There is a strenuous debate over whether civil disobedience is an effective way of bringing about change or not. The general assumption is that civil disobedience effectively brings change to the society. However, it is my point of view that civil disobedience is not an effective way.
To exemplify this, climate change is one of the most urgent, difficult, and side-lined issue in modern U.S. history. Government is our leader who needs to balance the economic growth and the climate change. For all the events that news can accommodate, unfortunately, climate change has been side-lined.
When the students across Europe and the United States couldn’t witness the trend of their future and went on strikes, Miami announced climate emergency status, Germany abandoned fossil fuel, and Russia mined combustible ice in arctic ocean the first time. And suddenly, as the world economic growth declines, the good signs are in recession too.
Meanwhile, abnormally extreme natural disasters, record-breaking sea level, and an all-time-high average temperature of the world ring bells on the government and people- to not compromise climate issues and exchange for economic growth, and to take radical actions that will cause sooner and beneficial effects- because climate change is an emergency in the modern U.S. history.
If the constitution is on the side of democracy, and government is making an effort towards the opposite direction of people’s will, we speak up, propose solutions, and insist on what the people believe in, which is better education, peace everywhere, and more aid of college students, etc. But the government is good at giving people promising visions with delivering only the minimum. If the constitution is on the side of people, the government is breaking the law. The people have already spoken and strived for disobedience that is civil, resulting in the government’s assault to the constitution. The most effective way to repair is taking radical actions to protect the constitution.
Just in the last century, a bus in the deep south was halted in the middle of a road, and a few feet away the night was lightened by torches held on the hands that are prejudice, discrimination, and racism. They put on masks so that their evilness would never be unveiled. They set the bus full of black college students on fire, and breathlessly loud screams were calling for the same actions implemented on the criminals. Because if we don’t take radical decisions, America will be on fire.
After a few years since Dr. King voiced his opposition to the Vietnam war, the U.S. government retracted troops because it finally admitted that the war was never going to end and a waste of sacrifice of American soldiers. And after another few years, the U.S. government also admitted that it could have ended the war earlier so that U.S. soldiers who were trained to follow orders from the government and Vietnam people who didn’t do anything harmful to the United States would not have their names inscribed on memorials. if the people have taken more radical actions at the beginning as Dr. King had suggested, we may have saved lives of our brothers and sisters. “let your life to be a counter-fiction to stop the machine.” Thoreau said.