Martin Luther King Jr’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” is an extremely powerful and effective argument. Technically he is addressing the clergymen, but more importantly this was published all over, so he in fact was reaching people all over the world. Simply put, he is addressing the issues of racism and segregation. There are several examples throughout the letter that depicts certain incidents where blacks and whites were distinctly treated differently. Throughout the whole letter he talks about how he is considering himself the voice of the people whom have been treated unfairly. There are a lot of very powerful arguments throughout the letter. One of my favorite points was, “Lamentably, it is an historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.” He is showing why he feels like he needs to finally speak out. He goes on to explain that in order to get recognized he must break the law, which is what he did.
Martin Luther King Jr. was so tired of hearing the word “wait” that he couldn’t stand the thought of waiting any longer. He argued that nothing was going to change if someone didn’t speak out and make the problems with society known. Because of this he was considered an extremist. He argued that there were all kinds of people in history that did the same things, just viewed in a different light. How was what he was doing any different?
The either-or logical fallacies were the most common throughout the letter. Most of the time he was saying either we make this change, or everything around us will stay the same. I spotted a hasty generalization in the first paragraph on pg. 162, and also name calling in the bottom sentence on pg. 157. More commonly they were seen in the form of begging the question. He is asking why his brother and sisters aren’t granted the necessary freedom that everyone is supposed to share.
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