{"product_id":"rita","title":"Rita By O'hare, Rita","description":"\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eI knew, even though none of this was discussed around the\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003efamily table, that there was something wrong from an early\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eage, that things were not normal. You would have had to have\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003ebeen very unaware of your surroundings if you didn’t\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003erecognise by the time you were thirteen or fourteen that\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003ethere was a despondency attached to the place, a gloom, a\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eweight. I couldn’t have articulated it then but it was a sense of\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003evictors and vanquished, in the way that everything was\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003earranged, in the way that even the news, sport, culture, was\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003epresented on television. For many adults it was safer to live\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003ewith their head in the sand because the alternative meant\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003ehaving to do something about it, and the prospects of bringing\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align: center;\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eabout change were not only slim but came at a cost.\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eRita O’Hare grew up in West Belfast, a community alienated from unionist one-party government, a people suffering decades of sectarian discrimination, with the threat of state violence as reprisal should they attempt to challenge their second-class citizenship.\u003cspan class=\"Apple-converted-space\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAs a mother of three young children she felt she could no longer ignore what was going on and made a stand by joining the Irish Republican Army. She was shot and grievously wounded by the British Army on an IRA operation, and was imprisoned three times.\u003cspan class=\"Apple-converted-space\"\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eShe became Sinn Féin’s National Director of Publicity and was the party’s representative in Washington for almost twenty years, having played a prominent role in the peace process particularly as a Sinn Féin contact with the Irish government.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eRita O’Hare died on 3 March, 2023, after a long battle with cancer.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MediaPlace","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57645675446654,"sku":"NW9783949573071","price":19.95,"currency_code":"EUR","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1379\/1261\/files\/9783949573071.jpg?v=1783282973","url":"https:\/\/mediaplace.com\/en-eu\/products\/rita","provider":"MediaPlace","version":"1.0","type":"link"}