commentary of semiramiss' essay

Overall Semiramiss’ essay was written very well and there wasn’t much I would change about it. She clearly stated what the problem was in her first paragraph of the essay. I think it is a good topic because it is something that most households can relate to. Also, it is a topic that is serious and relevant for the time. She didn’t exaggerate the problem at all and it applies to a large amount of people, especially in America. Skeptics may doubt the effectiveness of the solution, just because it is hard with all the violent video games out there to just ban every violent video game all together. It would be something that would take a lot of effort and time and even after that there would still be people with violent video games out there or maybe even illegal bootlegs of these games. I think that you should have wrote more about how they should be outside playing and how it is causing obesity too because you touched on this topic in the beginning of your paper but never brought it up again, or perhaps just drop that part where you mention those topics. I did like how you brought up possible problems, like how the sales of video games might go down, but it will not cost the state(s) any money. If it is helping kids be less violent and more emotionally stable that yes it out ways the cost. I don’t think that a skeptic would bring up counterproposals in her paper because she mentioned that a possible solution might be that you have to be eighteen or older to enter video game stores that sell or offer these violent video games. It was good that you put examples of how these games are effecting the children that grow up playing them.

reflection on ethical paper

I was very happy with my essay after revising it with the help of Mr. Brown’s feedback. I changed a lot of grammar errors to help my essay flow more and make more sense as you read it. I also eased into my thesis much better after revising it from my draft, with the help of Mr. Brown’s revision notes and I think that helped it a lot by giving more information on vivisection before I actually gave my side on the topic. Also, in my second paragraph I gave a too big of word for word quote that took up too much space and was unnecessary so then I paraphrased it, only mentioning the details the reader needed to know. Another thing that I changed that I think greatly help improve my paper was that I mentioned a quote from Darwin in the third paragraph and with the help from Mr. Brown he suggested that I elaborate on the importance of that quote and turn it into a whole separate paragraph, which really helped me prove my argument in my paper. In my second to last paragraph I had information that didn’t really belong in that paragraph so I put it in the previous paragraph and it made way more sense. I also changed how I started out my conclusion because it wasn’t really formal and clear before.

6 harsh truths

1.       Are we too lazy to change the things in our lives that we don’t like?

2.       Why are we so sensitive when someone tells us a harsh truth?

3.       Are the majority of people satisfied being “miserable”?

I think as human beings we like to complain about the things we don’t like about ourselves and about the things we don’t like about or in our lives. This being said, I think that most humans aren’t quick to change the things we don’t like about our lives because we think that the hassle to change is greater than the outcome. What I’m basically trying to say that humans are lazy, at least the majority. As David Wong said in his article; we want to be skinny without working out or changing what we eat, we want to get the pretty girl without even approaching her, etc. Many of us obsess with things we want but aren’t willing to work for it, we rather settle for things in life just because it is easier for us. I’m not sure what other reason to give for this other than that we are naturally lazy beings. Not only are we lazy but we are ultra-sensitive too, especially when someone gives us a harsh truth. Personally, I think that this is something that is only getting worse and worse as times goes on because now a days children are raised being told that they are the best and can do anything. Therefore when someone tells them their not the best and didn’t achieve something they take it personally and don’t know how to handle it. No matter if we change, there will just always be those people that want things in lives more than others and those will be the people that succeed in life and achieve their goals. And for the rest of the people they are satisfied being “miserable.”

Daniel Yankelovich, "Stepping Off Maslow's Escalator" (1984)

1.       When do we find self-realization?

2.       Is the “self” only defined by caring for others?

3.       Why are we so obsessed with find our-selves?

I don’t think that there is a certain point in everyone’s lives where we find our-selves.  Yankelovich says at one point that someone describes when someone close to them was near death and it was then that they reached self-realization. He also gave the complete opposite example of another person that was near death and how he didn’t seem like himself and that he would reminisce about when he was a child. Personally, I think that not everyone will leave this world having a confident outlook on whether or not they reached self-realization.  It is something you may reach by just living your life and realizing the things, people, places, etc. that you like and that you can relate to. You may think that you have reached self-realization at one point and later on in life realize that you hadn’t.

 I do not know why psychologists and the everyday person obsesses with “finding themselves.” I don’t understand why it is so important to reach self-realization…I think It’s better to go on living your life day to day and not spending so much time on over analyzing whether or not we are the best self we can be. Also, maybe if people didn’t spend so much time analyzing this thought than they might actually reach their “perfect self,” just through living and making mistakes and learning from them.

However, I do think that once you are confident with you and what you have become in your life than comes the caring for others (not that you can’t care for someone/something without reaching self-realization). I just think that once you have reached this point in your life than you can allow yourself to be vulnerable and tell people about the mistakes you’ve gone through in your life, in order to help them with something they might be going through. It’s almost as if you don’t need to be fixing anything in yourself so than you are able to help others with themselves.

Kincaid's, "A Small Place"

1.)    Overall, is tourism good or bad?

2.)    How come when we become tourists “we become ugly?”

3.)    Does this make readers want to visit or avoid Antigua?

Overall, tourism is good for every country. Without tourists some cities or even larger areas wouldn’t flourish and this might even result in poverty.  “An ugly thing, that is what you are when you become a tourist, an ugly, empty thing, a stupid thing, a piece of rubbish pausing here and there to gaze at this and taste that, and it will never occur to you that people who inhabit the place in which you have just paused cannot stand you, that behind their closed doors they laugh at your strangeness (you do not look the way they look); the physical sight of you does not please them; you have bad manners 9it is their custom to eat their food with their hands; you try eating their way, you look silly; you try eating the way you always eat; you look silly) they do not like the way you speak…”

                I totally agree with this excerpt from Kincaid, although it may come off a bit harsh it is very true. Most of us live in South Orange County where we experience plenty of tourism during summer time and we can all relate how annoying it is to try and go to the beach and have all these people taking all the parking and spots on the beach that are not there the rest of the 9months out of the year. We mock the male Europeans that are there wearing speedos or tiny little shorts because this is what we’re not use to seeing or accustom to, but to them this is normal. We get angry when we see a car with an out of state license plate causing traffic because there are sight-seeing or aren’t sure where they are going. But, we do not realize that when we travel somewhere that we never been or aren’t use to that we become these people that we despise oh so much. Why is it that when you take someone out of their normal element that they become “an ugly, empty thing, a stupid thing?” Does it make us stupid that we aren’t familiar with a certain surrounding or do we come off stupid to the locals that live there…?

commentary #2 on kayla's paper

Kayla, I think you did a great job on using ethos, pathos, and logos. You broke every paragraph down out these three main topics and you also gave great definitions of what ethos, pathos, and logos is. This is very important in connecting to the reader that Hitchens actually achieved all three forms in his article. You also did a very good job on your thesis, it was clear and defined on what you were going to be talking about in your paper. It was also very clear that you thought Hitchens had successfully convinced in his article that water boarding is in fact a form of torture and never did you seem that you thought otherwise in your paper. I really liked how you did a summary of “Believe Me It’s Torture” in your second paragraph because not everyone that might be reading your paper read Hitchens article as well. This was a good idea because you let people reading your paper understand what you were writing about, so they got a clearer view in case they had not read Hitchens article or in case they forgot what it was actually about.

Throughout your body paragraphs you achieved your points of ethos, pathos, and logos by using quotes from Hitchens article. You also picked relevant quotes to what you were talking about at the time. You also brought up how Hitchens might not have achieved that water boarding is a form of torture in this part of your essay, “In the midst of a very descriptive paragraph making great use of Pathos, Hitchens admits to having a great fear of drowning that comes from early in his childhood. Some readers might say that this statement makes his argument invalid because of course water boarding would fell like torture to him if he already has a great fear of drowning. Would it feel as much like torture to someone who loved the ocean and had no childhood accident that gave them that irrational fear? Of course it would. Hitchens saves himself when he includes the statement “Not that that makes me special: I don’t know anyone who likes the idea of drowning” (1). This statement puts a stop to the thoughts that make his argument invalid; no one likes the idea of drowning.” This was good point in your paper because you showed where Hitchens may contradict himself, but you shut down that thought through your rebuttal of, “who isn’t scared of drowning?” Overall I think your essay is pretty strong and you achieved all the guidelines you were supposed to meet. GOOD JOB! (:

rhetorical critique (draft)

Monica Rivera

Profesor Brown

English 1B

25 March 2013

Torture Is Torture

            In Christopher Hitchens, “Believe Me, It’s Torture,” he argues how waterboarding is in fact a form of torture. Waterboarding is a “tactic” performed and/or endured by Green Berets and other special forces in training. Hitchens’ overall rhetorical success was attained through the use of logos, ethos, and pathos.

            Logos means: persuading by the use of reasoning including; unspoken assumptions, use of evidence, and justification of claims. Hitchens especially establishes the use of logos through unspoken assumption. This is so because through the whole article he never gives what the actual definition of torture is. He writes his article assuming the entire time that everyone reading agrees that waterboarding is classified as torture. It’s pretty safe to say that this is an unspoken assumption because the definition of torture is an act committed by a person acting under the color of law specifically intended to inflict sever physical or mental pain or suffering (other than pain or suffering incidental to lawful sanctions) upon another person within his custody or physical control; “severe mental pain or suffering” means the prolonged mental harm caused by or resulting from-the intentional infliction or threatened infliction of severe physical pain or suffering; the administration of application, or threatened administration or application, of mind-altering substances or other procedures calculated to disrupt profoundly the senses or the personality; the threat of imminent death. By adding the absolute definition of what torture mean it would have only made his claim stronger. He might not have added in the definition because he took in consideration through kairos, the timing and appropriateness for the occasion, that the demographic reading Vanity Fair already knew what the definition of torture was.

            Hitchens also uses logos through justification of claims. Not only his argument that waterboarding is torture but Hitchens himself actually undergoes to become the victim of being waterboarded. He goes on to tell about his experience through vivid details. This is an excellent example of justification of claims because Hitchens wanted to leave no doubt to his readers on whether or not waterboarding did torture the victims, which he proves successfully.

            The definition of ethos is a means of convincing by the character of the author, including; appearing knowledgeable, audience-based reason, and fairness to opposing views. Considering Christopher Hitchens is a writer for a Vanity Fair, one of the most established magazines in the world, gives the answer to the audience that he is knowledgeable. If this is not enough evidence than that is okay because Hitchens gives many knowledgeable examples and evidence in his articles. After the third paragraph where he explains that he will be consenting to be a victim of waterboarding, he gives us an excerpt from the document he had to agree to and sign. It goes as follows, “’Water boarding’ is a potentially dangerous activity in which the participant can receive serious and permanent (physical, emotional, and psychological) injuries and even death, including injuries and death due to respiratory and neurological systems of the body…As the agreement went on to say, there would be safeguards provided during the ‘water boarding’ process, however, these measures may fail and even if they work properly they may not prevent Hitchens from experiencing serious injury or death.” By giving pieces of the contract that he had to sign shows how dangerous, if not deathly waterboarding can be.

            Hitchens article may seem one-sided at time, but he does give fairness to opposing views. Although he does not agree or “trust anybody who does not clearly understand this viewpoint,” he still gives a chance to see why people might be in favor for waterboarding. He does by talking about Mr. Nance, whom has been involved with the sere (Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape) program since 1997 and is in favor for waterboarding. He goes on to tell how Mr. Nance has had a completely different experience with life than him and has actually told him he “would personally cut bin Laden’s heart out with a plastic M.R.E. spoon.” This being said, Mr. Nance does not even agree with the practice or adoption of waterboarding by the United Sates. He goes on to say how it is unjust, a torture technique, a means of extracting junk information, and that we cannot get mad if other regimes perform waterboarding on captive U.S. citizens.

            Pathos mean persuading by appealing to the reader’s emotions, including; use of concrete language, use of specific examples and illustration, use of narratives, use of words, metaphors, and analogies with appropriate connotations, and language appeals. Hitchens proved his argument of waterboarding being a form of torture especially through the use of pathos. Almost every one of his sentences uses concrete language and definitely paints a picture in your head of what it must be like to go through such extremeness. He uses pathos in the first paragraph saying, “In these harsh exercises, brave men and women were introduced to the sorts of barbarism that they might expect to meet at the hands of a lawless foe who disregarded the Geneva Conventions.” This is a prime example of the use of pathos because he uses strong adjectives and he is appealing to our emotions by making us feel sorry for these people that are undergoing these “exercises” to protect the rest of us.

            “I held my breath for a while and then had to exhale and as you might expect inhale in turn. The inhalation brought the damp cloths tight against my nostrils, as if a huge, wet paw had been suddenly and annihilating clamped over my face.” This is the excerpt from the part of Hitchens article where he describes the actual first-hand experience of waterboarding. He makes the reader feel that they are there and almost experiencing the torture and pain he is going through, through the use of his words. At this point he makes the reader understand how unbearable and barbaric this practice is and if they have not agreed with his claim the entire time, they do now through the use of emotions/pathos.

            “I am somewhat proud of my ability to “keep my head,” as the saying goes, and to maintain presence of mind under trying circumstances. I was completely convinced that, when the water pressure had become intolerable, I had firmly uttered the pre-determined code word that would cause it to cease. But my interrogator told me that, rather, to his surprise, I had not spoken a word. I has activated the “dead man’s handle” that signaled the onset of unconsciousness.” Hitchens had believed that the waterboarding process had ended because he told them to stop, but in fact that is not the case at all. Not only is waterboarding a form of torture but a completely unreliable means of getting information out of prisoners, which is the actual point of  practicing waterboarding on captives.

            Christopher Hitchens’ point in writing, “Believe Me, It’s Torture,” was to convince or sway the reader(s) that waterboarding is in fact a form of torture and should not be practiced for any reason. When the definition of waterboarding and the definition of torture are explained than there is no way that the reader could consider disagreeing with Hitchens because they are almost exactly the same word for word. Even if the reader did not know what waterboarding was before reading this article, they do now because Hitchens explained it so well through the use of logos, ethos, and pathos. He was also successful through the use of kairos.