There's never a good time to go to a fancy dress party as a Nazi soldier but Prince Harry managed to choose a most inappropriate moment to make his sick joke. He was pictured in his fascist get-up only two weeks before the sixtieth anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.
His idiotic actions have caused outrage and deep offence. Quite rightly he has apologised. More importantly for his own sake, I hope he takes time to consider his menatality which led him to believe that such a costume was acceptable in the first place.
Nevertheless, he is young and he is male, so it is not surprising that he is stupid. Some years ago I went to a fancy dress party as the Pope. On my way to the party I wandered through the streets of a certain town in the North of Ireland dressed as the Supreme Pontiff. It's fair to say that most of the residents of the town in question would energetically contest the notion that the man I was impersonating is God's representative on earth. So I think I'll put the stones down right now, lest my own glass house gets damaged.
Prince Harry is not, I'm sure a Nazi, he is just an eejit. But what if he was a fascist? What if he wasn't joking? This is where it gets intriguing. Let's imagine, just for a moment, that young Harry is a fully paid-up BNP member. And let's imagine, just for a moment, that his brother, his Dad and his Granny are all killed by a pack of rabid corgis. What happens then?
All hail King Harry The Hitler Lover!
Birtain, a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, 21st century European state would be led by a Nazi. And there would be nothing anyone could do about it, except pray for another rabid corgi attack. This is the problem with monarchy, any monarchy: there's nothing to stop a fascist, or a paedophile, or a maniac becoming sovereign. As long as the person in question is next in line to the throne when the current occupant goes toe up, they're in.
This fatal weakness of royalty has been masked for the past half century in Britain by the fact that the current queen is, well, sort of normal. She's a bit stuffy and cold, and she certainly wouldn't win Mother of the Year, but nevertheless she is definitely in possesion of all her marbles. Compared to the rest of her family, she's The Normal One. If she was just an ordinary person people would say things like:
"Do you know that Betty Windsor?"
"No, don't think so."
"She lives down the road. Nice enough old woman I suppose, but her relatives are well mental."
For as long as the Windsors' most mentally balanced member remains on the throne, the true stupidity of the entire idea of monarchy will not be apparent. But once Betty goes, "the Firm" will be seriously, perhaps fatally flawed. Future sovereigns are likely to cause a lot more trouble than "Safe Hands Liz".
For helping to point this out with his stupid sense of humour, I say "thank you" to the third in line to the British throne.