Today is Kent State Day

I have some photos to share.

weekend and we had to leave. Never forgot this.

flag at half-staff today in memory.

REMEMBER KENT STATE!

I was on campus for the 25th anniversary of the shooting.

My FIL was a student at the time (walked out of the architecture 5 minutes before the shooting started.

The photo of the HS runaway girl holding a dead body on the cover of the most prominent news magazine of the time was major factor in sentiment changing about the vietnam war.

52 years later -- the blatant systemic racism that led to a similar massacre at Jackson State is still ignored. Just like the Tulsa race massacre has been widely ignored. We could list the other atrocities committed against blacks and they would largely be ignored. That is sad.

When middle class white kids get shot -- it is on the front page. When black kids are killed police (in the 1970s or all the way through today) it is just another statistic. Sadly, the systemic racism of our country has proven Soviet dictators correct -- "One death is a tragedy. Millions are a statistic."

is Star Wars Day.

Probably on all the major news shows because isn't Star Wars so much more important in our history than Kent State and the Viet Nam War?

Americans don’t give a rip about the horrible things that happen in Africa or Asia. Ukrainians are white people who look a lot like the Home Goods crowd. We no like seeing the white people suffer.

Yes Jackson State has been completely ignored.

Let us always mention Jackson State University, where the same thing happened. I read that one of the young people who was shot and killed had NOTHING to do with the protest. He was, in fact, a young brand-new father, on his way home from work to his poor young postpartum wife and her poor tiny new baby.

Teaching it in school will upset some students, don't ya know.
Thanks for your excellent comment. I apologize for being a downer. Stay strong
everyone and don't give up. We can only get better if we acknowledge the truth no
matter how bitter.

When he asked his military leaders, "Can't we shoot protesters in the legs?" He wanted something like this.

Nick Saban, the football coach at Alabama, was in his freshman year at Kent State. He and his roommate went to eat instead of going to see what was going on in the student commons area. I’m summarizing here. He’s been very open and public, yes in Alabama, about how he feels about it and how lucky he is that they weren’t in the area. One of the girls was in a class with him not that he really knew her. You can find videos of him talking about it on YouTube.

Saban grew up and played ball with Sen. Manchin in Farmington WV. They are still close friends.

I was in junior college and we were in the middle of a school-wide protest on the war. Both liberals and conservatives protested. This was an eye-opener to me.