“Saving Lions by Killing them”
by Alexander N. Songorwa
This OP-ED
pulled me in with its title, “Saving Lions by Killing Them”….huh? I wanted to
read more. The Lion King being one of my favorite movies and an all-time
classic played a role in that too. Songorwa in this article is trying to convince
the reader to not list the African Lion as an endangered species. If the
African Lion is indeed listed as endangered, protecting wildlife in Tanzania
will be more difficult. The millions of dollars that hunters spend in Tanzania
to go on a safari to hunt African Lions, helps finance the game reserves,
wildlife management areas, and conservation efforts. Without this revenue, the
efforts to protect wildlife in Tanzia will diminish. So basically, hunting a
few lions, saves a whole lot more. The writer used a subtle but persuasive tone
throughout the article. For example, “While that is true, the lion population
in Tanzania is not endangered. We have an estimated 16,800 lions, perhaps 40
percent of all lions on the continent, the biggest population in the world.
Their numbers are stable here, and while our hunting system is not perfect, we
have taken aggressive efforts to protect our lions.” And “Tanzania has
regulated hunting for decades; female and younger lions are completely
protected, and the hunting of males is limited by quotas set for each hunting
area in the country. We recently made it illegal to hunt male lions younger
than 6 years old to ensure that reproductively active animals remained with
their prides. And proposed amendments to our wildlife law would further crack
down on the export of lions taken illegally, penalize hunting companies that
violated our rules and reward those that complied.” I felt that both of those
paragraphs were the most persuasive. It hints the reader subtly that Tanzia does
everything possible to protect the lions, and that they make efforts to
continue to do so. I thought this OP-Ed did a good job following the guidelines
we made in class. It attracted my attention with the title, the writer clearly
stated his claim in the first paragraph, he provided evidence with statistics
and numbers of how many lions are hunted and how much money it brings in, and
restates his position at the end, asking the public to please side with him.
One thing I noticed is how subtly he acknowledged the opposition. “If lions are
listed by the United States as an endangered species, American hunters may
choose to hunt other prized species outside of Africa or simply not hunt at
all. This would add further strain to our already limited budgets, undo the
progress we’ve made, and undermine our ability to conserve not only our lions
but all of our wildlife.”
“How Beer Gave Us Civilization”
by Jeffery P. Kahn
An OP-ED about beer and how it "gave us civilization", I had
to hear this. Kahn uses humor throughout this article to convince the reader
that beer played a huge role in the development of civilization. He persuades
the reader with evidence of certain places that supposedly beer played a role
in civilization, “Natufian culture in the Eastern Mediterranean, the team
concludes that “brewing of beer was an important aspect of feasting and society
in the Late Epipaleolithic” era.” And “Anthropological studies in Mexico
suggest a similar conclusion: there, the ancestral grass of modern maize,
teosinte, was well suited for making beer — but was much less so for making corn
flour for bread or tortillas.” and “beer
was thought to be so important in many bygone civilizations that the Code of
Urukagina, often cited as the first legal code, even prescribed it as a central
unit of payment and penance.” He jokes that the effects of “early brews” must
have been discovered because it quickly spread, and helped people break out of
their inner shell and be more social. He does acknowledge the opposition
though, stating how some drink so much due to “social anxiety” or “panic
anxiety” and he states “But getting drunk, unfortunately, only compounds the
problem: it can lead to decivilizing behaviors and encounters, and harm the
body over time.”. But, he quickly
refutes it by ending it and restating his claim. That “But beer’s place in the
development of civilization deserves at least a raising of the glass.” Again,
this OP-ED does a good job following the “Do’s” list in class. One thing I think
he lacks is significant evidence. Sure, he lists some fun facts about theories
of certain countries or eras, but he never really fully gained my trust.
