Run The World, Girls.

So, another technically member of the royal family who has a Twitter is Mike Tindall. Of course, that is completely unimportant, because Mike Tindall now also has a daughter.

That's right. If you haven't read already, Zara Phillips had a baby girl on Friday. So far, there is no word from the Palace on her name, but she's sixteenth in line to the throne and so she's a royal baby too. Though, and I hate to say this because all royal babies are wonderful, not half as important a one as Prince George. 

Even though they are never going to read this, my congratulations to Zara and Mike. I wish nothing but well for them and their baby daughter. Also, I wish that the entire family shows up for some royal event so we can have pictures.

When I first read the news, my train of thought went something like this: “One more royal baby? Cool! Oh, it’s a girl. Good thing I don’t bet money on these things, because otherwise I would have lost money. This is the Queen’s FOURTH great-grandchild. Her Majesty’s getting quite old. Third great-granddaughter, though. There’ve a lot of girls being born into this family. Princess Madeleine’s going to have a girl too. Lot of girls being born into a lot of royal families. Maybe they’ll call her Margaret. If I tweet about the possibility of them calling her Margaret, will Mike Tindall read it? Does Mike Tindall read posts tagged #royalbaby?” and so on and so forth.

A mostly pointless stream of thoughts, but one stayed in my mind particularly. There are a lot of girls being born into royal families. And now, with these new laws allowing succession of the first born child of the Monarch, irrespective of their gender, they can someday be Queen, no matter how many younger brothers they have. And that got me thinking; is it possible that a society that has been predominantly controlled by men for all these years could someday be ruled over by women? 

Politics are of no interest to me, so when I say 'ruled over by', I'm talking about the heads of the seven major monarchies in Europe - Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom. 

Of the current group of rulers, the ones that existed pre-abdications, three are Queens. Two of them, Queen Elizabeth and Queen Margrethe, ascended the throne at a fairly young age, due to the unexpected circumstances their fathers' untimely death without any male heirs. Queen Beatrix, however, ascended the throne after her mother abdicated in her favour, and her grandmother had been Queen before that, so the Netherlands are no stranger to a Queen's rule. But, despite a surprisingly modern ratio of kings is to queens, the scale still tips in the favour of the men.

The next generation isn't any better. Worse, in fact. No one, apart from Crown Princess Victoria, is a woman, and most of them are going to rule because they are the elder sibling and not because the laws are biased.

It is the generation after that, the generation that consists of the grandchildren of the present monarchs (except Queen Elizabeth, whose great-grandchild is the one I'm considering, because she is OLD), who range between the ages of 1/2 and 12, that, for the first time in history, there will be more Queens of European nations than there will be Kings. Just look at the list.

FUTURE KINGS

Prince Christian of Denmark, second in line to the throne. 

The most featured baby on my blog. You should know his name and his position in the hierarchy by now.

And that's all. Two. Out of seven. Hopelessly outnumbered. On the other hand, 

FUTURE QUEENS

Princess Elisabeth of Belgium, first in line to the throne.

Catharina-Amalia of the Netherlands, first in line to the throne.

Princess Ingrid Alexandra of Norway, second in line to the throne.

Infanta Leonor of Spain, second in line to the throne.

Princess Estelle of Sweden, second in line to the throne.

That's just fantastic, isn't it? And, the best thing is, I'm not so much older than them that I won't be around to see this happen. I will! 

Oh, I can't wait. Only fifty years to go.

~

I'm doing a thing called the 100 Book Challenge on Twitter, where I try and read a hundred books in the year and chart my progress through tweets. So far, I've read one, but you can see how I'm coming along by following me @JustAsSaneAsMe. Also, participate in the challenge yourself. It's fun!

N