Madam, - Matt Doyle of the National Graves Association (July 5th) mentions several points about the disrespect of our national flag, all which I agree with. Most notably, he writes that our schools should be used as places where this lack of respect can be addressed.
I have recently completed my Leaving Cert and have therefore left school, but in the last term I attempted to bring this very issue up with my fellow pupils and the school management.
I noted that the Irish flag was rarely hoisted except for certain occasions like the Day of National Mourning after 9/11.
I wanted to stop the flag being raised as an exception rather than a rule, so I tabled a motion at the school student congress to address this issue.
When it came up on the agenda, I made a speech about how the local Superquinn raises the flag every day whilst my school, Blackrock College, which has produced several prominent Irishmen like Eamon de Valera and Brian O'Driscoll, does not.
The principal took up the issue with me and while he acknowledged my point of view, essentially dismissed it as a chore to raise the flag at the highest point in the school on a daily basis.
I too acknowledge his points and they are reasonable but if this is to be taken as the case in every school across the island, we are facing a problem.
The flag and what it represents are in danger, as mentioned in your letters page, of becoming an advertising tool, terrorist emblem, or ultimately an utter joke.
Compare the almost crazed respect American children are taught for their flag in schools, saluting it daily and making pledges to it, with the lacklustre mentality in this State and I immediately feel shame. There is simply no logical reason or rationale why we shouldn't change this attitude now before it's too late.
I left my student congress with a compromise, that the National Anthem, another neglected piece of our nationhood, be made compulsory for all students to learn in civics class. This is the most obvious part of the school curriculum which can be used to solve this problem and without much effort either.
I can only hope our flag is saved from crass desecration before it's too late and that a generation of Irish schoolchildren learn to respect it in a decent, patriotic manner which will shame those who abuse it. - Yours, etc.,
IAN O'MARA, St Helen's Road, Booterstown, Co Dublin