The Royal Family is just a “cartel of really weird people”, according to journalist Ash Sarkar.
Speaking on BBC Newsnight on Tuesday night – days before King Charles’s coronation – the contributing editor to Novara Media shared her take on why young people aren’t interested in the monarchy.
She claimed: “When it comes to this generation in particular, young people are interested in the values of fairness and in the values of representation.
“Whatever way you slice it, the monarchy is neither a fair nor a representative institution.”
Her words come on the back on a YouGov poll which found less than a third of 18-24-year-olds in the UK actively support the monarchy.
Sarkar also said that when the royals have lifted back the so-called veil of mystery around Palace life, they have “revealed themselves to be a cartel of some very weird people”.
She continued: “And I think that the more that social media, 24-hour news, tabloid press intrusion gets us to see who they are as individuals – which is people who have been made in many cases deeply unhappy by the institution that they have been born into – the less people are inclined to support the monarchy, either as a political national institution, or as a kind of old-school celebrity that they secretly enjoy.”
Sarkar does not mention Prince Harry here, but as King Charles’s youngest son, he has frequently spoken out about his misery as a member of the Royal Family.
His wife, Meghan Markle, also worked as a member of the Royal Family for less than two years before the pair of them decided to formally step back due to their own unhappiness with life behind Palace walls.
Sarkar said it was “a double-edged sword” to being in the spotlight as a royal, adding: “If you think of the person who really pioneered celebrity for the Royal Family, Princess Diana, that goes hand-in-hand with tragedy.”
The journalist then mentioned how the Palace was “not able to keep” Meghan – someone who was already an established celebrity before royal life and the first royal of colour ever – onside adds to the younger generation’s overall disillusionment with the institution.
This inability “really does fly in the face of what a lot of Generation Z and millennials value”, according to Sarkar.