This article sets out the argument, advocated by Peter Singer in particular, that giving to charity is our duty.
This article sets out the argument, advocated by Peter Singer in particular, that giving to charity is our duty.
This is the argument that we ought to save the lives of strangers when we can do so at relatively little cost to ourselves.
Australian philosopher Peter Singer says that where world poverty is concerned 'giving to charity' is neither charitable nor generous; it is no more than our duty and not giving would be wrong.
if you are living comfortably while others are hungry or dying from easily preventable diseases, and you are doing nothing about it, there is something wrong with your behavior.
Peter Singer, Humility Kills, Jewcy, May 2007
Singer says we have a duty to reduce poverty and death simply because we can.
...the failure of people in the rich nations to make any significant sacrifices in order to assist people who are dying from poverty-related causes is ethically indefensible.
It is not simply the absence of charity, let alone of moral saintliness: It is wrong, and one cannot claim to be a morally decent person unless one is doing far more than the typical comfortably-off person does.
Peter Singer, Achieving the Best Outcome: Final Rejoinder, Ethics & International Affairs, 2002
This isn't the sort of duty that is enforceable, so it's charity in the sense that giving is up to you – no one will make you give.
Professor Singer puts his money where his mouth is and gives away around a quarter of his income to charity, although he says he should be giving away even more.
Singer's argument goes like this
Singer's argument is clear, and when you consider the drowning child example, pretty seductive.
But it does impose very high obligations on those of us who live in comparatively rich countries, and it may be just too demanding.
Singer adds 'neither our distance from a preventable evil nor the number of other people who, in respect to that evil, are in the same situation as we are, lessens our obligation to mitigate or prevent that evil.'
The philosopher Thomas Pogge argues that there are two very clear reasons why they do:
[Rich countries] enjoy crushing economic, political, and military dominance over a world in which effective enslavement and genocide continue unabated.
Thomas Pogge, World Poverty and Human Rights, 2008
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