The brave new Knights of the Round Table—Sir Rod Stewart, Sir Paul McCartney, Sir Mick Jagger, and even the appallingly prolific sexual abuser, Sir Jimmy Savile, now deceased. Sadly none of the Monty Python team made the cut for knighthood—obviously no sense of humor goes into the selection process.
The myth surrounding King Arthur’s knights was about behaving with honor and fighting for good over evil. The code of chivalry for knights that developed in medieval times emphasized horsemanship, bravery in battle, service to God and one’s country, being faithful, honest and generous, and protecting the weak against injustice from the strong.
Nowadays, being faithful is not a requirement for those awarded British knighthoods. Rather than protecting ladies’ virtues, many modern knights do exactly the opposite. At least these adulterers’ wives get the title of “Lady” in exchange for putting up with all that philandering.
Rod Stewart has built a reputation, not only for his music, but also for infidelity and the sheer quantity of babes he has bonked. In Wikipedia, rather than just getting a couple of sentences about his relationships, Stewart has earned a table to list some of his best-known liaisons. He has had eight children by five different mothers. Rod Stewart’s first child, Sarah Streeter, is eight years older than model Penny Lancaster, the woman he married in 2007. Celebs do love those models. Penny is Stewart’s third wife and 26 years his junior. This babe is now Lady Stewart. Will she be able to keep that title if Stewart, true to his previous behavior, trades her in for a younger model—or maybe an actress?
However, what might save Lady Stewart from Rod Stewart’s chopping block and keep him happy is that she does not seem to be a fan of modern feminist values. As Emily Hewett of the MailOnline reported on 28 September 2015 (see here), Penny Stewart has declared that if a man puts on an apron and helps out in the kitchen, it could damage the poor chap’s masculinity. She reckons that most men are needy. Despite also having to minister to the couple’s two children—although presumably she has a team of paid help to assist—Lady Stewart knows on which side her bread is buttered. She insists that the key to a successful marriage with the aging rock star is to ensure she makes a conscious effort to dedicate time to him. As well as being a sex goddess to 71-year-old Sir Rod (who most likely needs those little blue pills to become rod-like), Lady Stewart also needs to do a good job of mothering the old codger.
The knighthood Rod Stewart received was a KBE—Knight Bachelor of the Order of the British Empire, the highest of a series of Orders of the British Empire awards (see the 2015 BBC Online article “Guide to the Honours”). The lowest of these is Member of the British Empire (MBE), followed by Officer (OBE), then Commander (CBE), and finally the KBE. These honors were created by King George V during World War I to reward services to the war effort by civilians at home and military personnel in support positions. This was a time when Britain really did have an empire over which to preside.
Nowadays, actors playing heroes on the silver screen will have far greater chances of snagging a knighthood than people who have actually carried out acts of heroism. Being given the role of James Bond, a character renowned for putting his life in danger for the good of Britain and the civilized world, ups your odds considerably—just look at Sir Roger Moore and Sir Sean Connery. Will Daniel Craig be next?
Yet pitifully few of the Battle of Britain fighter pilots who saved Britain from invasion by the Nazis in World War II were given knighthoods. In Hurricane: The Last Witness (André Deutsch, 2015), author Brian Milton writes, “The young men who mounted their modern steeds in the summer of 1940—Hurricanes and Spitfires—to fight skillfully as ‘The Few’ in the Battle of Britain, exactly fit the description of young men who actually earned their knighthoods by sacrifice and courage. Their ‘sword, lance and bow’ were Browning .303 machine guns.” Milton is himself an unsung hero who has put his life on the line in several adventures, including having been the first person to circumnavigate the world in an open-cockpit ultralight aircraft.
One of the best-known Battle of Britain fighter pilots is Douglas Bader, a controversial figure who was taken on by the Royal Air Force despite having lost both his legs in a flying accident. However, Bader’s recognition in the Queen’s Honours List came only after his life story was made into a film, Reach for the Sky, in 1956. That year he was awarded a CBE. Ironically, Kenneth More, the actor who played Bader in the film, was also given a CBE in 1970. Bader had to wait till 1976 to get his award upgraded to a knighthood, but by then he was a legend.
I accept that many of current knights of the entertainment world are indeed extremely talented. As an avowed Trekkie, I loved Sir Patrick Stewart’s portrayal of Captain Jean Luc Picard in Star Trek Next Generation. He is a wonderful actor whose Shakespearean training shows through in every part he plays. Most of the knighted celebs have made bucket loads of money, and some have even decided to place a few million here and there into charitable causes. If the celeb hasn’t gone off to live overseas, the British Government may also be earning a decent amount of tax revenue from his or her efforts. But does all this merit the Queen slapping a sword on the celeb’s shoulder? Some might say that today’s criteria rarely measure up to the legacy of British heroism that in past centuries that would be necessary to earn a knighthood.
Huffington Post Contributor and former BBC journalist C. J Grace is the author of the new book Adulterer’s Wife: How to Thrive Whether You Stay or Not, available on Amazon.com. Read C. J.’s blogs on www.adultererswife.com and follow her on Twitter: https://twitter.com/cjgraceauthor.