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19 pros and cons of civil disobedience
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Indeed, disobedience is extremely important in today’s society, despite the fact that it can sometimes lead to chaos. Certain acts of civil disobedience can indeed be harmful and ineffective, where they don’t serve to cause any social progress. For example, practicing civil disobedience by littering doesn’t serve to solve any social issues. Instead, it only harms the environment, where it causes pollution and damages the environment. However, other forms of civil disobedience are actually beneficial to society, where they can spread awareness about a certain issue in society and catalyse change for it. An example of this occurred with how Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white American on December 1, 1955. By practicing civil disobedience
against the laws of segregation during this time, Parks raised awareness about the inequality African Americans faced and sparked change that would eventually lead to more freedom and equality for African Americans. This incident with Rosa Parks shows how civil disobedience has shaped America, which is similar to how the civil disobedience against the Stamp Act catalysed social change to declare independence from Britain in order to shape America into what it is today. Both incidents led to people questioning the status quo of the time, leading to the social progress which civil disobedience is often responsible for.
According to Oscar Wilde, disobedience is a valuable human trait that promotes social progress. Civil disobedience allows for the unification of various groups to fight towards a common goal, often resulting in change. Historically, there has been much evidence supporting Wilde’s claim. Significant examples of disobedience that led to social progress include the Boston Tea Party, the Salt March, and the Civil Rights Movement.
The civil and eventually violent disobedience of the thirteen colonies against England resulted in the birth of now one of the most powerful nations in the world. The civil disobedience of those willing to go against the norm allowed for Americans to be able to marry who they chose. It is because of Nelson Mandela getting arrested for what he believed in to allow for south Africa to be free from segregation. Civil disobedience has paved the way for society to become better because at some points society was not based on fairness. It was based on cruel ideologies and those ideologies put laws into affect that were meant to lower certain groups of people. So by breaking those laws it awakens those groups and allows them the motivation to go up against these unfair laws and in doing this allows for these unfair laws to be
“No radical change on the plane of history is possible without crime,” This quote from Hermann Keyserling is just one of many statements that help describe the meaning and true raw power of Civil Disobedience. Civil disobedience as defined by Merriam Webster is the “refusal to obey governmental demands or commands especially as a nonviolent and usually collective means of forcing concessions from the government”. The most promising and understandable of the definitions of Civil Disobedience would be that given to us by Gandhi from India “Compassion in the form of respectful disagreement”. Even the Veterans Fast for Life from here in the United States must agree when saying, “when leaders act contrary to conscience, we must act contrary to leaders.” To understand why civil disobedience is so important in our lives you must first look into your heart and realize that the integrity of mankind has no need of rules.
Civil Disobedience, as stated in the prompt, is the act of opposing a law one considers unjust and peacefully disobeying it while accepting the consequences. Many people believe this has a negative impact on the free society because they believe civil disobedience can be dangerous or harmful. Civil disobedience does not negatively affect the free society in a dangerous manner because it is peaceful and once it becomes harmful to the free society then it is not civil disobedience. Thoreau believed civil disobedience is an effective way of changing laws that are unjust or changing things that as a society and to the people does not seem correct. This peaceful act of resistance positively impacts a free society. Some examples are Muhammad Ali peacefully denying the draft and getting arrested. These men believed that what they saw was wrong and they did something about it but they did it peacefully.
Why partake in civil disobedience? Oscar Wilde, an influential author, has an opinion on utilization of civil disobedience. “Disobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is man's original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion. Meaning, if a person wants to change society and its actions, they must rebel against the governing body in order to create effective alterations. Many situations exist where civil disobedience advocates change. In those situations, people have rights for disobedience, but must realize consequences may result from their disobedient actions.
It is important to notice that if civil disobedience was not effective, then it would not be continually used to disobey the law. In "The Role of Civil Disobedience in Democracy” by Kayla Starr, she explains why we have the right to participate in civil disobedience. “The U.S. Bill of Rights asserts that the authority of a government is derived from the consent of the governed, and whenever any form of government becomes destructive, it is the right and duty of the people to alter or abolish it” (Starr 1). There are many examples of how effective this act of defiance could be. During the Boston Tea Party, the citizens of Massachusetts practiced civil disobedience by throwing Britain’s tea into the Boston harbor because they did not want to pay taxes on tea. Now, you can see that the Boston Tea Party played a major role in the United States becoming independent from Britain (Starr 1). Although violating the law has consequences, in this case the reward outweighed the risk. I think that by realizing the power that civil disobedience carries, we can stand up against ...
Over the centuries, some leaders have believed that private citizens should rebel against injustice in a non-violent rebellion. These leaders have had courage and passion to start or encourage revelations; they have committed acts of civil disobedience to protest these laws put up by a corrupt government. The leaders were willing to give up their lives or freedom because their conscience would not let them rest and accept the unjust laws. Some of these leaders include Henry David Thoreau, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, Aung San Suu Kyi, and Malala Yousafzai.
In our country’s history, Civil Disobedience has had positive effects upon legislation and societal norms. The First Amendment of the United States Constitution states five basic forms of expression that are to be protected by the government: Speech, Press, Assembly, Religion, and Petition. The Founders, in essence, created a means by which the average citizen can achieve political and social change. Justice William J. Brennan Jr. stated in 1989 that, “If there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment, it is that government cannot prohibit the expression of an idea simply because the society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable.”* When citizens speak out or
Oscar Wilde, an Irish author, once suggested that if one were to ever look at the discourse of history, they would find that disobedience is man’s original virtue, and through disobedience social progress is made. The study of history is the study of social progress. Social progressions are the changes that occur in society that progress or improve social, political, and economic structures. Social progress can be achieved in several ways, but just like Oscar Wilde, I believe that disobedience is a valuable human trait that just so happens to be a huge part in the progression our society has made and continues to make.
Henry David Thoreau, a philosopher and creative artist as well as an anti slavery activist, wrote his short story “From Resistance to Civil Disobedience”. In this story he’s arrested for not paying his state taxes. At the time the state was engaged in the Mexican-American War that was not only fought over boundaries expanding slavery but was also enacted by President Polk under his own decision. Thoreau thought the war was too aggressive and without just reason.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. received a Nobel Prize and was honored by the President of the United States for his contributions to society. On the other hand, he was prosecuted, convicted, incarcerated, and had his sentence reaffirmed by the Supreme Court. These explanations seem rather contradictory. If what he did was noble, why was he jailed for his actions? When we take into account these manifestations of the government's attitude towards Martin Luther King, we can safely make the assumption that the government is not always justified in the laws that it creates. Our government's original purpose was to keep order and ensure freedom to its people. As history has shown us, as in the case of African Americans, the government will expand its role and take away liberties of the few. The individual is justified in acting out in civil disobedience when the government restricts the liberties of the individual.
Civil disobedience has been around for a long time. In Bible times Christians would disobey laws that would go against their beliefs, such as the law that they couldn’t preach. (Acts 4) Christians still disobey laws in many countries that do not let them practice their faith, some end up in jail or killed.
By definition, civil disobedience means to actively refuse to obey certain laws, demands, and commands of a government or of an occupying power without resorting to physical violence (Wikipedia 2007). Many of the influential people in history have felt passionately about what they believe. These passions caused them to rebel against a government or authority. Many times they felt so strongly about what they believed and how they were being treated was wrong they became disobedient. They would take physical and verbal abuse for being disobedient but would never retaliate. They believed in what they thought was wrong and tried to change the way they were governed. Albert Einstein once said 'never do anything against conscience even if the state demands it.' Albert Einstein's views seem to be reasonable. The claim by Albert Einstein is accurate because people should stand up for what they believe, they should know when they are right and their government is wrong, and they should trust in themselves and their own beliefs.
Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience is a piece that denounces the role of government and promotes the individuality of man. He argues that government rarely proves itself to be useful, and that anything achieved under the influence of that government could have been even greater had the system not been involved, evident in paragraph 2, “Yet this government never of itself furthered any enterprise, but by the alacrity with which it got out of its way. It does not keep the country free. It does not settle the West. It does not educate. The character inherent in the American people has done all that has been accomplished; and it would have done somewhat more, if the government had not sometimes got in its way.” (Thoreau, lines 12-16) He states that the American government derives its power from the majority, not the strongest group, and not necessarily the most moral. Thoreau wants us to believe that we the people should follow what we think to be ethically just, not what the government and the majority force upon us. In my opinion, I agree with Thoreau in the aspect that we need a more improved form of government, however I disagree with the type of government that Thoreau wishes for. He believes we work better without restraint and that we must command our individual respect, but I heartily argue the opposite; a society must have order and an infrastructure, we need a system to oversee the problems that we cannot solve as humans with individual mindsets. I do not believe that the government should have the right to pry into our lives without solid evidence, but I do believe that we need a fair and balanced administration that is required to look after its’ peoples’ well being.
All in all, civil disobedience has made many positive changes in the world today. Nevertheless, the end goal or result of any act of civil disobedience is not meant to benefit the individual, but the community as a whole. The ends of such an act should not be a private gain, but a public gain. Just like in The Hunger Games, how Peeta and Katniss remained brave by risking their lives to stand up for their districts.