The Case Against Helping the Poor

Garret Hardin was Professor Emeritus of Biology at the University of California – Santa Barbara, and considered himself to be a human ecologist who wrote, lectured, and taught about this subject. His most famous essay is “The Tragedy of the Commons,” published in 1968; the ideas in this essay resurface in “Lifeboat Ethics. ” In the article “Lifeboat Ethics: The Case Against Helping the Poor,” Garrett Hardin argues that wealthy nations should not help poor nations by using the combinations of logos and pathos.

He uses three writing tactics: lifeboat metaphor, population statistics, and critiques of other potential solutions.

At the beginning, Hardin introduces the metaphor of a lifeboat to describe the main argument – The Case Against Helping the Poor. “If we divide the world crudely into rich nations and poor nations, two thirds of them are desperately poor, and only one third comparatively rich, with the United States the wealthiest of all. Metaphorically each rich nation can be seen as a lifeboat full of comparatively rich people.

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In the ocean outside each lifeboat swim the poor of the world, who would like to get in, or at least to share some of the wealth.

What should the lifeboat passengers do? ” (Hardin 377). He starts with a simple comparison between the proportions of rich nations and poor nations. The metaphor – a lifeboat full of rich people – conveys clear image and message to help the readers visualize the first object in the scene, lifeboat. Every lifeboat has a limited capacity and resources which are only enough for small number of people; however, the surrounding swimmers, poor people, who want to get onto the lifeboat, are uncountable.

Garrett Hardin totally makes the introduction appeal to logos and pathos.

He positions the readers in the lifeboat as well as his argument. He makes the readers be safe on the lifeboat but he also makes them be nervous about the people under the water with the question “What should the lifeboat passengers do? ” The lifeboat has limited capacity hardly get all the people in poor nations in, which becomes impossible when the population of poor countries increases rapidly. He demonstrates that ideas with the specific data of population. Hardin uses the population statistic to prove the harsh ethics of the lifeboat. “As of 1973, the U.

S. had a population of 210 million people, who were increasing by 0. 8 percent per year. Outside our lifeboat, let us imagine another 210 million people (say the combined populations of Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela, Morocco, Pakistan, Thailand and the Philippines) who are increasing at a rate of 3. 3 percent per year. Put differently, the doubling time for this aggregate population is 21 years, compared to 87 years for the U. S” (Hardin 378). Rapid population growth is one of the most important problems which many poor countries are facing.

Initially suppose that the ratio of Americans to others is one-to-one, but with the reproductive differences between Americans and non-Americans, non-Americans quickly become great majority after short time. The growth of uncontrolled population can lead to huge pressure on the poor country’s limited natural resources as well as the countries that are helping them; beside, it also affects global environment negatively. Appealing to logos on population statistics, the necessity of the ethics of a lifeboat becomes harsher when the rich countries resources need to be protected.

On the other hand Hardin also discredits other potential solutions. Garret Hardin tries to give a critique of other potential solutions, which appeals powerfully to humanitarian impulse. “The real question is, what are the operational consequences of establishing a world food bank? If it is open to every country every time a need develops, slovenly rulers will not be motivated to take Joseph's advice. Someone will always come to their aid. Some countries will deposit food in the world food bank, and others will withdraw it. There will be almost no overlap.

As a result of such solutions to food shortage emergencies, the poor countries will not learn to mend their ways, and will suffer progressively greater emergencies as their populations grow” (Hardin 380). Hardin starts the critique of other potential solutions with the World Food Bank, a new common system of the world, an international depository of food reserves to which nations would contribute according to their abilities and from which they would draw according to their needs. This humanitarian proposal received support from many international groups, prominent citizens, and some of his readers as well.

However, Hardin points out that if rich countries deposit food and poor countries always withdraw it and the food in the World Food Bank always available to withdraw, then the poor nations will never prepare for the new food disasters. They are always in the emergency situation then they will come and withdraw the food without the fear of failure. The readers feel angry with the government of poor countries when they awake to what actually happens to the World Food Bank. To this point, Garrett Hardin appeals to the logos and pathos by discrediting the humanitarian action of his readers, which actually contributes to harm just going on.

The combination of logos and pathos used with three writing tactics: lifeboat metaphor, population statistics, and critique of other potential solutions support Garrett Hardin to persuade with his argument easily. Garrett Hardin helps the readers to visualize and understand the situation as well as think critically with the combination of logos and pathos. Garrett Hardin convinces the readers a lot of point with logics and statistics; however, his argument is rather limited. The lifeboat could be peaceful before the global issues not effect them