Category: Essays on Controversial Topics
Browse our collection of essays on controversial topics. Each topic in this category represents a controversial issue and thus is a good choice if you are looking for argumentative or persuasive essay topics. When writing an argumentative essay or a persuasive essay you should focus on picking a topic that is current and relevant to society and can be argued logically.
While a strong interest in a topic is important, it’s not enough to be interested. You have to consider what position you can back up with reasoning and evidence. It’s one thing to have a strong belief, but when shaping an argument you’ll have to explain why your belief is reasonable and logical. As you explore the topics, make a mental list of points you could use as evidence for or against an issue.
Residential segregation most often refers to the separation of people into different neighborhoods based on their race and/or ethnicity, though neighborhood-level segregation can be computed using other characteristics of people, households, or neighborhoods, for example, social class, single-parent families, or home ownership. The association between the term residential …
Sociologist Robert Merton coined the term self-fulfilling prophecy in 1949 in Social Theory and Social Structure as “a false definition of the situation evoking a new behavior which makes the original false conception come true.” In other words, a person’s expectations about a situation eventually lead that person …
Individuals convicted of crimes are sentenced to a variety of punishments, including fines, treatment, supervision, and incarceration. Disparities, or differences, in these sentences correlate with both legal characteristics such as crime of conviction and prior record, and “extra-legal” characteristics such as race, employment status, sex, and age. Moreover, …
Serial killing is defined as four or more homicides in separate events, in which there is a psychological “cool-down” period for the perpetrator, which may be weeks, months, or years. It is commonly distinguished from mass killing and spree killing, in which there is no “cool-down” period. Unlike …
The term service economy refers to those industries and occupations within the formal economy that provide various services. It is a broad, general term covering industries as diverse as insurance, transportation, and food, and occupations as diverse as lawyers, investment bankers, and bartenders. Rather than producing a material …
Progressive, comprehensive sex education encompasses the myriad issues related to human sexuality, including birth control, disease prevention, sexual orientation, gender roles, relationships, and intimacy. Such programs provide age appropriate information throughout primary and secondary education and support student exploration and development of emotions, attitudes, values, and identity as …
Sexism is a system of oppression that privileges men and discriminates against women. Sexism requires prejudice plus power. Like racism, sexism is not about isolated incidents but about patterns. The institutions of government, law, religion, education, and the media— as well as language and social mores—long perpetuated sexism, …
Americans see thousands of advertisements for products and services every week, and many of those commercial messages contain representations of women that are unflattering, demeaning, and offensive to many. Over the years, parents, teachers, religious organizations, feminists, media critics, and public interest groups have all voiced concerns over …
Many people view sexism, defined as an ideology and practices that promote women’s inferiority to men, as a significant problem in contemporary music. While some think of the latest offensive lyrics by some popular music artists as symptomatic of this issue, others believe that the sexism in music …
Sex trafficking refers to the trafficking of women and children for sexual exploitation in forced marriages and forced prostitution. Generally, the trafficking flows from poorer countries to countries where the average person’s living standard is relatively higher. Women are typically tricked and recruited with promises of well-paid legitimate …
Sexual harassment in the workplace has existed since men and women started working. Yet the term sexual harassment and the problem of sexual harassment were not legally and publicly recognized until the 1970s in the United States and later in other countries. Historical accounts of sexual harassment in …
Human sexuality is one of the few distinctive traits shared by all civilizations, although its cultural characteristics and nuances differ widely. Sexuality in its broadest sense is not easily definable, since it covers such a broad range of behaviors, interpretations, norms, and processes. Sexuality is a sociocultural and …
Sexualization of mainstream media refers to the way that sex has become more visible in contemporary Western mainstream media in recent years. Other interchangeable terms are pornification, pornographication, and porno chic, which more specifically describe a fascination in contemporary media with sexually explicit styles of representation and the …
Sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), also known as sexually transmitted infections (STIs), are infections spread primarily through sexual contact. More than 65 million people in the United States are currently infected with an incurable sexually transmitted disease such as genital herpes, and each year an additional 19 million people …
Sexual orientation is the expression of sexuality enveloped by one’s self-identification, including romantic, emotional, and/or sexual attraction. Sexual orientation can be problematic for those not conforming to mainstream societal norms. Heterosexuals are people who are sexually and romantically attracted to people of the opposite sex. Because heterosexuals are …
Shoplifting, also termed retail theft, is a crime involving theft of goods or merchandise from a store. It also consists of altering or removing price labels, and in some jurisdictions, causing undercharging at the register to deprive the retailer the full value of the merchandise. Commonly included in …
U.S. Census Bureau data indicate that the percentage of children living in single-mother families increased from 11 percent in 1970 to 23 percent by 2005. Although the percentage of single-father families also grew, rising from 1 percent in 1970 to 6 percent by 2003, the vast majority of …
The term situation ethics, coined by Joseph Fletcher in 1966, is sometimes referred to as “situational ethics” or as “situationism.” Fletcher and others argued that moral and legal absolutes are inflexible and do not allow for rational, thinking humans to make choices and decisions based on the specifics …
Skills mismatch refers to a labor market condition in which a significant proportion of the labor force is either over- or underqualified relative to the skill levels of jobs offered by employers. Job seekers and workers affected cannot obtain jobs that match their skill level at the level …
African slavery is arguably the thesis for almost every aspect of black life in the Western world. Beginning in the 16th century, slaves became a major commodity for international commerce, with large numbers of blacks forced to migrate throughout the world via the African slave trade. Kept in …
