May 4, 1970 ~ a major turning point in US history

[woodie1]

Would you like the word iconic better? Another question, were you alive then and older than 12?

I have to have been alive and over 12? Gosh, why? Yes, I was stationed overseas at the time of the shooting.

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

Sounds like today

I should have qualified that. When I said 'widespread' discontent, I meant everyone talking about the war, censorship and, lack of representation. Not just a few vocal politically centered folks but, the MAJORITY of every day citizens who differed so wildly in their opinions that there were daily acts of civil disobedience by those same every day citizens. The level of discontent then was an entire order of magnitude greater than now.

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

I have to have been alive and over 12? Gosh, why? Yes, I was stationed overseas at the time of the shooting.

I was also in a war far far away at the time and the news added greatly to my perspective of the times being insane. While 4 students I didn't know being killed didn't approach the horrors of that far away place, the fact that those Casualties of War were at home hit pretty hard. Home being that mythical place where everything made sense and random strangers weren't out to kill you.

 

[bamacre]

Hippies dying...trying to give a damn. (Okay I'm not trying at all).

Thanks for telling everyone here how ignorant you are.

 

[preCRT]

I should have qualified that. When I said 'widespread' discontent, I meant everyone talking about the war, censorship and, lack of representation. Not just a few vocal politically centered folks but, the MAJORITY of every day citizens who differed so wildly in their opinions that there were daily acts of civil disobedience by those same every day citizens. The level of discontent then was an entire order of magnitude greater than now.

Yes, and until May 4th, protesters were safe from harm. The sacred sanctuary of a college campus was violently violated forever on that day.

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

Yes, and until May 4th, protesters were safe from harm. The sacred sanctuary of a college campus was violently violated forever on that day.

All history is subjective. The events of an era take on additional meaning to those who experienced it at the same rate that those events lose importance to those who didn't. Perspective is gained over time and distance. Staying alive to write the history later has always been the immediate goal.

 

[DanDaManJC]

I had heard references to Kent State before, but never actually looked into what it was. That's absolutely crazy that they were actually killed.

I had a conservative american history teacher last time I went through american history... and he glossed over the 60s and 70s and spent time praising the rise of goldwater repubs.

 

[Pocatello]

Do they even teach about what happened at Kent State on May 4, 1970 in schools today?

It was the final day, the true end of innocence, after JFK, MLK, RFK...the day America turned on its own.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=126423778

It was a tragedy. But "the true end of innocence" or "the day America turned on its own" is a little over dramatic. Americans have always been fighting each other, sometimes it's just words, sometimes it's really bloody. America has never been as innocent as we wish. Before Kent, there were slavery, civil war, racism, ethnic cleansing, reservations, internment camps.

 

[PrinceofWands]

Do they even teach about what happened at Kent State on May 4, 1970 in schools today?

It was the final day, the true end of innocence, after JFK, MLK, RFK...the day America turned on its own.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=126423778

Are you kidding? This wasn't the first, last, biggest, or any other most in a long line of government/business/military abuses against the citizenry.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludlow_massacre

The Ludlow massacre refers to the violent deaths of 19 people[1]:42 during an attack by the Colorado National Guard on a tent colony of 1,200 striking coal miners and their families at Ludlow, Colorado on April 20, 1914.

Yes, the thing had been ongoing, and there had been violence between the strikers and company men (as there often is in strikes). However, there was no immediate aggression to have caused the orchestrated attack on a campsite with women and children.

America: killing its own for much longer than most realize.

 

[Linflas]

Yes, and until May 4th, protesters were safe from harm. The sacred sanctuary of a college campus was violently violated forever on that day.

Are you kidding me? Sacred sanctuary my ass. When students are taking over buildings and destroying university and private citizens property they have pretty much destroyed any notion of sacred sanctuary along with their right to "peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances". What happened at Kent State was unfortunate but inevitable when you place National Guardsmen untrained in domestic policing in a situation where people are throwing rocks and bottles at them.

 

[dguy6789]

After reading the article, they got what they deserved. Hardly a tragedy.

 

[PrinceofWands]

After reading the article, they got what they deserved. Hardly a tragedy.

*boggle*

And that, precisely, is why the world is in the toilet.

 

[Tristicus]

Thanks for telling everyone here how ignorant you are.

I'm obviously doing something right if it gets your panties in a bunch.

 

[dguy6789]

*boggle*

And that, precisely, is why the world is in the toilet.

The article is a very clear case of yellow journalism. If the military shows up and they tell you to leave, you leave. You don't start attacking them. And you sure as hell don't complain and pretend to be a victim when they defend themselves.

 

[Tristicus]

The article is a very clear case of yellow journalism. If the military shows up and they tell you to leave, you leave. You don't start attacking them. And you sure as hell don't complain and pretend to be a victim when they defend themselves.

But you must understand the super liberal hippy population to understand the pain the are going through!

 

[Red Dawn]

Are you kidding me? Sacred sanctuary my ass. When students are taking over buildings and destroying university and private citizens property they have pretty much destroyed any notion of sacred sanctuary along with their right to "peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances". What happened at Kent State was unfortunate but inevitable when you place National Guardsmen untrained in domestic policing in a situation where people are throwing rocks and bottles at them.

Are you aware that those students shot were well over a 100 yards away and were not threatening the Guardsman?

The Guardsman should have never been deployed, it was a job for the campuse Police, Police from Local munincipalties amd State Troopers.

 

[Red Dawn]

I believe Zombie Raygun called up the Guard for Bezerkly but instead of confronting the Guardsman the Protestors offered them Oranges...laced with LSD.

 

[PrinceofWands]

The article is a very clear case of yellow journalism. If the military shows up and they tell you to leave, you leave. You don't start attacking them. And you sure as hell don't complain and pretend to be a victim when they defend themselves.

Fuck you.

The closest person to the guard unit which opened fire was a nearly a hundred feet away. The average was several hundred feet. They were not significantly armed. There is absolutely zero hard evidence that they posed a direct threat in ANY way...certainly none which warranted lethal force. Many of the injured were bystanders, not even involved in the protest. The guard unit didn't fire when the most pressed by the protesters...instead they retreated, were not pursued, and then turned and fired. The guard unit acted, not reacted. It was intentional, it was orchestrated, and every one of them is a murdering bastard.

The guard unit broke the law, squashed morality, and EVERY member who fired should have been hung. They were, of course, exonerated (as is usually the case in MASSIVE abuses against the citizenry).

 

[Red Dawn]

Fuck you.

The closest person to the guard unit which opened fire was a nearly a hundred feet away. The average was several hundred feet. They were not significantly armed. There is absolutely zero hard evidence that they posed a direct threat in ANY way...certainly none which warranted lethal force. Many of the injured were bystanders, not even involved in the protest. The guard unit didn't fire when the most pressed by the protesters...instead they retreated, were not pursued, and then turned and fired. The guard unit acted, not reacted. It was intentional, it was orchestrated, and every one of them is a murdering bastard.

The guard unit broke the law, squashed morality, and EVERY member who fired should have been hung. They were, of course, exonerated (as is usually the case in MASSIVE abuses against the citizenry).

I wouldn't go that far, IMO the Guardsman were just scared kids, about the same age as the Protestors, who were not trained for such situations and with real lack of leadership panicked and fired.

 

[Nemesis 1]

I cried like a baby , We all new what the implacations were, The path was set.

 

[Moonbeam]

It was a big day and a big turning point from what was said by those who lived it. It was the day when millions saw the emperor in his necked true garb. It was the end of respect for conservative authority at the beginning times of a wave in global consciousness yet to crest.

The unnamed fear, the fear that seizes communism, the fear that seizes hippie idealism, the fear that seizes terrorists, the fear that seizes Islam, the fear that fears the unknown terror that must find a tangible to name, that fear, that sickness, that evil is the fear of feeling how much you hate and who you hate. And because we are cowards who are afraid to feel our fear, we will kill everything, even our own children, and we will excuse ourselves for our disgusting evil, laugh and shine it on.

 

[OutHouse]

i was 3 years old when this happened and believe it or not i remember it on the news. like another poster said, my dad believed at the time the dirty pinko commie bastards got what they deserved. Years later he finally had a change of heart about Kent state.

 

[Moonbeam]

Fuck you.

The closest person to the guard unit which opened fire was a nearly a hundred feet away. The average was several hundred feet. They were not significantly armed. There is absolutely zero hard evidence that they posed a direct threat in ANY way...certainly none which warranted lethal force. Many of the injured were bystanders, not even involved in the protest. The guard unit didn't fire when the most pressed by the protesters...instead they retreated, were not pursued, and then turned and fired. The guard unit acted, not reacted. It was intentional, it was orchestrated, and every one of them is a murdering bastard.

The guard unit broke the law, squashed morality, and EVERY member who fired should have been hung. They were, of course, exonerated (as is usually the case in MASSIVE abuses against the citizenry).

He won't understand until a tyrant puts a bullet through his child. He has been put to sheep by the Borg.

 

[GuitarDaddy]

For those claiming this wasn't a big deal, you really had to live through that time to understand symbolicaly just how important it was. Through the counter culture revolution and civil rights movements of the sixties a large part of the younger citizens of the US truly believed a transformative change had taken place giving them a greater voice and irreversible freedoms, but on that one day in May 1970 it all came crashing down and it felt like the rug had been pulled from under our feet.

This event also threw gasoline on the smoldering fire that was Vietnam war protests, and played a big part in making Vietnam the steaming pile of stench in American history that it is.

 

[PrinceofWands]

I wouldn't go that far, IMO the Guardsman were just scared kids, about the same age as the Protestors, who were not trained for such situations and with real lack of leadership panicked and fired.

For that to be true one of two scenarios would have to play out:

1) An individual or two panicked, and fired, resulting in others doing the same. This would have been a staggered shooting incident.

2) Some specific event occurred to spark a sudden, mass firing.

There has never been an ounce of testimony about any specific event, so #2 is right out.

The initial shooting was a volley from 29 guardsman who were NOT holding a line. There is simply no chance that 29 soldiers, all moving away together, suddenly turned and fired at once, with no direct provocation, unless it was orchestrated. After the initial volley it degenerated to staggered fire. That pretty much defeats #1.

Mind you, there is also supported testimony that before the withdraw the same group of soldiers massed together in a huddle of discussion for about 10 minutes after clearing everyone off the commons.

Also note that there were 77 guardsmen in total, but only 29 (the sub-group that had the discussion) turned and fired. Obviously the remaining 48 didn't perceive a threat, even after the shooting started.

Finally lets realize that some intentionally fired into the dirt, or sky...something not done when in fear for your life. In fact, those actions will cause a civilian to be convicted of a crime if done in a defensive shooting. They had to KNOW they were going to fire, but couldn't reconcile the taking of innocent lives. Again, those soldiers didn't fire AT anyone, even in the chaos of a supposed 'firefight'.

I'm not saying they weren't scared in general...you'd be stupid not to be scared. I'm saying they weren't firing in defense, or out of fear for themselves. They planned to fire, and they carried it out. They fired because they were angry.