According to Dalai Lama during one of his public address, he mentions that love and empathy are requirements, not bonuses. Without them, humanity cannot live on or coexist peacefully. It is in the nature of human beings to hold different definitions of good and evil. However, individuals who opt to forget the analogy of good and evil and strive to seek only to know the facts stand a chance to likely attain good than those who view the world through the falsifying medium of their desires. Individuals tend to have varied viewpoints to various subjects which would be very difficult to come into consensus. Theodore Dalrymple, the writer of How and How not to love mankind in his article, wrote that every person in the society claims that they have consideration for the welfare of humanity at heart precisely that of the poor. Additionally, they still hold to their ideology even when committing wrongful acts, for instance, mass murder.
The wrongdoers will still find justification for their actions by arguing that they are considering the welfare of humanity and that their actions have the interests of the people at heart. However, the various forms of love articulated towards human’s nurtures different reactions among them reason being they are viewed differently. The writer presents a row on both sides; how to love humanity and how not to love humankind. However, Dalrymple does not say which side he supports or instead thinks is the best. He leaves that to his readers. As a result, the paper shall be focusing on discussing the argument of Dalrymple in his essay on, “How and How Not to Love Mankind.”
Dalrymple strives to explain humanity and welfare to humankind in his article. The article demonstrates how two people born in the same year, having shared the same careers, lived near similar lives, and mostly have everything parallel can be entirely different from one another based on their school of thought and behavior. The writer noted down an article based on two famous writers of the nineteenth century Ivan Turgenev and Karl Marx. The author tries to display how the two writers have different views on the people and humanity. Turgenev seems to show affection to humankind. The writer gives illustrations for Turgenev love towards the understanding and well-being of the people. Karl Marx, on the other hand, ascertains to love humanity but he seems to have been drawn and inclined more on interest in people system rather than in people.
The writer also compares two famous articles that are authored by these famous philosophers “Mumu” written by Turgenev and the “Communist Manifesto” by Marx to contrast the ideas the philosophers had towards the humanity. Writer's central thesis in the article is, people more often than not claim to have the welfare to mankind at heart more specifically to the poor but truth is all that remains just as a claim for it is not always valid. The protection of humanity or rather that of the minority within the society is not necessarily pegged on any one person as some individual portray to fight for it. The writer further notes that there are various ways to offer service to humanity. However, the writer disagrees with the kind of individualism declarations where an individual public claim that he or she has the real welfare of interest of humanity at heart. Many people are compost of all talk, what they say and what they do are two different things all together. As the saying goes, talk is cheap. Without actions behind the discussion, it is entirely useless. In a nutshell, the writer tries to say that a promise is just but a cloud and that fulfilment is rain. The writers try to make a clarification on his point by citing an example of Turgenev and Karl Marx.
Turgenev in his article hopes to lead us to behave humane way whereas, Marx, on the other hand, aims to incite us to violence. Turgenev in his work tries to be impassionate and apparently against the use of an arbitrary form of power in governance, however, he is not also in support of political schematic. Turgenev demonstrates this by using a landlord who is portrayed as cruel a sour and embittered widow who is unjust by all means. When the landowner hears that Gerasim has a young puppy she immediately makes a command that the dog-Mumu is brought to her. The Mumu is afraid of the landowner and bares her teeth to her. On seeing this landowner instantly conceives a dislike of the dog and demands that she be gotten rid of. This depicts that the landowner is dictators and needs to be loved back by everyone even the animals. This is a valid form of dictatorship in modern society when cruel leaders demand to be appreciated praised and worship for every good deed they offer the community. Though the article is entirely and is directed against serfdom, the story, however, does not suggest that cruelty is the entitlement of feudal landowners alone. The writer suggests that if only serfdom were abolished, no observance against such malice would be necessary. The writer further adds that if power is a permanent feature of human relationships and evidently only adolescents and certain kinds of intellectuals.
The writer is quoted saying I don’t think anyone could have said this of Marx. The writer tries to portray Marx as some protagonist who believes in violence. Marx in his article says the workingmen belong to no country. He further adds that we cannot take from them what they have not got he wrote as a man who, as far as is known, had never gone through the trouble to drum up support for the living views of anyone but himself. His pronouncement of the death of nationalist feeling was untimely. Mark was a war geared man. He never believes in begging for his rights. According to him the only way to stay above the dictators was to rise from ashes and stand for your freedom. He belonged to the school of thought that believes that’s you would rather die on your feet than live by your knees.
In conclusion Turgenev always portrayed positivity in his action and as a result of this many people attended his funeral whereas Marx who regularly reflected negativity in regards to societal oppression had very few people in his burial. Human beings may have different standpoints, but they shall support those ideologies that acquaintances with them regarding the benefits, hope and, happiness, that adds value to their life. General humanity lies with the power of individual conviction to do right by his neighbour. People should learn to love each other and do right by the laws of the land. The government on the other hand should strive to campaign for democracy and equity to all.
Work Cited
Dalrymple, Theodore., How and How Not to Love Mankind. City .Journal, 2001. 1-13.
