ive had this debate on about 20 other forums, i thought TLR was above this. If elton "****ing" john, david "sodding" beckham and colin "i cant pronounce colin properly so it sounds like your arse" powell can get knighthoods then its been a problem for quite a while. Thing is uselessness begets uselessness. People want to scrap and **** around with the monarchy and stuff, i wanna train them up and put them to use. Theyre just sitting there twiddling their thumbs but their one of the most influencial families in the world. You get them onto something important and i bet they could kick ass at it. Theyve got the best goddamn educations in the world and we consign them to opening american ships and knighting international corporate carnivores.

Actually, the royal family have now real say in the honours list. That is the government, and i have to admit - i fear that they have "numbers" to make up sometimes. Personally, i think these should be our own countrymens honors to start with, and secondly, i think its for benefits for our country. Now beckham got an obe i think, he should NEVER get a knighthood. Seeing as you have the Sir Richard Attenborough, Sir Ranulph Fiennes and so on many more that have distinguished themselves aptly. Then you have Michael Caine, and other "less desirable" poeple getting them. I think its an attempt to bring them a little more "modern" rather than being seen as an old fashioned tradition..........


Another thing, The Royal Family do TONS of engagements. They have hectic schedules, and at the end of it all, they have a very high profile public image. Not only do they have to trape round the country promoting things, including research, heading charities, and doing other high profile public deeds, they also do one hell of alot of lower profile deeds as well. They are public puppets almost. They can "shrug" duties if they must, but to keep public appearance they spend their WHOLE LIVES running around for the good of other people's charities etc.

When you consider that most people the Queens age are sat down in retirement, but she is off round the world meeting, greeting, and supporting things - speaks volumes. Oh yes, and they cannot throw a sickie like we can if they are fed up, they have to go and smile, be bored to tears for days on end, and still smile - come what may. Mind you, the Queen and Prince Charles seem to have an active interest in many areas - so they probabily enjoy doing most of what they do.

Arcon - Can you take it easy, damn it! It seems like every time you post that you have a grievance. I've never spoken a harsh word about anyone here on TLR, and I don't intend to start now, but you are really going over the top. As for "I thought TLR was better than this", why should we not have a discussion about this issue? Whether or not BG deserves a knighthood may not be an important question, but it is a matter of personal opinion, and one that people should feel free to comment on.

Edited by - esquilax on 1/27/2004 6:33:46 PM

maybe arcon is stressed like me right now

Why is it that whenever you attempt to catch something that's falling off the table you always manage to knock something else over?
its in the way

Huh? I thought you had to be a citizen of the commonwealth to get knighted?

that'll be the Commonwealth that you're still part of and we still run (nominally anyway)

anyone can be knighted now, Caspar Weinberger got one (don't know why) and the rules are pretty lax.

Do they have a certain number of knighthoods to hand out and when one knight dies, they have to give it to someone else? My dad's adoptive father was a knight and my mum's dad was knighted shortly after he (my dad's dad) died. I heard my dad saying he passed his knighthood on to my mum's dad - in a jokey way of course. I've never really thought to ask my mum and dad if that's actually what happens...

My gap year in Borneo

I think they just dish them out willy nilly. Maybe we should demand one for Sir Spectre, he'll at least have some legitamacy then.

Seriously though, the whole title thing is a bit of a w*nk. I'd prefer that the queen just threw some of her cash my way instead, or at the least give me one of those snazzy Range Rovers they burn around in.

Edited by - Mustang on 1/28/2004 3:18:32 AM

I'm getting sick of hearing Bill Gates arguments. You may be jealous of his money and think the guy is a ****er for trying to monopolise the market, but I think the guy deserves some credit. How many of you are using PCs running windows? How many running ms office? windows media player? There isn't a person here who doesn't know that there are alternatives to windows, office and winmedia, but you all use them anyway. Stop your f'in moaning for christs sake. If you're using linux then fair enough, moan to your hearts content, the rest of you are being hypocritical.

As for the monarchy...arcons right, have you seen the people that have been knighted over the past few years? Its all crap....at least with Gates they're taking a risk for a change and going with someone who HAS actually made a change to the world. Whether you like him or not you can't deny him of that.

Am with you Grom, he made windows, which helps me do what i want. People moan about how its available to hackers etc, but constant updates of versions means that they close these holes down - usually before any trouble starts (from what i understand, nearly every update preceeds a virus exploting the hole the update fixed. Its just that poeple don't download the updates when they should!).

Also - he puts his money towards charitable causes as well. The guy worked hard, pioneered stuff, and protects it just like any other company would. He seems to have a low public profile, unlike Richard Branson (our only possible English comparison - no, he didn't make money from computers), who of course does lots of very public country supporting things, and so has an excellent public image (don't know ANYONE who doesn't think he is a top bloke). If the gripe is that he keeps himself away from public view as much as possible and has stacks of cash...............well, he is doing what most people would, trying to have some privacy.

I really don't get poeples *****es about it.

burn the Royal family for firewood!

Gates gets more credit than he is due, he also is accused of more sins than he ever could have committed.

Bottom line is that he is a highly successful business man who, like any of them who want to accumulate wealth, seek and cry for fair opportunities to compete for themselves but work very hard to deny the same fair play to their direct competition.

However, none in Gates' immediate world of competitors behave any better than he does. It is not as if, for example, Larry Ellison is such a paragon of open source code and fair competition anyway.

In way, the stupidity of those who were running Xerox (PARC) and IBM in the early years should have been a foretelling of what was to come from the likes of Jobs and Gates.

Edited by - Indy11 on 1/28/2004 10:24:24 AM

loc, america was one of englands imperial provinces

Grom - Yes, your statements are correct, but I am not criticising him. Instead, I am stating that, as the head of a company that has been convicted of "anti-competitive" practices, knighting him is rather unusual. Indeed, the argument could be made that recognising the head of software company that has a virtual (and arguably illegal) monopoly on the desktop market, is legitimising the aforementioned business practices. I would not necessarily agree with this argument, but it does raise some interesting issues.