Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal: Illuminating Poverty and Controlling Scarcity
Jonathan Swift wrote a story called A Modest Proposal that talked about poverty in Ireland. It is illuminating poverty and offering a plan for controlling scarcity in the country. Swift suggested selling the impoverished people's children to the affluent and the meat market. By lowering the unemployment rate and stabilizing the population, the proposal's execution would end poverty.
Symbolism and the Rich-Poor Divide
Swift was able to establish the unexpected conclusion right at the start of his writing. The sole option put up to control the underprivileged population, which was predominately made up of women and children, was cannibalism. The proposal was directly symbolic since it portrays how the rich are taking advantage of the poor. In Ireland, people thought it was an excellent idea to disconnect a majority of the poor from the rich community. The rich enjoyed living at the expense of the poor to the extent that it never bothered them that an individual was suggesting to murder thousands of children for the sake of making profits. It is a clear indication that the rich do not care about the daily realities of the lower realities of the poor.
Convincing the Readers: Poverty, Population, and Cannibalism
It is clear that the author successfully convinced the readers that cannibalism was the only way of regulating the population and poverty. He paints a picture that shows poverty-stricken kids are useless and only depend on others for support. With a well-outlined plan, no one could object to it. Swift had gathered all the practical solutions to eradicating poverty and population issues in Ireland. From the context of the proposal, the poor citizen would have something to value. The modest proposal suggested that having a child was one step towards riches. More so, families may pay their bills after selling the young ones. The proposal can be considered as a project which solves Ireland's political, economic, and social problems.
Work Cited
Jonathan Swift’s “ A Modest Proposal.” Retrieved July 28, 2017, from http://www.victorianweb.org/previctorian/swift/modest.html
