The Wikipedia monster gleefully tears down the future Queen of England

[nableezy]

But you're happy with people quoting a full post of mine just to say they didn't read it? (but obviously did, they're just not willing or even able to defend the rather unpalatable views they seem to have, when applied to the topic of this thread)

I’d be seriously surprised if anybody made it all the way through your posts. At least for myself, I get through a few sentences, detect a certain level of hysteria, and then scroll down furiously.

[Kraken]

Kraken, why did I bring up the Daily Mail? Because I knew you'd come up with the most ridiculous crap to defend its vacuous tabloid gossip. And in doing so, show just how selective you are with your deranged rants.

The Daily Mail, let's remind ourselves, has a front-page header like this:


A whole damn section specially for 'royals'. And clearly not 'news', since that would go in the the news section. Nope. 99% vacuous gossip. Sure, being the Mail, they like to pretend they are engaging in serious reporting while they witter on about whatever nonsense they have come up with, or tut-tut about other media peddling the same conspiracy theories they insist on writing clickbait headlines about just to make sure everyone sees them.

There is a serious debate to be had about the way the media handled this story. There is a serious debate to be had about how utterly fucked up Wikipedia was to engage with it. You are however in no position to participate usefully in such a debate, because you are using it as an excuse (or 'coatrack', if you prefer) to rant on about anything and everything you hate , while denying the obvious role the British media - which includes the Mail, whether you like it or not - has to play in perpetuating the nonsense. They - and the Mail in particular - tell their readers, daily, that the 'royals' are special. They tell their readers that anything and everything they say or do, no matter how trivial, is worth writing about. They feed them headlines. They feed them photographs. They feed them gossip. And when they run out of anything else to say, they feed off each other's gossip and conspiracy-peddling, so they can repeat it while condemning their competitors for printing it. The Mail is the embodiment of hypocrisy in this regard, which is presumably why you defend it so vehemently. You have so much in common.

This is all well and good. But where is your proof? The one single Mail piece you offered up here, was one hundred percent factual and a reasonable take reflecting popular opinion. So you sure got lucky finding that 1% when that was presumably the very last thing you had gone looking for, right? A Mail Royal section piece on a story that exists not because the tabloids wished it Into being, but the more responsible media Wikipedia loves to cite, acting on the all important socials, wanted this to become a massive story.

The Mail has a Royal section! So what? The UK has a monarchy and people are interested in it. They, shock horror, like it. You clearly hate that, but it's a fact of life. People like you love to make sweeping claims about what is in such a section, but you need back it up. And you certainly don’t seem to have read the supposedly better newspapers in a very long time.

This media circus certainly didn't come into being via the Royal correspondents of the major British newspapers, of which the Mail is a part, a major part, much to your obvious disgust. Correspondants who, unlike Wikipedia and its beloved RS RS RS GNG GNG GNG such as EJ Dickson, respected Kate's privacy and didn't use this toxic social media slime pool as a vehicle to launch into anti-Monarchy tirades that fly in the face of established fact.

No, this widespread sloshing bucket of conspiracy clap trap didn't dent the public trust in the monarchy one bit. Proven fact. Never in doubt to anyone who knows the man and woman in the street here. But to a Republican like yourself, my word, do they hate this with a passion. How dare they. I'll show them. Click click click.

This is why I picked you up on it. Why I thought it hilarious that you would randomly bring a Mail story here when you clearly hadn't even read it. And don't seem to give a damn that any serious debate on the role the media played here, would include the fact countless outlets Wikipedia considers ultra reliable, these days have "Internet Culture" or "Social Media" correspondents whose sole reason for being is making sure the clicks flying around InstaTikTwatter can be monetized. Because they're not making any money from their reporting otherwise. Calling it culture or media doesn't make the fact it is gossip. It is conspiracy peddling. They all do it now. Welcome to the world, sweet prince.

Like a lot of people, especially on the left, you're only angry because where the Mail does venture into the area of the gossip tabloid, they're far better at it than their competitors. Much bigger articles, way more factual content. Exclusive content. Way more pictures even. Look how mad you get. A newspaper publishing pictures! A newspaper publishing multiple articles every day! Arrrgggh!

It was amazing how long it took Wikipedia editors to understand that if you outright ban a newspaper because it's allegedly totally fabricated, you can't then gleefully use this exclusive content when it appears in a different newspaper with attribution. Attributon is what it says. It is not independent reporting. I think that was when they got really mad, when they realized how much what the Mail says matters to other newspapers, and why that might be.

These other titles aren't making money from real news because unlike the Mail, they won't lower themselves to writing about what the people are interested in reading from a newspaper. Just like it was the Mail who pioneered hiring a female editor with a female stable of writers to write about the things women wanted to read about in a female branded section. Femail. All that, back when it was normal for women readers to be fed knitting patterns and cookery tips, on the rare occasion they were thought of at all. Femail covered the serious and the silly. Try finding that history on Wikipedia. It's not there. Because people like you are long on bias, short on fact.

I know my biases. Which is why I make sure to back up what I say with facts and reasoned analysis. It's a pity you ignore it.

Ignored it even when I specifically quoted a reliable source above (the inews piece) that makes it as plain as it can be that the Mail, certainly their Royal section, are the very last people who can be blamed for any of this. But here you are, trying to do just that. Calling them out by name. You're the one who COATRACKED my thread. Don't complain now I'm taking your interruption and running with it to places you don't want to go. The real world.

It's the world of fantasy to suggest the Royals are popular even now, as we enter a majority non-Christian era with trust in politics (authority) at epic lows, because somehow the Mail and specifically the Mail brainwashed them. It's laughable. It's the left who love to use the media to brainwash the people. It's as old as time. Doesn't wash here. As the popularity of the Mirror and their role here (literally coming up with their own conspiracy theories!) attests.

[Kraken]

But you're happy with people quoting a full post of mine just to say they didn't read it? (but obviously did, they're just not willing or even able to defend the rather unpalatable views they seem to have, when applied to the topic of this thread)

I’d be seriously surprised if anybody made it all the way through your posts. At least for myself, I get through a few sentences, detect a certain level of hysteria, and then scroll down furiously.

I'm surprised how often someone says they didn't read a post of mine, but.....here's a quoted bit from the very bottom that I want to make a sarcastic comment about. At least you might be doing what you say you do and probably are ignoring the whole thing. Not sure if that's consistent with you asking me to just say less. Unless.....

[AndyTheGrump]

Anyone else notice the glaring contradiction in Kraken's rants? One moment he's telling us how secure the monarchy is, and how the British people (or at least, the English, since Kate is only 'the future Queen of England' apparently?) are behind it 100%. Yet the next moment he's babbling on about how anyone and everyone is attacking it, as if it is going to collapse any minute due to Wikipedia publishing a page full of crap they got from the (non-Mail) tabloids..

Nothing new in this of course. Standard fare for right-wing appeals-to-emotion never-mind-logic politicking. U.S. readers will have seen the same thing with Trump's rants about Biden, who is a doddering senile fool one minute, and an evil mastermind the next. Doesn't make sense, but it doesn't have to. Don't think. Just hate.

As for Kraken's pretended feminism, I am beginning to wonder if he's ever actually met a woman...

[Kraken]

he's babbling on about how anyone and everyone is attacking it, as if it is going to collapse any minute due to Wikipedia publishing a page full of crap they got from the (non-Mail) tabloids..

OK, well, we can see about you claim I have done.

This is where you prove it. Where did I say these things?

I don't normally engage in this kind of thing, but since you did it to me earlier in the thread for the crime of making reasonable inferences from your own words, it seems only fair to hold you to this standard when you appear to be blatantly misrepresenting my views to draw conclusions you wouldn't otherwise be able to support.

[AndyTheGrump]

Reading Kraken's rants once (or at least skimming them) is hard enough. Now he wants me to go back and read them again? Optimistic...

[Kraken]

The Mail is the embodiment of hypocrisy in this regard, which is presumably why you defend it so vehemently.

I defend it because of how often it is that the attacks it is subjected to are devoid of any semblance of balance. To the point they appear to be nakedly left wing in origin. That would appear to be a major problem for an encyclopedia that claims to be neutral, but has often been accused of a left wing bias. And whose defenders often dare to claim that if it is there, it is merely because reality has a left wing bias. They're reflecting media bias in general. Pffft.

I just Googled "Middleton shame" to see what the latest stories are.

Up popped the Mirror with an exclusive interview with the former BBC Royal Correspondent Jenny Bond (T-H-L) who is naturally quite disgusted by what's been going on.

Now royal expert Jennie Bond has urged online trolls to 'hang their heads in shame' following Kate's brave admission, arguing the video message should bring embarassment to those who callously spread rumours.

Slamming the online circus, the expert told the Mirror: "Both the Princess and Prince William have taken an appalling amount of flak from the cesspit of social media trolls peddling vicious, unfounded rumours on the worldwide web. Those conspiracy theorists should hang their heads in shame.

Powerful stuff. Jenny Bond is a hugely respected journalist in Britain. The embodiment of our broad support for and trust in the Monarchy. As the Mirror would know.

So it was of course freaking hilarious to me to have so recently learned that the tabloid press hasn't just been giving a platform to these trolls, in the case of the Mirror, their own journalists, specifically "Ruby Naldrett, a senior social media editor at the Daily Mirror and Daily Star" were literally inventing thieir own conspiracy theories on Twitter.

Which then went viral, and sparked a fresh series of further reporting in the media Wikipedia deems reliable, all geared to debunking this batshit theory. Presumably because of who had posted them, a journalist. Which of course all simply amplified this toxic idea that Kate's photo was a fake.

So it was perhaps just a little bit hypocritical of the Mirror not to tell Jenny Bond of this little minor detail.

To your absolute horror no doubt, while the hook of this piece in the Mirror's "/news/royals" url section is this eminently newsworthy interview, the article is padded with the usual archive pictures and links and background information which serves only to serve more links. And we know why that is, according to the inews piece I quoted above.....

I hope this social media hit is not celebrated as good practice by Naldrett’s employer, Reach, a publisher which seems fixated on traffic at all costs.

So come on. Now is the time for you to admit that, in this case certainly, as you made a decision about what to say about the Mail, singling it out as "the embodiment", you really did rather overlook what the Mirror is guilty of. Capable of. Literally actually does. That is no surprise to most people in Britain. This is why the Mirror sells one copy to three (four?) Mail's. And I rather think you did that because of your anti-Monarchy sentiment, and thus you might have a certain affinity for the Mirror, one of the few left wing newspapers the UK has.

And as we know. The Mail is straight up banned by Wikipedia. The Mirror, merely discouraged. You can use it for certain things. You can trust them. Even though nobody disputes it is a tabloid. People in the real world do dispute this tag for the Mail, and rightly, so given a comparison of the two. Not many, but only because the word tabloid is in of itself quite a loose term. As I said above, npr seemed to think the BBC and Telegraph were tabloids for carrying front page stories about Kategate.

If not, by all means, let's see an example from the Mail's Royal section of a similar level of astounding hypocrisy (fairly described perhaps as utterly deplorable lack of journalistic integrity).

[AndyTheGrump]

Skimmed it. Not worth responding to. Too silly.

[Vigilant]

Time for a word limit for Crow.

[yasslay]

I don't think I've seen such an unhinged rant before.

[rhindle]

Time for a word limit for Crow.

The Mods should add a recipe of something to the end of all their posts.

[The Blue Newt]

Time for a word limit for Crow.

The Mods should add a recipe of something to the end of all their posts.

That Doe Snot make any sense.

[rhindle]

Time for a word limit for Crow.

The Mods should add a recipe of something to the end of all their posts.

That Doe Snot make any sense.

I was in the moment about how people who give out recipes online usually have a long drawn out story before they show what the recipe is.

[The Blue Newt]

Time for a word limit for Crow.

The Mods should add a recipe of something to the end of all their posts.

That Doe Snot make any sense.

I was in the moment about how people who give out recipes online usually have a long drawn out story before they show what the recipe is.

Back in the dear dead days of Usenet, starting from alt.folklore.urban, and spreading like an inkstain, that was a deliberate strategy. Somebody posts crap, you respond with irrelevance. Recipes were a favorite.

This was called “doe snot,” probably after some long-forgotten typo. But AFU liked to rejigger words; the people you see at your employer are “cow-orkers”, who often type mishy-phenations. Mighta been deliberate from the get-go.

[Elinruby]

Usually when people say "say less" it means they already agreed with you or they’re happy with what you said. But here the meaning is literal. Say less.

But you're happy with people quoting a full post of mine just to say they didn't read it? (but obviously did, they're just not willing or even able to defend the rather unpalatable views they seem to have, when applied to the topic of this thread)

Or people posting random links to the Mail and offering so little by way of words to go with it, you literally can't tell what their intended point is, much less if it has any relevance to the topic of this thread.

You're fine with that? Just trying to get a read on why you're focusing on me with this moderator-like opinion. Sometimes it's better to say more, lest people make assumptions about your intent.

No, Crow, I really didn't read it.

[Bezdomni]

Back in the day, I worked for a bookstore owned by a Libertarian who was happy to make money off folks buying copies of The Anarchist's Cookbook. Still, I'm not sure it would be wise to encourage Kraken to heave the Hafgufa family recipe for Ikasumi-tov cocktails up into his signature...

[greenday61892]

I mean, when is it time to say "enough is enough"?

[AndyTheGrump]

I rather like Vigilant's idea that Crow/Kraken should have a word limit, but rather than just preventing him posting more, we should delete words at random from his earlier posts when he exceeds it. To add to the fun, we don't tell him what the limit is...

[Kraken]

Skimmed it. Not worth responding to. Too silly.

I get it. Some people just don't like to admit when they made a mistake. A really embarrassing mistake. Coming in here derailing a perfectly good thread making big claims about the Mail, specifically the Mail, and utterly failing to back them up. I gave you every chance to just walk away and let the thread get back on track, but you kept pushing. So I pushed back. Just a tiny little bit. And you folded.

You said something you thought made sense, perhaps genuinely believed, then realized just how wrong you were when presented with the cold hard truth of the matter. Your beliefs disproven with a three second Google search and a call back to something that had already been revealed.

I mean, I knew the Mirror were staffed by some vile pieces of shit, which sadly comes with the territory of left wing class warfare, but even I was shocked to see how hypocritical they had been. How utterly used Jenny Bond must feel feel now.

You were so confident. From such great heights, come such great falls.

Let there be no more of this.

I don't like humiliating people. But I'll happily do it when it needs to be done.

[greenday61892]

What's the equivalent of "he just loves the sound of his own voice" for ridiculous walls of text?

[tarantino]

Kraken, you need to dial it down.

[yasslay]

Are we still talking about the Daily Fail here? I mean, come on, tabloids are the epitome of idiocy, but surely we know better than to allow ourselves to be consumed by it. To be controlled by it.

Yeah. That’s right.

We. Don’t.

All your bases are belong to us.

Insert quip here.

What's the equivalent of "he just loves the sound of his own voice" for ridiculous walls of text?

We could call it a thoughtcrime for dramatic effect.
“Looks like you’ve had a bit too much to think!”

[Bezdomni]

“Looks like you’ve had a bit too much to think!”

Thinking, after all, is good for your liver, though it can pickle your spleen.

[Vigilant]

I don't like humiliating people. But I'll happily do it when it needs to be done.

lol

[Elinruby]

Who the hell is Jenny Bond? No, don't answer that. I am tempted to just respond to your posts with other irrelevancies. First up, Jack Ward (T-H-L), which is at least interesting if also irrelevant.

[Bezdomni]

Who the hell is Jenny Bond?

[Ron Lybonly]

Usually when people say "say less" it means they already agreed with you or they’re happy with what you said. But here the meaning is literal. Say less.

But you're happy with people quoting a full post of mine just to say they didn't read it? (but obviously did, they're just not willing or even able to defend the rather unpalatable views they seem to have, when applied to the topic of this thread)

Or people posting random links to the Mail and offering so little by way of words to go with it, you literally can't tell what their intended point is, much less if it has any relevance to the topic of this thread.

You're fine with that? Just trying to get a read on why you're focusing on me with this moderator-like opinion. Sometimes it's better to say more, lest people make assumptions about your intent.

Kraken, you articulate some interesting things but your posts are very long. In terms of engagement here, I recommend one of two approaches:

1. You make your one long post, then leave it at that.

• If it's good, you don't need to argue back and forth, especially with additional long posts.

• Right now, you pursue diminishing returns too far and with really long posts. However, you've already articulated your main points well, so those long posts don't add much; they just weary the reader.

or

2. Volley back and forth with others using short posts. Use a tennis ball, not a medicine ball.

This is not a critique of your ideas but rather a realpolitik view of persuading others on message boards like this one. You can't persuade others if they don't read your posts.

You enjoy long form writing and you're good at it. Besides posting here, I suggest you consider also starting a blog or writing for money.

[Elinruby]

Who the hell is Jenny Bond?

TL;DR. Too English for me. I realize he can't help it, but still. link

[yasslay]

<snip>

You enjoy long form writing and you're good at it. Besides posting here, I suggest you consider also starting a blog or writing for money.

[Ron Lybonly]

Also, Kraken, 90+% of readers here don't care much about the Daily Mail and other British tabloids.

We're either Brits that read something else or else we're not Brits and we really don't care.

This subform is about biographies on Wikipedia. Maybe adjourn the British tabloid critique to the Off Topic subforum.

[Ron Lybonly]

Also, Kraken, 90+% of readers here don't care much about the Daily Mail and other British tabloids.

We're either Brits that read something else or else we're not Brits and we really don't care.

This subform is about biographies on Wikipedia. Maybe adjourn the British tabloid critique to the Off Topic subforum.

Oops, Kraken, I see you didn't start the Daily Mail stuff. Well, my comments still apply to the topic.

[Kraken]

Thank you for the kind words and excellent points Ron.

[Ming]

The thing in the end is that, even in a book length biography at any distance from the present, the whole episode, cancer and all, is maybe a chapter. In WP it should end up as maybe a few paragraphs at most. The whole "we don't have to worry about running out of space" seems to perennially override "maybe, but you still need to edit for length."

[rnu]

[Alalch Emis]

Hey, redirects are cheap, remember?

[Kraken]

It's funny, the things that sometimes don't occur to news editors, such as the (hopefully incorrect) inference here that American companies cashed in on Kategate by hiring Kate impersonators for corporate events. Not that the other likely explanations for this uptick feel any less icky.

How did you become a Catherine impersonator?
It was 12 years ago. I was working as a waitress, and everybody just kept saying how much I looked like her. It was around the time of the wedding. I didn’t even think look-alikes were real or that you could make money doing it. Eventually, I sent my picture off to a few agents and I got my first job a week later. I quit waitressing.
.....
What does a typical gig look like for you? Do you do a lot of parties?
There are a lot of corporate events. There are a lot of American companies that will bring people over, I suppose top sellers or whatever. They’ll come to London and we’ll often do meet and greets at their welcome dinners, because, you know, you’re not going to get Kate and William to rock up at your events.
......
Does this line of work ever make you feel unsafe?
There are occasions where somebody can get a little bit crazy or they can follow you home. It’s usually if I’ve been on a job in London and somebody spots you and they think that you are real. They will follow you as far as they can. I’ve switched trains a couple of times before just to kind of shake somebody.
......
Has the intrigue in the past few weeks been good for business?
Usually when Kate is out of the limelight, like when she was pregnant and she was really sick, work would kind of die off, I think, out of respect for her to make sure that she was OK. That’s what I expected to happen this time. It’s been really strange that it’s kind of gone the other way.

[rnu]

[...]

[...]
Does this line of work ever make you feel unsafe?
There are occasions where somebody can get a little bit crazy or they can follow you home. It’s usually if I’ve been on a job in London and somebody spots you and they think that you are real. They will follow you as far as they can. I’ve switched trains a couple of times before just to kind of shake somebody.
[...]

Seriously? The fact that she walks around alone and gets on a train doesn't tip people off, she has to switch trains to shake them?

[Midsize Jake]

So... I guess if I were to try to sum up what Mr. Kraken is (voluminously) saying in this thread in as few words as possible, it would be something like, "Kate Middleton deserves privacy despite being a Royal, and indeed the fact that she's a Royal as well as the whole question of whether or not a monarchy should even exist in the UK should both be treated as tangential issues at best; and, along with Wikipedia, which isn't following or respecting its own rules, the American media is just as guilty of privacy-denial and mishandling of the situation as the British media, if not more so."

Also, I'd say this whole business with the Daily Mail is just his usual defense of the Daily Mail, which for many of us is admittedly hard to stomach, but I suppose it isn't significantly worse than my own belief in the near-perfect accuracy of nearly everything published by Classic Toy Trains Magazine.

On the one hand, I agree that we're not going to resolve any of the basic questions involved — the media footprint of the British monarchy is simply too large to allow for "normal" treatment of anyone with a significant role in the Royal Family. On the other, I think we also have to consider that most of what Mr. Kraken is saying here, despite the enormous byte-count, is essentially correct — or at least morally defensible. It might seem irrational, but maybe that's only because the reality of the Modern Media Machine has made many of us cynical and fatalistic about such things.

Anyhoo, I don't like to lock threads, so I'm hoping we can all just try to simmer down on some of the non-Wikipedia-related aspects of this argument. As for the posting-length question(s), once I upgrade to the latest phpBB version, it should be technically possible to modify the board software a bit to impose an smaller byte-limit on an individual member, but of course I don't like modifying the board software except as a last resort. (Currently it's a global setting, set to 64 characters.) Whereas, locking a thread only takes a couple of mouse-clicks, so... you see the dilemma!

[The Blue Newt]

You look at stuff like this, and you wonder how anyone could take this Wiki thing seriously.

[Elinruby]

You look at stuff like this, and you wonder how anyone could take this Wiki thing seriously.

I wonder something, that's for sure. Look Kraken, I am profoundly uninterested in anything to do with the royals. Not just specifically your post. I am sure the whole British media circus was unbelievable. I am on record as telling the RM that it was embarrassing itself. But I'd be changing the channel on anything to do with a member of royalty regardless. Surely there are other things in the world. Yeokchon station (T-H-L)

[The Blue Newt]

You look at stuff like this, and you wonder how anyone could take this Wiki thing seriously.

I wonder something, that's for sure. Look Kraken, I am profoundly uninterested in anything to do with the royals. Not just specifically your post. I am sure the whole British media circus was unbelievable. I am on record as telling the RM that it was embarrassing itself. But I'd be changing the channel on anything to do with a member of royalty regardless. Surely there are other things in the world. Yeokchon station (T-H-L)

Crowken aside, if you need to have 50 redirects to something, that’s a rather long clue-by-four that something just might not belong in an encyclopedia.

[Elinruby]

Crowken aside, if you need to have 50 redirects to something, that’s a rather long clue-by-four that something just might not belong in an encyclopedia.

Uh yeah. I didn't know that was happening, but yes I'd agree it's a sign of an issue.

[Kraken]

Look Kraken, I am profoundly uninterested in anything to do with the royals.

I can believe that....

She signed up for this.

This was unprecedented and unpredictable.

Much of the least informed but most hurtful commentary features this tell tale phrase. as the non-tabloid non-British anti-Monarchist media try to shift blame away from where it rightly belongs, now that the horrible truth has been revealed.

The manner in which the palace went about handling this situation produced that situation.

False.

What the palace apparently decided to do here was to allow speculation to reach fever pitch over a period of weeks, release an obviously doctored photo of Middleton, blame her for the editing job, approve a grainy piece of bystander footage of her leaving a farm shop, and patch all of this up by trotting out a woman fighting cancer to sit alone on a bench and tell us, in the kindest words they could write for her, to leave her alone.

Absurdly false. Deeply harmful to Middleton. Further fueling conspiracy theories by claiming the "Windsor Farm Shop video" (a literal section heading on Wikipedia right now) was staged.

It’s important to remember that Middleton is not a celebrity in any normal sense. The Kardashians, people of perhaps equivalent fame, do not owe anybody any information about themselves, although they choose to give out a lot of it. But the royals do owe the public, in order to justify their existence.

The British public do not expect much less demand the intimate details of a Royal's most private life. This is a gross media invention, fueled by a deep ignorance or more likely a deep loathing of the uniquely British way of life.

There is a market for this stuff when it is stolen or otherwise obtained through deceptive or intrusive means, just like there's a market for illegal pornography that feeds the baser urges of humanity when thoughts of the victim are curiously absent.

If anyone can be fairly said to bring this level of intrusion upon themselves, or owe the public a certain level of transparency about things that are presented willingly via social media as aspects of their personal lives, it is the Kardashians etc. America's deeply fake proxy for a Monarchy.

The idea that a person like that could just disappear, and people wouldn’t wonder where she was, is ludicrous.

What's ludicrous is suggesting in any way that this was a dissappearance and nobody had any clue where she was or why she wasn't available to be gawked at, but this is what many have done, and which Wikipedia has amplified. Quite literally with their chosen article title, Where is Kate? It perhaps suitably frames this as some giant sick game of hide and seek, or worse, some kind of literal hunt.

The reason it’s intolerable for the individuals under its umbrella is that being in the royal family is built on a fundamental paradox. You are an individual person with the desire for and the right to a private life, but you are also, quite literally, public property.

Garbage.

These people are not public property, not even when occupying the literal post of head of state. This is a gross distortion of reality. The British public famously knew very little of the private life of Queen Elizabeth II. We know very little of the private life of the current King.

Barring prurient gossip and salacious rumour, we would know very little of Kate Middleton's most intimate private life, if the world still operated on the basis that the rightful bridge between the Royals and the public are the Royal correspondents of the British media.

Inherent in which has of course evolved a sensible yet unwritten give and take, given their role does come with a certain aspect of fluffier if not wholly vacuous public interest. This is a rather more cynically capitalist and deeply disingenuous relationship when occurring between America and the Kardashians of course.

But the world doesn't operate under those rules anymore. And Wikipedia has played its full part in that, on many fronts, in many ways. Up to and including it being being a uniquely American invention.

Wikipedia is in many ways a mirror of its editors, who are disproportionately American and anti-Monarchy. Generally lacking in maturity, class, and even simple common sense, much less common decency.

The world needs more accountability and sincere apologies when serious harm has been done. Wikipedia features little if not none of these two crucial components of a civilized society.

That same author/publication previously had this to say on the matter of the infamous "Windsor Farm Shop" incident.....

The whole sighting was at least somewhat staged, I’m certain. ...... The palace may even have tipped someone off to take a candid video of them. Nobody so far has come forward to confirm that they also saw Kate at this public shop, and no other pictures or footage have emerged, but that’s not to say that these people don’t exist. .....What are we doing? How have we arrived at the point that senior journalists are poking around in grocery stores outside Windsor to check on the status of heart-shaped wreaths? How has it got to this point?

How indeed.

The irresponsible behavior of journalists and outlets considered by Wikipedia to be of the highest reliability possible, have played their full part in this. All to feed the biases of people who begin from the presumption that she brought this on herself and the Royals are public property in every respect.

And yet still, she blames the Royals. She blames Kate. Anyone but herself or the public she willingly feeds conspiracy theories to and who so gladly ran with them.

This journalist who quite literally phoned the Winsdor Farm Shop on the Windsor Estate, apparently not not realizing (because she's fucking pig ignorant) the shop is run by the Palace and so does not, surprisingly, have free rein to answer her media questions, especially when they are predicated on this having been a staged event and thus trying to confirm the identity of someone she's suggesting is some kind of replicant lizard.

Not really a mistake the Daily Mail would make, and not the kind of Royal reporting they have engaged in here, unless anyone can show differently. If only Wikipedia would allow the world to know this outlet does exist and is a newspaper for the purposes of articles such as this, maybe Americans would not have such a deeply misinformed picture of British public life.

Instead they are given this journalist and her outlet. Her opinions as a "Life" correspondent. Someone incapable of getting their head around the fact this wasn't a staged event, and Kate was regrettably but understandably photographed by a member of the public on publicly accessible private land going about her private business. Because shock horror the Monarchy stopped barring the peasants from their estates lest they stab them with a pitchfork quite a long time ago indeed. Perhaps a mistake in hindsight.

Some of this stuff being done by reliable and responsible American outlets is quite literally severe harassment under UK law (endangerment, incitement), as well as just so insanely irresponsible. I dare say in America it is considered freedom of the press. Except when it involves the head of state. The SS is always watching. A literal armed wing of the state protecting the privacy of public servants, even as they quite famously use their taxpayer funded official residence as a giant fuck pad for bedding their mistresses or even their subordinates, and not even when they're off the clock as it were.

Just one of a thousand reasons why, when asked (and it is our free and democratic choice under our laws and traditions, you understand I hope), the British public decline to take the world up on its offer of a President or other political appointee as our Head of State. Sorry not sorry. We got it right. The good outweighs the bad. Or at least it did.

But make no mistake, the British tabloids did not bring us to this nightmare future where the kindest thing to do really might be to let these people go back to being private citizens so we can be sure their replacements absolutely, positively, brought it upon themselves. For that, we must look elsewhere. Into the darkness. Into the belly of the beast. RS/N and BLP/N.

The true nature of Wikipedia and its community.

I wonder how Wikipedia and its beloved reliable sources and deep commitment to BLP fair in this incident in comparison to the conspiracy theories suggesting Hilary was planning to run a child porn slash human flesh pizza joint out of the White House if she won the Presidency.

I'm game if you are. Come now. Join me. Be the change. Take a stand.

Take an interest at least. Certainly when you are interested enough to cause deep offence. Either accidentally, or one suspects, really quite deliberately, due to some pretty deep seated prejudices.

Or not. It's not for everyone. Takes you to some dark places and some uncomfortable truths.

[ltbdl]

[Vigilant]

Time for a word limit for Crow.

[greenday61892]

There's something so truly self-centered about how little (if any) self-editing you do and expecting people to spend the minutes (literally) it takes to read each and every single one of your posts.

[Elinruby]

Who are you talking to?

[Ron Lybonly]

1. You make your one long post, then leave it at that.

• If it's good, you don't need to argue back and forth, especially with additional long posts.

• Right now, you pursue diminishing returns too far and with really long posts. However, you've already articulated your main points well, so those long posts don't add much; they just weary the reader.

or

2. Volley back and forth with others using short posts. Use a tennis ball, not a medicine ball.

Kraken, tennis balls not medicine balls (T-H-L)

Also your first long post is usual pretty interesting but by now you’ve lost your audience.

You enjoy long form writing but this just isn’t a good place for it. Seriously, take that writing to a different kind of venue where folks will appreciate it. Write for The Atlantic (T-H-L). You can do this.

A forum like this is for conversation, not lectures, regardless of how compelling or righteous they may or may not be. You won’t convince anyone after your first post. Even my eyes are glazing over.

Please don’t get yourself banned here.

[Ron Lybonly]

As for the royals’ privacy, whatever happened to lèse-majéste (T-H-L) laws?

[AndyTheGrump]

As for the royals’ privacy, whatever happened to lèse-majéste (T-H-L) laws?

For reference the current UK law:

If any person whatsoever shall, within the United Kingdom or without, compass, imagine, invent, devise, or intend to deprive or depose our Most Gracious Lady the Queen, from the style, honour, or royal name of the imperial crown of the United Kingdom, or of any other of her Majesty’s dominions and countries, or to levy war against her Majesty, within any part of the United Kingdom, in order by force or constraint to compel her to change her measures or counsels, or in order to put any force or constraint upon or in order to intimidate or overawe both Houses or either House of Parliament, or to move or stir any foreigner or stranger with force to invade the United Kingdom or any other of her Majesty’s dominions or countries under the obeisance of her Majesty, and such compassings, imaginations, inventions, devices, or intentions, or any of them, shall express, utter, or declare, by publishing any printing or writing . . . . . . F3 or by any overt act or deed, every person so offending shall be guilty of felony, and being convicted thereof shall be liable . . . . . . F4 to be transported beyond the seas for the term or his or her natural life . . . . . .

Treason Felony Act 1848

Evidently, parliament has yet to notice that we no longer have a Queen, but then I doubt they are overly bothered about keeping this particular legislation up to date. It is widely regarded as unenforceable due to Britain's commitments to international law regarding civil rights. If they were to try, I'd have to assume that the authorities of whatever 'beyond the seas' territory they sent the miscreants to would object somewhat, given the numbers that would be involved.