Should the 'E' be dropped from OBE, CBE and MBE?

[sp1814]

Seeing how Britain doesn't have an Empire any more, aren't these honours now out of date?

http://www.guardian.c...nt-honours-empire-obe

Would 'C' for Commonwealth make more sense? Or something else...?

[cathfromsaron]

i say: leave it alone and stop changing things! x

[shooty]

old bugger, cantankerous bugger and miserable bugger. Yep, i'd drop the E

[shooty]

Just re-read that. It was a joke and NOT aimed at yourself : )

[sp1814]

snooty...didn't think so for a second sir!

[DTCwordfan]

The new awards:

Cock - Commander of Charles & his Kingdom
Mock - Member of Charles & his Kingdom
Dame - magic wand of Camilla and her Kingdom
Oick - Order inside Camilla and her King

[seadogg]

Sustitute "Endeavour" and the letters still stand.

[seadogg]

"Member of Charles and His Kingdom" could be D*ckhead.

[mojay]

oh - and I though OBE was summat like other bu88ers efforts or similar

[HowardKennitby]

Something else - stop the whole charade. You have no idea how scary I find it for me to be in agreement with Arthur Scargill when he described these things as 'baubles from the establishment'

[Maydup]

^^^ Agree

Maybe have a community award - there seems to be a demand for something that recognises people doing good. A kind of Good Egg honour nominated by local people or people in a particular sector, but not awarded for any other reason.

[jno]

CMG - call me God
KCMG - kindly call me God
GCMG - God calls me God

er, yes, it's hard to see what the empire really has to do with any of this any more. Old empire countries do give the same honours to their own citizens, however, so perhaps it's just a harmless bit of tradition.

[I.Don No]

because a lot of these awards go to people who do not go above and beyond to be awarded them, those that go to people who do are devalued. Scrap the lot I say and maybe have honours awarded by communities and not hmg.

[mike11111]

As some 16 countries of the Commonwealth, although totally self-governing, acknowledge the Queen as Head of State, and in some cases the last court of appeal in those countries is to the Privy Council in London, one could argue that an empire of sorts still exists, therefore leave well alone.

[sp1814]

mike1111

But as those countries are part of the Commonwealth, surely the letter C should replace the E?

[jake-the-peg]

One could argue that Mike if one totally neglected the meaning of Empire

An Empire of people who are self governing is no more an empire than a dictatorship that governs by democratic consent is a dictatorship!

[mike11111]

Is there anyone on here old enough to remember when Empire Day (24th May, Queen Victoria's birthday) was celebrated in schools until the late 50s? We all went to school with little flags on a stick. The school piano was wheeled out into the schoolyard and we would all assemble in ranks. We sang:

We've come to school this morning,
It's the 24th of May',
We've come to school this morning,
For this is Empire Day.

This was followed by a couple of songs from the operetta Merrie England, viz
"God Save Elizabeth" (the Queen had not long been crowned) and
"Who Were The Yeomen (The Yeomen of England)?

Then we got the afternoon off.

I can still remember it after 50 years.

[sp1814]

Before my time (although I've seen footage of celebrations on telly).

The furthest I can go back is the '77 Silver Jubilee where every school child in our area (probably every one in the country) got a Silver Jubilee coin. I still have mine. I thought it would be worth a fortune by the time I became an adult.

It was worth 50p back in 1977.

It is now worth £22...which means I won't be retiring any time soon.

[ludwig]

// Should the 'E' be dropped from OBE, CBE and MBE? //

Yes. It doesn't make much sense for the E to be there.

[jno]

I've checked different inflation calculators - they vary wildly, but 50p in 1977 is worth somewhere between £2.50 and £5 now. So you've made a fat profit. You should have collected more coins.