An evil deed is not redeemed by an evil deed in retaliation.
Interpretation
Retaliating against evil with more evil does not bring redemption or justice.
Coretta Scott King suggests that responding to wrongdoing with further wrongdoing does not correct the original wrong and often perpetuates a cycle of harm. True justice and healing come from breaking this cycle and responding with a moral and ethical approach, even in the face of injustice.
In practice
In a speech about nonviolent conflict resolution.
I've always felt that homophobic attitudes and policies were unjust and unworthy of a free society and must be opposed by all Americans who believe in democracy. The civil rights movement thrives on unity and inclusion, not division and exclusion. My husband's struggle parallels that of the gay rights movement.
...We have an historic opportunity for a great global healing and renewal. If we will accept the challenge of nonviolent activism with faith, courage, and determination, we can bring this great vision of a world united in peace and harmony from a distant ideal into glowing reality.
I think if people really read Martin Luther King, Jr., then they would begin to understand what he really represented.
It doesn't matter how strong your opinions are. If you don't use your power for positive change, you are, indeed, part of the problem.
Sometimes, I am also identified as a civil rights leader or a human rights activist. I would also like to be thought of as a complex, three-dimensional, flesh-and-blood human being with a rich storehouse of experiences, much like everyone else, yet unique in my own way, much like everyone else.
People don't ever have to starve to death; there are solutions. We have failed if we can't eradicate hunger in Africa and Ethiopia.
Everything in Louisiana is about layers. There are layers of race, layers of class, layers of survival, layers of death, and layers of rebirth. To live with these layers is to be a true Louisianian. This state has a depth that is simultaneously beyond words and yet as natural as breathing. How can a place be both other-worldly and completely pedestrian is beyond me; however, Louisiana manages to do it. Louisiana is spooky that way.
...chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas, and orangutans are thinking, self-aware beings, capable of planning ahead, who form lasting social bonds with others and have a rich social and emotional life. The great apes are therefore an ideal case for showing the arbitrariness of the species boundary. If we think that all human beings, irrespective of age or mental capacity, have some basic rights, how can we deny that the great apes, who surpass some humans in their capacities, also have these rights?
Our environments shape the way we see ourselves. If you have been condemned to live in an area that is pretty evidently a rat-run, then sooner or later you're gonna come to the conclusion that you're a rat.
Whatever you accept completely will take you to peace, including the acceptance that you cannot accept, that you are in resistance.
We know that the body needs bread, therefore we seek for bread for it: so must we seek for the food of the soul.
The punishment which the wise suffer who refuse to take part in the government, is to live under the government of worse men.
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