Techniques to State Opinions

In class over the past few weeks we read two articles about child soldiers. Child soldiers are children living mostly in Africa who have been kidnapped or abducted by a rebel army who is trying to fight of their government. They children are plucked away from their families and homes and are forced to fight in wars, Boys and girls. These girls are mostly used for rape and sexual abuse and the boys are mostly used for fighting. Both articles “Armed and Underage” by Jeffrey Gettleman and “Children at War” by PW Singer are give us information about child soldier but are also persuading the reader to a certain feeling or opinion/side. They both try to persuade the reader to think that child soldiers are wrong and need to be stopped but do this is different ways. “Armed and Underage” uses imagery to almost scare or make images in their mind that will convince them this is wrong, while “Children at war” Mostly just state facts.

So in the article “Armed and Underage” they use imagery to give the reader certain images into heir head, some freighting or shocking, to convince them how bad child soldiers are. For example in the article it describes a child soldier named Awil who has trouble carrying his gun. However they don’t state it like this they state it by saying “The strap digs into his bony shoulders and he is constantly shifting it from one side to another with a grimace.” Basically all they are saying is its hard for Awil to carry a gun but they say it in a way where you picture a little skinny boy with a gun and see his face filled with pain. Also they use certain words to exaggerate. For example, in that last quote the used the word, grimace. They could have just said with pain, or with a grown but they decided to say grimace which is much more powerful.  Another example of imagery used in this article is when they describe what they sleep on. They say, “Like most soldiers, his bed is a fly-covered mattress that he shares with two other child soldiers.” If you read they sleep on bad beds you wouldn’t really picture it as much as you would after reading the quote.

            In the article “Children at War” he uses facts and doesn’t really use imagery. You may think well if he is only using facts then how can he be persuading people to a specific side or opinion. The way he does it is by using facts but mostly using facts about how child soldiers are victims and suffer. One example is they tell us that the youngest child soldier that was armed, meaning given weapons was five years of age. They could have told us whom the oldest soldier was if we were talking about the war. Also he mentions that over 300,00 children 17 and under serve in worldwide combat. Here he could have told us along with this fact how many people over 18 serve in worldwide combat. In this example I think he chooses just to tell us kids under 17 because I’m sure the number fro over 18 is higher. If he had mentions the over 18 people the younger then 18 people wouldn’t look as much of a big number. Therefor he is making the facts seem worse then they actually are by sharing only bad facts about child soldiers. He didn’t mention any child soldiers that volunteered into the army.

Obviously both arguments have opinion and facts mixed together. Which technique of writing do you thinks supported the opinion that child soldiers are victims? Is there a different technique you would use?