Breakthrough Writer

1A Lesson for “Two Cheers for Materialism” (28)

 

Part One. Study Questions

 

1. What is the typical academic critique of consumerism? Shopping is an insatiable mental disease in which consumerism is a substitute for a lack of fulfilling the basic human needs—love, belonging, creativity, personal distinction, and a sense of accomplishment.
2. Why does Twitchell disdain the academic critique of consumerism? He is too out of touch with popular culture, Twitchell contends. See page 30. His negative and narrow view of consumerism blinds him to the vitality, comfort (31 bottom) and creativity of consumerism. Also consumerism is accessible to people of all economic classes, not just the rich. See page 31.
3. For Twitchell, what are the major defenses of consumerism?
4. For Twitchell, what is “spiritualism”? See page 31.
5. What is Twitchell’s thesis? See page 31, second to last paragraph.
6. Read Twitchell’s defense of consumerism on page 32. How is his defense stand up to the current foreclosure, bailout, and Stock Market crises?

 

 

Part Two. The Defenses of Consumerism

 

1. It is a powerful force that has triumphed over other forces and therefore it deserves our attention. See page 28.
2. Consumerism is not a disease, but the natural result of human beings’ innate nature, which is “to love things.” See page 29.
3. Loving, making and acquiring things is part of how we create and transform ourselves. See page 29.
4. Consumerism is an important affirmation of democracy and freedom. See page 31, top.
5. Consumerism is compatible with spiritualism, not at war with it. See page 31.
6. Consumerism has improved the quality of our lives. See page 31, bottom.
7. Consumerism has not been an elitist endeavor, reserved only for the rich, but available to all. See page 32 top.
8. Consumerism has not eroded financial responsibility and in fact 95.5 percent of consumer debt gets paid? See page 32. (still true?)
9. Consumption heightens our engagement with the world. See page 34.
10. Consumption has created “lifestyles” or “secular religions” to nourish the human spirit. See page 35.
11. Consumerism frees us from the restraints of class. We don’t aspire to be middle class anymore, he writes on page 36; we aspire to be hip and cool.

 

Part Three. Weaknesses in Twitchell’s Defense of Consumerism

1. Twitchell makes a good point that consumerism energizes us and stimulates our creativity and improves our lives, but he ignores the Too Much of a Good Thing Rule, which states that good things in the extreme are destructive and that consumerism is in too many cases extreme addiction that consumes us.
2. His definition of democracy and freedom, on page 31, that our unlimited buying choices affirm our democracy and freedom, is a woefully fatuous (stupid), over simplistic, and infantile definition of democracy and freedom.
3. His claim, on page 31, that we are stronger by idolizing mass produced objects as sources of spirituality is either misguided or a stupid joke. Either way, the statement is lame.
4. His claim, on page 32, that Americans can handle debt and credit does not stand up to empirical evidence, especially during our present financial crisis.
5. His claim that kids are “engaged” with television on page 34, a short paragraph, is too over simplistic and to have any credibility or merit.
6. His claim on page 35 that consumerism allows us to plug-in to a prefabricated lifestyle and that this opportunity is a good thing is over simplistic and does not address the inevitable emptiness and shallowness of blindly embracing a “lifestyle.”

 

Part Three. Writing Option for Essay #4.

 

Defend or refute James Twitchell’s rhapsodic celebration of consumerism.

 

A sample thesis in defense of Twitchell might look like this:

 

While McMahon is determined to skewer Twitchell as a lunatic cheerleader for consumerism, Twitchell’s consumer celebration is a much needed antidote to the pessimistic academic critiques of consumerism, which remain woefully inadequate evidenced by _____________________, ______________________, _________________________, and _____________________________.

 

While Twitchell does a good job of pointing out the narrow-minded, sour academic critiques of consumerism, he is so eager to wave his pompoms in order to show consumerism’s sunny side that, as McMahon’s cogent lecture convincingly demonstrates, Twitchell  goes overboard and commits many serious argumentative errors evidenced by _______________________, __________________________, __________________________, and _____________________________. 

1A Lesson for “Do the Right Thing” (46)

 

Part One. Study Questions.

 

One. What is cultural relativism? See pages 46 and 47 in which we see that different cultures have different moral standards.

 

Four responses to the ticket crisis:

 

1. moral absolutism says it’s forbidden to steal, period.
2. Contractual agreement takes priority over stealing prohibition.
3. An uncaring society deserves to be victims of theft and, by implication, other crimes.
4. Nihilism; screw it; anything goes because there is no such thing as right and wrong

 

Two. What is the essay’s main question? Do we universally share a moral sense or are morals an artificial construction designed to inhibit the Hobbesian throng?

 

Hobbesian refers to the worldview, from the philosopher Thomas Hobbes, that human beings are animals or barbarians unless the force of fear keeps their barbaric impulses in check.

 

Some criticize the Hobbesian worldview, which I share for better or worse, as being paranoid, unduly pessimistic, and misanthropic. Of course, a Hobbesian would call himself a “realist.”

 

Three. What is Kant’s Moral Imperative? See page 49, top.

 

Four. How do the two genders moralize differently? 49, top.

 

Five. What are moral instincts? An unspoken revulsion to several categories of human behavior.

 

1. betrayal
2. cowardice
3. cruelty
4. sloth (laziness)
5. greed
6. selfishness
7. willful ignorance
8. using and manipulating others
9. leeching or being a parasite of others
10. dishonesty, especially with intent to deceive (as opposed to sparing someone’s feelings or protecting someone)

 

 

Six. How does the term tsika confuse the assertion that morality is universal? Because tskika emphasizes manner, and we can infer appearances, more than it does morals. See page 54.

 

Seven. What is the moral emphasis with toddlers? Mean and nice vs. right and wrong. See page 55.

 

Part Two: Writing Option for Essay #4 (based on #5 “Writing” on page 59)

 

Write a contrast essay that highlights the differences between morality as an innate sense and morality as an artificial convention taught by culture. Is the distinction between “innate morality” and “conventional morality” legitimate? Explain with 4 mapping statements.

 

1A Lesson for “I Do. Not.: Why I Won’t Marry” (60)

Part I. Study Questions

 

One. How have men “historically solidified their economic connections to other men”? Is this true today? See 60 and 61.

Two. Is the wedding reception a fair comparison to a dowry? Explain. 61

Three. Is Catherine Newman’s interpretation of the candle on page 61 fair to her argument? Could you call it a “faulty comparison”? Explain.

Four. For Newman, how would getting married be a betrayal against her gay friends? See page 61.

Five. What are Newman’s beliefs about monogamy and how they do they affect her attitude toward marriage? See pages 62 and 63.

Six. What kind of insecurities does Newman disclose on page 63?

Seven. Does Newman’s definition of the “best life partner” help her argument? Explain. See bottom of page 63 and top of 64.

Eight. How does not being married make Newman feel more wanted? See page 64.

Nine. Is having a child a substitute for being married? Explain. See page 64.

 

Part II. Alleged Fallacies in Newman’s Essay

 

One. On pages 60 and 61, Newman equates modern marriage with marriages of hundreds and thousands of years ago, lumping all marriages, today’s and yesterday’s, as part of a “patriarchy” in which women are “trafficked” like property. This is an over simplification of marriage.

 

Two. Fallacy of hasty generalization based on a single anecdote on page 61 in which Newman wants us to believe that the symbolism of a Catholic wedding represents enslavement to the husband.

 

Three. Purposely misinterpreting the candle symbolism of the Catholic wedding described on page 61 in which Newman writes that the single candle represents the bride’s “old naughty self.” This is Newman’s language and false interpretation, which in critical thinking is called a “straw man.”

Four. Faulty logic: If some people use marriage as a bully club against the gay community, as Newman purports on page 61, then ALL people who marry are against gays.

Five. Fallacy of irrelevance or red herring: Newman confesses to having a previous relationship with a woman on page 61. What is the relevance? Perhaps that if she wants to go back to relating to women, it would not be fair if she married a man.

Six. Let’s concede that Newman’s next point on page 62. Specifically, she is saying that she and her boyfriend are not monogamous; nor do they believe in monogamy. I think we can all agree that people who reject monogamy should not get married.

Seven. For Newman, it appears that in marriage the commitment is too strong. In other words, it is so strong that it becomes a form of mutual possession. She feels threatened by that sense of possession whether or not being enslaved or possessed by one’s spouse is true or not. Such a condition is more psychological than anything. Legally, one is not “possessed,” not in modern times. It appears that Newman is paranoid and irrational in her definition of marriage, so of course she objects to it.

Eight. She and her boyfriend don’t need marriage because they are tied together by a child. Actually, lots of deadbeat dads bail on the mother and child, so Newman is a bit naïve to place so much faith in the child as a permanent bonding agent.

 

 

Part III. Writing Options:

Defend or refute one of the following thesis statements regarding Newman’s essay

 

Thesis One

Newman’s position to not marry is a self-justifying hack job wrought with paranoia, over simplifications, Straw Man arguments, faulty comparisons, red herrings, and other lapses of logic so egregious that she comes off as someone trying, feebly, to gloss over her irrational fear of marriage with pseudo intellectual arguments.  

Thesis Two 

While Newman’s argument contains some of the logical errors mentioned above, she makes some legitimate criticisms against marriage, most importantly the myth of monogamy. If we’re honest and look at the research on marriage and monogamy, we must conclude that marriage is a very precarious institution since the monogamy it rests upon is compromised by ____________________, ________________________, ____________________________, and __________________________________.  

Thesis Three

Newman should be commended for her brutally honest assessment of herself and the institution of marriage. Her position to not marry is well supported when we consider that ________________________, _________________________, __________________________, and ___________________________. 

1A Lesson Plan for “Cuteness” (134)

Part One. What is cuteness?

One. Contrary to the idea of being attractive, cuteness is essentially “loveable ugliness.”

Two. Any creature that is loveable because it is helpless, deformed, and crippled. These creatures often have stubs for limbs and warped, exaggerated features. It is grotesque and malformed. See page 135 top.

Three. The embodiment of innocence, see page 134.

Four. Sad, saucer-like eyes.

Five. A creature that triggers maternal feelings, the need to suffocate the object with love and care.

Six. A creature that looks inhuman and even alien. See 135.

Seven. Modeled after trolls.

Eight. A creature mutated to the point of being an outcast. 135.

Nine. Hideous and rejected, the cute object needs to be rescued by us. 135 bottom.

Ten. It is a product that needs to be “adopted.” Read: Needs to be purchased. 136.

 

Part Two. Why is being caught up in cuteness so immoral?

One. Cuteness is all about being sadistic, making the cute object helpless and enjoying the power over it as you “rescue” it.

Two. We transfer our sadistic orientation from toys to our children. 136.

Three. We seek to maim the very thing we idolize. 136.

Four. Cuteness compels us to dehumanize human beings because they are only adorable as long as they’re helpless, maimed, comatose or semi-conscious. 137

Five. Cuteness encourages narcissism because it creates the illusion of being all-powerful and projects human traits to animals. And we like our babies to imitate us and show us how cute they are by showing how they want to be like us. 138 bottom. And 139 top.

Six. No child can forever live up to the cuteness ideal, so that unhappiness and disappointment are inevitable. 140

Part Three. What is anti-cute?

One.  We create the demonic child as an antidote to the cute child. 140 and 141.

Two. One extreme idealization of a child feeds its opposite. 141

Three. Cynicism against childhood has been born from cuteness and this is just as unhealthy as the cult of cuteness. 141

Four. The obnoxious child, like Bart Simpson, is a reaction to cuteness. 141

 

Part Four. Writing Option for Essay #3:

Write a contrast essay in which you analyze the features of cuteness and anti-cuteness in popular culture. You can use toys, greeting cards, TV shows, films, anything from popular culture that embodies cuteness and anti-cuteness.

 

A thesis might look like this:

 

Popular culture images of cuteness such as _____________,________________, and ____________________, can be characterized by _____________________, _______________________, and __________________________. In contrast, anti-cute images, such as ____________________, ___________________, and ____________________ are distinguished by ______________________, _____________________, and ____________________________. 

Research Links:

Salon

Media Reader

IA: Images of Cuteness

1A: Images of Anti-Cute

1A Lesson Plan for “Frames of Reference” (123) and Consolidation of All Essay #3 Options

Part One. Lexicon

 

One. Media’s role in framing: Looting vs. finding 123 and 124, last paragraph

Two. Implicit messages and value judgments 124, second paragraph

Three. Michael Eric Dyson’s first argument: Since the media framing is implicitly racist, we can not believe media reports of heinous crimes in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and have to suspect those crimes were exaggerated. This has been the source of great debate and is the source of today’s research paper. But one can frame the Katrina events fairly AND report crime to its full extent.

Four. Michael Eric Dyson’s second argument: We should tolerate greed in the poor lest we are guilty of “self-righteous indifference.” See 126. Should Dyson have lower standards for the poor?

Five. Criminalizing the victims is Dyson’s major criticism.

 

Essay Options for Essay #3:

 

#1: Refute or defend the idea, as laid out in Michael Eric Dyson's "Frame of Reference" that in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina there was exaggerated or hyperbolic claims of crime, which gave an unjust picture of poor black society in New Orleans.

 

#2: In response to Spike Lee's When the Levees Broke and Michael Eric Dyson's "Frames of Reference," write a research paper about the role of racism and economic and social class as they pertain to the victimization that ensued from Hurricane Katrina. 

For this option, you might contrast the way Spike Lee humanizes the victims of the Hurricane while some media reports, as Dyson points out, demonizes those victims. 

 

#3: Defend or refute Peter Singer’s position that there are moral grounds for infanticide or “mercy killings.”

 

Thesis One:

Peter Singer’s utilitarian position on infanticide is asinine, full of false claims, vague definitions, and morally bankrupt.

 

Thesis Two:

While Singer’s argument for infanticide is consistent with his utilitarian worldview, his position collapses under the close eye of scrutiny in which we detect huge holes or flaws in his reasoning. These flaws include __________________________, ___________________________, ____________________________, and __________________________.

 

Thesis Three:

McMahon has treated Peter Singer’s infanticide argument with gross unfairness. While McMahon is correct that Singer needs to tidy up some of his vague definitions, Singer’s general argument is rigorous, moral, and defensible.

 

 

#4: Sample Thesis: Ariel Levy and Brook Knight analyzes the major causes behind the Internet culture of webcam exhibitionism. The major causes include ____________________, _____________________, _____________________, and __________________________.

 

 

 

#5: “Watch Me!” by Brooke A. Knight (150) offers various defenses of webcam exhibitionism. It’s claimed to be resource of education, love, community, authenticity, a “new machine/body,” healthy profit, and personal liberation.

 

Defend or refute these claims.

 

 

#6: Ariel’s misguided strident attack of raunch culture collapses under the weight of several logical fallacies, unsubstantiated claims, and cheap emotional attacks, which include __________________________, ________________________, __________________________, and ____________________________.

 

 

#7: Women who justify their raunch look by claiming they are empowered and liberated are woefully blind to the fact that they are willing participants in their own demise evidenced by __________________________, __________________________, ________________________________, and ____________________________.

 

#8: Write a defense or refutation of US policy of torturing terrorist suspects as a way of improving national security. Be sure to show the arguments for both sides, in a about a page or 2, before proceeding with your argument and mapping components. Also be sure to include a minimum of 3 research sources.

A pro-torture thesis with concession clause might look like this:

 

While torture entails many abuses, torture is justified in certain situations, including _________________________, _____________________, ________________________, and _________________________.

An anti-torture thesis might look like this:

While the pro-torture debaters are good at drumming up all sorts of scary scenarios, their arguments for torture collapse under the weight of several fallacies, myths, and misconceptions, which include _____________________, ________________________, ________________________________, ________________________, and _____________________________. 

 

 

A thesis that “rides the middle” might look like this:

 

To embrace a “pro-torture” or “anti-torture” is over simplistic nonsense. The potential for abuse in the realm of torture is huge, to be sure. But sometimes there are in fact extreme conditions that warrant torture. Therefore, torture should be allowed in the most narrow of circumstances and stringent conditions, which include ____________________, ____________________________, _________________________, _____________________________, and __________________________________.

 

Links:

The most useful, complex, insightful treatment of torture I've read is Mark Bowden's "The Dark Art of Interrogation." 

The most notorious case of American rendition that I know of happened to Khaled el Masri. 

 

#9: Based on Writing #5 on page 143, contrast the superior moral code of “anti-cute” with the moral bankruptcy of “cuteness.”

 

Sample Thesis:

Whereas cuteness is a grotesque mental affliction characterized by ________________, ________________, ____________, and ________________________, anti-cuteness is a healthier frame of mind defined by ________________________, _____________________, _________________, and ______________________.

 

 

Research Paper Checklist:

1. Make sure your thesis is more argumentative than informative in order to give your essay more of an edge. An informative essay tends to summarize, which makes your essay flat and boring.
2. Make sure to use headers in Microsoft Word.
3. Make sure to spell your final page Works Cited, not “Work Cited,” not “Works Sited.”
4. If one of your Works Cited listings is more than one line, the subsequent lines for that heading are indented 5 spaces. Your next listing is not indented 5 spaces. Only the second and subsequent lines are.
5. Make sure to staple your essay in the right order.
6. Make sure your paragraphs are meaty, a good 120-150 words.
7. Make sure to use italics for movies, books, websites, newspapers, and magazines. We are reading Acting Out Culture in McMahon’s English 1A class.
8. Make sure to use quotation marks around essay titles, short stories. 
9. Make sure to use a striking, salient title for your essay. Don’t use “Essay #3.”
10. Make sure to attribute all direct quotes and paraphrases from your sources.
11. Make sure to avoid “academic speak,” which is often plagiarized from your sources. Example: “We deem the arbitrary oscillations of the economy to be an inevitable part of a society beholden to irrational exuberance or the Machiavellian machinations of unscrupulous stock brokers.
12. Be prepared to defend your essay as its sole creator. Do not excuse your essay’s mistakes by abnegating your responsibility to a tutor, another teacher, spell check, grammar check, etc. Blaming others for your product is a sign of failure in life. Successful people take charge of their own lives and succeed or fail by their own choices.

 

 

1A Lesson Plan for “Unspeakable Conversations” (92)

 

Part One. Quiz Contest:

From reading today’s essay, explain what is morally objectionable about Peter Singer.

 

Part Two. Lexicon

 

One. Peter Singer’s quality of life argument for infanticide:

His stated reason, rather, is that such children have diminished prospects of eventually enjoying an adequate "quality of life", in his words, and to allow them to live would take away resources from what Singer calls "normal" children. He therefore advocates killing "disabled" infants, if the parents so choose, and replacing them with "normal" ones. The terminology of "replacement" is Singer's own; his philosophy "treats infants as replaceable", in his words (Practical Ethics p. 186).

 

Why, then, does Singer argue that infants born with this condition can justly be killed? Because they are "abnormal" and do not have "good prospects" (Rethinking p. 214). This notion of "prospects" runs like a mantra through Singer's discussion of Down syndrome children: "the future prospects of life may be so bleak" (211), "the prospects are clouded" (213), and so forth. But what sort of prospects does he have in mind? On p. 213 of Rethinking he lists several activities which a person with Down syndrome will supposedly never be capable of: "to play the guitar, to develop an appreciation of science fiction, to learn a foreign language, to chat with us about the latest Woody Allen movie, or to be a respectable athlete,  basketballer or tennis player." This list reads like a parody of bourgeois myths of achievement, success, and respectability. To Singer, however, these are legitimate reasons for killing a newborn. After all, if you can't do your own financial planning, why should you be allowed to live?

 

Two. Peter Singer’s utilitarian argument for infanticide:

What counts as a "severe disability" for Singer? He intentionally leaves the term vague to allow for a broad range of parental discretion, but he has discussed a number of specific examples, both hypothetical as well as actual cases. The conditions he has explicitly named as sufficient justification for active infanticide include Down syndrome, spina bifida, and hemophilia. Here is Singer's reasoning on the latter condition, taken from his popular textbook Practical Ethics (P. 186): "Suppose a woman planning to have two children has one normal child, then gives birth to a haemophiliac child. The burden of caring for that child may make it impossible for her to cope with a third child; but if the disabled child were to die, she would have another. . . . When the death of a disabled infant will lead to the birth of another infant with better prospects of a happy life, the total amount of happiness will be greater if the disabled infant is killed. The loss of happy life for the first infant is outweighed by the gain of a happier life for the second. Therefore, if killing the haemophiliac infant has no adverse effect on others, it would, according to the total view, be right to kill him."

 

Three. Peter Singer’s definition of a “person” or someone who is worthy of the label “personhood”:

a conscious being,  a creature who has the capacity to imagine the future. This definition can apply to humans, animals, and creatures. A “person” should not be killed, but a human baby suffering severe retardation or some other handicap is not a “person.”

 

Four. Utilitarian Slippery Slope:

If we agree that we should aim for the greatest good for the greatest amount of people and that handicapped people burden the “greatest good,” at what point do we stop at defining who constitutes a “burden”? Smokers, the obese, criminals, the handicapped, the autistic? Where do we stop?

 

Five. Peter Singer’s “Worse Off” Argument:

Disability makes a person worse off and therefore that person should be killed. And Peter Singer is comfortable judging who’s “worse off” and who’s not, a very subjective condition. See page 97 and page 106 top.

 

Six. Peter Singer’s Eugenicist Position:

The eugenicist position endorses selection according to desirable and undesirable genetic traits, and favors the elimination of the latter. Singer's argument sorts people into two categories, "normal" and "abnormal", and declares the ostensibly abnormal ones fair game at birth. He doesn't even bother to try to provide "objective" grounds on which to classify some human physical or mental conditions as "defective" (a term he used in earlier editions of Practical Ethics) and contrast them with "healthy" ones. Instead he simply welcomes whatever arbitrary social norms happen to prevail, thus turning his argument into a vehicle for prejudice. But of course there is no perfect, flawless version of the human form against which putatively "inferior" specimens could be measured.

 

Seven. Harriet McBryde Johnson’s quality of life argument:

Studies show that the public underestimates the quality of life for most handicapped people based on stereotypes. See 104 top.

 

 

Part Three: Essay #3 Option:

Defend or refute Peter Singer’s position that there are moral grounds for infanticide or “mercy killings.”

 

Thesis One:

Peter Singer’s utilitarian position on infanticide is asinine, full of false claims, vague definitions, and morally bankrupt.

 

Thesis Two:

While Singer’s argument for infanticide is consistent with his utilitarian worldview, his position collapses under the close eye of scrutiny in which we detect huge holes or flaws in his reasoning. These flaws include __________________________, ___________________________, ____________________________, and __________________________.

 

Thesis Three:

McMahon has treated Peter Singer’s infanticide argument with gross unfairness. While McMahon is correct that Singer needs to tidy up some of his vague definitions, Singer’s general argument is rigorous, moral, and defensible.

 

1A Lesson Plan for Ariel Levy (144) and Brooke Knight (150)

Part One. Lexicon

 

1. Salacious, prurient: sex obsessed
2. Desensitization: the more sex obsessed a culture becomes, the more numbed or desensitized it becomes to sex requiring more extremes displays
3. Pushing the envelope
4. Quintessential: see paragraph 1 on 144: the ultimate
5. Ubiquitous: see last paragraph on 144 and top of 145 and see 146
6. Raunch Culture: The line between porno and mainstream is dissolved; see 145
7. Bacchanal: a place of drunken self-abandonment made popular by Madonna in the 1980s and 90s. 
8. Cyborg: a person who is both naturally human and artificially human at the same time: These are the new sexual images that have been idealized in the Internet Age. See page 150 and second paragraph on 152
9. Voyeuristic: spying with salacious intent. This is the motive, not education, as Jennifer Ringley suggests on bottom of page 150.
10. Narcissistic delusion: See top of 151: “Everyone is my angel.”
11. Flaneur: a traveler. See 153 top.
12. Delusion of “personal discovery”: see 153 top
13. Mundane: minutia of daily existence: see 153 bottom
14. Minutia: small, trivial, unremarkable

 

 

Part Two. Study Questions

 

One. What is “raunch culture”? It is more than a culture obsessed with eroticism. Taking the obsession further, raunch culture is elevating eroticism to a noble ideal. Being raunchy becomes the ultimate expression of the human condition and even feminism (see page 145).

Two. How did the Charlie’s Angels film contribute to the ideal of raunch? Because the women were more than soft-core porn images; they were strong, independent, and smart. (144)

 

Three. How does raunch show that a woman can “hang with the guys”? See 146 top.

 

Four. What is Ariel Levy’s conclusion? That women who feel that sexualizing themselves into raunchy images are deluded, fooling themselves, and succumbing to self-exploitation. It’s a self-hustle.

 

 

 

Part Three. The 10 Causes of Exhibitionism:

 

1. Incremental or gradual acceptance takes away the scandal and embarrassment factor; mainstreaming of porn culture blurs the line between normal and marginal behavior: See 146.
2. The nation has been “Howard Sterned” and “YouTubed” into desensitization. See 145 top
3. People are starving for attention, perhaps at the level of the narcissist
4. Lad magazines; promoting “raunch culture”; see 145
5. Need to be “one of the guys.” See 145 bottom
6. Exhibitionism became confused with empowerment: see 146 top
7. No line between the public and private in the world of Internet cams and cell phones in which people have fights with boyfriends and talk about personal surgeries for everyone to hear. See 150
8. Gives people a sense of control. See 150 bottom and 151 top.
9. Gives people a sense of community. See last paragraph on 151.
10. Gives outsiders a chance to be flaneurs—explorers of new places—from the safety of their own homes. See 153 top

 

 

First Option for Essay #3:

 

Sample Thesis: Ariel Levy and Brook Knight analyzes the major causes behind the Internet culture of webcam exhibitionism. The major causes include ____________________, _____________________, _____________________, and __________________________.

 

 

Second Option for Essay #3:

 

“Watch Me!” by Brooke A. Knight (150) offers various defenses of webcam exhibitionism. It’s claimed to be resource of education, love, community, authenticity, a “new machine/body,” healthy profit, and personal liberation.

 

Defend or refute these claims.

 

Third Option for Essay #3:

 

Ariel’s misguided strident attack of raunch culture collapses under the weight of several logical fallacies, unsubstantiated claims, and cheap emotional attacks, which include __________________________, ________________________, __________________________, and ____________________________.

 

Fourth Option for Essay #3:

 

Women who justify their raunch look by claiming they are empowered and liberated are woefully blind to the fact that they are willing participants in their own demise evidenced by __________________________, __________________________, ________________________________, and ____________________________.

 

 

 

 

 

1A Research Sources for Ariel Levy's "The Rise of Raunch Culture"

If you should decide to analyze the causes behind the rise of raunch culture (exhibitionism), then you may want to refer to these sources: 

Feminism Gone Wild

The Death of Real Passion

Sex and the Stupid Girl