Blog Critique

The Smirking Chimp is a left leaning blog. Writers who post within this blog have fairly liberal views and are often against conservative views. The writer of this post, Rose Aguilar, is a woman. She is extremely interested in women’s issues and activism. She has interviewed several people about different political issues. She has also hosted a radio station. Therefore, I believe that the source is quite credible. Aguilar is well known and is an active member in several different organizations. I presume that since she has run a few political talk shows, she has a fair amount of knowledge.

Since Aguilar is interested in women activism, I believe that her intended audience is women. Rose Aguilar is blogging about certain laws being passed that are making self induced abortions illegal. The audience doesn’t even need to look past the title of Aguilar’s blog in order to know her opinion-Meet Rep. Carl Wimmer, the Man Behind Utah's New Law Criminalizing Miscarriages When most people think of miscarriage, they think of a woman losing her baby without wanting to. However, Wimmer is trying to pass laws making self induced abortion illegal. Aguilar claims that these laws would weaken the decision made in Roe v. Wade. It is apparent that Aguilar’s intended audience is pro-choice. The writer seems to think that making self induced abortions illegal is ridiculous. This can be seen by the questions she asks in her interview with Representative Carl Wimmer. She continually asks what his actual goal is in passing these laws. She also asks if he believes that educating teen girls about sex would be more beneficial than these laws.

Rose Aguilar asks Wimmer what kind of circumstances the law would apply to. She also continues to ask him what the implications of the laws would be. Will Carl Wimmer hope to pass a law against abortion overall? Also, she asks him how he will make sure that the children who are born have good lives. Lastly, she claims that he couldn’t possibly believe in the death penalty if he is against abortion. This shows Aguilar’s use of logic. This is a good argument, because many people believe that killing others is wrong overall. However, Aguilar points out that it doesn’t make sense for Wimmer to pass laws against abortion, yet be for the death penalty.

Aguilar gives great evidence when she states that the amount of teen pregnancies went down when the schools focused on sex education. She alludes to the fact that sex education may be a better answer than laws against abortion. Perhaps, if the schools educated young teens, they wouldn’t get pregnant. Her argument is clear and cohesive. She argues that the law is not defined enough to apply to certain situations as well.

I believe that her argument is organized and easy to understand. Although I do not agree with her views on abortion, she presents facts that lead me to understand another perspective. Her argument is logical, contains evidence, and she appears to be quite credible.