Down Down Deeper and Down

The years 1973 to 1985 in Ireland were turbulent, dramatic and unpredictable. It was a different and wild time.

 A time when strikes meant you couldn’t post a letter for five months, rubbish piled up in the streets and there was no TV to watch.

When there were bombs in the streets of the capital, hostage dramas kept everyone glued to their sets and the government kidnapped a hunger-striker’s corpse.

When you needed a prescription to buy a condom and when trying to alter this situation could see you threatened with death and your family with abduction.

When crowds marched for pirate radio, a pro-life referendum and Viking relics, and against the PAYE system and nuclear power.

When a president resigned, a Taoiseach voted against his own government and ministers bugged journalists and their own party colleague.

 When Garret and Charlie went head to head.

When Irish women looked for equal pay and got it, when people risked their jobs and their liberty to help the oppressed in South Africa and the Philippines, when Irish gays took their first steps out of the closet.

When the pope came to Dublin and so did heroin and Heffo’s Army.

Sometimes it wasn’t too different from today. An unprecedented boom led to an economic meltdown, unemployment soared into double figures and the government bailed out the bankers while everyone else suffered.

Down, Down, Deeper and Down is the story of a time when statues moved and the Rats rocked. It is the story of a time not so long ago which is sometimes portrayed as being part of ancient history.

 It is the story of the years that made us what we are today.