I became convinced that noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation with good. No other person has been more eloquent and passionate in getting this idea across than Henry David Thoreau. As a result of his writings and personal witness, we are the heirs of a legacy of creative protest.
Interpretation
Noncooperation with evil is as essential a moral duty as cooperating with good.
Martin Luther King, Jr. emphasizes the importance of actively resisting evil in society, arguing that turning a blind eye to wrongdoing is not a neutral stance but a moral failing. He acknowledges the influence of Henry David Thoreau, whose ideas on civil disobedience inspire individuals to engage in creative forms of protest against injustice.
In practice
During a speech at a civil rights rally to encourage active resistance against injustice.
This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice and love.
Music is the best consolation for a despaired man
We must meet the forces of hate with the power of love.
We may have all come on different ships, but we're in the same boat now.
Israel... is one of the great outpost of democracy in the world
One of the greatest casualties of the war in Vietnam is the Great Society... shot down on the battlefield of Vietnam.
To his enemies the householder must be a hero. Them he must resist. That is the duty of the householder. He must not sit down in a corner and weep, and talk nonsense about non-resistance. If he does not show himself a hero to his enemies he has not done his duty.
Women have to summon courage to fulfill dormant dreams.
We're going to be OK because of the American people. They have more grit, determination and courage than you can imagine.
They tried their best to find a place where I was isolated. But all the resources of a superpower cannot isolate the man who hears a voice of freedom, a voice I heard from the very chamber of my soul.
People with courage and character always seem sinister to the rest.
I think the self-burning itself on practice of non-violence. These people, you see, they easily use bomb explosive, more casualty people. But they didn't do that. Only sacrifice their own life. So this also is part of practice of non-violence.
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