I watched it. It’s a difficult topic to discuss, because like most modern topics the teams are already…

I watched it. It’s a difficult topic to discuss, because like most modern topics the teams are already defined, in the team sports we mistake for understanding anything. If you argue for, you’re a monarchist. Against, and you’re a republican. The topic itself disappears. /1 https://t.co/9595fvU5iD

Here’s how I see an event like this. Putting my cards on the table, my passionate interest is social continuity. Nothing else. When I watch the coronation, the overwhelming thing that impresses upon me is how completely impersonal it is. And that’s a good thing. /2 https://t.co/tysuBvTPSL

It’s irrelevant who the specific Kings and Queens being crowned are. The people themselves. They’re bit-players to a set of customs and traditions going back many centuries. Here’s Henry the 8th being crowned in 1509. It’s a tightly woven web of both Church and King. /3 https://t.co/U0HrJXnZV1

That’s forgotten today, because we’ve had decades of atheist drivel about religion being all about fairytales. Religion is far and away more important as a cultural institution than it is about any particular beliefs, in anything. It built our societies. /4

It crowned the King yesterday, in a modern secular State. That’s not an anachronism, that’s the greatest weight of our history on display, of which most of us are pig ignorant. How many understood even a handful of the complex rituals on display in the coronation? /5

I can promise you that it pays to learn about them. Each will make a light bulb come on in terms of understanding how societies work, and where in history this or that thing came from. Ditch all the tedious team sports of the present day which will restrict you to a team. /6

Which will force you to see the whole thing only as grist to some dialectical debating mill, raw material for some current tedious argument. The event and the traditions and customs that drive it transcend any of our individual lives. Sure, argue monarchies are irrelevant. /7

But suggest what will replace them. A local head of State, with no connection with anything earlier than the day they’re appointed? To me this isn’t about any particular fondness for the Brits, they’ve been bastards in so many ways. /8

But in a world where social continuity doesn’t stretch further than what’s ‘trending’ on social media, where our societies are torn asunder by competing fads and fashions every day, we need grounding. Some connection to what’s come before. /9

Centuries of suffering-generated wisdom is in these customs and traditions. It disturbs us, because we don’t have any. It just looks like ‘pomp’. Again, if you think it’s an anachronism, you need to have an alternative that doesn’t rip our present moment completely…/10

…away from its own history. A history none of us even seem to know any more, which proves the point. These grand events and rituals make us feel profoundly uncomfortable, because in our populist age the idea of being only servants to a tradition is anathema. /11

Of life not being centred on ourselves only. I see it in wedding dances, marriage being a tradition that again now has lost its deeper meaning, to many. So they invent their own, nearly always some twee social media-driven choreography. Imagine for one moment being Charles. /12 https://t.co/E7PgW1bG5J

A life given entirely to what his mother called ‘service’. A life that is not theirs to live. Every single day some new event they have to host or be a part of. Where they can’t say what they think, a year mostly diarised by the requirements of the role of Head of State. /13

Lives entirely given over to a set of customs and traditions, of which they’re only temporary bit-players. The exact opposite of ‘living your best life’, the facile philosophy that drives modern populism. I likely won’t support support an Australian republic. /14

I’ve seen the US republic. And all republics, that replace custom and tradition with popular presidents. It doesn’t matter if that popularity is at arm’s length, by parliament selecting the head of State (which i can guarantee the public will resist). Popularity will win. /15

The reason we have the customs and traditions we saw on display at the coronation, is that we’ve been down this road many times in history before. We know how it ends. Churches evolved to halt the dumb descent into populism. To structure a society using impersonal values. /16

Yes that has gone more or less well, throughout history. But absolutely guaranteed, modern populism is offering nothing new or better. It’s the disastrous path humans learned to avoid at all costs, before, and have now forgotten. To finish, two things. /17

There will never be a tell-all expose of life as Queen, from Elizabeth 2. She died taking all of her personal impressions to the grave, with her. That shows what life as servant to a tradition is. Imagine your entire life determined by that service. /18

Dying not even being able to tell anybody outside your immediate family how it impacted you personally, what you felt or thought about it, or about anything. That’s what the deepest aspect of social continuity means. Secondly, listen to the music in the coronation. /19

The depth of history in what we heard, magnificent. Try replacing that. You could build another tradition that would give you a similar richness to draw upon. But it would take centuries. Have the humility to watch this event as if it’s not about you. But about eternity. /end