"Self Reliance" Response-Society

How does (and should) a person define his/her place in society? (what does Emerson mean by "society" anyhow?)

One of Emerson's opinion about society is on page 24, "Is it so bad, then , to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood." The people who emerson talked about in this quote, Luther, Galileo, Newton, etc, are all important and wise people in the world today. we, as a society, listen to what they say because they were intelligent, but these people were misunderstood and were outcasts but as they grew up they came out to be on top. These men and women may have had different opinions and did not conform to other people's thoughts which made them an outcast but it is so important to have your own opinion and to think for yourself. That is what Emerson is saying in this passage. In a society, each individual person should be independent and unique. These men in Emerson's quote were misunderstood but they followed their thoughts and opinions and later on became understood.

Quran Burning

Rauf said, "I am prepared to consider meeting with anyone who is seriously committed to pursuing peace." I agree with this quote. After 9-11, I believe it is important to try to make peace, but burning the Quran is doing the exact opposite. The constitution states that we need to respect the freedom of religion. If we do what this article is saying, we are neglecting other religious views. The 9-11 attacks were awful, and I understand the need for revenge, but if we burn the Quran, we are initiating war. If we do this, we are doing exactly what these terrorists did to us. The terrorists who flew the plans into the twin towers were terrible people, but we cannot make the assumption that all Muslims are terrorists too. If we burn the Quran, yes, we are hurting those terrorists and their religion, but we are also hurting the thousands other people who are not terrorists and who believe in that religion.

The American Crisis Response

Thomas Paine used the quote, "These are times that try men's souls." He is talking about the Revolutionary War and what the choices are on approaching this war. Are they going to back down because there are bombs and guns and are they going to fight and stick by the Declaration of Independence? In my opinion, this reading was more of a motivational speech. It used the quotes, "God Almighty will not give up a people to military destruction, or leave them unsupportedly to perish, who have so earnestly and so repeatedly sought to avoid the calamities of war, by every descent method which wisdom could invent." This quote is talking to Americans and he is saying, are we going to back down and ignore the Declaration of Independence or are we going to stick by it and fight? "I call not upon a few, but upon all: not on this state or that state, but on every state; up and help us; lay your shoulders to the wheel; better have too much force than too little, when so great an object is at stake."