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_Depression -> Fighting with Candy (3/26/2010 1:38:36)
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I wrote this essay for a Philosophy course I recently took, to fulfill the requirements of the assignment "Using the works you were assigned from Plato's 'The Apology', King's 'Letters from Birmingham Jail' and Malcolm X's 'The Ballot or the Bullet', determine the best way to enact change in society."
Having never been one to really follow the expected norm, I quickly threw all three plans of action out and began anew, determining for myself the most effective way to enact change. I named both my idea, and the essay, "Fighting with Candy". I am open to all comments, criticism, and disagreements. The link to the comments page is located at the bottom of this post.
In conflict, there have been three clearly defined ways of planning resistance. On the most peaceful system, devised by Plato through his stories of Socrates, one would work for change through education, believing that following the law was just as important as changing it; however, this method is highly ineffective, especially in a system with corruption, a problem that would be the cause for needing change in the first place. The most aggressive form of resistance is offered by Malcolm X, requires its followers to employ physically violent opposition to injustice; while this form of resistance may be the most powerful in being noticed by society as a whole, it can easily come across as belligerent on the part of the aggressor and used as a defense to keep the injustice in place or – worse yet – increase the amount of injustice to help oppress the resistance movement. The more moderate form of resistance was devised by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. with the influence of revolutionaries like Mohandas Gandhi, and entails using illegal, yet peaceful, means of opposition to injustice, a term coined by Henry David Thoreau as "civil disobedience"; though this is not aggressive enough to warrant more reprisals, it is still providing the oppressors with reason to combat the resistance, because this means of disobedience still requires the use of illegal activities.
Truly, the best way to beat corruption and injustice is to use a more rudimentary tactic that plays into natural human greed. Instead of using one's resistance to punish the wicked, one should do everything in his power to reward the just. People, businesses, and governments all have a fear of being attacked, or resisted against. But as with a group of children, adults – be they individuals or corporations – learn to rebel against punishment, if they find it undeserved. If a man thinks he has been unjustly reprimanded for his actions or beliefs, he is within his rights to bring lawful charges against the offending party, and history tells us that the wronged man will often win his battle, assuming a jury of his peers has the final say in the matter. While punishing wrongdoing leads to short-term solutions, it is often only a matter of time before the punished party learns to work around the charges brought against it and devises a way to reinstate old practices again. In history, this has been thoroughly proven, most effectively by the treatment of the British against the North American colonies in the 1700s. The British Parliament focused its considerable military and political power in subduing those who were unhappy with legislation that levied unjust taxation on the colonists. By only trying to smother the flames of the discontent, the British government bred stronger and deeper contempt of the oppression, creating an inferno of anger that led to the eventual revolution of the North American colonists. In this way, the British attempts to punish the colonists for their actions only strengthened their resolve.
However, while punishment only breeds contempt and revolt, reward encourages repetition of good deeds. In a classroom of children, a teacher has a choice; he or she can choose to punish the wrongdoers in the class, alienating them and shaming them into following rules and protocol until the most devious can subvert the teacher's authority, possibly converting friends to their cause, or the teacher can choose to reward the behavior of good students. The process of rewarding the good students, a process dubbed by its creator as "fighting with candy", has a multi-faceted effect, every facet of which is positive. The most immediate effects are the direct encouragement and acknowledgement of good behavior, as well as the envy and possibly contempt of other students who were not rewarded. But in the long term, the envy and contempt felt by children who did not receive a reward often turns into the desire to change, to earn the same reward as the good child by conforming their attitudes to the one most likely to get recognized as good and rewarded. As for the child who originally received a reward, he or she is likely to continue the good behavior that had earned him or her a prize, in hopes of getting the same reward.
The implementation of this system of rebellion in conflict against any opposition, from a classroom of unruly children to the largest businesses, is inherently the same. Those fighting injustice of segregation in eateries like diners and food courts simply, as a group, shift their focus from punishing those segregationist establishments that would force them to eat in the streets, to rewarding those establishments that allow them equality in their patronage. By rewarding these businesses with increased profits, the civil rights activists encourage the establishments to keep their pro-equality ideals in place; at the same time, those businesses that have lost the support of the civil rights activists' business will be forced, by the necessity to profit and stay competitive, to change their segregationist views in order to win back some of their previous business. In time, as the understanding that only establishments that support equality will be in return supported with the patronage of civil rights activists, most businesses will change their policies, and segregationist ideals will dwindle. And over time, the ideas of equality amongst races will be understood so intrinsically that segregation will be taboo, even in the public sector.
Negativity can only breed more negativity; revolt will always be met with resistance. Malcolm X's aggression, Martin Luther King, Jr.'s civil disobedience, and even Socrates' lawful objection have all proven to be incapable of efficiently and effectively bringing about change. It has also been shown that fighting with candy, a system of rewarding the just rather than punishing the unjust, is the most powerful means of effectively changing precedent, policy, and law. From its application in a classroom to its potential to effect business practices, rewarding good behavior is a fully positive system of reinforcement that minimizes the amount of negative repercussion to the revolutionaries, while still bringing about significant change.
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