Why is the Queen so popular when politicians struggle? While there are lots of reasons, I was struck by one as I watched the second season of Netflix’s The Crown. Now, the rest of this article will have some spoilers in it, although since it’s historically based, I don’t feel too guilty sharing them. Nevertheless, you have been warned.
In episode 5 we meet John Grigg, also known as Lord Altrincham. He called Queen Elizabeth II a “priggish schoolgirl,” and generally criticized her and the monarchy for being too upper class and disconnected from the regular people.
To keep reading, click here: Queen Elizabeth Shows How a True Leader Reacts to Criticism
Not to mention that it’s not even like she can be fired (easily, without revolution). She did not have to listen to him at all! Sad when a monarch has better management skills than elected leaders who are supposed to be serving us.
I realize that the Crown is fictionalized, but every episode I’m like, “you are so awesome!!!!!” She had a super hard job and she rocked it.
She’s still rocking it, actually.
I’m not quite as hopeful for Charles.
Charles won’t be as good as Elizabeth, but I think William will knock it out of the park.
William is incapable of accepting criticism. He is always right – the exact opposite of the Queen as illustrated by this article.
He is also lazy and completely blind to his extreme privilege – a bad combination in itself.
Charles works hard and learns from his mistakes even if he isn’t particularly popular.
The Queen has no real duties, but her own sense of duty seems to be all about setting a good example and never, ever embarrassing the kingdom, and she seems to do that quite well. Certainly when confronted with much less polite criticism (the Sex Pistols song which called her an insulting name) she had the good sense to remain silent, allowing the entire world to see that the singer was simply being a horse’s ass.
As for Charles, he will probably never be king, because Her Majesty feels he embarrassed the country with his extramarital affair. Why else would the Queen, who is over 80, not have retired by now?
A more recent example of the Queen’s reacting to criticism was after the death of Princess Di, when she made the very wise decision to join the public in mourning, instead of remaining sequestered in private. On a totally unrelated point, I don’t think it’s accurate to refer to Harry’s fiancée as “Black.” She is — at most — “half-Black,” in that her Mother is African-American and her father Anglo.
I never quite understood the harsh criticism of Prince Charles.
Anyway, The Crown is fabulous. I did however read a disappointing article about the creator of The Crown, Peter Morgan where he said the following:
THE Queen is a ‘woman of limited intelligence’ and the Royal Family is ‘like a mutating virus’ says the creator of the widely popular series The Crown.
For me, it’s that he comments publicly on issues I don’t think he knows anything about.