Hero Prince Charles

We have adopted Prince Charles as patron of our collection (MAN AW-1516). It is a rather British affair as well as ironic and theatrical. In case you were wondering – Take a break. The graphics on your invitation are also on a t-shirt we call “the meaningless t-shirt” – they mean nothing at all.

At the end of 2014 I posted photos of heroes on the Climate Revolution website. People who are fighting for a better world. They included Naomi Klein, Bill McKibbon, Julian Assange, Chelsea Manning. I will also add Pope Francis and Arundati Roy.

One by one I will write texts for our heroes. So far I have done Edward Snowden and Glenn Greenwald. Today I will do Prince Charles by way of a press release for our MAN show.

Prince Charles, Prince of Wales, has used his royal status to help the human race. He has worked indefatigably to do only good. I am astonished by what he has achieved. He is a visionary.

Back in the 70s when I was a punk and fighting for human rights, the young Prince Charles was interested  also in spiritual things and more aware of culture than I was and most importantly, planning his career as an organic farmer; he already realized that we must live in harmony with the earth. The rest of the world was instead swallowing the idea of Big Agriculture monopoly, which we now know turns the earth to sand.

Prince Charles has hundreds of charities which he funds from donating the profits from produce of his organic farming and from using his status to fund-raise. They all put people first – in contrast to government policy, which always puts business first. According to government policy wealth ends up with monopolies and banks: According to Charles “What’s good for people is good for the economy is good for the planet.”

To sum up: If Prince Charles had ruled the world according to his priorities during the last 30 years, we would be alright and we would be tackling Climate Change.

Further details of Prince Charles charities:
The Prince of Wales has set up 19 main charities in the last 30 years, 14 of which he is a president of. Starting in the UK these charities are now extended to work in 38 countries.

An important strength of these charities is that although they are all independent, they can also work in conjunction with each other as they are all involved in one of four main strategic interests of the Prince himself.
These are: 1. Responsible business & enterprise, 2. education & young people, 3. the built environment & 4.  global sustainability.

1) This first group contains four charities which aim to connect business with support for local communities.
Initiatives include getting companies to donate their surplus or cosmetically damaged stock to charity, providing practical support to people aged 50 and over in Wales (& other locations) who want to become and remain economically active, working with business to stimulate local economies by providing local jobs, tackling inequalities & cutting dependency on diminishing natural resources.

2) The second group contains five charities which aim to educate & help young people.
The Princes Trust helps disadvantaged young people in the UK to change their lives and get into work, education or training. It can supply them with grants to set up their own business.
Another 3 charities connect children with the arts & the last charity helps teachers giving them support & encouragement for giving their children extra-curricular activities, i.e. summer schools.

3) The third group contains four charities with the aim of protecting the environment, promoting healthy communities & building sound economies around the world. ‘The University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership’ for instance is dedicated to working with leaders from business, government and civil society on the critical global challenges of the 21st Century.
The other charities in the group deal with maintaining & restoring heritage buildings as well as ‘empowering people to want better places to live in and helping them to achieve it’. ‘The Princes Foundation for Building Community’ for instance is involved with ‘rebuilding the capital city of earthquake-rocked Haiti, teaching its inhabitants step-by-step the skills needed as we build’ as well as in the UK ‘striving towards a sustainable, community-focused future for the country’. Compare this to British government policy. They are pulling down social housing in London, breaking up communities & building on land where people can gather (clubs & bars) & build community projects. Meanwhile they plan another 200 high rise blocks for luxury flats-taking advantage of the present speculation bubble.

4) The last group of charities aim to protect the natural environment. These include the ‘International Sustainability Unit’ which was ‘formed in 2010 to address critical challenges to development and the environment. The I.S.U. builds on the success of The Prince’s Rainforests Project, established to find a solution to tropical deforestation, which resulted in international commitments of US$5 billion for immediate financing’. A further two charities are in this group, The Prince’s Countryside Fund & The Prince of Wales’s Accounting for Sustainability Leadership.
A further four charities are based abroad in the Commonwealth countries, Canada & Australia, a third in the USA & The British Asian Trust which serves as a ‘social fund’ to support high impact charities within the areas of education, enterprise and health in Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and the UK.
Apart from this The Prince is Patron or President of more than 400 organisations including societies to help ex-servicemen from the armed forces as well as The World Wildlife Fund.
The Prince provides funding for these charities by personally donating the profits from his ‘Duchy Originals from Waitrose’ food range, grown on Duchy lands, by donating the profits from ‘Highgrove Enterprises’ based around The Prince’s Highgrove Estate in Gloucestershire & also more importantly by his worldwide funding efforts, using his privileged position to influence the world’s rich to donate.