George Orwell explained it best in the end of his novel Nineteen Eighty-four when his character Winston Smith declares his love for Big Brother. It is the same with whatever Canadian love there supposedly is for the British monarchy. We know it is fiction but in that fiction, people find stability. They believe.
And it is unwise to challenge beliefs of that nature without offering an exchange. It would be like denying a person their strong religious beliefs without offering an alternative. If you deny them that cross, you had better offer another crutch. While Orwell was hardly the first to claim you needed to demolish someone’s beliefs to replace them, the mistake would be to not replace them.
And here we are celebrating 60 years of supposed Canadian servility to a now 85-year old Queen Elizabeth II. Her mother lived to be over 100 so we do not anticipate having to replace her right away.
And nobody wants to rush replacing her with Charlie and his lovely wife Camilla. The idea that Special Branch (the people charged with protecting the royals) has some bloke ready to pop old Charlie if anything happens to the Queen is so much balderdash. And the fiction that Billie and Kate will follow rapidly into the monarchial role is strictly that, fiction and fairy tales.
What Canadians need to realize is that the monarchy in Canada is about 100 years past its ‘best before’ date. It has become a noose around the neck of reform. We can hardly consider guillotining the monarchy without knowing what will replace it. It is not a band-aid to reform. It is a major step to a better future.
Step one has to be a decision to have a constitutional assembly. This has to have representatives from every part of the country. They should be elected. They should be allowed the time for deliberations, consultation with their area, access to expertise and at all times they should be free to review any and all aspects of our nationhood.
But it cannot be open-ended. A reasonable time limit needs to be set. At that time, their decisions can be subject to a vote by the Canadian people. Options should require a majority vote. If at that time, people choose the monarchy, it is their free choice. It will not be something that Big Brother decrees.
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Copyright 2012 © Peter Lowry
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