PT. 51 S3 Q12

rockytoral

Can someone please explain this question... I'm not really sure what's even going on in the stimulus.

Admin edit: Here's the passage for reference
http://7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-51-section-3-question-12/

Accounts Playable

This is a tough question, and a lot of the difficulty is due to the fact that the damn stimulus is so long/convoluted It's a most strongly supported question, so we don't really need to evaluate the argument (if there is any) in the stimulus.

Here is my sentence by sentence paraphrase:
Recently, there have been some articles talking smack about the environmental movement. According to some guy named Winslow (with a nerd name like that, he must be pretty smart), these articles criticizing the environmental movement are NOT being written because the editors don't like the environmental movement. Instead, it's to seem "daring" or "contrarian" or "anti-establishment" since they challenge political positions. Winslow is correct in saying/believing this. However, people who are staunch environmentalists aren't apart of the political majority. Additionally, those who are anti-environmental are not really apart of the opposition as well, even though they present themselves as so.

Here is my paraphrase in English now:
There are some recent articles criticizing the environmental movement. Winslow thinks these articles are being written because the content go against the status quo. He is right in that regard. But, environmentalists aren't apart of the status quo to begin with and those opposed to environmentalism aren't against the status que.

Breakdown of the argument: To me, it seems as if the author isn't arguing with Winslow's conclusion (in fact, the author agrees with it). The author is trying to say (pretty poorly in my mind) that the editors erroneously BELIEVE that the articles are daring, but they are ACTUALLY not that daring. Again, we don't really need to analyze the argument, but it is good practice when you are BRing anyway.

Answer A: This is definitely supported, and it is directly stated in line 8. The author agrees with Winslow.

Answer B: I think, if anything, this must be false. The last 2-3 lines seem to imply that the anti-environmentalists (assuming they are critics) have been somewhat successful in promoting themselves as renegades.

Answer C: What a whole lot of nothing in this answer choice. This answer choice says that Winslow's explanation is not consistent with the facts about the published articles about environmentalism. Again, I think this must be false because Winslow's hypothesis completely fits the facts, and the author agrees with him.

Answer This is a mish mash of ideas that isn't supported. We know that environmentalism is not the prevailing political position (orthodoxy), but we can't say that the critique of that is the majority position.

Answer E: I am always wary of answer choices that predict the future. We have nothing in the passage that makes any futuristic prediction.

Hope this helps!

rockytoral

This is great! Thank you!