Alberto's 1st Discourse Analysis Write-up.

This video is about children living in poverty in America.  The reason why I choose this source is because I think it represent what often most people think about poverty, or  the stigmatism towards it.  I feel the author is extremely biased how they portray children living in poverty in America.

In the video, the subject is portrayed as dark and dire. These kids are living in scary neighborhoods with rapists, drug dealers, and murderers. They are abused and they are often left to take care of themselves.  The only place they feel safest is in their bedrooms and they are lucky to have even mattress to go with.  Then the video lists some children who died from child abuse, and then concludes it by telling the audience they can help these children by visiting a website called Roomsforhope.com. The group that is associated with this website helps designs rooms for inner city kids. The group wants to help create a safe haven for those kids. I feel that the message that this video is sending is that if the child is living in poverty, then their living are really horrible, and they are often abused. The person who made this video used strong emotional appeal using depressing music and sad images. They want people to be aware of this problem, and definitely want action to be done.

            Analyzing this video, it’s clear that the author has a definite bias.  Quoting from the video “I wish you knew what it is like to be me because I am poor I have to live in scary neighborhoods with drug dealers, rapists, and murderers”. This kind statement is really emotional. The premise from this is those who live in poverty also live in scary crime-ridden neighborhoods. Looking around online I found that there is an association with poverty and crime, but not all people who are poor live in scary neighborhoods that ridden with crime (1). The same goes with child abuse and poverty (2). I do believe Poverty, & Child Abuse are serious issues but I feel that the author exaggerates on who is the victim and how wide spread it is. Their appeal makes people want to join their side kind like a mad mob. A comment left by user “How can Barak Obama dictate to other countries in the world as to how to run their affairs, when he has this going on in his own back yard? Tony Blair & Co in the UK are the same; they cannot tell the world how to run its affairs when they can't even look after their own people.“ Like a mob, there’s no direction. People are riled up about this issue, and they should be but not for the reasons the way the author portrayed in the video. In face this type of appeal, if they are smart people are turned off and quite possibly they hurt their cause of helping children in poverty. This is probably one thing I should look out for my other sources.

(1) http://www.capaassociation.org/newsletter_N009/Articles/PovertyCrime.htm

(2) http://www.medicinenet.com/child_abuse/page3.htm