Gee…That’s Too Bad

Today Queen Elizabeth II passed, September 8, 2022. Although I am not British, she has been Queen of England for all my life and I feel a sadness. It is not a profound sadness, but a personal sadness. Personal in a way like… as a child growing up there were two Dogwood trees in our front yard. As children we would climb and play in those trees.. well at least when mama was gone we’d play in them. Anyway while I was away in the service, the trees died and mom had them cut down. When I returned and saw they were gone, a sadness overcame me… not a profound sadness… but a personal sadness… like I feel at the Queens passing… a small part of my life was now forever gone. Last year Prince Philip died and it was the only time I had written about the British monarchy. Although the Queen presided over one of the most historically brutal racist colonial empires in history, I cannot attribute one single act of racism to her personally.. Now as for her husband, the late Prince Philip, well that’s another story. He never met one that wasn’t worth hanging. I wrote this story about him last year. So while this article is not dedicated to the Queen primarily, it is about a faucet of her life and the British monarchy… and one I hope you will enjoy.

sar·casm/
/ˈsärˌkazəm/
noun
1. the use of irony to mock or convey contempt.
“His voice, hardened by sarcasm, said “Gee that’s to bad..,” after hearing a racist in a Klan uniform got caught breaking into NFAC headquarters and they forced him tap dance to N.W.A ‘s greatest hits.

“Gee, that’s too bad,” is the response former President Trump said upon hearing Senator Mitt Romney was in isolation after being exposed to Covid on the Senate floor. Of course we all remember Romney for being the lone Republican senator who voted for the impeachment of Trump in his first impeachment. Trump was impeached twice during his four years, once for asking foreign governments to interfere in the 2020 elections and obstruction of justice and again in 2020 for inciting insurrection in which he tacitly told a crowd to storm the Capital and hang his Vice President. I mean when I heard that I’m like, “Wow!, you told them to storm the Capitol!! Lol… Anyway, we lost another OG this week when three time Grammy Award winning rapper DMX was called home. I liked his music, but was more a fan of his movies like Exit Wounds, Cradle 2 the Grave and Belly. Across my social media feeds I watched as tributes and condolences from people all over the world poured in after hearing the news. Rest in peace O.G DMX. O.G stands for Original Gangster and according to two former Crips, it originated back in the early 70’s when gang members started using the term. It wasn’t alway “OG”. It used to be just “O”, as in being the first. So gang members would walk around and might say something like,” I’m Original ???,” meaning that they where one of the first. “Gangster” was added a couple years later. Like many of you I first heard the term from Ice-T in the 90’s on an album called O.G Original Gangster.” When I look back it was real funny because after the album dropped, everybody was calling each other OG. “Where is OG so and so,” or come on OG, let’s roll..” We had more OG’s than Google.. DMX got his moniker from an instrument he used to play when he was a young teenager called the Oberheim DMX drum machine. Later DMX was interpreted as standing for Dark Man X. In other news, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh passed away at the age of 99. So naturally the first thing that came to my mind was “Gee.. that’s too bad…” and that brings us to the focus of this article. But before we begin.. there is a photo in this article that could cause distress to sensitive people. It comes right after the picture entitled “Guess who?” You can change your browser to display text only by following these instructions.

“If it has four legs and is not a chair, has wings and is not an airplane, or swims and is not a submarine, the Cantonese will eat it.” -Prince Philip

About a month ago Duchess Markle and Prince Harry gave an interview to black royalty, Miss O and surprised most of the white world with the news that there were racist in Buckingham Palace. So I am not sure what planet these folks live on, seeing that Britain was the most dominate slave trading nation between the 1600’s and early 1800’s and that they were responsible for selling three million black and brown people into slavery. So you might have some people say, “Well they were the first nation to abolish slavery too… .” Yeah after they saw flies in the royal milk. “My, my Duchess.. that’s a wonderful tan you have!! Did you just come from the colony?” Duchess: How kind dear sir, but I have never been out the country. My mother the Queen says we are a ruddy bunch.. but please tell good sir.. is there a Popeyes in yonder dale where one might partake of chicken and grape soda?” We will cover that story in another article…(Sophia Charlotte pictured right). Anyway, back to Philip.. Philip was born into Greek royalty, but his family was exiled from the country when he was a toddler. He joined the British Navy at the age of 18 and then did something that if it occured nowadays, would be frowned upon and might even mean an azz kicking by somebody’s father. He begin to write love letters to thirteen year old Princess Elizabeth. So first of all before some of my old heads get into a ditty, let me quantify that. Back in those days older men courting babies.. excuse me I mean…”younger” women weren’t looked upon as child molesters. Primarily because back in those days any eyeball contact to exposed skin meant you had to marry her or somebody gonna die. “Sir Harold you saw my daughters ankle!! I demand you marry her or else!!” Yep..

In 1986 while visiting China, Prince Philip told a bunch of British students: “If you stay here much longer you’ll all be slitty-eyed.”

King George VI, her mother Queen Elizabeth, and her younger sister Princess Margaret in their coronation robes in 1937. Elizabeth was about 12 when this picture was taken. (Left)

Philip was a Mountbatten.. Prince Philip Schleswig Holstein Sonderburg Glücksburg Mountbatten Windsor… the name just drips of “I’ma royal SOB and I can’t be touched…” His branch of the family came from the Battenbergs of Germany. What could go wrong? His father, Louis Francis Albert Victor Nicholas Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma, was Admiral of the British Fleet and also held the title, “Prince Louis of Battenberg.” Burma changed its name in 1989 to Myanmar but is still recognized as Burma by the United States. Uncle Sam: “Who told you to change yo name.. (smack! smack!) Yo name is Burma!” Sounds familiar right? There is a serious conflict happening in Myanmar right now as pro democratic protesters battle the military which took control of the country in a coup a few years ago. The military promised fair democratic elections like Republicans do here but…. okay I’m getting off the subject. A while back I mention something about what could go wrong… I mean them being Battenbergs from Germany.. Well for one thing his sister and her husband,  Georg Donatus, Hereditary Grand Duke of Hesse..drip.. drip.. drip.. were members of the Nazi Party. They were killed in an airplane crash in 1937. You all know about the apple and the the tree thing right? Anyway, the future Queen met Philip in 1939 while her mother and King George VI toured the Royal Naval College at Dartmouth. Like I said she was thirteen and he was a whole eighteen year old man in college. In the summer of 1946 Philip asked King George for Elizabeth’s hand in marriage. The King said “Hold on mfer… at least wait till she’s twentyone!!” Okay he didn’t say it like that.. but he told him he would let him marry her when she became 21… “but I still say he was probably thinking that..” Anywho.. Philip and Elizabeth were married in a ceremony at Westminster Abbey on November 20, 1947. In 1952 Philip and Elizabeth were touring the Commonwealth and had stopped over in Kenya because they heard the natives had started back sassing Colonial Governor, Sir Evelyn Baring. “Evelyn!! What kinda name is dat boy? Did dey run outta mens names ova dere in Inlend?” Philip: “Beth.. we gonna have to go over there and kick some ass… Evelyn says every morning somebody leaves makeup and lipstick on his desk with a copy of “Woman’s Day…” lol.. Anyway, it was while they were in Kenya that Elizabeth got the news that her father had passed and she was now Queen.. Queen Of England.

 “Do you still throw spears at each other?” Philip talking to an aboriginal leader in Queensland, Australia in 2002.

Guess who???

There is an old saying in England.. “The wogs begin in Calais.” Philip was a man of this generation. Wog is an offensive British term for a non white person and Calais is the nearest French port to England. He wielded his racism, sexism and class privilege over every wog he met. The British press portrays him as a man of the people, but in reality many of the Queen’s subjects wondered why they had to put up with this %$$# for ninety nine years. In 1980 an American visiting Buckingham palace was aghast at the spectre of an black person bowing down and then licking the boots of the Queens consort. The American said, “By gawd man, he is licking your boots!!” Philip looked at the man and said.. “Yeah and he missed a spot too.” Okay I made that up.. but that’s the kind of person he was… On a tour of a community centre in London in 2015, Philip asked a group of female Asian volunteers: “So who do you sponge off then?”. They were like “What!!” Philip’s hatred of the lower orders were only a reflection of the attitudes that dominated in the British ruling class in the decades of his upbringing. Fascism came naturally to them. Fascism is the European white supremacy. It places loyalty to an ideology based on biological, cultural or historical terms above all else. In this case it was the monarchy. In 1936 King Edward VIII abdicated the throne to marry the American divorcee Wallis Simpson. It cause a constitutional crisis because one, she was twice divorced and two, both of her former husbands were still living. That’s the official reason for the abdication, but some say the real reason is that Edward and Wallis were fanatically pro-Hitler. The abdication was in 1936 and Hitler was appointed chancellor of Germany in 1933. In 1939 Hitler invaded Poland which while not starting WWII would lead to a formal declaration of war by the UK later that year. Imagine Britain aligning itself with the Axis, and the King of England was a Nazi? Might have been a lot of spit polished shoes running around here today.. Edward was King George’s brother and King George was Elizabeth’s father. It is said Edward taught her the fascist stiff-arm salute when she was six years old. So yeah, Philip and some of the members of the family he married into were nothing but cold stone racist. According to one newspaper account:

Sixty-nine years as royal consort, kept at huge expense to the public to lead a life of waste and self-indulgence, only reinforced Prince Philip’s unlikability, his rude and overbearing manner. What were regarded as outrageous statements by many were the norm in what counts as “high society” in Britain—the royal enclosure at the Ascot races, the royal box at Wimbledon, the “coming out” parties of the debutantes, the country hunts, the London clubs, the Oxford and Cambridge boat race, the Henley Royal Regatta, the charity balls and the countless polo matches. To this scum, the rest of us are the unwashed masses. -Redflag

Now to be transparent, RedFlag is a revolutionary socialist organisation. Insert “communist” for revolutionary here. I am not a communist socialist.. yet.. but who’s to say. They keep gunning us down in the streets… well Ima keep my options open… just kidding. Our country is a racist sh*thole.. but its our racist sh*thole. Anyway this is the environment Philip grew up in. Remember King Leopold? He was the tyrant who presided over the Free State of the Congo. It was conservatively estimated that over 10 million Congolese died under his reign. Far greater than the six million who died during the Holocaust. He was a first cousin of Queen Victoria, who was Queen Elizabeth’s great-great-grandmother. I wrote a story a few years ago about him which you can read here. The picture to the left is an example of the punishment he meted out for disobedience. Anyway, among the monarchy, you will find some of the most racist people who ever lived and Philip was one of them. But it makes you wonder why he was not pulled from public life, why did they let his racist and sexist attitude go unabated for decades?

•  “You are a woman, aren’t you?” he asked a Kenyan woman in 1984 when she gave him a gift.
• “So who’s on drugs here?… He looks as if he’s on drugs,” while pointing to a 14-year-old member of a Bangladeshi youth club.
• He told the president of Nigeria that he looked like he was “ready for bed,” because he was dressed in a traditional robe.
• Phillip also told a 13-year-old who wanted to become an astronaut that he should lose some weight.
• His history of offensive comments comes at a time when racial sensitivity and racism in the Royal family is being looked into after Prince Harry and Meghan Markle told Oprah that members of the family were concerned over what skin tone her son Archie would have before he was born. Markle never specifically said who made those comments. (Everyone thinks it was Philip who brought it up.)

So in ending this article, I would like to say I was pleasantly surprised not to see my timeline flooded with condolences for one of the most racist men on the planet, Prince Philip. Kehinde Andrews, Professor of Black Studies at Birmingham City University, said “He was a throwback to old-school racism. Painting him as a benign, cuddly uncle of the nation is simply untrue.” In the beginning of this article I wrote the definition of “sarcasm.” So it is fitting that I end this article with a tribute from Prince Harry and Duchess Markle to Philip:  “In loving memory of His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh, “Thank you for your service…You will be greatly missed.” ( FYI.. Besides the loving memory and the being greatly missed part…Philip could not be called “His Royal Highness” because he was not in line to succeed to the British throne. It messed with him his whole life that he could not be addressed as “Your Royal Highness.” The Prince and Duchess are showing us what next level payback looks like..)

Correction: In 1956 Queen Elizabeth bestowed the title of “Your Royal Highness,” on her husband almost a decade after they were married… because you ain’t getting no sleep if you don’t. Still it was an honorary title and and many found it distasteful as he was not in the line of succession to the British throne.

Thanks for reading © Hill1News
Reprint: April 2012