Typhoon Haiyan And The Language Of Disaster

Name: Professor’s Name: Course: Date: Analysis Essay Typhoon Haiyan and the Language of Disaster Poverty is an issue which has affected and is still affecting or distressing many countries in the world. Many nations have strategized or planned in finding means and methods to eradicate poverty completely. Statistics show that there has been a drastic percentage fall of poverty cases in the world. Nonetheless, it still continues to affect some nations. In some countries, the newly elected leaders or the existing ones have or had promised to change the lives the people lead, especially the poor. However, that does or did not seem to be the case. Most of them forget or ignore the promises they made, and they use the power and authority they have to steal from these citizens to enrich themselves while increasing poverty in the regions. Majority rich people get away with everything specifically when it benefits them mostly hence the poor are unable to defend themselves. The stories that come after such acts are always lies and they are often told frequently. In the article, Typhoon Haiyan and the Language of Disaster, Rebecca Solnit orates how the poor are postulated based on what is told about them. She opines that people should not always believe what is always told about the poor whose voices are often found wanting mainly due to the lies which are repeatedly told. In her article, Solnit states, “A lie repeated often and confidently enough can become widely mistaken for the truth, becoming a belief that obscures the facts.” Lies told repeatedly are often calamitous hence we first need to consider what we hear and see before making a rush conclusion. What is Solnit trying to tell her readers? Solnit is trying to tell her readers not to believe in everything that they are told or what they hear. She comes up with this statement based on what happened in the Philippines when the typhoon Haiyan struck the region taking away thousands of lives. It is indeed evident that a reiterated story can become disastrous supplementing what people already know. A typhoon hit the Philippines claiming many lives, destroying a lot of property, leaving people without medical care, food and water. The few people who subsisted or endured the massacre had to find a means of survival. In her article, for instance, there is a photo showing some of the survivors carrying away sacks of rice from a warehouse in the Philippines. However, some people perceive their attempts to survive as wrongdoings. News from the Associated Press headlined, “Mobs overran a rice warehouse” and “parts of the disaster zone are descending into chaos.” This has made the survivors to be thought of as criminals instead of people who are looking for ways to continue living. When told recurrently, many people will opt to believe that these people are criminals yet they are looking for a means of survival. Solnit appeals to emotions when she states that we should not always believe in lies told repeatedly as it can be mistaken for the truth. Consider the devices used to present the arguments...