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“The Queen died peacefully at Balmoral this afternoon”, this is how Buckingham Palace, in its traditional laconic rhetoric, announced the death of her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II yesterday. The announcement didn’t need to be flowery nor eight pages long to convey its momentous nature, we all knew it meant the end of an era.
In many ways, that two-paragraph press release is the perfect encapsulation of the seven decades of the Queen’s reign. She never made a big fuzz about her job, she didn’t self-publicize, as she knew she didn’t need it. She fulfilled her duty and knew that her subjects would appreciate it. She was mostly right, the only thing she was wrong is that not only did she earn the respect and love of her people, but she gained the admiration and became a recognizable icon of the entire world.
The media outlets of Britain and the world will now cover the ten-day-long “Operation London Bridge” which will end with her state funeral, an event that leaders from all over the world and thousands of Brits are expected to attend. Pundits and writers will note the highlights of her life, and all will question the type of monarch that King Charles III will be and debate the future of the Monarchy.
Albeit important, these issues do not capture the essence of why the death of a British Monarch (an institution many accuse of being archaic) has shocked a vibrant 21st-century first-world country and captivated the rest of the world.
The Queen’s death marks truly the end of an era (EFE)
The Queen: Disruptive stability
After all, why was the Queen important? She did not check any of the boxes that make people famous or iconic today: She did not hold any real political power, her country was definitely no longer the hegemony that ruled the waves, she did not make daily controversial tweets, and she did not play the role of the victim nor she was a TikTok viral sensation. Why was the Queen an icon in a world that appears to value scandal, social media virality, and a borderline sociopathic concern for yourself?
The answer is quite simple. In a world that moves quickly, that applauds the constant sacrifice of tradition, that views change (sometimes radical) as the ultimate good there is, a world that turns how saints into demons in a split second, Queen Elizabeth presented stability, continuity, and a genuine sense of public duty, values that are in low supply. In a world that changes constantly, the Queen never truly did, and we unconsciously admired her for that.
Paradoxically, by obeying the customs of yesterday and maintaining the old-school selfless character that was forged in the fires of the Second World War, the Queen defied modern standards and expectations. In a weird way, the stability and discipline with which she carried herself, were disruptive characteristics in a world too accustomed to instability and indiscipline.
The Queen’s commitment to public duty and selfless service makes her a disrupter in today’s self-centered world (EFE)
Work ethic and continuity
The Queen never complained. Despite her inherent privileged and pompous position, she rarely decided to consciously be the center of attention, despite the personal difficulties she faced she just “kept buggering on,” a phrase her first Prime Minister Winston Churchill famously used daily.
The Queen kept buggering on until her very last days. Just this Tuesday the Queen held an audience with Prime Minister Liz Truss, giving her the commission to form a government in her name after the resignation of Boris Johnson. Up to the very last, the Queen left her personal issues aside and played her role as a constitutional monarch, she fulfilled the duty she acquired when she ascended to the throne in 1952.
Her longevity gave Britain and the world a calming sense of continuity. Time passed, Presidents came and went, wars started and ended, cultural icons rose and fell, and countries were created and destroyed, yet she remained.
A strange case of true national unity
Her combination of work ethic, continuity, and sense of selfless duty made her a truly unifying figure, an almost unheard accomplishment in today’s divided and polarized Western societies. Even republicans (in the British, not American sense) decided to only attack the broad idea of the monarchy, and not the Queen herself.
The scenes we will see in the coming days, thousands of people together expressing their gratitude to the Queen, might seem extraordinary and even alien in 2022. After all, is there any other public figure who could elicit such a response in any Western country today? Is it too much to say that such a moment of national unity over the death of a public servant is impossible to fathom in today’s bitterly divided America?
The Queen swore to do her duty and to personify the so-needed sense of national unity that any country yearns for, the reactions of grief from her people clearly show that she left the world having accomplished her mission.
Regretfully, the death of Her Majesty the Queen comes at a time of uncertainty. Britain and the world face a looming energy crisis, rampant inflation, a war in Europe, and a revanchist China in the East. More changes will surely come in the future, and the Queen will no longer be there to provide some sense of permanency and calm.
Nobody knows what King Charles III will do during his reign. It is certain he will not be able to fill her shoes, however, let us hope he does his very best to maintain the good work his mother did for seventy years and maintains the role of the monarchy. Until then, as the old saying goes: the Queen is dead, long live the King.
Daniel is a Political Science and Economics student from the University of South Florida. He worked as a congressional intern to Rep. Gus Bilirakis (FL-12) from January to May 2020. He also is the head of international analysis at Politiks // Daniel es un estudiante de Cs Políticas y Economía en la Universidad del Sur de la Florida. Trabajo como pasante legislativo para el Representate Gus Bilirakis (FL-12) desde enero hasta mayo del 2020. Daniel también es el jefe de análisis internacional de Politiks.