Every individual in a society has a responsibility to obey just laws and to disobey and resist unjust laws.
Write a response in which you discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the claim. In developing and supporting your position, be sure to address the most compelling reasons and/or examples that could be used to challenge your position.
Humans are social creatures. We have lived in a society since time immemorial, and have found that to live in a civilised society some form of legal order is necessary. This makes it the individual's responsibility to follow the laws of the society they exist in. However, they must also have the agency to disobey the laws they find unjust, to ensure freewill. I believe these two ideas need to coexist for any society to function. In this essay, I will raise two arguments in favour of this delicate balance of responsibility and freewill and one against.
To begin, the value system of a society is defined by its constituents and may not always be represented by the constitution or lawbook. It could simply be too outdated, or may be oppressing the rights of certain groups in society. At one point in time, it was illegal for African Americans to sit in the same part of the bus as their white counterparts even though they existed in the same society. Rosa Parks disobeyed that law one day and sparked the Civil Rights Movement in the USA, which led to a more equal society and a removal of several racist laws. If she had not obeyed this unjust, discriminatory law, perhaps the society in the US would be in a different place altogether and the legally sanctioned racism would continue.
Another point to consider is that laws exist for the people, and not vice versa. Individuals should be law abiding citizens, true, but the laws of humanity trump all other laws. In Nazi Germany, there was a range in the kind of individuals. Some were apathetic, only concerned with their own lives and did what they could to survive. Others were extremely loyal to the system, the most law-abiding and chose to enrol in the many divisions of the Nazi Party and contribute to the systemic horror that was the Holocaust. There was a third small section of society, rare individuals who chose to shelter Jews in their homes, against the law and at great mortal peril. They might have broken the laws of the society they lived in but they honoured the greatest law of all: humanity.
On the other hand, the question must be asked: When it comes to laws, what is just and what is unjust? Imagine some antisocial elements one day decide that they believe some laws are unjust and decide to stop obeying them. Soon they indict more and more people into this movement and large sections of society are disobeying laws at large. This would gradually lead to the breakdown of all social structure and the society would descent into anarchy. Nothing good would be wrought from this, only pain, chaos and destruction. Thus, giving people the agency to disobey laws they believe unjust might lead to the breakdown of society altogether.
To conclude, this is a really nuanced issue and there is no one “easy” answer here. In my opinion, the benefits do outweigh the cons of allowing people in a society to disobey laws they find unjust while being responsible law-abiding citizen otherwise.
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Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 188, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'individuals'' or 'individual's'?
Suggestion: individuals'; individual's
...l order is necessary. This makes it the individuals responsibility to follow the laws of th...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 103, Rule ID: SHOULD_BE_DO[1]
Message: Did you mean ''?
...d not vice versa. Individuals should be law abiding citizens, true, but the laws of...
^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, however, if, may, really, so, third, thus, while, kind of, in my opinion, on the other hand
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 24.0 19.5258426966 123% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 16.0 12.4196629213 129% => OK
Conjunction : 23.0 14.8657303371 155% => OK
Relative clauses : 8.0 11.3162921348 71% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 41.0 33.0505617978 124% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 72.0 58.6224719101 123% => OK
Nominalization: 8.0 12.9106741573 62% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2465.0 2235.4752809 110% => OK
No of words: 520.0 442.535393258 118% => OK
Chars per words: 4.74038461538 5.05705443957 94% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.77530192783 4.55969084622 105% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.53037099392 2.79657885939 90% => OK
Unique words: 267.0 215.323595506 124% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.513461538462 0.4932671777 104% => OK
syllable_count: 789.3 704.065955056 112% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59117977528 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 10.0 6.24550561798 160% => OK
Article: 4.0 4.99550561798 80% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 3.10617977528 32% => OK
Conjunction: 4.0 1.77640449438 225% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 9.0 4.38483146067 205% => Less preposition wanted as sentence beginnings.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 26.0 20.2370786517 128% => OK
Sentence length: 20.0 23.0359550562 87% => OK
Sentence length SD: 37.3073949235 60.3974514979 62% => OK
Chars per sentence: 94.8076923077 118.986275619 80% => OK
Words per sentence: 20.0 23.4991977007 85% => OK
Discourse Markers: 3.92307692308 5.21951772744 75% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 4.97078651685 101% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 7.80617977528 26% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 10.0 10.2758426966 97% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 9.0 5.13820224719 175% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 7.0 4.83258426966 145% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.24042661151 0.243740707755 99% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0685214798312 0.0831039109588 82% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0564375350949 0.0758088955206 74% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.14806332554 0.150359130593 98% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0112054557038 0.0667264976115 17% => Paragraphs are similar to each other. Some content may get duplicated or it is not exactly right on the topic.
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 10.9 14.1392134831 77% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 59.64 48.8420337079 122% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.92365168539 39% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 9.9 12.1743820225 81% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 10.21 12.1639044944 84% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.36 8.38706741573 100% => OK
difficult_words: 123.0 100.480337079 122% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 7.0 11.8971910112 59% => Linsear_write_formula is low.
gunning_fog: 10.0 11.2143820225 89% => OK
text_standard: 10.0 11.7820224719 85% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 58.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.5 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.