A Royal Wedding

Reading my Facebook news feed home page this morning I felt as though I was the only person actually pleased about the forthcoming wedding after the engagement of Prince William and Kate Middleton hit the news yesterday.  I must admit to being slightly more irked than I realised I cared but comments of who was going to pay for the wedding and who cared about the royals anyway started to irritate me more as the day went on. 

One such comment from a person who freely admits she went through a top university at the taxpayers expense, (prior to the introduction of tuition fees) and spent her grant on holidays and booze made me feel that we in Britain simply want to have our cake and eat it most of the times.  Republican comments about the monarchy are equally annoying and one wants to say, 'Well go and live in another country if it bugs you that much,' but hey I am British and that would be rude wouldn't it?  Actually, where would one go to escape?  When the news was announced fanfares were sounded on TV show, 'Good Morning America' across the Atlantic and during Prince William's fairly recent visit to Australia people lined the streets to see him; this in a country that has repotedly been on the edge of Republicanism for some years.  The British Monarchy is big news, people follow the celebrity and they love the tradition, ritual and to some extent the escapism, across the globe, after all what could be more romantic than a Prince and a Princess on their Wedding Day? 

As for the cost, the monarchy cost the British public 38.2 million pounds in 2009-2010 (source: BBC News) yet Visit Britain suggest that the places, events and history associated with the British Monarchy bring in around 500million pounds to the British economy on an average year and in the year of the wedding could be up to 900 million, I may not be an economist but by anyones reckoning that's a pretty good margin and compared to the debacle of the Olympics we are hosting the following year... well I'll leave that to you to consider.

Finally the appealing thing about a forthcoming wedding for me is that it brings marriage back into the spotlight, it seems that traditional old fashioned marriage has been out of favour for a while and let's face it the last generation of Royals didn't do much to promote marriage but despite that I still believe that marriage is good for society and I believe it is good for children to grow up with two people who are brave enough and committed enough to make a public declaration of love for each other, not just with emotion but with the will, an action as well as a feeling, to love and to cherish whatever happens and whatever the cost.  It is a rare thing to find in these modern times but if William and Kate have found that together then this wedding, Royal or not, really is a true cause for celebration.