Everyone can relax, the royal family have visited Manchester and everything is better now

The terror attacks that took place on Monday 23rd May, towards the end of an Ariana Grande concert at the MEN Arena are something I’ll never forget. I’ll never forget the horror I felt when I realised what had happened, as I read through the endless tweets blaming a balloon, or a speaker and seeing Greater Manchester Police’s statement, that it was being treated as a terrorist attack, that there were confirmed fatalities, that some of them were children.

The past few weeks since it has happened have been fraught with a strange kind of atmosphere. We found out that arrests had been made in Fallowfield, that the suicide bomber was a student at Salford, there have been a number of bomb scares and evacuations, Manchester seems to be on high alert.

We’ve seen some lovely things and some incredible displays of solidarity among the people of Manchester, vigils, tattoos, blood donations, fundraisers and people volunteering their homes and cars on the night. We’ve seen Manchester grow, resilient and united in the face of this, and it’s been great. But why the hell has everyone lost their head about a few royal visits?

Yes, I know that it’s their duty, that as apparently god-appointed superior human beings the royal family have a certain responsibility to us, the peasants. That it would be unprofessional (their profession being?) not to be seen, holding the country together and showing support in times such as these. In fact, I don’t actually know how we would cope without having a wrinkly old lady in a hat to gawp at.

It’s so nice though, of them to remind us that we matter, of course you only matter if something terrible has happened to you, and there’s a television camera pointing in your direction.

If I’m honest, and if you haven’t already guessed, I feel like the royal family is an absurd and archaic idea that we cling on to, under the guise that it’s part of ~British culture~ but it’s not, it’s patronising, it’s a looming reminder of our (awful) colonial past. How can Britain, a modern, progressive, multicultural country have some boring old white people as our figureheads, why do we need royal representation? Are we not good enough to represent ourselves? Our normal person blood too thin and watery in comparison to rich, royal blood?

At the end of the day, the royal family aren’t doing any harm visiting victims of the attack, if it cheers them up after the awful time they’ve had then that’s great – but how about they get listed by someone relevant, someone inspirational, someone who’s visit is purely for the benefit of the victims, rather than the press?