Princess Delphine & Family, News & Events 1; 2020 - 2023

[tihkon2]

"when she found out she was pregnant from the Prince de Liège, she regularly made Jacques Boël drunk to have intercourse with him and make him believe that she was pregnant from him. So if we may have some consideration with the "cold" father..."

Can you imagine if a husband got his wife drunk to have sex with her to cover some lie,
The furor would be to the high heavens. That shows Sybylle in a disgusting light. What an awful thing to do multiple times. Much of the unhappiness in Delphine's life can be laid squarely at the feet of her mother who seems like a piece of work.

"if you want to blame anybody for the situation delphine was put more blame on her mother"

Exactly. Her and Albert were awful.

At that time they were selfish, deceitful, and other not very nice things.

 

[Prinsara]

I think you are all missing the part where "Sybille had to get herself drunk to do it". And Delphine wept about it. No one was celebrating it.

If lamenting the late Jacques Boël is in order, it’s notable that neither Sybille nor Delphine have ever breathed a syllable about any potential extramarital activity of his, nor any of the obvious problems in their marriage, nor anything that didn’t have to do with Delphine. There is still quite a level of discretion involved.

 

[tihkon2]

Not missing it. Just saying, if it were the other way around people would be talking about consent issues,

 

[ladongas]

Bulletin: lots of people get drunk (accidentally, purposefully, but seldom forceably) and have sex.

 

[rominet09]

I think some things are better left unsaid.... Especially for the child to hear.

 

[Prinsara]

I think some things are better left unsaid.... Especially for the child to hear.

No kidding. Unfortunately Delphine had to hear a lot of it. Including “I’m tired of this story. You’re not my daughter.”

The documentary is painful for a lot of reasons…

 

[tihkon2]

Bulletin: lots of people get drunk (accidentally, purposefully, but seldom forceably) and have sex.

Bulletin. She admits getting him drunk purposefully for the intent of having sex with him to deceive him.

Switch that around to man doing that to woman.

 

[Duc_et_Pair]

but he wasn't her father...He did not act like a father. Neither did her blood father

From Delphine's birth in February 1968 until the end of her juridical battle in January 2020, the late Jacques Boël was her father. That is a period of 52 years. Delphine was cared for, in Mr Boël's house and out of Mr Boëls pocket.


Delphine even had to fight her father's legal paternity first before she could continue to have someone else's paternity established. This proves he was her father.

 

[Denville]

that was a legal issue. She had to give up legally being his daughter before she could make a claim that Albert was her father. And I think you know what I mean by being a father. Yes Boel paid for her expenses and accepted legal paternity but he could have made some effort to care for the child. If he had, perrhaps she would not have rejected him and tried to prove that she was ALbert's daughter.

 

[Duc_et_Pair]

that was a legal issue. She had to give up legally being his daughter before she could make a claim that Albert was her father. And I think you know what I mean by being a father. Yes Boel paid for her expenses and accepted legal paternity but he could have made some effort to care for the child. If he had, perrhaps she would not have rejected him and tried to prove that she was ALbert's daughter.

Jacques and Sybille separated in 1976 (when Delphine was 8 years old) and formally divorced in 1978. Whatever a perceived lack of warmth: the father's involvement was limited anyway. As is the use, the father had to pay for his daughter's upkeep and education until she reached the age of majority. And that is what Mr Boël did.

Delphine herself told about her mother's pregnancy: "She immediately knew it was Albert's baby, because she had been living separately from Boël for a long time," Delphine said. "But she also knew that it would cause a lot of problems. At one point she made sure she made Boël very drunk. She made love to him, so that later she could say that I was his child."

Other sources claim that Jacques Boël knew from the beginning that Delphine was not his daughter, but that he did recognize her. The story certainly fits in with another long tradition of the Boël family: discretion. "The family has always maintained good contacts with the royal family," according financial journalist Ludwig Verduyn. "In order not to jeopardize this relationship, Jacques Boël has covered this with the mantle of love by recognizing Delphine as his daughter."

Delphine herself claimed she never had a relationship with Jacques. She said in a documentary: "I called him papa because everyone told me to do that, but it was difficult for me. When I was with him, I would sit in the kitchen and his personnel would take care of me. When I had to go to him, I would hide, But my mom pushed me into his car and said: "It is the law."

Source: https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/nl/2022/01/22/jacques-boel/

 

[Denville]

well isnt htat clear that he did not show any affection or encourage her to have any kind of relationship iwth him? I dont entirely agree with her behaviour but I think that wiht 2 fathers rejecting her, it is not surprising.

 

[ladongas]

Bulletin. She admits getting him drunk purposefully for the intent of having sex with him to deceive him.

Switch that around to man doing that to woman.

No, I don’t equate a married couple having a few drinks at home, and then having sex, to date rape.

 

[tihkon2]

No, I don’t equate a married couple having a few drinks at home, and then having sex, to date rape.

That's nice. I do. Because it's not quite what happened. It's not a married couple having drinks at home. It was one person making the other party drunk for the purpose of deception and with the goal of having sex with them once they had impaired their ability to make judgements.

 

[Prinsara]

Let’s see: abortion was not an option. Divorce was not an option (at that point for whatever reason). Presumably Sybille felt she had no other choices. She also did not do it coldbloodedly or for pleasure like most date rapists, but had to get herself to a point where she couldn’t think straight or care.

It’s interesting that you feel you can judge a (probably desperate) woman in a heavily Catholic country in 1967 (when “consent” had yet to be invented) by modern standards. Maybe that’s enough now?

 

[Denville]

That's nice. I do. Because it's not quite what happened. It's not a married couple having drinks at home. It was one person making the other party drunk for the purpose of deception and with the goal of having sex with them once they had impaired their ability to make judgements.

so why are there sources saying that Boel knew that his wife was Alberts mistress and htat the child was his?

 

[Prinsara]

so why are there sources saying that Boel knew that his wife was Alberts mistress and htat the child was his?

Probably it wasn’t hard to figure out. But Sybille had to give him some plausibility. Living with the certainty probably wouldn’t have been the slightest bit pleasant for either party, either. (As shown with how he ended up behaving to both mother and child.)

 

[Heavs]

Let’s see: abortion was not an option. Divorce was not an option (at that point for whatever reason). Presumably Sybille felt she had no other choices. She also did not do it coldbloodedly or for pleasure like most date rapists, but had to get herself to a point where she couldn’t think straight or care.

It’s interesting that you feel you can judge a (probably desperate) woman in a heavily Catholic country in 1967 (when “consent” had yet to be invented) by modern standards. Maybe that’s enough now?

Can we not acknowledge that she may have felt she didn't have any good options and was probably desperate whilst acknowledging that deliberately and premeditatedly getting someone drunk and having sex with them to try pass off a child as their own is also wrong?

It doesn't have to be one thing or the other, victim or villain so to speak. People are complicated.

 

[Vicky7]

What Sybylle did was rape.. people now days cancel others for what they have done 70 years ago. Heck they even cancel others for what their ancestors did 500 years ago. But sure its always poor Sybylle and Delphine everyone was out to make their lives miserable. Woe is Sybylle who was married to a billionare while sleeping with a married royal prince. Woe,woe,woe.

 

[Prinsara]

Can we not acknowledge that she may have felt she didn't have any good options and was probably desperate whilst acknowledging that deliberately and premeditatedly getting someone drunk and having sex with them to try pass off a child as their own is also wrong?

It doesn't have to be one thing or the other, victim or villain so to speak. People are complicated.

No one ever said “look at this wonderful thing Sybille did”. But I think dismissing a accidentally-pregnant woman in a fairly-repressive society in an already-terrible marriage with no options as an average “disgusting” date-rapist who does it for kicks, is rather callous considering her circumstances, and inaccurate to use current standards to judge her. (Also presumably, if a guy is getting a woman drunk for coercive sex, it’s not because the guy is pregnant with no other recourse.)

Being so concerned over how the situation would look if the parties were reversed is ignoring how little control women actually had over their lives and bodies in 1967.

 

[Vicky7]

Then why are you using current standards to judge Jacques Boels treatment of Delphine. People in those days especially in their social class treated the kids exactly how he treated Delphine. Distant and cold. Hire nannies to look after the kids when the kids are old enough send them to boarding school. The hypocrisy of it all.

 

[Denville]

that is not necessarily true. Some fathers were distnat, others less so. You can have a nanny and send your kids to boarding school and still show them that you love them.

 

[Heavs]

No one ever said “look at this wonderful thing Sybille did”. But I think dismissing a accidentally-pregnant woman in a fairly-repressive society in an already-terrible marriage with no options as an average “disgusting” date-rapist who does it for kicks, is rather callous considering her circumstances, and inaccurate to use current standards to judge her. (Also presumably, if a guy is getting a woman drunk for coercive sex, it’s not because the guy is pregnant with no other recourse.)

Being so concerned over how the situation would look if the parties were reversed is ignoring how little control women actually had over their lives and bodies in 1967.

You kind of ignored what I personally was saying there. I didn't dismiss her problem or flip it to a man deliberately getting a woman blind drunk to impregnate her against her will.

I said that getting someone incapacitated/unconscious via alcohol in order to have sex with them and pre meditatively lie to them about a child is wrong. Leave aside all references to other date rapists who may do so for "pleasure" (or any other reason like power or hatred of women) it is still wrong. But that perhaps she did feel terrified of what was going to happen to her otherwise and thought this was the best way forward for everyone. We'll never know. Although in the end it doesn't seem to have made anyone happy.

Therefore perhaps she's neither a complete victim or a complete villain in regards to how she acted about this, she's both.

If we're going to judge the situation by the standards of 1967 conservative Catholic Belgium then Delphine would never be HRH Princess Delphine and Albert would be right to never publicly acknowledge her.

 

[tihkon2]

"Being so concerned over how the situation would look if the parties were reversed is ignoring how little control women actually had over their lives and bodies in 1967."

Not ignoring anything. I find the "poor little Sybille" attitude to be sexist and I find rape apology to be rape apology. Period. No matter who's taking the consent from someone. She presumably wholeheartedly joined into an extramarital affair with Albert and presumably knew pregnancy was a possibility and decided to lie more and deceive more to cover the lying and deceiving of the adulterous affair she and Albert were engaging in. So no, no sympathy for her or Albert on my part. None at all.

 

[Vicky7]

What was Sybylle afraid of anyway? That Jacques was going to leave her and she will not have access to his billions anymore? That she will have to provide for delphine out of her own pocket. Was she afraid she will not have the best of both worlds anymore use the Boel Billions while playing house with the royal prince.

 

[Denville]

Exactly.

Since Albert was not keen to marry her, and divorce was frowned upon, I would imagine that she was indeed afraid of losing her husband.. who at least in English society would be a protection against gossip and scandal.
I must say that there seems to be a lot of disagreement about Boel, one school of thoguht saying that He knew Del was not his child but accepted her out of old fashioned chivalry or out of a desire to stand well with the RF.. the other saying that he was tricked into thinking that she was his child.. some saying that he could not possibly love her because he knew she was not his own.. and others saying that he was just a distant father like all fathers of his class and time...

 

[maria-olivia]

To day in our newspapers the annoucement of Jacques Boël funerals . His Widow , born Diane de Woot de Trixhe de Jannée is the first in the annoncement. Her Children such as his close relatives. At the End the Count Boël , head of the family.
Amen !

 

[Duc_et_Pair]

I have seen the documentary Delphine, Mijn Verhaal (Delphine, My Story) on VRT, the Dutch speaking public network in Belgium.


Eeeermmmmm.....


I am not sure what the objective was of Deplhine and her mother Sybille. It was dragging up the whole story, all the steps to the Court of Justice, the demand for a DNA test, the fight for recognition. But it was essentially just old news: we all know Deplhine is now recognized, she is now a Van Saksen-Coburg and she is received by her halfbrother the King.


With the voice-over, the background music and the way it was cut and with those "insider comments" from her laywer, or from the author Mario Danneels, and others it was a bit too melodramatic. Pauvre Delphine. Especially the last part irritated me, it was like milk machine sucking the empty udders of an old cow: milk it to the very last drop. Pffff.

 

[cdm]

Isn’t it that what documentaries do: when things are over, looking back on events with the perspective of what we know now?

 

[iceflower]

Princess Delphine has been to Abu Dhabi and has visited the Belgian pavilion at the Expo 2020:


** Pic **

 

[iceflower]

Princess Delphine and husband Jim O’Hare attended day 4 of the 5th Canneseries Festival in Cannes, France, today, April 4:


** Pic ** gettyimages gallery ** dailymail article **