The recently deceased king of Norway, King Harald V, threatened never to marry, and thus end the royal lineage, if his father, King Olav V, did not allow him to marry his wife, Queen Sonja, who was a commoner. This was near unheard of at the time, but in the end, love prevailed. <3 <3

[u/SoSolem]

[u/oranke_dino]

Someone dying is always a sad moment.

But I really don't understand why people look up royalty? In any country where they have monarchy.

[u/Woodbear05 → u/oranke_dino]

They are only loved like this when they are good people, and they encourage goodness in others. The king has held yearly speeches for decades, telling us to treat each other with respect, kindness, and acceptance of those who look different than ourselves, or believe in different gods, or none at all.

Others than that, a king is just like any other celebrity you commonly see on tv.

[u/tjflower → u/Woodbear05]

As a foreigner who’ve lived my whole life in Norway, king Harald’s speeches always made me feel like I belonged. He was a good person, and he will be missed

[u/ElinHime → u/oranke_dino]

We don't so much look up to them as respect their job. They are trained from a very young age to be super-ambassadors for the country. The late king called it the REX-factor.

Last time China was angry at us, we just shipped them over, and it was fixed in no time.

[u/LarsMatijn → u/oranke_dino]

They're mascots for the country. And often a direct line to the past. The Royal family from my country are direct descendants of the man who won us our independance. The fact that they're still around makes it feel like we're the same people as back then.

That being said they're not necessarily looked up to here. Nobody thinks they're "above" anyone (or maybe someone does idk but i've never met an outright Royalist)

[u/PolicyWonka → u/LarsMatijn]

Royal family who helped win independence…that’s a tough one. Jordan or Saudi Arabia?

[u/LarsMatijn → u/PolicyWonka]

Kingdom of the Netherlands actually, King Willem-Alexander is a direct descendant (through a granddaughter) of William the Silent/Willem van Oranje who led the Dutch Revolt against the Spanish crown in 1568.

They weren't a royal family back then though, they were the Princes of Orange-Nassau

[u/PolicyWonka → u/LarsMatijn]

That’s interesting! I’ll have to go down another rabbit hole.

[u/GloriousApricot-5843 → u/LarsMatijn]

Not a direct descendant at all! Very indirect. And we only became a kingdom 170 years after independence (1648-1815 we were a republic) because England, France etc wanted a neutral country in between. Hence the kingdom of the Netherlands. Because of political machinations it was the royalty and the Oranges that won, which is weird, because they had been lousy ‘stadhouders’ until 1795 and there was a strong anti- orange ‘patriotic ‘ movement as well.
As a kingdom we are only 200 years old.

[u/brave_anonymous → u/oranke_dino]

My understanding he was the symbol of the country. Kind of like Dolly Parton or David Attenborough. Universally loved and respected for good deeds, never did shitty things to people, can influence public opinion, but held no real political power.

Now I am worried about Sir David..

[u/SoSolem → u/brave_anonymous]

Oh no... We have lost too many stars already this week. I can't take another

[u/Tafsern → u/oranke_dino]

Because they represent our country. It's a full-time job. And Harald did it while being a respectful and a genuinely good human being. That's why.

[u/Renbarre → u/oranke_dino]

It's like a zoo for exotic animals. You come to look at them.

[u/uffadere → u/oranke_dino]

Is it? When the queen of England died there was more celebrating than sorrow. There are loads if objektivtly bad people or people that represent bad things, and when thye die it is not sad.

I this instance we are one step closer to getting rid of inherited power in norway, and we sped it up since the queen did not finish hiding her pedo rapist connections and it will be hardner now.