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Hello and welcome to the effortless English vocabulary for Disobedience.

OK, I’m gonna talk about the word just. Just is an important word. It’s a different meaning than the word just when you say, “I just want to go to sleep”. In that case, just means only, right? I only want to go to sleep. But in this case, in this article, just means good or fair. It comes from the word justice. OK, so it means goodness or to be good, fair, correct. That’s what just means.

Alright, little bit later, I use the in that same, in the first paragraph, Thoreau, in the Thoreau quote, I use the word admirable or he uses the word admirable.

Admirable means should be admired. And admired means to think good things about someone, to think someone is good. So if someone is admirable it means you should think they’re good. “wow he’s a good person. He is an admirable person”.

Alright, I use the phrase against their wills or against your will or against his will. Against your will means against your choice. It means you do something but you don’t want to do it. Maybe you must do it but it’s against your will, you don’t really want to.

Alright, we use the, there is a word here conscience, conscience in this case with a C, S-C-I-E-N-C-E. Your conscience is your feeling for right and wrong, what is right and what is wrong.

It’s how you decide if you think, “Oh no, this is bad. This is good”. That’s your conscience. If you say he has a strong conscience, it means he always thinks about what is right and what is wrong, he never wants to hurt people. That’s conscience.

In that first paragraph you see the word unscrupulous, an unscrupulous man in power. Unscrupulous, we use it to describe people usually, maybe a company.

And unscrupulous means you don’t care about right or wrong. It means you do not have a conscience. You only care about power, that’s all you care about. Unscrupulous.

Alright, the next paragraph you see the phrase the state, the is important here, the state means the country or the nation.

Alright, in the next sentence you see the phrase standing army. A standing army is a permanent army. It means that army that’s always ready. So America has a standing army, it’s a professional army, It’s not temporary.

Alright, you see the word manufactured in that paragraph. Manufactured means made. The verb to manufacture means to make something.

Alright, you see the phrase lump of dirt. A lump of dirt is a round piece of dirt, like a ball, a ball of dirt. A lump is something kind of round, a small round thing, we call that a lump. If I hit you on the head with a rock, your head will get a lump on top of it.

OK next, so that’s the end of the quote, next paragraph. I use the word abominable. I say many of the abominable problems in the world. Abominable means terrible, horrible, really really bad, abominable.

Obedience is an important word for this article. Obedience is a noun, the verb is to obey. Obedience means you do what other people tell you to do, right? You follow other people, you follow your boss or you follow your parents or you follow the president. That’s obedience. That’s the noun. The action is actually called to obey, right? Obey.

Alright, the next sentence I use the word moan. Moan is this sound: ooh ooh. It’s a sound you make when you’re hurt, you’re hurt: ahhh. And it also sometimes has the idea of criticizing, criticizing someone, right? “Ahh he’s terrible, ahh she’s horrible, she’s bad”, you’re moaning.

OK, I use the word solely in that paragraph. Solely responsible, it means only responsible, right? Solely means only.

And the end of that paragraph, I use the word abandoned. This people have abandoned their conscience. To abandon something means to leave it, to leave it forever, or to get rid of it.

If a mom a mother abandons her children, she takes her children, she puts them somewhere and she goes away, she never sees her children again. She has abandoned her children.

Alright, next page of the learning guide, you see the word soldiers. Of course, a soldier is someone in the army, an army man or army woman.

Talk about pulling the trigger, the trigger is part of a gun. It’s the part you pull, you pull the trigger, that little piece of metal and then pshho! the gun shoots.

I use the word torturing comes from the verb to torture. To torture is to hurt someone, you try to hurt someone. But it means to hurt someone who has no power. They’re helpless, maybe a prisoner or a child or something. So you hurt them, you hit them, you beat them, you do terrible things to them. That’s called torture. It’s a noun or a verb.

Alright, and at the end of that part, the end of that paragraph, I use the verb to refuse, to refuse an order. To refuse something means to say no. Someone asked you to do something, or tells you to do something; but you say no I won’t do it, that means you’re refusing, right? I refuse I will not do it.

So refuse is a little bit like a word in the next paragraph which is disobey, disobey. It has a similar meaning, a close meaning, it means… disobey means not obey, do not do what someone tells you to do. You do not follow orders.

And you see the word unjust. Unjust is the opposite of just. So unjust means bad. An unjust law is a bad law, it’s a law that hurts people. So Thoreau and Gandhi and Martin Luther King they all said disobey unjust laws, do not follow bad laws.

OK and these people were rebels. You see in the same paragraph the word rebels. A rebel is a person who fights the government, they go against the government. Martin Luther King was a rebel. Gandhi was a rebel. Many famous people were rebels, they fought against the government that sometime.

Alright, at the end of that same paragraph you see the phrase Vietnam War resisters. A resister is a person who resists, OK of course :) and to resist, the verb, means… it’s a little bit like refuse; but it has the idea of going against something, fighting against something or trying to stop something.

So Vietnam War resister is a person who try to stop the Vietnam War. An Iraq War resister someone who is trying to stop the Iraq War.

Next paragraph, I say that these people, Martin Luther King, Gandhi, Thoreau; they’re always condemned in the present, means during their life. People condemned them.

To condemned means to criticize, to say very bad things about someone, to blame them, to say they are wrong, right?

So, when Gandhi was alive, the British… many British people especially the government, they said he’s bad, Gandhi’s terrible. The same thing Martin Luther King, many people in the 1950s, they said Martin Luther King is a bad guy, he’s terrible.

Alright, and I say they are vilified, these people are vilified. To vilify someone is to describe them as being evil. You say they are evil, terrible people. That’s vilify. So Martin Luther King was vilified during his life. Gandhi was vilified by some people, Thoreau also.

Alright, I say during 1950s, Martin Luther King was vilified as a radical. A radical is someone who wants very big changes. They want to change a lot of things, especially the government. Now it has a little bit of negative meaning and it has the idea someone who might be violent.

Of course Martin Luther King was not violent and so you know, was he a radical? I don’t know, he did want big changes, but he was not violent. So the radical, someone who wants big changes.

Alright, and I say in the next paragraph, “the authorities he resisted are now viewed as scum”. The authorities, you need the or the in front. Those two together means… usually means the government. It means people with power, the authorities.

And scum is an insult, it’s a bad word, don’t call someone a scum unless you hate them. A scum is a low class person, a really bad person, maybe a criminal, maybe someone with no education, is very terrible bad person, scum.

Alright, and finally the word lifetime means of course the time that someone lived. Martin Luther King’s lifetime, he lived in the 40s, 50s, 60s. Gandhi lived you know late 1800s, 1900s through World War II etc. Thoreau lived in, you know, 1840s, 1850s etc.

OK, that’s it for today’s vocabulary. I went fast today. So, if you don’t understand the first time listen again. That’s the magic of mp3s. You can listen many many times, repeat this many times. The repetition, the repeating will help you a lot.

It’s easier than trying to memorize and study so hard, right? Just relax and listen again, no problem. If you don’t remember, eh, so what! Listen again, it’s really easy.

OK, after you finish this a few times, listen to the mini-story that might also help you. Okay, see you next time. Bye-bye.