The following appeared in a newspaper editorial:
“As violence in movies increases, so do crime rates in our cities. To combat this problem we must establish a board to censor certain movies, or we must limit admission to persons over 21 years of age. Apparently our legislators are not concerned about this issue since a bill calling for such actions recently failed to receive a majority vote.”
Discuss how well reasoned you find this argument. In your discussion be sure to analyze the line of reasoning and the use of evidence in the argument. For example, you may need to consider what questionable assumptions underlie the thinking and what alternative explanations or counterexamples might weaken the conclusion. You can also discuss what sort of evidence would strengthen or refute the argument, what changes in the argument would make it more logically sound, and what, if anything, would help you better evaluate its conclusion.
The argument speaks of how as violence in movies increases, so do crime rates in the cities. It certainly assumes that, of late, the number of movies that glorify violence is increasing and as a result, the criminal activities in the cities are also increasing. Implied in this assumption is another assumption that, movies that glorify violence have a great influence on the minds of its viewers. What could corroborate this assumption is to compare the statistics, i.e, by considering the reported criminal activities during a period of time when no such movies were released compared to when a large proportion of the same was released. A strong positive or lack of correlation thereof could throw light into this assumption. But it could also have been that the number of reported crimes vary from time to time due a number of factors like the political and socio-economic situations of the period. As the number of reported criminal activities vary, an unambiguous extrapolation cannot be made.
Secondly, the argument propounds that a censor board that censors only certain movies need to be established. It is unclear as to who will decide which all movies would come under this category. It might be that another board would need to be established to decide which all movies would need to be censored in the first place. In such a case, vested interests from different parties would come into the picture and the movie would have to be edited in a way, that would suit a particular individuals' tastes. And naturally, what is violent for one person may not be so for another, for the tolerance for action and blood is personal and vary with demographics- be it age, gender or race.
Further, the author suggests as a solution, to limit admission to only those who are 21 or older. The age of being considered an adult, the age of consent, the legal age for drinking, driving etc vary from country to country. Such limitations have been placed on the society after painstaking research and after conducting surveys and collecting data that make compelling arguments for such reasonable restrictions to be placed on them. I'm not sure if introducing an age limit for movie viewing is an effective idea. It sounds rather extreme. It needs to be carefully studied if this would be of any help. True that, it may be the younger generation or the teenagers who are most influenced by violence; but in this age and day, when information and movies are one click away on the internet, apart from reducing profits for the movie makers by reducing the movie-going audiences - of which these teenagers form a huge chunk of - it won't be that effective. Rather than a one-step ban for those who are younger than 21, better and more effective steps and strategies could be considered. Moral education that would advice one to see a movie as just a movie and not real life comes to the mind.
And as a conclusion, all my previous arguments could be some of the reasons as to why the bill that was introduced failed to receive a majority vote. The bill being introduced itself stands testament to the fact that the legislators are indeed concerned about the issue, contrary to the argument made by the author. As to why the bill failed - the provisions of the bill need to be studied. Maybe the legislators thought that some provisions were too strong or that they weren't effective enough? But if it was in fact, only a half-hearted attempt to appease the voters, then stronger actions need to be demanded.
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Comments
Essay evaluation report
argument 1 -- OK
argument 2 -- OK
argument 3 -- OK, but it is too long. here we just need to mention like: are the crimes mainly by persons over 21 years of age? or persons younger than 21 years of age?
and argument 2 and argument 3 can be put together in one paragraph:
'To combat this problem we must establish a board to censor certain movies, or we must limit admission to persons over 21 years of age.'
argument 4 -- OK
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Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.5 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 26 15
No. of Words: 608 350
No. of Characters: 2832 1500
No. of Different Words: 279 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.966 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.658 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.65 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 189 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 140 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 103 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 69 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 23.385 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 10.937 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.5 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.254 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.444 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.078 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 4 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 530, Rule ID: PERIOD_OF_TIME[1]
Message: Use simply 'period'.
Suggestion: period
...e reported criminal activities during a period of time when no such movies were released compa...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 78, Rule ID: WHO_NOUN[1]
Message: A noun should not follow "who". Try changing to a verb or maybe to 'who is a are'.
Suggestion: who is a are
...ution, to limit admission to only those who are 21 or older. The age of being considere...
^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 438, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: I'm
...able restrictions to be placed on them. Im not sure if introducing an age limit fo...
^^
Line 5, column 793, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...vies are one click away on the internet, apart from reducing profits for the movi...
^^
Line 5, column 1116, Rule ID: GIVE_ADVISE[4]
Message: Did you mean 'advise' (a verb)?
Suggestion: advise
... considered. Moral education that would advice one to see a movie as just a movie and ...
^^^^^^
Line 7, column 57, Rule ID: SOME_OF_THE[1]
Message: Simply use 'some'.
Suggestion: some
...ion, all my previous arguments could be some of the reasons as to why the bill that was int...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 472, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: weren't
...provisions were too strong or that they werent effective enough? But if it was in fact...
^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, if, may, second, secondly, so, then, apart from, as to, in fact, as a result, in the first place
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 39.0 19.6327345309 199% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 23.0 12.9520958084 178% => OK
Conjunction : 22.0 11.1786427146 197% => OK
Relative clauses : 27.0 13.6137724551 198% => OK
Pronoun: 41.0 28.8173652695 142% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 75.0 55.5748502994 135% => OK
Nominalization: 21.0 16.3942115768 128% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2899.0 2260.96107784 128% => OK
No of words: 604.0 441.139720559 137% => Less content wanted.
Chars per words: 4.79966887417 5.12650576532 94% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.95746018188 4.56307096286 109% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.71851129819 2.78398813304 98% => OK
Unique words: 287.0 204.123752495 141% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.475165562914 0.468620217663 101% => OK
syllable_count: 918.9 705.55239521 130% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 7.0 4.96107784431 141% => OK
Article: 11.0 8.76447105788 126% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 5.0 1.67365269461 299% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 26.0 19.7664670659 132% => OK
Sentence length: 23.0 22.8473053892 101% => OK
Sentence length SD: 64.4122378941 57.8364921388 111% => OK
Chars per sentence: 111.5 119.503703932 93% => OK
Words per sentence: 23.2307692308 23.324526521 100% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.38461538462 5.70786347227 77% => OK
Paragraphs: 4.0 5.15768463074 78% => More paragraphs wanted.
Language errors: 7.0 5.25449101796 133% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 12.0 8.20758483034 146% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 12.0 6.88822355289 174% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 2.0 4.67664670659 43% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.130331237046 0.218282227539 60% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0427636133961 0.0743258471296 58% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0525151799536 0.0701772020484 75% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0762530435442 0.128457276422 59% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0454752797116 0.0628817314937 72% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.8 14.3799401198 89% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 56.59 48.3550499002 117% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.1 12.197005988 91% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 10.86 12.5979740519 86% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.44 8.32208582834 101% => OK
difficult_words: 140.0 98.500998004 142% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 13.5 12.3882235529 109% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.2 11.1389221557 101% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Write the essay in 30 minutes.
Rates: 62.5 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.75 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.