Some Persuasive Essay Topics you may Use

How to pick a persuasive essay topic

Not every essay can count as a persuasive essay, even when they all are, some way or another, trying to capture the reader’s attention. But when it comes to writing persuasive essays (A.K.A. argumentative essay papers), the student should focus on applying a series of techniques. These papers use reason and logical arguments to prove that a specific idea (the writer’s point of view on a certain topic) is more valid than another, typically opposite to the first. And how can we choose good persuasive essay topics? Can we write a persuasive essay just about anything?

Choosing a topic

The basic thing to remember is that, when writing persuasive essays, you can’t just choose any random topic. You can certainly write argumentative essays on many different fields and on a wide variety of topics. But not just any topic. This is because you should always choose a debatable topic: you must make a statement and prove that the contrary is either wrong, unmoral or impossible. When doing so, if you choose a topic that provokes no controversies, you would never achieve a successful task persuading readers: simply, because they are already persuaded!
That means, write about something that forces you to adopt a point of view, even when somebody else could –and would- choose the opposite. For example, no one can write a persuasive essay about Russia being the largest country in surface, since there are no doubts about it; but you could easily write a Russia essay persuading against communism.

Some topic examples

Controversial persuasive essay topics include affirmative action, globalization, abortion, capital punishment, traffic restriction, environmental pollution, political opinions, euthanasia, in vitro fertilization, immigration controls… Basically, any topic in which you can write down a thesis statement as well as its opposite.
The persuasive essay topic should be an unsolved problem. You must choose your own position, taking into account real facts that support it. Do not appeal to the reader’s feelings or beliefs but base your whole essay on logic and reason. For example, you can’t support capital punishment by saying “let’s just kill the bastards”, but you can provide actual facts on how much money from taxes is spent in keeping them alive while it could be used in hospitals or education.

After choosing the topic

Before actually starting to write, do a research and be well informed about your persuasive essay topic. You should provide the reader with the opposing argument as well, in order to refute it with evidence and examples that support your own statement. To find them, read newspapers and books. A visit to the library would be a great idea. Direct quotes from experts in the topic are other valuable source of information.

Supporting your argument

You can’t just prove other people wrong by listening to your heart and intuition, so you should support your argument with valid reasons, using facts, examples and experts quotation to prove you right. Other way to support your argument is using plenty of examples. Finally, don’t forget to identify the opposite statement’s main points, and eventually prove them wrong.

Tags: persuasive essay, persuasive essay topics, persuasive essay writing techniques