The Coronation Not Seen on TV: Anti-Monarchists Arrested; Slavery & Colonization Reparations Demanded

Police in England arrested at least 52 people Saturday around the coronation of King Charles, including numerous anti-monarchy activists who say they were detained before they even started protesting. Charles and his wife Camilla were crowned king and queen in a lavish ceremony at Westminster Abbey that is expected to cost over 100 million, or about $125 million USD, taking place against the backdrop of a severe cost-of-living crisis in the U.K. Despite growing disinterest in the monarchy, criticism of the institution has been very muted" in the mainstream U.K. media, says Priya Gopal, Cambridge professor and author of Insurgent Empire: Anticolonial Resistance and British Dissent. The media and the police are colluding in essentially suppressing criticism of the monarchy and what has been going on around the coronation," she says.