Patriot games leave me cold

Watching the Jubilee celebrations was a deeply transformative experience. Although never a great fan of the Royal Family, over the past few years I have softened towards the Queen. She's been there since I was born, and I find that faintly reassuring in some childish, irrational way. Charles seems reasonably well-intentioned. Wills is as cute as a puppy and the Queen Mother was always admirably old and is now admirably dead.

But the last few days changed all that. I caught the end of the Jubilee concert on Sunday night, and my stomach churned. The pathetic spectacle of the over-the-hill rockers grovelling in front of the royal podium bewildered me. Sir Paul McCartney's winsome posturing confirmed Jerry Sadowitz's observation that Mark Chapman shot the wrong Beatle. Charles's speech to "mummy" seemed maudlin and absurd.

I've suddenly remembered that I can't stand the Royal Family. And I've realised simultaneously that I'm living on a different planet to most of the country, who for some reason seem to think the Queen's great.

Will someone please tell me why she's great? Why should we be grateful to her, why should we grovel at her feet? What has she done, exactly, except spend a lifetime waving and mouthing platitudes. She means nothing to me. But anti-royal sentiment seemed to be almost forbidden.

If anything, it was worse than in 1977, when I remember in my office we put up a Sex Pistols poster while the Queen's motorcade came past and the police came and made us take it down. This year, they arrested a tiny anti-monarchy demonstration for no other reason, apparently, than the fact that it flew in the face of popular sentiment. And where were the alternative TV programmes, where were the dissenting voices?

I love England. I consider myself a patriot. But the things I love about it have nothing to do with last weekend. I loathe deference, cringing and mindless jingoism - all the things that the Jubilee seemed to applaud. What's wonderful about this country is not its outmoded national symbols, but something I always believed to be lodged deep in the character of the people - bloody-minded independence of spirit, self-deprecation, humour, tolerance, creativity, a sense of fairness. None of these things do I associate in any way with the Royal Family.

Above all, they prop up the single worst cancer in British society, the tumour of class and privilege. The Guardian recently published a map of Britain showing all the land the Royal Family owned - most of it, as far as I could make out. It shocked and infuriated me, and it hardly ever gets mentioned. Conveniently, the status quo is never news. Meanwhile, all the money they dodge in tax barely raises a protest. To risk an obvious point, if they're such patriots, why don't they give up some of their incredible wealth? As a patriotic gesture, they could pay off the huge debt that I was amazed to learn this week we still owe the US as a result of the Marshall Plan.

An odd thing happened while I was watching the celebrations on the TV. I got a text message, by accident, clearly intended for someone else. I did not know the sender. It said: "Wow, isn't it amazing." And I texted back, out into the ether to where no one was listening, three words. Bread and circuses.

What century are we living in? It won't be too long before my daughter is ready to go to secondary school, and the majority of her choices seem to be church schools. This is accepted as normal and natural. But can someone tell me why the Church should have anything at all to do with children's education?

This is the most secular nation on earth, thank heavens. Most practising Christians are seen as prigs or nutters. Hardly anyone goes to church. Yet, like the Royal Family, the Church seems to occupy a huge part of our symbolic national life, with its homilies on our way of life and its so-called moral teaching.

Poor Philip Pullman was attacked for criticising CS Lewis's Narnia tales for being sexist and racist, but above all for being religious propaganda. But the popularity of Pullman's books is evidence of the huge attractions of humanism and secularism for people in this country. Religious belief is not only misguided - historically and presently it has made for an extraordinary amount of mischief.

It shares with royalty the underlying assumption that the world is a top-to-bottom construction, with God or the monarch at the top. This is an emotionally attractive idea for children, but a retarded one for adults to subscribe to.

As the religious wars in the world reach critical mass - fundamentalist America v. fundamentalist al Qaeda, Pakistan and India on the point of blowing each other to kingdom come - we must understand the need to grow up as societies. Benevolent monarch, almighty God - both are dangerous, infantile fantasies that hold us back and drag us down.

Almost all the staff seem to be recruited from a rainbow coalition of ethnic minorities, and they are phenomenal in their love and care, a care which goes way beyond technical expertise.

I shall remember their tenderness, kindness and dedication long after I have forgotten the pomp and posturing of this Jubilee weekend.