Quote:
Originally Posted by Brian Swartz
As to the point about the conflict between morality and law, the problem is; who gets to decide what the moral thing is, when we are throwing out society's previously established decision?
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The People. It’s written all over our documents.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Brian Swartz
I believe there is a place for civil disobedience, provided that it is respectful and expects to pay the price for such as a matter of protest. The only other thing I can say is to put to you directly the question already posed in my last post; what do we know of that works better? If it is ok to disobey a law because you think it is immoral, then we might as well not have laws at all.
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A respectful act of disobedience? Wouldn’t that just be civility? Can you think of a social/moral movement that was successful because it was respectful? The very essence of civil disobedience is reacting to an immoral, disrespectful system. In way, you are saying: I expect the people being treated immorally show their displeasure politely.
MLK said in his last speech:All we say to America is, “Be true to what you said on paper.”
America’s greatness is precisely because of acts against governments protesting their (immoral) rule of law. It is not a zero sum situation, protesting and questioning laws is exactly what keeps us from being a totalitarian state.