Stupidity and Regal Arrogance Ruined Andrew, and It Could Continue Yet

The saga started with a single photograph, arguably the most significant ever taken of a individual from the royal household.

There stood the Earl of Inverness, with his arm around a female youth, while a companion smiled knowingly in the rear.

Absent that snapshot, captured at a social event in 2001, who would have believed the claims of a adolescent who declared she was transported across the Atlantic and compelled to have brief intimate contact with a member of the royal family?

A curious, telling gesture by someone who had publicly stated to have not heard of her, asserted he could no have had relations with her, and yet handed over millions of his mother's resources to settle a protracted lawsuit.

Over a Decade of Scandal

Against this backdrop, discussions of the royal family acting swiftly to cut Andrew off are misguided. This controversy has endured for the better part of 15 years since that photograph, and an additional image of Andrew walking pleasantly with a notorious individual came to light.

• Self-importance: To what extent did his family members, perhaps even his relatives, know that Andrew was so arrogant?
• Dubious Friendships: They must have understood, if his aides and the police were fulfilling their roles, that he had some deeply disreputable companions given he unabashedly hosted them to estates.
• Fiscal Irresponsibility: If the household did not know about his personal conduct, they certainly knew about his overspending with public money.

Trips were listed in official documents: chopper travel from the royal residence to a golf course and back again in time for midday meal, private flights instead of scheduled services, all for the benefit of "the travel enthusiast".

A Life of Privilege

Then there was the arrogance which demanded respect when he walked into a room or the supreme obsession about his royal titles used on his correspondence in communication to his associates.

He avoided accountability while his matriarch, who inexplicably indulged him, was still surviving. The sovereign did at least strip him of royal responsibilities and ceremonial ranks in the wake of his disastrous and, it is now clear, untruthful media appearance six years ago.

Latest Events

Merely in the last fortnight that events accelerated, following the issuance of accounts giving more troubling particulars of his behavior and that of his companions.

More information have again revealed Andrew's assumption that he could escape lying about his relationship with a convicted criminal.

People (and the journalists) were far ahead of the royal family. There was no one of any importance to support him, a consequence of all those years of hubris.

Institutional Fears

The wiser royals realized that. The one imperative is to hand down the monarchy, if not as previously at least whole and untarnished.

They have spent the last 190 years trying to reverse the image of previous monarchs, showing they are valuable, accountable and attentive to their citizens.

His actions endangered all that in danger in an age when submission and privacy is no longer adequate.

Aftermath

Eventually, the notoriously uncertain king was pressured further. There was no alternative. The palace had relinquished authority of the account.

Presently the stripping of designations and the persistent and permanent social disgrace that will pain Andrew most deeply.

• Demotion: Lowered to just Mr Mountbatten-Windsor
• Prior Instance: The primary royal to surrender his titles in contemporary era
• Military Service: Especially hurtful given his service in the conflict

He continues to be a constitutional officer, on paper able to act for the king, and he is still in the succession to the crown, but neither of these will truly occur.

Coming Developments

Can persons he encounters still acknowledge him? Might they still slip up and call him Your Highness? Would they say Mr,

Certainly, he is not retiring to suburbia, but to the royal family's vast grounds at a monarchical property.

In that place, he will be furnished by the king with one of the estate properties and given some form of personal stipend.

It is not his former home, where he paid a minimal rent for more than 20 years, and the area is a bit distant, but even so it may not be sufficiently removed.

Pending Matters

Matters remain unresolved. There are still records in the custody of overseas authorities to be revealed.

• Governmental Scrutiny: Will lawmakers request additional information
• Financial Investigation: Or investigate the improper use of state resources
• Judicial Potential: There may even be a law enforcement inquiry into his conduct

Maybe for the time being the institutional damage to the monarchy is limited. The statement from the royal household was clearly that the removal of titles was what the monarch, and especially other senior royals, sought.

Altered Approach

No more illusion that Andrew was acting willingly. And, notably, the brief announcement showed clearly that the monarchy were supporting the complainant's narrative of incidents.

Furthermore, for the initial instance they eventually showed consideration for the survivors: "The measures are considered essential, regardless of the reality that he continues to deny the accusations against him."

In the end it is entitlement, self-seeking and laziness that will undermine the crown. In his stupidity, self-indulgence and greed, Andrew appears never to have understood that lesson.