A Group Act an Indvidual Thinks

Issues of Ethics and Civil Disobedience

Your paper should be 3-5 pages, with a minimum of 3 full pages. Make sure the essay is typed, double-spaced, in Times New Roman 12 pt. font, and with 1-inch margins. Underline your thesis statement and topic sentences on that final draft. Be sure that you illustrate your argument through well-selected quotes and that you explain each quote’s significance to your argument after the quote (or descriptive example, if the paper calls for it).

Choose one of the following topics for your paper. Use a five-paragraph structure with an introduction (with a thesis), at least three body paragraphs (with clear topic sentences), and a conclusion. Use specific quotes/examples for support. Keep Ethos Pathos and Logos in mind.

Please avoid saying I believe, and I feel. DO NOT use you or we in this paper because such pronoun usage in argumentative essays implicates the reader in your argument and may not accurately reflect the reader’s stance. In other words, you risk making generalizations (fallacy central) as well as polarizing your reader. You may use I for Topic #3 since you should be applying a well thought-out and well-depicted personal example for your argument.

Topic Four:

King says, My friends, I must say to you that we have not made a single gain in civil rights without determined legal and nonviolent pressure. Lamentably, it is a historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture; but, as Reinhold Niebuhr has reminded us, groups tend to be more immoral than individuals (568). Drawing upon King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail and George Orwell’s Shooting an Elephant, groups tend to be more immoral than individuals.

Include at least one quote from King and one quote from Orwell to support your argument. Come up with one sustained example to serve as the paper’s body paragraph proof. Orwell’s sustained example for his essay is that he kills an elephant in order to appease the crowd but winds up feeling morally corrupt because of his role in Burma’s colonial history.