Dependence on Technology

Writing Lab #3 “A Modest Proposal” Is a satirical speech that uses humor and irony. Swift begins by talking about the poor state of Ireland and expresses sympathy and the need for a solution. He then asks if anyone could find a fair, cheap, and easy method of making the children useful sound members of the common wealth would deserve a stature set up. (702) Stereotypes against Irish Catholics make it easier for Swift to use them as the subject of his satire. The stereotypes are present in both the reasons for the proposal and the language used. The narrator’s argument that something must be done with infants because they are too young to steal implies that this is a common employment of Irish Catholics, even while it is humorous apart from the stereotype. The overall idea of overpopulation comes from the stereotype that Catholics tend to have a lot of children. The first reason Swift’s narrator gives for adopting his proposal, that it will lessen the number of Catholics, is perhaps the best example of satire of religious prejudice in the piece. Furthermore, he uses the word “papists” in the offensive sense of anti-Catholic rejection of the Pope. In Protestant England, many people might share the stereotypes but would never go so far as the speaker suggests about eating children.

The theme of prejudice against the lower classes is revealed in suggestions such as the idea that the carcasses of the poor children could be used for clothing, like women’s gloves. Swift suggests, with this extreme example, as well as his statement that the landlords have already “devoured” the poor infants’ parents, that the rich live at the expense of the poor. By referring next to another figure, “a very worthy person” (who is meant to represent a member of the upper, learned classes), Swift furthers his satire of the upper classes by implying that there are people so disconnected from the lower classes that they might agree with this outlandish proposal.

Swift’s aim, however, was not merely to expose England’s biased view of Ireland or to shed light on general English arrogance towards other peoples, although the final aim is achieved. The narrator’s statement that an “American” told him that children are “delicious” parodies the idea that the Americans, like the Irish, were considered to be a barbaric people in need of instruction from the English. Also the reference to the island of Formosa evokes a kind of English cultural arrogance. All people who could be classified as “other” are potentially dangerous to the English, needing to be tamed.

“A Modest Proposal” is also literary commentary. Swift intended to parody similar pamphlets that were being circulated at the time. His diction throughout the piece, including the word modest in the title, highlights this effect. Of course, one’s proposals are modest and offered “humbly.” With word choice like this, Swift is mocking the false modesty in the tone of many of the pamphlets of his contemporaries; their style may have professed deference, but their proposals displayed audacity.

Swift finally gets down to some real arguments when the narrator lists all the arguments that he will not give any time to. If eating the children were off the table, the people would have to turn to realistic arguments like these, such as the encouragement of virtue and thrift.

Swift’s decision to put off the actual suggestion of eating babies until several paragraphs into the piece makes his idea all the more arresting when it does come. Swift then raises a potential objection to his proposal: that it will deplete Ireland’s population. Swift responds by saying that this is the point. He says that this proposal will in no way hinder England, as the infants will not be able to be exported, as their flesh is not easily preserved for later consumption. He is not willing to entertain any other arguments for solving the problem, like virtue and thrift. Aso, naming population decrease as the one potential objection to his proposal, Swift heightens the irony of an already ironic piece.

Finally, when the writer reassures the reader that he has nothing to gain economically from his proposal, for he has no children, Swift is playing on the common protestation of writers that their political and social proposals are made altruistically for the good of society and should therefore be believed to be all the more truthful. If the writer did have children and lived in Ireland, it would be consistent to eat them or sell them.