Civil Disobedience Essay

Civil disobedience is a form of nonviolent protest that involves breaking the law to challenge unjust policies or practices. The term civil disobedience was theorised only in the 19th century by Henry Thoreau, although such forms of rebellion have existed for as long as injustices, and, until there are, I strongly believe that civil disobedience should be implemented to demand change and justice. Whenever certain rights are threatened, I think everyone has to rise up to protect them, because, as T. Jefferson stated: “When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty”. Civil disobedience is one of the ways citizens can organise their resistance and, throughout history, it has proven itself successful many times; however, not everyone agrees

Clearly, such actions are not exempt from critique and many people regard these activists as childish vandals. For some, the use of civil disobedience for the climate crisis is not justified, as they think that this issue is already on the agenda and, therefore, demanding to take action is unnecessary. Instead, for many others the problem is not the cause itself but the methods they use. The general public dislikes their actions mainly because of their disruptive nature, which is the core of civil disobedience, and they usually suggest they should use other legal methods. Moreover, many people also affirm that their disruptive attitude undermines the rule of law, and destabilises society, by signalling to others that anyone can disobey if they feel the

Civil disobedient acts do indeed cause discomfort, but it is what forces governments to take action and to fulfil the activists’ demands to reestablish order. If they were not forced to do this by such extreme acts, they probably would not listen or it would take excessive time to achieve results, which we do not have in this situation. For this reason, legal and quiet demonstrations, which have been useful to spread awareness and affirm the urgency of solving the issue, would not work to achieve immediate and more radical reforms. The aim of their acts of disobedience is not to harm people, although it might be perceived as such, but to hold accountable all those who are profiting from the climate crisis. So, although sometimes annoying, these protests are necessary and those who complain are more concerned about themself than the environment, like those burning fossil