Yasmine's Blog!!

The article I read on theonion.com was named "African Children Given 30000 Unused 'Save Darfur' T-Shirts". This article is turning the situation of Darfur and our response to it into a joke. Hundreds of Thousands of people are dying in Darfur, and although the U.S. says that they are trying to help the situation, not much has been done, other than producing t-shirts or making a few signs. The article spoke of how the U.S. had made 30000 t-shirts about Darfur, but since the problem had not been as much of a concern as they had thought, they are just going to give the shirts to the children of Darfur. Instead of using the money of making the t-shirts to the people of darfur, they made t-shirts, making fun of the U.S's approach to the unfortunate situation. I think that the article was an example of Horatian Satire. This type of satire is somewhat making fun of a group of people, or an idea, but not in a mean spirited way, as Juvenalian satire is. In this case, the satire is aiming at the United State's response to the cries of help from Darfur. The writing was funny because it was written as if it was an article, but was actually making a joke about the U.S. A sentence that made me laugh was: " 'Frankly, we thought this would be a more popular issue," a Mee Tees spokeswoman said." It is funny because it is actually true. The response the T-Shirt company made to Darfur is funny becuase they did not try and help Darfur, but used it as an excuse for business. This is what the United States has become.

posted by Yasmine Scott @ 1:57 PM