Such outrage Firstplay. It's OK to continue to hold your firm views on the monarchy whilst acknowledging that William's contribution to the Air Ambulance Service deserves positive recognition. Contorting it into a further negative to reinforce your stance suggests to me that you only see black and white in a world which is mostly gray.
the end of the british monarchy.

Spot on Anok!. The idea that some of em do a bit in return for £millions is quite funny really. I know quite a few people who do really important voluntary work, Maybe we should put them, and the other few hundred thousand volunteers on the civil list instead of the pampered family, descendants of thieves and murderers and one of the wealthiest families in the world.
I doubt many would miss them, but a referendum would be fun, as suggested by Opti. I think we can imagine the front pages of the tabloids while the campaign was running, alongside glowing reports on the tv about the pampered family.
On the other hand it would be a great opportunity for their real history to be examined, in the far past and more recent, where we could have colour photies of them 'sieg-heiling' in their Nazi uniforms. A 'Who do you think you are' special could be shown on tv, how they bumped off their rivals and family members. A visit to the royal households could be shown to show us all where the priceless treasures were looted from. And not forgetting of course members of their family locked away in asylums due to problems they had. Plus the incest, infanticide, rape, torture perpetrated on anyone who wouldn't bend the knee. Oh yes, a referendum would be good I think.

Such outrage Firstplay. It's OK to continue to hold your firm views on the monarchy whilst acknowledging that William's contribution to the Air Ambulance Service deserves positive recognition. Contorting it into a further negative to reinforce your stance suggests to me that you only see black and white in a world which is mostly gray.
LOl!! No, just expressing an opinion, same as yourself.

thats one picture fp , and weve all had family get togethers where embarrassing things occur
i dont care if they are goosestepping oven building xenophobes each to their own ,( thats grollox anok lol you lying git ) i object that they expect us to pay for them though , thats taking the urine

You'd think their supporters would be suggesting clubbing together for em, surely a reasonable thing to do if enough people want them as a private enterprise. Instead we get indignation because some of us don't like paying for an outdated elite! Incredible!

internet age ,, patreon , i know one bloke gets 200 quid a month of it
so if lizz needs painters in she asks for donatioms on patreon ,
theres always that programme on telly posh pawn , shes got some loverly jewellry

The Queen does and has done a lot of useful work. She has tried to serve us devotedly. The problem is possibly the vast numbers of royal hangers-on. It isn't a question of who pays the bills, since if the Royal Family does useful work, then we all benefit from it, including those who disapprove of the idea. How?
There seems no doubt that the question about the royals has arguments on both sides, and in the context of modern times, where royal families are relatively few, it seems vexatious and it's understandable that there are strong critics. However, the majority are in favour of them [you can't possibly know this] and indeed, there are a lot of good reasons for that. I agree, but they're not the ones you're thinking of. Many find it comforting to submit to authority - the establishment knows how to exploit this and they're very good at it as well they might be, they've been doing it for hundreds of years.

Prince William has worked 20hrs a week for The Air Ambulance Service for the last 2 years. A very worthy endeavour and not something he would do if he was only concerned with putting his feet up and enjoying the fruits of his position.
The British Royal Family is a business enterprise, a brand. Just like any other brand, a key part of their business model is based on something that advertisers and PR consultants call positioning.
Prince William has been positioned in the Air Ambulance precisely because it looks worthy and people like you lap it up. By much the same token, Princess Diana was positioned in a campaign against anti-personnel mines precisely because it looked worthy and people like you lapped it up, even while she was shagging the nephew of one of the biggest arms dealers on the planet.
So there you go, next time you see the royals being paraded for public view just think of a brand name and a catchy slogan, like Heinz baked beans or Hovis.

..and again we see inflammatory remarks by Opti, of a political nature, aimed at Scottish people. It's about royalty Opti, keep up.

And Ghosty, remember the story we were told about Prince Edward in the Falklands war, er sorry, 'conflict'. They tried to have us believe he was flying a helicopter as a decoy for Exocet missiles!! What a whopper, but I dare say some believed that nonsense too. Maybe his brand name could have been 'Exocet Eddy'.

Yes I remember that, as if the British military would hand the enemy a propaganda opportunity like that on a plate "Here you go lads, a member of our Royal family - see if you can hit him!"
It was laughable, yet people believed it and I don't accept that's because they're stupid, it's rather more complicated than that. People believe such things because they want to believe them, they've invested too much emotionally not to. None of us are completely immune from this by the way and the advertising industry knows this very well, they know how to exploit it too.

But why should we want to believe such things? I'm interested in the way British people's relationship with their royals comes, I suspect it is different in a subtle way from here.

Here it like they are not so consolidated, but media (all of them) have been harping up for decades on the idea they bring us the democracy, and if the monarchy's image is in danger, democracy itself is in danger. They have been portrayed like angels, the whole family, more than human beings. No one could talk about them if not for flattering, even light jokes were considered bad taste. Years ago there was a version of Spitting Image, they were the only public figures who never appeared there.

My mother told me once, "if not for the king, we quickly would be slaughtering each other again". I answered: "if that's true, I don't know what is saddest, the fact we are savages or that we can be turned into sheeps by a paternal figure".

Much the same here Pulp, and I'd guess everywhere else they have royalty; they're portrayed as god-like figures. I think it's even more amazing that so many people buy into this image after our establishment ridiculed the same status given to the Emporer of Japan in WW2.

That's interesting, not human but divine? Yeah, that's part of the branding too - but happily it's broken down for the Windsors and probably for good.
Ever since a series of sex scandals made it into view back in the 80s and 90s our royal family has been one of Britain's favourite national jokes . You can pick any satirical show on the TV or radio at random and virtually guarantee that the inbred Nazis will pop up at some point.
perhaps he should persuade his granny to do some mopping at a hospital his dad and step mum brother cousins all to pitch in in health work whilst it suffers from cuts , especially as weve just ok d 367 million tax free no questions asked to his clan
the disparity and economic insanity , this land needs its health service being its jewel , not some little old lady thats been permanently retired but wont stop showing up for work