What Is Propaganda?

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What Is Propaganda?
Tite
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Kent State University May 1970

• Listen to the song and look at the images
• Song is Ohio by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young
• What is the song about? What happens?
• Who seems to be blamed for the event?
• Who seems more innocent?

3
Kent State University May 1970

• What else is going on in 1970?
• 1968 - Robert Kennedy and MLK Jr. are both
  assassinated
• 1969 First soldiers drafted for Vietnam
• 1970 - Protests to the Vietnam War are at their
  peak
• Nixon expanded the war and invaded Cambodia
• Richard Nixon is President of the US

4
Kent State University May 1970

• May 1, 1970
• Big war protest
• Riots start downtown around Midnight
• Police arrive, are harassed, and disperse the
  gathering

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Kent State University May 1970

• May 2, 1970
• Mayor of Kent declares a state of emergency
• Ohio National Guard arrive
• ROTC building on campus is set on fire
• Students/Protesters clash with police and firemen

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Kent State University May 1970

• May 3, 1970
• 1,000 Guardsmen on campus
• 800 PM Protest rally
• Guardsmen break up rally with tear gas
• 10 guardsmen injured
• A protestor is stabbed with a bayonet

7
Kent State University May 1970

• Governor of Ohio says...
• They're the worst type of people that we harbor
  in America. I think that we're up against the
  strongest, well-trained, militant, revolutionary
  group that has ever assembled in America.

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Kent State University May 1970

• May 4, 1970
• 2,000 students attend a war protest
• Guardsmen try to break up protest with tear gas
• Guardsmen march towards students
• Some soldiers open fire on students

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Kent State University May 1970

• May 4, 1970 (cont.)
• 4 students killed
• 2 were uninvolved in the war protests
• 9 students injured
• 1 paralyzed
• Debate continues over whether soldiers were
  ordered to shoot

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Kent State University May 1970

• Now reconsider your opinion of the Kent State
  students and the National Guardsmen...
• Were the students entirely innocent?
• Were the soldiers entirely to blame?
• Did the song twist the truth at all?

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Boston Massacre - 1770

• Look at History Through Art on p98.
• Answer the Skillbuilder questions
• What advantages to the soldiers have?
• How could this help the resistance against
  England?

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Boston Massacre - 1770

• How is Revere's engraving a piece of propaganda?
• How would you define a massacre?
• Do you think the picture is totally accurate?
• Where do you think Paul Revere stretched the
  truth or omitted certain details?

13
Comparing Boston and Kent

• The Kent State shootings occurred almost exactly
  two hundred years after the Boston Massacre...
• Are there any similarities between the two?
• Are there any differences?
• Do you think that riot control tactics should
  have changed over those 200 years?
• Do you think Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young
  could more easily spread their propaganda than
  Paul Revere?