Over on Atrios I read that one of our usual trolls was
celebrating Kent State on his blog. I'm sure he'll equivocate and say he meant something else.
After all, that kind of person has no guts, by definition.
But, after dispensing with that trash, and thinking on the seriousness of that day, I recalled what I took away from the Kent State massacre while reflecting on a similar May 4th, and it's probably not what you think.
This day, the anniversary of Kent State, should be celebrated
(and not for the reasons the troll thinks, either).
First, a tip of the hat to those who have already diaried this anniversary today. Othniel's civil disobedience is an example to us all, and his relationship with his superior is also something to think on. This diary, however, leads me to the essential point: the right has learned nothing from Kent State, and the Left risks recycling the mythology of those who would happily gun us down.
What everyone seems to miss is this:
We should celebrate Kent State as a confrontation between cowardice and courage. It pitted the courage of those who opposed the war openly and on principle against those who had hidden in the Ohio National Guard to avoid service. Honest and brave Americans were fired upon by cowards.
What kind of person shoots an unarmed person?
What kind of person stands up to a row of fixed bayonettes, unarmed?
What kind of person fires into a crowd?
What kind of person stays to help the wounded, despite the danger?
What kind of person hides behind a lie, that snipers fired first?
What kind of person marches on DC thereafter, knowing that someone else was just killed for doing the same.
Here lies the difference between us and them. It was and it is the difference between us.
What kind of person stands up against an unjust war, knowing the government may take action against him?
That person shows courage by taking a risk in order to stand up for a principle.
That takes guts. The following does not:
What kind of person hides in the National Guard while supporting a war in which he will not serve?
That person is a coward. Weapons cannot compensate for his fundamental weakness, and his principles are anyone's guess since he won't stand up for them.
Protesters were not shot for throwing rocks at soldiers, as the apologists would have us believe, and as many probably do. The reality was quite different:
The shootings killed four students and wounded nine. Only one of the four students killed was participating in the protest, and one of the students killed, William Schroeder (who was observing but not participating in the demonstration) was a member of the campus ROTC chapter. Of those wounded, none was closer than 71 feet (22 m) from the guardsmen. Of those killed, the nearest was 265 feet (81 m) from the guardsmen.
The cowards struck out as cowards do: in a blind panic and at random. Only one protester was killed. He, moreover, was at least 23 2/3 yards away. What threat did he pose? None. A coward will imagine his own peril. That's why he's a coward.
* * *
O FORTUNATA MORS QUAE NATURAE DEBITA.
PRO PATRIA EST POTISSIMUM REDDITA.
Killed:
Allison Krause
Jeffrey Glen Miller
Sandra Lee Scheuer
William Knox Schroeder
The Wounded:
Alan Canfora
John Cleary
Thomas Mark Grace
Dean Kahler
Joseph Lewis
Donald MacKenzie
James Dennis Russell
Robert Stamps
Douglas Wrentmore
The names of the cowards are not recorded here.
* * *
Someone in uniform that day gave the order to fire. They opened their mouth, and they gave the order. What do we call such a person? What should we do with such a person?
Of the three bystanders shot by Ohio National Guardsmen, one was ROTC. He, however, was killed by someone trying to avoid service in Vietnam. Back then it was a good way to pretend to serve while letting others do it for you. You could say you supported the war, while letting others do it for you. They would take the risk, they would learn the pointlessness of Vietnam and the incompetence of America's "leadership."
Is any of this sounding familiar?
Am I making myself clear?
That three fourths of those killed were not among the protestors is the measure of the futility of the Guardsmen's gesture, the one the Right is celebrating today. If I weren't an agnositic, I might see the escape of the vast majority who stood up despite the danger to be a sign of divine sanction.
The Kent State Massacre began with an attempt to shut people up. The Ohio National Guard was there for the purposes of shutting down a protest. Americans' opposition to their government's criminal conduct in Vietnam and Cambodia brought the kind of un-American response we associate with the third world. The actions of the Ohio State National Guard were beneath the dignity of any American.
The notion, therefore, that Kent State represents something insignificant, being trumped up by "liberals" (whoever they are) as a political ploy, however, is more than undignified. It's an assault on America and Americans, the kind of assault we've grown too accustomed to, but which we must oppose.
Those who are content to watch the hijacking and ruin of their country, so long as they are told can kick the "commies" or "liberals" (or whatever they're calling them this week) in their midst, then as now, are cowards. That's what makes them useful to those who merely use our country, and who have no regard for it. Their leader, after all, is indistinguishable from those cowards in the Ohio National Guard 35 years ago today. Those who never served in Vietnam are repeating its mistakes, albeit on a piece of real-estate that's actually worth something, and have removed the option that left them alive to do these things to their country. Better they had died when America first made this mistake, or else Been There to learn from it, than live to make others die again for nothing. Better they had died in the stink of their own vices than lived, as hypocrites, to turn their mobs of wide-eyed cowards loose on real Americans again.
These cowards need you. You do not need them. They need to come after you, to pretend to be doing something, to pretend to be patriots, a compulsive convulsion, a pretense, to pretend to be tough. They will wait until someone else knocks you down, and only then will they kick you.
That's how 'tough' they are.
They will not stand up for their country in either side's sense: they won't stand up against the war here, and they won't fight it over there. They are beneath contempt. They know what we know, they just don't have the guts to do anything about it. They cannot believe their own cant. They cannot believe in this war, any more than they did in the last one. The war Over There is simply a crutch to the cowards over here. And that impotence drives them to desperation. It has driven them to desperate acts.
In the process, however, a lot of innocent people get hurt. That's the way it was, 35 years ago today.
One final note:
In ten days, let us make sure to recall this as well, and with as much thought.