God bless you M’am

[Hal Jordan]

So, does she get two funerals, like she had two birthdays?

[Jock42]

Does that mean they only have to be a member of the Royal Houshold for a year to qualify for the medal?

You can get them on eBay for thirty quid.

You can, but that doesn't mean you can wear it.

Thirty quid eh? I've got 2...

[Tichtheid]

Made of nickel silver and being produced by at Worcestershire Medal Service in Birmingham, the medal will be awarded to:

Serving members of the Armed Forces that have completed five full calendar years of service on 6 February 2022.
Frontline emergency services personnel that have been in paid service, retained or in a voluntary capacity, dealing with emergencies as part of their conditions of service, and have completed five full calendar years of service on 6 February 2022.
Prison services personnel who are publicly employed and are regularly exposed to difficult and sometimes emergency situations that have completed five full calendar years of service on 6 February 2022.
Members of the Royal Household with one year of qualifying service.
Living individual recipients of the George Cross.
Living individual recipients of the Victoria Cross.

Does that mean they only have to be a member of the Royal Houshold for a year to qualify for the medal?

Pretty certain that is staff, not family members. Ludicrous if not.

Doh!

Of course it is.

I was away up the wrong garden path there

Still none the wiser as to how some people got the medals, unless Biffer is right with the Ebay option

[Blackmac]

Does that mean they only have to be a member of the Royal Houshold for a year to qualify for the medal?

Pretty certain that is staff, not family members. Ludicrous if not.

Doh!

Of course it is.

I was away up the wrong garden path there

Still none the wiser as to how some people got the medals, unless Biffer is right with the Ebay option

Apparently awarded to all members of the Royal Family as well. Goglais was right. Bit of a brass neck wearing medals you have done the square root of feck all to deserve.

[fishfoodie]

Pretty certain that is staff, not family members. Ludicrous if not.

Doh!

Of course it is.

I was away up the wrong garden path there

Still none the wiser as to how some people got the medals, unless Biffer is right with the Ebay option

Apparently awarded to all members of the Royal Family as well. Goglais was right. Bit of a brass neck wearing medals you have done the square root of feck all to deserve.

Strictly bush league !

Professionals have hunch backs from the weight of unearned medals

[I like neeps]

Judging by the coverage of the event this is ... Surprising.

[GogLais]

Well I didn’t expect my thread to end up like this when I started it.

[dpedin]

Thank fuck that's all over!

[Tichtheid]

If our sun is just one of possibly 100 Billion stars in the Milky Way (according to NASA) and our Milky Way is one of over a thousand galaxies in our local group, and our local group is one of hundreds of groups in the Virgo Super cluster and on out to the edges of the universe, from where there hasn't been enough time for light to reach us, does it make any sense at all that God chose one particular family to be monarchs in this country, a small country on this infinitesimally small speck of a planet?

It's like asking does God really help one boxer beat another man unconscious? The boxers seem to think so, I have my doubts over either intervention to be honest.

This isn't a trivial question; the whole existence of the monarchy depends on this intervention.

[Wylie Coyote]

If our sun is just one of possibly 100 Billion stars in the Milky Way (according to NASA) and our Milky Way is one of over a thousand galaxies in our local group, and our local group is one of hundreds of groups in the Virgo Super cluster and on out to the edges of the universe, from where there hasn't been enough time for light to reach us, does it make any sense at all that God chose one particular family to be monarchs in this country, a small country on this infinitesimally small speck of a planet?

It's like asking does God really help one boxer beat another man unconscious? The boxers seem to think so, I have my doubts over either intervention to be honest.

This isn't a trivial question; the whole existence of the monarchy depends on this intervention.

You're not the first person to ask a question like this:

When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,
what is man that you are mindful of him,
and the son of man that you care for him?
Psalm 8:3-4

[I like neeps]

Judging by the coverage of the event this is ... Surprising.

Back then they had no telly and fuck all else to be doing

They had jobs with significantly less paid leave than today and the population was smaller...

I wondered what was the make up of the queue in terms of full time employed Vs not.

[Marylandolorian]

If our sun is just one of possibly 100 Billion stars in the Milky Way (according to NASA) and our Milky Way is one of over a thousand galaxies in our local group, and our local group is one of hundreds of groups in the Virgo Super cluster and on out to the edges of the universe, from where there hasn't been enough time for light to reach us, does it make any sense at all that God chose one particular family to be monarchs in this country, a small country on this infinitesimally small speck of a planet?

It's like asking does God really help one boxer beat another man unconscious? The boxers seem to think so, I have my doubts over either intervention to be honest.

This isn't a trivial question; the whole existence of the monarchy depends on this intervention.

Don’t forget at the time when god chose all the kings and lords, 99% of the pop couldn’t read, earth was flat and the center of the (very small) universe. They burned you at the stake if you said otherwise.

[Dinsdale Piranha]

If our sun is just one of possibly 100 Billion stars in the Milky Way (according to NASA) and our Milky Way is one of over a thousand galaxies in our local group, and our local group is one of hundreds of groups in the Virgo Super cluster and on out to the edges of the universe, from where there hasn't been enough time for light to reach us, does it make any sense at all that God chose one particular family to be monarchs in this country, a small country on this infinitesimally small speck of a planet?

It's like asking does God really help one boxer beat another man unconscious? The boxers seem to think so, I have my doubts over either intervention to be honest.

This isn't a trivial question; the whole existence of the monarchy depends on this intervention.

Divine right of Kings ended a _really_ long time ago.

[Biffer]

If our sun is just one of possibly 100 Billion stars in the Milky Way (according to NASA) and our Milky Way is one of over a thousand galaxies in our local group, and our local group is one of hundreds of groups in the Virgo Super cluster and on out to the edges of the universe, from where there hasn't been enough time for light to reach us, does it make any sense at all that God chose one particular family to be monarchs in this country, a small country on this infinitesimally small speck of a planet?

It's like asking does God really help one boxer beat another man unconscious? The boxers seem to think so, I have my doubts over either intervention to be honest.

This isn't a trivial question; the whole existence of the monarchy depends on this intervention.

You're not the first person to ask a question like this:

When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,
what is man that you are mindful of him,
and the son of man that you care for him?
Psalm 8:3-4

As Carl Sagan said

Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

[Mahoney]

I don't think most monotheists think in terms of a god whose ability to pay attention is constrained in some way by volume of things, or who thinks bigger things are more important than smaller things. Fall of a sparrow, count the hairs on your head, and so on.

The Sagan piece I've always found baffling. It's literally the Father Ted small / far away thing in a hushed voice. Yes, the earth looks small from far away. But it looks really big close up! So it's totally worth killing for so long as you're close to it!

[Mahoney]

Divine right of kings is a relatively recent concept - started to flourish in the 16th century, reached its height in the 17th century. Certainly doesn't apply to the English and Scottish monarchies which replaced the monarch in 1688 to avoid it and then happily rewrote the line of succession in 1714 to stop his descendants coming back.

It's been common knowledge the world is round since Aristotle.

[GogLais]

Divine right of kings is a relatively recent concept - started to flourish in the 16th century, reached its height in the 17th century. Certainly doesn't apply to the English and Scottish monarchies which replaced the monarch in 1688 to avoid it and then happily rewrote the line of succession in 1714 to stop his descendants coming back.

It's been common knowledge the world is round since Aristotle.

I thought the Divine Right was a given in the Middle Ages and it only became an issue when people started challenging it.
The early Hanoverians had cause to worry really, having seen one king executed and one dethroned in living memory.

[Mahoney]

Things were fuzzier in the middle ages; far less aggressively developed theories of what being a monarch meant in relation to God. Certainly you were anointed, and God had had a hand in putting you there, but the absolutist notions come with James VI & I in England (though Henry VIII would hardly have disagreed...) and Louis XIV onward in France.

[GogLais]

Things were fuzzier in the middle ages; far less aggressively developed theories of what being a monarch meant in relation to God. Certainly you were anointed, and God had had a hand in putting you there, but the absolutist notions come with James VI & I in England (though Henry VIII would hardly have disagreed...) and Louis XIV onward in France.

Ah ok ta. Make sense I guess, James VI probably didn’t feel that secure. But then I imagine Louis XIV did,

[tabascoboy]

Divine right of kings is a relatively recent concept - started to flourish in the 16th century, reached its height in the 17th century. Certainly doesn't apply to the English and Scottish monarchies which replaced the monarch in 1688 to avoid it and then happily rewrote the line of succession in 1714 to stop his descendants coming back.

It's been common knowledge the world is round since Aristotle.

I thought the Divine Right was a given in the Middle Ages and it only became an issue when people started challenging it.
The early Hanoverians had cause to worry really, having seen one king executed and one dethroned in living memory.

Well, kings of the pre-Christian Anglo-Saxon / Mercian / Northumbrian kingdoms were always at pains to show their direct line of descent from Woden / Thor etc, so Divine Right of Kings was I guess a logical successor

[Mahoney]

Actually on reflection I'd retract that post - I got hung up on the ideas of absolute monarchy. While the use of the idea of the divine right of kings to justify absolute monarchy was a 16th & 17th century thing you can definitely say that monarchs had been claiming to rule by God's grace and with his anointing since the early middle ages. And equally the British monarchs claimed & continue to claim to rule by divine grace, if not right, after becoming king even when the selection process is somewhat flexible.

[Lobby]

Back then they had no telly and fuck all else to be doing

They had jobs with significantly less paid leave than today and the population was smaller...

I wondered what was the make up of the queue in terms of full time employed Vs not.

Nah they were given the time off. A week and a half of organised gloom as one Catholic Bishop said

There wouldn’t have been ‘airport-style security’ gates and bag checks for them to negotiate in 1952 either, so once they got to Westminster Hall they could simply go straight in and see the coffin.

[Paddington Bear]

They had jobs with significantly less paid leave than today and the population was smaller...

I wondered what was the make up of the queue in terms of full time employed Vs not.

Nah they were given the time off. A week and a half of organised gloom as one Catholic Bishop said

There wouldn’t have been ‘airport-style security’ gates and bag checks for them to negotiate in 1952 either, so once they got to Westminster Hall they could simply go straight in and see the coffin.

Was thinking the same. Also I assume that number doesn’t include those who saw her in Edinburgh? And you have to factor in how easy it all was to follow from home

[shaggy]

They had jobs with significantly less paid leave than today and the population was smaller...

I wondered what was the make up of the queue in terms of full time employed Vs not.

Nah they were given the time off. A week and a half of organised gloom as one Catholic Bishop said

There wouldn’t have been ‘airport-style security’ gates and bag checks for them to negotiate in 1952 either, so once they got to Westminster Hall they could simply go straight in and see the coffin.

The choke on the throughput is the actual door to the hall, all the queuing beforehand is irrelevant once the queue has started to move. What would speed it up us more people viewing at the same time.

Value of parallel over series.

[charltom]

Nah they were given the time off. A week and a half of organised gloom as one Catholic Bishop said

There wouldn’t have been ‘airport-style security’ gates and bag checks for them to negotiate in 1952 either, so once they got to Westminster Hall they could simply go straight in and see the coffin.

The choke on the throughput is the actual door to the hall, all the queuing beforehand is irrelevant once the queue has started to move. What would speed it up us more people viewing at the same time.

Value of parallel over series.

You could certainly see more people viewing at once in the 1952 photos.

[Openside]

Judging by the coverage of the event this is ... Surprising.

The reduced numbers will have been down to the airport security everyone had to go through that slowed everything up…

[Biffer]

Judging by the coverage of the event this is ... Surprising.

The reduced numbers will have been down to the airport security everyone had to go through that slowed everything up…

I don’t think that slowed things. Unless you were chasing people through and telling them to hurry up, throughput wouldn’t have been any higher.

That’s also from a larger population 50million in 1952 v 68 million now

[C69]

However Tv and medi coverage was much less pervasive and I doubt the Beeb have a 24 hour round the clock live, stream/channel of people walking around a corpse in a lead lined box so subjects could pay their respect "vitually"

[Openside]

Judging by the coverage of the event this is ... Surprising.

The reduced numbers will have been down to the airport security everyone had to go through that slowed everything up…

I don’t think that slowed things. Unless you were chasing people through and telling them to hurry up, throughput wouldn’t have been any higher.

That’s also from a larger population 50million in 1952 v 68 million now

without a doubt it did, also in Churchills time they let a lot more through the hall at once. The security aspect without a doubt restricted numbers. Which is a shame but a fact of life these days

[Glaston]

Re: the Churchill funeral
Very noticeable that none of the police/military were facing the crowds. All were facing the procession.

[Ymx]

I’m starting to think Lizzy had the right idea getting out when she did.

[fishfoodie]

Is there a super-injunction in place in the UK, or just an agreement ?, because this case seems to be going on a very long time, with zero reporting, for such an incendiary case.

https://www.rte.ie/news/2022/1016/1329499-abuse/

[Lobby]

Is there a super-injunction in place in the UK, or just an agreement ?, because this case seems to be going on a very long time, with zero reporting, for such an incendiary case.

https://www.rte.ie/news/2022/1016/1329499-abuse/

Or its just possible that after the Carl Beech case the press are a bit more wary/sceptical about publishing conspiracy theories about VIP sex rings at the moment. Also, the Paedofinder General, Tom Watson, is no longer in Parliament to make unfounded allegations using Parliamentary Privilege.

[fishfoodie]

The cracks, continue to spread.

It's a more than a bit farcical that elected Politicians could be refused their post, because their refuse to swear alligance to a foreign (Unelected) Monarch.

With the upcoming coronation of King Charles III, the Canadian province of Quebec is reviving a debate on the country's ties to the British monarchy.

On Wednesday, Canadian parliamentarians overwhelmingly voted no to severing ties with the monarchy, after Bloc Quebecois leader Yves-Francois Blanchet introduced a motion that sparked a conversation in the House of Commons about the monarchy.

His move follows the refusal of 14 recently elected Quebec politicians to recite an oath of allegiance to the King during their swearing-in to the provincial legislature, as required by Canadian law.

Speaking to reporters, Mr Blanchet admitted that he had expected his motion to fail, but he said it would show Quebecers that federal politicians "prefer to support the King than the people".

In Canada, the monarch - now King Charles - is the head of state. The monarchy serves a mainly symbolic role, with the power to govern entrusted to the Canadian government.

Changing the current system would need approval from both the House of Commons and the Senate in parliament, as well as the unanimous consent of all 10 provinces.

While Mr Blanchet's motion has failed, the future of Quebec politicians who refused to swear the oath to the Crown remains uncertain.

Their refusal could lead to a bill that seeks to redefine the requirement to take the oath of allegiance in the province - if they are able to sit in Quebec's legislature at all - and political watchers say they are eager to see how the dispute unfolds.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-63393955

If the Commonwealthists want to maintain any link to the Monarch; they need to accept that the demand for people elected by the people, should swear any form of alligance to a foreign head of state is ludicrous, & insulting. Far better to accept a more independant existance, than to force the issue, & end up with a full on Republic, detatching itself entirely from the Commonwealth.