This week’s visual literacy post is a little different. In honour of Martin Luther King Day (in the States), we are going to watch his “I Have a Dream” speech. You can find more information out about him here, and here. If you are interested in authentic artefacts (things actually written or created by Martin Luther King Jr.), check out this slightly more challenging website.
In your comment, I want you to consider the following question: Do you have to be disobedient if you want justice? Consider the speech, but also consider the things happening in the world today – the Black Lives movement, the arguments about cultural appropriation, the conflicts in the United States around race and religion. What do you think?
I think that for some people it is hard to get justice. All people should be treated equally or fairly and since some of them aren’t they break the law by making a speech. It was good when Martin Luther king junior made that speech because it probably made more people want to treat each other as they would want other people to treat them. My answer to the question is yes you need to be disobedient to get justice.
I agree with you about what you are saying about the Martin Luther King Junior,beacause when I was searching about Luther King junior I saw that he was trying make all of those people respect nice in friends, when he was telling his speech.I also said yes, about that you need to disobedient to get justice.
Yes you have to be disobedient. For protesting. You do not kill. There is huges riots in a lot of places the thing about riots is they do nothing. There is camping somewhere and not leaving that is something that can work. In Martin Luther king jr speech I have a dream made a different. The thing is it has made a difference but pepole still have to see in some places it still is not that much better. Lots of pepole whould get arrest but it made a difference. So you really do have to be disobedient to make a difference in a spca debate they went all the way to royal court there is so many ones but this one on pit bulls was bad. And it made a difference.
Interesting thoughts you said that you have to be disobedient but what is considered disobedient? I beilve you don’t even need to cross the line and be disobedient in any way. I do think though that you have to have a good point, look at America a month ago everyone was so upset that trump won but they hadn’t even seen him in the whitehouse. Some people might say people were sexist because they didn’t want a woman in the whitehouse and there probably were a few but most people don’t care if it’s a man if it’s a woman if you are black if your white it’s if you are ready to go be there president.He won fair in square and people thought protesting was gonna change it that’s also the problem people protest over things that don’t need to be protested.What did there disobedience even get them? Nothing. Therefore this is why I beilve you don’t have to be disobedient you just need to protest respectfully and protest over something worth protesting over
That question about disobedience is one that I kind of struggle with in this context. Disobedience literally is not obeying (the rules, the expectations) – so if you are not allowed to protest in your country (no free speech), then technically, that would be disobedience. In a situation like that, I don’t think there’s any way around it: you have to be disobedient to get justice. In the West, though, for the most part we have freedom of speech constitutionalized – so you can protest (peacefully) against the things you disagree with. The question is this: how effective is it “just” to protest?
I think sometimes you have to be disobedient to get justice. If you are going to break a law/rule to do something you should believe it is important (for whatever reason, justice or something else), the only way to be a respected person is to accept the punishment even if something might happen to you. But in another perspective, some people believe in things that are bad, like that gay/transgender/ lesbian/ bisexual people shouldn’t be allowed to be in the bathroom of who they feel like but should be by there birth sex, So they might fight on what they believe in but for a bad cause.
I don’t think that you should be disobedient in a way that you are laying bombs or going around killing people but if your doing something like camping out somewhere to protest or give a speech how can that hurt anyone, it can only raise awareness. Both of those situations are breaking the law but one is more intense. I think you can be disobedient to get justice but you shouldn’t by so intense. Even Martin Luther King, Jr was arrested a few times and that’s breaking the law but he got justice. So if you think Martin Luther King, Jr used a good method, the you think that being disobedient to get justice is a good method.
I agree with Lena sometimes you do have to be disobedient sometimes to show justice!!!
I believe that you don’t have to be disobedient if you want justice. I think that if you are having a peaceful protest that your point of view on a subject can even maybe get across better, I think this way because when someone is screaming and yelling at you, you don’t really want to listen to them and might just be getting annoyed and frustrated and then end up not listening to them at all.
There is a difference from yelling and screaming to breaking the law. Peaceful need does not work that well to get something right.
I understand what you’re saying but, in certain problems you can’t always be nice and follow the rules. Sometimes to get what you want you need to do somethings that you wouldn’t normally do. I don’t mean that it always has to be violent, but sometimes being peaceful doesn’t always get you where you want to be. So that’s why I think you do have to be disobedient in order to have justice.
I agree, there is a fine line between being too peaceful and too violent to get what you need. I think you need to find the middle.
What would a middle ground be?
I agree with you, sometimes you have to step out of your comfort zone if it’s something your really passionate about. Although have you considered the thought of a protester staring out calm and peaceful and being obedient to start? What if they started out peaceful and it actually grew and became noticed, and they didn’t have to do anything wrong in order to get the attention in the first place. Yes, like you said it might not get where you want to be and it might not work, but maybe take that failure and build on it? Work your way up to disobedience in baby steps.
Interesting … so you don’t have to be disobedient (assuming protesting isn’t disobedient) to get justice … but if nothing is happening, then … would you say you “have to” escalate and become disobedient?
Bruh, I totally don’t agree with you, if your cousin is over and wont stop yelling about how he wants that “thicc choccy milk”
your going to give some to him eventually. Same with protesting, women want equal rights, they yell at the government and go on tumblr until they get what they want.
Bruh, I totally don’t agree with you, if your cousin is over and wont stop yelling about how he wants that “thicc choccy milk”
your going to give some to him eventually. Same with protesting, women want equal rights, they yell at the government and go on tumblr until they get what they want!
I do agree with alisssgr512, but what if the people that you are protesting against can be a corrupt government. They won’t listen to you even if your not disobedient. I think in that case you have to be disobedient.
In the speech Martin Luther King. Jr was talking about him having a dream about black people and white people having the same rights and black people and white people getting along. In my opinion you don’t have to be disobedient to get justice. For example there was a protest about sikh’s having equal rights in India and we didn’t break we found a loop hole to get the news to reach out to everyone and try to get more support.
I disagree in some ways. I feel like to get more justice you have to be disobedientbut if you are looking for a little justice you don’t . I don’t know what other protest thing you looked up but I did B.L.M. and to get their justice over their family and friends deaths they needed justice and also needed to be disobedient so people would listen.
No you do not have to be disobedient to have justice but sometimes you do cause people don’t always listen to what you are saying but he spoke up and EVREY one listened to his opinion and he actually changed something in life to stop being all rasit about skin colours he changed a lot
i completly agree with amrita that it just depends on the situation and sometimes it is unessesary but sometimes it really needs to be done.
But he was being disobedient against society to get what he thought was right.
I have a question about your answer because you said you don’t have to be disobedient. Then you agreed with a comment saying that you do have to be. So I’m wondering what made you change your answer?
This is for amritas comment
I don’t know if you HAVE to be disobedient to get justice. The Salt March in India or what ever the protest is called, started out with being disobedient. They weren’t allowed to make salt, an order from the British, so one person -Gandhi- started to make salt. Some other people joined him and the British soon found out. They arrested Gandhi and his followers, but Gandhi told them to obediently do as they’re told. The British soon realized that nothing was going to work so they let Gandhi and his men make salt again. I think in some cases you have to be disobedient and in some cases you don’t, but there might have to be some disobedience in almost every protest. I think it all depends on what you’re protesting for and how you protest.
I agree, being disobedient or obedient all depends on the matter at hand. But most people be disobedient to really get the point across that what they are protesting is actually really important to them
Very true. I wonder – are there other ways that they could get their point across, in your opinion?
Go all out with posters, speachs etc.
Wow *speechs
I say yes you have to be disobedient to get justice. Because for the B.L.M moment they would not listen to the cops so they can get their justice for their kids and family is not that but their culture too. Now me as a white male I don’t know the challenges of that , but I can imagine how hard it can be. And the same for M.L.K. , how hard it was to live in a world of racists and standing up to them for their own rights. So yes you have to be disobedient
The question “do you have to be disobedient to get justice?” Is a very tricky one to find an answer to. But I have taken examples from Martin Luther King’s ‘I have a dream” speech and the LGBT protest in the states in 2015. I n found that most of the time you can get justice without any violence. This is proven by Martin Luther Kings I have a dream speech. It was just a speech and talking doesn’t hurt anyone it was not violating the law but yet it still got justice. Most of the LGBT protests did not have violence involved. It was mostly just signs and rants. This question will now be answered with NO you do not need to be disobedient to get justice.
I agree with you about not having to be disobedient to get justice. For example the LGBT protest that you were talking about they only had signs and were ranting about the topic they didn’t break any rules. Same as the M.L.K protest they just were speaking openly about it and just ranting about it so they could get there message out plus they were not breaking any rules.
I agree you don’t have to be disobedient to get justice becuase protesting can be for anything you believe in like a friendly protest that you want to save the environment by not cutting down the forest to the government. Which was a real protest that got the government to stop cutting down the forest. If you are protesting about a foolish thing you probably won’t win and not much people would join the protest.
Yes, we have to be disobedient if we want to have justice and consider the speech that we watched on the you tube channel in class. We have to be considering the napping in this world today, because the argument about cultural the Martin Luthen king were saying that we have to have a dream and the king. What was happening was that I Martin Luther king is wants white people to have a slaves in Virginia at USA.
I think that you might have to be disobedient but definitely not violent to protest. The black lives matter movement for example, chained together protesters across the M4 road into Heathrow. This causes a big scene, it’s on the news, police are there, people are angry. It might be considered disobedient but it’s not violent. And people watching the news still see that they are taking a stand. Martin Luther King was a huge part of racial equality and he believed that you could make changes without violence. In the Montgomery bus boycot from 1955-56, Black people in the area didn’t ride the bus after Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on the bus for a white person. This caused a large deficit because black people were the majority of the customers for the bus transit in that area. Finally, on December 20th 1956, the US Supreme Court upheld the district court’s ruling. The end of the boycott was one of the first victories and it didn’t involve any violence.
I agree, how some protests can be disobedient, but nonviolent. Things like riots get you nowhere in protesting.
Interesting…why do you think that riots get nowhere in protesting?
I agree with Emilia because yes sometimes we have to be disobedient but that doesn’t mean we have to start violence with eachother.
There’s definitely a significant difference between disobedience and violence. In the west, though, do you have to be disobedient to get justice? We are allowed to peacefully protest; it’s one of our constitutional rights. However, what about in countries where you aren’t allowed to protest?
I believe you do not need to be disobedient you just have to have a good opinion with facts and statistics that can prove your points on why we should change things to your idea or help put your idea in action. Back in time people were fighting for woman’s rights, and black rights and as you can tell there arguement won and now they have rights. Nowadays people are protesting over things that aren’t really anything to protest over. The black lives matter movement focuses its energy on black men killed by the police. The work of criminologist Doctor Richard Johnston of the university of Toledo explains just how small this is. Based on 2012 numbers it would take 40 years for police killing blacks to have the same numbers of blacks killed by blacks.Less than 400 people a year are killed by cops 61% of them are white men, 32% being black males.Black men are not killed out of proportion when you consider that they are more likely to interact with police, people killed by police is about as often as they are stuck by lightning but I don’t see and protests against storms. Black males are 58% of people killed by leagal citizens in self defence.You might think that you got us on that but 75% were killed by other blacks. Black men are about 6.5% of the us population but they commit 52% of all murders.That has dipped to about 40% in recent years.Overall violent crime Blacks are 27 percent more likely to attack whites vies versa and are 8x more likely to kill Hispanics. 90% of blacks that die from murder die in the hands of other blacks this is from the FBI homicide report.This is why black lives matter hasn’t gone anywhere same with many other protests because no one takes it seriously because there’s no problem to protest against. Martin Luther King had the idea for blacks to be equal as well as he just had a point and the people saw his point and realized what was going on was wrong. You don’t need to be disobedient to get justice you just need to have a point where justice can be made as that has been proven with woman’s rights as well.
I completely agree! I drive some insane when people start making this whole deal about the police. Of course we can’t be oblivious to the fact that there is still and will be for sometime, racism in Canada, USA and the whole world. But it annoys me when people think that the police are suddenly the bad guys! Did you know that Toronto Black lives matter demanded that police in uniform be banned from the Pride Toronto parade? It’s insane, they don’t understand that without the police we would be in Chaos!
I remember hearing about that and finding it pretty offensive for a few different reasons: for one, the police in Toronto – at least as far as I know – were not part of the problem with regards to the BLM. For two, there is still hatred and violence towards LGBTQ+ people, and not having the police there seems like it could be dangerous. Finally, how is banning (and being prejudiced towards) one group going to help uplift another??
Do you have to be disobedient if you want justice? I think that being disobedient certainly gets the media and the government’s attention, so I guess you could say that it’s a good way of getting what you want (justice) but is it really always the best choice? There are several other ways of getting what you want for example if we want to recycle more then should we protest about it? Or should we really make it happen
In my opinion i do think that when there is something important like black lives matter or something of that size you may have to break some rules but you deffinatly do not have to be violent in any way. You may have to go where you are not aloud but you do not have to be violent, like the walk on washington. It was one of the biggest rallies ever to fight for jobs and freedom for african americans and it took place right in front of the lincoln memorial and there was no violence but there was some rule breaking and it still was one of the biggest movments in history. So my final answer to the question is yes you do SOMETIMES have to be disobedient to get what you want but you do not have to be violent.
Same
No you don’t have to be disobedient if you want justice because in a protest in Vancouver all the people did was hold up signs and chante. There is nothing disobedient about that. The protest was called,” anti-trump” this protest was about people who didn’t want Donald Trump as president, so they were chanting about him. Another example of how you don’t have to be disobedient if you want justice is in Martin Luther King Jr protest which was about racism. All Martin Luther King Jr did was go up to a podium and speak about racism and how he can make it stop and what he wants the world to look like in regards to racism. If you don’t believe that he brought justice to society look at today’s society and earliers society, racism has stopped so no you don’t have to be disobedient if you want justice. Also the word disobedient means; to break the rule; not listening to someone injustice. As long as your not breaking a rule while you protest then you don’t have to be disobedient if you want justice. In those two examples I gave there was no rule breaking in those protests therefore, you don’t have to be disobedient if you want justice.
Why do people in vancouver care about if trump is president😂
disagree in some ways. I feel like to get more justice you have to be disobedientbut if you are looking for a little justice you don’t . I don’t know what other protest thing you looked up but I did B.L.M. and to get their justice over their family and friends deaths they needed justice and also needed to be disobedient so people would listen.disagree in some ways. I feel like to get more justice you have to be disobedientbut if you are looking for a little justice you don’t . I don’t know what other protest thing you looked up but I did B.L.M. and to get their justice over their family and friends deaths they needed justice and also needed to be disobedient so people would listen. Same
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Martin Luther king jr was aressted before. You still have to think some places in the states are preety racists.
It is a really good way to stop racism around the hole world. It looks really old because there was no colours. It had a lot of people there to support what he was trying to say. His speech changed the world by what he said that day. He was saying why did it madder that we have a different skin or do stuff different we are all human.
Yes, I agree that the speech was very inspirational and influenced many people. It is truly AMAZING. However, I think that the main reasons why Martin Luther King was so successful because he had enough supporters, enough spotlight was given (e.g. Newspapers, etc.), and he led serious nonviolent protests. If he didn’t have these three things, I wonder how much of an impact the speech would have made?
What do you think?
That’s an interesting question. Maybe the question isn’t so much “do you have to be disobedient” but “is there a sort of critical mass, a certain number of people you need to get together in order to change things without violence”?
i don’t think you have to be disobedient because most people aren’t doing anything wrong they just want to prove a point that those type of things are wrong. I have heard that when some people protest they can be harmed after that because some people take it the wrong way just like what happened to martin luther king jr. Some things you really do need to take a stand for all the things that happened. Like black people wern’t aloud privaledges like us or we’re treated wrong was cruel and disgusting. The stuff that would happen to them if they did something they weren’t supposed to was horrible. And that’s why i say no you do not have to be disobedient
Interesting…what do you mean by most protesters are not doing anything wrong?
Do you mean that whatever cause they bring forward is usually never wrong?
In my opinion you don’ t have to be disobedient to get justice. You do not have to kill, you do not have to hurt people. Look at Martin Luther king. He got up on that podium and he spoke his words and he didn’t fail to make his dream come true. He was not disobedient and look at what he has done for society!!! There is no more racism! So that there alone shows you don’t have to be disobedient of you want justice. You just have to work for it. And that’s just what Martin Luther king did.
I agree, Martain Luther Ling Jr was not disobedient and he definitely made a change. But sadly racism is still around, and some people will vet change.
Never change, oops!
I think you do have to be disobedient. Like if your always under the people your fighting against then you will be put to the side if you still do everything they say. When you do something that is a good way to get your point across it might make you be disobedient to make things right. In a way your not if your trying to make things good or better, but it may also be a bad thing if you kill or do something drastic like that. If you just stand out side of w place and voice your opinion the people who are against you might think you disobedient but you might also think they are too. So in a way both sides of the protest may think the others are disobedient. My final answer is yes I think you do so you can make them notice you and force them for change.
You force them to change is a great thing to say about protesting.
I think at first if you are trying to protest you should first be peaceful and calm. You don’t want to go all crazy and get in trouble. If you start out calm like the hashtag for black lives matter, it could actually make an impact and it’s not illegal or reckless. I feel start with something simple, see if it works, then build from there. When your plan stops working then I believe you need to do something bigger that will attract more attention like going out in public with signs like most of the Martin Luther king protesters did. When you build an audience the government will notice and they will see what you are doing. If they continue to disregard the statement you are trying to put out that’s when I would take to drastic measures(but nothing to dangerous that it would hurt people). I think that doing something the government knows is wrong will hopefully make them understand that this is an important issue that people believe in and will go to great lengths until it is fixed. It is then the governments problem to fix it until the people stop doing the dangerous things. They need to decide to agree with the community or disagree and get an enormous amount of backlash(and maybe support from the people who disagree with the protests). I feel people should gradually become more disobedient if there protest is not getting the proper attention it needs.
No, you don’t have to be disobedient to get justice. When they were protesting against trump being president they didn’t do harmful things to eachother, they simply held signs that said they did not want Donald trump to be president. When Martin Luther king jr. talked about how we should all treat one another equally, he didn’t cause a major disturbance and he wasn’t refusing to follow the rules. That is why I think you dong need to be disobedient to get justice.
I think that you sometimes have to be disobedient to get justice.
Martin Luther King protested to get what he believed is right, protesting is illegal, and sometimes it works, in his case it did. Claudette Colvin refused to give up her bus seat to a white person, and that was illegal. So, yes I think you have to sometimes be disobedient to get justice.
I totally agree with you, -and even Martin Luther King .Jr was arrested a few times. Most of the people who stood up for black rights had to break the law Because black people weren’t allowed to do many things, like you said to sit in the front of the bus.
I think that you do have to be disobedient to get justice but not in a violent way. Riots happen all the time but they usually end up getting no where. MLK’s speech involved no violence but spread the word that he wanted Black rights. His speech must have worked because here we are today with way less racism. You have to be disobedient because what you believe in may go against everyone else’s beliefs. You have to be willing to accept that not everyone will agree but go with what you know even if you have to be disobedient.
I think that if people want what they want in life then they have to be disobedient. Because nobody will listen to you. My evidence, the day after trump won people were blocking highways, streets, mraching though cities and riating because he won, the reason they were was because they wanted to be heared for onc . Back in the day, the vises were split into sections the front was for white and the back was for colored people. A colored person sat in the front because he/she wanted to be heared and for everything to be far and not based on colors.
I think people should have justice no matter what their skin colour is. Martin Luther king broke the law to make that speech and it probably inspired a lot of people that it will get better. We will all be treated equally no matter who we are in the future. If you were to break the law I think you should think if it is important because there are going to be consequences. I think Martin Luther king new that but still wanted to make his “I have a dream” speech because it is a really important speech for everyone.
I think that you do need to be disobedient to get justice. But it doesn’t need to be a violent protest. The MLK protest wasn’t violent but it still made a change in the worlds society today. But now there are more ways to protest for example you can start a petition online. The protests against Donald Trump were happening around the world but they still didn’t change anything, once Donald Trump won the election there started to be riots in the US but then again nothing happened besides some protesters getting arrested. This just shows that even if you are disobedient nothing will happen.
I think yes you do have to be disobedient to get justice. I think that because if you do not do something disobedient you are not as heard as if u didn’t. For example on the news you don’t really see any protests even when there is lots the only ones they really show is the ones were they are disobedient. Such as the Donald trump protest were they were destroying shops in streets as they were protesting in Vancouver, NYC and other places were trump was not wanted
I think that sometimes you do have to be disobedient to have justice. I think that if you believe in something so strongly that you do have to be disobedient, then you should. I don’t think it’s fair to have to do something, or have believe in something, if you don’t agree with it.
I think that standing up for what you believe, and think, is a good thing, and know one should tell you otherwise.
Other people might not agree with you might be protesting but as long as your doing what you think is right, then that’s all that matters.
Your last paragraph has a really good point as long as you think what your doing is right then that is ok. That is something I can agree with yea it may not work but what you believe is what you believe and no one can say otherwise
Ok, but what if what the “what you’re doing” that you think is right is actually not? As a really offensive example, the KKK thinks that what they are doing is right … but we know differently. So who determines what’s right?
I didn’t originally think of it that way. But I do agree with you. That everyone has a different opinion on what is right and what is wrong. So I guess it depends on the subject we’re talking about. Like how racism is not a good thing, and how peace is a goal lots of people work towards. So it really does depend on the subject and who is determining what is right and wrong.
Being disobedient in my way seems not right, but it is the only way people can get there point across. People shouldn’t be using violence against people to get what they want, they should talk in a normal way and respect each other’s opinions. For example the African American people should be able to do what ever they want without any argument from the white people. Over time I think people will finally understand that being disobedient will not fix the world’s problems!
This is an interesting point, that people who are fighting for what they think is right are being disobedient which to you seems not right at all. Is there another way people can get their point across without being disobedient?
Well, I honestly think that as long as youre not hurting anyone (physically and emotionally) then yes you have to be disobedient. Not only does being disobedient help people understand that you really are serious about what you’re protesting but also how much it means to you. The protest in Western Australia is about forced closure on over 100 aboriginal indigenous communities. Although, they camped out in the area, protested, and booed the Premier and the Aboriginal Affairs Minister the protesters didn’t really hurt anyone.
I think you don’t have to be disobedient if you want justice because being disobedient means that you’re breaking the law but when you have a nice peaceful protest where there’s no fights then you could have justice without being disobedient. In “I have a dream” video Martin Luther king Jr was just having a nice protest were he was saying how everyone should have the rights to do anything and go anywhere without doing anything bad like killing people or having to go into different places like here’s the black people washroom and here’s the white people washroom, and he won. He got his justice without being disobedient and breaking the law without forcing people to agree to him.
yes i do think that you have to be disobedient to get justice. MLK led the march in washington and the bus boycott in montgomery, which led to the civil rights act of 1964 and the voting rights act of 1965. if you aren’t disobedient and you are trying to fight for something that doesn’t effect the government , why would they listen. If nothing bad would come of them saying no then why would they listen. it would probably just be looked at as more paper work. the recent trump riots are a good example of this because in the beginning trump basically ignored all the protestors. later on when the groups were starting to get larger in numbers and more agressive, Trump started to tweet things like it’s so good to see all of these passionate americans fighting for what they believe but i promise we will all come to peace with each other one day. all he was doing is trying to seem like a nice reasonable guy to calm everyone down but if the riots keep up maybe trump will have to give up all of this president stuff.
So how far does disobedience have to go to get noticed by the people like the government? MLK led a peaceful march, but how many of those Trump riots were not peaceful. So which type of disobedience proves more effective?
In my opinion you have to be disobedient in order to have justice. As you have said before, being disobedient isn’t just being violent. It can also be breaking or bending rules. For example with Martin Luther King Jr. and the series of events that happened during that time it has showed that some people had gone as far as to not give up their seat on the bus for a white person. It may not seem that bad but at that time that was considered illegal and many black people had gotten arrested because of that.
Another example is that at around 1890, a women named Mrs. Anne McClung went from door to door asking women to sign a petition. That may not seem disobedient to you but if enough people signed it, it could mean the group of people would “team up” and would find ways to show the opposing party what they want.
I do not agree with this statement because you do not always need to be disobedient to get justice. I do agree though, that there have been some protests that have involved but the majority of protests that have made an impact on society have been peaceful protesting.
But what if the protest in and of itself is disobedient? Like in a totalitarian regime, where one person (or group) holds all the power, and orders people to go back to their homes and stop sitting in Tiananmen Square … then you are being disobedient by peacefully sitting there.
No you do not have to be disobedient to get justice. In India there was i protest about one year ago and an MLA of a city was protesting with hundreds of different people about government policies and one of the police officers was sitting on his horse, the MLA stated hitting the horse’s leg until the horse fell down. He had to get his leg amputated but something went wrong with the fake leg, he suffered for a month until he died. The MLA was disobedient and he did not get his way, Instead he went to jail. Martin Luther King was not disobedient and he got his way. This is why you should not be disobedient.
Okay so I’m in the middle right now, I agree but at the same time I disagree, you don’t HAVE to be disobedient if you don’t want to and if it isn’t necessary but if you really want to get the point across that you really care about what your protesting and that your serious then I think that you do have to be disobedient, just as long your not hurting someone.
I would say that there is really no answer to this. It depends on what one considers “justice” and what is the “right” thing. However, this varies greatly by person!
But regardless, I think that most political protests should be done in a peaceful manner. This can include street demonstrations, online petitions, and using social media. If goal cannot be reached and the government doesn’t listen, I think more serious measures should be taken, but again, in a nonviolent form such as sit-ins or hunger strikes. The protests at Tiananmen Square in 1989 is one example. The Montomogery Bus Boycott in the 1955, is another form of a serious measure. When the blacks boycotted the city buses, the city suffered huge money losses. Martin Luther King was one of the leaders in this boycott and he played a major role in pressuring the city until the blacks won their case at court.
I think nonviolent protests are better than violent forms because change is possible with nonviolent forms. As long as there are enough supporters, enough spotlight is given, and serious nonviolent forms of protests continue, it is inevitable for the people in power to listen. At least in a democracy. Politicians are public servants. They exist to serve the people. All people. But if they don’t listen and the people start to act, they can be held accountable. Why? Because they worry about their next election! They would definitely not want a large portion of people to turn their backs on them. Martin Luther King’s activism for the rights of black people were able to succeed because he was able to fulfill these three conditions.
But I think there is one exception, however. If a country is unfairly annexed by another country (e.g. when Korea was annexed by Japan in the early 1900s), I think it is totally all right to use both nonviolent and violent forms of activism. And this includes bombing and shooting. These violent forms would plant fear in the hearts of the leaders of the country that is annexing another. It sends a clear message to them: The people will not obey. The people have not given up. The people will continue fighting.
I believe yo do have to be disobedient in order to achieve justice. Now that does not mean it guarantees that the protest will prevail. Take the Chinese students at Beijing’s Tiananmen Square in 1889. Many protesters were either executed or imprisoned. Even so, Martin Luther King Jr. successfully performed his “I have a Dream” speech peacefully. He convinced people, he helped them understand the way he felt, how all African-Americans felt. If he had never brought up that speech, then we would probably never come around the topic, if no one took a stand and tried to help others understand, then this world would be a lot more different than it is now.
Before I can answer this question, I need to know the meaning of disobedient. Which to me, is going against someone’s wishes. For example, breaking the law is being disobedient. Martin Luther King’s protest was definitely peaceful, I found a quote saying “Not one hair of one head of one person should be harmed.” Since he was peaceful, and the did end up getting justice, was this protest disobedient? Even peaceful protests could be disobedient, if you’re going against someone’s wishes. For example I researched another peaceful protest, which ended in success. “The tree sitters of Pureora” Their goal was to save the New Zealand Pureora forest. Their method was to build tree houses and refuse to leave them. Which resulted in a success, the government stopped the deforestation, and it became a park. With this protest, even though it was peaceful but it was still disobedient. The government planned on removing the Pureora forest, to which the people disagreed. Ultimately disobeying the government. This was a small protest compared to Martin Luther King’s. So, Martin Luther King’s protest was also disobedient. In my opinion, protesting itself is disobedient. Since you’re disagreeing and taking action against someone.
So do you have to be disobedient to get justice? In my opinion, yes you do.
You don’t have to be disobedient with what problems that was happening back then. There were riots and other problems. Did u know there was lots of racism to black people they had less decisions in life. I think it’s ok if black people break a little bit of rules because you got to cut them some slack there life is way harder than the white peoples life. Tbc
The answer to the question is no you don’t have to be disobedient to get justice. If you are disobedient you are doing illegal things. In the video he says he wants no violence and he wants peace and not being disobedient is peacefull.
I see what you mean but MLK has been arrested many times for breaking laws during protest. He might not have been violent but he was being somewhat disobedient and eventually his protests lead to the civil rights act and other important documents.
Good point – I’ve said elsewhere that there is a difference between disobedience and violence. Especially in other countries, where even protesting isn’t legal.
I’m curious – what laws did he break?
I feel like in some situations you should be disobedient to get justice like for example Martin Luker King wanting justice for African Americans during the time when African Americans where treated quite terrible while white people where treated fine