http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/17/opinion/17rich.html
I was given this article by my teacher today to read and we are discussing it on Friday. I have just recently begun learning about argumentation, and to me the article seems like an ad hominem which commits the fallacy of association. I was curious if others come to this same conclusion and their opinion of the piece, because I thought it was terrible… Although, I am far from knowledgeable about this and could be just as easily wrong. Any help would be appreciated!
So democrats control the House, the Senate, the Presidency, just put 2 leftists on the supreme court. Democrats control the mainstream media, academia, unions, Hollywood, television, popular culture, children’s schools, the entire nonprofit center, the government-connected organizations such as the AMA, the scientific establishment, etc.
And I’m supposed to be worried about people who want to shrink government a little, but never have actually done it? Yeah, I’m worried about the Republicans. I’m worried they’ll act like Democrats, like they always do.
Anything in NYT is bad. Just for future reference.
Sigh. You have to feel sorry for any person who considers that article to be profound.
It’s single purpose was to conflate being anti-government with racism. He even used scare quotes around the word government. Huh?
And yet I bet your professor fails to see that it is articles exactly like that that are part of the problem, and certainly offer little in the way of solution.
It’s the same old fear mongering wearing a different dress. Make only minor changes to some of the language contained in that article and your professor, no doubt, would denounce it as far-right fear mongering propaganda. To idiots like this writer and, I assume, your professor anyone who advocates for less government (or, god forbid, no government at all haha) must necessarily be bigots, hate poor people, and want a few elite rich to control everything. To their equally unhelpful counterparts on the right anyone who sees a role for government activism must necessarily be some kind of freedom hating, totalitarian socialist who wants to disarm us all. Neither package of rhetoric is especially insightful or helpful to civil debate on these important matters. Pretending the left is less guilty than the right of these charges is absurd.
In short, this article is blatantly partisan and this professor is doing a great disservice to his students in presenting this vitriolic one-sided “argument” in my opinion. His job is (or should be anyway) to teach kids HOW to think not teach them WHAT to think.