Just for the record, I wasn't attempting to be humorous in saying that a gym is likely to provide more benefits than a memorial. I'm just not all that big on memorials in general -- sometimes I feel like we as a society go overboard in our well-intentioned desire to remember things that we feel are are worth remembering. But I certainly don't spit on the memories of the people who died. I believe their cause was just, and their deaths were tragic (although, as GUEST,Jack correctly pointed out, not all who were shot were part of the protest).

As for Neil Young's "Ohio," I think it rates among his better works musically, but falls short lyrically -- it's sort of a generic "down with government thugs, up with the little guy" anthem to my way of thinking. More importantly, it reduces a complex story to cheap slogans and crude characterizations (these were not "tin soldiers," but real flesh and blood human beings), and fosters misunderstandings about what actually occurred and why. I don't think he did anyone any favors by doing that. "What if you knew her and found her dead on the ground/how can you run when you know?" What is he advocating here -- that the students should have honored the dead by staying to fight the Guard, thereby increasing the death toll? Sorry, but I don't buy it, and don't consider it one of Mr. Young's finer moments.

I do think that GUEST,Jack raises another interesting question about the responsibility of the protesters. I believe in the right to protest, and to a certain extent in civil disobedience when all else fails (of the sort practiced by followers of Gandhi and Martin Luther King). But I don't believe that anything goes in the name of protest, and I do think that people who intentionally create or promote an out-of-control situation -- particularly one that has the potential to turn violent -- bear a certain responsibility for what happens as a result.