There are many things people may suffer from: poor weather conditions, inabilities to achieve goals, wrong international relations, etc. However, people cannot even guess that the majority of problems are based on wrong human decisions. With all possibilities people have in their lives, they are weak because of the failures they make unconsciously. There are three stories that can prove that the beginning of the 1970s was one of the periods when inappropriateness of people’s decisions influenced the lives of millions.
Howard Zinn’s Problem Is Civil Obedience discusses the events happened at the beginning of the 1970s. The author makes a strong declaration that the world suffers from a “topsy-turvy” diagnosis (Zinn 483). There are many wrong people are in jail and out of jail. All this is happening not because of the inability to follow the order and rules set by society. On the contrary, people can make mistakes because of their desire to be obedient. It is so easy to choose a wrong person as a leader of a country and believe in the power of his thoughts. A number of laws are introduced to people to be followed. However, if there is a person, who can answer which standards or conditions should be considered to check the appropriateness of law. Zinn underlines that it is one of the biggest human mistakes and delusions – the inability to realize that law is not always correct.
Another powerful work about the possibility of wrong decisions made by the government and people’s inabilities to realize these mistakes is created by Marian Wright Edelman. Commencement Address at Milton Academy is the author’s explanation of how wrong the President can be. At the beginning of the 1970s, the President Reagan started spending billions to develop powerful military programs to protect the citizens. At the same time, the costs for help that can be offered to homeless children, jobless Americans, and other people in need should be reduced considerably (Wright-Edelman 513). It was the President, who made wrong decisions and made people suffer. Still, his actions and suggestions cannot be regarded as inappropriate because they correspond to the law. It is probably the most terrible thing when a leader of a country is able to make wrong decisions and makes all citizens think that his actions are good and necessary.
In regards to the governmental mistakes and wrong decisions, Leonard Peltier offers to use a protest as the only form of communication with the help of which it is possible to be heard. In his Trail of Broken Treaties Protest, the events took place in November 1972 when Native Americans wanted to protect their rights and make the current American government follow the treaties developed before (Peltier 500). The author defines the necessity of protests as a hope and desire to talk directly to the President about the state of affairs. However, instead of achieving the compromise, the government used the power against its people that led to more misunderstandings.
In general, these three stories explain how wrong human decisions can be even if people are still confident in their correctness. The most terrible mistakes are those made by the government because the law can be used to justify the solutions. People should know that the consequences of their decisions are hard to predict and try to be fair with themselves as well as with everyone and everything around.
Works Cited
Peltier, Leonard. “The Trail of Broken Treaties Protest.” Voices of a People’s History of the United States. Ed. Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove. New York: Seven Stories Press, 2009. 500-504. Print.
Wright-Edelman, Marian. “Commencement Address at Milton Academy.” Voices of a People’s History of the United States. Ed. Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove. New York: Seven Stories Press, 2009. 512-515. Print.
Zinn, Howard. “The Problem Is Civil Obedience.” Voices of a People’s History of the United States. Ed. Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove. New York: Seven Stories Press, 2009. 483-489. Print.