4- Friday, January 30, 1987 - North Shore News

Bob Hunter

@ strictly personal ®

I’M SURE, like me, you
avidly followed the story of
gentle Prince Edward quit-
ting the British marines.

I'm sure by now Sgt. Collins
over on the other page has laid
down the law on this matter, he
being a war hero and whatnot.

I hope Doug wasn’t too hard
on Eddie, that’s all.

1 like the boy. I think he did
what he hadda do, in his own
way. Sure, he looks a bit foppish,
but I] don’t find anything wrong
with the word ‘‘sensitive’’ being
used to describe a soul.

Some of the, well, most sen-
sitive people I know are sensitive.

Just why should British princes
have to join the bloody military,
anyway?

It’s bad enough that a prince is
expected to do stud duty. But
then they have to go march.
That’s not democratic, having to
prove how macho you are just so
the Family gets to maintain its
dominant position in the monar-
chy market.

1 mean, the poor kid has been
treated like a Mafia scion.

Remember what John Lennon
sang: ‘‘First you must learn how
to smile as you kill.” All that
hippie stuff.

Now that I think about it, I
realize that what’s happening is
that some kind of ripple effect
from two decades ago has finally
reached the Royal high tide line.
Peace. Good vibes. Grooviness,
even.

I think, actually, Prince Ed-
ward is the long-awaited Pop
Prince of Peace whose coming
was predicted in the underground
comics in the *60s. You didn’t
notice? Too bad. Here he comes
anyway!

Big brother Andie showed the
fortitude — or at least a will-
ingness to follow orders (a char-
acteristic I always wonder. about)
— enough to ride in a helicopter
in the Falklands. He didn’t exact-
ly play a front-and-centre bat-
tlefield role, of course. Royalty
hasn't been dumb enough to do
that since the Hundred Years’
War. ;

But it dicl wonders for his ter-
rible reputation as a cad-about-
town, which of course us com-
_moner males envied all to hell.

How many guys get to camp
out with a porn star, after all?

In the wake of the Falklands,
Andie grew into the role of a
bona fide warrior prince, fit to
seek fair Fergie’s hand.

I mean, following this stuff on
television, I sometimes have
trouble keeping a firm handle on
reality, you know?

By every reasonable expecta-
tion of the Age of Enlighten-
ment, the institution of monar-
chy should be totally, absolutely
extinct by now,

The very idea of royalty is so
patently ridiculous, so un-
dignified and demeaning to ordi-
nary people, so pretentious, so
unfair, so primitive, that any
thinking person who still finds
the British Royal Family
fascinating has to have a hole in
his head.

And that’s me. Sorry.

1 really do enjoy watching a
professional Royal Family at
work. They give good entertain-
ment value for the tax buck it
costs the average Briton or the
occasional dollar from the na-
tional and provincial coffers as
one of the Royals whips through
town, whether it’s Margaret
dragging her Scotch or Di dragg-
ing an eternally pained-looking
Charlie.

I never begrudge the money.

If it weren't for the Royal
Family, | might have to turn to
sitcoms or soap operas for
amusement and edification.

Instead, I watch the news,
especially any tidbits about the
Queen Mum, Liz herself, Lady
Di, or any fights they might be
having with Maggie Thatcher.

It is a matriarchy, in case you
hadn’t noticed.

The secret of the Royals is that
we love to see someone wearing a
crown. We know inside that they
can’t seriously be any better than
you or me — and look, indeed,
don’t they fall on their prats a lot
in public.

It’s the price of greatness.

But maybe there’s something
more going on here, this time.

Maybe we’re looking at the
Greening of England. America

was supposed to have ‘‘Greened”’

more than a decade ago,
although, as we see, it was a
strange darned Greening that
threw Ronald Reagan up on the
shore.

In any event, the Labour Party
in the U.K. has vowed to get out
of the nuclear weapons side of
defence, exercising what is
known overseas as the ‘‘Cana-
dian Option,’’ and they still ap-
parently have a chance of getting
elected.

And, by coincidence, at
roughly the same time, a prince
of the Royal Family drops out
of the Marines.

It’s enough to make ya mushy
inside, eh, mate?

I guess the next epic drama
from Buckingham Palace will be
when some princess or other
joins the Marines.

Don’t count the Brits out yet!

Would you like to become part
of a success story? Are you
tired of your current
occupation? Speak to Block
Bros. Realty about a career
in real estate today.

KIM SPENCER

CAREER DEVELOPMENT MANAGER
988-3151

BLOCK BROS. REALTY LTD.
3709 DELBROOK AVE. —
NORTH VANCOUVER, V7N 324

Langley man faces
illegal fishing charge

A 34-YEAR-OLD Langley man
appeared in North Vancouver pro-
vincial court Monday to face il-
legal fishing charges.

Brian Molloy was originally
charged with one count of posses-
sion of fish caught with a net and

possession of fish caught under an
Indian food fishing licence follow-
ing a seizure of fish by Fisheries
and Oceans personnel.

Appearing before Judge J.K.
Shaw, Molloy was remanded to
April 14 for trial on the charges.

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