In 1834 the Houses of Parliament in Great Britain caught fire and burnt to the ground. The cause of the fire was wooden tally sticks used by the Exchequer for the collection of taxes from local farmers by local sheriffs. It was an accident, but Charles Dickens, speaking at a conference on governmental reform, told how counting devices destroyed "the halls of government". In 1849 the House of Parliament in Canada was burnt down by a group of angry Canadian citizens. They destroyed everything...
What is my point, you ask? Well my point is this: if you don't like your government -- change it. I mean, really change it. Don't just say you're going to change it -- actually change it. During the 1960s and 1970s, people took to the streets in violent mass demonstrations. People not only changed laws and government, they changed the culture and the social order -- forever -- and I might add, for the better. The call was "Power to the People!" As a result, in the last three or four decades unacceptable laws, rules and practices that were once taken for granted, are no longer acceptable. These things were changed in a major way, not by the government but by the people.
In his famous Gettysburg Address, President Lincoln referred to "government of the people, by the people, for the people." This concept can be applied to any democratic country where the government representatives are elected. Some of the greatest changes in laws and government have taken place through civil disobedience, or nonviolent resistance. Civil disobedience is one of the many ways people have rebelled against unfair laws. It has been used in many well-documented nonviolent resistance movements in India (Gandhi's campaigns for independence from the British Empire), in Czechoslovakia's Velvet Revolution and in East Germany to oust their communist dictatorships, in South Africa in the fight against apartheid, in the American Civil Rights Movement, in the Singing Revolution to bring independence to the Baltic countries from the Soviet Union, and recently in the 2004 Orange Revolution and 2005 Rose Revolution, among other various movements worldwide...
I am not a student of political science, so to those folks out there who understand this more than I do, the premise of my blog will seem very naïve, which in fact it is. However, lately I have been hearing so many people whining complaining about their governments. Henry David Thoreau wrote an essay called "Resistance to Civil Government" in which he said people do not have to support a government with which they do not agree. People have the right to protest anything with which they disagree. In other words, if you don't like something your government is doing -- or not doing -- get off your butts and change it. Stop being complacent. The power is in your hands; you are the government...
What is my point, you ask? Well my point is this: if you don't like your government -- change it. I mean, really change it. Don't just say you're going to change it -- actually change it. During the 1960s and 1970s, people took to the streets in violent mass demonstrations. People not only changed laws and government, they changed the culture and the social order -- forever -- and I might add, for the better. The call was "Power to the People!" As a result, in the last three or four decades unacceptable laws, rules and practices that were once taken for granted, are no longer acceptable. These things were changed in a major way, not by the government but by the people.
In his famous Gettysburg Address, President Lincoln referred to "government of the people, by the people, for the people." This concept can be applied to any democratic country where the government representatives are elected. Some of the greatest changes in laws and government have taken place through civil disobedience, or nonviolent resistance. Civil disobedience is one of the many ways people have rebelled against unfair laws. It has been used in many well-documented nonviolent resistance movements in India (Gandhi's campaigns for independence from the British Empire), in Czechoslovakia's Velvet Revolution and in East Germany to oust their communist dictatorships, in South Africa in the fight against apartheid, in the American Civil Rights Movement, in the Singing Revolution to bring independence to the Baltic countries from the Soviet Union, and recently in the 2004 Orange Revolution and 2005 Rose Revolution, among other various movements worldwide...
I am not a student of political science, so to those folks out there who understand this more than I do, the premise of my blog will seem very naïve, which in fact it is. However, lately I have been hearing so many people whining complaining about their governments. Henry David Thoreau wrote an essay called "Resistance to Civil Government" in which he said people do not have to support a government with which they do not agree. People have the right to protest anything with which they disagree. In other words, if you don't like something your government is doing -- or not doing -- get off your butts and change it. Stop being complacent. The power is in your hands; you are the government...
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