Oscar Wilde's Argument Against Disobedience

Irish author, Oscar Wilde, once said, “Disobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is man’s original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion.” Disobedience is the failure or refusal to obey rules. Wilde claims that disobedience is a trait that is vital to social progress. In the play, “Julius Caesar” by William Shakespeare, Shakespeare follows the life of a prosperous Roman politician who surround himself around deceitful people. Caesar’s was stabbed to death by his associate, Brutus, who was motivated by Cassius, Caesar’s other associate.Caesar’s largest support system came from Antony. The characters in Julius Caesar proves that disobedience is a trait that is critical to human progression.

Disobedience is a valuable human traits because through disobedience it have bring great change in the society which have impact all people around the world. For example people who disobedience the law to bring change in their society are such as Martin Luther king, Malala yousafzai, and Mahatma gandhi. These three people had a great impact on people's lives and change the society forever by disobedience.

Human beings possess several virtues that differentiate them from other creatures and can use them in ways that represent their perceptions of social order. Surprisingly, Oscar Wilde believes that disobedience is an original virtue of every human and that it is responsible for progress and development. While Wilde’s claim is not entirely accurate, it is largely valid as evidenced by the recent events across the world, including the US, that have led to positive outcomes in spite of being termed and perceived as acts of disobedience.

Disobedience has promoted social progress various times in the past by allowing people to speak up against an unjust government. For example, Henry Thoreau in “Civil Disobedience” brought up the role of disobedience in the American Revolution when he stated, “All men recognize the right of revolution… to resist, the government, when its tyranny are great and unendurable” (Thoreau 3). Consequently, disobedience was necessary in the American Revolution in order for the colonists to gain independence from the British government, after all the unjust treatment that the colonists endured, such as excessively high

Disobedience is an important force in our society and helps bring about necessary social progress because it will lead to superior lives for its citizens. Oscar Wilde believed that through disobedience there is man’s original virtue. He asserts that civil disobedience promotes social progress. I agree with Wilde's belief because looking throughout centuries, society has shown a variety of situations with the act of practicing disobedience,and have achieved their goal.

Disobedience always comes with a reason, some do it to go against something that is wrong others do it for attention or because they do not care about the situation. When there is an unjust law that is putting someone down or is oppressing it, people will begin to go against the law and not stand around while everyone including themselves gets hurt. Just Laws are to help and to keep everyone safe and unjust laws are made for minorities to stay away from the high-class group who want nothing with them. Sadly today there are still unjust laws to put people down but they are not standing around to let it happen. Martin Luther King could not watch his brothers and sisters be constantly put down so he went against unjust laws to stand his grounds. Antigone shared similarities when she went against king Creon rules rule to not bury her brother Polyneicês, she knew the consequences but paid no minds and stood her ground and kept doing what she has planned to do.

I strongly agree with what Oscar Wilde’s statement. Stating that “disobedience is man’s original virtue” is saying that we as people know more about disobedience than anything else. Many people would say that disobedience holds a great deal with the way people carry themselves. To not accept disobedience, you will have to work really hard on how you can change that and make things better. There are many different types of disobedience. For example, there is civil disobedience which carries a great deal with the law and how you act to the laws.

The author exemplifies the ways that disobedience helps the society and its contribution to furthering the human race but notes on the fact that blind obedience may eventually account for the end of civilization.

An object at rest will remain at rest and an object in motion will remain in motion unless acted upon by an unbalanced force. Newton’s first law of motion identifies what is needed to produce change. Oscar Wilde shared similar observations when he said, “Disobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is man’s original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion.” Both Newton and Wilde recognized how force was essential in order to successfully achieve change. Although Wilde was an influential leader in the late 1800s, his ideas are still applicable to today’s world just like Newton’s laws of motion. The force of disobedience and rebellion has followed Wilde’s claim by historically altering the world and continuing to serve as a powerful platform for change.

The term disobedience can be interpreted differently depending on how someone looks at it. Martin Luther King Jr. for instance once said: “one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws”. A moral responsibility, to not only respect someone's action but to respect it even if it's disobeying the law that they believe are unjust. Which this portrays that everyone has a voice and it should be heard no matter what. Society should not be the judge because of our voices.

Many of the problems we face in today’s society are a result of disobedience. In 2016, there were over 10 million crimes in the United States, over 500,000 of which were violent crimes, resulting in over 17,000 deaths (Crime). All of these crimes were acts of disobedience because the people were breaking the law. Laws are put in place to maintain the integrity of society and keep people safe. The number of innocent lives lost would dramatically increase if people did not break the law, not to mention all of the injuries caused by the crimes as

Throughout life we are told not to do anything bad and to not break the rules, however how is a person supposed to learn from what they do wrong? Oscar Wilde once wrote, “Disobedience in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is a man’s original virtue…,” through historical evidence this statement is made true because without minor disobedience and rebellion, we wouldn’t have the basic human rights that we have today. In the second part of his quote, Wilde makes a point that through the disobedience and rebellion of historical figures, social progress would not have been made, and the shape of American culture wouldn’t be the way it is today.

Disobedience has been a man’s virtue ever since laws have been constructed. As a progression that has developed in our society , it is safely to indicate that disobedience is morally acceptable by the common people. In order for change, people have demonstrated  disobedience successfully to promote social progress, change is impossible without disobedience.Our society has failed to realize that there is no such thing a “perfect society”. There are people in our society who agree with change and would sacrifice themselves for it through violence and multiple times of rejection. Many individuals known as the majority simply do not like change. This majority is the group that construct these laws that we must follow.  Thoreau states ,” A majority is permitted , and for a long period continue, to rule, is not because they are mostly likely right, nor because this seems fairest to the minority,  but because they are physically the strongest.” Although we do perceive the system as the strongest, citizens still use disobedience to challenge the system’s authority. Disobedience is a man’s virtue when our natural rights are being violated by the majority . In order for change to occur the common people must use disobedience to fight the injustice in their society to promote social progress.

Disobedience was strong when it came to Nelson Mandela. He became an advocate for civil disobedience and managed to become the very first black president of South Africa (Pechey, 2008). He was known to use his voice not only for speech, but as well as the brutality used to cease the Apartheid government of South Africa. What does Apartheid mean? It is meant to be used as an insurance non colored people who covered 20 percent of the nation’s population who would maintain the governing statues of the country Evans, 2015). The South African government grew violently in the process to divide the native Africans from their families and their homes as they were not viewed the same as Europeans (Engler, 2013). Nelson Mandela used his voice to protest

Thoughts of disobedience and rebellion have existed for almost as long as the first law or rule that could be broken. These thoughts come naturally to us, being humans we are curious and we wonder, what would happen if we were to do something different, something off the beaten path. This curiosity has fueled, our evolution, our development to the beings that we are now. It has spawned the thoughts of morality and justice that caused the subject of this essay, civil disobedience. People, when they are dissatisfied, naturally become pent up and temperamental, a prelude to actions taken to resolve the dissatisfaction. Throughout history this element of human nature surfaced to be witnessed numerous times: riots, revolts, rebellions, civil wars, revolutions, and movements. Previously, we devolved to using violence and brute force to accomplish what we wanted but as time passed we evolved to be more civilized. Civil Disobedience, a way of expressing our dissatisfaction of the current situation by peacefully going against the status quo, has proven an effective and efficient agent of change because of the moral implication it imposes and the attention it garners.