Summer Reading Contest Winner, Week 8: On ‘Why America Needs a Royal Family’

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Summer Reading Contest Winner, Week 8: On ‘Why America Needs a Royal Family’

The royal family’s private life often intersects with their royal duties. Similarly in America, the extracurricular activities of politicians often overlap with their political affairs as well. Seeing this, writer Jennifer Weiner asserts that America needs its own “royal family,” separately-elected representatives who can perform ceremonial tasks while representing America’s overall values.

Ms. Weiner juxtaposes the royal family’s personal affairs with a soap opera, stating that, “The problem with a real-time soap opera … is that very few people are equipped to be its stars.” She appeals to a sense of familiarity by comparing the lives of the royal family and, in larger part, politicians to television melodrama, showing the reader that these matters relate.

I largely disagree with her argument and would like to propose one of my own: We need to separate the ribbon-cutting and the baby-kissing from politics and remove them entirely. Even now, politicians’ personal affairs distract from more important political matters, and an American “royal family” would only compound this issue.

What Ms. Weiner is asking for reminds me of a mascot, such as the Nesquik bunny — a hollow symbol of the values of carefree fun that the company supposedly has while its parent company, Nestle, commits child-trafficking and slavery in West Africa to harvest cocoa. America needs a lot of things, and a mascot isn’t one of them.

In alphabetical order by the writer’s first name.