Prince Andrew’s BBC interview likened to ‘a plane crashing into an oil tanker’

Why do people discussing the antics of the titled famous persist using the titles e.g. ‘Prince Andrew’ and ‘Duke of York’?

To do so panders to an unmerited sense of entitlement and thereby bolsters fragile narcissistic egos anxious to be treated with deference.

Some name prefixes serve useful purpose designating an occupation and/or degree of learning/wisdom. Inherited titles other than in context of historical study have become fanciful. If their bearers decline voluntarily dropping them it behoves others to set example. Mr, Mrs, Miss, and Ms are polite neutral forms of address: hence Mr Andrew Windsor.

Similarly, present day conferred titles smack of anachronism. People appointed to the House of Lords, a process of supposed ennoblement, can function adequately without flummery. When their position in the legislature is relevant to discussion they may be introduced as Members of the House of Lords, an institution better named Senate. MPs carry their job designation post-fixed to their names; their use among themselves of ‘Honourable’ and ‘Right Honourable’, the latter designating appointment to the Privy Council, is harmless eccentricity.

Then there are knighthoods, and a female equivalent, which are utter tosh. Somehow recipients are deemed to have passed a threshold of repute. Where that stands with respect to professional sportsmen, other ‘entertainers’, figures in the City, writers, and academics, is unclear. Seemingly it is incommensurable across occupational groups with perhaps the only comparable features being fame (either among plebeians or within a specific peer group) and/or acquisition of not quite enough wealth to justify placement in the Lords. The one thing they have in common is approbation, each within some defined group. Additional reward by positioning in a bizarre and arbitrary Byzantine hierarchy of ‘honour’ is unnecessary and foolish.

Perhaps ‘little people’ need reassurance provided by anachronistic social structure; they know their place; whom to look upward to with envy or awe and those to look downwards upon with smug satisfaction. Meanwhile, there is no obligation upon people of discernment to play along in the silly game.

As for Mr Andrew Windsor, he is a nonentity of interest only to people taking prurient delight from indiscretions by their ‘betters’.