What Is Peaceful Resistance

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Peaceful resistance or civil disobedience to laws impacts a free society both positively and negatively. Peaceful resistance and demonstrations have been in the news quite a bit over the past few months. Black Lives Matter protests, the kneeling of athletes during the National Anthem, and protests concerning the President-Elect, Donald are a few of the most current that come to mind. I have seen good and bad come from these protests.

First, the Black Lives Matter protests have come about due to the deaths of many African American males by police officers. While I understand the fear and peaceful protests, I do not understand when these protests turn violent. Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. states in his "Letter from a Birmingham Jail," Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the …show more content…

While I agree that there is a divide and that it needs to be addressed, I do not feel that disrepect of our flag or national anthem is the way to a solution. I feel that it creates a further divide of "them against us" mentality. Woodrow Wilson once said: "A nation which does not remem­ber what it was yesterday, does not know what it is today, nor what it is trying to do. We are trying to do a futile thing if we do not know where we came from or what we have been about." Our flag and our national anthem are where we came from and kneeling instead of respecting the flag incites hatred instead of the tension Martin Luther King, Jr. talked about. It is a further insult when flag burners are allowed to burn a flag that Americans, black and white fought to

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