The Troubles of the 1980s

Written by Patrick Wang

Edited by sophie gain and A. a. A. Ewal

It was a cold winter night on the gray streets of Belfast. Most shops were closed and the wind was howling, with an aura of loneliness surrounding the recent murder scene. No one gave the cold body lying in the street a second glance. It was not that there wasn't anybody passing by to take action, but to the people passing by this was the norm; the norm that once in a while, there would be some kind of tragedy such as this taking place.

‘The Troubles’ began 10 years ago.

Different factions broke apart as the people within them decided to stand up for their respective ideals. Unfortunately, instead of mutual change, their ideals were met by violence and fear which eventually turned Belfast into a warzone. What was once the centre of Northern Ireland became a wasteland; shops went down and went bankrupt. Not only did businesses go bankrupt, but so did people's hearts. Violence frequented people's lives, and they had long since accepted it. A dead body lying down on the open streets of downtown? People don’t care, they walk right by.

10 years ago, if someone on the streets asked you for help, you’d probably have given them a hand. But now, things are different. You don't know if they're from the remnants of a ‘bad’ faction or whether or not they're up to anything fishy. Human communication is gone! The trust between people is gone! Everything about this place is now just bland and colorless. Even during huge festivals such as Christmas or Easter, people aren’t celebrating in huge groups as before ‘The Troubles’. They're now in fear of being ambushed by the leftovers of an opposing faction or simply being attacked out on the streets. The idea of safety is nothing but a joke.

With the recent bomb attacks perpetrated by the IRA, the government back in London had decided to deploy the Special Air Services, or the SAS, into region to ‘solve’ the crisis. But given the order ‘shoot to kill’? Ha! how ironic! Of course, as we all know, it didn’t solve anything, it only made things worse. The situation became more precarious than before, with street shootouts between the Special forces and the IRA being a common place, occurring at an almost daily basis. Military zones have been set up, restricted areas are being maintained and Northern Ireland is being divided again and again, into smaller and smaller pieces.

Everyone caught in the scrimmages fosters a hope; a hope that one day a change will eventually arise. But realistically, taking the events that are occurring right now and the developments of such, the title of this piece seems to be the norm for this place, at least for the foreseeable future.