Talk:Civil Disobedience (Thoreau)

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[edit] Anarchist

I don't think it's fair to call Thoreau an anarchist; because he specifically says that he would pay other taxes, such as the school tax or the highway tax...it's simply that he cannot support one ideal of the federal government at this time. He is not saying he wants no rules, he is saying he wants fair ones. Rikku 19:36, 30 December 2006 (UTC) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Rikku (talk • contribs) 13:57, May 15, 2006 (UTC)

Anarchism is against leaders, not laws. - Anarchist without an account

Tell that to the Oxford English Dictionary.71.61.64.113 (talk) 20:27, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Thoreau specifically said in Civil Disobedience "I ask for, not at once no government, but at once a better government". So therefore I wouldn't call Thoreau an anarchist. However, I think it's fine to say in the article that people have interpreted Civil Disobedience as having anarchistic views, however,they are wrong for blah blah blah reasons. 66.32.151.112 (talk) 22:54, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Civil Disobedience wasn't the only thing he wrote, and besides, that quote you gave can be interpreted as just meaning that he endorses a gradualist approach to an anarchist end. He expressed an anarchist outlook in other places, but also more ambiguous things as well. He didn't appear to be self-consciously anarchist, or to be trying deliberately to construct an anarchist political philosophy, but he often wrote things that sound very much like they don't leave much room for a legitimate State. -Moorlock (talk) 23:23, 21 February 2008 (UTC) For instance, from A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers:

“I have not so surely foreseen that any Cossack or Chippeway would come to disturb the honest and simple commonwealth, as that some monster institution would at length embrace and crush its free members in its scaly folds; for it is not to be forgotten, that while the law holds fast the thief and murderer, it lets itself go loose. When I have not paid the tax which the State demanded for that protection which I did not want, itself has robbed me; when I have asserted the liberty it presumed to declare, itself has imprisoned me. Poor creature! if it knows no better I will not blame it. If it cannot live but by these means, I can. I do not wish, it happens, to be associated with Massachusetts, either in holding slaves or in conquering Mexico. I am a little better than herself in these respects.… Thus it has happened, that not the Arch Fiend himself has been in my way, but these toils which tradition says were originally spun to obstruct him.… If, for instance, a man asserts the value of individual liberty over the merely political commonweal, his neighbor still tolerates him, that he who is living near him, sometimes even sustains him, but never the State. Its officer, as a living man, may have human virtues and a thought in his brain, but as the tool of an institution, a jailer or constable it may be, he is not a whit superior to his prison key or his staff. Herein is the tragedy; that men doing outrage to their proper natures, even those called wise and good, lend themselves to perform the office of inferior and brutal ones. Hence come war and slavery in; and what else may not come in by this opening?”

[edit] question..

Why is it that in all of the articles about essays written by people, there is never a section containing a word for word reproduction of the actual essay? I mean, I'm sure that would add understanding to what the essay is about...I'm sure it's in the public domain or something, right? 66.32.151.112 (talk) 19:30, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

The full text of such documents belong at Wikisource, not in an article. ---RepublicanJacobite_{The'FortyFive'} 23:51, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] "A Paraphrased Synopsis"?

Am I the only one who feels that this "paraphrased synopsis" section is highly questionable, and perhaps inappropriate? We do not include the full text of documents in articles, because that is what Wikisource is for, but neither should we include "paraphrased synopses" which give "only the important parts." This, obviously, calls for someone to make a judgment as to which parts are important and those that can be left out. Quotes from the document would be appropriate, certainly, within the context of an examination of the essay's influence or how different scholars have interpreted the importance of Thoreau's argument. But, a "paraphrased synopsis" is very troublesome to me precisely because it provides only bits and pieces, and does so in an unencyclopædic manner. ---RepublicanJacobite_{The'FortyFive'} 03:35, 6 March 2008 (UTC)