The Royal Follies

The Monday morning Lew Rockwell list of fear mongering essays had one about Meghan and Harry.

Talk about the unusual. For those of you who do not know just what Lew Rockwell stands for, it’s a list of fear and loathing essays, from around the blog world, on how the United States and Europe, are about to die from their over indulgence in Covid jabs,  Russia/Ukraine, climate change, recession, inflation and downright corruption. So what is an essay about Meghan and Harry doing in this mix? Good question. That is why I read it.

 Firstly, the headline, is this: Meghan Markle Was ‘Narcissistic Sociopath’ Who Wanted to Be Rejected by Royals, Former Aides Say. The article is from that high end tabloid, the Daily Beast. The tabloid has a Royalist column, written by a couple of royalist watchers, Tim Teeman and Tom Sykes. It is worth the read for its entertainment value. (Tim and Tom also need an editor, but I digress.)

Though the headline screams out at us that this piece is gossip, like all gossip, it is grounded in a background story. Though the Harry and Meghan story may seem like much ado about nothings, I will ask you to look at the bigger picture.

Harry and Meghan are the poster children for why parents need to be adults. I am not referring to them as parents, but their parents. Especially crucial here are their daddy issues. It is the why of  Harry’s confusion, and the reason for Meghan’s chip on her shoulder. Indeed, you might say their issues with their daddies make Harry and Meghan perfect for one another.

Mostly, we will look at Harry. I will deal with Meghan’s issue later. Her issues are close to my own.

When the Harry and Meghan story developed, I shook my head. A prince marrying a Hollywood actress, and a divorcé, well, there is trouble ahead. Nonetheless, royal watchers were hopeful. Royal watchers can be naive. They can give you the lineages, but they fail when it comes to the reality that crowned heads, and their families, are human beings that can make a mess of things. They also are angered when one uses a royal as an example of not-so-exemplary, behavior. (See my September 13 essay) The late queen had the highest form of exemplary conduct, but had two sons, Charles and Andrew, who needed a good whupping. (Her other two children did not.)

Charles did not get a whupping, because his family had their fingers in his pie. Nonetheless,  Charles’ first son is truly a prince in every sense of the word. Ditto his wife. They are the future the royal family must have if it is to continue.

Andrew is another matter altogether. His children, however, seem rather grounded.

Back to Harry and Meghan. They have a conundrum. Neither has been trained to do anything really useful. Like run a company or charity, or even organize their own lives. Harry did organize his autobiography, but now he wants to walk that back. Ergo, my judgement call is that they are another set of know-it-all young people, that desperately need guidance.

So what is Harry’s issue? Both history and mythology/psychology give us answers.

Adolescent boys are quite vulnerable, and that was Harry when his father and mother divorced. His father then kept company with the other woman. Then his mother died. Those of you who think children will get over their parent’s divorce, well, I offer Harry, Duke of Sussex, as exhibit A. (Meghan was 6 when her parents divorced.) Harry was, I suggest, disrupted in his growth at this point. Which is to say, emotionally, he did not get past this point. It has been suggested by others that, to this day, he does not like Camilla. He tolerates her, but that does not mean they have a healthy relationship. Indeed, it is almost impossible for a son to have a normal relationship with “the other woman.”

Royal parents, throughout the ages, have negatively affected their children, and this toxin spreads out to the general public. Let’s look at a couple of examples.

Henry II had a father that was a philanderer. And, like his father, he married a woman that was older. Henry’s mother, Matilda, had been previously married to an emperor. She was a widow of 26 when she married Geoffrey of Anjou, who was 15. Like father, like son, Henry married Eleanor at 19, when she was 30. Do the math, and you see that both men married women that were 11 years their senior.

But wait, there’s more. Both men had offspring outside of their marriages. Geoffrey had two that he recognized, and Henry had three. What other children were born from their sleeping around, is not known. Geoffrey, however, did not have huge issues with his three legit sons. Not so Henry; his sons out and out rebelled against him. And Eleanor took their side. What does that tell you?

Can you imagine the headlines if this were today’s news? Did Richard, Geoffrey and John rebel against their father because Henry couldn’t keep his pants zipped? True, people were certainly different back in the 12th century, because they had different expectations. On the other hand, the marriage vows extracted by the Church were no different: husbands and wives were to be faithful. As in not sleep around. Women, queens, were better at keeping this commandment and vow. But why, if the Church was stricter in those days, why tolerate the obvious philandering of kings? One, huge reason, not to tolerate adultery is that it does effect the children. Anyone that says it doesn’t is naive. Therefore, it is a question that floats around in my brain, that if the Church would have made a point with kings keeping their vows, would our world be more advanced because there would be fewer side trips into conflicts that effect entire regions and civilizations?

The 100 Years War is a prime example of the church failing to do what ist was supposed to do. If the Church had stuck to its principles about those 7 degrees of consanguinity, there would have been no war between England and France about who should be king. There would have been no disruption  of the lives of thousands of people because all those cousins with the same grandparents, would not have existed. The king of England, Edward III, would not be able to say, “…the king of France was my grandpa, so I should be king.” There would be no Saint Jeanne d’Arc, who was brutalized and murdered, by the English church, for the audacity of wanting her French king on the French throne.

What I say here is that there are royal follies because their watchdog, their Church,  is asleep at the front door. It is, in my most humble opinion, the reason why atheism and postmodernism, with its anti deity stance, has a huge foothold in our civilization. To give that reason a name, it is Hypocrisy.

Marriage was, at one time, a private affair. Indeed, among the middle class and working class, it always was. Monarchs were a different matter. Their marriages were for alliances. Which didn’t always work out so well. See the above regarding the 100 Years War. In the beginning, the monarchs were spread out fairly thin, and their practice was polygamy. In that era, smaller states wanted to be connected to the big states, like Egypt. Sisters and daughters of the smaller kingdoms, were sent regularly to the Egyptian Pharaohs. This is why, to this day, many people can claim a genetic kinship with Ramses II. Any guy who has fathered over 100 children will have many descendants.

Ramses and Sargon, and other kings of the first civilizations had no troubles with royal follies.Their priests were not asleep. The priesthood in ancient states had their own power base. In Sumer, the priest called the king out on New Year’s day, to face them, and the people, at the temple. The king had to humble himself and answer questions about his actions over the preceding year. I would love to see that happen in our modern world. But the English were so full of their own folly, they made the king the head of their church.

Arghhh!

The rest of Western Europe, with few monarchs, has n

o device for bringing a monarch to task. That is a shame. Because once upon a time, a pope could force a king to stand in the snow, and wait.

Charles the king, and Charles the head of his church, has a vested interest in not asking questions of his troubled son, and his wife. It would be embarrassing. The world would know that a prince suffered terribly, whilst he kept up a good face. It would tell the world that divorce does indeed effect children. Moderns don’t like to hear that. They might have to grow up and learn to live with an imperfect spouse. That might be way too much to ask of a modern person. Because many moderns can be just like Harry: stuck at a younger age.

Royals are people that suffer just like the rest of us. And we non royals engage in our own set of follies. And do dumb stuff, that in turn, makes others suffer. No one can throw the first stone. But we can learn from the follies, if we’re awake.

Stay awake.