In examining how hunger in Ireland affected literature, a story was written called A Modest Proposal by Johnathan Swift. Swift, who was an Irishman, wrote primarily about political issues, but included dark humor in his stories to "lighten things up." Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay In A Modest Proposal, Swift highlights how hungry the Irish people were because of the rampant hunger and how broken their government was. Swift suggested eating what the Irish eat their children. He had some justification for his reasoning. Swift wrote that around the age of six, children lose their innocence and begin to commit crimes like theft (615). He also uses "mathematics" to justify his situation, saying that if there were one hundred and twenty thousand children, half would be left to help maintain the population. Then the remaining half is only half of them are men. This would represent a quarter of the remaining child population (615). Swift then compares these children to cattle, pigs, chickens and sheep. This would leave anyone reading his proposal with the impression that children are more of a commodity than human beings. Swift also continues in his writings that, if a baby is born, the price of feeding that berry is quite cheap because he will only drink breast milk. However, once this baby stops drinking from his mother's breast, he will become nothing more than a financial burden on the family. So instead of being a burden on the family, this child could be sacrificed and feed the family with himself (616). The real reason he kept referring to eating their babies was because, in the first place, the families who worked for other people's farms had no money. stable income and since the famine broke out, no one was making money. But since these families gave everything to the landowners, the landowners practically owned the entire family. Thus, the children would never have freedom since they were heavily in debt (617). Second, because these children were forced to work since they were young, everyone (even adults) was paid less (617). If the Irish took children, aged two to twelve, people would be paid more. Swift had also pointed out that it would be less difficult to keep them alive throughout their old age (617). These children continued to die from lack of food and nutrients. The food shortage of the 1770s not only made people hungry, it made them hungry to see a difference in government involvement. When the Irish needed help, their superiors did not come to their aid. John Swift was hungry for change and by making it clear that they would have to sacrifice their most beloved children by eating them to keep the rest of the family alive, he highlighted how hungry these Irish people were. Keep in mind: this is just a sample. .Get a personalized article from our expert writers now.Get a personalized essay Today's world could have avoided famines and hunger thanks to genetically modified organisms and the presence of very diverse food groups. The potato famine and food shortage of the 1770s affected the lives of many people. Hunger and disease have claimed the lives of more than a million people. Hunger affected the way people were treated. Hunger affected the way people made choices. In today's society, especially in small.