Poll: Why does England still have a royal family?

Are you pro or anti royal?

  • Total voters
    604
DanielMMS said:
But the idea of technocracy is fraught with danger for a variety of reasons. Interesting article here which puts it far better than could I. Ultimately, I would question how it would be possible to legitimise a technocracy and how personality/external/political issues could be avoided - much the same way as is the situation within a democracy.
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While I agree it has dangers if taken down a certain route (restricting education to create a ruling class of intelligentsia) I doubt we would have the total screw up of the global markets, mass pollution & the reliance on fossil fuels.

A technocracy with a strong emphasis of educating the population, as to maximise efficiency & progress it makes sense to tap into the biggest resource we have - the human population.

Keep in mind this kind of mode of governance would take a long time for society to move to - for a start I doubt believe it's compatible with capitalism - so we will need to wait for that to go first.

But looking at the global markets it shouldn't take long - the ponzi-scheme has almost ended.

I don't expect it to happen in our lifetime, but these pointless & archaic concepts like "kings & queens" are pretty minor on the grade scale of things - the fact people think inequity is not a problem (as a whole in society) is of much greater concern to me than a thousand kings.
 
Craig1981 said:
I wouldnt bow and I'm pretty sure I dont think too much of myself.

Quite the opposite in fact. I dont think I'm superior to the Queen. I just dont think that shes superior to me, therefore theres no reason to bow.
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Exactly my thoughts on the matter.
 
A monarchy can be more effective than a government. A good king can be far better than a socialist authoritarian nightmare. But with our current system I see no point in acknowledging the monarchy of any country. They have lost their power and should be phased out. They could start by not spending any tax money on them.

Many people associate the monarchy with nationalism and pride and this goes back 1000s of years. I would have thought though that by now people would have come to their sense.
 
groen said:
A monarchy can be more effective than a government. A good king can be far better than a socialist authoritarian nightmare. But with our current system I see no point in acknowledging the monarchy of any country. They have lost their power and should be phased out. They could start by not spending any tax money on them.
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As has been said many times, they bring in more money to the treasury then is spent on them.
 
If they bring in so much money why do they need any from the tax payers then?

The difference in that balance sheet is that they spend tax payers money and then when they make money, that goes in to their coffers. Not sure the queen pays income tax and national insurance.
 
groen said:
Many people associate the monarchy with nationalism and pride and this goes back 1000s of years. I would have thought though that by now people would have come to their sense.
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I do love it when people say I have no sense for holding a particular view without providing any justification whatsoever... :D :rolleyes:
 
groen said:
A monarchy can be more effective than a government. A good king can be far better than a socialist authoritarian nightmare. But with our current system I see no point in acknowledging the monarchy of any country. They have lost their power and should be phased out. They could start by not spending any tax money on them.

Many people associate the monarchy with nationalism and pride and this goes back 1000s of years. I would have thought though that by now people would have come to their sense.
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I'd be interesting in hearing an example of a "good king" - also I'd like to hear of an example of a "socialist authoritarian nightmare", please don't say Hitler (he wasn't a socialist, regardless of his name of his party).

I do agree there history is in blood - they have also divided this nation & squandered it's resources over the past in pointless wars, hardly something to be revered.
 
I never said that I had a specific example of a good king. I just said that there is the possibility that a king could be good and in doing so he could make the peasants better off. I can think of a few British kings that were ok but they made some choices that i did not approve of. As for a socialist authoritarian nightmare, just need to look out the window my friend.
 
groen said:
As for a socialist authoritarian nightmare, just need to look out the window my friend.
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I just looked out of my window, I couldn't see one. And then I thought you may have been speaking figuratively and could have been referring to our government, and realised that that would also be a nonsensical claim. I then extended the parameter to include all the governments in Europe, upon which I realised that you either made a poor joke or don't understand what a 'socialist authoritarian nightmare' would actually be.
 
platypus said:
As has been said many times, they bring in more money to the treasury then is spent on them.
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I don't think that necessarily precludes the money spent on them being invested in a better way.

You really could argue this to the death both sides. Ultimately, you either like them or you don't.
 
I voted Pro. I'm glad to see the results from GD mostly in favour or "not arsed either way".

I think the royal family is a good thing. They are a symbol of our once great nation and they do a lot of good. They make me proud to be British and with events such as the Royal Wedding, which I was originally very apathetic towards (but soon changed my mind), it just makes the world take notice of us in a good way. Rather than being in illegal wars, mugging off the EU, being Americas bum-chum and so on.

Plus, Kate Middleton is hot and it all comes down to T & A at the end of the day.
 
Nitefly said:
I don't think that necessarily precludes the money spent on them being invested in a better way.

You really could argue this to the death both sides. Ultimately, you either like them or you don't.
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I'm aware of that; but the inference in his post was purely anti-monarchy, and the stipulation that they are a waste of money.

However in this case lets look at the numbers. The civil list is £7.9m. Taken as an investment, that £7.9m for a return of £210m (the 2010 Crown estate surplus budget)? Where else can you get a percentage increase like that?
 
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