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This episode commenced with a isolated photograph, perhaps the most significant ever snapped of a member of the monarchy.

Present was the Earl of Inverness, arm-in-arm a young woman, while an associate grinned suggestively in the rear.

Without that photograph, taken at a party in 2001, few would have credited the allegations of a young woman who said she was trafficked across the ocean and compelled to have perfunctory relations with a member of the monarchy?

An odd, telling gesture by someone who had publicly asserted to have no heard of her, claimed he could not have had sex with her, and yet paid a large amount of family resources to settle a drawn-out legal case.

A Long Period of Controversy

In this context, talk of the royal family acting firmly to distance themselves from Andrew are misguided. This controversy has continued for the majority of 15 years since that picture, and another photo of Andrew ambling amiably with a convicted sex offender surfaced.

• Self-importance: How long did his family members, possibly even his parents, realize that Andrew was so arrogant?
• Problematic Connections: They must have known, if his aides and the law enforcement were doing their jobs, that he had some highly questionable friends given he unabashedly welcomed them to palaces.
• Financial Extravagance: If the household did not know about his sexual proclivities, they certainly knew about his extravagance with state resources.

Travel were documented in royal annual reports: private aircraft transfers from the palace to a golf course and back again in time for lunch, private flights instead of scheduled services, all for the comfort of "the travel enthusiast".

A Life of Privilege

Additionally the entitlement which demanded respect when he walked into a space or the extreme obsession about his royal titles used on his official documents in letters to his associates.

He avoided accountability while his parent, who unaccountably indulged him, was still surviving. The Queen did at least strip him of official roles and military positions in the wake of his ill-fated and, as revealed, untruthful media appearance six years ago.

Current Situation

Merely in the last two weeks that events progressed rapidly, following the publication of biographical works giving more troubling details of his behavior and that of his connections.

Additional revelations have again exposed Andrew's thinking that he could get away with being untruthful about his contact with a disgraced individual.

Society (and the journalists) were far ahead of the royal family. There was not a single person of any significance to support him, a consequence of all those years of presumption.

Monarchical Concerns

The more astute monarchical figures realized that. The primary concern is to transfer the institution, if not as previously at least whole and unblemished.

For generations the last 190 years trying to undo the legacy of earlier rulers, showing they are beneficial, dutiful and reactive to their citizens.

He was placing all that in peril in an era when deference and privacy is no longer enough.

The Fallout

Eventually, the famously uncertain sovereign was prodded more. There was little choice. The palace had surrendered command of the story.

Now it is the removal of designations and the ongoing and permanent public humiliation that will afflict Andrew most severely.

• Downgrading: Lowered to just Mr Mountbatten-Windsor
• Historical Precedent: The first monarch to forfeit his honorifics in recent history
• Naval Career: Particularly hurtful given his service in the engagement

He remains a constitutional officer, in principle able to stand in for the king, and he is still in the lineage to the crown, but not any of these will actually come to pass.

Coming Developments

Do individuals he encounters still defer to him? Could they still make mistakes and call him Sir? Would they say Mr,

Naturally, he is not retiring to a common area, but to the royal family's large property at a royal residence.

There, he will be provided by the sovereign with one of the grace and favour houses and given some form of private allowance.

This differs from his former home, where he paid a nominal payment for more than 20 years, and the area is a bit far, but even so it may not be adequate distance.

Pending Matters

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

• Parliamentary Interest: Will lawmakers demand more
• Monetary Probe: Or scrutinize the misuse of public money
• Criminal Investigation: There may even be a criminal probe into his behavior

Maybe for the time being the harm to the monarchy to the institution is restricted. The statement from the royal household was evidently that the revocation of designations was what the monarch, and notably other senior royals, desired.

A Shift in Position

The cessation of deception that Andrew was doing it voluntarily. And, remarkably, the brief statement showed evidently that the institution were aligning with the accuser's narrative of events.

Furthermore, for the premiere occasion they finally showed consideration for the survivors: "These actions are judged required, notwithstanding the reality that he continues to deny the allegations against him."

In the end it is entitlement, selfishness and inactivity that will destroy the institution. In his stupidity, self-gratification and corruption, Andrew gives the impression never to have grasped that truth.