'I couldn't care less.' What some young Britons think of the Queen's Platinum Jubilee & More News Here

MacDonald said that his childhood wasn’t filled with memories of the Queen and his family were far from “royalists.” But his mum is still going to a jubilee gathering on their street, he said, “mostly because it’s a good excuse for a party.”

Like many other young Britons, MacDonald said that the monarchy, whose wealth and power is linked to a legacy of British colonialism, has failed to modernize and is disconnected from today’s multicultural Britain. The 29-year-old ceramicist said he thought the royal family with “its history of militarism and imperialism” was undemocratic and should be abolished — not celebrated in a four-day jubilee holiday across the UK.

“I won’t begrudge people a good time. I think the opportunity to have a big national celebration is great, but it’s such a shame that it has to be for this institution,” he added.

Ahead of the Platinum Jubilee, CNN spoke to several Britons under 30 living across London — the epicenter of festivities — about their views.

Josie Watson, 25, won’t be tuning in to watch the £15 million ($19 million) privately-funded “People’s Pageant” festival on Saturday night, which will feature — among other things — a 20-foot tall puppet of the Queen as a princess with an entourage of corgi puppets, a dancing wedding cake, and singer Ed Sheeran. Instead, the highlight of her weekend will be going to see Abba Voyage, a concert performed by holographic apparitions of the Swedish pop band, with her mum.

Watson said she is apathetic about the jubilee because she “doesn’t see the point in celebrating someone who was just born into a family and assigned a role.”

The tech journalist lives in Ealing, a district in west London, where 154 street parties will be hosted by residents — among the most to be held in any London borough this weekend.

Despite having grown up in a family that is pro-monarchy, Watson believes that “young people disconnect with the royal family because we’ve never lived at a time where their leadership has meant much.” They served their purpose to provide “patriotism and leadership” during wartime but now “priorities have shifted,” she added.

Robert Hazell, professor of government and the constitution at University College London and co-editor of “The Role of Monarchy in Modern Democracy: European Monarchies Compared,” told CNN there are many possible reasons for the apparent shift in attitudes towards the British monarchy among a younger generation of Britons.

“We have an aging monarch. It’s difficult for young people to identify with someone who’s very old,” Hazell said. But with Prince William and Catherine doing more public engagements with their children, he expects interest to rise again as Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis eventually become teenagers.

But for Watson, age isn’t the issue. “We just don’t see enough of ourselves in them,” she said.

Pakistani-British freelance journalist Asiya Istikhar, 22, said that she felt a shift in the way ethnic minorities related to the royal family when biracial American actress Meghan Markle arrived on the scene. When Istikhar was growing up, it became a ritual in her family to occasionally watch royal events, especially for her mother, who loved Princess Diana, but she herself was never that interested.

It wasn’t until Prince Harry and Meghan’s relationship that she felt at all excited by the royals, she said. But that excitement quickly turned to horror when she saw how Meghan was covered by British tabloids. “For many, many weeks at a time, you would just be picking up a newspaper or seeing multiple articles online that were just ruthlessly destroying Meghan,” she said.

Istikhar said this reported lack of support for Meghan from the royal family hasn’t instilled much hope among young people — particularly people of color — that the monarchy can change.

Istikhar plans to head to her family home in Birmingham in a “purposely orchestrated” move to avoid the big celebration — and the 101 street parties that will be taking place in Southwark, on the south bank of the Thames, where she lives, because she has no interest in celebrating the “70-year reign of an unelected monarch.”

Meanwhile, Roisin Conneely, a 26-year-old digital communications professional, has grand plans for her weekend — spending it at her home in Redbridge, in east London, binge-watching the latest season of “Stranger Things.”

“I couldn’t care less,” she said of the jubilee.