1. Civil disobedience has worked when the timing and circumstances are right, and there is a just cause and clear pattern of oppression that engages the sympathies of a broad swath of people. That is rare. Most of the time, civil disobedience has been ineffective. Remember Occupy Wall Street? Black Lives Matter? The violence that coincided with them was a major turn-off for most Americans. About the only one in recent memory that was successful was gay rights, and even that was a result of evolving social mores and media portrayal, not disobedience. It required a tremendous amount of patience: the Stonewall uprising was in 1969; All in the Family had TV's first portray of an openly gay character in 1971; and the Obergefell v. Hodges decision that legalized gay marriage was in 2015--46 years after Stonewall--and even that was a 5-4 decision.

2. Openly thumbing your nose at the law is not going to serve you well in court. What did Prof. Bernstein do when he was threatened with legal sanctions? He lawyered up and took his counsel's advice. His communications throughout the process remained factual and respectful even though his disagreement was clear. He did not go onto Hacker News and prejudice himself by saying things like "Illinois legislators can eat shit" and "I dare someone to try to take me to court over this." He was patient, let his lawyers do the talking, and did not get the judge pissed off at him.

Civil disobedience, as with the legislative and judicial processes, works through the power of persuasion. If you fail to persuade, your mission fails.

These processes involve emotional and imperfect people, not deterministic logical machines, and success ultimately requires making them happy (or at least not making enemies out of them). The system might not work, but you have to work the system.