Curtailment of free speech is rationalized on grounds that a more compelling American tradition forbids criticism of the government when the nation is at war... Nothing can be more destructive of our fundamental democratic traditions than the vicious effort to silence dissenters.
Interpretation
Free speech must be protected, especially during times of war, as silencing dissent undermines democracy.
In this quote, Martin Luther King, Jr. emphasizes the importance of free speech in a democratic society, particularly when the nation is involved in conflict. He warns that justifying the suppression of dissenting voices under the guise of patriotism severely threatens the foundational principles of democracy, leading to a chilling effect on discourse and the stifling of essential debates about governance and policy.
In practice
In a speech advocating for civil liberties at a public rally.
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.
Society's preservation against the unlimited violence of scandals lies in the mimetic coalition against the single victim and its ensuing limited violence. The violent death of Jesus is, humanly speaking, an example of this strange process.
If we live out of our memory, we're tied to the past and to that which is finite. When we live out of our imagination, _x000D_ we're tied to that which is infinite.
Of course I litter the public highway. Every chance I get. After all, it's not the beer cans that are ugly; it's the highway that is ugly.
To understand the heart and mind of a person, look not at what he has already achieved, but at what he aspires to.
If there be a God and one has never sought him, it will be small consolation to remember that one could not get proof of his existence.
There is the "you" that people see and then there is the "rest of you". Take some time and craft a picture of the "rest of you." This could be a drawing, in words, even a song. Just remember that the chances are good it will be full of paradox and contradictions.
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