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20 Years On: Princess Diana's Death


Today marks the twentieth anniversary of the death of Princess Diana. For the past week or so Diana (The Peoples’ Princess TM) has been in every paper, on every channel. The BBC has a saccharine fluff piece, shallow as a puddle. The Daily Mail goes one step further into the absurd, publicising a “what if” novel, offering a version of reality where Diana survived. In the Guardian, Jonathan Freedland descends into self-parody by somehow contriving to use Diana’s anniversary to whine about Brexit (again), whilst Matthew D’Ancona makes the argument that maybe public emotion is bad and should be ignored. Hillary Mantel writes thousands of words about a person that never really existed, none of them really mean anything.
Nobody, anywhere in the press, comes close to saying anything important. Nobody tries to tell the truth.
I don’t know what happened the night Princess Diana died in a car accident, along with her lover and her driver – nobody knows. It could have been an accident, it could have been something worse. But there are three important facts that are not contended:
1. 18 months before she died, Diana wrote to two separate friends (one, her lawyer), stating that the Royal family would attempt to murder her by staging a car accident.
2. The death of Diana resolved a potentially awkward and unpleasant situation for the Royal family.
3. The press repeatedly published exaggerations and falsehoods about many areas of the case, whilst with-holding and ignoring other important evidence.
Keith Allen’s 2011 documentary “Unlawful Killing” (embedded above) covers this ground, and much more. It was a brave documentary to make, given the public mood around Diana. It was, of course, widely criticised after being premiered at the 2011 Cannes Festival. It never received a public release in this country. When it was released on YouTube in 2014, the Guardian printed a cruel and dishonest review, ignoring all content in favour of one liners. Not a surprise.
The film is hard to get, especially in the UK, so I would download and share it while you have the chance.
Diana may not have been the perfect “people’s princess”, she probably didn’t deserve the hysterical outpouring of public emotion that followed her death – very few people ever have. She probably never earned her place in Britain’s pantheon of domestic saints. But she was a young woman, with two young children, dead before her time.
She was a person, and like all people, she deserves what nobody in the press is really willing to give her – an honest obituary.


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Zen
Zen
Sep 7, 2017 12:58 PM

But Folks .. She was a social climbing airhead of no intelligence who slept her way through the home guard and used the media in her own manipulative way. And Charles was a “Good catch” who was naive and weak enough to be bullied and manipulated into a loveless marriage.. She was no saint and she wasn’t so innocent. really who cares…
And the media (Mi5/Mi6/Crew house/Wellington house/Ministry of truth) used her and still use her today to sell the fairy tale to the zombie sheeple while the empire murders its way through thousands in Syria, Libya and Yemen and on and on. But millions die and they don’t get a word because there “Non people”
People believe what they want to believe and facts have nothing to do with it. This is social programming for the simple minded, just social programming and we shouldn’t give it credibility by treating it as anything else.

paulcarline
paulcarline
Sep 8, 2017 1:19 PM
Reply to  Zen

Diana was murdered precisely because she had stopped ‘playing their game’ and had therefore become a liability and a threat – to the Royal Family and the warmongering state.

rtj1211
rtj1211
Sep 5, 2017 2:58 PM

The reality of Diana is that a young innocent girl married a significantly older man, put under pressure by his family to produce an heir and a spare with a person deemed suitable to be a royal wife.
Prior to marriage she had worked in the innocent world of young children, a million miles away from Royal Court politics, scheming, briefing, leaking etc. She faced a rude awakening…..
She had an innocent view on marriage, perhaps strengthened by the early birth of her first child. With strong maternal instincts, her two sons were everything to her, even as she discovered that the life of a royal conflicted with her most deeply held values. She was neither cold nor reserved, she did not see the royal institution as justifying sham marriages and even if her husband spoke marriage vows as a two-faced cad, hers were genuinely delivered. To her, if a marriage became meaningless, both parties should not suffer to maintain a false image of royalty. She had a life to live, happiness to find and if that meant leaving The Firm, so be it….
Perhaps most important of all, she believed in emotional honesty, emotional integration and ensuring that her children could become good 21st century parents. She believed in childhood being precisely that, a time for spontaneity, fun, play and emotions coming out. Not for a childhood of reserved formality, adult duty and preparing for a life of childish extramarital affairs. To say that that came into conflict with the Royal Court is like saying Adolf Hitler mildly annoyed Winston Churchill…..
She furthered causes which arose from worldwide arms sales, notably the effect of land mines on young children. A stronger silent rebuke to royal contributions to global arms sales is hard to imagine.
She thought dancing and going to pop concerts entirely normal and healthy. Quite right, as long as performers were not performing furtively on her back stage!! But hardly what Royal protocol considered suitable….
People warmed to her because she did not her soul to become a Royal. She was warm, kind, empathic and understanding to the common person.
Of course she learned to play the media game when she had to. Of course she will have at times driven people spare, like every genuine person does from time to time.
But ultimately she was an outsider who died being pursued by a Press gang. Whether she died through murderous action, not wearing a seat belt or any other reason, I do not know.
What I do know is that papparrazzi taking pictures of critically injured victims of motor accidents have no place working for the public interest……

paulcarline
paulcarline
Sep 8, 2017 1:21 PM
Reply to  rtj1211

Not an accident.

George
George
Sep 5, 2017 8:21 AM

I had no idea there might have been a REAL conspiracy around Diana’s death. What put me off is that David Icke jumped right in there. And I think this may underline a nice little confidence trick. There are indeed conspiracies. They happen all the time. But it seems to me that the more outlandish ones – the “grand” conspiracy theories about millenia old secret societies and aliens etc. – serve a usefule purpose for the vested interests whether the ones putting forward these theories are sincere or not i.e. if you link a credible suspicion up with stuff about lizards from the fourth dimension or whatever then you make the suspicion seem INcredible.

wardropper
wardropper
Sep 6, 2017 6:32 PM
Reply to  George

Those old secret societies are not to be sniffed at.
People won’t face the reality that they still control a great deal of what goes on in all our western governments.
Being an old society isn’t like being a 96-year-old human being.
That kind of influence has always spanned many generations.
There’s so much documentation about this that people just can’t be bothered to distinguish what is worthy of attention from the trash, but some of it most certainly is worth attention.
It’s better to know.

George
George
Sep 7, 2017 8:37 AM
Reply to  wardropper

I have no doubt there is much to know about old and even ancient organisations. My problem is when people like Icke start tracing it all back to the sinking of Atlantis and the supposed interference of invaders from space etc. I have attempted to read Icke out of curiosity and it seems he never met a conspiracy theory he didn’t like. Ironically, after a short while all this “astonishing information” becomes monotonous. Is this intentional? Interestingly, while he’s raving about all that colourful stuff, there are basic facts that he gets wrong. Again – is this intentional? The effect in any case is to cause most people to roll their eyes and dismiss the occasionally credible bit. Mission accomplished – whether he personally intends it or not.

Alan
Alan
Sep 2, 2017 11:30 PM

I do remember how Diana was relentlessly sold as an innocent, almost girl next door type whose fairy tale dream of marring a prince came true. It was really quite repulsive. The author is correct in stating, irrespective to all she was a person and deserves honesty. She was used in life and as most myths continues to be used in death.

flybow
flybow
Sep 2, 2017 11:38 AM

Better version. No advertisements.

David Simpson
David Simpson
Sep 2, 2017 1:15 AM

what happens at about 38 minutes in?

rehmat1
rehmat1
Sep 1, 2017 12:25 PM

On August 31, 2017, Egyptian-born British billionaire and former owner of London’s Harrods, Mohamed Al-Fayyad privately marked the 20th anniversary of his son Emad El-Din Mohamed Abdel Muna’im Al-Fayed better known as Dodi and princess Diana’s death on Sakara yacht in St. Tropez. This the same yacht on which princess Diana and her two sons, prince William and prince Harry took a vacation with Dodi in summer 1997, shortly before they were both killed in a car accident.
Al-Fayyad still insists that both lovers were killed by British security services just a few hours of announcing their plan to marry – because the royal family didn’t want princes Diana to marry a Muslim.
https://rehmat1.com/2017/09/01/princess-diana-and-dodi-after-20-years/

rtj1211
rtj1211
Sep 2, 2017 6:37 PM
Reply to  rehmat1

I have to say it is absolutely not the place of the Security Services to take moral decisions to justify murder. So if they did what al Fayad alleges, executions are required.
More likely the Royal family took the decision. And as Charles had been shagging around during marriage, post divorce they have no human rights to determine who Diana chose to marry. No Referendum on Charles marrying his horsey mistress after all…..
Most deaths have news management to control mass emotions. The truth is irrelevant. Lockerbie, 9/11, 7/7, all kinds of other incidents. Every one of them hysterical nonsense, misinformation media city and endless inquests without ever intending to find the truth.
We are in a post-decency media culture, a post humanity political culture.
Why on earth would telling the truth be a priority to the Powers that Be?

michaelk
michaelk
Aug 31, 2017 10:07 PM

Having just watched Keith Allen’s documentary, it’s pretty clear why the Guardian reviewed it so negatively; Allen attacks the UK media relentlessly for its culture of studied incompetence and subservience to power. Essentially the media’s role is to protect the establishment from scrutiny and divert attention away from its crimes. The final part about the media choosing to spin the jury’s opinion, that Diana was unlawfully killed and this was linked to the vehicles pursuing her, into the fiction of ‘just a road accident’, is pretty damning. But that’s what they do so well, over and over again, misdirect and cover up. Create plausible lies rather than uncover the truth.

janetbeale
janetbeale
Aug 31, 2017 5:06 PM

As you’ve expressed interest in Diana, Princess of Wales, I thought you maybe interested in this clip/video
Sent from Samsung tablet

flybow
flybow
Sep 2, 2017 9:52 PM
Reply to  janetbeale

what clip?

michaelk
michaelk
Aug 31, 2017 10:36 AM

The ‘problem’ for the royal family in relation to Diana was her massive popularity with ordinary people not only in the UK but woldwide. She had charisma to burn. For whatever reason… people liked what they saw and heard. Essentially, she was brought into the family in order to provide ‘new blood’ and ‘modernize’ how it was perceived. She was seen as an asset for the royal family. A face, an icon, a model. The trouble really began when Diana became too popular and too big to contain within the role she’d been alloted. She began, slowly, to question her role and the lines she’d been given, especially as her marriage was a sham. The fairytale of her marriage fell apart when she discovered that prince charming was already married… whoops!
In the modern media world she became far more popular than the rest of them put together which unbalanced the entire relationship and she litterally outgrew the restrictions of her role. She became a very powerful figure, a distabilizing one by her very existance. Almost an alternative Queen in waiting. She seemed to be carving out a role for herself that was perceived as independent of the royal family and that alone made her a threat to the established order and balance within the constitution. Imagine if Diana had visited Gaza or began to speak out about the rights of the Palestinians, which isn’t as far-fetched as it seems.
She might have matured and really become the ‘peoples’ queen’ not just the peoples’ princess. This idea, that the people somehow chose her to ‘represent’ them in opposition to the rest of the royal family is a dangerous idea that would upset and threaten an awful lot of very powerful people and institutions. So, it’ not really surprising that she died the way she did. A awful lot of people heaved a long sigh of relief and a lot of problems were solved with her passing, balance and stability were restored once more to the realm.

StAug
StAug
Aug 31, 2017 10:18 AM

Diana Spencer’s death was of no more importance than anyone else’s; she was a standard airhead of her class… I only every paid particular attention to her because it was so irritating to be told that I was supposed to believe that she was “beautiful” when my own eyes could see that she was not. Having said that: it’s obvious she and her lover were killed by The Royal Huns in concert with MI5/MI6; saying “perhaps it was an accident, we’ll never know!” is like saying “maybe OJ was innocent!” In most murder cases, circumstantial evidence is all you have; in Diana Spencer’s case, the circumstantial evidence is almost parodically unambiguous. Did she have a Death Wish or did she not, deep down, believe that They were capable of it?
In any case, why spend any time on the topic? We know the Bastards do those things and more… but it’s not as though she was John Lennon.

StAug
StAug
Aug 31, 2017 10:20 AM
Reply to  StAug

erratum: “I only EVER paid”

writerroddis
writerroddis
Aug 31, 2017 8:50 AM

Good piece. My sentiments exactly. I recall at the time the indefatiguably ridiculous Julie Burchill saying Di was “a republican at heart”, prompting the indefatiguably witty Mark Steel to point out that, since she’d wanted her son king we’d have to place her on the moderate wing of republicanism, wouldn’t we?
Another aspect is the power the monarchy enjoys, over and above that flowing from membership of Britain’s ruling class. I refer to the ‘constitutional right’ of the monarch to dismiss HIS/HER government. Liberals scoff – ‘just a bit of archaic tradition; not worth getting fussed over’. (This despite the armed forces also swearing allegiance not to tax payer but HIS/HER MAJESTY. And despite legislation going back to the seventeenth century, used to intimidate striking miners In 84/85. Britain’s ruling class has all manner of tricks up its sleeve.)
If the power of the monrachy is really nothing but colourful pageant, well, they won’t mind giving it up now will they?

Seamus Padraig
Seamus Padraig
Sep 1, 2017 12:21 AM
Reply to  writerroddis

The British ruling class is as sneaky and underhanded as they get. But they have a marvelous gift for wholly undeserved self-promotion. It’s amazing what Churchill was able to get away with, while still being hailed as a ‘great statesman’. Though a memorable orator, the man was right basically once his entire career, just before WW2.

susannapanevin
susannapanevin
Aug 31, 2017 5:44 AM

Reblogged this on Susanna Panevin.

joekano76
joekano76
Aug 31, 2017 3:08 AM

Reblogged this on Floating-voter.