Lap's PHI100 Weblog

 Already knowing Martin Luther King's famous speeches and half knowing his later shift to economic justice (some would say, socialistic politics), what shocked me the most was King's deep disapproval from the American public. In early 1968, Martin Luther King was disapproved by 75% of the American Public. The same Harris Poll shown than 60% of Black citizens in America believed that he was irrelevant. In the final years of his life, he was 25 points more unpopular than he was in 1963 when he gave his historic address. Of course, there are some situational factors, such as the race riots, but nothing surprised me more than seeing King's popularity declined as he kept pushing for more achievements. The statistics only speak for themselves.  https://news.gallup.com/poll/20920/martin-luther-king-jr-revered-more-after-death-than-before.aspx

 Susan B Anthony's Civil Disobedience (Natural Rights) In 1872, Susan B Anthony went on a barnstorming speaking tour throughout the 29 and 21 towns and villages of Monroe and Ontario County. While opinion polling did not exist in the late 19th century, her speechifying was effective enough for the prosecution to transfer her to the United States Circuit Court at Canandaigua for a less sympathetic jury to hear her case.  Susan B Anthony's speech and the case for disobedience is already persuasive enough with her title, but what set apart her rhetoric from standard suffragette beliefs was her arguments rooted in the Natural Rights ingrained in the constitution. Despite advocating for a government intervention to change the law an existing law (and legitimize positive action in an age of negative liberty), Ms. Anthony calls for women to vote used Natural Rights and old negative libertarian arguments that appealed to the average American's skeptical dispensation against the gov...

" Hayim Greenberg, editor of The Jewish Frontier and an admirer of Gandhi, wrote to him, ‘a Jewish Gandhi in Germany, should one arise, could function for about five minutes and would be promptly taken to the guillotine.’ Gandhi replied that Hitler too was a human being, that the Jews, who were going to be slaughtered anyway, should have asserted their dignity and freely chosen their way of death, and that such an action was bound to have an effect on ordinary Germans, if not immediately at least a little later (lxviii. 137–41). His reply had a point, but it rested on an uncritical faith in the power of non-violence and showed little understanding of the complex ways in which totalitarian systems brutalized the community, demoralized the victims, distorted public discourse, and undermined the basic preconditions of satyagraha. (Bikhu Parekh,  Gandhi, A short Introduction,  p.75)" Gandhi's peaceful means have not worked everywhere. While his methods have not been followed ...

  Do you agree with Thoreau's argument that action according to conscience (i.e moral action) is not compatible with living in a representative democracy  where decisions are based on collective agreement?     Thoreau's essay uses several persuasive arguments to proposition. His most persuasive argument is his detestation of those whom " disapprove of the character and measures of a government, yield to it their allegiance and support, are undoubtedly its most conscientious supporters, and so frequently the most serious obstacles to reform." Thoreau implores these conscientious patriots to intellectually secede from the state and refuse to pay taxes. Above all, Thoreau asks, "Do not they stand in the same relation to the State, that the State does to the Union?" Thoreau's argument rests upon two chief assumptions: people are more likely to obey a government because of coercion. This coercion is so strong because most people are unwilling and unlikely to ...