commits egregious crimes. The Prime Minister gets some degree of respect for the job, but a vote of no confidence is something much more likely to happen as it won’t seem disloyal to the country. For those that feel they must show subservience to a person to prove their loyalty to the country we have a King who’s apolitical. In the US, the subservient must show loyalty to the President since they have no king.
There are many many reasons to have a King, not least of which was the reason Pierre Trudeau brought up: It would take a lot of effort to remove the King and it wouldn’t really change anything. Why bother removing the King?
The only reasons you have to go through that effort is hypotheticals (which would also apply to a President) and your belief that there’s something wrong with the Royal lineage. Which is… hmmmm.