Rhetorical Analysis of “Rich and Poor”
We all heard countless solutions on how to solve world poverty. In Peter Singer’s article “Rich and Poor”, he discusses how he thinks this problem can be fixed. Singer claims that we all have a responsibility to support people who are in extreme need and are suffering from absolute poverty. Singer believes that poverty could be fixed if people give up their luxuries and give the money that they spent on unnecessary things to those who are destitute. In Singer 's mind, we all have a duty to give until we are no longer able to, or until the problem with the world poverty will be solved. Singer feels that it is necessary for people who are more wealthy to help those who are less fortunate by donating money right away to organizations that help fight poverty. In his opinion, by not helping those in need we are negatively responsible for their suffering and thus failing to live a moral life. Peter Singer is an Australian philosopher who is well known for his contributions to the philosophy of ethics and morality. Singer has taught bioethics (study of the controversial ethical issues) at Princeton University. He specifies in writing on a variety of argumentative problems such as euthanasia, which is the practice of intentionally ending a life in order to relieve pain and suffering. He’s also the author of “Animal Liberation” which is a text of great importance in the animal right movement. All of these achievements make Singer a credible
In “The Singer Solution to World Poverty,” by Peter Singer, Singer uses analogies and propaganda to defend his solution for world poverty. In the article, Singer parallels a story of a man choosing to save a car over saving a child with modern Americans choosing luxuries over donating money to save underprivileged children. He provides resources of organizations to help these children, and he continuously describes the problems with both materialism in American society and children who are dying preventable deaths. Singer’s solution is that individuals should simply give away any money that is not absolutely essential for basic necessities.
After reading Peter Singer’s article “The Singer Solution to World Poverty” I concluded that Singer’s solution is not adequate enough to accomplish the end of world poverty or the benefit of sick children. While multiple positive possibilities for his simple formula of “whatever money you’re spending on luxuries, not necessities, should be given away” (22) several negative complications with his solution are also present. If Singer’s solution was followed by every standard, he had set it would help children in poverty which is advocated by the fact that it only takes “$200 in donations would help a sickly two-year-old transform into a healthy six-year-old” (8). Unfortunately, it is against human nature to give vast amounts of money to others
Peter Singer discusses that we have extensive responsibilities to the people of the world who are in poverty, nonetheless he wants you to recognise that we can encounter these responsibilities without altogether losing our worldly materialistic properties. He starts his rationalisation by emphasizing the realities which blatantly distinguish between our way of life and those who struggle to meet their "basic human needs for adequate food, water, shelter, clothing, sanitation, health care or education" (2011: 191). This is a strong and unbiased approach that makes even the most agreeable objections ethically inadequate. In relation to describing the ‘us’ in Singer’s argument it is vital to remember his collocation of absolute and absolute poverty.
Peter Singer’s essay, The Singer Solution to World Poverty is an essay that addresses the problem with American consumers and their contribution to the ongoing problem of thousands of people living in poverty all over the world dying every year. Singer makes a detailed argument discussing the current problems with the way America spends their money needlessly on activities and luxuries such as dining out at a favorite restaurant. Singer then explains his radical solution, that Americans should redirect all unnecessary income to organizations aiding victims of poverty. There were many aspects of his essay I found to be to extreme and unrealistic as I was reading through it. For starters, his title is very boastful and self-centered,
In Peter Singer’s essay “The Singer Solution to World Poverty”, published on September 5th, 1999 in The New York Times Magazine, Singer claims that the solution to world poverty is for Americans to donate excess income to aid organizations. His article consists of a gathering of exaggerated situations which he uses to engage readers, while also adequately supporting an argument of moral duty by comparing the hypothetical scenarios to Americans who do not donate. Singer exhibits an appeal to pathos to a substantial amount throughout his article. The provided situations set an outline for the reader to feel certain, appealing emotions.
In his essay “The Singer Solution to World Poverty”, philosopher Peter Singer claims that the solution to world poverty is for Americans to donate all their income not required for necessities to overseas help organizations. His article, published on September 5, 1999 in The New York Times Magazine, poses several hypothetical and dramatized situations which he uses as comparisons concerning Americans who do not donate their excess income. Singer breaks down how much it takes to specifically save a single child. The use of his precise language within the text establishes a strong tone and voice to let his readers know he’s serious.
In his article Rich and Poor, Peter Singer argues that we have a moral obligation to give assistance to people in absolute poverty. He derived this conclusion from three premises. The first states that if it is in our power to prevent something bad from happening without sacrificing anything of comparable moral importance, then we ought to it. The second premise is that absolute poverty is a bad thing. The third premise is that we are able to alleviate some portion of absolute poverty without giving up anything of comparable moral significance. To illustrate the urgency of our duty to assist the poor, he believes that in a case where we happen to walk pass a child drowning in a shallow pond, the vast majority of people would agree that it would be seriously morally wrong to not rescue the child. Connecting this scenario to Singer’s argument, we can say it is seriously morally wrong to not assist the poor because the lives of these people in need are of greater moral importance than the excess income we would otherwise spend on luxury goods. Thus, Singer is correct in saying that we have a moral obligation to assist the poor, and that failing to do so is equally as morally wrong as failing to rescue the drowning child.
the issue of poverty by suggesting Americans give away most of their income to aid those in need. Singer believes that withholding income is the equivalence of letting a child starve to death. Therefore, Singer suggests the ethical thing to do to end world hunger is to give up everyday luxuries. Although donating a vast amount of money could help dying and starving children, Singer’s proposition is not only unrealistic but also too demanding for everyday Americans who have responsibilities of their own.
Explanation: Peter Singer’s argument about global poverty can be broken down into three distinct steps. The first is easily accepted. Nearly everyone can agree that starvation, lack of shelter and a scarcity of medical care is a bad thing. His next is also frequently acknowledged. If we are able to donate without sacrificing anything morally significant we morally ought to do so. However, it’s Singer’s third ideal where he loses most people, including myself. In his third premise he states that by donating to aid agencies, we can prevent suffering from lack of food, shelter and medical care without sacrificing anything morally significant. But that arises the question. What is considered morally significant? Moral significance varies from one person to another making it nearly impossible to determine a universal constant everyone can follow. Along with that, this premise speaks entirely towards a financial donation of giving money to aid agencies. This again raises speculation and concern as to how much money is morally significant to give away from one person to another.
In Peter Singer’s article, “The Singer Solution to World Poverty” he explains situations that may benefit poverty but in doing so explains a person’s morals and willingness of a person to do so. America a capitalist country that Americans work to making a living for themselves and for some their children. Working is a big factor in America that Singer uses “Dora a retired schoolteacher” (Singer 400) as an example of a situation. Though Dora knows nothing is free in the society we live in but she still finds a way to “[make] ends meet by sitting at the station writing letters for illiterate people” (Singer 400). In this society it becomes hard to find work and make
In Peter Singers paper “All Animals are Equal”, he attempts to make the point that all animals have interest equal to those of humans. Over the years, both this topic and Peter Singer himself have stirred up much controversy. His beliefs, while radical, are founded upon well-developed logic based upon the utilitarian calculus. In this paper specifically, he supports the rights of non-human animals with two main positions.
Singer believes that not donating to the less-fortunate is the equivalence of letting a child starve to death. In this essay I will be giving my thoughts and arguing against Singer on why people do not have the obligation to help the less-fortunate and why his ideas are unrealistic. People should only be morally obligate to help others if they are responsible for the problem caused. Wealthy people live in a big house with a big tv, expensive furnitures, expensive cars and big-screen TV. Singer believes that those are unnecessary materials that people should not get and use the money to donate to charities and less-fortunate people.
Poverty is the biggest problem all across the world and whatever we do to solve it, never gets resolved. To answer these question two philosophers, Singer and Shiva approaches to the problem of the world poverty and gives their opinion towards it. Singer is utilitarian and thus sees the problem as utilitarianism. Utilitarianism is focused on “the consequences of the action, and it produce the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people.” Singer thus looks more towards the solutions for the world poverty. Whereas, Shiva argues that Singer is just giving money to this problem without caring about the causes of poverty. Thus, she approaches towards what
Peter Singer’s central idea focuses around how grim death and suffering from lack of food, shelter and medical care really is. He further argues that if we can prevent something this unfortunate from happening, without sacrificing anything morally significant, we ought to do it. In other words, as privileged citizens, we ought to prevent all of the death and suffering that we can from lack of food, shelter and medical care from happening by giving our money and resources to charity (Chao, 2016, in-class discussion). In the terms of this argument, death and suffering from poverty are preventable with the
In this section I will consider and summarise Singer’s argument for poverty. Singer’s argument about poverty is based on the idea of giving help no matter where the help is needed as it not moral to allow something bad to happen if it is preventable. One of Singer’s arguments relating to poverty is “we have a duty to reduce poverty and death simply because we can” (BBC, 2014), this idea of giving help can be applied to various situations not just poverty however this essay will only give examples and situations relating to poverty. Singer also states that “it makes no moral difference whether the person I can help is a neighbour's child ten yards from me or a Bengali whose name I shall never know, ten thousand miles away” (BBC, 2014), this quote form Singer shows that even though there may be no serious situations nearby you where you can help, there is still a lot of issues that need resolving by time commitment or donations, even though you can’t see