Agree Sue but with respect, we all have the choice to either believe or reject the stuff churned out by the media.
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I don’t necessarily disagree - and, yes it is sad that we have a media which is incapable of presenting a balanced or nuanced view of someone (possibly because we have a public which is incapable of forming a balanced or nuanced opinion of, well, anything).
If anything Philip took the media view of him in his stride - his dentopedology comment was wonderfully self depreciating for example.
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I wonder? It is so pervasive. We have no counteracting view to give balance. Especially when all media (including the so-called reputable ones) spout the same messages. It is all too often, sadly, afterwards that we learn differently - as in Diana’s relationship with Philip.
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Tell me more. 
Actually I got the spelling of that wrong - he referred to his being a practitioner of dontopedology - the science of opening one’s mouth and inserting one’s foot
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I know they said they wanted to ‘root out racism from the royal family’ but I didn’t think they’d be starting so soon.
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That’s brave with this crowd Roland… 
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Generational as well as actual attitude I suspect: the most racist person I have known personally was my great-grandmother who loved putting a blonde wig on and taking the piss out of white people, whom she saw generally as dirty, unsubtle, lazy and lacking culture. She died when I was 30 so I heard it a lot.
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I don’t usually read Polly Toynbee, but a friend recommended this article today - precisely on the subject of ‘coercive grieving’ and why it is politically dangerous.
Whether they share its opinions or not, I think everyone will agree it is a fine piece of writing:
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I see some old Tory complained that the BBC was making it too easy to complain!
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This goes back 200 years at least. It is amazing to read of contemporary reports and stories in the 18th/19thC press - incredible invective, mud-slinging. And the cartoons and charicatures! - only Scarfe and Steadman are in that league.
I took The Independent from its first issue on the basis that this was supposed to be a newpaper of a different stripe - remember their slogan? “We’re Independent. Are you”? Eventually they morphed into the same old same old. I gave up on them when they printed a photo of a queue in a snowy Moscow square supposedly queueing for bread. The church that they were actually queueing for was cropped out.
And so it goes on. Put whatever spin you like on all of this.
I read it was more than just some old tory! Too easy to complain was said by others.
I’ve learnt a new English word today while reading on the funeral protocol, “quire”:
Quire is an (archaic) alternative spelling for “choir”, I’d never come across it before so that made my day. I’ll use it again to impress the few church-going people I know!
From the Net:
Quire is an alternative spelling for choir, the place where services are sung. Choirs are commonly in the chancel, at the east end of the church, generally separated from the nave by the chancel arch and possibly a screen.*
From the Westminster Abbey site:
The Quire
Westminster Abbey has resounded to music every day for more than a thousand years. Come to one of the daily choral services at the Abbey and you will hear our Choir singing from their stalls in the quire - continuing a tradition dating back to the plainsong chanted by the monks of the 10th-century monastic foundation.
Is that from where enquire is derived perhaps?
I need to toddle off now but will have a look later in my etymology books or on the Net.
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As per Paul’s post, yes, the etymologies are unrelated:
(Quire is “an early form and later variant spelling of choir”).
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There have been many stories emerging about the Duke but this one from Quora particularly caught my eye…
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