[slg]

>Gandhi, MLK, and the U.S. Founding Fathers were all criminals of their times. Sometimes the world needs people to break the law to show how broken the law really is.

Except those individuals fought the laws and the people behind them. They did not simply try to circumvent the unjust laws. It is tougher to take the moral high-ground when you aren't striving for change. These people are not battling some great injustice, they are breaking [perhaps unjust] laws for their own personal gain (either monetarily or recreationally).

[indrax]

Lots of slaves just escaped.

It's is not anyone's place to assign to the oppressed the duty of changing their oppressors' minds.

The Founding Fathers were just victorious. Being powerful enough to deter enforcement is not a reliable indicator of moral high ground.

[slg]

I'm not saying oppressed people have a responsibility to change things or that being powerful means you have moral weight behind you. I am saying that breaking an unjust law has no moral value. Gandhi, MLK, and the U.S. Founding Fathers have the moral high-ground because they fought for change. The guy buying pot over the internet is only serving himself. Grouping them all together just because they broke [potentially] unmoral laws is dismissing the motives and sacrifices of the former group.