The 54th Anniversary of Ohio by Neil Young and CSNY...and Why The Song Still Resonates | Ep. 770
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- Опубліковано 20 тра 2024
- #Ohio #CSNY #protest #protestsong
In this edition of #thedailydoug, I'm diving into the classic protest song Ohio by Neil Young and performed by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. It's been 54 years since the campus shooting at Kent State as National Guard members shot student protestors. Neil Young wrote this song in solidarity with the students, and the song has stayed relevant and popular ever since. I'm also listening to a 2020 cover of this song by students at Kent State University, who were (at the time) commemorating the 50th anniversary of the massacre. Protests and social unrest are continuing today, and I close with thoughts on these protests and the music that accompanies these rallies and protests. I hope you enjoy.
Reference Video: • "Ohio" as performed by...
Reference Video: • Ohio
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Very bravely articulated, Doug. I am not american but was around for the original anti-Vietnam protests. University students, then as now, are generally intelligent and well informed. You often see savage crackdowns on student activity in authoritarian regimes and when it begins to happen in so called democratic countries it is worrying. Sadly, for all the sanctimonious rhetoric, our governments are guilty of facile political posturing whilst 'protecting' their own perceived interests. 'Twas ever thus.
I am not american too. All true what you said, but the democratic West is clearly loosing the "war" against authoritarian (what a euphemism !) countries...we can see that happening everywhere...see Ukraine, Transnistria, Georgia, Turkey, Middle East, Far East, Africa, and even on the western shores. The intelligent and well informed university students of the West I'm afraid they don't live into real life.
I am not american, too. Generally intelligent and well informed university students I'm afraid don't live into the real world.
@@giuliogrifi7739 Everyone lives in the real world friend. You're just being dismissive of the call to action.
@giuliogrifi7739 Nor am I American. Generally, intelligent and well-informed people don't expect to be shot for living in the real world, either. Let's hope history doesn't repeat.I was doing A-levels in England at the time and the feeling it created was pretty shocking. Slán!
@@austinmchale7232 At the time of Kent State University I was 15 and attending the first of the Upper Secondary School's five years. I heard about what happened thru Neil Young song and only some years behind time, you know, in those years, news got late in my country, Italy was even less developed than today !. Anyway, over the years, I made myself the belief that, since the end of WW2, people, everywhere, have to choose sides, either the West or.......for better options we can't do anything other than hope in the arrival of some good aliens from outer space !!!. Arrivederci e stammi bene !
I was at Kent State when that all went down. I was not a student but I was visiting a cousin who was a freshman the school at the time. It was a horrendous incident and like you I am seeing the parallels between the Vietnam era protests and these protests. I am also horrified at seeing "the Establishment" (as we called those in power in the Vietnam era) making the same bonehead mistakes of using force instead of reason.
It is sort of a case of the Establishment getting what they asked for. We send these young people to those educational establishment to supposedly teach them what they are going to need in their coming adult life. So now, they young people in these schools are applying what they have been taught there and are standing up and saying "This is not right! This needs to STOP! NOW!" I am not a prayerful person but I am praying that we do not spiral into another Kent or Jackson State.
I know one of the guys shot (twice) on May 4th. He continues to do all he can to support his community. A truly wonderful person.
Those who make a peaceful resolution impossible will make a violent revolution inevitable - John F. Kennedy 1962
I was only 5 but my older sister and the neighbor girl were both freshman at Kent. The neighbor man took off the afternoon and and brought both of them home. This is still a sore spot locally, especially now in the light of the current campus protests and the strong arm way many of them are being broken up. I went to Akron Univ. and we were outraged when the university decided to name the new athletic center after James Rhodes.
Nice arrangement from the choir. Solidarity with all brave students protesting against war and genocide - they are inevitably on the right side of history
It's a moving and powerful song and I have always felt chills listening to it. Nixon's high-handedness and the ruthless response by him and Gov. Rhodes had to be answered. Having said that, student deferments were also blatantly discriminatory, rewarding those who were economically capable of affording college while poor, urban citizens (largely African-Americans) were unable to avoid the draft, resulting in a disproportionately high percentage of them being drafted.
I would add, all four of CSNY were amazing songwriters, but one of the hallmarks of Neil Young's writing was it's directness and fearlessness which certainly shows up here.
The deferments were unfair and tended towards a sort of working class army. There were many who volunteered regardless of their social status. But the students were opposing the war and resisting the draft, supporting draftees already, before the deferments were revoked. You may not remember there was a lottery and many men knew they would never be called up, but the anti-war movement was a way of life, whatever your personal situation was.
Chryssie Hynde from The Pretenders was a student at Kent State at the time of this massacre. She was there when the shooting occurred and talks about it in her book.
So was Joe Walsh.
Neil was from Canada and didn't personally fear the draft so was able to speak for others, for his friends. That explains the viewpoint and ability to question.
Thank you for your compassion.
I've been struggling to find words to post my own comment. I think you said what I'm thinking. Thank you.
I think it was David Crosby that did the anguished cries of "how many more" at the end.
Why???
It was....
Yes it was David Crosby and it was not planned. He did that spontaneously.
@@caseyshawn5 Correct. He improvised.
Shared a video of this song this morning on FB. Had no idea of the anniversary, I'd just been watching the week's news wrap up and all the stories of the arrests of protestors got me thinking bout it.
Blood flows.
🤘🧙♂️🤘
I was 15 and remember seeing it on the news. The song is very relevant today with what is going on today at colleges
The opening 2 bars of guitar riff always instantly evoke a mood for me. Shock, horror, sadness and maybe most of all a sense of grimness. It's entirely appropriate and to my mind a big part of what makes it such a powerful statement.
Beautiful, beautiful Chorale! Peace and Love! ✌️☮️
After having all of we students at uni in Québec out for four days to show solidarity with the Kent State martyrs (even though Canada wasn't involved in Vietnam), several busloads of us went to the DC anti-war demo the next May. 12,000 were arrested there - though I think our Maple Leaf patches saved us!
There's also the song "For What it's Worth" written by Stephen Stills performed by Buffalo Springfield in December 1966. That was an important protest song too. There is a modern cover version by Tab Benoit that is also worth a few listens.
Even as a 12yo living in Australia I was aware of the Kent State murders. The horror still fills me. 😢 Ohio is a seminal tune in my life ❤
The Ohio massacre was also covered by Genesis, in a song called "The Knife", off their 1970 album Tresspass.
There's a quiet part, and you hear people chanting, "we are only wanting freedom!", when a voice yells out, "OK men fire over their heads!" The music suddenly changes and there are people screaming.
The song ends "some of you are going to die, matyres to the freedom I shall provide"
Maybe you should review this song as well Doug, not only for the lyrics but it is a fantastic piece of prog rock to listen to.
It sounded like David Crosby singing “How many more.”, etc., at the end of the song.
That iconic picture featured a girl from the high school not far from my own, in fact, in the next district over. She was from floram park. Misspell. Both versions of this song drove me to tears. I remember those days so well and have been thinking about them recently.
@Doug_Helvering-ON_Te-le-Gram Why?
Thank you Doug!!
Thanks for the history lesson, Dr. Doug. I was a bit too young at this time, but I was living in Los Gatos (N. California), but I had friends who had siblings who were afraid of being sent to Vietnam. History is prologue...
54 years ago - I was 11 and I remember hearing this when it was released on Boss Radio 93 KHJ in Los Angeles.
What a performance! Big Respect for the Kent State Chorale.
I was 17 and remember it well. The beginning of my anti-war protesting. I marched on my college campus in spring of 72 when war was expanded into Cambodia.
Thanks Doug. Love the honesty and the message. 100% with you. Love the music videos as well
They were there: Chris Butler (Waitresses), Gerald Casale (Devo) and Chrissie Hynde (Pretenders).
A seminary classmate of my husband served a church in Kent. She wrote an essay of how it was to serve a congregation that decades later was still traumatized by the the deaths and injuries to students on the Kent State campus.
To the students who are protesting I say ‘right on!’ ✊🏻
Well-balanced words.
i’m currently going to kent state. may 4th is a very busy day for us. thank you for this
Thanks Doug, another great tune and response.
As powerful as the CSN&Y version is, the choral version is so much more emotional.
I cry every time I hear this song, this anthem to peace!😢😢😢
Thank you Doug!
Hind Sight is always 20x20
Niel young is a Canadian, alot of draft dodegers went to Canada.
Now im 62, i didnt understand the Vietnam experience back then.
I will consider voting for RFK jr. I salute those who answered the call, and those who protested the war in Vietnam.
❤️🇺🇲
Thank you so much for remembering this sad episode Doug, and reviving memories of this brilliant Neil Young composition. The Kent State Chorale version was new to me and moved me to tears with the poignancy of those wonderful harmonies. Thank you again, love and peace from the UK 🙏❤️
Doug, thanks for reviewing this important song. We should never forget. I was graduating high school in 1970, and was horrified, and so very sad at seeing this on the news that evening. How could this happen? It was just so unbelievable, and so difficult to process. We can’t let this happen again, yet I fear that it may. Your comments are spot on, totally agree. Thanks, Doug.
You gotta do Chicago by them. It's about the 1968 Democratic convention protests. It's on the live album 4 Way Street. Got a catchy piano. 🙂
Thanks for remembering this one, Doug. I was 17 at the time, but in the UK there was very little fuss about this - obviously there should have been, but that's politics for you.
One more bit of trivia about the song's release. Usually a band goes 3 months between singles, to give one a chance to see what legs it is going to get on the charts, before being distracted from by the next one. Less common an issue on "rock" stations over pop, where the FM AOR rock format allowed for anything goes at the time.
But on the pop chart, radio would focus only on the "current" single. And that, for CSNY, was Nash's Teach Your Children, itself one of the immortal songs of the period.
Nash and the band and management knew that if they released Ohio, in the current climate and while the press on it all was still fresh, it would have killed Teach's chance to get to the top 10, even #1 as the sales were hinting it could have.
He let it go. He knew it was more important to get the message of Ohio get out there.
Yes. I've heard Graham talk about this. Per him, Neil was shown a newspaper article about the shootings; he took his guitar, walked off into the woods, and came back an hour or two later with this song. Graham got on the phone to gather the rest of the band and get a studio booked; collectively they pushed to get this single released as immediately as possible... not caring that it'd knock Teach Your Children off the charts, because to them this song, Ohio, was more important.
These kids need our solidarity. Thank you, friend.
Sad resonances with Zombie by the Cranberries
Fantastic Friday reaction Doug! What some may not know, RichardNixon was reelected in a landslide just 2 yrs later, and benefiting in part on illegal activities by his campaign committee (who's acronym, I kid you not, was CREEP [committee to reelect the prez]!).
I was a 16 yr old street protester against America's war on Vietnam in 1970, so it could have been me...
As a secular jew, I oppose genocides against anyone, including those living in Gaza. Further, I am an antizionist, cuz I oppose ALL nations that have state religions, including a "jewish state." Many thanx for braving this political minefield Doug.
Ðamn, man, powerful stuff. You said what needed to be said. It's seems that every generation needs to be reminded of this crap. As a historian, the message should be clear to learn from the mistakes of the past. Clearly, it's a lesson that needs to be repeated over and over because we haven't learned a damn thing.
A memory I will never forget............ Peace out.......
I'm a 67 yo subscriber in rural Australia I 100% agree with your thoughts Doug , May God Bless You for your Humanity.
Thank you, Doug, once again. You said so many true things in this one that I lost count. There was valuable music analysis, of course, and it was enjoyable to see you light up hearing and seeing the Kent State Chorale version. You also showed why I love this channel and why I support you. You spoke with both your mind and your heart, and you said everything I would have said. I was in high school when Kent State happened, and believe me, the outrage and anger were real. And you're absolutely correct that people want to inherit a better world, yet generation after generation we fail our progeny. My generation tried back in those days, and look at the current mess. I hope this generation can finally change that, and not succumb to the lure of greed and power.
Absolutely beautiful, thank you, amazing. No easy answers, that's for sure. The thinking as we can see was far less progressive. Be the change you want to see in the world.
The insanely talented Joni did the cover artwork Doug is displaying.
This song does something to me. Deep, deep, deep feelings as an Ohio native. Brilliantly composed and performed.
Thank you Doug !!!! This song is one of THE BEST From CSNY and one of THE most Powerful Anti war songs EVER written..Fast forward to current times i fear that history WILL repeat itself...SCARY TIMES INDEED.. I was born in '68 but later on when i was old enough I could just never understand WHY this Horror had happened..JUST SENSELESS.. " HOW MANY MORE ???? " Also, that version done by the Students of Kent state is BEAUTIFUL...TRULY MOVING...BRAVO..
I would love to hear you do Dialogue 1 and 2 by Chicago. Another great protest song
I am not sure which pains me more, reliving the memory of why this song was written or the fact of it being fifty four years ago.😜🎶🎹🎶Play On
Thank you, Doug!
Amen. It’s not about sides or facts defending a side. It’s about killing. There are many privileged people in high places and it doesn’t need to affect their jobs or performance.
It is irrelevant to call them bums. It’s just name calling to show you argue like a seventh grader.
Thank you Doug for sharing your thoughts. We should follow your lead.
So important commend. Thanks! One of my all time favourite Songs.
I was a 5th grader living in Cleveland, just north of Kent State in 1970. The entire country was in shock following 5/4 similar to the shock of 9/11..... As a kid we were very much aware of the Yippies from '68 and the insanity of the Cambodian invasion. 4 years later I volunteered with the organizers of an unfortunately very un documented 4th anniversary rally at Kent State with an incredible speach by Julian Bond, Daniel Ellsberg, I drove back to Cleveland with Jane Fonda..and spent a few hours chatting with Judy Collins at a reception/ gathering that evening...Thank You Doug for this memorial and your thoughtfulness in addressing those and parallel current avents
Another war protest song from this era is 'Machine Gun' by Jimi Hendrix. Doug, you should react to it as well. While there are several live version which at great, the 'Live at Berkeley' version is my personal favorite. The song is worth the listen to.
agree with everything you say. Its a uniquely human tragedy that history repeats itself
Well said Sir.
Great job Doug.
Nicely done,it’s was a magical yet confusing time for us.Great song great review thank you
Well said, sir!
I'm not anti-Semitic. And I'm not pro Palestinian. However; what is happening in Gaza is a state military driving Palestinian people into a point where they cannot seek refuge anymore and that state is being petty and I believe that what is happening in Gaza is not what should be occurring. As an Americn; I support all your viewers and the people on college campuses The first amendment right we are afforded in America.
Very well said
They would call you pro-palestine for saying this, mind you. Any disagreement with israel's actions is anti-semitism.
@@dopaminecloud if you miss interpreted what I wrote; I would suggest that you would ask for clarification, before you spew Misinformation. It would be wise for you to do so going forward.
@@dopaminecloud if you didn't clarification on what I commented, I would appreciate you asking what I meant. Because clearly you do not understand what I am saying.
@@dopaminecloudSo you are staying what the Zionists use as an excuse for genocide. It is not your opinion that anti Israel is anti semitism I take it. So I would agree with you, they use those excuses to perpetrated their war crimes and breaches of international law
Naomi Klein has a great speech at Columbia against Zionism. It's on UA-cam.
I was 12 and remember this very vividly ... thanks Doug!
I was in high school at the time of the shooting and my politics were forever changed by it (before that I was very inclined to assume the authorities knew what they were doing). Take away lesson for current times: the NATIONAL GUARD is NOT helpful in these situations. Until recently, I always gave the National Guard members a pass when they were acquitted because they were just following orders (from Nixon), and at the time it was said that they had not been trained for dealing with civil disobedience. But I just realized REALLY? This was 1970. What about the whole Civil Rights movement?! A horrible tragedy all around. And I love, love, love this song.
Thank you, Doug.
I remember Kent State ever though my parents shielded me from Vietnam. WOW. The video will be hard to watch but watch I did.
Bravo.
We got to see Neil play at Lake Compounce in June of 1989. Only 2 months after the Tienanmen Square massacre.
He came out wearing one of the those "Mao" caps with the star on the front. Excellent show. Same message.
Great clip. Great song. So timely
I lived in Kent and was 12 years old when this tragedy occurred. My mom worked at a bookstore across from KSU. A classmate had a brother in National Guard. Scary time.
Really enjoyed chorus Version. Thanks Doug!
I was one month from graduating high school when this shooting happened and was due to start college in September. What an eye opener. I was in junior college so the campus was not as active as a large state campus near me that had riots. Crazy times everywhere.
THANK YOU
Of course, rulers who conquer other countries by force of war must be stopped.
Whatever political color it is.
It is not easy to decide to defend someone, but simply, when we see someone innocent being attacked, our empathy makes us step forward to help the innocent person.
Only we cannot go in and trump over the aggressor and kill the innocent as collateral damage.
It is difficult for us to use innocent lives to defeat criminals.
It is always difficult to decide with the right judgment when war is in charge.
No to war, which represents political greed, which in turn represents only the economic interests of excessive and devastating production of planet Earth and its Nature and... cruelty.
But we will always feel obliged to help an innocent person... whatever political color it has.
One thing is for sure: war only brings death and hunger.
Whatever political color it is.
I'm fed up with the perpetrators always going unpunished... and there's no shortage of faces in the history of the planet.
Whatever political color they are.
In fact, the political color doesn't even matter because the policies that perpetrate cruel aggression only represent psychopaths with no empathy for innocent people, which ironically provide them with this economy with their hard and exploited work.
Can I suggest ‘5 leaves left” by Nick Drake as a masterpiece? Honestly you will adore the orchestration apart from anything else!
I attended Kent State University in the late ‘90s. And the pall of that incident still hangs over it. You can find signs of that on campus. Including one I found myself: at a metal art sculpture on a hill, there is at least one bullet hole in it. I touched that and found it chilling. Putting your finger to it is a tiny connection to that violence.
I agree that the anger and fear surrounding these incidents is justified. These are very severe situations, as well as dangerous and intense. But the prejudices people are adding to the mix does not help or aid the scenarios involved. That only puts an ugly, negative layer on a state of affairs which is already loaded with terrible injustice.
I was in college and at protests in California later that year. We were protesting and opposing the war in high school. Thank you for reminding me of how the events unfolded. To be fair, students were actively opposing the war before the student deferments being revoked. We already knew the war was wrong, and Nixon was making it bigger.
The Isley Brothers also did an excellent version of this in a medley of sorts with Jimi Hendrix’s Machine Gun. It is very powerful. Also worth a listen.
I remember an interview with of the CSN members, which one???
They said after hearing about kent state Neil disappeared into the woods with his guitar and returned with the song basically done
Managed to find the interview with Graham Nash relating what Crosby had told him. The heard about the 4 dead students. Neil disappears into the woods with his guitar returned an hour later and played Ohio. Just another story proving what a musical genius Neil is
Hey Doug , loved your comments on the current situation at the colleges , I was 13 at the time of the shooting at Kent state and remember wondering why this happened.
Let's all pray for peace ✌️
David Crosby sang how many more and wept at the end of the take. Later he said: “Neil and I were out driving around in one of his woodies. And we heard about it on the radio, and we just couldn’t conceive of it.
“I watched it hit Neil. Wham! It was like he’d been punched. Neil picked up the guitar and wrote the song right in front of me. And I called Nash and said, ‘Get a studio. Now.’
Uncle Neil’s guitar is on another planet in this.
For once, it feels wrong to want to talk music here.
This is the song that got me into double drop D tuning -- that is, both the low and high E strings are tuned down a step to D. Doug mentioned this song was in an "easy key", but there is that little quirk to getting it exactly right.
Turn To Stone by Joe Walsh is also about the same incident.
Please Doug, react to DEPECHE MODE - ENJOY THE SILENCE
I was 11 years old when this happened... hearing this song still moves me to angry tears, and frustration with how we as a nation and a world don't seem to have learned anything. The choral version is beautiful but does not carry the angry edge of the original.
I was 16 years old when that happened. I live in Ohio about 50 miles from Kent state. I was totally against the war in Vietnam. And what happened at Kent state was a national tragedy. And should never have happened. But the students weren't angles either. May 2nd, they burnt down the ROTC building. Not exactly a peaceful demonstration.
Thank you! While anyone with an ounce of moral integrity will always be repulsed by the events of May 4th, the general tendency to delete historical facts that would help to clear up our full understanding of the events - yet removed from revisionist reports because it doesn't suit the intended message - only serve to stir up more anger and resentment. Pointing a rifle and shooting at a defenceless, unarmed person is NEVER (or hardly ever) justified in any circumstance - I think that is universally agreed. If the National Guard was present primarily to prevent another building from being torched, then that information should be as accessible as information about the tragedy itself. Nonetheless, it is galling to imagine doing what those armed guards did, that they were even applauded in government circles, and were never held to account. It turns my stomach in knots.
@@JacoWium There is speculation that the old, wooden ROTC building was in the way of those in the campus administration who wanted the prime site it was on for another newer building and it was conveniently torched that weekend when it could be blamed on the student protesters. No way now to prove that one way or the other. Gov. Rhodes used the opportunity of the student protests to grandstand for voters since he was in a very close primary race for U. S. Senate (he lost the election) in calling out the National Guard. I'm from Akron and was 12 that day. I remember it very well, and the shame I felt when my family said the students "got what the deserved". Five years later it affected me when it came time to go to college and they said I couldn't go to Kent State "with those radicals", even though the war was over.
I went to the 54 year commemoration last Saturday. I had wanted to go to the 50th when it was cancelled for the pandemic. There was also a pro-Palestine demonstration going on as well, and the whole thing was peaceful. Nobody wanted any violence at a ceremony commemorating the killing of peaceful student protesters by the military. The university Chorale performed that version of "Ohio" at the ceremony. Thanks, Doug.
@@paulw.woodring7304 I can imagine that the choral performance of "Ohio" was very special, and I'm happy too to hear that that particular pro-Palestine demonstration was orderly and peaceful. It's a pity that your study ambitions in the 1970s were affected in the way that you described. As someone who'd also have been labelled "radical" back in my student days in South Africa when I opposed the apartheid system of the time (I know what it's like to run from tear gas and rubber bullets), I certainly sympathise with your feelings about it all.
Just two points of interest: The Kent State students who were killed were shot by members of the Ohio National Guard, not "the military". Secondly, I file speculative information such as that about the ROTC Building in a folder called "Questionable Information" where it remains until conclusive evidence is presented in its favour. That is where I diverge from the vast majority of the internet commentariat.
As a Clevelander, I can tell you that the Kent State shootings spurred on more music than you even realize.
There was... and STILL IS... a band from Kent known as "the Numbers Band" (officially "15 - 60 - 75"). They are still around with at least 2 original members in the current band. I catch them maybe once a year locally.
Original members included the Mothersbaugh brothers and the Casales brothers... IOW... DEVO. DEVO was a direct reaction to the Kent State shootings. Also in the band was (Pretenders) Chrissy Hynde's brother. I'm not clear on what Chrissy's actual involvement was. So there are at least 2 major bands spawned directly from the Kent State shootings.
Doug, you should do an Extended Play Lounge on the Neil Young album, Living With War… Done in 2006. Like Ohio, written and recorded in a little over a week, spur of the moment performances… I liked it when I bought it at the time but I’ve personally become a little of a right leaning centrist, rather than the leftist of my youth… Neil’s writing is blunt, viscous and visionary…
Best Doug ever :)
One word. Actually, to quote someone else, a few more words too: “Amen, amen I say to you. Let the little children lead you.”
Beautiful words Doug, we have students protesting over here now too and the right wing media are attacking them the same way.
Proud of you, Doug. You’ll catch shit for this, but you’re on the right side of history.
As relevant today, as it was then. The parallels with the events of today, are uncanny.
The saying goes “If you don’t learn from history, you’re doomed to repeat it.” The people in the halls of power, today…, haven’t seemed to learn from the past.
Why do you think they try to revise the past?
Then they don't have to worry about it.
Why isn’t anyone mentioning the Neil Young sang this yesterday at Jazzfest ?
“What if you knew her, and found her dead on the ground? How can you run when you know?”😮😢😢
One of the most powerful songs ever. I wish you had added a review of "Find The Cost Of Freedom". too. At 2 minutes, it's a worthy epilog to Ohio. The studio version is great, but the live version (from 4 Way Street) is stunning. ua-cam.com/video/3YUkiAU7aRM/v-deo.html
My college graduating students, who missed high school graduation cuz Covid, would like to bring their WW2 interned grandma to see them. Too bad graduation got canceled. Again.
I just want to make note that the politicians who sent those kids loaded for bear, who would shoot and kill other kids, paid no penalty at all. I'm less upset about the shooters getting acquitted than about the governor and president going to their graves unpunished and unapologetic.
My dad did the GI bill to get through college; my mom was a navy brat. I nearly joined the service for the same reason, and there are a fair number of veterans where I work right now (San Quentin).
Politicians don't learn, because they don't pay the penalty. They just pretend their soldiers are tin and they put them where they want, with only basic training and live ammo.
__
The students are privileged...so what? Does that mean they're wrong? I was against Desert Storm (both versions) when I was a student. Rumsfeld and Reagan / Bush load the Iraquis for bear and suddenly they're the boogeman we've got to go get?
My big criticism of the protests nowadays is clarity. You're wanting peace...how? If the US stops supporting Israel, how does that produce anything but a bloodbath? I'm old enough to remember the PLO being the militants Israel wouldn't talk to and then finally they did, and so it's now Hamas instead.