Queen Máxima has had an ‘excellent discussion’ on abortion”, I know thanks to the NOS website from last Saturday. I would have read about that a week ago. But as the British mourn their queen, who managed to remain a mystery to nearly all of her subjects for 96 years, the fact that Máxima discussed abortion almost became personal news.

The quote continues: “In a conversation with (Texan) Governor Greg Abbott, the Dutch delegation emphasized the importance of women’s freedom of choice. “We fully support that,” Máxima stressed to the press.”

The first thing that comes to mind: but the royal dynasty can’t use agents or abortion at all. The core business is children and more or less forced succession.

It’s not a question of whether you or I personally support ‘free choice for women’. You can’t imagine Queen Elizabeth talking about abortion to reporters. After all, it is a political statement, with a personal touch, and the British monarch has openly ignored personality and politics. She appeared to the people as an apparition of the Protestant Mary that no one could deny. Like a hologram, untouched.

When our then Queen Juliana called her British counterpart in the early 1980s to inform her of her retirement in favor of Beatrix, Elizabeth said: “Usually Dutch‘ and hung up the phone. (People had other ways of doing things back then.)

Now that we are crammed with English writings, we are once again confronted with the superhuman position of the British rulers. A puzzle.

He loves horses. He loves his dogs (corgis).

We count Holland and England among the monarchies, but how different are the two Houses. Elizabeth’s “serving unto death” was not a job, much less a job, but a God-given duty. It is high, but I am also afraid of social deformation and ultimately inhumanity for the king himself. This is already an objection in the Netherlands, but with the British Royal Family the question is even more pressing: can you do it to those people? Aren’t they supposed to be protected from themselves? And we submit, may we ask this of them?

I see Prince, forgive King Charles III receiving condolences from the commoners: a kiss here, a kiss on the cheek there.

It was very human—with the full promise of the end of the dynasty.

Stephan Sanders write a column here every Monday.