It seems that Britain’s class system is a bit anachronistic. Especially with the immigration from the EU. People from all over Eastern Europe, Europe and other EU countries have settled in Britain. Will immigrants accept being commoners?
What happens if someone refuses to address his Lordship in a suitable and subservient fashion?
Is their any legal requirement to use the noble person’s title and follow the protocols? Bowing and curtseying.
Isn’t a lot of the old family money drying up? Estate taxes add up after a few generations. It must be a bit awkward when the nobility enter the workforce.
There is no legal requirement for a UK citizen to address any other UK citizen in a specific way under normal interactions. If you’ve chosen to enter into a specific organisation or employment then they may have their own conventions or contractual obligations or customs that you freely abide by.
Even if some arcane law could be dredged up it would be laughed out of a legal court and ridiculed in the court of public opinion.
No matter who I meet in a public environment I will address them with the same courtesy or formality as they address me whether a lord or a pauper (I have met both)
If anyone insists on a title outside of a professional capacity they are an arsehole and can safely be ignored or, better still…make an even more pronounced effort to not use their preferred title.
It is true that there is a class system in parts of the UK.
A few people will judge you on what school you went to or what job your parents have. (Of course, this may happen in other countries too.)
But you have a wildly exaggerated idea of what it means to be a ‘commoner’ in the UK.
I’m 63 and have met Prime Ministers, High Court Judges, Headmasters, senior Clergy, TV stars, billionaires and World Champions (both chess and snooker players.) I’ve never had to bow to anyone.
“Accept” being commoners? Why wouldn’t we? I’m a commoner back home and I’m reasonably sure the coat of arms of the Duke of Alba doesn’t keep him any drier in the shower than mine does me.
You seem to think that “commoner” is equivalent to “serf”, rather than being the usual status.
I assumed that being polite and courteous is the best approach in life.
It just seems that as British culture changes that the class system will be less and less relevant in the future. Although tradition may keep it alive for a few more generations.
I’ve often wondered if laws were in place requiring the strict observance of Titles and protocols. I’ve read too many Agatha Christie books.
AFAIK, English law has always been pretty lax about this kind of thing, at least in theory. Even for the monarch. Lèse-majesté is more of a continental thing. Indeed, someone was jailed for insulting the Dutch monarch just last year (and it’s not just monarchies with these laws).
You may also be suffering from a confused idea of the types of people who carry a title in today’s Britain. They aren’t all members of the aristocracy with family histories dating back centuries. There are many Lords and Baronesses etc who have pretty humble backgrounds.
A couple of examples include Baroness Joan Bakewell (from Welsh lead mining stock) and Baron Melvyn Bragg (son of a tailor and a mechanic).
I used to drink in the same pub as a fully paid up copper bottomed Lord of the Realm with a title that went back to William the Bastard. If there was one thing that annoyed him most, it was someone my lording him.
He was ex RN and used to go the the Lords whenever the Navy was being debated. At the start of a new Parliament, he went off in his full ermine uniform. As far as he or anyone else was concerned, that was his part time job and when he was doing it he was indeed My Lord or Your Lordship to the other players in the business; in the pub he was Fred who played darts and bought his round like the rest of us.
He told a tale where some character with an inflated idea of his own importance, had pulled up in his Rolls beside his (fairly modest) house where he was trimming his hedge. Addressing him as “My Man” the oik wanted to know where His Lordship was. Fred, in his best yokel accent, sent him up a narrow muddy lane which had nowhere to turn round at the end.
Maggie Thatcher ended up a Baroness, and she was a grocer’s daughter from Grantham. I think there is more snobbery in the US about which school you went to; phi beta kappa and all that nonsense than there is in the UK. Not that we don’t have some of course.
The handful of titled Brits I’ve met over the years have always said things like “Please call me Bob” (or Ann, or Tim, or whatever their name was) and seemed somewhat embarrassed if someone tried to M’Lord/Lady them.
it is a strange quirk perhaps that Cameron was by far the poshest and privileged conservative PM of the last 45 years. Teresa May is a vicars daughter of no great wealth. John Major, son of a music hall performer, of no great wealth and didn’t even go to university, Mrs. T mentioned above, Edward Heath was the son of a Kentish carpenter.
A party allegedly built on class and snobbery seems to regularly pick people from all social strata.
There are certainly conventions about addressing people in the House of Lords or in a criminal court - where the judge is ‘My Lord’ or ‘My Lady’ (whether titled or not.)
I believe that American judges are addressed as ‘Your Honor’ and that everyone must stand when a judge enters or leaves. Does that mean you are all ‘commoners’?!
Agatha Christie gives a reasonable picture of upper-class life in the 1920’s and 1930’s.
Her murder mysteries are often set in country houses where some titled chap has extensive staff (e.g. butler, steward, housemaid, footman, gardener, cook, valet etc.)
No doubt all these servant would bow or curtsey.
But that was long ago…
Of course they accept it. It’s not as though the native-born population is awash with titles. Anyway, immigrants are quite frequently ennobled (though as far as I can tell none have been elevated to the peerage). The composer Handel, the car designer Alec Issigonis, or more recently the architect Anish Kapoor, to use some well-known examples. And there are plenty of second-generation immigrants who have joined the peerage, like Baroness Warsi.
Not really. Obviously she has the right of abode in the United Kingdom and can abdicate tomorrow and enjoy all the privileges of citizenship, but in practice the monarch enjoys most of the benefits of citizenship but not the obligations; she’s above the law. She is effectively insulated from any criminal prosecution, and from many civil obligations. Liz II pays UK income taxes voluntarily, for example. She doesn’t have to serve on a jury, and cannot vote or stand for election.
So are (some or all) UK citizens required to address the monarch a certain way? Or is the monarch required to address (some or all) UK citizens a certain way?
Also, she can’t abdicate herself, though, can she? Only Parliament (of which she is a part) can remove her from the throne.
Karan Bilimoria (of Cobra beer fame) is an immigrant who is now a member of the House of Lords. He’s also the first Zoroastrian Parsi to take a seat in the Lords.
