So no merit, effort or capability-based gains; instead a straight title, prestige, wealth and inheritance gain through DNA, over which no offspring has any control.
Are you advocating for all children being anonymized and raised in orphanages? Or a 100% inheritance tax? Or just expressing disappointment at your own relative lack of wealthy & famous recent ancestors?
> Are you advocating for all children being anonymized and raised in orphanages? Or a 100% inheritance tax? Or just expressing disappointment at your own relative lack of wealthy & famous recent ancestors?
I'm advocating for all children to be given a fair shot at life. How do you suggest we achieve that as a society? Or is that too much to ask, in your view?
He got equal inheritance rights as every person gets from his parents. In this case I see it as "You had a kid, you better take charge of that."
Also:
> But he will not receive a royal allowance, nor will he be expected to take on official duties, and he has no rights to the Belgian throne. Vandenkerckhove could take his father’s family name, Saxe-Coburg, but has indicated he may not choose to.
I got curious about this but it seems that this is also the case for all his siblings. His bio dad gets it (EUR 300k/y) because of a transitional compromise but the future princes aside from the presumptive heir to the throne will not get it.
Not that they might be any close to being destitute given the estate size.
As for him, I suppose you can sue for backpay child support.
From a simulation hypothesis perspective, your DNA is the passport through many simulations you've experienced and it carries the merit, effort and capabilities gained over time.
Yes. unfortunately rich people without merit effort and capability are still rich and some of them don't work very hard, so it looks pretty much the same as every other place in the world.
Leopold II had millions and millions murdered in the Congo to make himself rich with rubber, but he wasted it all and in the end the Belgian people had to bail him out. No fortune to get from him.
I'm Belgian, this has been public knowledge since the guy was born. At least it was dealt with a lot more amicably than the other case (Delphine Boël being the child of King (then Prince) Albert II), which was decades of bad lying and denial.
I don't understand what you mean, but then again, I am Spanish and we carry both family names, and nobody changes their family name upon marriage. Anything less than that seems backwards to me xD
It's obvious that women don't betray their families when they marry and take the husband's name (as was and is custom across much of the Western world.)
It would be considered a betrayal in my culture, and as far as I know Spanish-speaking countries represent a sizable chunk of the Western hemisphere ;)
Case in point, my GF is Japanese and I told her in very clear terms that I would NOT marry her if she ever thinks about taking my family name. Although I also heard that marriage numbers are going down significantly in Japan because young women don't want to change their name and the stubborn government refuses to change the law, which is funny because they copied it from the Americans; Chinese and Korean women don't change their names because doing so would be a dishonor to their ancestors...
So he knew when he turned 16 but only got recognized 10 years later. I hope when he was a teenager he got into some friendly brawl and said "Shut up my Dad is the King." and got laughed on and now the other person is seeing the news.
But it’s funny because this is a common childhood fantasy. Like maybe as a five year old, you get into a conflict with your parents and you imagine that your dad is actually not really your dad, but is actually some other outstanding member of the community. There was a similar plot point in the Joker (2019) movie too.
It's German, not British. When Belgium was founded, the fear was it would immediately try to join France. So when a French noble was offered the throne, he actually said no, quite a blemish for the young nation. A surplus German noble was crowned, which was palatable to the English as it balanced things out a bit.
"The British branch was officially renamed to House of Windsor by British king George V in 1917, during the First World War, amid anti-German sentiment."
As TFA pointed out, it's not the first time in the belgian royal family (which has no power btw and they're not anywhere near as rich as, say, the royal british family). A few years ago it was revealed that Delphine Boel was the daughter of the then belgian king.
And contrarily to his son, prince Laurent, who's been classy and accepted immediately the DNA test, the king refused and went to court but lost his case and had to submit to a DNA test. He later on abdicated IIRC.
It's interesting to think of the number of kids from kings and princes that, through the ages, never got recognized because DNA tests didn't exist and they could just deny it, even if the offspring was a near identical copy (in the case of the son of prince Laurent: he looks just like his father).
But yup in Belgium we've got a monarchy and king/queen/princes/princesses (princes and princesses either from the royal family or not), counts/countesses, dukes, many barons, a lot of knights and some esquires (I think we have esquires). And even more "Madame/Monsieur": people from the nobility but without any title.
The title appears on the identity card but that's basically it: it's more of an historical thing than anything else really.
Several of my friends hold such titles: it is not uncommon and it brings you exactly jack fucking shit advantage in life (unless you're really from the royal family).
It's not just Belgium, Practically every major monarchy has had some kind of controversy that could have easily been resolved through DNA testing, if it existed at the time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pretender
Was reading that many European countries have "forced heirship" which means that varying amounts - 50% to 75% is typical - have to be left to spouse/children.
I was representative in the US for my aunt and she and her husband specifically disinherited his two daughters from his first marriage. It was interesting that this was simply not allowed in other countries.
Anyway, time to take his dad mountain climbing, caving, scuba diving, ...
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[ 0.25 ms ] story [ 37.9 ms ] threadI'm advocating for all children to be given a fair shot at life. How do you suggest we achieve that as a society? Or is that too much to ask, in your view?
Also:
> But he will not receive a royal allowance, nor will he be expected to take on official duties, and he has no rights to the Belgian throne. Vandenkerckhove could take his father’s family name, Saxe-Coburg, but has indicated he may not choose to.
So it seems nothing will change for him.
Not that they might be any close to being destitute given the estate size.
As for him, I suppose you can sue for backpay child support.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopold_I_of_Belgium
(not making this up, google it)
Only a man could entertain this thought.
Case in point, my GF is Japanese and I told her in very clear terms that I would NOT marry her if she ever thinks about taking my family name. Although I also heard that marriage numbers are going down significantly in Japan because young women don't want to change their name and the stubborn government refuses to change the law, which is funny because they copied it from the Americans; Chinese and Korean women don't change their names because doing so would be a dishonor to their ancestors...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Saxe-Coburg_and_Gotha
And contrarily to his son, prince Laurent, who's been classy and accepted immediately the DNA test, the king refused and went to court but lost his case and had to submit to a DNA test. He later on abdicated IIRC.
It's interesting to think of the number of kids from kings and princes that, through the ages, never got recognized because DNA tests didn't exist and they could just deny it, even if the offspring was a near identical copy (in the case of the son of prince Laurent: he looks just like his father).
But yup in Belgium we've got a monarchy and king/queen/princes/princesses (princes and princesses either from the royal family or not), counts/countesses, dukes, many barons, a lot of knights and some esquires (I think we have esquires). And even more "Madame/Monsieur": people from the nobility but without any title.
The title appears on the identity card but that's basically it: it's more of an historical thing than anything else really.
Several of my friends hold such titles: it is not uncommon and it brings you exactly jack fucking shit advantage in life (unless you're really from the royal family).
I was representative in the US for my aunt and she and her husband specifically disinherited his two daughters from his first marriage. It was interesting that this was simply not allowed in other countries.
Anyway, time to take his dad mountain climbing, caving, scuba diving, ...
https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=5d80ec56-4c29...
“We went to the hospital together and I remember him saying, ‘I’ll go first so you’re feeling at ease,’” Vandenkerckhove told VTM.
Good on the dad for not trying to weasel out on this and stepping up.