I am aware that the media is currently saying a great deal about Peter Mandelson in connection with Jeffrey Epstein, but I am very worried that this might just be a very useful mechanism for distracting attention from the much deeper crisis in the UK's power structures that this scandal represents. In that context, let me highlight the current roles of two people whose entitlement to participate in the UK's power structures must be open to question.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m referring to the princesses Beatrice and Eugenie. They are, of course, the daughters of Andrew Mount Batton-Windsor, who was formerly known as Prince Andrew and the Duke of York.<\/p>\n
I confess I have remarkably little interest in which of these sisters is which. I\u2019m not even sure which is the elder. I do know, however, that one of them is now considered so important, given the absence of their father and Prince Harry from the Royal \u201cfirm\u201d, that they are included in the group<\/a> authorised to give Royal assent in this country in the absence of the King being able to do so.<\/p>\n My opinion is quite straightforward. I think that this is absolutely unacceptable.<\/p>\n Let me leave aside, for the sake of argument, the fact that I object to royalty as a whole. The whole eugenic foundation of this edifice is profoundly unacceptable to me. But do let me then presume that the eugenic assumptions on which royalty is based hold true, and that by some miracle, royalty does confer exceptional genes on some members of a particular family, giving them an ability to participate in government in a manner not granted to anyone else.<\/p>\n Accepting, for the sake of this argument, that this is the case, what very obviously follows is that it must be agreed that this genetic line of inheritance clearly failed in the case of the person now known as Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. If the Royal family has itself excluded him from authority and stripped him of his titles, then they must have identified the fault line in their own eugenic theory in his particular case.<\/p>\n But surely something else logically follows from that? If this genetic line has now proved unsuitable, so too, surely, must the line descended from him be equally flawed, because it is by descent that these people get their power?<\/p>\n If so, and ignoring any references to the princesses in question included in the Epstein papers (and they are there), then the time has come to recognise that they, like their father, should be stripped of their royal privileges. Based solely on the eugenic logic of royal power, they must be unqualified for the roles and titles they hold and should, therefore, be excluded from the country's power hierarchies.<\/p>\n I admit I could reach this conclusion by simply referring to the royal family as a whole, but I know others would not agree. I have therefore carefully constructed this argument on the basis of the assumptions that those who support the monarchy themselves favour. How, in that case, can they object to what I am saying?<\/p>\n I stress, this has nothing to do with the two people I refer to. The argument is logical. Either you believe in the unflawed genetic inheritance of the royal family and its consequent right to participate in government, or you don't. You really cannot have it both ways.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"