Freedom has a Cost

   “…freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”

    This excerpt from Martin Luther King's "A Letter from a Birmingham Jail" is very compelling to me, because it really shows the truth of how freedom is not free, in a way that is very matter-of-factly.  As shown through many examples from many different time periods, freedom is not in any way free, it always comes with a cost, but in the end freedom is always worth it.  The major example of this was the African-American people that Martin Luther King Jr. fought for, and was the reason he wrote this letter to the eight clergymen.  The African-Americans all through the 1960s, had to have riots in order to have their voices heard in order to gain basic rights, such as a cup of coffee at a lunch counter.  These oppressed people had to demand their freedom from the white oppressor through riots and public speeches.  Famous speakers such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X fought vigorously to gain their rights and freedoms, and in the end, their fighting was worth it all, and the African-American people were finally able to get the rights that they deserved and the segregation went away.  Other events like this happened as early as when the English colonists were demanding freedom from the English in the eighteenth century.  Before the American Revolutionary War started in 1775, the colonists in the British North America, were being oppressed by the English with several very high taxes on everyday things such as the newspaper, pamphlets, and most of all, tea.  Some of the colonists were willing to abide by these taxes and accept them as a "duty" to England and they wanted to be close and loyal to the king.  Unlike these particular colonists, the majority of the English colonists were not willing to follow these outrageous taxes and began to rebel, and eventually fought the British in the American Revolutionary War.   The oppressed Americans had to demand their freedom from their oppressors, the British, through war, and because of that war they were finally able to gain their freedom.  Any oppressor, whomever it may be, will never want to give up his or her power freely to the people that they are oppressing.  As humans, we like having power and authority over others, and we will do anything to maintain that power.  An everyday example of this is bullying.  Bullies love to mess with or hurt other people, because they feel powerful, this makes them the oppressor of the kids or even adults, and the bullied individuals become the oppressed.  The oppressed, in order to obtain their "freedom" from the bullies, have to either tell the bullies themselves to stop, which would be to demand that they stop, or go to a teacher or principal so that they will talk to the bully and demand them to stop.  This also shows that everyday "freedoms" have to be fought for.  This is why Dr. King's statement is so compelling, because he is not only addressing the lack of freedoms for the African-American community, but is also addressing the little freedoms that have to be fought for by everyone, and he puts it into language that everyone can understand.  Another example of the oppressed having to demand freedom were the women of America in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.  These women had to fight in order to get their right to vote, just like all the (white) men were able to.  During this time the African-American women were trying to get their right to vote as well.  Sojourner Truth, was a well-known black feminist who demanded for the right to vote when she spoke in the Second Annual Convention of Women's Rights in Akron Ohio in 1852.  Other famous women such as Elizabeth Blackwell (1821-1910), wanted to pursue a higher education and to become a doctor, also had to demand her rights and freedom just to got to school and become a doctor.  Blackwell fought diligently to be accepted into a medical school and she was finally able to get into a medical school in 1847.  These real life examples of oppressed individuals having to demand their rights from the oppressors are what Martin Luther King Jr. was talking about in his "Letter from a Birmingham Jail."  This is why he wrote this letter to the eight clergymen who were attacking him and his actions to get rights for the African-American people.




Sources:
http://www.rise-of-womanhood.org/history-of-feminism.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Blackwell
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/changingthefaceofmedicine/physicians/biography_35.html