This country we call America has relied on the value of the dollar bill. Rather its inflated or full value, you are not getting the value of that buck. People's attitudes towards money vary enormously and are largely influenced by the values they were brought up with and, to a certain extent, how much money they have now. People in this country are put into social classes based on salary and occupation. Many Americans believe in a simple three-class model that includes the "rich,” the "middle class", and the "poor." More complex models that have been proposed describe as many as a dozen class levels; while still others deny the very existence, in the strict sense, of "social class" in American society. Most definitions of class structure group people according to wealth, income, education, type of occupation, and membership in a specific subculture or social network. Lapham is observing people’s attitudes toward wealth in the United States. He is speaking the truth in this excerpt. The desire for people to have money in this country is a shame. The drive is not positive. People are not taking the time to get deserving jobs instead; they are selling jobs and selling their bodies just to make a quick dollar.
Money in America has many meanings. “The American faith in money easily surpasses the degree of intensity achieved by other societies in other times and places.” (Lapham) America measures everything according to the dollar bill. America is very materialistic. People buy things they cannot possibly afford, but they do it anyway just to make their lives worth wild. There are so many high-end stores being sold out because people live their lives materialistically. Stores such as Wal-Mart®, Kmart®, and Target® are lowering their prices so they can get consumers in so they can stop buying high priced items. On the street, there are so many brand new cars on the street because people are just buying cars every two years without thinking that car payments are skyrocketing.
Our country as we speak is in a recession, according to ask.com, a recession is a period of reduced economic activity,” a business cycle contraction. What causes a recession is currency crisis, energy crisis, war, under consumption, overproduction, and finance crisis. The effects of a recession are bankruptcies, credit crunches, and deflation of the dollar, foreclosures, and unemployment. In 2009 the reasons of the recession is due to high oil prices, high food prices and a substantial credit crisis leading to the bankruptcy of large and well established investment banks as well as commercial banks in many nations around the world. It was argued that huge increases in commodity prices came because of extended period of easily available credit and the primary cause of the downturn was exceptionally financial. People are worrying about how the wealthy are going to live it is really how the poor are going to live. People never take spending seriously until things happen and they are living paycheck to paycheck. “The visible signs of wealth testify to an inward state of grace, and without at least some of these talismans posted in one’s house or on one’s person an American loses all hope of demonstrating to himself the theorem of his happiness” (Lapham) People’s happiness are defined by the materialistic things they own.
Americans do not know the real value of the dollar bill. Lapham says Americans are not greedy, but I think they are. Money never made a man happy yet, nor will it. There is nothing in its nature to produce happiness. The more a man has, the more he wants. Instead of its filling a vacuum, it makes one.- Ben Franklin
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Argument and Persuasion Questions "Death and Justice"
Meaning
1. Koch is in favor of capital punishment it. Life is indeed precious, and I believe the death penalty helps to affirm this fact" (Koch 320). He believes that having the death penalty will help keep the idea of life being precious. He thought that the murderer might not have committed the crime in fear of losing his or her own life in the end. He also believed that one day the percentage of killers would decrease and would then diminish entirely. He asked that society please stop not taking responsibility for the murdering of lives. He believed that, without the death penalty, murderers would feel that they could kill without fear of a dyer consequence. He also stated that God gave people the right to punish those that had murdered someone.
2. The argument dealing with the issue in the debate over capital punishment of the death penalty as a deterrent to murder is that the death penalty will scare murderers so bad that they will not murder. Koch provides many statistics and examples of the positive and negative effects the death penalty would have on the society. He brings up situations that have happened with murderers that are sentenced to life in prison yet they still kill. The argument dealing with the issue in the debate over the death penalty being a form of justice for the murder done is that it provides somewhat of an even exchange. Since the person decided to take a life, then they should also be willing to lose theirs. It is a life for a life.
Purpose and Audience
1. Koch did not use his essay as a way to gain votes from the people. It seems to be this way because although this is a persuasive argument, many people are turned away from Socratic subjects like these. If the purpose was for votes he may have done himself an injustice because there will be people, potential voters, that will not vote for him because of his beliefs. Instead, he is strongly supporting and attacking their reasons for why they are not supporting the death penalty.
2. He believes that his audience does not agree with the death penalty at all. He shows this belief by directly addressing his audience, giving and naming their reasons for not supporting the death penalty, and finally describing that his society members are terrified to declare the death penalty as constitutional. In this essay, there was not a single part of his essay where he showed his belief of people who already supported his argument. His wrote a persuasive essay. This essay was created to try to persuade people that the death penalty was a necessity and correct form of justice. In order to try to persuade his readers of this, he placed emotional appeal in his essay. His examples of how murders were murdering people numerously were placed in the essay to try to show readers that the death penalty was the best option for society.
3. Koch places the right on the reader that they should follow the law for such harsh crimes and punishments. The state is allowed to do certain things but the citizens of that state do not have that same right, which is what we call justice. People in our society always complain and are disappointed with the things that happen, but they cannot seem to get up and do something about it.
Method and Structure
1. Ethical: “During my 22 years in public service, I have heard the pros and cons of capital punishment expressed with special intensity” (Koch 320). Emotional: “Consider the tragic death of Rosa Velez, who happened to be home when a man named Luis Vera burglarized her apartment in Brooklyn. “ Yeah, I shot her, she knew me, and I knew I wouldn’t go to the chair.” (Koch 320) Rational: "But to give up and do nothing would be far more barbaric and would certainly delay the discovery of an eventual cure." (Koch 321). People have different emotions, so emotional appeal would be least effective. Rational appeal uses facts, but there only is as good as, it is going to get. The best appeal to Koch’s argument is ethical appeal because that he had prior experience, it gives off the fact that he experienced it and it is reliable information.
2. The major premise is that before death murderers admit they were wrong. The minor premise is murderers eventually realize that they were wrong. The conclusion is that all murderers admit they were wrong and realize what they did right before they die. Koch denies the validity of this in paragraph 13 because this is not necessarily true for all murderers.
3. Koch’s strategy in explaining that the death penalty is barbaric was not too effective. He describes things that would prove the point of the idea of the death penalty being barbaric. He creates images of “lethal injection, ropes, voltage, bullets, and gas. This does make the death penalty seem very barbaric. Koch claims that doing nothing will be more barbaric than the act of the death penalty itself. Lethal injection is now mostly used. This form of execution is not supposed to hurt. It is said to be quick, painless, and easy.
4. Koch uses murderers and what they have done as examples. "Lemuel Smith... lured a woman corrections officer into the chaplain's office and strangled her. He then mutilated and dismembered her body." (Koch 322) Rosa Velez example represented just how some of the murderers think, the murderer admits to shooting the victim and claims that she even knew him, yet he still took her life. The cure for cancer example shows that you do not have to support certain ideas to believe that they might actually help better the world. The neighbors who did not help the screaming victim represent how scary and careless people can be unless it happens to them or to someone that was close to them.
Language
1. Koch seems determined and very passionate about this topic. He really seems to want to get people to feel the same way that he does about the death penalty. He is determined to show people that the death penalty is the only way to rightfully make justice from murders. "Dozens of neighbors heard her cries for help but did nothing to assist her." (Koch 324) This example of the women screaming for help and no one came to her assistance concludes that there is a lack of need to help others and prevent more crime and murders.
2. Koch seems to sound as if he believes that his opponents do not think logically. He sounds as if they are wrong. He says that he has listened to his opponent's views but that they are wrong.
Writing Topics
1. Now the question is whether murderers should be face death penalty or not? My response to this matter is that they should be executed if the murder is for no reason, insanity, and petty reason. If someone murdered someone using self-defense then there should be some jail time, but the evidence should prove that it was. If you have taken someone’s right from live his or her life, why shouldn’t the state or federal government take yours? There is always a consequence and repercussions for such a felony. A person’s life is just as valuable as yours, so why would you take it upon yourself and murder someone.
There are some excuses for the death penalty also. Such as police and armor truck workers who can shoot and kill people for self-defense. That is not fair, because there are times when you hear of police brutality. Police, majority of the time, have killed someone without justifying the reason why they did what they did. It could have been intentional, accidental, or self-defense. Whatever the case maybe, they are still citizens and they should be tried just like a real criminal. One question, where does the death penalty fits in for these specific people? No one can really answer that, so really there should not be a death penalty.
1. Koch is in favor of capital punishment it. Life is indeed precious, and I believe the death penalty helps to affirm this fact" (Koch 320). He believes that having the death penalty will help keep the idea of life being precious. He thought that the murderer might not have committed the crime in fear of losing his or her own life in the end. He also believed that one day the percentage of killers would decrease and would then diminish entirely. He asked that society please stop not taking responsibility for the murdering of lives. He believed that, without the death penalty, murderers would feel that they could kill without fear of a dyer consequence. He also stated that God gave people the right to punish those that had murdered someone.
2. The argument dealing with the issue in the debate over capital punishment of the death penalty as a deterrent to murder is that the death penalty will scare murderers so bad that they will not murder. Koch provides many statistics and examples of the positive and negative effects the death penalty would have on the society. He brings up situations that have happened with murderers that are sentenced to life in prison yet they still kill. The argument dealing with the issue in the debate over the death penalty being a form of justice for the murder done is that it provides somewhat of an even exchange. Since the person decided to take a life, then they should also be willing to lose theirs. It is a life for a life.
Purpose and Audience
1. Koch did not use his essay as a way to gain votes from the people. It seems to be this way because although this is a persuasive argument, many people are turned away from Socratic subjects like these. If the purpose was for votes he may have done himself an injustice because there will be people, potential voters, that will not vote for him because of his beliefs. Instead, he is strongly supporting and attacking their reasons for why they are not supporting the death penalty.
2. He believes that his audience does not agree with the death penalty at all. He shows this belief by directly addressing his audience, giving and naming their reasons for not supporting the death penalty, and finally describing that his society members are terrified to declare the death penalty as constitutional. In this essay, there was not a single part of his essay where he showed his belief of people who already supported his argument. His wrote a persuasive essay. This essay was created to try to persuade people that the death penalty was a necessity and correct form of justice. In order to try to persuade his readers of this, he placed emotional appeal in his essay. His examples of how murders were murdering people numerously were placed in the essay to try to show readers that the death penalty was the best option for society.
3. Koch places the right on the reader that they should follow the law for such harsh crimes and punishments. The state is allowed to do certain things but the citizens of that state do not have that same right, which is what we call justice. People in our society always complain and are disappointed with the things that happen, but they cannot seem to get up and do something about it.
Method and Structure
1. Ethical: “During my 22 years in public service, I have heard the pros and cons of capital punishment expressed with special intensity” (Koch 320). Emotional: “Consider the tragic death of Rosa Velez, who happened to be home when a man named Luis Vera burglarized her apartment in Brooklyn. “ Yeah, I shot her, she knew me, and I knew I wouldn’t go to the chair.” (Koch 320) Rational: "But to give up and do nothing would be far more barbaric and would certainly delay the discovery of an eventual cure." (Koch 321). People have different emotions, so emotional appeal would be least effective. Rational appeal uses facts, but there only is as good as, it is going to get. The best appeal to Koch’s argument is ethical appeal because that he had prior experience, it gives off the fact that he experienced it and it is reliable information.
2. The major premise is that before death murderers admit they were wrong. The minor premise is murderers eventually realize that they were wrong. The conclusion is that all murderers admit they were wrong and realize what they did right before they die. Koch denies the validity of this in paragraph 13 because this is not necessarily true for all murderers.
3. Koch’s strategy in explaining that the death penalty is barbaric was not too effective. He describes things that would prove the point of the idea of the death penalty being barbaric. He creates images of “lethal injection, ropes, voltage, bullets, and gas. This does make the death penalty seem very barbaric. Koch claims that doing nothing will be more barbaric than the act of the death penalty itself. Lethal injection is now mostly used. This form of execution is not supposed to hurt. It is said to be quick, painless, and easy.
4. Koch uses murderers and what they have done as examples. "Lemuel Smith... lured a woman corrections officer into the chaplain's office and strangled her. He then mutilated and dismembered her body." (Koch 322) Rosa Velez example represented just how some of the murderers think, the murderer admits to shooting the victim and claims that she even knew him, yet he still took her life. The cure for cancer example shows that you do not have to support certain ideas to believe that they might actually help better the world. The neighbors who did not help the screaming victim represent how scary and careless people can be unless it happens to them or to someone that was close to them.
Language
1. Koch seems determined and very passionate about this topic. He really seems to want to get people to feel the same way that he does about the death penalty. He is determined to show people that the death penalty is the only way to rightfully make justice from murders. "Dozens of neighbors heard her cries for help but did nothing to assist her." (Koch 324) This example of the women screaming for help and no one came to her assistance concludes that there is a lack of need to help others and prevent more crime and murders.
2. Koch seems to sound as if he believes that his opponents do not think logically. He sounds as if they are wrong. He says that he has listened to his opponent's views but that they are wrong.
Writing Topics
1. Now the question is whether murderers should be face death penalty or not? My response to this matter is that they should be executed if the murder is for no reason, insanity, and petty reason. If someone murdered someone using self-defense then there should be some jail time, but the evidence should prove that it was. If you have taken someone’s right from live his or her life, why shouldn’t the state or federal government take yours? There is always a consequence and repercussions for such a felony. A person’s life is just as valuable as yours, so why would you take it upon yourself and murder someone.
There are some excuses for the death penalty also. Such as police and armor truck workers who can shoot and kill people for self-defense. That is not fair, because there are times when you hear of police brutality. Police, majority of the time, have killed someone without justifying the reason why they did what they did. It could have been intentional, accidental, or self-defense. Whatever the case maybe, they are still citizens and they should be tried just like a real criminal. One question, where does the death penalty fits in for these specific people? No one can really answer that, so really there should not be a death penalty.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)