Essay Exercises

First, identify the conclusion and reasons. Then identify the value conflicts and assumptions in each of the following passages.

1) Sarah: I’ve made my choice of colleges. I want to go to Dreswel University.
High school counselor: Why do you want to go there?
Sarah: Their residence hall rooms have much more closet space than other schools I visited.


2) Today’s youth need to spend a lot less time with their computers, cell phones and iPods. Long sedentary hours at a computer is one of the major causes of early obesity in our children, and all that time spent instant messaging and e-mailing keeps them from learning important face-to-face social skills. Also parents are having to struggle to find any time to spend with their children. How much time our children are wasting is revealed by a recent survey that found that the total amount of media content our children get exposed to has increased to eight and a half hours per day! Parents need to set limits on the time their children spend “dialing up.”


3) Conscientious objectors are traitors to their country and should be either arrested or deported to somewhere that will tolerate them. When one's country is in danger of foreign domination, there is no time for cowardice or reflection. The freedom of every citizen is in danger when a war is on, and it is every citizen's duty to contribute to that freedom's defense. Conscientious objectors put everyone at risk, and they must not be allowed to do so with impunity.


4) Each year in the United States, hundreds of thousands of animals are slaughtered each year to please the palates of Americans. Before their death — usually by electrocution or blunt force head trauma — most of these livestock are kept in deplorable conditions. Cattle feed lots are packed so tightly that animals can scarcely move; chickens are held in cages too small for them to turn around in; veal calves are denied any motion at all to keep their flesh tender. For what? So that people who can afford the privilege can enjoy tasty meat products.
These methods are not necessarily bound to eating meat. People can raise animals the old-fashioned way — on farms with ample pasture and free-ranging animals — and still produce enough meat for America. Mass production methods of raising animals, like those described above, must change if we are to think of ourselves as ethical people; as long as we tolerate such tremendous and pointless suffering, we cannot.


5) In 1992, 282.5 people per 100,000 in the United States died of heart disease, and 204.3 per 100,000 died of cancer. These two death rates are nearly four times the size of the next nearest cause of death (cerebrovascular diseases), and both are largely caused by lifestyle choices.
What kind of lifestyle choices are Americans making to lead to this result? 27.5 percent are grossly overweight (20 percent or more over average), 59 percent don't exercise regularly, and 25.5 percent smoke. Only 40 percent of women and 32 percent of men select foods carefully to maintain a healthy diet.
Americans have demonstrated themselves incapable of making responsible choices to serve their own health. Strict government regulation of food and drug products is clearly needed to reduce high rates of preventable diseases like this. If people will not make responsible choices by themselves, the government can at least prevent manufacturers from producing goods that will eventually harm the health of millions.


6) America's youth are being cheated out of their educational future by narrow-minded budget cuts. Legislatures have apparently forgotten that learning requires a network of support and that those who facilitate the learning process require resources to do their jobs effectively. Unless teachers feel that their work is appreciated, they may find it hard to get up each day, excited about the challenge of encouraging as much learning as they know how.
Direct federal support for students is one more area where the cutbacks are harmful. When students cannot afford higher education, they certainly lose, but so do we all. The creativity and talents that would have been developed through higher education are lost to all of us. Just because a student is not born into a rich family, should they be unable to attend college? Where is our sense of justice and opportunity?