Would something like this entail an automatic fail or could it still pass?

[Kuciwalker]

You're paranoid.

[DRoseDARs]

I'm American.

[Dracon II]

Fortunately, there's no such thing as a Bill of Rights where I live.

... I never thought I'd say that. But there you go...

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Speaking as a former professor: I would grade him down, since part of his argument is specious and unsupported, but that paragraph alone is not enough to fail him. If the whole paper consists of overstated, unsupported assertions like that one, then it certainly fails; but if that was one paragraph of blowing off steam in an otherwise competent paper, then I'd just knock him down one grade for it.

[Pekka]

Fail, fail for what?

It's pretty horrible paragraph but let's not get all upset about it. It's just stupid, that's what it is. If you look at the rest of the papers, you'll find other stupid paragraphs as well, they just dont' stick out so bad but they're equally as stupid, they're bound to be.

There's 2 options, either that student was being funny, maybe he/she was tired, who knows. We all write stuff we think are funny in inappropriate places and the joke doesn't even translate. It's possible. Second option is that the student is just pissed off and decided to write that down. Third option is that the student really believes that and somehow thinks it is representing the business to write it down like that.

IN ALL cases the student missed the assignment for one paragraph at least, but is that such a big deal? Big deal as in fail the student? Nah, it's just a bad paragraph, decrease the value of the paper accordingly.

It's just bad writing.

[Dracon II]

Yeah I know that's not enough to fail him. Part of my motivation was just wanting to post it because I thought it was hilarious when I read it. The rest of the essay is poorly written, with no in-text references but, apart from that, sticks to the issue at hand. That one paragraph just did a real number on my head.

[Tim_Augustus]

Hey, that's my assignment













Joking

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Could be one of those things you just drop in there to see if the paper is actually being read. I used to do that all the time (though mine were more random and less, uh, interesting.) Hit rate wasn't that great, either...

[Sirotnikov]

Originally posted by Koyaanisqatsi
Could be one of those things you just drop in there to see if the paper is actually being read. I used to do that all the time (though mine were more random and less, uh, interesting.) Hit rate wasn't that great, either...

My first thought as well

[Kontiki]

You should put a comment next to the paragraphs that says "Damn straight. Bloody Jews ruining everything" and give it back to him.

[Seeker]

Tell him to redo it or fail. Not for the remark, but for failing to follow instructions. This is not something a lobbyist for or member of a real estate company association would write.

Also, the tone is atrocious. If you let it slide it tells me you might as well put a big picture of a feather next to this course--bird course.

WTF kind of lobbyist writes "However I know this will never happen blahblah snarky elitist bafflegab lolz pheerme" like this guy"

The tone is conversational, too familar, and beyond informal to condescending, or even worse in my eyes, condescending without anything to back it up. Be condescending if you're KH and you can crush all us mortals beneath the mass of your enourmous brain, but not if you're just talkin' smack about the ill-defined Zionists.

NOT UNIVERSITY LEVEL, or at least it shouldn't be.

It would be like starting off a paragraph in an English paper critiquing Oscar Wilde with something like:
"..another factor in Wilde's upbringing that affected his literary output was not class-based, at least on its surface, but rather reflected the increasing levels of Butt-Piracy in English public schools. Oh, don't get me started on butt-piracy...I could go on and--...ahem, where was I?"

[The Mad Monk]

The biggest factor is of course that Australia is a capitalist country, and the goal of most capitalist countries is to basically take every last cent from the public

I thought that was the job of rich people in capitalist countries, and the government just got the hell out of the way.

[Zkribbler]

How'd he get the job at the fictious company he works for? When the job application asked "Reasons you want to work for us?", he put something like, "To destroy the system from within."

I wouldn't fail him. He hit a mental speed bump and said what he really thought rather than what his "employer" would have wanted him to say. Kick him in the shin but don't ignore the rest of the stuff he wrote.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Zkribbler
I wouldn't fail him.

Why not?

The rest of the essay is poorly written, with no in-text references

[Japher]

This really should have been a poll