Prince Andrew is a creep. But he’s not the only one. There is also something creepy about the public shaming of Andrew. There’s something disturbing in the obsessive, salacious chatter about his allegedly depraved private life and the presumption that he is guilty of terrible crimes.
The Andrew storm increasingly looks like a clash of two types of creepiness.
On Andrew himself: maybe I’m jaundiced because I have been a republican my whole adult life, but I think the Newsnight interview is the best case I’ve seen for abolishing the monarchy. Andrew comes across as a grotesque figure. Aloof, entitled, utterly disconnected from normalcy.
Yes, there were the idiotic statements (I don’t sweat; it’s very unusual for me to go to Woking), but even more damning was the inappropriate laughter. His condescending chuckle upon being asked a difficult question revealed a man who has never had to negotiate public life as a normal citizen and who therefore has not acquired basic social and moral skills.
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