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A Perfectly Pointless Hypothesis on a Subject about Which No Sane Person Cares Anyway [1]
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Date: 2022-09-19
Like many in and out of the Anglophone world, I’ve about had my fill of Her Majesty’s farewell rituals.
As to why so many, even those no longer Her Majesty’s subjects, are required to see their airwaves filled with the pomp and circumstance of her official passing, well, as Sir John Lennon once said, I’ve a theory about that…
In August of 1997, the world was shocked to hear of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, in a car wreck under the streets of Paris. Her celebrity and controversial history, her notably young age, the circumstances of her death, the unsure and inelegant response of Britain’s royal family to the news, all combined to make Diana Death Week a worldwide media phenomenon. Every television network, print outlet, wire service, et al, sent whatever stars or stringers could be spared to London and Scotland to feed us The Latest News.
For a solid week, it was difficult to find a TV screen not occupied by video of piles of flowers and teddy bears and somber correspondents asking if the queen would ever acknowledge her onetime daughter-in-law’s existence and its unfortunate end.
It was a non-controversy simply made for television, and television, as it will, obliged with its undivided attention. The entirety of the situation, from the hyper-real banality of Diana’s demise to Queen Elizabeth’s discomfort and media-mediated comeuppance, was perhaps the perfect expression of man biting dog for a spot on the front page. Or the top of every CNN hour.
It was tawdry. It was excessive. And, once begun, it was gloriously inevitable, however embarrassing.
I even thought at the time, “Good Lord, what are they going to have to do when Her Majesty herself actually kicks?”
Well, now we know. Days of pageantry, reported by the lead anchors of every network. Endless iterations of the details of a life already excessively documented. I’m disappointed the networks haven’t hired out to compose theme music. Where’s Henry Purcell when you need him, damn it?
No one I know agrees with my hypothesis. “She’s the longest-reigning monarch; of course they’re going to make a deal.” “Well, she designed all the rituals herself.” “It’s the Trumps trying to distract.”
No, I don’t think so. Meself, I think the world’s media realized a quarter century ago just how too far they’d gone with the Diana business and knew, even then, that they were going to have to top the act when Her Actual Majesty finally missed the final snooze button.
So that’s it, Crashing Vor’s utterly pointless media analysis of a royal funeral 25 years following another, almost royal funeral, and comprehensive answer to the question, “Why in heaven’s name can’t I see the next part of Ken Burns’ new bit?”
Just one Vor’s opinion. Keep whatever and carry on.
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