I thought the preface to the pages of the Fable of the Bees was an interesting document because Mandeville felt required, by the gross misunderstanding of his original poem “The Grumbling Hive,” to clarify the aim of his original satirical fable. Satire can function as a tool of social control; it can highlight what is considered good and bad behavior in a society and influence viewers by offering a reflection of their behavior. However, that change can only happen if some type of self reflection and accountability is present. The fact that the preface to this revised version of “The Grumbling Hive” exists at all is extremely ironic, and also serves to prove part of his point, which is related to a lack of self reflection on the part that everyone plays in society with regard to crime and the conception of criminality. Maybe Mandeville’s original satire wasn’t as well executed as he planned, which led him to outline explicitly his intention. 

He says, “The main design of the Fable is to show the Impossibility of enjoying all the most elegant Comforts of Life that are to be met with an industrious, wealthy and powerful Nation, and at the same time be bless’d with all the Virtue and Innocence that can be wish’d for in a Golden age…” (7). The rest of that sentence comments on the hypocrisy of those that celebrate and desire all the conveniences provided by an opulent Nation while decrying the vices, faults, and corruptions of the people. He says part of the point of writing the satire was for people to examine “their own Consciences, be made asham’d of always railing at what they are more or less guilty of themselves.” I liked his example of London, and how it would be hypocritical to detest the filth of the streets and in the same breath enjoy the prosperity of the city.

This also makes me think about ways that criminality is fabricated in our societies, and especially about police forces like the NYPD. Lots of people are fans of the Protect and Serve narrative, that police always ensure safety in the face of disorder and crime, but in order for the NYPD to exist, crime must also exist. Large scale abuse, brutality, and corruption exist in the NYPD, however, because of lack of accountability structures in the police force, a lot of that crime remains forcibly invisible in exchange for the visible crime that law enforcement has a hand in punishing, even if those crimes are things like sleeping on the street or selling marijuana 20 years ago then going to jail only to come back to a world where marijuana is a flourishing industry. I’m not sure if this is an accurate parallel to some of the discussions of the reading, but that’s just what I thought of. 

Mandeville speaks of societies involving monarchs, but I thought one of the first lines in his poem resonated with the situations involving the current president Trump. “But Kings, that could not wrong, because/ Their power was circumscrib’d by Laws.”

I think there are a lot of things and theories in this reading that I’m still unclear about, and I found some of it difficult to understand because of my unfamiliarity.