Now and Then.

[sheshe2]

May 4th 1970: Four Kent State students killed by their own country’s army.

snip

Within hours of this terrible event singer/songwriter Neil Young was scrawling the lyrics to a song that expressed all of his rage and horror towards this headline, the immortal anti-war hymn, ‘Ohio’. His band, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, were so eager to release the song that they only took a few takes to record it. It was liberated only 10 days after the shootings, reflecting the horrific social injustice of the events of that early May day.

The lyrics open with the ominous ‘Tin soldiers and Nixon’s coming’. ‘Tin soldiers’ refers to the Ohio National Guard, who were called in by the Mayor of Kent, when he believed the student protests were starting to get out of hand. The metaphor of ‘Tin soldiers’ shows how they blindly follow orders, manipulated by Nixon, the child who playfully manoeuvres them, handling their deadly weapons as if it were all a game. It’s as if he was vicariously watching from above, as the four helpless students were cut down in cold blood. “We're finally on our own” descibes how we can't count on our country, our army, or even our President to be on our side.

Young was a widely outspoken musician at the time, and always relished the chance to express an opinion through song. ‘Ohio’ provided perhaps one of his most famous opportunities to do so. In its resentful lyrics and crashing guitars the song immediately captures all of Young’s idealism and fury.

https://www.lyricinterpretations.com/neil-young/ohio

We protested then. We Protest now. We will never stop.

Teach Your Children Well.

I am a man.

Am I next.

They can't kill us all.

March for our lives.

Teach.

Preach.

We Care.

[lastlib]

1. Great songs! (by great, thoughtful musicians) and a great post.

Love the videos! I've bookmarked them.

Kent State was a seminal event in my political awareness, even though I was only 12 at the time. I realized then that Nixon, and the GOPee, were evil, power-hungry wannabe tyrants who would destroy democracy and all fairness in this country if they had the opportunity. In the years since, they haven't done anything to change my mind. I hope that this election isn't a landslide--I want it to be a CEMENT-slide that buries the repuglikan party and seals it off forever. I want it to be the GOPee's Pompeii. I want to see the GOPee treated like the Chernobyl it has become--a toxic, radioactive waste, buried in a concrete sarcophagus, with a permanent exclusion zone around it for the next thousand years.

[sheshe2]

2. I was in highschool.

It still hurts.

This...I 100% agree with, lastlib.

I hope that this election isn't a landslide--I want it to be a CEMENT-slide that buries the repuglikan party and seals it off forever. I want it to be the GOPee's Pompeii. I want to see the GOPee treated like the Chernobyl it has become--a toxic, radioactive waste, buried in a concrete sarcophagus, with a permanent exclusion zone around it for the next thousand years.

[rsdsharp]

3. It was my 16th birthday.