Hilary Mantel makes a good point

[juneau]

She shouldn't have said it, since it's bitchy and uncalled for (and I actually find HM rather odd, if I'm honest), but after a good couple of years in the media spotlight I struggle to think of one thing the Duchess of Cambridge thinks or believes in. She never gives an opinion, she barely speaks, she just looks pretty and smiles.

I cannot understand why any sane woman would choose Kate's lifestyle where she has so very little control over what she does. But I think it unfair to criticise her for not doing much - she is very busy indeed and her time is not her own.

Indeed. Women always end up regretting living off male earnings. Never wise.

Yes Kate has punishing schedule,smile,wave,walk, all at same time
Gosh she has it hard,it's v demaning being a decorous appendage to her husband
It's nearly lime having a proper job. Not

Quite!

I like Greer's sensible reply at school, Copthall :)

I haven't said Mantel's not entitled to talk about Kate's size and/or the way she's represented in the media, poface. Depending on what you call a personal attack, I may have made some on Mantel despite having read and understood her essay. Perhaps it comes as a surprise to you that anyone could read her work and other utterances, yet still find her unworthy of adulation? It seems to me that she's pretty gifted at PR.

There's fairly heavy irony, too, in people here taking the piss out of the Duchess's supposed idleness, since this supposition's based on the scarcity of her public appearances.

My comment on size and right to comment was to Russiansonspree garlic, sorry for confusion.

I don't expect anyone to adulate her. I just find it very distressing and depressing that people would attack her personally for her observations of a royal public persona and the way the media have cultivated that persona.

on not of

both words good in context :)

I didn't attack her personally. I had no objection to most of the things that Mantel said about the way the press objectify royals because she was, essentially, on the nose. Particularly, regarding Kate,the use of the word plastic (because what we are presented with is not real, it is manufactured - and malleable (to the manufacturers, the press) and the point about her being designed to breed. I object strenuously to her use of the phrase 'painfully thin' because that was HER value judgement. The press do not give Kate a hard time for being thin, never have. And she isn't painfully thin either - she just isn't fat. Mantel ruined her own piece by introducing her own vAlue judgement at that point and it was cruel and vicious and completely unnecessary. That is my view and to state it is not to make a personal attack on her. I have not, and will not, for example, comment on her appearance. Because that, you see, is not nice. It's gittish.

And Po - I would be as furious with Mantel's snidely if she had said it about me, or someone I like, or someone else I dislike as much as I dislike the royals. Because every single time someone 'respectable' makes a comment like that, it makes it more acceptable to everyone else. And it shouldn't be.

I wrote snideness but the iPad autocorrected. Because it thinks it knows best.

yes you didn't attack her personally but others did.

No the press do not give Middleton a hard time about being thin - she could be painfully thin in some people's eyes -that is pretty subjective - the point is the media treats that size as perfection and often demonizes women who are larger than that. I spent a lot of time in an industry where most people, including myself, claimed we were all naturally skinny. It was a lie for the vast amount of the time, probably 99% of the time. We most of us ate pretty little.

There article I linked to earlier described Mantel's observations as a mix of sympathy and savagery. I think that is fair.

Well then address your comments on attacking her to others not to me, thanks. To describe a perfectly normal sized woman as painfully thin is to be using her to further an agenda. You seem to be using your own issues to justify some pretty nasty objectifying of another human being yourself, now. Neither the fact that you have issues, nor the fact that the press are sometimes mean about fat people, excuses a powerful person with a large and vociferous fan club (Mantel) making an agenda driven comment like that against someone who realistically will never have any right of reply.

Kate is a role model whether she wants to be or not, because she is in the public eye, so other people will be influenced by her. Whether other females should be influenced by her isn't the question.
Any person in the public eye , any intelligent person, shouldn't just be thinking about being inoffensive, but, to my mind, should be taking the opportunity to - well, make a statement, make a diference, help the world be a better place etc. Because they have that chance, that opportunity. But thats just my opinion.
Making a difference isn't the same as being a working mum. In theory, Kate could have a career in business by sustaining 'Party Pieces' in a managerial/executive role. I wouldn't be as impressed if she did that, as I would be if, say, she spoke up for the regeneration of Welsh mining valleys or army wives.

I am not doing any nasty objectifying thanks, and neither did I address my comments about personal attacks to you. And pretty unpleasant to try to make out I have' issues' really.

I think it is rather disingenous to try to make out that those who feel the essay has been completely misinterpreted and object only to personal attacks as part of a Mantel fan club.

I don't agree with this view that having a career and earning money is what makes someone a role model or worthy of praise. The majority do that. I believe that the thing that makes someone noteworthy is the impact on people's lives that they make through good deeds.

Diana was noteworthy and praiseworthy because she touched the lives of millions and changed lives through her charitable work. She will be remembered when the career of Sir Fred the Shred has long been forgotten. She left a mark on more people than any hedge fund manager or banker ever will.

Kate is doing a great job and performing a great role. She is learning the ropes and I think she will one day affect millions of lives through charitable works etc.

I don't want her to spout off about "saving the planet" etc. in the way that Prince Charles does, because that would open her up to ridicule. She is wiser than that, she is no politician like Gordon Brown and his "fifty days to save the planet" scare story.

Kate keeps many of her opinions to herself in order to find favour with all people. Just like the Queen herself, she is above factions and fads and politics.

The reason that Zara Phillips can be more forthright and free is because she is not in as important a position as Kate. The press doesn't really care what Zara does or says. Kate is in a much more important position and therefore attracts much more scrutiny. Zara can put her foot in it, whereas Kate cannot put a foot wrong.

Kate has so far done an excellent job and performed her cermonial role very well. That takes skill, but is mainly due to her natural qualities. Some of it cannot be taught. It is Kate's personality that has made her successful in this role. A mannequin or dummy could not do it, they would fall flat on their face as some politicians have done in the past.

I refer, of course, to certain politicians of the New Labour persuasion who glean their facts from the pages of the Gaurdian newspaper.

Well, and his Tory counterpart, Claig They're both utterly shit at choosing pop stars to pose with, as well. Some folks in influential positions have no fucking clue about how normal human beings work! I imagine Kate does have a clue and will go on to make a positive difference to very many lives. She's sorting this heir business quickly, all being well, so let's hope she gets on with defining her "role" once DC's past the first year.

If Kate or her bosses aides read forum threads about her - I'd like her, in addition to doing charity stuff and staying more or less grounded, to promote simple moral & common-sense agendas. One example might be better education about domestic abuse, so both women and men know what a healthy, equal relationship looks like and that controlling another human being is bad. Sexual violence awareness links naturally to this (it's always the perpetrator's fault.) She could promote young women achievers in all areas of life. She could hire male nannies and housekeepers. She could learn to drive an HGV and get her pilot's licence.

What she'll actually do remains to be seen ...

The Duchess of Cambridge has been set up as an idol of womanhood - largely by reason of her passivity and attractive while wholly non-sexual appearance - by some pretty reactionary and unpleasant elements of our media. As such any other woman who demurs from the view that she is female perfection is fair game for all manner of insult, as Hilary Mantel is finding out. Because those elements aren't capable of appreciating the subtleties of what she's saying - she's just fat/infertile/unattractive and therefore jealous.
it stinks

What Karlos said ^^.

Has the Queen been set up as an idol of womanhood? I don't think so. If it was that easy to create idols, then the Establishment would be churning them out.

The Queen and Diana were more popular than Prince Philip and Prince Charles and Fergie and the Duchess of Kent, and that is due in part to her character and how she conducts herself.

The Queen and Diana had that magic touch, and I think Kate has it too. Beckham is another one who has it, and it is not something that money or privilege can buy. When teh people see it, they recognise it.

The reason that tens of thousands of people lined the streets when Diana died is because people believe in good and they want good to triumph and survive. People want idols, they want to believe that the system is good and that good will prevail. They are sick to death of fiddling MPs flipping their homes and lying and spinning the truth and conning them about political issues; they are sick of corruption and coverups; sick of the complicity revealed in the Savile case where prominent people escape justice and are covered up for; sick of bankers being bailed out by the people and receiving bonuses after what they did. People want to believe that the system is just, that social mobility is possible, that the people at the top are good and honest and decent.

That is why they admire Beckham and admired Diana and like Kate. People need idols and fairytales in which social mobility is real in order to have hope and to believe that they can progress. That is why they need magic and why they don't like to see their hopes and dreams and idols crushed and don't like their idols to be revealed as having feet of clay.

The literati are out of touch with ordinary people. They knock the people's idols because they are more fortunate than the people, they get golden goodbyes and golden hellos. The BBC messed up their royal coverage during the Jubilee. They didn't understand the people. And after the Savile case, many have just been shuffled in their jobs.

The people don't like to see their idols dragged down because it knocks their faith in the system. They don't benefit from the system, like the literati and liberals do, and hope is all they have and they don't want to see their hopes and beliefs in magic crushed by those who are more fortunate than them.

Attacking what the people perceive to be good offends their sense of justice. That is why this story has got wings.

And Diana and Beckham are seen by people worldwide as symbols and ambassadors who are praiseworthy. And it is not due to the media, because the media can fool some of the people all of the time, but it can't fool all of the people all of the time, as we have seen with global warming.

sorry, what about global warming?