Part of the responsibility of working as a human service provider is being aware of both sides of the issue. Often we allow our personal convictions to guide our delivery of human services. When presenting an argument for or against a specific policy, or listening to someone else present an argument, we need to be aware of persuasive techniques.
• Complete the Recognizing Deceptive Arguments exercise on pp. 292–294 in Ch. 7 of the text. Please note there are 15 arguments.
• Number the questions and provide your answers.
1. The Supreme Court has a greater obligation to protect the rights of victims than those of criminals.
2. It is clear to every intelligent person that the Eighth Amendment to the
U.S. Constitution, protection against cruel and unusual punishment, does not bar the use of victim impact statements.
3. Victim reforms will destroy the constitutional rights of the accused.
4. The conservative, prejudiced Supreme Court judges are too stupid to recognize the rights of the accused.
5. Every decent lawyer believes the harm a victim suffered because of a defendant should be considered when determining punishment.
6. Victims have absolutely no rights at all.
7. Everyone agrees that victim reforms are false promises made by legislators seeking to please voters worried about crime.
8. The victims’ rights movement developed because victims of crime felt they had no rights in the criminal justice system.
9. Thurgood Marshall, a pro-criminal, bleeding-heart liberal, considers the harm a victim suffered irrelevant in a criminal trial.
10. As Justice John Paul Stevens correctly points out, the defendant should have more rights than the state in a criminal trial.
11. Victim impact statements force juries to base their decisions on emotion rather than on objective facts.
12. As Deborah Kelly, chair of the American Bar Association’s Victims’