To not want royal wedding fever forced on my DC

[rosybell]

So my DD is in reception. They are having a royal wedding party at school today. Whilst I think this is fine I hate that they have been told to bring clothes to change into- a dress or a shirt (this is what the info given to parents said). Of course most girls have taken princess dresses. I have now seen photos from the party showing the children in boy girl pairs walking down an red carpet 'aisle'

I'm all for imaginative play but some of these kids looked bewildered. AIBU to complain to the school? There is something that really doesn't feel right about it - maybe because it seems like it more for the adults than the kids let alone all the princess pressure the girls must feel.

I find it so sad that many on MN and beyond seem to suck all the enjoyment out of the little things that make up their own and their children's lives.

Personally I do not care about the royal wedding (probably watch the action replay of the highlights on TV ) but the reaction about the flags , indoctrination of children fears, is just so OTT and completely joyless.

thisissparta I have made an extremely lucrative living out of my critical thinking and analytical skills. They are not lacking. I do, in fact, want my child to think as I do. I would be embarrassed and ashamed for my daughter to lack the analytical skills and independent thought required to stand up to people like metoodear (who I now recall from other threads) and a sizeable proportion of the British population who look no further than the pomp and glamour, certainly not into the murky history of the royal family through the centuries. What a thing to venerate. There’s more to it than that, of course. I could go on for hours...

To the other point: I don’t live in the uk, but we do have a similar contract to the home/school agreement (I think, I can guess what that means). As I said, we chose our school very carefully, and I am absolutely behind our school’s ethos. They have once or twice got it wrong, and I didn’t complain as such; merely pointed out the inconsistency. It was no biggie (eg they went OTT with their anti-Trump message in a school project, I pointed out this was contrary to their stated aim of tolerance, inclusiveness and allowing holders to speak their minds. No harm done, the point was taken).

I would not have put my children in a school whose ethos I didn’t agree with. Why would I?

Some comments on this thread.....sheesh! Has no-one ever heard of dress-up!??

I'm:

Foreign
Staunchly Republican)
Live in Scotland (so not the most loyalist place in the UK)
Am a feminist and loathe the principle of being a "princess", saved (and kept by a man)

My children had a Royal Wedding party at nursery today, complete with dresses and tiaras and I couldn't find it in myself to be remotely bothered about it.

FFS

ikeepaforkinmypurse you’re right. All I said was I would have kept my child at home today. That’s it. Everyone should feel free to do what’s in their child’s best interest. It would not have been in my child’s best interests to hear years and years of me telling her how all this pomp and glamour is nonsense and actually insidious (haven’t got that far yet, she’s still a bit young), and then to merrily pack her off to school knowing this was happening today. Total mixed messages. That’s literally all.

flatwhite32 I think you’ve missed my point, but it doesn’t matter. I’ve made it plenty of times on this thread now.

Having a party and dress up and use your imagination day at school.

How bloody awful. One whole afternoon in the term wasted. They should be learning thier advanced maths, and writing in clear copperplate script on thier slates. What are schools coming to?

All those morning about us killjoys: yeah, I’m sure everyone who ever suffered at the hands of the British Empire should put being jolly ahead of their own dignity, independence, sovereignty, personhood, and in too many millions of cases, their ancestors’ lives.

To each their own. You have your tea parties and celebrate the wedding with your children. I will indoctrinate mine, miserably, into the virtues of standing up for things that are worth standing up for. Everyone’s happy.

Some people clearly have too much time on their hands.

I’m with LaLaLolly. There’s a royal wedding tea party at DD’s daycare today. This in a country where all the tea got hurled in the sea in 1773 and the monarchy was told where to stick it in 1776. It’s supposed to be a bit of fun not a political statement.

I got mildly annoyed about it - the school did a street party and dressed in red white and blue... got narked the kids came home full of how wonderful the Royal Family are (cos I think they're a waste of fucking space the lot of them) but it sharpish got dispelled when DD1 announced she wanted to be Queen and got informed she couldn't because it's only one family who get to be Queen and princes and princesses unless you get married to one of them. She's concluded that "that's a bit rubbish and not very fair then is it?" Then she resumed going on about the biscuit she'd decorated in red white and blue icing but she'd mixed the red and white to make it pink and more interesting for her.

She's since decided Prime Minister sounds a much more attractive proposition in her eternal pursuit of telling the entire country what to do because bossing her sister around just isn't cutting it much anymore.

It’s so sad that complaining would even be a question..and princess pressure? I’m embarrassed for you. Maybe your time is better spent on educating yourself than on here, just a suggestion.

@plums - I’m anglo Arab. My family directly feel the after affects of colonialism. The British Empire did horrific things and children NEED to be taught these atrocities in schools. I firmly believe this and my son will be educated by me in this regard too. However, v young kids being told about the royal wedding, having a tea, and waving some flags is really not an issue. I’m not a royalist and I tell my son why I don’t believe in having a royal family. However, this country has one, one of them’s marrying and for the kids it’s an excuse to have cake! That’s it!!

I wouldn't be thrilled, either. Heteronormative, reinforcing of gender roles, suggesting that we should celebrate these fucking parasites...

That's pretty much how I feel, too. Jingoistic bloody nonsense, costing fuck knows how much when we're told the country afford to make the NHS work properly or give the poor enough to live in.

If I had school-age kids, I probably would have been That Parent.

Party at my son's school too. He's year 6 and unimpressed by the Royal bit but happy to have a non-uniform day and eat cake, also to celebrate end of SATS. We did joke about him dressing up as Oliver Cromwell or something.

HOWEVER I saw a friend's post from a private school where they even had the local bloody vicar there and they went through an entire mock marriage ceremony. I was nearly sick. Seriously weird and creepy.

But, no, there's no point complaining. You might have bigger battles another day.

If I'd had kids I too would have been that parent over this. Like it or not, schools are massively influential to young minds and what this is teaching children is that they should celebrate a Royal Wedding and not think about what having a Royal Family actually means. I remember learning about the civil war, royalty etc and, at the primary school age, accepting that Oliver Cromwell was a bad man and that the monarchy was the accepted model. I would have preferred to have a more balanced view of things and would prefer it if schools offered the same to children now, instead if wrapping it up as something "fun"and those who object as miserable. It is like those people who shut down conversations by accusing women of not supporting each other. It is the defence of those who do not have an eloquent argument.

As someone of Irish Catholic extraction, albeit one who was born and raised in England, I too understand the objection with the Union Flag and seeing it paraded and waved by brainless idiots makes me feel slightly nauseous.

It sucks that in 2018 girls are still taught to aspire to be a ‘princess’. In ways, William and Harry marrying ‘regular stock’ (ish) has perpetuated this showing that anyone can be a ‘princess’. I don’t appreciate the connotations and think it sets women back approx 60 years.

It also sounds like OP's kids' school overdid it - I think a lot of us, even those who despise the veneration of this bunch of inbred useless benefit scroungers, would have shrugged off a party which consisted of cakes and squash and a few party games, for KS1 kids who really don't know or care very much about it. But pretend-weddings? Overkill.

Also, given the increase in racism, fuckwittery, inequality etc, it's probably more important than ever to keep an eye on what schools are doing WRT 'British values'.

I’m with the previous poster who said they would have kept their child off school sick and we would have had a fun filled Royal leeching scroungers free day!

I'm a reception teacher. I'm teaching abroad at the mo so we haven't really discussed the wedding at all. At my old UK school we would have had dressing up and a street party.
I'm a lefty athiest and no lover of the Royals (though not a republican); but I really could not get het up about this.
One of my favourite memories of infants school was the Jubilee party in 77 - I remember dancing, making a bonnet and (very exotic for the 70s) red white and blue meringues.
So much of primary is about celebrating the wheel of the year, plus adding in specials like the Olympics.
I make the same Christmas decorations with my class as I made myself back in the 70s; and have come to think that these things bind us and are social glue - we all share this, generation to generation. As I said I'm an atheist but there's definitely a feeling of community and continuity as I see the shepherds in teaclothes and the angels covered in tinsel.

(and before you think I'm some Little Englander, the 'wheel if the year' includes many significant festivals of non-Christian religions)

I'd build a bridge and get over it! Its just a bit of Harmless fun

@Metoodear that’s really sweet about your daughter. I’m glad she feels like she belongs a bit. 👸🏾