Civil Disobedience

There is a rich tradition in this country of civil disobedience. Nonviolent civil disobedience was a critical factor in gaining women the right to vote in the United States as well as the U.S. labor movement with striking effectiveness such as the Industrial Workers of the World, the Chicano community’s UFW grape and Lettuce boycotts. . My understanding of civil disobedience was shaped by images of civil rights activists in the 1960s using passive …

…then in place. As a man/woman of a very strong faith, they believed in the goodness o f people, even those who were hurting them. Their followers allowed themselves to be beaten and even killed with out offering resistance. Non-violence requires a ‘leap of faith ‘, the belief that things can change, as well as people. "Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed." Martin Luther King, Jr.