19 An ACA Rogerian Argument

As this class has proven multiple times, I am not always the best in writing arguments.  As such, this blog post requiring me to argue about something I am not 100% knowledgeable on will not be the best argument by any one's standards.  Sorry, but you have been warned. 

 

Let's just get this over with.

 

Yes we know that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is a controversial issue (mainly for Republicans), but it doesn't have to be that way.  So in my own way of finding common ground with my opposition, let me start off with a few questions:

 

1.  Do you enjoy being healthy and wish to stay that way?

 

2.  Do you want your loved ones and neighbors to be healthy?

 

3.  Didn't you hate it when you couldn't get insurance due to your pre-existing condition?  (Or wouldn't you hate it if you developed a condition that prevented you from being able to pay your way?)

 

4.  Don't you hate it when people close to you are sick and cannot afford their medical bills?

 

If you answered yes to two or more of the questions, congratulations!  You are a real human being capable of caring and affection to other life forms.

 

Now, as a caring and considerate human being, here are the facts!

 

The ACA covers tens of millions of uninsured Americans and improves the medical coverage of already insured Americans.  There are no death panels and the law does not pander to illegal immigrants.  The ACA actually improves senior care and Illegal aliens are not covered under the law.  It allows American people to afford health insurance, which in turn, allows for better recovery from illnesses and injuries that anyone could potentially suffer.

 

It doesn't matter if President Obama introduced the law.  That is a political hang up that serves no purpose in the progression of our country.

 

What matters is that millions of sick people can begin to afford health care thanks to the ACA.  That is a big deal.  If you really do care about the well being of your fellow man, then make the right choice and support the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.  It is the morally right thing to do.

 

Thank you for your time.

18 Problem/Solution (or Just How Can Batman Defeat the Joker?)

Well, well...  Professor Hamon said that we can create an argument of our choice for a solution to a controversial problem.  He's going to regret that.  (Sinister laughter ensues...)

 

In Gotham City, no super-criminal is more notorious than The Joker.  While characters like Two-Face and Poison Ivy can be detained with greater or lesser success, it is The Joker who pushes the boundaries of vindictive and meaningless terrorism against the good people of Gotham New Jersey.  Clearly suffering from a massive case of Antisocial Personality Disorder, the Joker not only wishes to cause as much blatant violence and destruction as possible, but is more than charismatic enough to win over the masses and convince them to support his wicked machinations.  Just ask the former doctor Harleen Quinzel if you don't believe me.  Truly, within hours of his arrest and admittance into Blackgate Prison (an institution proud of its inhospitable treatment of serial criminals) the Joker single handedly took control of the facility and organized dozens of murders.  Clearly, this is not a man to trifle with.

 

Unfortunately, the only man who has ever been able to subdue him (a certain masked vigilante known as the Batman) has a code of ethics that involves him refusing to kill anyone no matter how evil or insane.  Certainly, this is an admirable system of ethics; but it fails to permanently deal with the problem of the Joker, who has murdered hundreds, if not thousands, of civilians in his pursuit of the macabre.  And while Batman usually has the Joker incarcerated repeatedly at institutions like Blackgate Prison or even Arkham Asylum, the Joker continues to manipulate the system in his favor and escape.  So what can we do about this?

 

The answer is simple.  We put the Joker in Suspended Animation.

 

Truly, there has never been a more simple way of dealing with such a monstrosity.  While Batman has many qualms about killing a suspect, suspended animation does not involve any sort of death, whatsoever.  A coma that can last for as long as the subject is detained, the Joker can merely dream of committing even more acts of terrorism all within the confines of a medically administered sleep he can never awaken from.  It's genius I tell you.  The Joker will have been permanently apprehended and the Batman will not have any blood on his hands from the encounter.

 

I want to hear from you, the citizens of Gotham on this great new theory.  If we can get enough support, then maybe we can get this action into motion and prevent the Joker from destroying another life once and for all!

 

Who is with me?

17 Logos (The Alleged Word of God)

Logos, as referred to in Hamon's composition class, means the factual information used in an argument and, by proxy, the best way to win the argument.  Using proven ideas to support one's argument is always a sure way to succeed.  There is no doubt about it.  Unless, of course, one's opponent uses lie after lie after lie in such rapid succession that it becomes almost impossible to disprove such an opponent.  In this case, by the time the Logos-user has dispelled the first lie, five more have been added to the equation, allowing the opponent to win.  This is often the strategy used by republicans during their political reign.  What a shame.

But Logos goes even further than just using the facts.  Far from it.  Logos is the Latin word for "The Word" and carries mystical attachments to it.  While one minor example of this entails a Greco-Roman demigod of Love:  Hedylogos, whose name means "Sweet-Talker", it doesn't end there.

Anyone who has read the bible will easily remember the opening chapter of the Gospel of John in which the author states:  "In the beginning was the word and the word was with God"...  Blah, blah, blah.  In many mystical and New Age circles, this "Word" is translated as Logos and is used to describe the divine power attributed to words and speaking.  Many religious writings, both past and modern, really push this idea that man, through God, has spiritual power in his words to remake his world and being by proxy of the Logos.

I know that this doesn't have much to do with English Composition, but I always found that to be an interesting idea.  Knowledge is power, after all.  The more you know.  The more you grow.

Blessed Be.

Christopher.

16 Pathos in Retrograde

We've all seen it.  The silly woman interrupting our regularly scheduled television programming with a commercial begging for donations to some starving or dying group of children in a research hospital or a plague-ridden continent.  Personalities like Mary Tyler Moore or Alyssa Milano or Sarah McLachlan and her ridiculously abused animals.  They sit in front of a red background and in a heartfelt, yet demanding, voice, go on and on about how these little cancer victims or starving Africans or neglected canines need your donations so badly that they will die within the hour lest they receive your money to feed or medicate or arrange an adoption for them.  There are even commercials begging for donations for facially deformed children who desperately need plastic surgery.  How about you don't display those hideous children on my television?  I was just laughing at Betty White's latest joke on "The Golden Girls", feeling so happy and lighthearted, when I am then affronted with a picture of a fugly child needing plastic surgery.  See what you awful women have done?  You have gone from champions of the weak and helpless to ultimate buzzkill.  That's not cool.  And sorry!  I don't have any money to donate.  If I were more well off, I would be donating to charitable causes.  But right now I'm stuck being broke and in a fix trying to drown out my miseries via a cheerful situational comedy from the 1980s.  So stop making me feel bad about myself because I cannot help your god-forsaken starving, cancer-stricken, deformed, abused African children.  I can't stand it when you do that to me!  Why are you doing this to me?  Stop doing this to me!!!  I just wanted to watch Bea Arthur and Estelle Getty make catty jokes at each other's expenses.  Is that to much to ask?  You people are more evil than the animal abusers and dictators condemning the Africans to starve!  I hate you!!!

Ahem.  I digress.  That was an example of Pathos in the real world, in addition to a very normal reaction to it.  Have a pleasant evening!

15 The Wonders of Professor Hamon's Socks

The first time I bore witness to Professor Hamon's socks, I was enraptured in a cosmic bliss that is usually felt only by Catholic saints in the heights of religious ecstasy.  A passionate throbbing whirl of sensation and emotion enfolded me and pulled me down into the depths of artistic imagination, a mad, erotic dance of life and bliss unfathomable to most minds.  In this world of solid matter and cold, hard facts; a spiritual experience akin to the perception of Keith Hamon's inspired and mystical stockings is sheer proof that there truly IS a God.  And what a God He must be to have created such works of art.  A simple and unassuming pattern of black with longitudinal stripes; Hamon's socks speak of the profound mysteries of time just by their lowly existence, being worn upon our professor's feet. 

While it is true that Professor Hamon has humorously inferred to his socks on previous occasions, I had no idea as to how magnificent they could truly be until I saw them for myself.  The black wool woven with purpose and authority, speaking loudly about the importance of style and the heights of celestial beauty contained within such simple and unassuming stripes.

I am much more illumined for having gazed upon Hamon's socks and if you were to have seen them, I am certain that you would feel the same way.  They truly are a miraculous vision.

Blessed Be

Christopher

14 Author's Purpose

My purpose in writing Doc 2 is, unfortunately, none other than to achieve an exemplary grade.  Yes, I know that it does not seem like a very good reason for it, but it is all that I've got.  As this class goes on, the writing assignments are becoming ever more challenging, and the topic of this paper certainly threw me off, so I've been left scrambling to find a suitable author's voice that should communicate my intentions and will for the remainder of this class and assignments.  It is truly dismal, considering my early pride concerning my work in this class.  Alas, I am at a standstill and all I can do now is try my best to make it through in a satisfying way.

I truly hope that the class will pick up for me again, but until then, this is how it goes.  Please don't judge me on these faults.  They're all that I have left.

13 Basic Arguments (of Doc2)

Oh boy!  Time for yet another blog post!  I'm so excited!  Seriously, I haven't been this excited since I graduated high school.  This is probably the most fun I will have all year!  Whoopee!

 

Ahem.  Anyways, in an assignment in writing about a controversy in my chosen profession of Occupational Therapy Assistant, I have selected the Sensory Processing debate as my topic; and like the blog title states:  There must be a basic argument in the title.  So here it goes.

 

The SP debate revolves around a neurological disorder (not presently included in the DSM-V) founded by the Occupational Therapy profession known as "Sensory Processing Disorder" or SPD for short.  The disorder dictates that some children with it have difficulty processing sensory information; and OTs claim to have treatments to allegedly "rewire" a child's brain as to better process sonsory information.  And according to pioneers and parents whose children are receiving treatment in the movement, sensory gyms have a beneficial impact on the children's malfunctioning.  Unfortunately, SPD has several similarites with disorders such as Autism and ADHD; prompting other health professionals, such as pediatricians, to state not only that OTs have no authority to be coining new disorders and that the diagnosis of SPD is a rash one in which children who suffer from other disorders get misdiagnosed with SPD and then miss out on proper treatment.

 

But what do I have to say on it?  My basic argument is that both sides need to take a serious chill pill and start working together in order to make real headway on this problem.  Even physicians opposed to OT treatment of SPD acknowledge that numerous children suffer from sensory disabilities in processing such information.  And with that, to me, comes the crux.  If those opposed can acknowledge that children do experience symptoms related to the OT diagnosis, then there must be more truth to the disorder than the opposition would like to admit.  On the same note, OTs need the support of the rest of the medical community should they wish to receive the help they need in getting SPD treatment the support it needs to be recognized; which includes the proper scientific studies necessary to assess treatment outcomes, get the disorder into the DSM-V, and find the proper ways to help children who suffer from sensory disabilities.  Truly, it is my belief that both sides of the debate are lacking in their own logic regarding their stance, but if they work together, there could very easily be new and better ways to treat disabled children sooner than expected.

 

Thank you.