Just Andrew is a regular degular

Prince Andrew and Buckingham Palace announced two weeks ago that he would no longer use his title or his honours, and go by Just Andrew. As I wrote yesterday before the big news broke, this was a meaningless gesture. All it meant was that he wouldn’t go around calling himself a duke – which might be a big deal for his pretentious ass but clearly wasn’t for everyone else. Because while they had hoped that this nothingburger would placate his critics and lower the volume on his scandal, it had the opposite effect. The public wasn’t having it, the politicians weren’t having it, and the anti-monarchists had more fuel for their campaign. 

Over the last two weeks, Just Andrew’s lifestyle and residence has been under intense scrutiny as MPs wanted to dig deeper into whether or not British taxpayers are somehow funding the easy retirement of a member of the British royal family who had allegedly participated in sex trafficking. The British monarchy was hoping that their bare minimum solution would be the end of it. They were wrong. And that’s why we’re here now, with the announcement yesterday that King Charles will formally strip Andrew of all his titles, he will no longer be a prince, he’ll be moved to Sandringham, and supported by the king’s personal – and substantial – bank account. 

Defenders of the British crown will insist that this is a good move on king’s part. Bullsh-t. Their backs were against the wall. Two weeks ago, their first instinct was to continue to protect their precious titles and bloodlines, uphold the increasingly archaic systems that distinguish them from civilians. Two weeks ago they prioritised these markers of privilege and hierarchy over justice and decency. Let’s not give credit to them for doing something that should long have been done, and only for the sake of preserving the shreds of superiority that they’re desperately clinging to. 

But also, let’s not forget what it took to get here, and the precedent that’s been set to bring us to this so-called unprecedented moment. For Regular Degular Just Andrew, he didn’t just get three strikes, he had all the strikes over nine innings before they called him out, unwillingly. The British royals would have given him a fresh nine if not for the entire stadium booing, then walking out, and then threatening to light the place on fire. 

This, then, is what he British monarchy has established as the timeline, a list of requirements that have to be satisfied before a prince can be stripped of his titles in 2025:

-Summer 2006: Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell are invited by Regular Degular Just Andrew to Princess Beatrice’s birthday party even though Epstein was, at the time, being investigated for sex crimes and would be arrested eight days later. He was convicted in 2008 

-Winter 2010, following Epstein’s release, Regular Degular Just Andrew visits Epstein, WHO IS NOW A CONVICTED SEX OFFENDER, in New York and is photographed with him in Central Park

-March 2011, Sarah Ferguson admits to accepting money from Epstein to pay off her debts; she publicly disavows him but it’s since emerged in a leaked email that she wrote to him to apologise, beg for forgiveness, and pledge her friendship 

-July 2011, Regular Degular Just Andrew is forced to resign from his post as UK trade envoy for his association with Epstein but also for inappropriate use of public funds and ALLEGATIONS OF ACCEPTING BRIBES

-Also in 2011, the now infamous photo of Regular Degular Just Andrew with his arm around Virginia Roberts Giuffre, then underage, and Ghislaine Maxwell hovering in the background, is published in the UK papers corroborating her claims that she was trafficked to him 

-April 2015, Regular Degular Just Andrew is named in another Epstein court case as he’s accused of participating in sex trafficking with Jeff Epstein, which the palace denies

-Summer 2019, Epstein is arrested and multiple victims come forward to confirm that they have direct knowledge of Regular Degular Just Andrew’s involvement in the sex trafficking ring that Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell were running

-Fall 2019, following Epstein’s death, Regular Degular Just Andrew’s disastrous interview with Emily Maitlis on Newsnight, precipitating his exit from public life

-In 2021, Virginia Guiffre sues Regular Degular Just Andrew for sexual assault

-In 2022, he settles out of court, for an undisclosed sum that is estimated to be around-ish $10 million and releases a statement in which he “accepts that she has suffered both as an established victim of abuse and as a result of unfair public attacks”

-In 2024 and through 2025, the Epstein files become an obsession during the American election, and people continue to demand the release of the documents, keeping the heat on the story 

AND STILL…

The Queen had to die and Virginia had to die, and release her memoir posthumously for us to arrive at today, when the British monarchy FINALLYYYYYYYYY moves to make it official: Just Andrew is a regular degular. 

But that’s how f-cking hard it was to get to this point. Those are allllllll the stains that have to accumulate for them to make this “unprecedented” move. So save it with the giving of the flowers and credit for doing the right thing, they just set the highest – or lowest – bar for removal. And while we’re here, save it with the goddamn incessant demands for whatever it is that some of these stupid loser haters are trying with Prince Harry and his titles. 

If that’s the established checklist of f-ckups that a member of the British royal family has to go through to be un-princed, you might as well go in the opposite direction with Harry and put the crown on his head.