RCL#4

For this RCL post I will be analyzing the logic of the organization Mother Jones.  Mother Jones is a non-profit news organization that is extremely progressive in there views.  Their progressive liberal leaning seem to be on display everywhere on the website, from the article selection, to article title and on into the actual material in the articles. They cover everything from politics to food.  As I was searching for a organization to feature in this post I came across many that represented something I disagreed with.  Unfortunately, even though I disagreed with what they were saying these organizations where not to ripe with fallacious arguments and logic.  Or it just was not so blatant.

Mother Jones on the other hand is like a liberal hub of all news presented with a slant that makes my blood boil.  I consider myself to have a moderate view on most issues but the few I have a staunch stance on such as abortion, gun rights and being pro-police officer where being all-around hated on by Mother Jones.  I immediately knew I had found the organization that I would enjoy looking for fallacies in there arguments.

The first article I will analyze “Americans are GorgingThemselves on Cheap Meat” by Jenny Luna appears to be a simple health article, nope.  It is a disguised article on why eating beef is not bad for your health but for the environment.

1) The article opens by saying, “While the Dutch and other nations are advising consumers to cut down on red meat, and it’s estimated that Americans will eat more beef this year than we have in the last decade.” The operative words are advising and estimated.  The Dutch government simply is advising that does not mean that the people of Denmark will eat less meat.  The writer compares an advisory statement to an estimate.  Then later says the Netherlands advises their population to eat no more than 0.9lbs of red meat a week.  Followed by the fact that it is estimated that the US eats 53.4lbs of red meat a year that is really close to the advisement from the Netherlands.  But the yearly total was included to the make the number look bigger. Also, you need to compare apples to apples not apples to oranges.  So why did the author not include what the estimated total consumption of meat in the Netherlands is?  An advisement number means nothing, the US Government could advice the population to eat no meat and nothing would change.  This article uses weak logic and contradicts itself throughout by bring up facts that hurt the argument.  This article is ripe with the fallacy of missing the point.  While also promoting the site progressive agenda by arguing that cows are bad for the environment. 

  

2) “Conservatives Just Lost a Big Weapon Against the AbortionPill” The title of the next article is a logical fallacy in itself. There are multiple fallacies at play such as false dichotomy, red herring, and slippery slope.  The false dichotomy fallacy comes up because it is saying conservatives have just lost and abortion has won, without even going into the argument.  Red herring is what the title is, conservatives are never again mentioned in the article, only in the title to make it appear that a changing of a label on a birth control pill is a blow to conservative, because it makes it more affordable.  The last on is a slippery slope and a weak one at that.  The fact that a two-thirds reduction in the dosage on a birth control pill results in birth control being cheaper and conservatives losing.  The rest of the article simply plays of the fallacies in the title.

If you look through Mother Jones website the articles linked commonly have a common denominator which is supporting the progressive agenda.  It only makes sense that the news outlet that is funded under the umbrella of the Foundation for National Progress.  You cannot fault the group polarizing the news, it gives more sites and organization a niche to cater to.  If all the news sites reported unbiased information there would only need to be one source.