CDZ What are the Limits to non-violent civil disobedience

[task0778]

This statement was written in another thread, since closed but I thought the issue of non-violent civil disobedience to be worthy of discussion. Violent civil disobedience is pretty much condemned by most people, but if someone wants to propose the value of such actions in another thread somewhere then I'll be happy to respond. For now though, in this thread we are talking about non-violent civil disobedience, okay?

"Nothing wrong with non-violent civil disobedience"

First, a definition. According to Wikipedia, Civil disobedience is the active, professed refusal of a citizen to obey certain laws, demands, orders or commands of a government. Some would note that the term "Civil" means non-violent, otherwise it would be uncivil. Fine, let's assume that for this discussion civil disobedience (CD) is by definition non-violent.


Let's talk about that. You are basically saying there's nothing wrong with breaking the law as long as you are non-violent about it. IOW, a willful disregard for the rule of law is okay, a person or group gets to decide that their cause or reason is ample justification to ignore the dictates of those elected officials whose responsibility it is to maintain law and good order. Does everyone then get to decide which laws to break in the name of whatever their cause is? That's getting kinda close to anarchy, isn't it? Who wants that? Or should the elected officials get to decide which causes and groups are allowed to break the laws and which are not?

For example, to maintain public safety and security, a city or state may issue a temporary curfew order. There's good reasons for doing that, namely to prevent or reduce violence and destruction that is harmful to the community and it's citizens. You say there's nothing wrong with CD, but what about when the activity becomes violent and destructive? What about when the peaceful protest gets hijacked by others with a different agenda? You don't think it's wise to try to preclude the violence before it starts? Should a person or group arbitrarily decide to ignore that curfew to continue to protest, knowing that violence has recently occurred and is likely to re-occur? Is that okay if you favor their cause? Isn't that kinda what's going on across the country? Breaking any valid law to protest an unjust law, action, or process would seem to me to be wrong, as well as antithetical to the law or gov't being protested. Valid laws are there for good reasons, and a curfew is a good reason; namely to preserve law and good order. So, CD is somewhat of a slippery slope, no?


And there are alternative ways to address bad laws or practices, right? It's called voting, if for example bad cops are not being disciplined or fired or prosecuted, then the people can vote out the elected officials who aren't doing their jobs in this regard, to be replaced by someone else who will do better. That's the whole point of a democratic republic, true? So, who's really at fault here? To me, it's the local gov't that is at fault, so is CD appropriate to protest the bad cops, or should BLM and others instead be addressing the real problem of the elected officials who have created the problem in the first place by allowing bad cops to remain on duty? My point is that if you're going to break a valid law then it oughta be the last resort rather than the 1st. IOW, CD is only justified when nothing else worked. It's not like you can't legally and peacefully protest without breaking any laws. It's not like people can't support another person for the position, even if he/she is (God Forbid!) a republican.

 

[Death-Ninja]

As soon as protest, at any level within the protest, presents criminal destructiveness, and or violent physical confrontations, its no longer a protest, or even mostly peaceful, its all a riot and all persons taking part in it are all rioters, not protesters, and thus all of the tools in the bag for dealing with such can now be fully deployed, up to and including the shooting dead of any rioters deemed especially violent and dangerous!

 

[miketx]

This statement was written in another thread, since closed but I thought the issue of non-violent civil disobedience to be worthy of discussion. Violent civil disobedience is pretty much condemned by most people, but if someone wants to propose the value of such actions in another thread somewhere then I'll be happy to respond. For now though, in this thread we are talking about non-violent civil disobedience, okay?

"Nothing wrong with non-violent civil disobedience"

First, a definition. According to Wikipedia, Civil disobedience is the active, professed refusal of a citizen to obey certain laws, demands, orders or commands of a government. Some would note that the term "Civil" means non-violent, otherwise it would be uncivil. Fine, let's assume that for this discussion civil disobedience (CD) is by definition non-violent.


Let's talk about that. You are basically saying there's nothing wrong with breaking the law as long as you are non-violent about it. IOW, a willful disregard for the rule of law is okay, a person or group gets to decide that their cause or reason is ample justification to ignore the dictates of those elected officials whose responsibility it is to maintain law and good order. Does everyone then get to decide which laws to break in the name of whatever their cause is? That's getting kinda close to anarchy, isn't it? Who wants that? Or should the elected officials get to decide which causes and groups are allowed to break the laws and which are not?

For example, to maintain public safety and security, a city or state may issue a temporary curfew order. There's good reasons for doing that, namely to prevent or reduce violence and destruction that is harmful to the community and it's citizens. You say there's nothing wrong with CD, but what about when the activity becomes violent and destructive? What about when the peaceful protest gets hijacked by others with a different agenda? You don't think it's wise to try to preclude the violence before it starts? Should a person or group arbitrarily decide to ignore that curfew to continue to protest, knowing that violence has recently occurred and is likely to re-occur? Is that okay if you favor their cause? Isn't that kinda what's going on across the country? Breaking any valid law to protest an unjust law, action, or process would seem to me to be wrong, as well as antithetical to the law or gov't being protested. Valid laws are there for good reasons, and a curfew is a good reason; namely to preserve law and good order. So, CD is somewhat of a slippery slope, no?


And there are alternative ways to address bad laws or practices, right? It's called voting, if for example bad cops are not being disciplined or fired or prosecuted, then the people can vote out the elected officials who aren't doing their jobs in this regard, to be replaced by someone else who will do better. That's the whole point of a democratic republic, true? So, who's really at fault here? To me, it's the local gov't that is at fault, so is CD appropriate to protest the bad cops, or should BLM and others instead be addressing the real problem of the elected officials who have created the problem in the first place by allowing bad cops to remain on duty? My point is that if you're going to break a valid law then it oughta be the last resort rather than the 1st. IOW, CD is only justified when nothing else worked. It's not like you can't legally and peacefully protest without breaking any laws. It's not like people can't support another person for the position, even if he/she is (God Forbid!) a republican.

It all depends on how sorry the democrat in charge is.

 

[denmark]

“If you're going to break a valid law then it oughta be the last resort”.

In general, I agree.
The question comes down to: what (unjust) laws are worth breaking?

Also, from the law enforcement perspective: which unlawful civil disobedience is worth ignoring?

Violent protest should be the last resort, and police should rarely ignore them.
However, both protesters & police must respect each others basic rights, or escalation may result on either side.
To minimize violence & looting, a curfew is sometimes necessary and should be enforced, if reasonable.

In either case, the main question becomes:
How do we deal with the EXTREMISTS on either side?
Many “protesters” are actual criminals making the peaceful ones look bad, and the few “bad apple” police officers make the rest of the department look bad!

 

[Dogmaphobe]

If violent civil disobedience is condemned by most people, why are there so many posters who call violent disobedience "peaceful" in order to try to justify their supporting it?

 

[occupied]

It is the natural right of every individual to air their grievances with the authorities in the public square. However this individual right somehow becomes forfeit if the authorities think the number of people exercising this right is too large and may cause some trouble for them and their money. Only in the most authoritarian regimes are demonstrations flatly illegal but they can be declared illegal practically everywhere as soon as a few windows get broke.

It is a fact that criminals and anarchists take advantage of the crowds to cause mischief. It is also a fact that sending out the riot squad is a provocative act. It is only at this moment when protests have the potential to turn into riots can any citizen be sure the Authorities are watching and thinking about the situation. There is also the fact that it very often works.

 

[Darkwind]

This statement was written in another thread, since closed but I thought the issue of non-violent civil disobedience to be worthy of discussion. Violent civil disobedience is pretty much condemned by most people, but if someone wants to propose the value of such actions in another thread somewhere then I'll be happy to respond. For now though, in this thread we are talking about non-violent civil disobedience, okay?

"Nothing wrong with non-violent civil disobedience"

First, a definition. According to Wikipedia, Civil disobedience is the active, professed refusal of a citizen to obey certain laws, demands, orders or commands of a government. Some would note that the term "Civil" means non-violent, otherwise it would be uncivil. Fine, let's assume that for this discussion civil disobedience (CD) is by definition non-violent.


Let's talk about that. You are basically saying there's nothing wrong with breaking the law as long as you are non-violent about it. IOW, a willful disregard for the rule of law is okay, a person or group gets to decide that their cause or reason is ample justification to ignore the dictates of those elected officials whose responsibility it is to maintain law and good order. Does everyone then get to decide which laws to break in the name of whatever their cause is? That's getting kinda close to anarchy, isn't it? Who wants that? Or should the elected officials get to decide which causes and groups are allowed to break the laws and which are not?

For example, to maintain public safety and security, a city or state may issue a temporary curfew order. There's good reasons for doing that, namely to prevent or reduce violence and destruction that is harmful to the community and it's citizens. You say there's nothing wrong with CD, but what about when the activity becomes violent and destructive? What about when the peaceful protest gets hijacked by others with a different agenda? You don't think it's wise to try to preclude the violence before it starts? Should a person or group arbitrarily decide to ignore that curfew to continue to protest, knowing that violence has recently occurred and is likely to re-occur? Is that okay if you favor their cause? Isn't that kinda what's going on across the country? Breaking any valid law to protest an unjust law, action, or process would seem to me to be wrong, as well as antithetical to the law or gov't being protested. Valid laws are there for good reasons, and a curfew is a good reason; namely to preserve law and good order. So, CD is somewhat of a slippery slope, no?


And there are alternative ways to address bad laws or practices, right? It's called voting, if for example bad cops are not being disciplined or fired or prosecuted, then the people can vote out the elected officials who aren't doing their jobs in this regard, to be replaced by someone else who will do better. That's the whole point of a democratic republic, true? So, who's really at fault here? To me, it's the local gov't that is at fault, so is CD appropriate to protest the bad cops, or should BLM and others instead be addressing the real problem of the elected officials who have created the problem in the first place by allowing bad cops to remain on duty? My point is that if you're going to break a valid law then it oughta be the last resort rather than the 1st. IOW, CD is only justified when nothing else worked. It's not like you can't legally and peacefully protest without breaking any laws. It's not like people can't support another person for the position, even if he/she is (God Forbid!) a republican.

Two limits from right off the top of My head.

1. While exercising your civil disobedience, you cannot break any other legitimate law. You're protesting does not give the right to block or hinder traffic as an example.

2. Obviously when it becomes violent.

It is a proven fact that the presence of the Police in demonstrations is NOT a provocative action.

Society demand that we keep some kind of civil order and we have police to do just that.

 

[Bob Blaylock]

As far as I am concerned, any time you steal or destroy property that is not yours, or commit acts of violence against otherwise uninvolved third-parties, or even if you interfere with the freedom of uninvolved third parties to go about their own business in peace; then you've crossed the line. At that point, you are no longer a protester, but a criminal and a terrorist.

Attacking innocent third parties who are otherwise uninvolved in your cause is the definition of terrorism.

 

[Bob Blaylock]

Violent protest should be the last resort, and police should rarely ignore them.
However, both protesters & police must respect each others basic rights, or escalation may result on either side.

“Violent protest” is not protest at all, but terrorism and criminality. And it is, by definition, a refusal to respect the basic rights of others.

At that point, the police are fully justified and obligated in using whatever force is necessary to bring the criminals/terrorists under control, and to protect the safety and property of law-abiding citizens from these violent pieces of shit.

 

[beagle9]

This statement was written in another thread, since closed but I thought the issue of non-violent civil disobedience to be worthy of discussion. Violent civil disobedience is pretty much condemned by most people, but if someone wants to propose the value of such actions in another thread somewhere then I'll be happy to respond. For now though, in this thread we are talking about non-violent civil disobedience, okay?

"Nothing wrong with non-violent civil disobedience"

First, a definition. According to Wikipedia, Civil disobedience is the active, professed refusal of a citizen to obey certain laws, demands, orders or commands of a government. Some would note that the term "Civil" means non-violent, otherwise it would be uncivil. Fine, let's assume that for this discussion civil disobedience (CD) is by definition non-violent.


Let's talk about that. You are basically saying there's nothing wrong with breaking the law as long as you are non-violent about it. IOW, a willful disregard for the rule of law is okay, a person or group gets to decide that their cause or reason is ample justification to ignore the dictates of those elected officials whose responsibility it is to maintain law and good order. Does everyone then get to decide which laws to break in the name of whatever their cause is? That's getting kinda close to anarchy, isn't it? Who wants that? Or should the elected officials get to decide which causes and groups are allowed to break the laws and which are not?

For example, to maintain public safety and security, a city or state may issue a temporary curfew order. There's good reasons for doing that, namely to prevent or reduce violence and destruction that is harmful to the community and it's citizens. You say there's nothing wrong with CD, but what about when the activity becomes violent and destructive? What about when the peaceful protest gets hijacked by others with a different agenda? You don't think it's wise to try to preclude the violence before it starts? Should a person or group arbitrarily decide to ignore that curfew to continue to protest, knowing that violence has recently occurred and is likely to re-occur? Is that okay if you favor their cause? Isn't that kinda what's going on across the country? Breaking any valid law to protest an unjust law, action, or process would seem to me to be wrong, as well as antithetical to the law or gov't being protested. Valid laws are there for good reasons, and a curfew is a good reason; namely to preserve law and good order. So, CD is somewhat of a slippery slope, no?


And there are alternative ways to address bad laws or practices, right? It's called voting, if for example bad cops are not being disciplined or fired or prosecuted, then the people can vote out the elected officials who aren't doing their jobs in this regard, to be replaced by someone else who will do better. That's the whole point of a democratic republic, true? So, who's really at fault here? To me, it's the local gov't that is at fault, so is CD appropriate to protest the bad cops, or should BLM and others instead be addressing the real problem of the elected officials who have created the problem in the first place by allowing bad cops to remain on duty? My point is that if you're going to break a valid law then it oughta be the last resort rather than the 1st. IOW, CD is only justified when nothing else worked. It's not like you can't legally and peacefully protest without breaking any laws. It's not like people can't support another person for the position, even if he/she is (God Forbid!) a republican.

It all depends on how sorry the democrat in charge is.

Yes and we've definitely seen that lately.

 

[beagle9]

They need to find every judge that let a violent protestor walk, and then disbar the judge, then indict the judge for being an accessory to criminal actions by letting that criminal go or slapping the person's hand.

It's time to get real about law and order in this country, but all the while making sure to protect the rights of the good citizen's. We don't need a police state, but rather we just need the judges to do their damned job's already. If liberal judges can't handle it, then get out of the way to let those who can handle it get the job done.

 

[SeaGal]

"Nothing wrong with non-violent civil disobedience"

Let's talk about that. You are basically saying there's nothing wrong with breaking the law as long as you are non-violent about it. IOW, a willful disregard for the rule of law is okay, a person or group gets to decide that their cause or reason is ample justification to ignore the dictates of those elected officials whose responsibility it is to maintain law and good order. Does everyone then get to decide which laws to break in the name of whatever their cause is? That's getting kinda close to anarchy, isn't it? Who wants that? Or should the elected officials get to decide which causes and groups are allowed to break the laws and which are not?

Peaceable assembly and redress of grievances are constitutionally protected rights, lawful. Civil disobedience on the other hand is not, though it must be non-violent and is usually passive. Those who choose to engage in civil disobedience know full well that they are breaking a particular law and expect the possibility of arrest or fine. That is the point. It is a way of bringing to the public's and possibly court's attention, a law or edict considered unjust, unfair or unenforceable. The difference (primarily) between the two - one is protected by law and the other 'requires' that a law be broken. Also, assembly usually brings to mind a crowd while CD can be effective with only a few or even just one.

That is the way I see it, anyway.

For example, to maintain public safety and security, a city or state may issue a temporary curfew order. There's good reasons for doing that, namely to prevent or reduce violence and destruction that is harmful to the community and it's citizens. You say there's nothing wrong with CD, but what about when the activity becomes violent and destructive?

Then it's no longer lawfully peaceable or civil.

The best hypothetical example that I can think of is the edict in Nevada that allows casinos and other commercial enterprises to operate at 50% capacity while mandating a 50 person limit for churches no matter the capacity. (a situation that may have already been resolved) If even one church decided to open its doors to 50% capacity, and that capacity was over the 50 person limit, while obeying all other mandates such as wearing masks and maintaining distances in seating, that would be an act of civil disobedience. The visual of peaceful churchgoers being escorted from Sunday service in handcuffs would be stunning.

Another hypothetical regarding curfews - curfews are generally enacted to keep mobs from gathering in the streets with malicious intent. Let's say that you owned a nightclub and the curfew greatly restricted your livelihood. An act of civil disobedience on your part would be to remain open and on the part of your customers to continue to patronize your club. I think a gym owner recently did something similar - reopening despite being told he couldn't...though still following other mandates - sanitizing, distancing, etc.

All the above are my opinion and may or may not be Wiki approved.

 

[danielpalos]

This statement was written in another thread, since closed but I thought the issue of non-violent civil disobedience to be worthy of discussion. Violent civil disobedience is pretty much condemned by most people, but if someone wants to propose the value of such actions in another thread somewhere then I'll be happy to respond. For now though, in this thread we are talking about non-violent civil disobedience, okay?

"Nothing wrong with non-violent civil disobedience"

First, a definition. According to Wikipedia, Civil disobedience is the active, professed refusal of a citizen to obey certain laws, demands, orders or commands of a government. Some would note that the term "Civil" means non-violent, otherwise it would be uncivil. Fine, let's assume that for this discussion civil disobedience (CD) is by definition non-violent.


Let's talk about that. You are basically saying there's nothing wrong with breaking the law as long as you are non-violent about it. IOW, a willful disregard for the rule of law is okay, a person or group gets to decide that their cause or reason is ample justification to ignore the dictates of those elected officials whose responsibility it is to maintain law and good order. Does everyone then get to decide which laws to break in the name of whatever their cause is? That's getting kinda close to anarchy, isn't it? Who wants that? Or should the elected officials get to decide which causes and groups are allowed to break the laws and which are not?

For example, to maintain public safety and security, a city or state may issue a temporary curfew order. There's good reasons for doing that, namely to prevent or reduce violence and destruction that is harmful to the community and it's citizens. You say there's nothing wrong with CD, but what about when the activity becomes violent and destructive? What about when the peaceful protest gets hijacked by others with a different agenda? You don't think it's wise to try to preclude the violence before it starts? Should a person or group arbitrarily decide to ignore that curfew to continue to protest, knowing that violence has recently occurred and is likely to re-occur? Is that okay if you favor their cause? Isn't that kinda what's going on across the country? Breaking any valid law to protest an unjust law, action, or process would seem to me to be wrong, as well as antithetical to the law or gov't being protested. Valid laws are there for good reasons, and a curfew is a good reason; namely to preserve law and good order. So, CD is somewhat of a slippery slope, no?


And there are alternative ways to address bad laws or practices, right? It's called voting, if for example bad cops are not being disciplined or fired or prosecuted, then the people can vote out the elected officials who aren't doing their jobs in this regard, to be replaced by someone else who will do better. That's the whole point of a democratic republic, true? So, who's really at fault here? To me, it's the local gov't that is at fault, so is CD appropriate to protest the bad cops, or should BLM and others instead be addressing the real problem of the elected officials who have created the problem in the first place by allowing bad cops to remain on duty? My point is that if you're going to break a valid law then it oughta be the last resort rather than the 1st. IOW, CD is only justified when nothing else worked. It's not like you can't legally and peacefully protest without breaking any laws. It's not like people can't support another person for the position, even if he/she is (God Forbid!) a republican.

We have a First Amendment. It should Always be applied First not Second. Better solutions at lower cost!

 

[AZrailwhale]

This statement was written in another thread, since closed but I thought the issue of non-violent civil disobedience to be worthy of discussion. Violent civil disobedience is pretty much condemned by most people, but if someone wants to propose the value of such actions in another thread somewhere then I'll be happy to respond. For now though, in this thread we are talking about non-violent civil disobedience, okay?

"Nothing wrong with non-violent civil disobedience"

First, a definition. According to Wikipedia, Civil disobedience is the active, professed refusal of a citizen to obey certain laws, demands, orders or commands of a government. Some would note that the term "Civil" means non-violent, otherwise it would be uncivil. Fine, let's assume that for this discussion civil disobedience (CD) is by definition non-violent.


Let's talk about that. You are basically saying there's nothing wrong with breaking the law as long as you are non-violent about it. IOW, a willful disregard for the rule of law is okay, a person or group gets to decide that their cause or reason is ample justification to ignore the dictates of those elected officials whose responsibility it is to maintain law and good order. Does everyone then get to decide which laws to break in the name of whatever their cause is? That's getting kinda close to anarchy, isn't it? Who wants that? Or should the elected officials get to decide which causes and groups are allowed to break the laws and which are not?

For example, to maintain public safety and security, a city or state may issue a temporary curfew order. There's good reasons for doing that, namely to prevent or reduce violence and destruction that is harmful to the community and it's citizens. You say there's nothing wrong with CD, but what about when the activity becomes violent and destructive? What about when the peaceful protest gets hijacked by others with a different agenda? You don't think it's wise to try to preclude the violence before it starts? Should a person or group arbitrarily decide to ignore that curfew to continue to protest, knowing that violence has recently occurred and is likely to re-occur? Is that okay if you favor their cause? Isn't that kinda what's going on across the country? Breaking any valid law to protest an unjust law, action, or process would seem to me to be wrong, as well as antithetical to the law or gov't being protested. Valid laws are there for good reasons, and a curfew is a good reason; namely to preserve law and good order. So, CD is somewhat of a slippery slope, no?


And there are alternative ways to address bad laws or practices, right? It's called voting, if for example bad cops are not being disciplined or fired or prosecuted, then the people can vote out the elected officials who aren't doing their jobs in this regard, to be replaced by someone else who will do better. That's the whole point of a democratic republic, true? So, who's really at fault here? To me, it's the local gov't that is at fault, so is CD appropriate to protest the bad cops, or should BLM and others instead be addressing the real problem of the elected officials who have created the problem in the first place by allowing bad cops to remain on duty? My point is that if you're going to break a valid law then it oughta be the last resort rather than the 1st. IOW, CD is only justified when nothing else worked. It's not like you can't legally and peacefully protest without breaking any laws. It's not like people can't support another person for the position, even if he/she is (God Forbid!) a republican.

I see no limits on non-violent civil disobedience as long as the demonstrator is willing to accept the full legal consequences of his or her law breaking. If a protestor trespasses, jail, if he or she blocks a intersection or street, jail, if he or she interferes with someone else’s free speech, jail. I find it admirable that people are willing to suffer consequences to protest a law they find objectionable.

 

[Jackson]

The purpose of having laws is to be sure the people can rely on a safe city to live in. Any law should be used when the culprit has crossed that line, even if it is protesting in city streets hampering traffic.

If that is going to be ignored, the next law that interferes with society will be broken, for instance, yelling, throwing things and sometimes breaking curfew.

If it gets that far, they protesters can start fires, break into stores and restaurants and could even cause bodily harm. When do we start arresting those people that break the laws? And when they break the law, for goodness sakes, LOCK THEM UP. Then arraign and start the clock on their attorney bills.

And as many have said, if the leaders of these cities and states don't do their job and stop the CD, don't wait for an election, recall them!

 

[Bob Blaylock]

I see no limits on non-violent civil disobedience as long as the demonstrator is willing to accept the full legal consequences of his or her law breaking. If a protestor trespasses, jail, if he or she blocks a intersection or street, jail, if he or she interferes with someone else’s free speech, jail. I find it admirable that people are willing to suffer consequences to protest a law they find objectionable.

I can see a legitimate place for civil disobedience, in the form of violating laws that one deems to be unjust.

Once you cross the line of violating the rights of uninvolved third parties, whether it is by destroying or illegally occupying property, blocking roadways, or in any other way depriving others of their right to go about their own business in peace and safety, then you are no longer a protester, but a criminal and a terrorist, and fully deserve to be seen and treated as such. There is nothing ever, to be admired about such behavior at all.