Well, on Saturday I participated in the No Kings event in Boston. It was a beautiful day to be out and about with my fellow terrorists antifas violence-lovers Communists America-haters citizens trying to check the power of the power-tripping, immoral/amoral madman who revels in playing king. And celebrating the fact that, at least for the mo, we don't have a monarchy in our country. Bad enough that on occasion we elect someone who is manifestly unfit to be the person in charge, let alone get stuck with someone who lucked into the lead-dog position by accident of birth.
After returning home and putting my whiteboard sign away for the next protest, I caught up on the news. While there was scant news about the estimated 5 million to 8 million folks who showed up at over 2,500 sites across the country, there was plenty of news about Prince Andrew.
After so many scandals, Prince Andrew has given up the use of his titles and honours.
He can no longer sign off as the Duke of York, or put "KG", a Knight of the Garter, after his name, with a flourish of medieval chivalry.
The Earl of Inverness and Baron Killyleagh are also scratched off his list of titles, with "Andrew Inverness" a name he'd sometimes used in his business dealings. (Source: BBC)
While the move was positioned as Andrew voluntarily elinquishing his hard-earned handed-to-him honorifics, it's pretty easy to see that he was pretty much forced to do so at the point of his brother the king's royal sceptre.
Questions about Andrew's links to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein were drowning out the work of the rest of the Royal Family. That was on top of unanswered questions about Andrew's finances and his connections to an alleged Chinese spy.
Although I lap up shows like The Crown, I'm not an obsessive royal watcher. (Brit royals of course. Is there any other kind?) But I do keep up. And I know enough about them to know that, of the current batch, the crown prince of unprincipled uselessness has long been Prince Andrew. For many decades this spoiled man-baby - the spare to Charles before he had kids and back in the day when Princess Anne, as a female, could not have succeeded Charles as the monarch, even though she was older than Andrew - made headlines for inappropriate behavior. He was dubbed "Randy Andy," and he was often caught up in some minor financial corruption scandal or the other.
Andrew was reputedly Queen Elizabeth's favorite child, but even she couldn't fully protect him once he was implicated in the Epstein scandal. She rescinded some of his military titles and a couple of hundred "royal patronages" (which are largely vague affiliations with charitable organizations; in Andrew's case, his patronages included the British-Kazakh Society, Greenwich Hospital, and the SickKids Foundation).
When the Queen gave him the royal Wellington boot, Andrew no longer was able to act in any official capacity at royal-ish events, and he had to stop using the His Royal Highness (HRH) style.
Which, before Ma-MA clamped down, he was even using in his email signature. As in this from a note to his buddy Jeffrey Epstein. A, HRH The Duke of York, KG.
And now, with the latest "voluntary" downgrade, Andrew can no longer use The Duke of York or KG (Knight of the Garter), either. (Andrew's good natured trollop-y ex-wife, Sarah Ferguson, is no longer able to use her Duchess of York honorific.)
And there go the Earl of Inverness and Baron Killyleagh, too.
It's rumored that Prince William is going to further de-whatever his Uncle Andrew by giving him the Duke of Windsor treatment, not inviting him to his coronation once King Charles ascends to the Great Palace in the Sky. (One would think that even William would be hard put to deprive Andrew of attending the funeral of his own brother should A outlive C, which is likely given an age difference of twelve years and Charles' health issues.)
It's not clear what impact Andrew's detitling will be on his pocketbook. He lives rent free in a mansion that he can't be evicted from, and I'm sure his mother left him enough to survive quite nicely. But losing his titles - other than Prince, I guess - must be humiliating and galling, and may cut down on the number of royal sucker-uppers who loved swanning around with Andrew when he was still titled. HRH, KG, Baron Killyleagh...
Serves this absolute git, this complete wanker, right.
Sure, it must be hard to have grown up in the House of Weird. To have been given everything in return for nothing. To have all sorts of gits and wankers falling all over you and your titles.
But Princess Anne and Prince Edward seem to have kept their noses clean, to have sucked it up, to have shown up for all the ribbon cuttings, funerals, garden parties, and whatevers. It can be done.
And title, schmitle. One thing to be a King, a Queen, a Prince, a Princess. Or even the Duke of Earl. But all of these other title-eens. Honorifics? Who and what are they honoring exactly? Nothing honorable about this former HRH.
Meanwhile, this latest royal hoo-hah sure underscores why a lot of us Americans want NO KINGS.
---------------------------------
Image Source: AOL
No comments:
Post a Comment