I don’t care how much “real” power they have. If you actually believe in a meritocracy how can you defend someone getting a job because of their lineage, attending real political events and ceremonies and influencing policies that way? And let’s not forget that in many cases, they ACTUALLY have institutional powers they just don’t use because they don’t have to, the institutions serve their interests all the same.

Sorry for the pointless rant. It just happens way too often.

  • PolandIsAStateOfMind@lemmygrad.ml
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    1 month ago

    Note how in historiography being powerless is actually THE heaviest accusation historians can have towards a monarch. But it change when the current ruling class coming onto the scene and into power, then it’s suddenly became just a cute tradition.

  • Sodium_nitride@lemmygrad.ml
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    1 month ago

    Not only do most of these monarchs have actual institutional power, but they also typically derieve incredible wealth and income at taxpayer’s expense. But liberals love parasites, so this is not too surprising.

  • big_spoon@lemmygrad.ml
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    1 month ago

    they’re not so “powerless” i mean, in spain, a communist rapper was jailed for “insulting the crown” or something like that, because he criticized the corruption of the king

    • lorty@lemmygrad.mlOP
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      1 month ago

      And not only that but the governor general still has that same constitutional power.

  • Fox [any, she/her]@vegantheoryclub.org
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    1 month ago

    I live in a country with a monarchy, we are conditioned from a young age to respect them through both school and the media. It is instilled from childhood and habits that are so longlasting are incredibly hard to break. Even though I started to move towards leftism as a teen it still took me another good few years to properly realise how fucked the monarchy was.

  • deathtoreddit@lemmygrad.ml
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    1 month ago

    Nothing new for liberals… when their power is threatened by the working class of wage labor, from the 1848 revolution and around it, they critically support every reactionary force against them, in case they rise up…

    The bourgeois republic triumphed. On its side stood the aristocracy of finance, the industrial bourgeoisie, the middle class, the petty bourgeois, the army, the lumpen proletariat organized as the Mobile Guard, the intellectual lights, the clergy, and the rural population. On the side of the Paris proletariat stood none but itself. More than three thousand insurgents were butchered after the victory, and fifteen thousand were deported without trial.

    Remember especially, in monarchist countries like those in Europe, many capitalists that derived from the pre-capitalist landed aristocracy and aristocracy of finance in feudalism, besides the monarchy, still predominate…

  • Trudge [Comrade]@lemmygrad.ml
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    1 month ago

    The only thing I respect about the current Austrian society is that they fully eliminated royalty and nobility and made the titles illegal.

    Germans, Dutch, British, et al prance around acting like they’re democracies when they’re feudal holdover states. They’re not even liberal democracies imho. South America and parts of Africa are much more advanced in that regard, without even mentioning proletarian democracies.

  • amemorablename@lemmygrad.ml
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    1 month ago

    I’m trying to compare in my mind since I did not grow up in such a society and I think being in the US, the closest comparison is unlearning the founding fathers and constitution worship. In that context, there’s almost this magical significance applied to these elements of the country, as if they discovered and created something wholly original that has never been done before or since. When all they did was create one of the most brutal colonies in human history.

    So you prob have to demystify it in a similar fashion, point out how much brutality these royals have been behind and continue to be behind. That there’s nothing cute about family gossip or ceremony for such people.

  • 小莱卡@lemmygrad.ml
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    1 month ago

    Is it even true that they are “powerless”? Like in spain the king is still the state max authority lol

  • Finiteacorn@lemmygrad.ml
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    1 month ago

    idk if they really did actually not have any legal/institutional/political power like most of they do i wouldnt really care any more than i care about any rich asshole and their family. Having ceremonial positions be hereditary is not crazy and if people wanna keep those traditions around i dont see the problem again as long as the very real powers that many of the still have today get taken away and it really was just ceremonial like that king in Bolivia for example. I think the real problem is that most people dont know how much power these people actually have.