The Queen Has Spoken

On this Palm Sunday, as Holy Week begins, our Sovereign Lady, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, has addressed the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth, regarding the dark times in which we live. She thanked, on behalf of us all, all those, especially the health workers, who are struggling to get us through this crisis. When speaking of the difficulty of the isolation measures, her words and the tone in which she spoke them, contained nothing of the shrill, hubristic, authoritarian, bossiness of the arrogant politicians whom we, her subjects, the citizens of her realms have foolishly chosen to be her unworthy government ministers, but were rather calm and sober, ending on a note of inspiration, assurance and hope. It was exactly what we have come to expect from her, a lady of deep and devout faith, and true public spirit.

While Her Majesty's speech spoke to the coronavirus pandemic and the hardships directly arising from it, it was indirectly inspirational to those, such as this writer, who have been far less concerned about the virus itself, than about the threat to our basic rights and liberties posed by a populace in panic that is demanding that government protect them from the virus, and governments that take a "nothing is off the table" approach to what they are prepared to do to give the frightened populace what it wants.

It was inspirational in this regard because of who the Queen is and what she stands for. In each of her realms, the Queen is the one who represents the country as a whole - not just those who live there at the moment, but those who have gone before, and those who will come after, which is something only a hereditary head of state can do. As such, she is also a symbol of the heritage of rights and freedoms that have come down to us from a past that included such significant events as the Magna Carta Libertatum, which we hope to pass down to future generations.

The Queen's role in our day and age has been likened to that of the king on a chessboard. The king, who never moves more than one space at a time, is not an offensive piece, but as long as he holds his space against all that would take it from him, the game is not over. Similarly, as long as the Queen and her heirs are on the throne reigning over us and our descendants, the flame of freedom cannot be extinguished entirely. In this day of arrogant, power-grabbing politicians, and physician bureaucrats who often give the impression that they want to trade the serpentine staff of Asclepius for Orwell's grim image of a boot stomping on a human face forever, this is more important than ever. For in Canada, the United Kingdom, and throughout the Commonwealth, "freedom", as the title of John Farthing's book puts it, "wears a crown."

God save the Queen!