My modest proposal

[[Kate]]

We read A modest proposal in school and had to write our own...if you havent read the original one you may not know the tone of mine. Tell me what you think. The spacing got messed up when I copied and pasted it so forgive me.

No Such Thing as Evil

I am sure we are all disgusted with the society we live in today. When I clicked the television on last night, my mind was instantly filled with vile images; women and children being taken advantage of and suffering, our boys being shipped off to a foreign country to fight in the endless wars that lead to death and destruction, and disease taking the life of yet another helpless victim. We have all seen the evils of both man and nature, and still no solution has surfaced. I asked myself, why are we so shocked and appalled by rape, thievery, murder, war and disease when day and night we are reminded of it? I kept watching the bringer of bad news, and had an epiphany. The answer we have been seeking was right there in front of me, right there in front of many people around the world; our sources of information are the problem. We are in constant fear of evil, yet it is nonsense, fear is nonsense.
Diplomacy, helpfulness, justice, and kindness, are methods we use to eliminate evil, but they are ideas of the ignorant because, they have all failed. No matter what our ways are for reducing deviancy, it will never be rid of entirely, unless, we get rid of the idea of evil itself. Before disregarding me, think of it, without evil, there is no fear, without fear, our lives are blissful. If we were to one day be able to walk down the street, not in fear, but, in hope, that something we consider wrong or immoral today will happen. Getting rid of evil is not the difficult task it seems to be. Take a look at other cultures around the world, and you will see my point. For example, some of the people belonging to a tribe in Africa put discs in their mouths, we as Americans see an act like that as barbaric, but to the Africans it is simply an act. We see crime as barbaric, but if we start promoting it now, that can change, it is not too late.
The first step towards eliminating evil is controlling the media. When we turn on the television, we will not be filled with sorrow at the destruction of man. The news should promote crime and death so that we too can rejoice. Of course this is a big change for Americans, so other areas of our lives need to be examined.
Cleanse the world of religion and justice. Either the religions can change with society or they can be eliminated all together. No more will there be messages of right and wrong, and how to tell the difference, there will be no right and wrong, only life, and life shall be grand. Justice is pointless, there won’t be anymore crime so there will be no need for justice. Just think, spending the day in the warm sun on a hot beach with family and friends, instead of paying your well earned money on tax for up keeping criminals. No more questioning of the after life, death will no longer be feared, so there is no more need for religion, we will live our lives stress free.
Before you question me, I will explain how my proposal will cure what we consider evil or deviant. Rape. At the moment, if I had a child, I would be very afraid of sexual predators, with the internet and such. What if I were to bring a child up in a society where he/she wanted to be raped. I would obviously still have issues with evil, but my child would not, and their children would not. I would not be the one to benefit from a society without evil, but knowing the future would be a brighter one, is a good enough reason to just bite the bullet. In fact, I think for the first rape to be accepted by society and the lucky person who is raped, a celebration should take place. The media should cover the story and let all the little girls and boys know what a glorious event has just taken place, and that one day maybe they will be lucky enough for it to happen to them.
Have you ever felt fear that someone was in your home stealing your valued items. Not anymore you won’t. Now if someone tries to steal something of yours, just let them, because you can turn around and steal it back either from them or the next person. It actually can become game like, there will be no “laws” and therefore no consequences. Thievery will merely be a part of life, not something to fear, it is just there.
Murder will be the most difficult aspect to change. People have a general fear of death right now, abolishing religion should take care of some misconceptions, but generation right now has to put forth some effort. Since the human race is apparently incapable of kind feelings, hence wars and such, but we seem to understand selfish desires and ambition, we could do this. All we have to do is put up with the young children behaving differently than we did when we were young, and learn to encourage them. Not too hard, it is for the better good, really. People will be killed, but we all have to except that, and promote it, because the people who are dead now DON’T CARE, they are dead. Death is awesome, death is an experience like no other, it is amazing. See, don’t you want to taste death? If the media preached death we would not fear it. Same with disease, who cares if people die, less money spent on keeping them alive. War is not such a bad thing either. We fight for what we want. It is pretty simple, people will die, people will live, and people can still have fun.
Everyone in society is brainwashed, that is a fact. Why on earth would we brainwash ourselves to know what suffering is? Why would we come up with murder, disease, rape, thievery, and war, to make our lives horrible? What is done is done, since we have those aspects of life we consider evil, than we should get rid of evil all together, than, life could be fun no matter what is happening. It really is a perfect plan.

[Sercee]

I see the points you are trying to make here about evil as a perception. However I can't help but strongly disagree with pretty much all of it.

Some of the things society perceives as 'evil' are not. Sex isn't evil, for example. How can it be? It feels so good and furthers the species? (though we should be careful not to further it too much, moderation is a key )

But most things we consider evil like rape and murder are in that category because of how it makes us feel. Rape isn't something we want. We want sex, we want love. We don't want to be forced. If you want rape, it isn't rape anymore. We fear the pain and humiliation of the act. With murder it isn't so much a fear of death (we all die, that's natural) it's the fact that the murderer is taking pleasure out of torturing us and ending our lives. We have people to love, things to do, and while pain is an important balance to pleasure torture and suffering are not necessary.

So I think you're right about the media, they do a good job of instilling fear in us, but it isn't because we're conditioned to fear all this evil. It's because all the 'top stories' are about the terrible things that people do to eachother (because those stories sell) rather than the good things out there. Even top celebrities like Jolie and Pitt and Clooney don't get the media coverage for the good things they do that murderers get. Why? Because we're morbid and curious. Again, because of media and, also, because of the prudishness of society. We are restrained from witnessing or taking part in natural acts of love, life and death and taught that they are evil so when we see unnatural acts we rubber-neck every chance we get so we can catch a glimpse.

K I'm ranting and rambling.. . Anyway, it was well written, I just don't agree with many of your examples I think

[[Kate]]

Sercee I am glad you disagree with my modest proposal, you are normal. I was creating a satire. The whole point of the essay was to create such an extreme solution, and a wrong solution, to get people to think about realistic solutions. What I was saying summed up, was if we were all evil, there would be no good or evil, because we wouldnt be able to establish the difference. Of course that is a bad idea, no one in their right mind would agree with my piece, so like I said, I am glad you didnt.

[Sercee]

LOL
Well if it was meant to be satire you did a great job, hon.

[[Kate]]

Thanks Sercee

[Eretik]

I've had to do similar work in English and other classes before too. It really helps with understanding and realisation, dosen't it? We used to have to argue on the opposite side of our beliefs, to gain better understanding of others viewpoints and I found it difficult but enlightening.

[[Kate]]

Yeah it was really quite creepy, while I was writing it, I found myself agreeing with it, then I thought I was sick and perverted, haha. It was a little difficult stating that rape should be a celebrated event, and crime is a thing to be promoted. I tried to get my point across.

[Lucine]

Whew, glad that was satire, Kate. For a minute I thought you were nutters, but I guess I figured out it was a spoof. I am constantly rethinking concepts of good and evil. I believe both exist, but how much of it is just projection. Like that pastor forget his name that was preaching against homosexuals then it turned out he hired a male prostitute. Does he really believe homosexuality is evil? Or is it just some babble he uses to fill up his Sunday sermon?

[jcrowfoot]

I was going to say that the whole "don't talk about it, and maybe it won't perpetuate" is an additude that was popular about 100 years ago. Funny, that didn't work very well, either.

It's amusing to note that I'm currently reading a book called "The Price of Silence" by Kate Wilhelm.

Then I read the replies and the mention that it was parody. Suddenly everything made sense, and I sat back and laughed.

[thatguy]

I think you did well using 'A Modest Proposal' as your inspiration. Good style, well written. I also like this sort of thing. I'm astonished that your school actually gave you such a meaningful exercise. They're probably just doing this to identify the intelligent, free-thinking deviants so they may be appropriately handled before they become a threat. I hope you didn't turn in your work

cheers,

T. Guy.

[Sercee]

Uh oh, Thatguy's right... You're a target now, you should that you're a free thinker! Run and hide, quick!

[[Kate]]

Oh no!!