Can I ask a question about Diana please?

[allmylifewheretheygo]

If Diana was alive now and divorced from Charles, I just wonder what effect it would with a monarch having an ex wife alive and well.

Would Camilla as Queen consort risk being overshadowed by her DH's ex wife?

Also, if Diana remarried what effect would that have on her royal status, would she move out of where she was living at Kensington Palace do you think?

LemonyAnus They say we go for someone like our parents though. Maybe subconciously even .

@Dinoteeth Which views do you mean? I won't ever get over him calling Chinese people 'slitty eyed,' very hurtful and wrong. Or are you talking about his views on children at state funerals? Harry was only something like 12, I think.

Yes I think a lot of the grieving for her was actually just sadness for the boys.

I also think PP was a lot like the outrageous Uncle! He often said things like this tongue in cheek,I dont think he would have wanted to embarrass the Queen if he was serious

I never mentioned anything about eyes.

A 13 & 15 year old behind one coffin.
A 16 year old behind 3 or 4 coffins, I don't know if his BIL was also in the precession or if the baby had its own coffin.

It's not like he asked William and Harry to do something that he hadn't done himself at a similar age.

@Dinoteeth Oh right I see. I wasn't bothered about who asked them to do it, or whether there was a precedent. It just saddened me as a parent and as someone who lost a mother young. I am sure many people felt for them, princes or not, they just looked like young boys who would never feel their mother's arms around them again.

Give it a bloody rest. She's his wife. And she's the Queen Consort, per the late Queen's wishes. They've been married 17 years, longer than Charles and Diana were.

Perhaps we need to remind ourselves Diana herself was the OW in a load of other marriages.

Harry would have grown up very differently if she hadn't died. Who knows if he would have ever even met Meghan.

The late Queen Mother's first name was Elizabeth too so she had the title of Queen Mother so that there wasn't confusion about which Queen Elizabeth was meant once her daughter was queen too. I think if there had been any expectation at the time of her birth that she would be queen they would not have given her the same forename as her mother tbh (or maybe they would have expected her to change to a different "regnal name"). In general over history there have been many times when there have been two queens, one being the king's mother and one being the king's wife, and they are easily differentiated simply by using their forename for clarity.

I wonder how many decades will have to pass before we could theoretically have up to 3 Queens at a time - The Queen (who is actually reigning), The Queen's mother and the Queen's wife.

@gnilliwdog I hear you.

I didn't know PPs story until recently but despite being a Prince he had a tough time. He was a late baby, 4 much older sisters, exciled from Greece as a baby on to a boat the RN sent for them, his mum ended up in a mental hospital, his dad basically fucked off. He was raised between his sisters inc the one who died and his Uncle.

@Dinoteeth Interesting. He sounds as if he had a childhood lacking in nurture, security and warmth. I expect you are right and it goes a long way towards explaining his views and character.

I doubt they'll ever allow a Queen to marry a woman.

There are rumours that Diana had fertility tests before she was allowed to marry Charles. It's kind of in the job description Queen needs to reproduce.

I’d like to think she would have been a caring mother in law to Kate.

like previous posters I don’t think Dodi was a serious contender for a relationship - she was still very much dealing with the end of her relationship with Hasnat Khan, which is quite sad.

Hopefully she would have recognised the need to have some time to process the end of her marriage, Mr Khan, the effects of the media on her self esteem.

Id like to think her causes would have helped her in her journey.

I truly believe her and Charles would have made peace, co-parented successfully.

She would of course been a doting grandmother. I think she would have relinquished the Princess of Wales when William married.

He was racist and sexist. If your Uncle is that, then yes he was like him.

Diana was popular, but as with so many people who die tragically when young, it was her death that exalted her to the mythical status she holds today.
Had she not died I think both her popularity (her relationship with Dodi Al Fayed did not endear her to the public, despite the romance attached in retrospect) media interest would likely also have waned as she got older, and with the advent of KM, i think become negligible unless she behaved very controversially.
Any presence she retained I think would be purely through her role as mother of the princes, and how important this was would i suppose have been up to them.

Yes, let's now spend time debating the impossible.

Totally, his story is fascinating. Given the shit he went through as a child he actually turned out OK.
School and joining the navy encouraged by his uncle gave him some sort of stability but that was about it.

That is not true. Despite some press attacks, she was very popular with the public and much admired for tackling controversial issues such as AIDS and land mines.
I think the Royal family had no understanding of just how popular she was until her death.
For example, months before her death she auctioned off some of her dresses for charity. That was covered a lot in the media and magazines. Not just once, but there were multiple stories in the same magazines about it.
The press knew that a photo of Diana on their cover increased their circulation that week.
It has become popular to sneer at her popularity. But whatever you personally think of her, she was popular.

Sorry, I do wish they would provide an emoji that means “ not meant literally, post lightly sprinkled with irony filings”

I agree with this.

Yet presumably she could have swanned off and married whoever she pleased? I disagree completely. When you're divorced thats it.

I started my post my acknowledging she was popular.
Of course she still enjoyed media attention at the time of her death. She was still a beautiful 33 year old woman living a very glamorous lifestyle, and much more popular than the royal family due to her greater warmth, glamour and status as a wronged woman.
However, her popularity soared at her death, as it invariably does when someone famous dies before they've had a chance for people to become bored of them or for them to lose favour.
Public interest is a very fickle thing and even if she had enjoyed the popularity in life she did after death, it would not have lasted at that intensity. There's always someone new coming up behind.

If she had not died Harry in particular would be a very different man, being made against his will to walk behind his mother's coffin aged 12 in front of those crowds and the media was abuse. His mental health was impacted massively. He would have had the support of his mother and probably lived abroad and would have made different choices as an adult.

Diana would have lived in the US with a new husband and hopefully her, Charles and Camilla could have been civil for their grandchildren. I do wonder how different Williams wedding would have been if she lived given that she would have had a significant role.

I wonder how many decades will have to pass before we could theoretically have up to 3 Queens at a time

It will likely be a long time before it happens again. There were three queens when Elizabeth came to the throne in 1952: Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, and The Queen.

Yes interest in her peaked at her death.
But she was working on controversial campaigns like landmines that would get publicity. She was interested in promoting British fashion designers so always wore interesting clothes. She also knew how to use the media to promote herself. She may have garnered less publicity at 61 years of age, but she would not have faded from view at all. Especially as there are no younger Royals that really fill the role she played.