My Writing

Over the course of this semester, I feel that my writing has grown tremendously. I think that, with each and every successive paper, I was writing with more freedom. This change is apparent when I look at the differences from my first, rhetorical analysis, essay to this final, popular, essay that I am currently still working on. Although I still like my writing in the rhetorical analysis and think that I did a good job of analyzing the commercial, my final essay just seems to have a much more entertaining voice to it. I use a greater variety of sentence structures and I seem much more willing to take risks with my writing. I think these changes resulted from the fact that, at some point this semester, I stopped trying to write a boring, standardized essay and realized that I was definitely able to take risks with my writing.

I really hope that my writing will continue to grow, since I feel that writing skills are very important to have in life. I have enjoyed reading some of the writing in our field guide, and I like trying to model my own writing of these authors.  I would say that it is definitely my goal to be able to write somewhere near the level of these people, since I like how they are able to draw the reader in so well and, by the end of the passage, often change their perspectives on the matter at hand.

I did not get much of a chance to look over my writing from this semester, but I picked out an example of my writing that I am relatively proud of. It is the first and last sentences of my Critical Review Paper:

“As an uncontrollable mildew begins to take root at the foundations of both an entire genre and of a novel, the mental stability of a man also undergoes the unyielding wrath of decay.”

“Because once the decayed mentality of specific genres and novel adaptations is pulled away by the roots, a dazzling new flower is allowed to grow, with The Shining serving as the seed.”       

My Comments

   

1.       http://kristenmazzei.blogspot.com/2012/04/great-writing.html#comment-form

2.       http://kristenmazzei.blogspot.com/2012/03/reflection-propsal.html#comment-form

3.       http://denisesantizo.wordpress.com/2012/03/24/hey-mexican-que-pasa/#comments

4.       http://denisesantizo.wordpress.com/2012/03/16/i-am-invincible/#comments

5.       http://denisesantizo.wordpress.com/2012/01/20/biker-chick/#comments

6.       http://psuenglishblog.blogspot.com/2012/04/egyptian-revolution-part-1-0-false-18.html

7.       http://psuenglishblog.blogspot.com/2012/04/egyptian-revolution-part-2-0-false-18.html

8.       http://psuenglishblog.blogspot.com/2012/04/egyptian-revolution-part-3-0-false-18.html

9.       http://psuenglishblog.blogspot.com/2012/04/example-of-excellent-writing.html

10.    http://english015harrisonwostein.blogspot.com/2012/04/article-comparison.html?showComment=1335476449687#c8467062465069625795

11.    http://english015harrisonwostein.blogspot.com/2012/04/example-of-good-writing.html?showComment=1335476756376#c8299723397974789419

12.    http://english015harrisonwostein.blogspot.com/2012/02/swimming.html?showComment=1335477194125#c6781082399387217296

13.    http://kristenmazzei.blogspot.com/2012/04/periodical-post.html?showComment=1335497909514#c6165976675559396341

14.    http://abbiebenson.blogspot.com/2012/04/nasty-things-in-your-grocerys.html?showComment=1335498508407#c5937448243303184133

15.    http://abbiebenson.blogspot.com/2012/02/mount-nittany.html?showComment=1335499192508#c8028023726363088493

16.    http://abbiebenson.blogspot.com/2012/04/english-reflection.html?showComment=1335499622135#c1462082496372657785

17.    http://abbiebenson.blogspot.com/2012/03/good-writing.html?showComment=1335499949327#c4022196311758420599

18.    http://psuenglishblog.blogspot.com/2012/04/egyptian-revolution-part-4.html?showComment=1335500429459#c7051252132252929910

19.    http://psuenglishblog.blogspot.com/2012/04/final-post-reflection.html?showComment=1335500718482#c3277642353057628996

20.    http://denisesantizo.wordpress.com/2012/04/25/the-sidewalk-shuffle/#comment-11

The Failures of North Korea

http://news.yahoo.com/analysts-north-koreas-missiles-fakes-061325872.html

Analysts Say North Korea’s New Missiles Are Fakes

This article caught my attention since, after reading it, I was amazed at how desperate North Korea appears to be in order to prove to the world that they are a powerful force, and with such little success.

The article discusses how, at a recent military parade, North Korea showcased several models of missiles, missiles that appeared to be designed for long range attacks. While the thought of a successful intercontinental ballistic missile, or ICBM, in the hands of North Korea is disturbing for Americans, the recent parade showed that they are likely far from creating one. The missiles that were showcased appeared to have a metal layer that was much too thin to survive flight, they did not fit on the launchers that supported them, and overall they just did not look like they would be able to fly. Furthermore, just a few weeks ago the North Korean’s failed terribly at launching a supposed “satellite carrying rocket” (probably was more for missile testing) as the rocket barely took flight before it came crashing down into a body of water. Overall, it seems like the claims that North Korea is making that they are capable of attacking the United States seem utterly weak.

There is some concern that while North Korea has probably not produced any ICBM’s to this point, they may be well on their way to doing so. This concern rises from the fear that the missiles on parade could have been actual designs for future missiles in the making, in addition to the fact that the carriers that supported the missiles were so large (why would North Korea spend so much cash on the carriers if they are not even going to use them?). Despite these worries, they are eventually assuaged since many believe that North Korea simply does not have the capital or technology to produce such weapons.

It almost amuses me at how pathetic these attempts by North Korea are. If they are unable to make such a powerful weapon, then why do they go through such great lengths (the parade) to prove to us that they a global force? While I understand their hunger to be viewed as a powerful nation, they are simply making themselves look foolish by parading these obviously fake missiles throughout their cities.    

The True Cost of Walmart

http://news.yahoo.com/really-costs-walmart-comes-town-143801034.html

What It really Costs When Walmart Comes to Town

This article about the great negative impact that new Walmarts often have on local communities really caught my attention, since it reminded me of a documentary, Walmart: The High Cost of Low Price, that I viewed a couple of years ago. I remember that this documentary revealed several problems that Walmarts introduced, including its low wages, monopolistic nature, lack of environmental protection policies, and poor treatment of workers. This documentary, with its numerous facts and interviews, really worked to change my opinion on this large corporation from a lack of interest in their affairs to almost downright disgust with their whole operation.

This article reintroduced the same feelings that I had after watching the documentary. It focused mainly on the fact that most Walmarts that are introduced into an area cause the community to lose millions of dollars in revenue. This sharp decline in revenue is due almost entirely to the lower wages that Walmarts provide compared to the local businesses that they overtake (about a 3 dollar per hour decrease). In addition to these lower wages, the article also introduces studies that assert that communities with Walmarts are much more likely to have more hate groups than a community without one. This occurs since this megastore puts smaller companies in the community out of business, companies which previously had served as “pillars of the community”. While Walmarts can benefit communities that were previous unable to supply enough products to satisfy consumer demand, this article states that in reality there are very few communities that cannot provide for the consumer.

I definitely agree with the arguments that this article is making, since I really believe that in order for a community to succeed, competition is required, not a single monopoly. Walmarts may appear to have lower prices (and, technically, they do), but there is a much higher price that communities have to pay in the presence of these stores, and that is the millions of dollars caused by lower wages.

A Possible Breakthrough in Organ Transplants

http://news.yahoo.com/add-kidneys-list-things-recycled-210438524.html

Add Kidneys to the List of Things That Can Be Recycled

This article struck me as very intriguing since I think that the discovery it discusses can prove to be an important breakthrough in medical science. In addition to this, the article also applies directly to my family, since my dad has a kidney condition and could use a transplant.

The article reveals how a transplanted kidney that was failing in one man was removed while he was still alive and given to another person in need. The man who had first received the kidney transplant only had the new organ for a few days before he found out that a disease in his body had damaged the kidney and rendered it useless. Although it would not work in this man’s body, doctors thought that the damaged kidney could still be used in someone else’s. With the first man’s permission, the doctors removed his transplanted kidney and gave it to someone else in need. After a couple of days, the kidney had begun working and the damage seemed to disappear.

While organs have been transplanted more than once for a couple of decades, this is the first time that the initial recipient was alive when the organ was removed. With tens of thousands of people currently in need of a transplanted kidney, I think that it is absolutely necessary that more kidneys, and organs in general, become “recycled”. This case proves that even if the organ is failing in one patient, it does not mean that the organ is useless for everyone.

It is noted in the article that reusing a transplanted kidney is risky since scar tissue forms around the new organ, making removal of it difficult. Also, it is rare that an organ that is recycled will actually work in another person. Despite these drawbacks, I still think that this method should be actively pursued.  

Exploring Venues/Publications

     The two publications that I have decided to look at are The Huffington Post and TIME. I normally do not spend much time reading either of these online magazines, so much of my analysis is based off of my first impressions of the venues. After looking at the each homepage, what really jumped out at me were the differences in each sites "approaches". The Huffington Post's homepage consists mostly of large, glaring pictures with short captions over each. TIME, on the hand, seems to rely much more on the audience's ability to read text, as much of the homepage consists of words with much smaller pictures. This drastic change in the size of the pictures was very noticeable. TIME also, from my first impressions, seems to take a much more serious approach to the news. This was evident since each publication took an entirely different approach to the same top headline, the failure of the North Korean rocket test. The Huffington Post took a much lighter approach to the whole situation, as the title read "Weapon of Mass Dysfunction", followed by "FAIL: North Korean Missile Falls Into Sea Soon After Launch." TIME seemed to present the story in a much more serious manner, with the headline "Kim's Rocket Fails, But N. Korea's Space Threat Is Scarier Than You Think." After skimming through each article, I noticed that The Huffington Post's article was very short and very critical of North Korea, while TIME's version was much longer and much more careful with the stance that it took on the matter. An aspect of each magazine that further revealed the formality of each was the kinds of articles that were included. In The Huffington Post, it seemed like many of the articles were more focused on popular culture than TIME's were (The Huffington Post still included a lot about politics and other serious issues, but just with a much lighter approach). From the brief amount of time that I surveyed each venue, I noticed a slightly liberal tone to The Huffington Post (just by some of the ads and headlines), while I thought that TIME seemed relatively neutral. There were also many more advertisements in the Huffington Post (big pictures that were a little distracting), while it was hard to find any on TIME's homepage.
    Overall, based on these differences, I would say that The Huffington Post is directed to a much younger adult (not too young though) audience, while TIME is directed an older adult audience. In my opinion, from the time that I spent looking at each one, I would probably be more willing to rely on TIME for a good, reliable article than The Huffington Post, mainly due to the ways in which each present their content.

Great Writing-A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Smith

https://scholarsbank.uoregon.edu/xmlui/bitstream/handle/1794/872/modest.pdf

This "proposal" by Jonathan Swift is a satire, where Swift proposes an idea for what should be done to solve the severe economic problem and human suffering caused by overpopulation in Ireland. Swift recommends killing Irish babies at one year of age in order to alleviate these problems. The reason that I think that this essay contains such great writing is because of the way Swift writes in a formal tone and makes his proposal seem valid, when in reality what he is proposing is absolutely ridiculous. Throughout the passage, Swift uses language that dehumanizes the Irish people, making them seem like cattle raised for slaughter, which helps him achieve his underlying purpose of criticizing the way in which the poor were mocked at this time. Swift's proposal is so agreeable and contains so much support that I even found myself somewhat agreeing with the man, until I remembered that it involved something that was morally terrible.

Proposal-Reflection Paper

            The question that I would like to explore in my reflection paper is “Why does the general public decide to treat other people so poorly?” It did not take me very long to decide on this question, since it is something that I notice each and every day of my life.

            I really began to question the attitudes of the people once I got my first job. My job was a caddy at a country club, so my primary objective was to serve the needs of the golfers by carrying their bags and handing them their clubs. Prior to working here, I had always seen other employed people (such as my parents or friends) deeply frustrated at the ways that they were treated by either people who had authority over them, or just normal individuals. After starting work, it astonished me how many people looked down upon me and treated me as if I was some sort of slave. I know I had done nothing wrong to them, so why were they treating me like this?

            After getting my next job at a grocery store, Wegman’s, I really began to question, and even dislike, much of the general public. Whether they are telling me to grab a grocery cart on the other side of the store just because the one they have is wet, or just acting rude by talking on their phone when I am trying to check them out in line, people look down upon me, and surely countless others, numerous times a day. I have even experiences some extreme cases where customers simply walk up to my face, curse me off, and then leave for no apparent reason. I often become very frustrated at times like these, even though I know that I should just brush them off. I have always hoped that my last day of work will consist of me getting back at a customer with some sort of revenge (this would be my last day of work since whatever I do would get me instantly fired), which is probably a byproduct of my built up anger. The bottom line is that working has opened my eyes to the terrible ways in which people treat others.

            In this paper, I really want to discuss how the ways people decided to downgrade others for numerous and profoundly meaningless reasons (taking frustration out on someone else, trying to make themselves feel better about themselves, or the fact that many people inherently just do not care about strangers) is a fundamental flaw in society. I will talk about how working opened my eyes to this nasty reality, and how today I see it everywhere. I will try to find the reasons for why people act so superior to others by treating them in a condescending manner. I will that, of course, not everyone is like this, but it is very surprising how many are. My overall voice in this paper will most likely be very critical and I will try to point just how meaningless degradation is.  

Logical Fallacies

http://www.truthout.org/witnessing-death-republican-party/1330698232

This article, arguing against the Republican Party and its ability to stay relevant in politics, contains a few logical fallacies. The major fallacies used are the hasty generalization and the slippery slope. In using Rick Santorum’s super-conservative agenda to characterize the entire Republican Party as a group of “right-wing nuts”, the author is demonstrating a hasty generalization. One party member does not represent the entire party as a whole. The author also makes a very bold jump from first criticizing the Republican Party candidates today as radicals to then stating that this will inevitably lead to the death of the Republican Party, at least in its ability to win a national election. The ability of the Republican Party to compete for presidential positions in the future really is not dependent on the group of party members running today (and, as was shown with the hasty generalization, it is really not correct to label all of the party members even of today as incapable of contending). Aside from this, the very statement that the Republican Party may be dying is fallacious, since so many of the past elections between the two major parties have been so tight, and since there is such a large base of Republican citizens that it is questionable to state that the party will die with such ease.   

Coffee Inhaler

http://health.yahoo.net/experts/dayinhealth/are-coffee-inhalers-safe

Coffee Inhalers: The New Club Drug?

As I was looking at the Yahoo homepage today, I came across the word “coffee inhaler”. The picture depicted a small, lipstick-like tube with a yellow cap. Since I had never before heard or seen anything like this, I decided to read the article to learn more.

It turns out that the man who invented this inhaler device is a biomedical engineer, which is the same major that I am interested in. The main purposes of this article were to explore whether or not this product is safe to use, in addition to providing some background information on the device. This product works by spraying a powdered substance containing caffeine into the customer’s mouth, where the powder instantly dissolves. This product is designed to increase the energy of the user much faster than through drinking a typical cup of coffee, and it can come in handy in places where coffee cannot be consumed (on an airplane).  

The potential problem with this device is that teens will use the product in combination of alcohol, which can cause many problems since people do not realize how intoxicated they and continue to drink. In response to this concern, the creator of this product simply argues that this product is not intended for these situations.

Another concern with this product is that users will overdose on caffeine with this device, since instead of having to consume large volumes of coffee, all one has to do is spray a small amount of powder into their mouth. For this issue, the founder of this product explains how it would take more than 80 inhalers in a short period of time to potentially cause death, and that moderate amounts of caffeine are actually good for a person’s health.

My opinion on this topic is that coffee inhalers are a great idea, and that they should not be taken off of the market simply because of a small minority of the population that will decide to abuse it. I understand that someone who combines this product with alcohol can endanger the lives of others (if they were to drive under the influence), but I think that the alcohol would be to blame in this situation, not the coffee inhaler. Besides, there are so many other products out on the market that contain both alcohol and caffeine (alcoholic energy drinks). If the FDA is not willing to ban products that contain pre-mixed alcohol and caffeine, why should they ban alcohol-free caffeine products? There is a much wider portion of the population that will benefit from this product.

Another interesting article…

http://voices.yahoo.com/crazy-laws-governing-harrisburg-pa-residents-10934532.html?cat=17

Crazy Laws Governing Pennsylvania Residents

The Universe

http://news.yahoo.com/bus-size-asteroid-earth-close-shave-friday-214406689.html

Bus-Size Asteroid to Give Earth Close Shave Friday

I found this article very interesting since it is concerned with something that I think about very often: asteroids that may pose potential risks of colliding with the Earth. As I was looking through the Yahoo homepage, I noticed that the subtitle for the article read, “Does it pose any danger”. This phrase, intended to draw people onto the article’s page, seemed a little weak for me. If the asteroid posed even the most remote possibility of actually impacting and endangering our planet, this story would surely not be sequenced behind other articles such as “John Travolta’s car chopped by crime ring”, or “7-year-old’s sweet letter to NFL player”. It would be FIRST in line, and not only on Yahoo news, it would be all over every news station in the world. I just found it interesting how whoever decided on this subtitle actually believed that it would work to draw people to read it, but then again, I and countless others did read the article.

For the actual content of the article, I found it very interesting how the asteroid is expected to come very close to the Earth in comparison with most other asteroid’s, and yet, it will pass within 36,750 miles of Earth. This sort of puts into perspective how large the universe actually is if this is considered a close call. Also, the asteroid is roughly the size of a bus (36 feet), though it would cause absolutely no problems to Earth even if it was on a collision-course, since it would never make it through our atmosphere. Apparently, the minimum size for an asteroid to cause issues is about 460 feet. The rest of the article talks about how much we have improved in technology that can detect these asteroids, which I guess is reassuring although it still leaves us with no way to prevent one from causing mass destruction.

Overall, I found this article very informing, as well as very thought-provoking. I cannot help but imagine all of the gigantic rock-like masses floating out there in the universe that are traveling at upwards of 25 kilometers per second, and not worry a little bit.

Here’s another article that I found that caught my attention for obvious reasons…

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/man-two-hearts-survives-double-heart-attack-223043465.html

Man with two hearts survives double heart attack

What this blog is all about...

                Probably part of the daily routine for most people, viewing the top headlines on the Yahoo! homepage is something I do each and every time I open up a new internet browser. It is a quick and convenient way for me to get caught up on the day’s most important events, or at least the most interesting ones.

                The major theme of this upcoming blog will have to do with my responses to the articles that I decide are most worthy of ongoing discussion. Since this blog is required for an English class, I will not only write about my reaction to the topics that the articles consist of, but I will also examine the ways that the article’s author tries to manipulate the reader through several ways. These include the catchy (albeit sometimes misleading) titles they place on these articles, as well as the pictures that they include on the homepage, both designed to lure the reader to the article’s page.

                   I will pick at least one intriguing article for each time I make a post, and I will spend some time discussing my opinions of them. These opinions may agree with the author’s opinions, but more than likely I will attack them simply to make the post more enjoyable for me to write, and for you to read. I also may question the author’s reasoning for bothering to make articles on such trivial matters, or I will applaud them for dealing with important issues. If the article is not very opinionated, I will simply write about the article itself. Finally, I will tell you, the reader of this blog, if the article is worth your time to read.

                For some background information on me, my name is Tom Dougherty and I am from Doylestown, Pennsylvania. I went to high school at Central Bucks South from 10^th grade to 12^th grade. My interests include playing sports, especially ice hockey. My major is bioengineering, and my favorite subject in high school was Physics. I hope to use this major to design artificial organs and limbs.  

                  This week I will not analyze each article, but here are some interesting ones that I found,

1.       World's Friendliest Countries http://travel.yahoo.com/ideas/world-s-friendliest-countries.html

2.       The man who 'Tebowed' before Tebow http://sports.yahoo.com/video/player/news/Sports_Minute/27860188#news/Sports_Minute/27860188

3.       Colbert preps prez run, transfers PAC to Stewart  http://news.yahoo.com/colbert-preps-prez-run-transfers-pac-stewart-020429243.html

I will also include videos, not just articles.