PS/IS 686 | Brooklyn, NY

Grade 7 Humanities: Week of 4/20/2020: Thoreau Down Your Disobedience!

 

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Dear Families,

After spending quite a bit of time, reading, analyzing, discussing and writing about Thoreau’s work, we took all that knowledge and applied it creatively! Working independently or with partners, we created “found” poems, raps, or songs from Henry David Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience.  A “found” writing piece is one that is created using words and phrases that have been selected and rearranged from another text. The idea is to choose language that is particularly meaningful or interesting and organize the language in a creative flow.

A good way to start is to write down words, phrases, or quotations that are particularly meaningful from the text. In general, identifying between 15-25 different words or phrases will give plenty of ideas from which to choose when composing a new piece.

Once the written pieces were complete, we made audio recordings!

Here is my ‘Mr. Betts Style’ sample for the Thoreau Down:

🎧Ms. Sacilotto

Here is Mr. Wilson’s Thoreau Down Contribution:

🎧Mr. Wilson                                                                      

Everyone has their own process — be it independent or a collaboration with friends. This is how I got started. First, I found some passages from Civil Disobedience that really spoke to me . . .

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Then, I wrote some of the lines down, and tried some rhyming (as you can see, a lot of this ended up getting crossed out!) . . .

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By this draft, I had picked out some random music on YouTube because I liked the beat. I worked out some of the lines I was writing with the beat. The numbers in the margins are how many seconds of the music I have to say my lines.  The whole thing is still a hot mess at this point . . .

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By listening to the music I was able to get rid of more of the words and phrases that didn’t work. This is essentially the final piece . . .

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In the galleries below you will find the written & spoken words for these projects. It is also of note that students completed this project — many collaborating remotely — in quarantine. Thoreau would be proud 💐💐💐

Yours,

Ms. Sacilotto

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701 Student Gallery: Click the 🎧 to hear each piece!

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INTELLIGENCE by Max Shabatayev

Law never made men a whit more just. 

A common and natural result of an undue respect for law is, that you may see a file of soldiers, colonel, captain, corporal, privates, powder-monkeys and all, marching in admirable order over hill and dale to the wars, against their wills, aye, 

against their common sense and consciences. 

Now, what are they? Men at all? or small moveable forts and magazines, at the service of some unscrupulous man in power? 

The mass of men serve the State thus, not as men mainly, but as machines, with their bodies. 

They are the standing army, and the militia, jailers, constables, posse comitatus, &c. 

Such command no more respect than men of straw, or a lump of dirt. 

They have the same sort of worth only as horses and dogs. 

Others, as most legislators, politicians, lawyers, ministers, and office-holders, serve the State chiefly with their heads, and they are as likely to serve the devil, without intending it, as God. 

___________________________________________________

How does it become a man to behave toward this American government to-day? 

All men recognize the right of revolution; that is, the right to refuse allegiance to and to resist the government, when its tyranny or its inefficiency are great and unendurable. 

But almost all say that such is not the case now. But such was the case, they think, in the Revolution of ’75. 

At any rate, it is a great evil to make a stir about it.  

What makes this duty the more urgent is the fact, that the country so overrun is not our own, but ours is the invading army. 

 Of this, he says, every man shall judge for himself. 

Practically speaking, the opponents to a reform in Massachusetts are not a hundred thousand politicians at the South, but a hundred thousand merchants and farmers here, who are more interested in commerce and agriculture than they are in humanity, and are not prepared to do justice to the slave and to Mexico, cost what it may. 

____________________________________________________

I meet this American government, or its representative the State government, directly, and face to face, once a year, no more, in the person of its tax-gatherer;

 My civil neighbor, the tax-gatherer, is the very man I have to deal with, for it is, after all, with men and not with parchment that I quarrel, and he has voluntarily chosen to be an agent of the government. 

How shall he ever know well what he is and does as an officer of the government, or as a man, until he is obliged to consider whether he shall treat me, his neighbor, for whom he has respect, as a neighbor and well-disposed man, or as a maniac and disturber of the peace, and see if he can get over this obstruction to his neighborliness without a ruder and more impetuous thought or speech corresponding with his action? 

For it matters not how small the beginning may seem to be: what is once well done is done for ever. 

But, if I deny the authority of the State when it presents its tax-bill, it will soon take and waste all my property, and so harass me and my children without end. This is hard. This makes it impossible for a man to live honestly and at the same time comfortably in outward respects.

🎧 701 Max S

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STOP THE MACHINE

by

Eavan Anderson, Eleanor Bolas, and Ian Cameron (aka ABC)

Defender of the Constitution,

STOP THE MACHINE

It is a democracy

It makes it worse. 

I have imagined

Even useful systems 

Stop the machine

Defender of the Constitution, 

Tell me this,

Why does it cry and resist before it is hurt?

Why does it not cherish

The first blush of sin?

STOP THE MACHINE.

Even the Chinese philosopher,

Defender of the Constitution,

Is at the service of some unscrupulous man in power.

STOP THE MACHINE.

I do not hesitate to say,

In America to-day,

A spring, or a pulley, or a rope, or a crank,

BLEEDS TO AN EVERLASTING DEATH

With a slight moral tinge to it.

I stopped the machine.

I DECLINED TO PAY.

Essentially revolutionary

BALTIMORE

Defender of the Constitution,

They do nothing in earnest and with effect.

They will wait for others to remedy the evil.

Ha! Remedy would be worse than the evil.  

This is why we must

STOP THE MACHINE.  

BONUS CONTENT: Thoreau’s food metaphors

In the midst of a huckleberry field

An acorn and a chestnut fall side by side

And this kind of fruit

Is holding a pint of chocolate

🎧 701 Eavan & Eleanor & Ian

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THE BEST GOVERNMENT by John Butsikares

Can there not be a government

in which majorities do not

 virtually decide right

 and wrong,

 but conscience?

A government is best

which governs least

Governments show thus

how successfully men can be

imposed on,

even impose themselves,

For their own advantage

A government is best

which governs least

I think that we should be men first,

and subjects afterward. 

The mass of men serve the State, 

as machines, 

Even voting for the right is doing nothing for it. 

A government is best

which governs least

🎧 701 John B

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DEMOCRACY IS NOT THE LAST IMPROVEMENT by Mina Aronczyk & Skye Mcarthur

Like birth and death

I quietly declare war with the state

Enemy within its walls

Is democracy such as we know it the last improvement possible in the government?

No. 

If injustice is part of the necessary friction

The true place for a just man is a prison

Unjust laws exist

Shall we be content to obey them 

Or shall we endeavor to amend them

They say that they know not what to do, and do nothing

They are as likely to serve the devil, without intending it, as God

Such command no more respect than man of straw or a lump of dirt

Impossible for a man to live honestly in this world

When his country has more reason to despair of him

🎧701 Mina & Skye

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RESPECT by Abigail Ivry & Kelly Vaysman

Men, expedient, and convenient.

Even successful men can be imposed on because they are physically the strongest.

The mass of men that serve the state, serve not as men, but as machines.

I heartily accept that a government is best when it governs not at all.

This American government has not the vitality and force of a single living man.

The government would not have consented to this measure but they are a standing army.

Let every man know what kind of government would command his respect.

🎧 701 Abigail & Kelly

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MY LIFE’S PURPOSE by Evie Steen-Pelletrea & Martin Zoi

Poem 1:

That would not be violent and bloody,

The state will commit violence and shed not guilty blood

But instead the innocent shall die an unwanted death.

Poem 2:

If my life’s purpose is to stop

I will stop.

If my life’s purpose is to write 

I will write.

If my life’s purpose is to stand by James K. Polk

I will do whatever I can to change that purpose.

🎧 701 Evie & Martin

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A CONFIDENT MINORITY by Edie Wadman

Written on paper, 

not fought in wars.

A non-violent act studied by philosophers.

Vote based on conscience.

Don’t be self-conscious.

Do what you think is right with confidence. 

Majority is minuscule compared to the minority.

The minority can have ideas beyond the ordinary.

Beyond the ordinary is right, justice, thoughts

That ought to be listened to by the majority.

Think based on conscience.

If you are self-conscious

Get over it, learn to be confident. 

If you are confident,

You can make the world listen,

Ideas so bright, they almost glisten.

A world in which the physical is critical to laws

The minority is minorly flawed,

But their ideas are based off of conscience,

Because only them are not self-conscious,

They’re confident.

🎧 701 Edie

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WHO CARES ABOUT JAMES POLK by Arden Burkett & Molly Nowlan

Walked up the path to Walden Pond,

Into my log cab-in.

Welcome to jail you broke the law, 

Whoa, am I gonna fit in?

Good thing that it was only for one night,

Although I believe that the gov’t is not right

This is all so crazy

Everybody needs to be equal  <3

Majority rule is not based on justice 

What we need in this country is fairness

It’s when the “Rule of Expediency” came to mind 

And the basis of majority rule

And the basis of majority rule

And the basis of majority rule 

So I put my foot down

The government sucks,

And it really needs a lot of fixing

Who cares about James Polk

Who cares about James Polk

I got my hands up,

I won’t pay taxes

You know I’m gonna be okay

Yeah, Who cares about James Polk 

yeah, who cares about James Polk

🎧 701 Arden & Molly

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ACCEPTANCE by Teddy Blomstom

I heartily accept the motto, “That government is best which governs least,” 

but it is not the less necessary for this. 

This American government, what is it but a tradition? 

It has not the vitality and force of a single living man.

But to speak practically and as a citizen,

I see that appeal is possible with the original presumption

about time and abuse.

Though a recent, the people would not have consented to this measure.

Such a man as an American government can make though he who gives himself entirely

this fellow-man appears to them useless and selfish.

We must respect effects and teach the soul.

It is a matter of conscience and religion, 

and not desire of rule or benefit.

Of people in government often think that they are too high-born to be propertied to be a

secondary at control. 

I answer that he cannot without disgrace be associated with it.

So they necessarily resist it for the most part.

And at last I finish with this principle being admitted.

🎧701 Teddy

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ACTION FROM PRINCIPLE by Arlo Varon & Zev Thompson

This American government, — what is it but a tradition

It is the fault of the government itself

It makes it worse

It’s very constitution is the evil 

Why is it not more apt to anticipate and provide for reform

Why does it not cherish its wise minority

Why does it cry and resist before it is hurt

Why does it not encourage its citizens to be on the alert to point out its faults

And do better than it would have them

Why does it always crucify Christ

And excommunicate Copernicus and Luther

And pronounce Washington and Franklin rebels?

Can the people be a government, with conscience to decide, not majorities?

Where conscience decides right and wrong?

Why should we have a conscience, if we have to resign it to those higher up?

The well-disposed may cultivate a respect for law

Before conscience

And this undue respect

May result upon them marching against conscience

This undue respect

May result in seeing soldiers, as admirable and patriotic, as they march to war

Against their heart

Are they men?

A patriot, or an opposition to humanity?

A citizen, or a subject following an unscrupulous, damnable government?

The latter for both

We must put our conscience first and act as subjects next

Law never made men a whit more just.

Men serve the state with their consciences

and so necessarily resist it for the most part.

All machines have their friction; 

and possibly this does enough good to counterbalance the evil.

If the injustice is part of the machine, let it go, let it go

Action from principle, 

the perception and performance of the right, 

changes things and relations: 

it is essentially revolutionary.

🎧 701 Arlo  

🎧 701 Zev

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NO TO POLK by David Belikoff & Michelle Flaksin

Once there was a president named James Polk,

he was such a crook,

Thoreau was so sick,

which means he wanted to write a book.

YO YO YO.

Ayo Thoreau was sick of all the nonsense

he wrote a bleeping book to touch on all the concepts.

Witness the present Mexican War,

and that’s why people looked into this more.

Yet such as these even commonly esteemed good citizens.

Some of them needed some medicines

OHHHHHH SHOTS FIRED.

I think that we should be men first,

so we don’t disperse.

A wise man will only be useful as a man.

Because people like us don’t ran.

It is truly enough said

IT’S TIME TO GO TO BED

🎧 701 David & Michelle

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HE WHO GIVES HIMSELF ENTIRELY by Isabelle Smith

Power is once in the hands of the people

But because they are physically the strongest

He who gives himself entirely

They are commonly treated as enemies

Now what are they?

Why has every man a conscience, then?

They have the same sort of worth only as horses and dogs

Law never made men a whit more

He who gives himself entirely to his fellow men

Appears to them useless and selfish

All men recognize the right of revolution

But such was the case, they think 

In the Revolution of ‘75

There are nine hundred and ninety-nine patrons

Of virtue to one virtuous man

He who gives himself entirely 

🎧 701 Isabelle

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HEARTS AND MINDS by Nico Rozner

(Thoreau)

Welcome to the US of A, glad you could make the trip 

The oasis far away from Britain’s iron grip 

I ‘m H.D Thoreau, a resident of this place of rest 

A haven for the wayward, that’s to say, if you can pay the rent 

(Polk)

Understand that if you try to stop my plans you’ll come to harm 

I’m James K Polk, and I’ve got quite a good bit of charm

I eschewed the grandeur, built a land for all that’s free of smarm 

(Thoreau)

But now we’re trapped out here on our little western farms

You blunder in and wonder if 

Your family can make the trip? 

A hundred twits with guns and clips 

Have tried their luck and lost the bet 

(Polk)

I’ve funded it! I’m one with it!

So watch your lip or run the risk

‘Cus if you’re here to plunder it

You might just end up under it

(Thoreau)

Be human, have a conscience, follow laws and free will dies

(Polk)

You can make them, you can break them, stay the course and stay alive

(Thoreau)

The majority can rule, we will beat the test of time

(Polk)

But you know that in the end, it’s all about the people’s

(Both)

Hearts and minds

(Thoreau)

Hearts and minds

(Polk)

Winning the fight

(Thoreau)

Hearts and minds

 

(Thoreau)

You want to see the profits of democracy? Then go and see ‘em 

Across the street a bunch of freaks are playing colosseum 4 

Honestly? Was the world you wanted what you got to see 

When you were dropping crosses into boxes behind polling screens? 

Was dropping bombs your chosen option? Did you vote for screams? 

Was the apocalypse your politician’s policy? 

Did you put stock in their prepostering and prophecy? 

A shining future built on squabble free equality? 

That every day you’d get your plate of steak and collard greens? 

That the human race was capable of anything but wanton greed? 

But now that world is gone and what lived on is gone to me 

That freedom you so wanted’s now the cost of living comfortably 

Peace is just a product with a focus test of billions 

And the test was unsuccessful so they altered it’s description 

What good is justice if it always comes with a cost?

If the judges hearts are as cold as permafrost

(Polk)

Impressed? I raised the stakes, returned this land to vibrance 

Witness as I raise estates from mud and random violence 

Business is the way to stay the bloody hand of tyrants 

If you don’t agree, please remain silent

A grip of iron never tires 

Head of ire, lead and wires 

Neon veins in ancient spires 

Pump the cash and I respire 

(Thoreau)

Your moral compass is ash, I didn’t light the fire 

But I can always lend a hand in sweeping up the pyre 

(Thoreau)

You can profit, you can prosper, but you’ll need to simplify

(Polk)

We will take the land that’s ours, and America will rise

(Thoreau)

The majority can rule, we will beat the test of time

(Polk)

But you know that in the end, it’s all about the people’s

(Both)

Hearts and minds

(Thoreau)

Hearts and minds

(Polk)

Quarters and dimes

(Thoreau)

Hearts and minds

 

I’ve got your interests in mind, no need to be alarmed

My gilded heart beats forever on to mend the scars 

I built an ark out of tiny homes and trendy bars

(Polk) 

I’m down to earth, but you my friend are up to Mars.

We’re making progress, so why do you insist on feeling blue?

I gave families a chance to move and start anew

(Thoreau)

Polk’s an overlord taxing on your survival 

Out to murder competition then sit back and hike the price up 

(Polk)

Oh no – A society trapped in a snow globe? 

No surprises, the rapture’s a no-show 

Undeniably tragic, there’s no hope 

The wild west is savage, it’s no home 

Until we came to manage the whole show 

Took the glitz and the glamour and show boats 

Built a bastion for man for my ‘folio 

(Thoreau)

You’ve dealt those people a low blow! 

(Polk)

With just a bit of war I came and tamed these earthly wastes 

I built a paradise, you might as well desert your faith 

(Thoreau)

Long ago, we made first contact at those pearly gates

Now we’re evicting natives in the spring of eighteen thirty-eight 

(Thoreau)

If you listen to your conscience, then goodness will arise

(Polk)

Let me tell you, I know Thoreau is an anarchist in disguise

(Thoreau)

The majority can rule, we will beat the test of time

(Polk)

But you know that in the end, it’s all about the people’s

(Both)

Hearts and minds

(Thoreau)

Hearts and minds

(Polk)

Winning the fight

(Both)

Hearts and minds

(Thoreau)

 Hearts and minds

🎧 Coming Soon!

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DISOBEDIENCE by Jeremiah Darrell

America: “Land of the Free”

Yet trying to break free

From these shackles

Is considered

Disobedience.

Strip me of the stars

And stripes

If I’m a public nuisance

For standing for justice

And equality.

Of what this land was built on,

Disobedience lays 6 feet underground. 

🎧 701 Jeremiah

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702 Student Gallery: Click the 🎧 to hear each piece!

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WORDS I LIKE by Daniel Rodionov & Julian Zimmermann & Vayden Bayross

Government

Laws 

Injustice 

The Majority Rule

Conscience

The Rule of Expediency

Those are my key terms, yeah, I like them a whole lot

Government, Government, what should I do with you?

Why do you let the single ones rule all of you? Yeah

Laws, the most unfair things on planet Earth, 

Why are they all so biased, did you, yet again, let the single ones do your job?

 It’s the majority’s job.

 Leave       the laws        alone! 

We really don’t understand, why are you so corrupt?

 Everything you do just seems unjust. Yeah, Yeah

Government, Government, what should I do with you?

Why do you let the single ones rule all of you? Yeah

Injustice

It’s like it was made to stick to us, the majority, yeah, but why not the single ones?

Why why, why not the single ones, why why?  

Conscience something I like to feel

It leads me to becoming the correct person 

To become a person with the ultimately best behavior. Yeah 

Government, Government, what should I do with you?

Why do you let the single ones rule all of you? Yeah

Rule of Expediency, 

Makes you do something that is mostly only convenient to you 

And that is how the government and the single rulers are acting towards us. Yeah 

The Majority Rule 

My favorite, this was the biggest thing ever created towards human beings

It was made to last 

But the government made it have a blast and disappear until someone saves it. Yeah Yeah

Government, Government, what should I do with you?

Why do you let the single ones rule all of you? Yeah

 

This is how the correct humanity government should be! Yeah

🎧 702 Daniel & Julian & Vayden

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INDIVIDUALITY by Hudson Ivers & Megan Nie & Nicky Babizhayeva

The weight of the moment,

The feeling of someone on your shoulder all the time

Nerves going up your back in fear and shame

The thought of despair,

Paper falling in… 

T

H

E

     S

     L

     O

     T

Head buried down low

Side with common sense

One in a million.

Standing for my opinion

Oh it’s so intense

Others

Set a path to misery, but I AM the ONE.

Going down in history

Low Low down 

One in a million part of the mass

The time to believe is about to pass

Loww Loww down 

Up against the harsh

Stand up…;

Don’t be a part of the crowd.

Low Low Down

THE ONE.

THE ONLY ONE

Unjust. 

Firing it in the air

Going to waste like you just don’t care

Useless.

Foolish.

UNJUST.

This is broken 

Not all of us

So just give us all a chanannnce 

A chance to BELIEVE…

A chance to HOPE…

A chance to be HEARD…

A chance to be FREE…

A chance to LIVE…

Low Low down 

One in a million part of the mass

The time to believe is about to pass

Loww Loww down 

Up against the harsh

Stand up…;

Don’t be a part of the crowd.

Low Low Down

THE ONE.

THE ONLY ONE

Beliefs.

Reality.

Completely out of order

Truth be told

You fear reality

Don’t hold it in

Just let it show

Be the one you were made to be

Morning.

Night.

Everyday of the year

Be the one who you really are

Show your true self

Morning.

Night.

This whole year

But most importantly;

Just be yourself.  

Side with common sense

One in a million.

Standing for my opinion

THE ONLY ONE.  

Nerves going up your back in fear and shame

Unjust

Foolish.

Beliefs.

Reality.

You fear reality

Just be yourself.  

Show your true self

Be the one who you really are

🎧 702 Hudson & Megan & Nicky

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GOVERNMENT by Jessica Oviedo

The government is best which governs least.

Government is at best but an expedient,

a whole country unjust.

Governments show thus how successfully men can be imposed on,

even impose on themselves.

This government

does not keep the country free.

This government

does not educate.

The machine of government is of injustice. 

I ask

for a better government. 

🎧 702 Jessica

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HUMANITY AND JUSTICE by Daria Golitsyna

I believe law never made men a whit more just

Though general laws of humanity and justice must.

I was put into jail for one night,

And since then, I see the light. 

I ask the government for a bit more

Than to be abused and perverted like before

I know our government isn’t so perfect

But a virtuous man commands his respect.

The government non-consciously thinks at night

So I cast my vote, perchance, as I think right.

I am not vitally concerned that this right should prevail,

In our government, a just man will be locked up in jail.

That government is best which governs least. 

I heartily accept that motto since when I was released.

🎧702 Daria

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WHAT IS AN AMERICAN? by Simona Heifetz

The American, 

Revolutionary, 

Permitted, 

Honesty, 

Lived,

Free.

The American, 

Blood, 

Evil, 

Slavery, 

Government, 

Enemy, 

Vote, 

Whole influence.

🎧 702 Simona

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GOVERNMENT by David Krol & Michael Ivanushkin & Lawrence Luo & Tyler Mui

A better government,

a standing government,

an American government,

a government that is best.

That government must not get in the way of the American people.

Keep the country free, settle in the west, educate,

the people have done all that.

So,

Let every man make known,

what kind of government would command his respect,

and that will be one step toward obtaining it.

A better government, 

An American government,

The government that is best, 

The government that governs le(a)st.

🎧 702 David & Michael & Lawrence & Tyler

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THE INDIVIDUAL by Ava Maddox & Dea Yavich & Marley Kim

 I have imagined a higher and independent power, 

The government is best which governs not at all, 

It divides the individual, separating the divine as a manic and disturber, 

The injustice is part of the machine; this American government, 

Subjects of shame, worse than evil,

The majority rule cannot be based on justice, 

The injustice is part of the machinery of society

 the machine will wear out. 

***

It does not keep the country free, 

it divides the individual 

Men can be imposed on a history and a gossip 

They force us to become themselves 

Nor because this seems fairest to minority,

Must the citizen resign his conscience?

🎧 702 Ava & Dea & Marley

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CITIZENS MUST NOT by Selena Ma

Can there not be a government in which majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, 

but conscience?

Must the citizen ever for a moment,

 or in the least degree, 

resign his conscience to the legislators? 

Why has every man a conscience then?

The practical reason why,

When the power is once in the hands of the people,

A majority are permitted, and for a long period continue,

To rule is not because they are most likely to be in the right,

Nor because this seems fairest to the minority,

But because they are physically the strongest.

🎧 702 Selena

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THE MAJORITY by Josh Podolsky & Ryan Levitskiy

For the majority rules, 

for there should be no government, for they can’t answer everything, 

of the people, for they should decision

A majority decides the right and the wrong, 

governments do not decide questions of right and wrong.

The government should be chosen by the self-government, 

who should choose not by law, 

but by the thought of right.

🎧 702 Josh & Ryan

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THE AMERICAN by Emily Avshalumova & Isabel Krupnik

Henry David Thoreau, 

Civil Disobedience, 

That government is best which governs not all, 

The standing army is only an arm of the standing government, 

Citizens shall not follow the law if the law is unjust

The majority is not your conscience,

You should choose upon your sense not among the population,

A government cannot be based on justice with majority, 

Justice cannot control conscience, 

With this said, do not lose your inner voice for the majority. 

Thoreau refuses to pay tax,

He was in protest against slavery and the Mexican War,

He believes in only two laws, 

The laws of men and the higher laws of God and humanity

If the rules of men are unjust, 

Then one has the right to disobey them.

He rebelled against his own,

The American.

Slavery is not right,

He declared to fight for the Mexican although he was indeed from America, 

His fighting helped but majority did not, 

He lost.

🎧 702 Emily & Isabel

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PEOPLE MUST ACT by Darnell Muyeeb

That government is best
which
governs not at all.

The government itself,
which
is only the mode which
the people
have chosen to execute
their will,

is equally liable
to be abused
and perverted
before
the people can act through it.

🎧 702 Darnell

*************************************************************************************

NOT TOO SOON TO REBEL by Oliver Clubb

A government in which majority rules cannot be based on justice

The mass of the men serve the state as machines

They are the standing army

They have the same worth as dogs

A government such as this cannot be based on justice

It is a disgrace to us 

As people, and as a country

When a sixth of the population are slaves

Disgrace is common

And a whole country is overrun

It is not too soon to rebel

🎧702 Oliver

*************************************************************************************

CONSCIENCE vs. CONVENIENCE by Tabor Axelrod-Paoli

Masses

do

as

masses

Will

For its own sake

and

no one

else.

And if the matter is left to conscience

Indifference shall fall upon us.

For conscience often comes and goes.

Convenience is all that masses know.

Screenshot 2020-04-22 at 11.33.26 PM

Digital Art Version of Poem by Tabor AP