Everyday, everywhere, at any time, people in the world contemplate the biggest mystery of all: life. Mankind thinks about how they can make their life more successful and more prosperous for their children and future generations to come. Even though life can sometimes not go according to what some people have planned, people still enjoy life and get the best use out of it. However, there are people like Professor Peter Singer who have a drastic view towards life. In his article “Should This Be the Last Generation?” Singer argues that mankind is the reason for all of the unrest and bad tensions in the world, and the only solution is to end the human race.
One of his arguments that he makes is that married couples think too much about the happiness they will give to their child and instead should think about all of the suffering their child might have to endure in the world. In addition, he implies that couples only think about themselves and their own happiness more than respecting the child. Singer believes that reproducing more children will just create more suffering for future generations of children. Now I agree that future generations of children will suffer, the fact of the matter is that the world has and will always contain some amount of suffering. Since the world began there has been suffering. Every generation has suffered in some way, more so than other generation. For example, during World War I, a whole generation of men was basically deleted from society because of the world’s new technological warfare at the time. Today we are suffering from dramatic climate change-that Singer says is our fault, which it is- and I don't think we suffer nearly as much as people who lived through the Great War. We can’t avoid suffering; we can ease it by making more intelligent decisions, but we can’t delete it by just telling everyone to stop reproducing and go jump off a cliff.
Singer continues his article by saying that he supports David Benatar’s argument that people come into the world full of hope and wild desires only to be met with disappointment. While I agree that people do deal with the feeling of sadness over a crushed dream, and sometimes lose happiness, not all desires and expectations are left unfulfilled. People all over the world succeed in reaching their expectations and discover a place or occupation that leaves them in a state of sheer joy. Katleen from Mill Valley, California said that “happiness and reward can be found in unlikely places;” this I believe to be true. Happiness is everywhere in the world and takes the form of many different objects and people. Whether it is from traveling to Europe or to playing with a ball of yarn, people find some way to make not only themselves happy, but also make others happy. The author of Unbridled Enthusiasm said in her blog post, Why Do We Have Children, that she knew couples that wanted to have children so they could be happier with their lives. Just like these couples, everyone has something that makes them happy enough to forget about all of the problems in the world.
Singer may think that a world without humans may be the ideal habitat because it is full of suffering that mankind has caused, but the reality is that the world contains much more happiness and prosperity than Singer thinks.
I think you're writing a standard composition introduction, which might turn the reader off. The first line is less of a hook than a broad sweeping intro. Try to attract the reader's attention with the first line, and dive right into specificity.
ReplyDeleteConsider breaking up paragraphs a bit more. They're chunky. "Now I agree . . . " new paragraph
So Singer's point is that if we can't stop the suffering, then we should stop the cycle. So once you finish the impossibility of suffering (which he certainly wouldn't disagree with) focus on rebutting his actual argument.
3rd paragraph -- his point is not that there isn't happiness, but that unhappiness outweighs happiness. And didn't he think couples should focus on the child rather than their own happiness?
The last line seems to accept Singer's premise that happiness is what keeps us living, and if the balance would shift to more misery than happiness, then we might be justified in taking Singer's approach.