Anonymity, Dissent, and Individual Integrity in America

Abstract

The restlessness of the sixties of the twentieth century has been exemplified particularly in the civil rights movement, in the student revolt, and in greatly expanded antiwar dissent. The background of this disquietude is rooted in the American tradition of dissent; in rejection of the alienation which has tended to accompany complex industrialism; and in the relatively great economic affluence which provides opportunities to think about injustice and the larger purposes of life. There is strong moral justification for the dissent of our day; and, in many respects, American moral consciousness is broader and deeper than in previous generations. For the most part, the black man has been treated as a thing, and he legitimately aspires to recognition as a human personality. The student revolt reflects a repudiation of the anonymity which so often accompanies a multiversity type of higher education. The antiwar movement represents a long-needed revolt against what is, in effect, a warfare state and a particularly unjust war in Vietnam. Although some of the dissent is doubtless a kind of compulsive revolt, much of it is an expression of genuine conscience. It is justified in terms of ends, and much of it in terms of means as well. In selecting means, the dissenter should give the benefit of the doubt to existing laws before adopting civil disobedience; he ought not to violate human personality, in the name of which he is speaking; and he ought to test his proposed action against the judgments of critics—even though he alone must make the final decision. In general, a conscientious dissenter may help overcome feelings of anonymity, counteract social inertia, and vindicate the integrity of personality.