ipl-logo

Summary Of Martin Luther King Jr Vietnam Speech

674 Words3 Pages

On April 4, 1967 Doctor Martin Luther King Jr gave the speech, “Beyond Vietnam-A time to Break Silence.” In this powerful speech Dr. King addresses his followers, and explains why the same people who are advocating for civil rights, should also protest the war in Vietnam. Dr. King’s main appeal is towards pathos because he is explaining his reasons, most of which are moral in some way. Dr. King develops the central claim of the speech by explaining how the war is taking away resources from the poor, how the soldiers are disproportionately poor people, and lastly how the war is completely against his morals. His central claim of the speech revolves around war being an enemy of the poor. In the first part of his speech, Dr. King begins with his first reason for protesting the war in Vietnam. He …show more content…

King’s third paragraph is his final reason, as he states in the first sentence. His third reason for protesting the war is his morals. His claim is that morally he cannot stand by with the violence that is being used, when he wants everything he does to be nonviolent. When he tells followers not to use violence they ask “what about Vietnam? They ask if our own nation wasn’t using massive doses of violence to solve its problems” (Paragraph 3). Dr. King feels that he cannot speak against violence being used in the ghettos without having protested the greatest use of violence, “[his] own government.” (Paragraph 3). Dr. King uses specificity such as “Molotov cocktails and rifles” (Paragraph 3) to create a vivid image of the violence that has occurred in his own nation. Dr. King made this speech to address the violence going on in the Vietnam War. Throughout the speech he is answering the question of “Why a civil rights leader has become a anti-war protester?” He uses rhetorical strategies such as; diction, similes, and specificity to strengthen his argument. To answer those who question him Dr. King gives three claims all of which resonate with people in different

Show More
Related
674 Words | 3 Pages

King notably uses several rhetorical questions as a means to guide his audience into following his position on the criticisms that were plagued on him by the published caution statement. For example, when Dr. King begins addressing the potential rebuttals to his response he states, “You may well ask, "Why direct action, why sit-ins, marches, and so forth? Isn't negotiation a better path?" ” With this question King is able to open his perspective on negations and how they have been attempted between the African community and those White public figures that can prove to be useful in the battle for African American Civil Rights and how those “negations” resulted in empty promises. Additionally, King also uses this topic of negations because he is able to emphasize the point that the more negations are ignored the more “crisis-packed” the issue becomes, eventually forcing the community to directly face the issue of injustice towards African Americans.

Read More
1573 Words | 7 Pages

Intro: The Vietnam War is one of the most protested wars in American history. Before the end of the war, many gave speeches and rallied against the war crimes that were being committed by American Soldiers in South East Asia. The following paper will use the Pentadic method to critique John F. Kerry’s “Vietnam Veterans Against the War” speech. Through this analysis, it will become apparent that the purpose is the most dominant element in Kerry’s speech, and that John F. Kerry’s speech meets the requirements it requires for an artifact to be considered strongly effective.

Read More
516 Words | 3 Pages

and they need to fight. Nothing else is working so fighting is the only working option. Dr. King’s purpose to this speech is to get out the word that the people need to fight with nonviolence. “We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence.” Martin Luther King is famous for fighting for equality using non violence.

Read More
736 Words | 3 Pages

Throughout the first paragraph of King’s speech, he used emotional diction with words such as struggle, poverty, and poor to prove that the war in Vietnam was bringing down the American’s and their families fighting overseas. King proved this partly with the quote, “America would never invest the necessary funds… in the rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued…” (King, Beyond, 9). King was establishing his point that America was more troubled about healing and adjusting other countries, but would never invest the same in their own country. He was in the process of proving that it wasn 't a money issue in America, but an equality issue.

Read More
552 Words | 3 Pages

After successfully pushing for the Civil Rights Act, King continued to fight for justice. He criticized the U.S.’s role in the Vietnam War. He argued that the reason the United States was in Vietnam was “to occupy it as an American colony.” In his speech, Beyond Vietnam—A Time to Break the Silence, he connected the war with economic justice. He told the public that the money that was supposed to be used to lessen poverty in the Americas had instead been used to pay for the war.

Read More
756 Words | 4 Pages

Martin Luther King Jr. was a civil right activist who fought for the right and equality of African American citizens. In his speech, he stressed that nonviolence was a more effective way to success. One of the rhetorical devices that was key was his persona. His persona showed his followers that with patience and persistence change will come. In his speech, King spoke about the march in Birmingham, Alabama, where he and his friend Bull Connor lead.

Read More
409 Words | 2 Pages

Dr. King gave his speech with the intent of making the march in Washington DC the greatest demonstration of civil rights freedom that the nation has ever seen. Dr. King talks about the Africans that were enslaved and how in a century of supposed freedom they are known as African Americans

Read More
934 Words | 4 Pages

King opened his speech by proclaiming, “I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.” Already known as the leader of the Civil Right’s Movement and a main organizer of the ”March On Washington”, this promise helped Dr. King further establish credibility with his audience because they understood that he was about to deliver a monumental address that would reflect the magnitude of the entire demonstration. Very few speakers have the courage to open a speech by declaring that it will become a moment in history that will be remembered forever. However, Dr. King knew he would deliver a powerful address and wanted the audience to realize the importance of his message to the future of

Read More
526 Words | 3 Pages

Oppositely what he thought, they asked “what about Vietnam?” Their question hit his virtuous vision or faith. Then he found that he could never again raise his voice against the violence. One more time he decided, he cannot hold his tongue. Martin Luther King wanted to find the poor of sake, and government’s

Read More
182 Words | 1 Pages

Dr. King’s intent was to inspire each and every person in attendance and not in attendance to join hands and recreate a nation. He uses powerful statements such as “One hundred years later, not free”, “Now is the time”, and “Never be satisfied”. Dr. King’s goal with these statements and ultimately his speech was to change the unequal rights in America, which

Read More
622 Words | 3 Pages

Martin Luther King Jr. was a man with strong motives and was able to move people through his words and speeches, such as his speech “I Have a Dream”. King was a civil rights activist and his speech’s main purpose was to end racial segregations in the 1960s. Through out his speech’s paragraphs King gives a lot claims. Some of the claims King mentions are: “ ‘the Negro is still not free;’ ‘black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.’ ‘America has given the Negro people a bad check’.

Read More
165 Words | 1 Pages

Back in 1965, there was A war between North and South Vietnam involving the issue of the spread of communism. Martin Luther King Jr delivered A speech called “Beyond Vietnam- A time to Break Silence.” talking about the concern of spreading communism all around the United States. Martin Luther King Jr also known as “MLK” was A civil rights leader who delivered and led speeches, protests, movements, and other big things to make A positive difference in the world.

Read More
1228 Words | 5 Pages

He said the Vietnam War was “one of History’s most cruel and senseless wars”. He set up a march on Washington against America funding the war. Dr. King did not like to speak on the war because it took away from his civil rights movement. He said "The press is being stacked against me" meaning they saw king as a saint when it came to speaking on Civil rights but when he spoke on Vietnam it was wrong. They disapproved when applied "toward little brown Vietnamese children".

Read More
561 Words | 3 Pages

How Martin Luther King Jr. Builds a Speech On April 4, 1967, Martin Luther gave a speech to the Riverside Church in New York City. He starts off his speech saying,”Since I am a preacher by calling, I suppose it is not surprising I have major reasoning for bringing Vietnam into the field of my moral vision. ”(1)

Read More
487 Words | 2 Pages

Using imagery, anaphora, antithesis, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr encourages Americans to take action to improve our living conditions. First of all, Dr King distinctly describes the unjustness and agony of what has been going on. For example, Dr. King reflects on how the people are “seared in the flames of withering injustice”(2). Dr. King mentioned this in his speech because he is tired of the way that

Read More

More about Summary Of Martin Luther King Jr Vietnam Speech

Open Document