Great Britain has been in mourning since the beloved monarch Queen Elizabeth II sadly passed away on Thursday 8 September 2022 after a 70-year reign. The longest-serving monarch in British history is much respected by the British public regardless of whether they feel an affinity to the Royals or not. The outpourings of affection on her silver, golden and diamond jubilees testified to the respect the public had for her.
Other European nations that also have a Royal Family such as Spain, have mourned the British Queen as if one of their own, and the Spanish capital Madrid, even declared three days of mourning.
However, the death of Queen Elizabeth II also prompted criticism. The New York Times was the main paper in the United States highlighting opposing voices to the Queen’s legacy. Some of those articles have been considered disrespectful by the British media with the Daily Mail calling it “anti-British propaganda.”
Photo by Shann/Pexels
Shortly after her Majesty’s death, New York Magazine’s, The Cut, published an interview entitled: ‘I Won’t Cry Over the Death of a Violent Oppressor’ where they spoke with Uju Anya, an applied-linguistics professor at Carnegie Mellon University. The professor told the Cut that Queen Elizabeth was ‘a representative of the cult of white womanhood.’ According to Uju Anya, the Queen was not exempt from the decisions made in the past by the British government, ‘she supervised.’
The professor also tweeted: ‘I heard the chief monarch of a thieving raping genocidal empire is finally dying. May her pain be excruciating.’
British journalist Piers Morgan called Uju a “vile, disgusting moron” and she received a lot of backlash for her views but had the full backing of her employer even though they didn’t agree with her views.
The paper also published an opinion piece shortly after the Queen’s death entitled “Mourn the Queen, Not Her Empire” in which history professor at Harvard University, Maya Jasanoff, criticised the role of the monarch. Mrs Jasanoff wrote: ‘The Queen helped obscure a bloody history of decolonisation whose proportions and legacies have yet to be adequately acknowledged.’
The paper also had a go at the costs of the Queen’s funeral, NYT reported that the British taxpayers would front the bill of the more than $6 million funeral costs. A ‘hefty price tag’ amid rampant inflation in Britain, says the NYT.
“Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral, which will involve elaborate processions, vigils and rituals, will be paid for by British taxpayers as they deal with soaring energy prices and high inflation. The British government has not yet said how much it will cost”,writes the NYT.
Twitter user Christian Calgie told the NYT: “Your journalists are a global embarrassment just FYI”. The tweet has already received over 2,211 likes.
Joe Armitage, also wrote to the Times saying that “The total cost of the State Funeral for our Head of State will pale in significance to the amount that US taxpayers will pay for President Biden to attend it. Flying motorcades, Air Force One, helicopters and 400 Secret Service agents across the Atlantic and back isn’t cheap.”
Piers Morgan again told the Times to “shut up, you clowns”. “You have no understanding about how we Brits feel about our great Queen, or you’d stop click-baiting all this negative garbage”.
Queen Elizabeth II had a state funeral at Westminster Abbey in London, on Monday 19 September 2022.
The Lady of the World 