15. Is This the Best Humanity Can Do for the Philippines?

            Friedersdorf, a staff writer at The Atlantic, wrote an article about the recent typhoon in Philippines and how the countries should use it to reflect their own attitudes.  He mentioned that the countries should invest their money on strengthening the infra-structure instead of wasting money on the army. The typhoon in the Philippines is a reminder for the rest of the world that the worst can happen, therefore, it is better the countries prepare themselves for future disasters. In this typhoon, the United States sent rescue helicopters, surveillance planes and Marines to help the survivors of this catastrophe. The author wrote that he felt very proud of the country for using the tools that were designed to fight wars to actually help the people in need. However, he thinks that the U.S spends less money for their own disaster preparedness and this will eventually lead to devastating consequences. A few days ago, it was detected that a huge earthquake or tsunami will hit the Pacific Northwest soon but even so, the country did not do much to protect their own citizen since it is hard to imagine the disaster actually happening. He urges the countries to stop finding methods to defeat other countries but find solutions to protect their own people from these terrifying catastrophes.

             Friedersdorf wrote a first person essay about how the people should react to the typhoon in Philippines. His used vocabularies that were strong and impacting that should the readers clearly the author`s opinion. He used a powerful quote from the survivors of the typhoon in the beginning of the article so that it would get the reader`s attention and also contributes to the seriousness of the main topic. He also used many credible fonts such as The Los Angeles Times and the opinions of Charles Krauthammer and Carl Sagan. These sources add to the overall credibility of the article and also increase the amount of information of the essay. Friedersdorf also used many examples to prove his points, for example the Boxing Day tsunami in Banda Aceh, the earthquake and tsunami in Japan and the newly detected disaster approaching the Pacific Northwest. These examples are used to prove that the countries should invest more money to strengthen their infra structure in order to prevent severe consequences. The author also used one phrase paragraphs which enforced the main idea of the essay.  An example would be “It is good to act then. It would be better to act sooner” which urges the countries to prepare themselves for future catastrophes. He also uses rhetorical questions in order to make the people reflect on their own attitudes and also give them an opportunity to have their own opinion. A negative aspect of this article is that the beginning of the essay does not match with the rest of the article because the beginning of the essay suggested that the author was going to write about the consequences of the typhoon and what the people can do to help the situation. Overall, the essay was well written since the author was able to express his opinion to his readers that were mainly the adults.  

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/11/is-this-the-best-humanity-can-do-for-the-philippines/281332/