Where’s the support for Margaretta D’Arcy?

As we go through a cold, wet and windy March, the mood of the elements seems a perfect match for the response and indifference of the artistic community to the imprisonment of one of their own, Margaretta D’Arcy.

If a practising dramatist, actor, writer, producer and peace activist were to be jailed for a matter of conscience and political belief, in distant Asia or Africa, it would be a matter of some agitation, but in this land of saints and scholars, hardly a squeak!

Is the pioneer of social street theatre in the dark 1970s, to be parked in our darkest detention centres, because she dared demand the investigation of military aeroplanes going through Shannon? Is a 70-year-old with an aluminium Zimmer frame such a major threat to the security of the airport, that she must be made an example of and imprisoned for three months?