Self-study
Activist: As electronic monitoring of employees grows more commonplace and invasive, we hear more and more attempted justifications of this practice by employers. █████████████ ████ ████████ █████ █████████ ███████ ██████████ ███ ██████ ██ ██████████ ████ ████████████ ███ █████████ █████████████ ███ ██ ██████ ███ ██ █████ ██ ███████ █████ ███████████ █████████ ██ ████████
Summarize Argument
The author concludes that an employer’s interest in honesty, efficiency, and politeness to customers is not a good justification for the invading employees’ privacy by electronically monitoring them. The author supports their argument by saying that an employer’s interest in honesty, efficiency, and politeness to customers must be a self-serving explanation, or one rooted only in the employer’s interest.
Identify and Describe Flaw
The author does not address the employer’s argument about honesty, efficiency, and politeness to customers, any of which could be a legitimate concern for a business. Instead, he assumes that the employers are selfishly motivated in making such an argument. Without actually addressing the argument of the employers, the author’s conclusion is unsupported.
9.
A questionable technique used in ███ ██████████ ████████ ██ ██
a
attack an argument █████████ ████ ████ ████████ ███████ ██ ███ █████████
The author does not attack an argument not offered by the employers; in fact, he does not attack any argument at all. Rather, he assumes the motives of the employers and uses those to support his conclusion.
b
presume that employees ███ █████ ██████████ ████████████ ██ ████
The author never assumes anything about employees or their behaviors. Rather, the flaw in his argument comes from attacking the employers’ suspected motivations instead of the merits of their argument.
c
insist that modern ████████ █████████ ████ █████ █████████ ███ ██████ ████ █████ ████████ ██ ███ ████
The author never makes a comparison between past and current business practices or moral standards. Instead, he makes an argument for privacy based on assumed motives of his opponents, the employers.
d
attack employers' motives ███████ ██ ██████████ █████ █████████
The author attacks what he assumes to be the motives of the employers, saying their argument is self serving. In order for his conclusion to be supported, he should have addressed their argument about honesty, politeness, and efficiency.
e
make a generalization █████ ██ █ ██████ ████ █████ ██ ██████ ██ ███████ ██ ██████
There is no sampling present in this argument—the author is not drawing conclusions about groups based on representative samples. Instead, he is using assumptions about his opponent’s motives to support his conclusion instead of addressing their argument.