Prince Charles: About as much of a dissident as a sausage sandwich is.
There was absolutely nothing surprising that came out of yesterday's hearing of Prince Charles vs Associated Newspapers. Prince Charles thinks of himself as a "political dissident", which is a rather pretentious and egotistical way for someone who also spends his time talking to plants to imagine themselves. We've also known for a long time that he writes plenty of letters both to the government and to other organisations. I can't understand why people are getting upset or are surprised by this; he's not the head the state like the Queen is, nor should he have to seek permission from his mummy like some seem to have suggested to make his views known. He's more than 50 years old for crying out loud.
In the hubbub over Charles's political views, the reality of the situation has been ignored. The Mail on Sunday published items from the man's private diary without permission, when asked by Charles's advisers at Clarence House not to. The contents of the diary, that Charles didn't much like the Chinese and felt they were bunch of dinosaurs wasn't exactly explosive or reveal anything new. Indeed, as other coverage of the hearing has made clear, Charles himself made sure that his snub to the Chinese president when he visited the UK was made public, and he was said to be "delighted" with the coverage. In other words, none of the contents of this diary were not already in the public domain. Charles has applied under the law to stop the Mail on Sunday from printing any more of his private thoughts. He is entirely right to. While Associated Newspapers pretends to be defending the public interest, all it is really doing is attempting to increase the sales of its turgid newspapers and make even larger profits. Just as if a newspaper decided to print my posts on here verbatim I would expect to be paid for it or at the very least given credit for what I had written, (by coincedence, the Mail on Sunday took the entirety of one blogger's posts and printed it without any credit being given to the writer or paying him for his effort) so does Prince Charles have the right not to have his thoughts published for public consumption.
As much as I hate the royal family and wish for the monarchy to be abolished, in this case the Mail on Sunday is being entirely hypocritical and deceitful about its true motives. The judge should rule in Charles's favour.
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