fear of invasion by foreign tribes. We are an insular people, wary of those who speak in a different tongue or whose skin may be a different colour. We are inexperienced in organising the infrastructure for this new challenge, both at government level and at the level of the human heart.
But in modern Ireland, there is an "ism" apart from racism that needs to be headlined. Ageism is a real problem in our youth-oriented society. The rejection of skins of a different hue includes the rejection of wrinkled skin. Attitudes tacitly suggest that elderly people, like Victorian children, should "be seen but not hear" in spite of the increasing percentage of people who are living longer.
An extraordinary aspect of this is the fact that the "experts" eagerly seek to prolong life but not to respect longevity. Just as there is pressure to play God and abort life at its beginning, the spectre of euthanasia follows the seeming success in adding years to life's span. What a tangled web we are weaving!
Medical and monetary perks are not the only thing the elderly want or deserve. How about giving them a public voice? Do we ever see a TV programme in which the aged are interviewed so that their giftedness, wisdom, humour, skills, needs and memories can be shared? How about including elderly people's reflections, creativity, tastes and, indeed, fashion requirements in newspaper and magazine articles?
Perhaps an unrealistic and primitive fear of death and dying is at the back of the trend to brush the elderly under the veneer of modern hard-wood floors? Now, there's a fact of life that requires highlighting! But will today's brand of censorship forbid that such a politically unpalatable subject be publicised? - Yours, etc.,
Angela MacNamara, Lower Kilmacud Road, Dublin 14.