‘Celtic cubs’ need to change their attitude

I’M afraid Steven King (January 21) reaches the wrong conclusion when he faults the political parties for the fact that membership is getting older and fewer in number.

When he quotes smart young people on university campuses on their attitude to being a member of any political party, he really lets the cat out of the bag as to where the real problem lies.

These university-educated young people aspire to be the elite in this country at some time in the future. If the only thought they can come up with is that political party membership is “no longer cool”, and anyway they would risk “being laughed at by friends” should they become party members, then democracy is indeed in danger of dying on its feet.

It is not the attitude of the political parties that needs examining. It is that of the smug, complacent and self-indulgent Celtic Tiger generation who mock and take for granted the achievements of previous generations in fashioning a fully functional democratic republic from the wreckage of 800 years of colonial rule.

Anthony Leavy

Shielmartin Drive

Sutton

Dublin 13