Reflections on the Revolution in England

Monarchs, Magic, and Maid Cafés

Those watching the online world over the last few days would be forgiven for thinking that a remarkable transformation is taking place. Suddenly everyone is a monarchist. King Charles is suddenly twice as popular as Prince Charles. The extreme opinions of anti-British commentators are now being met with overwhelming criticism and disapprobation. Where have these people come from?

How Social Media Works

One way to think about politics – and especially Twitter – is that the world consists of lots of anonymous mobs of people. Every now and again, something stirs them up enough to make a lot of noise, and then they shuffle back into quiescence. A lot of people don’t knowingly belong to any of these mobs and just allow themselves to be borne along by one tide of feelings or another; many of today’s mild monarchists will be just such a character. And so for brief periods, a group that makes a lot of noise can dominate public discourse internationally.

Governments naturally make use of this phenomenon, and are often instrumental in creating mass movements through social media. This is arguably a contributing factor to the Arab Spring, for example. Closer to home, we can see the clear use of propaganda to push dominant narratives regarding Ukraine, or Coronavirus measures, or BLM, or US domestic politics. The list goes on.

“The monarchy enjoys some institutional clout as well as grassroots support, and thus the monarchists can enjoy their time in the sun.”

For an individual user, each time a mob wakes up, the rules of social media change temporarily. (Let’s call these ‘the rules for engagement’). Most users learn to use social media for gratification, and stimulate the release of a pleasure neurochemical called dopamine from garnering followers, likes, shares, and comments. This operant conditioning trains users to post messages on Twitter simply to provoke positive responses from people they respect, and negative responses from those they may fashionably detest. Such behaviour uses exactly the same instincts that people have for behaving in a real-life social group, or tribe: competition for status and approval is paramount.

The Trevor Sinclair case is particularly illuminating. Unaware of the social shifts incurred by the September 2022 Monarchist Wake-Up Event, a man called Trevor posted the usual anti-British claptrap about racism, claiming that black and brown people shouldn’t mourn the death of the Queen – only to find himself met with a storm of well-deserved criticism, and even a Twitter suspension.

After a few days or weeks, the monarchists will subside, and Twitter will fall back into the hands of another dominant mob. The rules for engagement will mostly revert to normal. Only when a mob has powerful institutional backing do the rules change permanently – for example, when Twitter takes advantage of the mob’s noise to implement a banning policy for users who spread ‘misinformation’ about a particularly sensitive topic.

Personally, I’m very much enjoying the brief dominance of the monarchist mob. Not because I’m an especially fervent monarchist, but because this is the first time in many years that a pro-British mob has enjoyed the command of social media. All other British mobs, from football to Brexit, have been undermined and sidelined by institutional powers that look down on any manifestation of pro-British ‘populism’. But the monarchy enjoys some institutional clout as well as grassroots support, and thus the monarchists can enjoy their time in the sun. For now, we can sit back and enjoy the magic.

Making Magic

To use the academic term, magic is socially constructed. When your children believe in Santa Claus, and perform the ritual of the nocturnal mince pie, then they end up with gifts in their stockings and presents under the tree. If the same presents were signed by their parents, the magic would be greatly diminished, and if they were simply handed over unwrapped on a random day of the year, all of the Christmas magic would be gone. Dole out these gifts according to a signed contract and a schedule, and you will have achieved negative degrees of magic: it might extinguish the shine in your children’s eyes, but at least they’ll be prepared for the soullessness of the modern world.

“Japan is particularly good at magic… from the kawaii commercialism of Hello Kitty and Pokemon Centres, to the sombre ceremony of Shinto rituals.”

Fortunately, society is full of magic rituals that require no contracts or lawyers. They are what make a culture, providing shared experience and meaning to the participants. Without magic to bind people together, you simply don’t have a culture.

Japan is particularly good at magic. It manifests in unusual places, from the kawaii commercialism of Hello Kitty and Pokemon Centres, to the sombre ceremony of Shinto rituals. Not only is this culture on display everywhere, much of it is participatory. Visitors to Western cultural attractions will generally turn up, watch, and leave. But in Japan, there is always an element of joining in, whether it be the brief ritual of prayer at a Shinto shrine, or the bip bip greeting required by a Pokemon sales gimmick.

Nowhere is this more prominent than the anime and cosplay culture of Akihabara, where I once made the obligatory visit to a maid café while living in Tokyo. These curious institutions are probably the closest that real life comes to Animeland: imagine a café made of liquid sugar where everything on the menu is designed for Instagram rather than human consumption. Each unspeakably garish drink tastes like a vat of melted Haribo, and arrives with a participatory ritual of song and dance, led by a girl wearing an extravagant maid costume. If this all sounds rather twee – or dare I say, cringe – then congratulations, you are still sane.

“A certain open-mindedness is needed to experience magic.”

Needless to say, the experience was wasted on me. Being far too world-weary and cynical to appreciate the magic contained in waving my hands in front of a glass misted with rainbow sparkles, the outing remains lodged in my memory as a curious anthropological experiment rather than a magical day out. More interesting than the café itself were its Japanese patrons, who seemed genuinely delighted to be casting magic spells with real-life anime maids. And while the clientele was predominantly male, I was surprised to notice quite a few women. Some clients even seemed to have brought their girlfriends along.

And of course, they had a more rewarding attitude towards the whole charade. I might have retained my dignity by treating the whole show as a bit silly, but in doing so I refused the opportunity to experience that magic for myself.

The point is that a certain open-mindedness is necessary to create magic. When a couple chooses to do something special on Valentine’s day, or celebrates their anniversary, they are collaborating to create something meaningful and magical in their lives. Were one party to refuse the magic, to see it all as a waste of time or money, then something of value would be lost.

“The coronation of a King of England is one of those pieces of magic that hasn’t gone away.”

This is, I believe, what’s happened to Western society over the last century. Our quest for material prosperity has largely succeeded in bringing more stuff to more people than ever before. But cranky old billionaires who dismiss the protests of the masses by saying “It’s just envy, get over it – everyone’s five times better off than they used to be” are missing most of the picture. Life isn’t about material prosperity; people can be happy living in caves and unhappy living in luxury yachts. It’s about magic. Over the last three quarters of a century we have steadily sacrificed our customs and rituals on the altar of financial prosperity, resulting in thoroughly demoralised cultures with existential social problems.

The Coronation of a new King of England is one of those pieces of magic that hasn’t gone away. Many people were baffled to see the proclamation ceremony carried out with all proper pomp and circumstance, which has barely been seen in living memory (the last one being held in 1952). This isn’t merely the magic that we’ve chosen to create ourselves, but a continuity of belief that stretches back a thousand years, connecting us not only to the present but to our ancestors and descendants on this, our Sceptred Isle. This kind of magic is rare, precious, and utterly irreplaceable.

Of course, there are the usual voices grumbling in the corner that these things cost too much, and bearskin hats are bad for the environment, and we shouldn’t have a monarchy anyway, and so on. The fact remains that we do have a monarchy, and its ceremonies are about the only ones left to our culture that haven’t been economised into nonexistence. So we may as well treasure them.

Freedom of Speech, or Public Nuisance?

There are also those who have taken the opportunity of the Queen’s funeral procession to turn up with placards, shout republican slogans, or generally disturb the peace. Many of these are extremely young, and people are naturally concerned we seeing the police dealing with them in a robust manner.

Is this a question of freedom of speech? I’m sure many will agree that republican slogans should not be banned, yet those who turn up to ruin the experience of others at a funeral procession are tiresome attention-seekers at best. The act itself is not universally prohibited – but performing it in this time and place should not be indulged.

“If we proclaim freedom of speech as a universal absolute, then we invite into all of our rituals and ceremonies the howling tantrum of the direct activist.”

For comparison, consider those who bring air-horns at the Last Night of the Proms, in an attempt to ruin the singing of Land of Hope and Glory (which they generally see as bigoted, anachronistic, imperialist rubbish). Nobody is seriously suggesting that air-horns be banned throughout the country – that would be a grotesque overreach of state power. But it’s perfectly reasonable to suggest that those who bring them to the Royal Albert Hall should be shown the door.

Here lies a nuance to the rule of freedom of speech: reality does not easily conform to blanket universals. You could even argue that universals like this are dangerous, since those with power will enforce universals whenever it suits them, and remain deaf to all other incidents.

“If every maid café were picketed by feminist activists decrying sexism and objectification: the magic would be somewhat undermined.”

If we proclaim freedom of speech as a universal absolute, then we invite into all of our rituals and ceremonies the howling tantrum of the direct activist. Every wedding and funeral, every speech and celebration becomes fair game to noisy ideologues looking to make a scene and garner attention on social media. To use a previous example, imagine if every maid café were picketed by feminist activists decrying sexism and objectification: the magic would be somewhat undermined.

In reality, freedom of speech is determined on a case-by-case basis. The intolerably smug twenty-something republican may say what she likes about the monarchy online, and indeed on camera, but going to the ceremony itself to make a scene should not be considered acceptable.

This case-by-case logic applies also to counterprotests. If the counterprotest is set up with the aim of inflicting violence on protesters and intimidating them out of exercising their rights to political participation, then it is clearly an assault on free speech. But a counterprotest that turns up to merely shout disagreeable slogans at protesters is not the same thing. Protests accept a temporary disruption of harmony in order to make a point, so they can hardly claim that ordinary counterprotesters are in breach of the peace.

Of course, when a principle is applied with the nuance and subtlety of case-by-case logic, who decides? Ultimately, the people. The test of whether the removal of activists from the procession was justified comes from the public reaction, which was largely one of muted relief and approval, tempered with the occasional throwaway statement in favour of free speech. The only ones who were really outraged were the professional activist class, who – let’s face it – are not exactly strangers to manufactured outrage.

Creative Liberty

Another realm from which magic has not entirely vanished is fiction. Creative endeavour requires a certain magic; every artist, musician, and writer untarnished by modernist ideology is flattered by the suggestion that their work provides a ‘magical’ experience. Between a magical work like The Lord of the Rings and a shallow imitation like Amazon’s Rings of Power – made, I repeat, by those who have no magic in them – the difference in quality is eye-watering.

I still believe that one of the greatest political tragedies of the West is the ideological capture of the right-wing by economists. Encouraging a generation of conservatives to study finance, science, and engineering instead of art and literature was a mistake, for which we are all paying the price. Doubtless the national school system must carry its share of the blame. But the result of this morbid fascination with material prosperity and neglect of intangible cultural value will be very difficult to undo.

I hope that by providing a space like Creative Liberty for up-and-coming creatives to hone their skills, we can do our part in righting this mistake.