Kent State Shootings

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Commentary

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"Ohio" lyrics by Neil Young
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The following commentary is based on the analysis of the lyrics of Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young song "Ohio" about the Kent State shootings on May 4, 1970.

Charley Harvilicz » I'm 62 years old, and a U.S. Veteran (Navy Submarine Service) Had a Brother in country (Viet Nam)when this happened. I still cry when I think about it. What the hell use, What is it really all about, was my grandfathers, My Fathers, mine and my Brothers service to this country, when our own Government can do something like this? The way things are going now, you might think we may see it again. Don't think so, though, Kids cared more about things then......or so it seems.

Jessica » This song tells a very intense and tragic story about a real life incident that happened at one of the hardest times in America. Every time I hear it, the hairs on my arms stand up. It took a lot of courage for someone to write that song. Neil Young totally changed the history of rock and roll when that song was wrote.

Kaleigh » Here i sit, listening to Ohio. I am sixteen years old, and already I am given a great does of growing up. Our country is not always right, the place that i live for my life, is far from being perfect. & it's apalling to hear about the National Guard shooting those students. Jeffrey Miller, Allison Krause, William Schroeder, and Sandra Scheuer I am not in college yet, they were older than i am now, but yet, i try to put myself in their position. In many ways gives me courage to stand up for what I believe in. as you can see, they did not die in vain. Peace. Not War.

Bob » I'm a 40 year old soldier in Iraq. I have always loved the song, though maybe not purely for its original intention. For me, "Find the cost of freedom buried in the ground." is a poignant paradox when applied to both protesters (in general) and soldiers (in general). They have both shed their blood for our nation and our freedoms. I'm no relativist, but in our country the conflict between camps is vital to our freedom and it's often not clear who's right in intent and even harder to tell who's right in action. Finally, if that sounds like I am okay with the Kent state killings, I'm not. It just makes me think of the bigger picture.

Guy » I was a Marine in Vietnam but I'll skip the posturing. And how tender my feelings are. The Ohio National Guard was called out by the Governor of Ohio, not Nixon.
The Ohio Guardsmen should have had their weapons confiscated and shoved up their ass. It was very depressing that many people supported this armed and dangerous mob. (the Guardsmen, not the students)
One of the reasons for military training is "fire discipline" -- learning not to shoot just whenever you feel like it. No matter if you are tired and stressed and angry.

BB » I didn't grow up in the Kent State era, however, I was raised on the music of CSN&Y and the belief that social justice and standing up what's right is tantamount. In college I did a project on protest music during the Vietnam era. Much to my chagrin, my group members wondered why I was so passionate about including "Ohio" in our focus. Are we so far removed from standing up for what's right that we can't hear the merit and raw emotion in pieces of art such as this? If that's true, than we've learned nothing and will be traveling back to that era wraught with turbulence; not to mention we've been desensitized to the value of human life and the hurt caused by its loss. Neil Young created a masterpiece that should be included with academic study of this period in history. Thanks for having the nerve to put it all out there for the consumption of the human heart!

Tom Sexton » I'm sitting here in a hotel room, listening to some Neil Young I downloaded the other day. So I googled "Kent State shootings" and found this site and could only think how little we've learned in 35 years. We don't shoot war protesters anymore, not yet anyway, but we sure don't mind demonizing the mother of a soldier killed in the line of duty in another unpopular war who has the gall to ask why. How sad and ironic that we can still "find the cost of freedom, buried in the ground" but woe to he or she who actually exercises those same freedoms. I remember when the Kent State Massacre happened; I was in college in NY at the time, and we all walked around campus in a daze, shocked that protesting could result in death. If anything, it made us more determined to make our voices heard.

I think this incident shaped us all more than anyone realizes.

Suzanne » My 15 yr old daughter was looking for a historical event to research for a speech class and I suggested the Kent State shootings. She's spent hours reading articles and trying to sort out the facts. This topic has facilitated several interesting conversations, especially with the current unpopular war. I was young when this happened and probably sheltered from its unpleasantness by my parents. Having two other children in college, I am apalled at not only the shootings, but the attitudes of the establishment that young people had no right to voice dissent and question what our government was doing. The current marketing tactic of magnetic "Support our Troops" ribbons on cars actually means "keep your mouth shut". I feel I can be supportive of the soldiers following their orders, but I don't have to fall for the current administration's flawed rationale for being there.

Democracy Now! | Four Dead in Ohio: 35th Anniversary of Kent State Shootings: "Governor Rhodes held a news conference that day, which many say served only to provoke and increase the existing tension.

GOV. JAMES RHODES: We are seeing here at the city of Kent, especially, probably the most vicious form of campus-oriented violence yet perpetrated by dissident groups. They make definite plans of burning, destroying and throwing rocks at police and at the National Guard and the Highway Patrol. This is when we're going to use every part of the law enforcement agency of Ohio to drive them out of Kent. We are going to eradicate the problem. We're not going to treat the symptoms.

And these people just move from one campus to the other and terrorize the community. They're worse than the Brown Shirts in the communist element and also the Night Riders and the vigilantes. They're the worst type of people that we harbor in America. And I want to say that they're not going to take over a campus.

REPORTER: How long do you expect to keep the Guard at Kent?

GOV. JAMES RHODES: I'll answer that: Until we get rid of them. "

audiography: Non-fiction. Well, mostly.: "There have been many covers of the song, but I have chosen to include Devo's here for one good reason. Jerry Casale and Mark Mothersbaugh, the two artists behind Devo, were students at Kent State at the time, and if I understand it correctly, Mothersbaugh was actually present at the ill-fated rally into which the National Guardsmen shot. While the CSNY song is the stronger one musically, the Devo cover captures a lot of the raw emotion and what it must have felt like to actually have been there."

Daily Kos :: 35 Years Ago: A Black Kent State: "though Neil Young memorialized Kent State in "Ohio" - with its prophetic refrain "We're finally on our own" - the only white middle class Pop reference to Jackson that I know of is Steve Miller's 7 minute+ "Jackson-Kent Blues" from Steve Miller Number Five in the summer of 1970. Hard times, hard times ..."

kent state shooting - Protest Forum - Hip Forums:

In that particular case, four students made an incredibly stupid and dangerous move which resulted in their deaths. Police were preparing for a possible riot.

Four Students (or at least several in the group of four) moved away from the main group, positioned themselves to the side and began throwing rocks at the poice officers.

Since rocks sound and feel very very similar to bullets (to an officer in gear) - the police DO NOT GIVE THE BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT and quickly responded with fire.

Since then police have worked on ways to better identify the difference between bullets Vs rocks hitting them. Even still - if you throw rocks at police helmets and shields today, there is still a very good chance they will shoot you till you are dead.

Same goes for spinning around and pulling out a cell phone and pointing it at police.

The reason they will kill you is because many times it IS BULLETS or IS a small handgun.

Its pretty sad those four students put the cops in that position. They obviously did not think through what they were doing when they chose to hit cops in the head with rocks

Desapman:

Well your free to disagree with the Courts and all the following appeals and final rulings.

The facts remain that the police were being cornered and pelted with rocks (and tear gas cannisters thrown back.

They fired a burst of gunfire in the direction of the students and 4 of them were standing in the wrong place.

Whats always interesting is to put yourself in the shoes of the Cops. IF a mob backed you into your house and was tossing tear-gas, screaming at your window and suddenly someone you couldnt see threw handfuls of gravel at your window..... its very likely you would, at least be slightly terrified they were 'shooting' at you.

Cops are better trained now. They would NEVER let themselves get surrounded into a corner anymore. They would start shooting you dead BEFORE it got that far as it did at KEnt.

abnormal_cat:

You guys missed the point of the post. There were riots, looting, and buildings being burnt. It wasn’t a peaceful protest. Put your selves in the position of the Guard. If you heard shots being fired do you think that you might misconstrue the source of the gun fire? Is it far fetched to think that a group that just burnt down a building and was involved in looting the city could possess guns?

I wasn’t at Kent State, but my brother-in-law was. He is very critical of how the it was handled. He isn’t critical of the National Guard however. He says that they were kids his age who were poorly trained, and were equipped improperly. They were scared, and the school was chaotic. Innocent people were killed. Most of the crowd was not causing a problem. What do you guys think? Were the National Guard a bunch of murderous monsters? Do you think they planed on killing people?

May be I will break down and call my brother-in-law. So you can get some first hand information from someone who lived on the campus during the time.

shaggie:

I'd be interested in hearing your brother-in-laws remarks. I've listened to talks by Dean Kahler, Alan Canfora, and others who were on campus at that time and I've chatted briefly with Kahler. There's no question there was chaotic behavior on the campus and in Kent. It started with the protestors in response to Nixon's invasion of Cambodia but was escalated by devisive remarks and actions by people like Rhodes, older people who knew better than to talk and act the way they did.

The May 4th rally was peaceful until the guard swept across the commons and into the plactice field. One has to question what the rationale was to act pre-emptively when nothing at that gathering seemed to be going wrong.

I've never heard a good reason why the guard fired into the group. Saying that they were trying to fire into the air and missed is far-fetched. Saying that some fired because others fired doesn't answer the question either. Why did the others fire?

There were verbal exchanges between the parking lot group and the guard and hand gestures given (one protestor was holding up the middle finger when he was shot). My gut feeling is that there were a few in Troop G that were so annoyed and humiliated by the protestors in the parking lot that they open fired. Others guard members may have followed not realizing what was going on. I can't prove that any more than someone else can prove they did it in self-defense. I just have never heard a good reason as to why the shooting started.

The presence of Canfora (the flag waver) near the front of the group in the parking lot and the fact that many of the bullets that passed him and struck people further down in the parking lot has always made me suspicious that they were aiming for him in particular because of his symbolic status. Again, I can't prove that, but it has always left me suspicious.

The fact that guard members in Troop G waited until they were at the top of the hill and fired when they were apparently in no imminent danger has also made me suspicious. The fact that about a dozen guard members turned together and fired is suspicious. It's hard to imagine that was an unplanned response.