Royal row between King Charles and Earl Spencer 3

[Viviennemary]

A new thread and book not even published till Tuesday. I checked on Amazon and its only 12th on the non fiction bestseller list. Doesn't show Earl Spencer in a very good light imho.

A void that is being amply filled here and other places. Marking time until Spare2 no doubt when the zone will be filled with something or other.No one has raised the issue about Morgan's wounded reputation to which most will say "what reputation". If it ever went to court and apology and £1 damages would probably do it.

There are 2 separate issues being conflated here

• whether Spencer is telling the objective truth
• whether people believe him

As I think I've said about 5 times on here, none of us knows whether he's telling the truth. We will make up our minds based on our existing prejudices. I have thought he's a shit of the first order for many years, so I will filter my judgement through that.

But the polls are an objective fact and can't be denied.

Unless you judge that the people polled are too trashy to take any notice of, of course.....

The available evidence is more consistent with a genuine and very unpleasant argument having taken place than with the entire episode being a decades-later invention. The unresolved question is the precise words Charles used and the context/tone in which he used them.

If that was the flavour of the discussion here I suspect we'd all be agreeing with each other.

I would expect close to 100% of us believe there was an argument.

Some of us are saying that there is no evidence one way or another which words were used in that argument.

Then we are disagreeing about which Charles we believe.

"You are allowed to bury your head in the sand, if that’s how you want to deal with the reality of Charles Spencer not having much credibility with this book."

And the more that comes out about the contents of Spencer's book and interviews, the more his credibility crumbles.

OmG, that is fucking ridiculous and hilarious and seems to be,quite indicative of the schoolboy type of resentment he carries against Charles.

I have consistently said that I don’t believe any poll.

I don’t know if it’s true but many say Mumsnet leans right wing . We don’t know how many of the voters are bots - we do know the palace spends a fortune on bot farms .

The only poll I’m interested in - and by the way it would favour royalists as older people are more likely to vote- is a simple question added to a ballot paper.

Just ask us if we want to keep paying for the corrupt shitshow that is the UK monarchy .
No action to be taken so calm down about Brexit . We should be asked.
It’s normal in many countries .

And let's add everybody is forced to vote by law with sanctions if they don't given that the institution is taxpayer funded and we don't get to choose whether we fund them or not.

And what is even the point of publishing these daft, unlikely stories about things that supposedly happened 70 years and which are completely irrelevant to anything and which Spencer himself doesn't even know if they are true or not?

How is any of this honouring Diana and her leagacy? Or is that not Spencer's true aim with this book?

I’m increasingly getting school bully vibes.

I am also less inclined to believe him given that we have examples of mistakes in the book (the equerry one which at the least is worded incorrectly, the Frogmore one and the Piers Morgan one). Do I believe there was an argument? Yes. Do I believe that Charles R used those exact words in that exact way? Not really. I think it more likely that Charles S
misheard or misunderstood the context of what was being said in the middle of shouting and heightened emotions. Together with having no corroboration of what was said, the fact that there are mistakes in the book makes me think him an unreliable narrator

I do take issue when people say that the palace won’t engage (presumably because they are above such things 😀) and everyone takes that at face value?

Does anyone honestly think that the PR gurus at BP aren’t all over this book, that the lawyers aren’t being briefed, that NDAs aren’t being issued (for example as Lownie stated to the lady in Canada) that tame journalists and “friends of the palace” aren’t being briefed to ensure that public opinion is influenced the “right” way?

We know from Lownie’s investigation in to the Yorks that this is how the institution works. It’s naive and gullible to think otherwise.

So of course BP aren’t responding overtly! They don’t need to because they are diverting lots of financial resources and personnel to respond behind a wall of secrecy as usual.

But many posters have castigated William for using the word “paranoia” in any way, shape or form related to Diana, when in fact he was referring to the effect that Martin Bashir’s machinations had on her

The institution is not taxpayer-funded. Only the services that the royal family perform as part of state duties are state-funded. And I'm pretty sure that the value they add is far more than what a state-funded apolitical ceremonial president would add, so they bring in far more returns for the money spent on them as part of their state duties than a ceremonial president would.

I'm always surprised that people with such strong opinions about the royal family are completely ignorant of basic facts about the institution.

You need to lobby your MP to push for a vote on the constitution. Or vote for the party which declares it wants a republican system.

Just going on about how bad the current system is is pointless.

Why hasn’t even the Labour Party included this aim into its manifesto? I can think of many reasons. The world is in a frightening mess and most people actually find the monarchy either dull as ditchwater or a reassuring bit of continuity in an unstable world. And the RF is really a sort of national industry which employs thousands of people, some highly specialised.

That’s where most of the money goes - on staff wages. I’m OK with that.

Really, CS should have titled the book

‘All the trivia about King Charles that you thought you didn’t need to know”

You don’t believe any poll but you do believe Spencer…OK.

I think you need to be more honest about your own prejudices. I have been. I’ve followed the life of C Spencer for decades with increasing distaste. So I have a view on him which colours my reading of his very dramatic allegations AT THIS TIME. Imagine holding on to these terrible accusations for 30 years?

@CoffeeCantata

Your first sentence makes no sense .

What has a poll got to do with my opinion based on an interview I’ve watched ? And based on what I’ve read about events around Diana’s death ?

And you realise that your point about prejudices applies to equally to you ?
I don’t think I’ve ever behind the door with my opinions on the Windsors either !

My username was a response to the Duchy scandal and the greed of William and Charles ( no they do not own the Duchies )

Only the services that the royal family perform as part of state duties are state-funded.

Those services are paid for via a percentage of the Crown Estate profits, so not from taxpayers' money.

Taxpayer funds pay for security.

I’ve just noticed your very telling phrase “many say MN leans right wing”.

Who say this? How many? How do they know? On what evidence? What do you mean by right wing?

I think you need to be more precise and accurate if you’re going to label us all as right wingers.

Duh! Read my post. I explained my prejudice there - I think Spencer’s a shit.

Jeez - I can’t help it if you don’t read what I write.🙄

@bluegreygreen

Not this again

It’s ALL taxpayer money .
Every penny they have they took.

Philip married without a penny to his name and died a multi millionaire .
And that wealth was amassed from us before the Tories changed the payment system and the Windsor wealth ballooned . He’d be a billionaire if he was contemporary.

@CoffeeCantata

No that’s not quite what you said .
You are happy to describe your prejudice against Spencer in detail.
That does not make you neutral .
You are also prejudiced in favour of the Windsors .

Hopped on to X and this came up in my feed. If she has been saying this for years, I’ve never seen it in the papers 😬

Unless I’ve been living on another plane of existence…..there is a poll on this very board and one in aibu ….both with a similar outcome…..would these be considered non existent if the results were different I wonder……