I believe all "Royalty" should be discarded as an archaic throwback to pre Democratic times...

[wcmagumba]

Maintaining the Royalty is a huge expense and serves no purpose but letting a few people pretend to be better than the general populace...

[hlthe2b]

1. Fine start with OURS... and please before he bankrupts us.

[stopdiggin]

2. and you're not the first

Thanks for playing.

[Tim S]

3. There will always be Royalty as long as there is (unearned) inherited wealth

[tritsofme]

4. Modern monarchies exist at the pleasure of voters, on what grounds would you override their choice?

It’s not as though they are imposed undemocratically.

Is it really even a huge expense? In many countries they generate positive revenue for their treasury.

If other countries wish to maintain their traditions with royal families, I literally couldn’t care less, not my business.

[BuddhaGirl]

5. Agreed

Monarchies have no business in modern societies...they perpetuate classism and just need to go away.

I hope the Windsor monarchy loses a lot of its luster and makes Brits start to think differently about them!

[Metaphorical]

6. Nah

There's something to be said about separating one's leadership into symbolic vs. pragmatic.

The symbolic leader - the figurehead - is the one that you trot out for weddings and funerals, for signing important papers, and making stirring rallying speeches during times of hardship. It's a public relations function, when you get right down to it. They have little real political power and are very carefully circumscribed in what they do or can say.

The pragmatic leader is the functional head of the political apparatus. They determine policy and enact its execution. They can often do the necessary but unpopular thing (for better or worse) because the figurehead serves as a distraction. They are usually smarter than the figurehead (though not always) but they are also far more disposable.

Trump wants to be a King. He wants to be a figurehead president, and he has nearly no interest in actually governing. This means that there's a power vacuum in the US, because Trump has all the power and attention but has abdicated most of the governing responsibility.

[wcmagumba]

7. I respectfully agree to disagree...we're all adults and don't need a figurehead for distraction...at my house anyway...

[Emrys]

8. As a Brit, my main qualm is

that as a newly fledged republic, we'd probably have a president as head of state instead.

Having seen the calibre of people the UK population's elected as leaders over a number of decades, that's not a prospect I look forward to.

[UTUSN]

9. K&R, a social construct of insidious inequality, hereditary celebrity.