RuamRudy

Apparently even the police wouldn't tell them why they were arrested.

What is it about freedom of thought that you dislike?

These people were not disrupting or interrupting anything. They were intending to exercise what I had presumed was their democratic right to protest. They hadn't even got as far as lifting up their placards. In short, they were doing nothing unlawful. They were arrested simply because of their political beliefs. Tell me what is acceptable about that.

Your trivialising of this is the enabler that the government approves of. Well done.

Coronation fever sweeps across the British isles

Regardless of your feelings towards the monarchy, this should outrage every one of us - peaceful demonstrators arrested and their placards confiscated. Fascist regimes don't happen over night, but the UK is definitely on the road to dystopia.

Betteridge's law of headlines: "Any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no."

Can you provide backup for this? Then maybe they could start to pay their taxes? That would be a nice change. Do you have evidence for this? Currently the economy needs to support a head of state and numerous nonentities plus those nonentities' flunkies. Replacing a massive money pit with a much smaller and more accountable one would surely make economic sense? As for the crown estates, those endeavours will, presumably, continue to function. Only the income would be returned in full to the country, it's rightful owner. Not my sole reason, but your argument to the contrary is definitely unconvincing at present. Such a movement already exists: https://www.republic.org.uk/ But I fear, much like brexit, until we get democracy within the UK electoral franchise, we won't see any meaningful reform to the drain that is the royal family either. Until then, the UK electorate will continue to vote for the most damaging of results and any plebiscite for abolishing the monarchy will be thwarted by the very people who would benefit from it (see Brexit, PR referendum, any election which saw the Tories take office etc).

I am going to go out on a limb here - but might a website called royal central possibly have an inbuilt bias? We don't even know how much the monarchy actually costs us at present because of Byzantine accounting. Although, I guess, we do have a feel for the amount of taxes Charles was due when his mother died that he shirked. I suspect, however, that's just the tip of the iceberg.

We don't even have a presidential model so to suggest that it would be more expensive than supporting the current coterie of parasites, their flunkies and hangers on is a nonsense. The nature of his birth? He wasn't delivered to the hospital on the back of Boadicea' chariot. He most certainly wasn't imbued with special powers and uncanny insight. He is simply a flawed and generally unimpressive man who was very, very lucky to emerge from a specific, venerated vagina. He did nothing to deserve it and has done little since to show gratitude for it. True - and while the French method was effective in the long run, I would advocate a more modern approach to introducing democracy to the UK.

As much as a disliked the woman's politics, if she had been elected president then it would have been through a democratic process, and that same process would have allowed us the opportunity to remove her from office too.

To add to your very reasonable comments, I think there is also a growing disquiet about the cost of the monarchy, their incessant demands for special exemptions (inheritance tax, for example) and the totally undemocratic nature of an unelected head is state who uses their position to further bolster their own affairs.

I think now we are getting to the nub of the issue - are you talking about a piece of artistic effort, or easily digestible fodder for those more literal viewers. Do you want an historical re-enactment or something more artistically challenging? The world is surely big enough to allow both to exist without having to deride one or the other? (I am not sure why that sentence in the middle is in bold font - not intentional)

Commented as in responded to a question posed of him.

Utter racist drivel - he is as Scottish as anyone else who was born there. His affiliations clearly lie in Scotland, otherwise he would not be working to lead our country and his fellow Scots to independence.

More to the point, our country's leader is not obliged to meet every overseas visitor, even a one-term president.

Fair enough, although two points - it was scripted and filmed as a farce so the mannerisms were intended, and it was made pre-2007, the year we all (apparently) became infected with wokism.

Then your memory of it's history is as unreliable as your memory of it's name. It successfully completed 9 seasons, coming to a natural conclusion without any controversy. Since then it has been celebrated on the BBC in 2007. To say it was taken off the air because of its format is factually incorrect.

You are really getting yourself in a tangle here. On the one hand, you are criticising those who object to actors playing characters who's ethnicity or sexuality doesn't match their own, but on the other hand you are criticising the practice of... giving acting roles to people who's ethnicity or sexuality is different to the character they play. I think even Schroedinger would be confused about where you stand on that one.

Hello? Hello??? Did you mean 'Allo, 'Allo, the successful BBC comedy which ran for 9 series between 1982 and 1992 with a revival in 2007?

Good god, JonnyF, you are protesting against cultural appropriation. I would have never thought you would go woke. Robert Powell playing Jesus - outrageous!

Is there over-representation of any minority? Can you offer empirical evidence to back up that suggestion, or is it merely a gut feel?

I am not sure to whom you are referring, but I presume that they would play the character appropriately? Is there a particular gay actor who camps up a straight figure from history?

Because the gays and the coloured people don't exist in the real world?

Sunak was in Glasgow yesterday at the northern branch of of the Tory party conference (as an aside, the photos showing the hall at no more than 20% filled are a joy to see} and refused to answer journalists' questions on the matter. I guess what you would expect from a weak, spineless man who's ideology is nothing more profound than accumulation and self-aggrandisement.