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Analysis Of Barbara Lazear Aschers's 'On Compassion'

1588 Words7 Pages

“Someday, the capitalist system will disappear in the United States, because no social class system has even eternal. One day, class societies will disappear” - Fidel Castro. Peter Singers’ “A Solution To World Poverty” is viewed as a drastic way to end world poverty. Barbara Lazear Aschers “On Compassion” makes the reader understand that it is okay to help the lower class. Singer and Ascher have contrasting viewpoints on social class, particularly on donating money and the willingness to save a lower class citizen. However Singer and Ascher do agree on helping the lower class in anyway possible. In both essays there are examples of how we as the middle class try to help or try to get rid of the lower class. Singers essay is filled with …show more content…

Singer and Ascher have both given everyone who has read their essays a reason to donate or help the lower class. Earlier in Singers essay he talked about how we spend money on pointless things when we could be spending it on the poor/lower class citizens. In Singers essay he calculated to help a homeless/lower class citizen it only takes $200. Singer has sone some thinking and calculations and came up with “$200 in donations would help a sickly 2- year-old transform into a healthy 6-year-old—offering safe passage through childhood's most dangerous years” (2). Now that we as middle class citizens have the power to help out these children and people, why not do it? Wouldn’t it feel good to donate money to people in need rather than spending the $200 on another piece of decoration for your living room that you already have? Singer is making us feel guilty for not donating money to help the lower class. By making us feel guilty for not donating we are more likely to dominate the next time we have a chance. Just like Singers scenario, Ascher witnessed a very helping deed for the homeless in the city. During the fall and winter New York starts to get cold and the homeless have to where to go. The mayor of New York “is moving the homeless off the streets and into Bellevue Hospital” (3). By moving all the homeless and lower class into a shelter proves that this act is a good deed. The mayor of New York did not have to help the lower class but he did anyways. This shows that we do have people in our world who care enough to help people in need. Singer and Ascher find a pint of comparison when it comes to helping the lower class. Singers essay relates to helping the lower class by holding us as the middle class accountable for donating money since we now know how much it costs and how to donate. Aschers essay also relates to helping the lower class by noting that the mayor of New York

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