In Distrust of Movements :: Analysis, Wendell Berry

Humans require improvement, humans crave progress, and humans crave identity. For many, these cravings are satisfied within the ideas and actions behind complaisant movements. According to Dictionary.com, the description of a social movement is, a group of people with communal ideology who try together to achieve certain general goals (n.d.). Frequently, these social movements center around a singular issue. In his essay titled In Distrust of Movements, Wendell berry (2000) refers to single-issue movements as hopeless (p.333). He writes, I drive had a number of useful conversations about the necessity of acquire out of movements even movements that have seemed necessary and dear to us when they have lapsed into self righteousness as movements seem almost eer to do (p.331). Berry is incorrect in his belief that single-issue movements are toothless and inevitably fail, and flagrantly disregards history in making such an assertion. Since the orgasm of the printing pr ess, human communication has grown exponentially. The 20th century is sure as shooting no exception to this trend as we have seen in the climax of radio, television, and the internet. The ease of communication allowed the voice of the masses to be readily heard, and has turn out advantageous for social activists and the causes they championed. Such advantages did not go to waste as we have witnessed in movements like the civil rights movement or handsome Trade. Even today, we hear the cries of the Occupy Wall Street protestors. The truth is, liberalist movements and their political pull are here to stay and contrary to Berrys (2000) belief, those that grow around a single issue are just as successful as their multi-faceted counterparts. To give an example, the aforementioned genteel Rights Movement stands as a prominent specimen of a supercilious single-issue cause. Clear and precise, the goal of this cause was to grant African Americans the same ratified rights allo wed to any other American citizen. This effort ultimately led to such legislation as the American Civil Rights Act of 1964 (The Civil Rights Movement, n.d.), and the bring together Housing Act of 1968 (Fair Housing Laws, n.d.). Berry (2000) asserts that one of the major faults in movements is that They almost always fail to be radical enough, dealing finally in effects rather than causes (p.331). What was the Civil Rights Movement though, provided a solution to an effect rather than a cause?