Not so Modest

Honestly, I am glad I read some of my classmate's posts' before I read the Modest Proposal. Had I not been aware it was a satire I would have honestly been astonished that there is a thought mentality of that sort. However, even with knowing that, I still caught myself reacting genuinely to each gruesome detail. Amongst all the equally disturbing parts of his proposal, the paragraph devoted to eating babies was one that particularly creeped me out. Visualizing some sort of Gestapo like army roaming the streets looking for beggars and babies just did not sit well with me.When he talked about the flesh of his potential product, I honestly got chills, thinking back to this horrifying documentary about a man in paris who ate his female classmate. I think what was interesting to me was seeing how this related to the holocaust. I wonder if perhaps Adolf Hitler drew inspirations from satirical pieces like this and others that are out there. The main point of Swift's proposal was the extermination of one group, in this case the poor. He defends himself by saying that if we get rid of this 'problem' all our great countries/societies other problems will disappear with it. This is the kind of mentality that is going to destroy mankind, by thinking that if you are high up enough in the social pyramid, you can decide who deserves to live.