Many have
pointed out how Swift uses to satirize specific institutions of his day,
be it the British parliament, political factions in government, the monarchy, or the Royal
Society. All of this is true, but it misses the larger picture: what Swift satirizes are ways of
thinking that keep people from treating other people humanely. This can include petty,
small-minded behavior that cares, as the Lilliputians do, more about silly things like which way
to crack an egg than about kindness to the people around them. It can mean killing people to
carry out a silly experiment at the Grand Academy in Lagado. It can mean becoming cold blooded
and rationalistic as the Houyhnhnms sometimes do. It can mean fighting the pointless, bloody
wars with guns and cannons that the Europeans do: this horrifies the King of
Brobdingnag.
Swift offers so muchthat it important to get to his core point.
By showing the senseless cruelty of so many varieties of behavior, Swift is
pleading...
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