When I talk about civil disobedience, I ask myself two questions: how can breaking the law be considered as civil disobedience ? and when can it be morally justified ? actually to be able to answer these questions we have to understand civil disobedience. In fact, it can be described as an active refusal to obey laws and commands of a government. It is a type of civil resistance which is commonly considered as non-violent. This term was first used by Henry David Thoreau in his 1948 essay which later inspired many who claimed their protests were acts of civil disobedience. We see, for example, Gandhi’s resistance to British rule in India, and Martin Luther King’s U.S. civil rights movement. They both played an important role in social change. So, can civil disobedience be justified? Yes, it can if the cause for such an act is well founded and just. A person must have reasons for joining this kind of disobedience such as, for example, the feeling of injustice for the ill-treatment of blacks, or respect for human dignity, etc…. The Egyptian revolution of 1919 lead by Saad Zaghloul is considered one of the successful examples of non- violent civil disobedience against the British occupation of Egypt and Sudan.
After the Egyptian revolution of 2011 , I thought everything will change but I was wrong. Now everything is going wrong. At this juncture Egypt is considered as one of the most violent counties. I never thought that this could happen to the my country which should be full of peace and not anguish. I can’t stop myself from being scared. My heart breaks every time I know that someone died as I could not do anything to help them. There are innumerable losses that cannot be accepted. It is appalling how lots of banks are stolen into and people are being killed and kidnapped. I can’t sleep, when I close my eyes I only see nightmares. Sleeping should be appeasing but now it is not anymore. When I try to have fun, what comes to my mind suddenly is now you’re having fun and you can’t imagine the prodigious number of people who are crying and living in anguish. What I know is that I should think about what is happening around. I put myself in their shoes, to believe that this could happen to me or to my family. I wasn’t interested in politics before and I didn’t even know the name of the new government. I didn’t know anything at all, it was insignificant and ambiguous to me. But after the loss of my second cousin in Port Said my sister told me about everything that transpired there. I began to think and to feel sorry for everyone. When I knew that a civil disobedience will transpire, I believed that it will succeed just like what happened with Gandhi. That’s why I thought that the next day will be off. But I was wrong for the second time. When I woke up on Saturday, the first thing that I did was that I looked from a window just like a little girl who is running to watch the fireworks. But I was stupefied, it was like every Saturday. The street was full of people and cars. Even the delivery was working. I know this because I ordered something. Okay I know that this is a kind of a lax and indifferent attitude but I was hungry. I even thought that it was Friday because that day was too prosaic. And nothing really happened. I think that if this civil disobedience was well prepared it wouldn’t fail at all. Moreover, if some of the people did not preclude it and made it impossible to occur and heeded this action. Most of us were tentative about this decision and apprehensive. We should be unanimous, so that all the Egyptians participate in this action Now they nullified the civil disobedience and it lost it importance and meaning. If we try this another time and if it works it will mollify us.
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