We always want the bad thing not to be our fault. What’s the first thing people ask when they hear someone has lung cancer? “Did s/he smoke?” And if the answer is yes, you can think, OK, I don’t smoke so lung cancer isn’t in my future - when of course we know that non-smokers can get lung cancer. After Sandy Hook, I…

Diana was related to several old noble families. I remember reading that when they got married it was really Charles who was the one marrying up, because her ancestors held all sort of titles and lots of land long before the Hanoverians and the Saxe-Coburg and Gothas arrived on the scene. But he was the heir to the…

Those people would call anyone not born to the aristocracy or colonial-deriven money social climbers. If your family didn’t get it by exploiting serfs, indigenous peoples in other countries, or non-English lands (by which I mean “not England”) at least 100 years ago, it’s too new.

Well no, there are aristocratic families in GB every bit as prestigious as the Royals so their daughters wouldn’t be seen as social climbing by marrying the future king. For example, Lady Diana wasn’t judged to be social climbing because her family’s title is centuries old. 

I think the problem is that you’re judging this by the wrong goalposts. In Great Britain Kate could have been as rich as Bill Gates and she’d still be considered a social climber for marrying Prince William whereas the poorest of aristocrats who did rhe same would be considered as just doing what was expected.

This is not true. She grew up middle class and they didn’t become wealthy until her parents’ company took off. That wasn’t until the 90s, when Kate was a teen. Even then they weren’t wealthy, just comfortable. They still weren’t aristocratic and many from the old money, upper crust circles looked down on them. They…

I guess her sorority sister from college doesn’t count.

I grew up in a very religious, rural town and I was relentlessly bullied. I don’t have any friends from my childhood - let alone anyone I would invite to my hypothetical wedding. I’m not sure it’s that uncommon to distance yourself from childhood peers. I didn’t find my people until I was in my late 20s, and I move…

I don’t find it odd at all. People change as they grow up, they move, their interests change. It’s incredibly lucky if childhood friends still get along when they are adults. I have exactly 1 friend from before age 20- I don’t think that’s super uncommon.

Towards whom does one climb in Toronto?

 It seems very unusual that a woman wouldn’t have any friends from before she was in her late 20s, at her wedding.

What does that even mean?  Towards whom does one climb in Toronto?

Sneaking in a correction here: her parents are millionaires and have been successful for most of their children’s lives. However, they are rich and common, but not poor. Most of the looking down by the Royal peer group is mainly because the family are not, say, landed gentry.

She may have grown up among the wealthy and privileged, but make no mistake: the family are Nouveau Riche, untitled, with no immediate landowning forebears. It may seem insignificant to the general, non-English populace, but at these castes, it matters rather a bit.

She wasn’t wealthy as a child. She was a pleb like the rest of us until she started dating him. Then her family (not her) got wealthy. She’s never made any gobs of money herself.

So Kate is finally admitting she's a social climber? 

Nothing makes me happier than knowing all the American evangelicals who (illegally) traveled to Ireland to harrass the public failed to turn popular opinion. What a waste of time and money and very few people disserve it more. 

Explanation: in 1990, Irish Roman Catholic attendance at Sunday mass was 94%; only 6% did not. Over the subsequent 20 years, worse and worse church history came to light, and more and more Irish people felt free to be honest about their relationship to the church (and leave it). By 2012, the percentage of Irish church…

“I couldn’t control you,”

I never intend on getting pregnant but if I ever do they can pry my tea from my cold dead hands!! I go through about 6 or 7 cups every day in work (I’m Irish living in the UK so this is normal). If a spouse tried to get me to quit I’d serve them with divorce papers.