Summary Of Top 6 Issues Facing Americans Today

The target of the satirical article, “Top 6 Issues Facing Americans Today”, is American citizens and the culture they have established. It critiques some of America’s flaws, such as selfishness, entitlement, and gluttony, and highlights them by exaggerating slight daily dilemmas. The article outlines the “top six so called ‘First World Problems’” that Americans face and discusses how these issues “wreck havoc in the lives of Americans”. Citizens are portrayed as complaining, petty, and materialistic, in hopes that they will realize how trivial their problems are. Culture in the United States has become focused on consumption, because many citizens forget how privileged and comfortable they live. By magnifying minor American issues to large, catastrophic problems and
The most prevalent one of these is exaggeration, as each issue is magnified to the extent of foolishness. Choosing whether to charge one’s phone or listen to music is considered a “life altering, mood changing, high stakes decision”, when in reality, it is simply a slight inconvenience due to an advance in technology. The article continues by describing how “coffee scalding burns are pervasive”, an exaggeration of a minor burnt tongue. Trivial issues are magnified into life threatening and dangerous situations, as to point out the obvious minimal effects of these problems. By misrepresenting these small issues, the culture of entitlement and gluttony are made clear to the audience. Distortion is also used in this article, as American dilemmas are portrayed as more important than urgent issues of hunger and poverty. The first paragraph explains how “today’s culture is solely focused on issues in undeveloped, alienated countries, oblivious to real issues of real people.” This recurring idea undermines devastating world issues and exaggerates trivial matters faced by wealthy Americans. In doing this, the trifle and meaningless issues