Civil Disobedience Is A Disturbance Essay

f one followed the similarities of King's "Letter from Birmingham Jail" and Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience," they would notice that King may have been somewhat influenced by Thoreau's essay. The two essays also have many differences that are evident throughout analysis of the two essays that divide individual interpretation of each text. But it is obvious that the overall purpose of these two essays is to persuade the audiences that civil disobedience is necessary if there is social injustice in the government that governs over people.

Thoreau, knowing the widely accepted value of justice, says "If the injustice is part of the necessary friction of the machine of government, let it go, let it go; perchance it will wear smooth - certainly the machine will wear out. If the injustice has a spring, or a pulley, or a rope, or a crank, exclusively for itself, then perhaps you may consider whether the remedy will not be worse than the evil; but if it is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law. Let your life be a counter friction to stop the machine." His goal here is to inspire individuals to break unjust laws, to ultimately achieve the perfect idea of a government. By convincing his audience that civil disobedience is ethically and morally right, he achieves that goal. King takes a step back from civil rights to look at the big picture of moral rightness. “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial "outside agitator" idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.” This ethical argument is effective in showing how civil rights can benefit a much broader scope than what it seems. Through the use of ethical appeal, both Thoreau and King challenge their audience to target

In Martin Luther King, Jr.’s essay, “Letter From a Birmingham Jail” and Henry David Thoreau essay “Civil Disobedience,” both share their opinions on social injustice and civil disobedience. They both believe that people can protest unfair and unjust laws imposed on them in a civil way. In addition, King and Thoreau are challenging the government with their essays, which they wrote after they got sent to jail. For protesting the treatment of blacks in Birmingham, Alabama, King spent eleven days in jail; Thoreau spent a night in jail for refusing to pay his poll tax. Both King and Thoreau’s essays present similar plans for a resolution. They try to convince their audience that they are doing the right thing by using the three appeals; however, they both approach their arguments differently.

People could portray anything in different ways. Thoreau and King both have differences in portraying civil disobedience. In Thoreau’s essay “Civil Disobedience” he begins writing about how the government rarely shows how powerful it is and instead acquires power from the people. King used civil disobedience as a means of effectuating government change and used his courage to protest against discrimination through the act of civil disobedience. Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience," is written in the United States during transcendentalism era which was around 1837 to the 1840's. But Martin Luther’s “Letter from Birmingham City Jail” was written over 100 years after “Civil Disobedience. They both focus on a different audience, Martin Luther wrote to the eight clergyman while Thoreau focuses

Despite the fact that acts of civil disobedience may be harmful when isolated or disorderly, they can produce significant, positive effects when occurring in an organized series. Civil disobedience can accomplish a goal, but only when conducted in a repeated, orderly manner. Otherwise, the consequences of acting solely or destructively would outweigh benefit; rebellious actions will not gain the government’s consideration if they cause severe disruption in the public.

In Thoreau’s “Civil Disobedience” and Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter to Birmingham Jail” both have a purpose of expressing nonconformity towards the government by rebellions and protests of men for their rights. In “Civil Disobedience”, “...I think that it is not too soon for honest men to rebel and revolutionize” (Thoreau 942). In addition, in “Letter to 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” (King 263). Both Thoreau and King express a belief system that for anything to change, one must be able to speak the truth and lead the people to create a greater force to defeat the

People's justification to engage in civil disobedience rests on the unresponsiveness that their engagement to oppose an unjust law receives. People who yearn for a change in a policy might sometimes find themselves in a dead end because their “attempts to have the laws repealed have been ignored and legal protests and demonstrations have had no success” (Rawls 373). What Rawls says is that civil disobedience is a last option to oppose an unjust law; therefore, providing civil disobedients with a justification for their cause. Civil disobedience is the spark of light that people encountered at the dead end and they hope that this spark of light will illuminate to show that an unjust law should not exist at all. Martin Luther King, Jr, in his “Letter from

Henry David Thoreau’s famous essay, Civil Disobedience, is an interesting window into the mind of a staunch logician who supports morals above all else. As a transcendentalist, Thoreau supports the mindset of human perfection; that is, he believes that all humans can achieve a complete lack of sin. Unfortunately, Christians know this to be false; the only person who has ever achieved perfection was both God and man; however, this mindset is constantly seen in Thoreau’s essay. The entire essay serves as an indictment on the American government for its ‘complication’ and its efforts to create an empire during the Spanish-American War. While the entire essay is not a beneficial political ideology, a clear majority of

Civil disobedience is a key component to free society in and of itself. As a primary example, America herself was born from it; The American Revolution began with civil disobedience. If the colonists did not rebel, if they did not fight for their freedoms- albeit violently further on- where would we be today? Where would we be if the Boston Tea Party never happened, if the American people never disobeyed? Still under British rule. Civil disobedience has a positive effect on a free society, as it is the very core of free society.

Throughout history, civil disobedience has helped societies grow and accept social reforms. The case of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Letter from Birmingham Jail, is an important formal written statement for the need of social change. Civil disobedience has been a useful leveraging tactic in ways to draw attention to the perceived injustice. It has had huge impacts on societies in ways to create tension that

Civil disobedience is defined as the refusal to comply with laws or to pay taxes and fines, as political protest or peaceful form. I strongly believe that peaceful resistance to laws positively impacts a free society; especially depending on the situation at hand, similar to Martin Luther King non-violent tactics to stop racial segregation. An action like that doesn’t result in an instant change in the world but it brought notice to the problem. There was a gradual change that he contributed to the civil rights movement. He wanted Justice for his people and he did everything in his power to do so. A more modern situation where there were multiple protest with peaceful resistance was the presidential election, in which caused a lot of controversy.

For hundreds of years government has been a very important topic, everyone has different opinions and believes there should be different amounts of government. People do need a government but it can’t be too powerful, civilians need to be able to voice their opinions and be heard. But this has not happened a lot in the past, only been in the past 2 or 3 hundred years since America was born and we still struggle with it today. Civilians had to fight for most of the rights we have today and to do that there was a lot of civil disobedience. Civilians should be aloud to be civilly disobedient when laws are unjust because they aren’t being violent, you have to stand up for what you believe so people can’t take it away and so that government doesn't

•Ethical problems with civil disobedience: Civil disobedience can be a universal concept, in other words, civil disobedience is understood by all; however, civil disobedience has been corrupted and has also been used for hope, risks, and action-good and bad. For civil disobedience to be ethically wrong or right, one must take a step back, and see who exactly is the question being asked to-a women who fought for equality and rights in the 1960’s, a politician, police, or any government official who despised those who began sit-ins, rallies, and riots, upper or lower class, especially colored races, for instance, African Americans. Many African Americans and Mexican Americans began political reforms using violent and nonviolent tactics to voice their oppression, such as Martin Luther King or Cesar Chavez, who would rather have spoken or used peaceful means to get their point across, compared to the Black Panthers, who were outraged and angered, which only fueled their cause with harsh strategies and actions.

Some people might think of destruction or immorality when the words “civil disobedience” come up, but in reality, it’s quite the opposite. Many times in the past, civil disobedience has lead to social reform and building up a better future. It’s a form of resistance that commonly centers on a person’s morals as it’s basis. It’s a powerful tool in protests that has been used many times in the past and continues to be utilized today. Civil disobedience and breaking the law to some extent go hand in hand, which brings up the question, is it justifiable? Breaking the law for a cause is definitely justifiable, if that cause is being pushed by people working for a greater good.

The city is a very busy and hectic place with heavy traffic. Navigating the city and watching for cars is frightening, but lacking the ability to see and having to trust someone else to help you cross the street is even scarier. Blind people who live in the city experience this everyday and must rely on their service dogs to get them safely to their destination. The service dog must first learn to obey their owners commands in order to lead them to their destination. The dog is then taught to disobey harmful commands such as stopping their owner from walking through a red light. This disobedience to their owner is to ensure they will stay safe. Dogs learn to disobey when they realize the person commanding them is wrong and people should learn how to develop this skill as well. Disobedience that is done to protect yourself and to do the right thing is important as it can cause good change. Society wants people to conform to certain ideals, however students should value disobedience to change the