As They Say, Drugs Kill

“As They Say, Drugs Kill” by Laura Rowley is an article that tries to persuade people not to do drugs because they can kill you. Her thesis is made clear from the beginning of the essay, and is supported throughout the essay. Throughout the essay Rowley gives evidence that drug use is dangerous by talking about her personal experience. She speaks of her personal experience at a party where someone dies after taking “shrooms”. She recounted how traumatic the experience was and how it was an eye opener for her.
Even though her thesis of not using drugs because they can kill is a valid point and holds true to many situations I feel that her support was not strong enough. Though she gave a real life experience her particular experience could be seen almost as an unfortunate mishap meaning that it is unheard of for someone to die from “shrooms”. If you were to take the time to look up the effects of “shrooms” you would see that the only time death has occurred is when someone mistakes a poisonous mushroom for the one used for drugs. Also in the article it was never confirmed that his death was directly related to the mushrooms; all that is said is he died while taking mushrooms. I understand that it would be most logical to blame the mushrooms, but if he had been eating broccoli at the time would we automatically think that’s what killed him.
Her examples contain fact in a since that it is a real life experience, but it has no real facts that support what she is saying in my opinion. There is a lot of emotional appeal in her example. The way she describes the events appeals to the emotions, and she even goes as far to talk about how someone at the party had watched their father die of a heart attack and how this was bringing back bad memories for him. I think that because there are no real facts supporting her thesis that her emotional appeal is ineffective. Speaking for myself I know it’s hard to watch any one die, but since that is true in any case if she cannot prove he died from drug use then this story does not properly support her thesis.
Rowley’s intro is very effective in capturing the reader, but her conclusion is just like the rest of her article; based on emotion and holds no real value. The reason I say her conclusion has no real value is because in her conclusion she talks about how no one seemed to learn from the young man’s death, but since she has no proof that he died from the mushrooms there really is no lesson to learn. If she had facts to support the correlation of his drug use and his death she would have a more valid point.
As I said in the beginning her thesis is a valid thesis; people should not use drugs, but her reasons do not support the thesis well enough to make this article persuasive.