The Lady Diana thing

coopster_the_1st

As already pointed out, just look how people react to celebratory deaths today via social media. This was before the time of social media but print and TV media more than filled that role.

She was one of, if not the most famous women in the world who had died unnecessarily at a young age, so I can see the media interest around this. A state funeral showed the respect to a person who was the mother of a future king and showed her status in the world.

It was a sombre time and I was sad for the family who the media and public felt should be grieving in public. That was distasteful and I think the way they looked after 2 young boys who had just lost their mother was their correct priority. It also felt wrong the amount of money wasted on flowers. Why people could not think rationally and donate to one of her charities and benefit others as she would have wanted, rather than improve the profits of florists!

I do agree that what felt like exaggerated public grieving was unnecessary.

crispybug2

My take :-

As someone who grew up not much more than 3 miles from Althorp, the Spencer family estate, I remember that the Spencer family were seriously disliked in the area, I can't say whether or not she was particularly disliked but the family certainly were!

I don't particularly remember the morning when she died, my baby son was very unwell and my ex wife and me slept in until about eleven in the morning but I remember that the radio was playing non stop dirge, by the early afternoon I was sick to death of the television coverage

I made absolutely bloody sure that I avoided the live television coverage of the funeral but obviously it was impossible to avoid it completely, my thoughts are that people who wailed at the top of their voices as the coffin passed them are really bloody embarrassed by their actions, I thought then and I still think now that sizeable chunk of the population lost it's mind for a week or so.

crispybug2

ben@31 wrote:

A more likely theory is that, given the number of flowers thrown at her hearse during the funeral, Diana was murdered by florists who wanted to boost sales.

My ex wife's uncle had a florists shop at the time

I do know for a fact that he had a very nice Caribbean cruise on the proceeds from the flowers he sold in the weeks around the funeral.

sungod

jimmy carr said it all...

what do you get if you cross the queen and and prince phillip?

killed in a tunnel

verylonglegs

crispybug2 wrote:

ben@31 wrote:

A more likely theory is that, given the number of flowers thrown at her hearse during the funeral, Diana was murdered by florists who wanted to boost sales.

My ex wife's uncle had a florists shop at the time

I do know for a fact that he had a very nice Caribbean cruise on the proceeds from the flowers he sold in the weeks around the funeral.

I really hoped he ramped his prices right up for those mugs.

mfin

The title of the ITV Programme tonight? "Diana: The Day Britain Cried".

FFS

They should have called it "Diana: The Day Some People Very Weirdly Overreacted".

...as I said, it's being portrayed absolutely nothing like the truth of what most normal people experienced.

pblakeney

mfin wrote:

The title of the ITV Programme tonight? "Diana: The Day Britain Cried".

FFS

They should have called it "Diana: The Day Some People Very Weirdly Overreacted".

...as I said, it's being portrayed absolutely nothing like the truth of what most normal people experienced.

First mistake - Watching TV. Opiate for the masses*.
Or at least taking an interest as to what is on.

*©️ Calvin & Hobbes

Pross

Think how bad it would have been if we'd had social media back then!

Rather than Elton singing Candle In The Wind at the funeral someone should have sung Oh What A Circus from Evita, Lloyd Webber could have written it about the reaction we saw from some quarters - 'we've all gone crazy, mourning all day and mourning all night falling over ourselves to get all of the misery right'.

pblakeney

Pross wrote:

Think how bad it would have been if we'd had social media back then!

Rather than Elton singing Candle In The Wind at the funeral someone should have sung Oh What A Circus from Evita, Lloyd Webber could have written it about the reaction we saw from some quarters - 'we've all gone crazy, mourning all day and mourning all night falling over ourselves to get all of the misery right'.

I have mastered avoiding such things.
Spend too much time on here mind...

crescent

I remember hearing it on the TV news early on the Sunday morning - the newsreader was dressed in black and said there would be a statement from a royal spokesman shortly. I assumed the Queen Mother had died but was shocked to hear it was Princess Diana - I would say it was my JFK moment in so far as I remember where I was when I heard it. Very sad but, like so many others, I can't understand the hysteria over the death of someone who I was not close to. It almost felt like people were trying to outdo each other with their grieving. I watched one of the 20th anniversary programs last week and it was interesting to hear Prince William express the same view that he couldn't understand why complete strangers were so upset.

rob churchill

Wasn't bothered myself*, but neither do I think the reaction was as strange or surprising as some here. A footballer puts a ball in the back of the net and tens of thousands of people scream with joy and jump up and down. If it's a big match they might celebrate for days, travel miles to watch the team parade around in an open top bus, get commemorative tatoos, and years later bore their grandchildren with stories of the great day. We consider this perfectly normal, yet none of those people were players on the team that won, or even knew anyone personally who had ever played for the team. It wasn't in any sense their achievement, but that doesnt stop them blubbing 'We won!' with tears running down their faces.

Celebrity is much the same. Thanks to mass media we can have a one-sided relationship with a famous person: 50% of it is missing, but 50% of it is still there. We know what this person looks and sounds like, we know what's happening in their personal life, all the details of who they're dating, their health problems, the triumphs and disasters of their careers, their thoughts on everything from fashion trends to natural disasters, their spats with rival celebs, and on and on. Even without having any active interest you can end up knowing far more about people you've never met than people you work with every day. You can admire them or despise them, they just don't know anything about you. Hardly anyone on this forum has ever met Mark Cavendish, much less sat down and had a heart-to-heart with him, but almost everyone on here has an opinion on what he's like as a person and thinks they know how he'd react to this or that situation/event.

So why would it surprise anyone that a subset of the population reacted to Diana's death as though she was someone they knew and were very fond of?



*but I very nearly shed a tear when Spock died, it was a close-run thing but stiff upper lip held in the end.

mfin

rob churchill wrote:

.........So why would it surprise anyone that a subset of the population reacted to Diana's death as though she was someone they knew and were very fond of?

Because by your logic people would take the streets wailing at any major known figure's death and the reaction in this case wouldn't have been odd, but it was, and very notably. A stack of people went weird.

rob churchill

mfin wrote:

rob churchill wrote:

.........So why would it surprise anyone that a subset of the population reacted to Diana's death as though she was someone they knew and were very fond of?

Because by your logic people would take the streets wailing at any major known figure's death and the reaction in this case wouldn't have been odd, but it was, and very notably. A stack of people went weird.

Because she appealed to a wider section of the public than most celebrities and was idolised by many of those to a greater degree than is usual. In her own words, she set out to be "Queen of people's hearts" and with some skillful media manipulation she went a long way to achieving that (frankly dysfunctional) ambition. Then she died suddenly, violently, and at the height of her popularity. You don't have to look hard to see events equivalent in nature but on a smaller scale due to the narrower appeal of the celebrity concerned: think of teenage girls on the news collapsing in hysterical weeping because their boy-band crush has announced his engagement. Or if you want an example of a similar nature and scale, look at the reaction to the death of Evita Peron: three million people filing past her coffin, many fainting or losing control, a dozen or so killed in crowd crushes.

webboo

It's clear that you can't educate pork.

awavey

I know I was hungover on the Sunday, as my friend had held their birthday party the night before and we'd drunk alot of vino and when we finally dragged ourselves out of collective slumbering and someone says to you "oh princess di died last night", you kind of go "oh ok, has anyone got any anadin?" must have taken at least 10-15mins for it to finally sink in "so when you said Princess Di had died, you really meant she died ?" and of course each time someone else decided it was time for breakfast you kept going through the same routine, and then you are checking ceefax to find out what on earth had happened, and yeah you felt sad for her kids and her close family, but I dont remember anyone becoming an emotional wreck about it that I knew.

upto that point I think the highest profile royal to have died in my lifetime was Lord Mountbatten, and I just remember everyone being sombre about it and talking about it but it wasnt THE only topic people discussed for days on end, but I dont recall it dominating the media at the time so Id just assumed the same would be true this time.

but I was on a training course that next week for work at a place next to Holland Park and everyday youd see all these people walking past to Kensington palace/gardens and dumping mountains of flowers and toys and youd go out at lunch breaks and curious obviously go and have a look, and just end up thinking the worlds gone completely mad. It wasnt like people were spontaneously grieving for someone they didnt know, it was almost like you felt you were being told you must grieve publically for this individual and people were just getting caught up in the hysteria of it, wasnt it Scott Mills on Radio 1 who went all Tony Blackburn and played the same song on continuous repeat for hours.

I think on the day of the funeral, we just went out somewhere, just to get out of the house because there was nothing else on the tv, no DVD/blurays or catch up tv,and nothing much else happening, and it was nice and quiet, probably were one of the families who ended up walking around a diy warehouse. and no I didnt buy Candle in the flippin Wind.

Im not sure why the special need to commemorate it especially. I find it abit mawkish really and it must be incredibly hard for her two sons to feel they can move on from it at all as its just continually chucked at them.

webboo

How did they know Lord Mountbatten had dandruff, because they found his " head and shoulders on the beach"
I'll get my coat.

mfin

rob churchill wrote:

mfin wrote:

rob churchill wrote:

.........So why would it surprise anyone that a subset of the population reacted to Diana's death as though she was someone they knew and were very fond of?

Because by your logic people would take the streets wailing at any major known figure's death and the reaction in this case wouldn't have been odd, but it was, and very notably. A stack of people went weird.

Because she appealed to a wider section of the public than most celebrities and was idolised by many of those to a greater degree than is usual. In her own words, she set out to be "Queen of people's hearts" and with some skillful media manipulation she went a long way to achieving that (frankly dysfunctional) ambition. Then she died suddenly, violently, and at the height of her popularity. You don't have to look hard to see events equivalent in nature but on a smaller scale due to the narrower appeal of the celebrity concerned: think of teenage girls on the news collapsing in hysterical weeping because their boy-band crush has announced his engagement. Or if you want an example of a similar nature and scale, look at the reaction to the death of Evita Peron: three million people filing past her coffin, many fainting or losing control, a dozen or so killed in crowd crushes.

Hmmm... I think your perception of her sounds like it is what was pushed through the media. I mean "Queen of people's hearts" you say, well what on earth does that mean? How you can say she went a long way to achieving it only makes sense if there is a half decent definition of what it means, but there isn't.

I hear what you are saying regarding crowds and reactions to other things, but your examples don't fit for me. Peron is not the same, different culture, different behaviour around death.

Anyway, of course I guess a few people on here will feel they can relate to the outpouring, you sound like you are one.

All cool

ps. why have you got a photo of Rob Halford of Judas Priest as your avatar?

mfin

awavey wrote:

and no I didnt buy Candle in the flippin Wind.

I forgot about that! F-ing Elton Fat Fingers John with the welded on lyrics, that would have any person of taste leaping for the off button in sheer panic.

rob churchill

mfin wrote:

"Queen of people's hearts" you say, well what on earth does that mean? How you can say she went a long way to achieving it only makes sense if there is a half decent definition of what it means, but there isn't.

Her words, and as I said, dysfunctional. But I don't think we need to analyse the idea overmuch, it's fairly clear she had some success in achieving the kind of popular appeal she had in mind.

mfin wrote:

Anyway, of course I guess a few people on here will feel they can relate to the outpouring, you sound like you are one.

Christ, no. I can understand the emotion, I didn't share it.

mfin wrote:

ps. why have you got a photo of Rob Halford of Judas Priest as your avatar?

Nope, that's me! I keep meaning to change it, the purple/yellow union jack in the background is a painting my daughter bought but I worry people will think it's something Ukippy.

BelgianBeerGeek

Rob Halford of Judas Priest is one cool dude.

BelgianBeerGeek

My Tuppence worth, and it is cycling related..!
I was in the cops at the time and rode my bike into work. About 3 miles 8) I was on early shift on a beautiful morning. My Sergeant called me into the crew room and we watched the telly. I thought...fuck, them poor kids...
Phoned up Mrs BBGeek (it was on Sunday Morning) she gave me what for. Told her the news. Finished my shift and went home and Mrs BBGeek was still greetin.
Not sure if me and the dog got fed that day. Hey ho.

shimanobottombracket

motogull

pblakeney

Must watch In Brugge again.

john80

I remember being at a sailing event at the time when I heard the news and it glossed right over me to be honest. Sure she was a warm person who did good charity work but then that was her job at the time. Post royal life was always going to be tough but would have been manageable as she was not short of cash and could have done something else with her life that was less media intense if this was bothering her so much.

Maybe the lesson in all this is that getting into a car and fleeing from paparazzi as if you are in a war zone taking shots fired without wearing a seatbelt in a car with a driver who was tired and probably had low car handling skills in the first place is not the definition of risk averse. She was not killed by the royal family or the media but her own poor decision making and misplaced trust in others.

capt_slog

mfin wrote:

awavey wrote:

and no I didnt buy Candle in the flippin Wind.

I forgot about that! F-ing Elton Fat Fingers John with the welded on lyrics, that would have any person of taste leaping for the off button in sheer panic.

I recall being in a group of people when that song came on the radio at the time, and i made the mistake of saying something on the lines of "Oh god, here we go again, Song for a Dead Clothes Horse". A comment that went down like a sh1t sandwich.

Sometimes i only open my mouth to change feet.

tangled_metal

Media hound. Diana was. By that I mean she used the media for self promotion. Mines thing and other charities was her job, but didn't she choose ones that gave good copy to newspapers (before internet started to kill print off).

Sorry but I felt nothing at all in the day of her death and the day of her funeral. I felt nothing but disgust at the over sentimentality of it all. In fact I will go as far as saying that if royalty and it's hangers on results in displays like that in the future then I'm becoming a republican!

BTW this is not meant to be trolling. It's an honest viewpoint that I held 20 years ago and still hold it now. The only thing not turning me into a republican is my respect for the Duke of Edinburgh (and the queen). Seriously I respect him for his support of the queen, his sacrifice of his glittering naval career in a time when it was a man's world and the truly significant charity projects that would not exist without his drive. WWF, DofE, work at royal parks, etc. He's been one of the most active royals for so long. Plus he's filled the gaps left by the queen with his wit and sense of humour, if you follow me.

mfin

Oh dear

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-41243025

A floral tribute to Diana, Princess of Wales, displayed as part of a town's well dressing celebrations, has been described as "horrific" and "awful".

Pross

Looks more like Tina Turner!

ballysmate

Looks like a c0ck for a nose.