Not a monarchist, but I definitely have one big gripe with democracy.

Who is responsible?

I feel like there is no responsibility within democracy. Politicians just point at abstract things like party, commission etc. They can sell the country to the outsiders for cash money and nobody will be at fault. Or perhaps it’s the voter, his fault for voting. And when there is too much “guilt” put on party they just disband it and start a new one. Same people, same issues, just a different name.

As for British Monarchy - they are literally pets. I wouldn’t mind a permanent big-brother house with royal family for my country. Would certainly save up on production of telenovelas.

I might have a weird view of things but I don’t want to get rid of royalty, just take away any authority they have over the lives of themselves and others. They already live off others’ work. Let’s keep them as national pets.

‘Who’s a good king? Who looks nice and waves for the people?’

‘Is it me, <racial slur>?’

‘No! No talking! Bad! Smack you on the nose with a rolled up replica magna carta.’

I’m not monarchist. I think most of the time it ends up as a disaster. However, I’d say the appeal is training someone from birth to be a good leader. Theoretically this could still involve checks and balances.

The other benefit is that they can just get shit done instead of arguing about every little thing and special interest groups roadblocking progress at every turn. Again, this usually backfires spectacularly, but that’s the dream, to just go have a vision and fuckin’ do the thing.

Plato envisioned extending this to a ruling class/aristocracy that is intentionally not allowed to own property but instead focuses on just doing their job to benefit the city. They don’t have to campaign, they can’t reject power, so it is to their benefit to do a good job and benefit the city. There is some logic to this since any schmuck can get elected in a democracy, and money hungry oligarchs are diametrically opposed to having qualities desirable in leadership such as patriotism or caring about others in any way.

Rich dommy mommy telling me what to do.

I’m Norwegian, not British, but we also have a constitutional monarchy. I like it for mostly cynical reasons. They take care of ribbon-cutting and other big ceremonies so the politicians can focus on policy, and they give us a “head of state” that’s statistically less likely to become a dictator than an elected president is.

And all the drama and bullshit is a continuous reminder of what a bad idea it would be to institute genuine monarchy.

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I’m from the UK and I’m a Monarchist in so much as I want to keep the Royal Family. I certainly don’t like the idea of Kings and Queens broadly speaking and “respect” is a strong word, but here in the UK we’ve got a lot of institutions that have vile histories but wouldn’t serve to benefit anyone if we were to scrap them today.

The Mountbatten-Windsor family also happen to be the Royal Family. These days they’re basically powerless and have less influence and sway than pundits on GB News, the Murdoch media and Facebook, who also aren’t elected. But they’re still an aristocratic family, which means they have access to extraordinary wealth and control of a vast business empire… except they don’t. All their estates, land, businesses, interests, etc are held in reserve as the Crown Estate which is operated on their behalf by a Government-appointed manager. The income from the Crown Estate goes straight to the Government and the Government pays the Royal Family a salary - the Sovereign Grant - which is typically between 25% and 35% of the Crown Estate’s profits. So for all those people who say “ThEy’Re TaX dOdGiNg PaRaSiTeS”: they pay an effective tax rate of at least 60%, which is about 60% more than anyone else with that income. Anyone who moans about the couple of quid a year the Royal Family “costs” them must be ecstatic beyond words to learn about the few extra quid they actually make in profit.

Having a Royal Family is amazing for tourism. Yes, the French have palaces too, but they attract nothing like the numbers as the actual real, functioning palaces and castles actually used by a real, breathing monarchs. The Palace of Versailles makes Buckingham Palace look like a shanty but can you guess which one nets more visitors? Windsor Castle, same deal. Moreover, they’re an amazing soft political power. What would your response be if you found out the Prime Minister of the UK was visiting your country? For most people it’d probably be “oh, who is it this week?”. But what about a visit from the Actual King of England? There would be grand receptions, concerts, speeches, unveilings, all because the Actual King of Actual England is coming. Add demagogues like Trump to the equation and the Royal’s value is amplified further.

Then there’s the scrutiny. We all know the Andrew Formally Known As Prince being a nasty little pervert and I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s far more to it. And yet, no-one talks about the Dysons, or the Cavendish-es, or the Rothschilds, or the Montagus, and so on, all of whom are richer and more powerful than the Mountbatten-Windsors and far, far, far more sinister and vile, but they’re not the Royal Family so they’re unknowns. They make the Royals look like cherubs, but they’re well-connected enough to avoid scrutiny and smart enough to remain basically anonymous. Personally, if I was the King I’d tell the UK to fuck off. I’d make the UK a Republic, take my estates and wealth and power back, thankyou very much, and tell everyone to go suck their Mum’s dicks. I don’t know why or how they continue being the Royal Family, but if we “got rid” of them tomorrow we’d lose a tremendous political power and gain yet another unaccountable group of unjustifiably powerful aristocrats.

The question can also be applied to why people believe in God / follow a religion. The notion of monarchy has (in the UK at least) been tied into pseudo religious notions of ‘chosen by god’ or similar, so it ties into that belief system for better or worse. (Historically the tie-in was to co-opt the obedience baked into faith, but that’s probably lost on modern monarchists and believers.)

People everywhere develop unhealthy relationships with those that are oblivious to them, or outright parasitic and damaging. This is another of those that’s been wrapped up in tradition and ceremony under the guise of ‘normality’ and the status quo. ‘Ignorance is bliss’ may apply.

Former monarchist here: it was nationalism. Simple as that. Bavarian nationalism.

But that stemmed from self hatred and well thats why i am no longer in the right spectrum ^^

Specifically in regards to the British royal family, who don’t really wield much actual policy power, it seems to be more a cultural/traditional curiosity. They’re more like national mascots than anything.

In the case of actual monarchist government, I’m not a monarchist myself but in a certain sense I can understand the logic. Your leaders are trained basically from birth to be leaders, and institutional wealth and lack of elections makes them more difficult to bribe. If your monarch is a good and responsible person, the power to make sweeping improvements without slow, fiddly debates and negotiations is a big benefit.

The logic falls apart pretty quickly in reality though. Generations of isolation from the common people makes you ineffectual in the long term even if your intentions are pure. Then there’s the difficulty of dethroning a monarch whose intentions aren’t pure.

The British Monarch isn’t really a leader any more it’s mostly ceremonial.

They look fancy and bring in money, so with bother removing them?

i don’t see the appeal either. i like to think for myself. but i guess many people just don’t like to make decisions themselves so they defer them to someone else.

I’m a 'Murican. When they had that royal wedding back in 2012 or whenever and everyone was going crazy I was like didn’t we fight a war so we wouldn’t have to care about this?

I’ve been around general monarchists, as in people who support monarchy as a form of government, and always wanted to ask this question. The best answer I can think of myself is that democracy is not a guarantee against bad leadership.

My guess? Monarchies are likely to lean conservative and uphold “tradition”.

There are many who’d love to live in a monarchy and do away with all the lib/woke/left stuff they so much despise. Throw in some disregard for the dangers of absolute power and a sprinkle of love for a “strong leader” and voilà.

‘Appeal’ isn’t exactly the word. We just don’t dislike him enough to kick him out.