Originally Posted by Danny_Girl:
“I'm not a royal family hater. I believe that a scaled down royal family is a bonus to our country in terms of heritage and tourism. That said I struggle with Prince Andrew because I think he epitomises all the that is wrong in our royal family - privileged, pompous, arrogant, thick, lazy and self important. Somebody who thinks is owed more than the minescule value of his own personal abilities. Without his royal connections he would be nothing.”
I think he always suffered from being the "spare" to the throne, right up until the time Prince William was born in 1982. At that time it was still probably not expected that the 2nd in line to the throne should go into ordinary paid employment and I can see that this would have been awkward and difficult for everyone - hence the inevitable route into the Navy that a lot of male royals have taken. By all accounts he did well in his Naval Career but it would have been better if he'd been able to do something more meaningful after he left the Navy.
Being the "spare" is never easy, as you still don't have complete freedom to choose your own destiny and often by the time you do have more leeway i.e. when there are now others ahead in the line of succession, a lot of opportunities are no longer viable.
Unfortunately now, if Andrew tries to carve out a niche for himself, he is accused of all manner of things, such as not knowing anything about the subject and only getting the role on account of who he is.... or else he is accused of risking the reputation of the Royal Family by being associated with things which are unsuitable - or in some cases which bring him into contact with people who turn out to be dodgy or disreputable.
Whatever Andrew does, you can be sure a negative spin will be placed on it somehow or other. I feel a bit sorry for him because it doesn't seem possible for him to be able to do anything without coming under fire for it from somewhere. Edward is much the same.
Like I said before, none of them chose to be who they are - they just ARE. Personally I see the loss of personal freedom and privacy and the constraints of royal protocol to be such high prices to pay, for which no amount of wealth, status and perceived privilege could ever compensate.