Civil_Disobedience_by_Thoreau

Civil Disobedience by Thoreau Civil Disobedience In Thoreau’s essay, “Civil Disobedience”, he exhorts the need to prioritize social consciousness over the unquestioning allegiance to government policy. In essence, “Civil Disobedience” could arguably be touted as the quintessential rallying cry for the pioneers of a new social conscious movement. Thoreau’s essay argues that a government proves itself of little value if it obtains its power to govern from the majority of the masses solely on the basis that they are the strongest group. He contends that a citizen’s first obligation is to cling to his or her own belief of what is right and not blindly follow the law dictated by the majority. In addition, Thoreau also believes that when a government is unjust, people should detachment themselves from its control and make it their civic-minded duty to avoid membership in any such unjust institution. Thoreau further laments that United States clearly fits his criteria for an unjust government, given its support of slavery and its practice of military aggression. Thoreau continues his essay by revealing his skepticism on whether governmental reform by itself has any chance of making a difference and argues that voting and petitioning for change rarely achieves the thoreau, government, essay, thoreau’s, disobedience, civil, social, man, tone, style, slavery, protest, men, itself, citizen, writing, writes, whether, unjust, united, through, states, single, reveals, reform, political, need, integrity, further, clearly, believes, belief, whom, viewed, treat, themselves, state, shall, serve, sees, seems, right, responsibility, purpose, practice, power, position, piece, one, once