We have to convince young people that Ireland is worthy of their talents and energies, writes ORLA TINSLEY

IN 2009, my mother and I took a boat trip around Ireland and I marvelled at the beauty of our fair isle. In some way or another for a lot of my life, like many people of my generation, I had been discounting Ireland. Sure we had money, jobs and we could be anything we wanted. When people talked about the hardship of the 1980s, we rolled our eyes in ambivalence and told our parents it wasn’t “their day” anymore. It was our day, and things were better.

It’s still our day, but now because of greed and corruption from our leaders, many of us are being forced to abandon the country.

Unless a teenager or young adult was from a political family or studying politics, the workings of the country would mostly have flown under the radar over the last decade or so.

Politics was as grey and dull as Dáil Éireann looks on a typical Irish day.

We watched the Celtic Tiger grow and a generation become obsessed with money, fake tan, Mini Coopers and an American way of life.

We watched the divide between the richest and the poorest grow, severing hope from those at the bottom.

Now greed has given way to the fear which has spread across the country. It is this fear from which we now must move on, the fear that we must leave our country or surrender it back to the people who got us into this mess.

A new leader of Fianna Fáil will not sort out the health system, will not give hope to those who have lost their pensions, to those who have lost their homes, their security, their basic human rights.

If we always do what we always do, we’ll always get what we always got. If we fail to think outside the box we are doomed.

Shedding the old to give way to the new is never easy, particularly in politics.

First, in order to face up to the reality, we have to accept responsibility. We all have individual responsibility to save our country and we are all capable of it in some small or big way. We have power within ourselves to effect change in society. Casting a vote is just one way to do that.

In our post-boom era, the younger generation has become tuned in to politics – even if it is not at a local or national level. College students volunteering to rebuild homes in Africa, in Haiti or committing to help children with special needs in camps across the US. This generation may not buy a newspaper every day, but they are actively tweeting about news stories, or reading their newspapers on the internet.

They are aware.

We need to prove to them that instead of investing their energies internationally they should and can invest in their own country. We need to make this country great again, and we need them to do it. A good start would be holding a general election on a Friday giving those college students living outside of their constituency a chance to vote.

I called a friend of mine – 22 and in work – and asked him what he thinks of the political situation. He’s sick of it. He sees grey, boring and waffle. He sees people who have no connection to who he is or where he is going in life.

There are many like him. We see politicians on the television, in the Dáil or in the newspaper and we see bitching, arguing, in-fighting and talking double speak.

We see old age, lack of women and the shackles of tradition that continuously let down this country. We see staged performances. We do not see truth, integrity or a connection to anything we hold dear.

Ireland is a tired country for us, one where hope has been extinguished. Now, at the time where reigniting it is paramount, our options are limited to the same people with the same values.

They may be singing different songs, replacing leaders in a bid to continue, but the same egos and sense of elitism is involved. There is nothing for the citizen there, nothing that connects us to them. A government should provide for those most in need, protect social services and provide basic human rights for all.

New thoughts, new ways and new people will create a diversity that is badly needed in this country.

We do not want a politics of family dynasties bred in the way of the old, weighed down by history, familial responsibility and cronyism.

We need a dynamic force of new energies, new ideas and a sense of responsibility for the people of Ireland. We need a politics that reflects the rebirth of a downtrodden nation; we need citizens’ participation alongside that of politicians.

Building accountability for a country is no small task. We need to empower every single woman, man and child in this country with the knowledge that they have power through new choices.

We are not a condemned country, deals can be renegotiated and as the Government dissolves in front of our very eyes, it challenges the strength and resolve of the true spirit of the Irish people one last time.

Fintan O’Toole is on leave