Shame the female royals didn't walk too

[redsunshinedasiy]

Kudos to Anne who went against tradition and stood up front with her brothers and walked (and also to all the grandchildren who did the vigil) but it's a shame to see all the other females in the funeral stay crawling slowly in a car while all the men walked, just seems so old fashioned (particularly when Anne has gone against it and she is the eldest female!!)

Zara, Beatrice, Eugenie and Lady Sarah Chatto all had their male equivalents walking in the procession. People are just wondering why they didn’t walk as well. Seems to be no reason other than they are female.

The commands for the parade around the coffin were being called by a woman? Many of the ratings were women?

It's not always obvious when they're in uniform, but I was struck by how many women were involved.

Of course a state funeral will involve the military. I did feel for the woman walking not in uniform (Queen's household?) in their block heeled shoes. They tried for some comfort but everyone was on their feet for a really long time and one in particular seemed to be walking like a lame horse by the end.

TBH the The King and Princess Royal are quite elderly themselves. I thought they were stood for a long time. The commentary made something of the King's wry smile as the coffin went into the car. I suspect he was just glad it was almost time to sit down!

Princess Anne is one of the Queen’s children. She walked with her siblings. The Queen was head of the armed forces. That is why there is so much military presence. The precision of the ceremony could only have been performed by the military. The presence of the people who lined in silence showed the respect she deserved. Got to say that the remarks made about sexism just show the age range on this thread.

There were loads of women in the procession, and being a mainly white event, the majority of the country is white so proportionally it was probably about right.
There were mainly white people in the queue for the lying in state but it was open to everyone so others could have gone.

I was specifically talking about the royal family, not the military. I know there were loads of female military in the procession. It's just curious to me that all the men (bar Anne) walked while the women sat in cars crawling slowly behind. I'm sure there's loads of reasons but if it were me, I would have preferred to walk too.

Right. That was the old fashioned thing about the funeral.

🤣🤣

Princess Charlotte in her black hat though. They are a credit to their parents.

It is the military and I want the military to be made up of the strongest and best fighting specimens. Those that can carry the most weight across harsh battlefield situations I certainly don't want it to be representative of anything but the best. I'm sure on battle field the enemy won't fight less hard because their opponents are taking a representative approach to recruitment and not selecting the best. So no I'm not concerned about the make-up of the military in a country that is 85% white is largely white and male.

"Crawling slowly behind"? It would have been really odd if they'd mowed down the parade going any quicker.

Almost all the royals who walked had either current or previous military sevice/rank. It's actually not easy to walk in step for so long, you can't just rock up and do it and it would have looked really off to have them all ambling along like civilians.

Wtf?

But the royals who walked had particular rank didnt they, as in the Queens own children, then the new Kings children, and the oldest grandchild (Peter) then the others were the Queens cousins who were quite elderly

I wouldnt have thought there would be any need for Beatrice etc to walk, what would their role be compared to the others? It might be argued that the Princess of Wales could walk behind but a) she isnt royal blood and b) she has young children to look after

Or doing that double step/skip thing to catch up

I would assume it was very senior military, which is still very white and very male dominated. I believe you have to have served 22 years, for example, to be a Yeoman guard, and have achieved a certain rank.
Women make up 11% of the entire armed forces, according to Google, and ethnic minorities around 2%. The top brass will represent those percentages.

Bit like the monarchy then?

Almost all the royals who walked had either current or previous military sevice/rank

Peter Phillips and Earl Snowden have no military service or rank.

Of course the cars were going slowly. And they aren't you. Presumably they wanted to get the car.

I was surprised Catherine and Camilla were not in the procession. One is Queen Consort, the other will be in the future.
The children have a nanny.

Also you need some people in the cars in case there was a terrorist attack or something.

Zara, Beatrice, Eugenie and Lady Sarah Chatto all had their male equivalents walking in the procession

Who are the "male equivalents" of Beatrice and Eugenie? Zara and LSC have brothers, but not them. William and Harry aren't their equivalents as they are the King's children.

Camilla has a broken something. Toe maybe? Catherine wanted to be with her kids presumably. And even if they didn't have these issues maybe just maybe they wanted to go in the car rather than walk.

Camilla is 75, and may or may not be up to walking that far.

Also if they are in the car they can have a sneaky cereal bar or something to steady them for the next bit.

I thought the whole point of a state funeral is you do not do what you fancy doing on the day., There is protocol set out and you follow it.
They won't have had a choice. They will have been assigned the cars.

@Attictroll - I think you may find the military have served this country throughout our late Monarch’s reign and have represented this country well.

That's why I said almost.

I expect it was all discussed in minute detail and Kate and Camilla were glad to have the excuse of looking after the children.

At my DGF's funeral my wheelchair bound aunt stayed at home to "look after the children" (dsis and I) and we were asked to stay home and keep aunt company and open the curtains, just because it made the arrangements easier not to have children or a wheelchair to deal with. There will be all sorts of reasons for doing it the way they did.