In Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal”, he uses his satirical writing style to discuss the issue in his home country of Ireland in the early 1700s of famine, poverty, and too many people. His audience is mainly the people of Ireland, but mostly the government that is not oblivious to the issue, but choosing not to oblige the problem. He proposes many different resolutions in his writing, trying to persuade the government to make a call to action to help solve the problem of starvation and help reduce the oversized population of the homeless. Nobody seems to be trying to help the problem in Ireland, so in a sarcastic and satirical tone, Swift writes an essay, trying to get people to realize something needs to be fixed. In his essay he proposes that in order to reduce the population, people should start to eat their babies ranging from one to two years old. The proposal is absurd and disturbing, but it’s just drastic enough to catch the attention of the government and might actually make them do something about the situation. Swift makes this proposal because even though it is wrong on many levels to eat a baby, the child would provide food for those who are hungry and also limit the number of mouths that will later on become hungry and want to be fed.
In “A Modest Proposal” Swift is able to somehow make cannibalism completely normal. It made me almost scared by the end of the essay because I started to think that eating babies would actually be a reasonable solution for Ireland’s problem. He states that from a source he heard that "a young healthy child well nursed, at a year old, [is] a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled" he says this to let readers know that if Ireland did happen to begin to eat children, they would even taste good. So that’s always a plus, right? He then goes to explain that babies will feel multiple people, so they’d be getting many meals out of one child, so it would be worth it. "a child will make two dishes at an entertainment for friends, and when the family dines alone... [it] will be very good on the fourth day." It seems perfectly acceptable. Babies would also serve as entertainment during dinner parties, they may even be considered as a delicacy. He also gives the remains of the baby a purpose. He explains that the babies skin could be used to make "make admirable gloves for ladies, and summer boots for fine gentlemen." So, baby skin would become a fashion statement.
His proposal will benefit the “breeders” too, they’d be paid eight shillings per child they sell to be eaten and will be reimbursed for the money they spent to make the child plump and juicy and ready to be eaten. Swift actually has the balls to say that Ireland’s stock will increase by fifty thousand shillings per annum due to the marketing of baby meat and gain the “profit of a new dish.” The new food would draw people to taverns and restaurants and cooks would be able to experiment around with the “baby meat” and make it more interesting and taste better. He also wrote about how domestic violence would be reduced by a sufficient number because men would not want to beat their wives because of the risk of damaging the baby, who in a man’s eye is worth money and needs to be healthy so people will buy it.
Swift goes into detail about why society wouldn’t be able to eat older kids such as teenagers. Boys wouldn’t be good to eat because as they grow they become lean and leather like. Even though females could potentially make a nice meal, they need to be saved for breeding.
Swift uses fake sources to give him credibility. He refers to well trusted people from all these different places to make his argument seem more sane. He never actually states the name of the people that agree with his proposal. Also, he might just want readers to think that the names of his sources are left out because those selected few that agreed with him don’t want their names to be associated with this touchy subject of “eating babies.” Swift’s final paragraph is his counter argument which actually, in a way, is his real argument. He proposes solutions to the famine and the oversized population of Ireland. As weird as Swift’s essay is, it catches the attention of people and can’t be forgotten or ignored.
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