POLITICS
Why Protests Should Never Be Peaceful
A non-violent protest need not be quiet, tame, or even polite, but rather should be disruptive, provocative, and confrontational
“After all, the practical reason why, when the power is once in the hands of the people, a majority are permitted, and for a long period continue, to rule, is not because they are most likely to be in the right, nor because this seems fairest to the minority, but because they are physically the strongest.”
— Henry David Thoreau
The term civil disobedience was coined by Henry David Thoreau in his 1848 essay, “On the Duty of Civil Disobedience,” to describe his refusal to pay the state poll tax implemented by the American government to wage war and enforce the Fugitive Slave Law.
“Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator?” asked Thoreau. “Why has every man a conscience, then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward. It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for…
