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talkpoliticsBaaaa [greetings], my beloved bleating sheeple critically-thinking peeps! Last month's royal wedding in London very much reminds me of two things. First, and anecdote, and then, the story of a former never-to-be king in my country, then turned politician, then turned prime-minister, now turned irrelevant granddaddy. But first - the anecdote.
One day Jesus, the Pope and Boiko Borisov (our current superman prime-minister) were sailing through a lake in a boat. Suddenly Jesus stepped out of the boat and, walking on the surface of the water, he crossed the lake and reached the shore. In his turn, Boiko soon followed him to the shore, trotting on the water. Then the Pope tried to cross the lake in the same manner, but he immediately sank and drowned. Now on the shore, Jesus turned to Boiko and said, "Mr Borisov, don't you think we should've told this guy about the rocks under the surface of the lake?" Boiko scratched his head with irritation and said, "Huh... What rocks!?..."
This is an allusion to the personality cult which some politicians tend to create about themselves, in one way or another. Even in a supposed democracy like ours (although the latter is rather debatable). After years of prolonged and painful "transition" from a planned, communist society through a wild-wild-west style free-for-all thug-onomy, to the promised shores of capitalist democracy, people eventually grew so disillusioned with the lack of results and the staggering drop of the quality of life, that many voices could be heard demanding a "strong hand to rule us all", and "put this place in order". That's a natural consequence from this painful process, I guess.
So there have been a stream of Messiahs, Boiko "Batman" Borisov only being the most recent of them. But the British royal wedding rather reminded me of his predecessor, another Messiah, the son of our last King (deposed by the commies in the '44 communist putsch) - I'm talking about Simeon II Saxe Coburg-Gotha, who eventually returned to the country "on a white horse" in 2001, with a bag full of beautiful promises ("I'll fix this country in 800 days" -- literally his words). People were ready to sprinkle rose petals onto him (and many actually did). Even though he had never spent a year in his country, he didn't understand a thing about its realities and he was even hardly able to speak proper Bulgarian. But Messiahs tend to have that effect on people - no one seemed to care too much about all that. He's the King, remember? All right, he's not *exactly* king any more and besides he had never really ruled (he had to flee the country at age 6), but he's got blue blood after all, so he must know a thing or two about fixing this place! That's for sure!
It didn't work so well. Of course he brought his own oligarchs along with him from the London City, who continued to rob the country just like most previous post-communist governments had done. What's funnier, people's memory span seems to be painfully short, as they fell for the promises of our current new Messiah, Super-Boiko (you could easily apply any Chuck Norris joke to him and it'd fit him perfectly, he's like that). All of this may tell us a very unpleasant story about "ordinary peeps" as a whole, and about their capacity to use more than two of their brain cells at a time. It also raises some questions about democracy and the way it works (mind you, for those who are ready to jump at me lecturing about the awesome difference between "democracy" and "republic", I'm fully aware of that).
But back to the royal mega-spectacle at the Kate/William wedding in London. The similarities to 2004, the year when our "King" collected a party within just a couple of months - and won the election, are staggering. True, our event back then was much more humble, there were no dolls that yell "Will you marry me" when you press their belly button; there weren't thousands of TV cams conveniently catching every instant when someone in the public sheds a tear (although those were present there too); there weren't two billion watchers either. Just a couple of million (we're a small country after all). And still, the meaning of what was happening, although on a much smaller scale, was the same: a storm of emotions raised a legendary figure above the masses, who in turn invested all their hopes in him. Although he was a person who hardly had any relation and understanding of their life.
They would hand him daisies and give him lambs, they would cry with tears and kiss his hand as if he was their Savior, without having ever heard any substantial thought or statement from him, or any meaningful political idea coming out of his mouth (not that he could speak proper Bulgarian anyway; most of his sentences were full of commas and dots but few words longer than a syllable). They just worshiped a living legend, just like that, as some sort of sacrament in front of his divine body, which had deigned to condescend on us all. And even though the so-called "Premier-King" eventually managed to stir up the whole stagnated political system and shake it from the bottom up, bringing in new personalities and all, in contrast the British crown, by Constitution, does not have the right to meddle in the country's affairs. Its functions are merely ceremonial, symbolic, it serves almost as the country's primary tourist attraction. Well, it's at least the paragon of tradition, and tradition is concern number one for the good auld Albion.
But what about us? We didn't have a king for half a century. The tradition had been forgotten, or so it seemed. And still, Simeon's royal blood was clearly the top factor which gave him the sceptre. So can we even begin to comprehend such irrational outbursts on such a massive scale? One theory is that they're generated by the combined effect of two factors. On the one side, you have the market-friendly media who exploit ever more unscrupulously the ever dumber masses and their ever deepening proneness to get obsessive with the glamorous and fall for nicely-wrapped, shiny packages without caring much about their contents. On the other side, every event of this sort plays the function to "update" the mythology of fairy-tales with which we have lived since childhood - and I mean the childhood of our modern society - that fabulous world populated by unicorns and magic flowers where growing up is presented as rightful inheritance of throne, and sexual maturing is equated to earning the love of the handsome Prince, or the gorgeous Princess, respectively.
In this sense, the royal persons function as an important personage in our "modern" epoch - those are the celebrities, those glamorous people whose personal life generates envy, yearning, competent opinions pronounced loudly at cocktail parties downtown, and prolonged arguments around a bottle of rakia at the tavern. There's of course a significant difference: the interest towards the celebrities is much more voyeurist, as we all seek to dig up something about their personal life, something dark, kinky, wrong and shameful.
On the contrary, the royal persons tend to refrain from revealing themselves so publicly, they skillfully play a theater of majestic decency in front of their subjects, which carries the nostalgic scent of times long past. But even this has started changing today - it's enough to remember the Cinderella story about Diana, disliked by her mother-in-law, cheated by her husband, and dead while fleeing from paparazzi with her Egyptian billionaire lover. A true telenovela story, worth being told in 10 seasons, 50 episodes each! It's a miracle that no one has yet ventured to screen it. It would be a blockbuster.
There's a certain self-multiplicational effect in such events: the event itself becomes more important as the quantity of important personages involved increases. The more TVs are broadcasting the event live ("breaking news! they kissed on the balcony! and twice!!!"), so much greater is the pressure for all media to also respond to the challenge by sending their teams to report from as close to the Buckingham fence as possible, to purchase the TV rights, air hours and commercial spots in prime-time. Today, much like the showbiz celebrities, the monarchic personages are also mostly famous for... being famous.
On the other hand, it drives merchandise sales and reinvigorates the tourism industry, no? Win-win for all. Don't forget that.
As in any other ritual, the result from this one is also the strengthening of power (but not necessarily the royal power, as those are mostly figureheads today). The consolidation of ruling elites around an idea, an image, is in full gear - it's where next to the active prime-minister you could see a famous soccer superstar sitting at the cocktail table shoulder to shoulder, and next to the royal persons, a rock-star (probably one who has spent time in Africa and/or has met the Dalai Lama and considers him his "buddy"). By the way, my country would've been immensely more stable (at least symbolically), had "The Coburg" (as the commies used to call him) limited himself to just performing solemn royal rituals for foreign ambassadors instead of getting involved in governing a country that he didn't understand, encircling himself with people who used his name for blatant self-aggrandizement, restitution of former royal estates all across the country (previously seized by the commie regime), and murky privatization of the last remaining major industrial enterprises which still belonged to the state (and virtually gifting them to various individuals and economic entities with questionable reputation).
In recent decades, the media have re-legitimized monarchy in many respects. They gave it a unexpected second chance for a strike-back over the republican idea which had started a bold procession around the world. The first mega-event of this sort was the crowning of the present Elizabeth in 1953, then watched live by 300 million people on TV. And though our public remained in the dark about that glorious event because of the heavy Iron Curtain at the zenith of the Cold War, mostly due to the lack of a reliable TV network, Bulgaria has now taken its rightful place among the "cultured peoples" of the world, who spend their day debating in real-time on TV such crucial issues like the clothes of the guests, Kate's anorexia and what's the possible interpretation of her dream about her standing naked before the altar. What do some pesky issues like the paralyzing unemployment and upcoming collapse of the pension system matter compared to those, eh?
But this sub-genre of soap-opera is not entirely new to us here, not after our very own royal wedding of King Simeon's daughter Kalina, the so-called "Princess Kalina", whose wedding dress of high artistic merit, patriotically embroidered with stylized folk motifs, could be seen hanging in the National Museum of History, right next to such historic artifacts like Vasil Levski's revolver and the Freedom Flag of the April Uprising. It may sound strange, but there's nothing more media-like than tradition, amirite?
Just think about all the traditional religious rituals and personages that we see in church (I'm nominally supposed to be Orthodox Christian btw). Those, too, have become globalized, just like McDonald's and soccer - we constantly see some self-flagellating people who piously preach to us how we should keep the lent (while appearing on salami adverts), how we should lead a modest life (while moving around in S-class limos with their own personal driver, one with a driver's hat even), who constantly cite the Pope, any Pope, (or, in our case, the Patriarch) and refer to him as one of the greatest superstars this planet has ever seen (which, by the way, oddly contrasts to their advanced age).
The religious symbols, garments, peculiar orations and incomprehensible behaviors is excellent food for the journalist, that oddest of the oddest creatures Evolution has ever created - the Journalist, whose trait #1 in their job description is: "exciting interest and wonderment". Imagine a semi-mythologized clairvoyant healer (by default: female, at least 90 years old, preferably blind) who has healed a hundred people (or it appeared so; go explain to them what the placebo effect is), and whose miracles are totally insusceptible to any scientific explanation! That's front-page material! And not just around internet blogs and New-Age websites, no. It has become mainstream.
Actually there's no paradox here: the chieftains have always adorned themselves with crowns, jewels or at least colorful peacock feathers; the religious figures have inspired immeasurable awe and trepidation exactly because of the enormous amounts of attention. Because the main resource of power is and always will be the monopoly on our attention. And the problem is in ourselves. As a local proverb here says, "Not the one who eats the pie is insane; but the one who hands it to them". And the really funny thing is that we've somehow imagined technical progress to be a form of ultimate enlightenment and rationalization of the mind. But, as a French sociologist once said, "Perhaps we have never been modern?"
The magical royal cart. Who wouldn't love to see how it's like on the inside?
Shiny gold crowns are shiny and golden. What more do you need to know?
Simeon II used to have the popularity of a true pop-star.
Many are more familiar with the royal genealogy than that of their own family.
One day Jesus, the Pope and Boiko Borisov (our current superman prime-minister) were sailing through a lake in a boat. Suddenly Jesus stepped out of the boat and, walking on the surface of the water, he crossed the lake and reached the shore. In his turn, Boiko soon followed him to the shore, trotting on the water. Then the Pope tried to cross the lake in the same manner, but he immediately sank and drowned. Now on the shore, Jesus turned to Boiko and said, "Mr Borisov, don't you think we should've told this guy about the rocks under the surface of the lake?" Boiko scratched his head with irritation and said, "Huh... What rocks!?..."
This is an allusion to the personality cult which some politicians tend to create about themselves, in one way or another. Even in a supposed democracy like ours (although the latter is rather debatable). After years of prolonged and painful "transition" from a planned, communist society through a wild-wild-west style free-for-all thug-onomy, to the promised shores of capitalist democracy, people eventually grew so disillusioned with the lack of results and the staggering drop of the quality of life, that many voices could be heard demanding a "strong hand to rule us all", and "put this place in order". That's a natural consequence from this painful process, I guess.
So there have been a stream of Messiahs, Boiko "Batman" Borisov only being the most recent of them. But the British royal wedding rather reminded me of his predecessor, another Messiah, the son of our last King (deposed by the commies in the '44 communist putsch) - I'm talking about Simeon II Saxe Coburg-Gotha, who eventually returned to the country "on a white horse" in 2001, with a bag full of beautiful promises ("I'll fix this country in 800 days" -- literally his words). People were ready to sprinkle rose petals onto him (and many actually did). Even though he had never spent a year in his country, he didn't understand a thing about its realities and he was even hardly able to speak proper Bulgarian. But Messiahs tend to have that effect on people - no one seemed to care too much about all that. He's the King, remember? All right, he's not *exactly* king any more and besides he had never really ruled (he had to flee the country at age 6), but he's got blue blood after all, so he must know a thing or two about fixing this place! That's for sure!
It didn't work so well. Of course he brought his own oligarchs along with him from the London City, who continued to rob the country just like most previous post-communist governments had done. What's funnier, people's memory span seems to be painfully short, as they fell for the promises of our current new Messiah, Super-Boiko (you could easily apply any Chuck Norris joke to him and it'd fit him perfectly, he's like that). All of this may tell us a very unpleasant story about "ordinary peeps" as a whole, and about their capacity to use more than two of their brain cells at a time. It also raises some questions about democracy and the way it works (mind you, for those who are ready to jump at me lecturing about the awesome difference between "democracy" and "republic", I'm fully aware of that).
But back to the royal mega-spectacle at the Kate/William wedding in London. The similarities to 2004, the year when our "King" collected a party within just a couple of months - and won the election, are staggering. True, our event back then was much more humble, there were no dolls that yell "Will you marry me" when you press their belly button; there weren't thousands of TV cams conveniently catching every instant when someone in the public sheds a tear (although those were present there too); there weren't two billion watchers either. Just a couple of million (we're a small country after all). And still, the meaning of what was happening, although on a much smaller scale, was the same: a storm of emotions raised a legendary figure above the masses, who in turn invested all their hopes in him. Although he was a person who hardly had any relation and understanding of their life.
They would hand him daisies and give him lambs, they would cry with tears and kiss his hand as if he was their Savior, without having ever heard any substantial thought or statement from him, or any meaningful political idea coming out of his mouth (not that he could speak proper Bulgarian anyway; most of his sentences were full of commas and dots but few words longer than a syllable). They just worshiped a living legend, just like that, as some sort of sacrament in front of his divine body, which had deigned to condescend on us all. And even though the so-called "Premier-King" eventually managed to stir up the whole stagnated political system and shake it from the bottom up, bringing in new personalities and all, in contrast the British crown, by Constitution, does not have the right to meddle in the country's affairs. Its functions are merely ceremonial, symbolic, it serves almost as the country's primary tourist attraction. Well, it's at least the paragon of tradition, and tradition is concern number one for the good auld Albion.
But what about us? We didn't have a king for half a century. The tradition had been forgotten, or so it seemed. And still, Simeon's royal blood was clearly the top factor which gave him the sceptre. So can we even begin to comprehend such irrational outbursts on such a massive scale? One theory is that they're generated by the combined effect of two factors. On the one side, you have the market-friendly media who exploit ever more unscrupulously the ever dumber masses and their ever deepening proneness to get obsessive with the glamorous and fall for nicely-wrapped, shiny packages without caring much about their contents. On the other side, every event of this sort plays the function to "update" the mythology of fairy-tales with which we have lived since childhood - and I mean the childhood of our modern society - that fabulous world populated by unicorns and magic flowers where growing up is presented as rightful inheritance of throne, and sexual maturing is equated to earning the love of the handsome Prince, or the gorgeous Princess, respectively.
In this sense, the royal persons function as an important personage in our "modern" epoch - those are the celebrities, those glamorous people whose personal life generates envy, yearning, competent opinions pronounced loudly at cocktail parties downtown, and prolonged arguments around a bottle of rakia at the tavern. There's of course a significant difference: the interest towards the celebrities is much more voyeurist, as we all seek to dig up something about their personal life, something dark, kinky, wrong and shameful.
On the contrary, the royal persons tend to refrain from revealing themselves so publicly, they skillfully play a theater of majestic decency in front of their subjects, which carries the nostalgic scent of times long past. But even this has started changing today - it's enough to remember the Cinderella story about Diana, disliked by her mother-in-law, cheated by her husband, and dead while fleeing from paparazzi with her Egyptian billionaire lover. A true telenovela story, worth being told in 10 seasons, 50 episodes each! It's a miracle that no one has yet ventured to screen it. It would be a blockbuster.
There's a certain self-multiplicational effect in such events: the event itself becomes more important as the quantity of important personages involved increases. The more TVs are broadcasting the event live ("breaking news! they kissed on the balcony! and twice!!!"), so much greater is the pressure for all media to also respond to the challenge by sending their teams to report from as close to the Buckingham fence as possible, to purchase the TV rights, air hours and commercial spots in prime-time. Today, much like the showbiz celebrities, the monarchic personages are also mostly famous for... being famous.
On the other hand, it drives merchandise sales and reinvigorates the tourism industry, no? Win-win for all. Don't forget that.
As in any other ritual, the result from this one is also the strengthening of power (but not necessarily the royal power, as those are mostly figureheads today). The consolidation of ruling elites around an idea, an image, is in full gear - it's where next to the active prime-minister you could see a famous soccer superstar sitting at the cocktail table shoulder to shoulder, and next to the royal persons, a rock-star (probably one who has spent time in Africa and/or has met the Dalai Lama and considers him his "buddy"). By the way, my country would've been immensely more stable (at least symbolically), had "The Coburg" (as the commies used to call him) limited himself to just performing solemn royal rituals for foreign ambassadors instead of getting involved in governing a country that he didn't understand, encircling himself with people who used his name for blatant self-aggrandizement, restitution of former royal estates all across the country (previously seized by the commie regime), and murky privatization of the last remaining major industrial enterprises which still belonged to the state (and virtually gifting them to various individuals and economic entities with questionable reputation).
In recent decades, the media have re-legitimized monarchy in many respects. They gave it a unexpected second chance for a strike-back over the republican idea which had started a bold procession around the world. The first mega-event of this sort was the crowning of the present Elizabeth in 1953, then watched live by 300 million people on TV. And though our public remained in the dark about that glorious event because of the heavy Iron Curtain at the zenith of the Cold War, mostly due to the lack of a reliable TV network, Bulgaria has now taken its rightful place among the "cultured peoples" of the world, who spend their day debating in real-time on TV such crucial issues like the clothes of the guests, Kate's anorexia and what's the possible interpretation of her dream about her standing naked before the altar. What do some pesky issues like the paralyzing unemployment and upcoming collapse of the pension system matter compared to those, eh?
But this sub-genre of soap-opera is not entirely new to us here, not after our very own royal wedding of King Simeon's daughter Kalina, the so-called "Princess Kalina", whose wedding dress of high artistic merit, patriotically embroidered with stylized folk motifs, could be seen hanging in the National Museum of History, right next to such historic artifacts like Vasil Levski's revolver and the Freedom Flag of the April Uprising. It may sound strange, but there's nothing more media-like than tradition, amirite?
Just think about all the traditional religious rituals and personages that we see in church (I'm nominally supposed to be Orthodox Christian btw). Those, too, have become globalized, just like McDonald's and soccer - we constantly see some self-flagellating people who piously preach to us how we should keep the lent (while appearing on salami adverts), how we should lead a modest life (while moving around in S-class limos with their own personal driver, one with a driver's hat even), who constantly cite the Pope, any Pope, (or, in our case, the Patriarch) and refer to him as one of the greatest superstars this planet has ever seen (which, by the way, oddly contrasts to their advanced age).
The religious symbols, garments, peculiar orations and incomprehensible behaviors is excellent food for the journalist, that oddest of the oddest creatures Evolution has ever created - the Journalist, whose trait #1 in their job description is: "exciting interest and wonderment". Imagine a semi-mythologized clairvoyant healer (by default: female, at least 90 years old, preferably blind) who has healed a hundred people (or it appeared so; go explain to them what the placebo effect is), and whose miracles are totally insusceptible to any scientific explanation! That's front-page material! And not just around internet blogs and New-Age websites, no. It has become mainstream.
Actually there's no paradox here: the chieftains have always adorned themselves with crowns, jewels or at least colorful peacock feathers; the religious figures have inspired immeasurable awe and trepidation exactly because of the enormous amounts of attention. Because the main resource of power is and always will be the monopoly on our attention. And the problem is in ourselves. As a local proverb here says, "Not the one who eats the pie is insane; but the one who hands it to them". And the really funny thing is that we've somehow imagined technical progress to be a form of ultimate enlightenment and rationalization of the mind. But, as a French sociologist once said, "Perhaps we have never been modern?"
The magical royal cart. Who wouldn't love to see how it's like on the inside?
Shiny gold crowns are shiny and golden. What more do you need to know?
Simeon II used to have the popularity of a true pop-star.
Many are more familiar with the royal genealogy than that of their own family.
(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 14:02 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 14:08 (UTC)Another proverb says (because I'm full of them!): "It's an honor to promise it, doing it is a bitch."
(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 14:12 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 14:20 (UTC)Lame of thrones
Date: 12/5/11 14:21 (UTC)Bill Maher had a great editorial on the royal wedding and royalty in general, (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1TysupIgUmM) and tied it in beautifully to major issues he has with the current imperial presidency. Highly recommended.
(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 14:31 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 14:32 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 14:36 (UTC)Chuck Norris for President of the USA
Date: 12/5/11 20:06 (UTC)If Chuck Norris declared war on Terrorism, Terrorism would surrender.
Of course Chuck Norris was born in the USA. He was born everywhere.
Re: Chuck Norris for President of the USA
Date: 12/5/11 20:14 (UTC)http://talk-politics.livejournal.com/944646.html?thread=72979206#t72979206
(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 18:29 (UTC)Also, Monny II was a real acting head of state (well, at least for 4 years), as opposed to those jokers in 'gham. Figure that.
(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 19:05 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 19:06 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 19:10 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 23:06 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 12/5/11 23:19 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 13/5/11 14:54 (UTC)Excellent line.
(no subject)
Date: 14/5/11 22:26 (UTC)I think you're right, that to some degree, it is public demand that helps keep the royals in place. The royals don't necessarily prevent anyone from living out their lives and doing what they want, since they have limited political power (though they still seem to have great social power and business influence). They're perhaps more reliable and trustworthy than your regular, "run of the mill" celebrities, though that may be a matter of class. In a way, the commercial media at least are there to give the people what they want, or give them was the media thinks they want. I wonder what it would take politically or culturally to phase out royalty.
(no subject)
Date: 14/5/11 22:48 (UTC)