70 Years.
In the view of a human life span, it is a very long time. In the view of the history, it is less than the blink of an eye.
Yet, this weekend, the UK will have the main platinum jubilee celebrations for HRH Queen Elizabeth II. Of course, there have been countless articles, books and journals written about the longest reigning monarch in UK history and I am not going to regurgitate any of that here, as you can all read those yourselves. However, it is worth taking a few minutes to think about all the events, prime ministers, presidents, dictators and Donald Trump the Queen’s reign has surpassed and continues to do so.
Another peculiarity which takes place during a jubilee year is that the UK, and possible other countries around the world (particularly the Commonwealth) start to take a look back at their own history and re evaluate their place on the global platform. We have seen countries in the Caribbean question the role of the monarchy and the links the UK had to slavery and therefore their direct population lineage. A recent example of this was the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s trip to the Caribbean. The aim was to travel on the Queen’s behalf in the jubilee year and cement the ties between the nations. However, a series of events marred the trip from the start and led to questions of the relevance of the monarchy and the Commonwealth. You can read more about why the trip went wrong here
In the UK, the Tory government seems intent to drive the country back to the 1970’s with rapid rates of inflation, fuel crises and this week announcing that to celebrate the jubilee, there will be a report commissioned to bring back the imperial weights; ounces, pounds and stones. A government minister was quizzed on this and you can see the results for yourself. Indeed, to justify the return to imperial “to mark the Queen’s jubilee” has been justified by a government minister as “nobody knows what a 4.5kg baby looks like, but we all know a 10-pounder is a whopper.” This one sentence inspired me to start bashing my keyboard with my short stubby digits. My children were born at 5.035kg and 4.11kg. These were the weights displayed in the operating theatre and recorded in their medical notes. At no point did anyone say I have no idea what that baby weighs, can you tell me in 1950’s language please? It is also completely irrelevant what baby weighs at birth to anyone except the medical staff (who know how to tell if a baby is healthy or not). Yet somehow, giving birth to a “whopper” is now evidence that we need to go back to imperial measurement. Here is an idea, if you don’t understand something, look it up.
Why is the government doing this? Well, the answer will no doubt be complex and ultimately meaningless (hint, diversion, Sue Gray, Tory rebels).
The UK gets by using both metric and imperial absolutely fine. Food can be sold in imperial and metric. There appears to be a narrative in the right wing thought process that somehow the metric system is barbarian in form and has no place in the UK. Sorry, but when I am measuring something I do not have the time or the mental capacity to think how many ounces are in a pound or pounds in a stone. grams, kilos and tonnes are a lot easier every 1000 units, move up a level. The sane can be said for distance as well. I have no idea how many feet are in a yard or yards in a mile or what makes an acre, and to be honest, I don’t care. Every 1000 units move up a level.
Brexit (and I hate to reference it) has shown that where there is a lot of change to happen, people are wary of it and rather than look forward for change, the mantra of “take back control” connotes a harking back for a previous time, which generally speaking was a lot worse than it is now. Is this why we are looking at the return of imperial measurements, the blue passport and archaic border controls?
If indeed, we are heading back in time (coincidentally I finished building a lego delorean today) how far back should we go, what is the best time in history to be living in?
I think I will need to read Rule Nostalgia by Hannah Rose Woods to find out. But, to add my two pennies (6d) worth, recent nostalgia needs to be avoided at all costs. It does not bear any resemblance to life as it was. To give an example. Think back to school summer holidays and I bet that the majority of you will remember endless warm sunny days outside. You will not remember, the cold, wet wash out summers. Have or had a baby? Again, you will remember the times more fondly where they were easy to look after or on the happy days. The sleepless nights, endless feeds, exploding nappies, the indescribable tiredness will have been forgotten or put deep into the memory archives.
OK, what about historical nostaliga? To go full circle, the Queen and royal family as an institution are very good at this. Look at any state occasion, the full royal attire comes out, the crown jewels, the horses, the red military uniforms and bear skin hats, the pomp, circumstance and pageantry. All of this dates back centuries. None of it is in use in day to day life. History has given us a highlights real. Yet no one actually wants to go back. The Queen doesn’t wear the crown and the robes, the military don’t lead out into battle wearing red coats and half a dead bear on their head marching to Onward Christian Soldiers. We don’t use horses to tow carriages and cannons. We have taken the best bits and packaged them up in nice wrapping paper and a bow and when the sun is shining, we show the world why they should come and visit a tiny little Island in the North Atlantic.
By all means, keep some nostalgia and bring it out now and again. Tell the stories of “back in my day, we had to walk 4 miles bare foot in the snow just to get to school.” The 1990’s were 30 years ago (sshh, really just 6 years) and in all honesty, I don’t really want to go back there. I am happy here where I am and looking forward. We are entering a dangerous time now of nostalgia creeping its way into our daily lives just to please some backbenchers who don’t like change.
Maybe once the jubilee celebrations are over, there will be less pining for the past and more focus on the present and the future.
Anyway, congratulation, Your Majesty on 70 years doing the same job. You are able to see change and embrace it, even if you may not agree with it. That can only be commendable.
And thank you for a four day weekend so the UK can do what it has always done - get right royally sloshed.
Brilliantly written James. Good job!
Again a very thought provoking “rant!” However I do have to disagree with you about one issue. My children are now 30, 25 and 23 and I vividly remember the sleepless nights, the explosive diapers/nappies, the excruciating pain of hours and hours of labor, etc! For some reason I could never put that in my memory archives. Probably the reason it took my husband 5 years to talk me into having a second child and my last one being an “accident baby!” 😂