which statement about informative thesis statements is true

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Informative Thesis Statement

An informative thesis statement is a concise declaration that provides a short view of the main ideas or points discussed in the essay.

Introduction

Table of Contents

An informative thesis statement is type of thesis statement that is a concise declaration and provides a short view of the main ideas or points discussed in the essay . Its primary purpose is to inform and educate the reader on a specific topic, rather than to persuade or argue. The informative thesis statement, therefore, intends to outline the information the essay provides. It also guides the readers on what to expect from the content and organization of information.

However, such a thesis statement should be clear, focused, and objective, presenting the main topics or concepts explored in the subsequent body of the essay. The informative thesis statement acts as a roadmap for the readers, helping them understand the information presented in the main body.

Types of Informative Thesis Statement

There are several types of informative thesis statements. However, it all depends on the objective or purpose of the essay. It could comprise statistics, opinions, a case study, or even a personal anecdote as analyzed below in the table.

However, it must be noted that these are not the only types of informative thesis statements. Students or writers can devise their own, personalized and customized thesis statements, depending on the topic, context, and subject matter.

Main Parts of Informative Thesis Statement

• Topic: The thesis statement should indicate the topic or subject matter discussed in the essay.
• Focus: The thesis statement should have a clear focus that narrows the scope of the topic.
• Claim: The thesis statement should present a specific claim about the topic.
• Main Points: The thesis statement includes a short view of the main points or subtopics.
• Clarity: A strong thesis statement should be clear and concise.

These elements of information provide a comprehensive approach to supporting the thesis statement, incorporating various types of data, expert opinions, historical context, specific examples, and personal experiences.

Process or Steps of Writing an Informative Thesis Statement

This table provides a possible breakdown of the steps involved in writing an informative thesis statement. These could be exhaustive steps. However, more could depend on the individual writers, individual assignments, topics, and contexts.

Examples of Informative Thesis Statement

It is interesting to note that there are several types of Informative Thesis Statements. An Informative Thesis Statement could be a cause and effect Informative Thesis Statement or it could be an argumentative as well. Some of the examples are as follows.

Remember, these are just examples. More adaptation and modification require more information and more revision for customized thesis statements.

Suggested Readings

• Hadiani, Dini. “The Students’Difficulties In Writing Thesis Statement.” Semantik 2.1 (2017): 80-86.
• Miller, Ryan T., and Silvia Pessoa. “Where Is Your Thesis Statement and What Happened to Your Topic Sentences? Identifying Organizational Challenges in Undergraduate Student Argumentative Writing.” Tesol Journal 7.4 (2016): 847-873.
• Moore, Kathleen, and Susie Lan Cassel. Techniques for College Writing: The Thesis Statement and Beyond . Cengage Learning, 2010.

More from Essay Writing:

• Qualitative Thesis Statement
• Narrative Thesis Statement
• Cause and Effect Thesis Statement

Related posts:

• Essay Writing, Objectives, and Key Terms in Essay Writing
• Essay Type-3
• Hook and Its Position in an Essay
• Background Information

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ENG 101: The Informative Essay

• About the Informative Essay
• Developing Questions
• The Thesis Statement
• Reading Scholarly Sources
• Collecting Scholarly Information
• Research Databases
• MLA Resources

Thesis Basics

A thesis is one or two sentences that appear at the end of your introduction that communicates to your reader the main point of your work and why they should care enough to read it. You should have a ' working thesis ' before you dig into your research, but remain flexible.  As you learn  and understand more about your topic your thesis may evolve and that is completely normal; it's all part of the research process!  

The type of thesis should match the type of project; that is, the thesis for a persuasive essay will have different requirements than one for an informative essay; all thesis statements have some characteristics in common, however.

A thesis should always:

Clearly and concisely state the main idea.

Tie your supporting discussion into the main idea.

Thesis = topic + summary of main points

A persuasive/argumentative thesis should also:

State your position on a specific and debatable position.

Thesis = topic + your position + evidence to support position

An informative thesis should also:

Outline the facets that will be explained and discussed in the essay, or present the key points of the analysis, interpretation, or evaluation.

Thesis = topic + facets/key points

If you think of your essay as a five part outline including introduction, supporting point 1,  supporting point 2, supporting point 3, and conclusion, then think of the thesis as using the same basic components: topic, point 1, point 2, point 3, and position/conclusion. 

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Home / Guides / Writing Guides / Parts of a Paper / How to Write a Strong Thesis Statement

How to Write a Strong Thesis Statement

A thesis can be found in many places—a debate speech, a lawyer’s closing argument, even an advertisement. But the most common place for a thesis statement (and probably why you’re reading this article) is in an essay.

Whether you’re writing an argumentative paper, an informative essay, or a compare/contrast statement, you need a thesis. Without a thesis, your argument falls flat and your information is unfocused. Since a thesis is so important, it’s probably a good idea to look at some tips on how to put together a strong one.

Guide Overview

What is a “thesis statement” anyway.

• 2 categories of thesis statements: informative and persuasive
• 2 styles of thesis statements
• Formula for a strong argumentative thesis
• The qualities of a solid thesis statement (video)

You may have heard of something called a “thesis.” It’s what seniors commonly refer to as their final paper before graduation. That’s not what we’re talking about here. That type of thesis is a long, well-written paper that takes years to piece together.

Instead, we’re talking about a single sentence that ties together the main idea of any argument . In the context of student essays, it’s a statement that summarizes your topic and declares your position on it. This sentence can tell a reader whether your essay is something they want to read.

2 Categories of Thesis Statements: Informative and Persuasive

Just as there are different types of essays, there are different types of thesis statements. The thesis should match the essay.

For example, with an informative essay, you should compose an informative thesis (rather than argumentative). You want to declare your intentions in this essay and guide the reader to the conclusion that you reach.

To make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, you must procure the ingredients, find a knife, and spread the condiments.

This thesis showed the reader the topic (a type of sandwich) and the direction the essay will take (describing how the sandwich is made).

Most other types of essays, whether compare/contrast, argumentative, or narrative, have thesis statements that take a position and argue it. In other words, unless your purpose is simply to inform, your thesis is considered persuasive. A persuasive thesis usually contains an opinion and the reason why your opinion is true.

Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are the best type of sandwich because they are versatile, easy to make, and taste good.

In this persuasive thesis statement, you see that I state my opinion (the best type of sandwich), which means I have chosen a stance. Next, I explain that my opinion is correct with several key reasons. This persuasive type of thesis can be used in any essay that contains the writer’s opinion, including, as I mentioned above, compare/contrast essays, narrative essays, and so on.

2 Styles of Thesis Statements

Just as there are two different types of thesis statements (informative and persuasive), there are two basic styles you can use.

The first style uses a list of two or more points . This style of thesis is perfect for a brief essay that contains only two or three body paragraphs. This basic five-paragraph essay is typical of middle and high school assignments.

C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia series is one of the richest works of the 20th century because it offers an escape from reality, teaches readers to have faith even when they don’t understand, and contains a host of vibrant characters.

In the above persuasive thesis, you can see my opinion about Narnia followed by three clear reasons. This thesis is perfect for setting up a tidy five-paragraph essay.

In college, five paragraph essays become few and far between as essay length gets longer. Can you imagine having only five paragraphs in a six-page paper? For a longer essay, you need a thesis statement that is more versatile. Instead of listing two or three distinct points, a thesis can list one overarching point that all body paragraphs tie into.

Good vs. evil is the main theme of Lewis’s Narnia series, as is made clear through the struggles the main characters face in each book.

In this thesis, I have made a claim about the theme in Narnia followed by my reasoning. The broader scope of this thesis allows me to write about each of the series’ seven novels. I am no longer limited in how many body paragraphs I can logically use.

Formula for a Strong Argumentative Thesis

One thing I find that is helpful for students is having a clear template. While students rarely end up with a thesis that follows this exact wording, the following template creates a good starting point:

___________ is true because of ___________, ___________, and ___________.

Conversely, the formula for a thesis with only one point might follow this template:

___________________ is true because of _____________________.

Students usually end up using different terminology than simply “because,” but having a template is always helpful to get the creative juices flowing.

The Qualities of a Solid Thesis Statement

When composing a thesis, you must consider not only the format, but other qualities like length, position in the essay, and how strong the argument is.

Length: A thesis statement can be short or long, depending on how many points it mentions. Typically, however, it is only one concise sentence. It does contain at least two clauses, usually an independent clause (the opinion) and a dependent clause (the reasons). You probably should aim for a single sentence that is at least two lines, or about 30 to 40 words long.

Position: A thesis statement always belongs at the beginning of an essay. This is because it is a sentence that tells the reader what the writer is going to discuss. Teachers will have different preferences for the precise location of the thesis, but a good rule of thumb is in the introduction paragraph, within the last two or three sentences.

Strength: Finally, for a persuasive thesis to be strong, it needs to be arguable. This means that the statement is not obvious, and it is not something that everyone agrees is true.

Example of weak thesis:

Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are easy to make because it just takes three ingredients.

Most people would agree that PB&J is one of the easiest sandwiches in the American lunch repertoire.

Example of a stronger thesis:

Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are fun to eat because they always slide around.

This is more arguable because there are plenty of folks who might think a PB&J is messy or slimy rather than fun.

Composing a thesis statement does take a bit more thought than many other parts of an essay. However, because a thesis statement can contain an entire argument in just a few words, it is worth taking the extra time to compose this sentence. It can direct your research and your argument so that your essay is tight, focused, and makes readers think.

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Thesis Statement for Informative

Thesis statement generator for informative essay.

In the realm of informative essays, the thesis statement stands as a beacon of clarity, guiding readers to the heart of your insights. With the primary goal of educating the audience, the thesis must succinctly present the focal information you’re about to unpack. From setting the stage to presenting facts, every thesis matters. Dive deep into examples, unravel the crafting process, and learn valuable techniques to ensure your informative essay begins on the strongest note.

What is an Informative Essay Thesis Statement? – Definition

An informative essay thesis statement is a succinct declaration that outlines the primary focus or main point of the essay. Unlike argumentative essays, which make a claim and aim to persuade, an informative essay thesis seeks to educate the reader about a specific topic, providing a foundation for the detailed information that follows. The statement acts as a roadmap, giving the reader a glimpse of what to expect in the essay’s subsequent sections.

What is the Best Thesis Statement Example for Informative Essay?

While the “best” thesis statement often depends on the topic and the intent of the essay, here’s a generic example that embodies the characteristics of a strong informative thesis:

“The metamorphosis of a butterfly, from a humble caterpillar to a resplendent winged creature, is a captivating process involving four distinct stages: egg, larva, pupa, and adult.”

This thesis provides a clear, concise overview of the essay’s topic and what the reader can expect to learn from the ensuing paragraphs.

100 Thesis Statement Examples for Informative Essay

Crafting a robust thesis for an informative essay is essential to guide your readers through the nuances of the topic you’re exploring. Your thesis acts as a lens, focusing the reader’s attention on the key aspects you’ll delve into. Below is a collection of meticulously curated thesis statements for informative essays, designed to inspire and guide your writing process.

• “The history of the printing press revolutionized human communication, transforming societal structures and information dissemination.”
• “Solar energy, derived from the sun’s rays, offers a sustainable and environmentally friendly power source, with numerous applications in modern society.”
• “The water cycle is a continuous process, consisting of evaporation, condensation, precipitation, and collection, crucial to Earth’s climate and ecosystem.”
• “Ancient Egyptian mummification was a detailed ritual, embodying religious beliefs, preparations for the afterlife, and sophisticated preservation techniques.”
• “Quantum mechanics delves into the behavior of subatomic particles, challenging traditional physics and introducing concepts like superposition and entanglement.”
• “The Great Barrier Reef, the world’s largest coral reef system, boasts biodiversity, faces environmental threats, and is crucial for global marine ecology.”
• “Yoga, originating from ancient India, promotes physical, mental, and spiritual wellness, with various forms tailored to different needs.”
• “The Silk Road was a vast network of trade routes connecting Asia and Europe, facilitating the exchange of goods, cultures, and ideas.”
• “Chocolates, beyond being a delightful treat, have a rich history, production process, and health benefits when consumed in moderation.”
• “Mental health is a multifaceted topic, encompassing emotional, psychological, and social well-being, with various factors influencing one’s mental state.”
• “Leonardo da Vinci, a Renaissance polymath, contributed to art, science, and engineering, with masterpieces like the Mona Lisa and inventions ahead of his time.”
• “Pandas, native to China, play a significant role in global conservation efforts due to their endangered status and ecological importance.”
• “Photography, since its inception, has evolved in techniques and styles, influencing society’s perception of reality and memory.”
• “Green architecture integrates eco-friendly materials and energy-efficient designs to minimize environmental impact and promote sustainability.”
• “Sleep is a vital physiological process, with stages like REM and deep sleep, affecting cognitive function, mood, and overall health.”
• “Origami, the Japanese art of paper folding, has cultural significance, mathematical principles, and therapeutic benefits.”
• “The evolution of human language encompasses physiological changes, societal developments, and the emergence of linguistic diversity.”
• “The Internet, from ARPANET to today’s global network, has transformed communication, business, and entertainment, shaping the modern world.”
• “Black holes, mysterious cosmic entities, are regions of spacetime exhibiting gravitational forces from which nothing can escape, not even light.”
• “Jazz, an original American art form, draws from various music styles, influencing culture, civil rights movements, and global music scenes.”
• “Vaccination, a cornerstone of modern medicine, employs weakened or inactivated germs to train the immune system against diseases.”
• “Greek mythology, a rich tapestry of gods, heroes, and monsters, played a central role in ancient Greek religion and culture.”
• “Artificial intelligence, the simulation of human intelligence in machines, has applications in healthcare, finance, and more, heralding a new technological age.”
• “Mount Everest, the world’s highest peak, has a complex geology, history of expeditions, and challenges related to climbing and environmental conservation.”
• “Ballet, a classical dance form, has evolved over centuries, boasting different styles, techniques, and a profound impact on global dance culture.”
• “Mars, the fourth planet from the sun, is a focus of space exploration, with studies on its atmosphere, geology, and potential for life.”
• “The Amazon Rainforest, Earth’s largest tropical rainforest, houses unparalleled biodiversity and plays a pivotal role in the global climate system.”
• “The human brain, a marvel of evolution, is responsible for cognition, emotion, and consciousness, with regions dedicated to specific functions.”
• “The French Revolution, a tumultuous period in history, brought about political, social, and economic upheavals, shaping modern democracy.”
• “The Grand Canyon, carved by the Colorado River, showcases layers of Earth’s history, geology, and offers a haven for biodiversity.”
• “Hydroponics, a method of growing plants without soil, utilizes nutrient-rich water, offering solutions for urban farming and food scarcity.”
• “The Mona Lisa, beyond its fame as a painting, carries stories of its creation, theft, and cultural significance in art history.”
• “Quantum computing harnesses principles of quantum mechanics, promising breakthroughs in processing speed, cryptography, and complex problem-solving.”
• “The phenomenon of bioluminescence, seen in various marine creatures, is a chemical reaction that produces light, aiding in camouflage, prey attraction, and communication.”
• “The pyramids of Egypt, marvels of ancient engineering, were built as tombs for pharaohs, reflecting the civilization’s religious beliefs and technological prowess.”
• “Nanotechnology, the manipulation of matter on an atomic scale, holds promise for medical treatments, electronics, and materials science.”
• “The Roaring Twenties, a decade post-WWI, were marked by cultural shifts, economic prosperity, jazz, and the onset of the Great Depression.”
• “Sushi, a staple of Japanese cuisine, has a history spanning centuries, varying styles, and a globalized presence in today’s culinary landscape.”
• “Vincent van Gogh, though tormented in life, produced masterpieces like ‘Starry Night’, influencing modern art with his unique style and technique.”
• “The concept of zero, integral to mathematics, originated from ancient civilizations, influencing arithmetic, algebra, and our understanding of the universe.”
• “Biodiversity, the variety of life on Earth, is vital for ecosystem stability, human survival, and indicates the planet’s health.”
• “The Industrial Revolution marked a shift from agrarian societies to industrial urban centers, revolutionizing technology, society, and the global economy.”
• “Volcanoes, nature’s fiery vents, have diverse types and formation processes, playing roles in Earth’s geology and influencing climates.”
• “The human genome, our genetic blueprint, has been mapped, offering insights into genetics, evolution, and potentials for personalized medicine.”
• “Shakespeare’s works, from tragedies to comedies, offer insights into human nature, love, power, and have profoundly influenced literature and language.”
• “Acupuncture, an ancient Chinese therapy, involves inserting needles at specific points to balance energy and treat various ailments.”
• “The Antarctic, a frozen frontier, is crucial for climate research, housing unique ecosystems and holding mysteries beneath its ice.”
• “Meditation, a practice of focused attention, offers benefits like stress reduction, improved cognition, and greater self-awareness.”
• “The Periodic Table organizes chemical elements based on atomic number, guiding our understanding of chemistry, reactions, and element properties.”
• “The concept of time, from sundials to atomic clocks, has been central to human civilizations, influencing cultures, sciences, and daily life.
• “Gut microbiome, the community of microorganisms living in our intestines, has profound implications on our health, mood, and disease susceptibility.”
• “The Renaissance, spanning the 14th to 17th century, marked a cultural awakening in art, science, and thought, laying the foundation for the modern world.”
• “Artificial neural networks, inspired by the human brain, form the basis of deep learning, propelling advancements in image recognition, language translation, and more.”
• “The concept of relativity, introduced by Einstein, transformed our understanding of time, space, and the universe, challenging Newtonian physics.”
• “The cultural and religious festival of Diwali, celebrated predominantly in India, signifies the triumph of light over darkness and good over evil.”
• “J.R.R. Tolkien’s ‘The Lord of the Rings’ not only narrates an epic tale of heroism but delves deep into themes of friendship, power, and corruption.”
• “Climate change, driven primarily by human activities, has far-reaching consequences on weather patterns, sea levels, and global ecosystems.”
• “Impressionism, an art movement in the 19th century, captures fleeting moments with loose brushwork, championed by artists like Monet and Renoir.”
• “Holography, the science of producing three-dimensional images, has applications in medicine, art, and data storage, promising future advancements.”
• “The discovery of DNA’s double helix structure by Watson and Crick revolutionized biology, paving the way for genetic research and biotechnological innovations.”
• “Coffee, beyond a popular beverage, has a rich history of cultivation, trade, and cultural significance across continents.”
• “Migration patterns of monarch butterflies, traveling thousands of miles, are a remarkable phenomenon of nature, influenced by environmental cues and genetic factors.”
• “The Roman Empire, with its vast territories and lasting legacies, has impacted modern governance, architecture, and language.”
• “Virtual reality, an immersive technology, has transcended gaming to find applications in medicine, education, and real estate.”
• “Dream analysis, rooted in psychological theories of Freud and Jung, delves into the subconscious mind, interpreting symbols and emotions for insights.”
• “Beekeeping, an age-old practice, supports biodiversity, provides honey, and plays a crucial role in global food production through pollination.”
• “The concept of black markets, operating outside sanctioned channels, impacts global economies, ethics, and law enforcement challenges.”
• “The evolution of music, from classical symphonies to contemporary genres, reflects societal changes, technological innovations, and cultural exchanges.”
• “Neuroplasticity, the brain’s ability to reorganize and adapt, challenges previous beliefs about brain rigidity and offers hope for injury recovery.”
• “Taj Mahal, an architectural marvel in India, stands as a testament to eternal love, Mughal artistry, and intricate craftsmanship.
• “The Silk Road, not just a trade route, fostered cultural exchanges, spread religions, and laid the groundwork for globalization in the ancient world.”
• “Telecommunication, with its evolution from telegraphs to smartphones, has reshaped society, influencing communication habits, businesses, and global connectedness.”
• “Veganism, beyond a dietary choice, carries implications for animal rights, environmental sustainability, and global food resources.”
• “The architecture of Gaudi, particularly in Barcelona, embodies a unique blend of nature, religion, and modernism, attracting millions of admirers worldwide.”
• “Galaxies, vast cosmic structures containing billions of stars, provide insights into the universe’s formation, dark matter, and the fate of cosmic bodies.”
• “Procrastination, more than just delaying tasks, is a complex psychological behavior with implications for productivity, mental health, and personal growth.”
• “Jazz, birthed in New Orleans, embodies improvisation and cultural synthesis, influencing numerous other genres and reflecting societal changes.”
• “The Great Wall of China, beyond a monumental feat of engineering, symbolizes the lengths to which societies will go to defend their beliefs and territories.”
• “Human rights, a universal framework for dignity and equality, have evolved over centuries, shaping global policies, revolutions, and societal values.”
• “Pandemics, from the Black Plague to COVID-19, have shifted the course of history, influencing medical advancements, societal structures, and global economies.”
• “Cryptocurrency, decentralized digital money, challenges traditional banking systems, offering potential for financial freedom but also sparking debates on regulation.”
• “The Amazon Rainforest, often termed the ‘lungs of Earth’, plays a critical role in global climate regulation, biodiversity, and indigenous cultures.”
• “The Eiffel Tower, initially criticized but now an icon of France, represents engineering prowess, national pride, and the changing tides of public opinion.”
• “Ballet, a disciplined art form with roots in the Italian Renaissance, conveys stories, emotions, and has evolved with cultural and societal shifts.”
• “The concept of infinity, both in mathematics and philosophy, challenges human comprehension and has led to profound discoveries and existential debates.”
• “The Grand Canyon, carved by the Colorado River, stands as a testament to nature’s power and the geological history of Earth.”
• “Storytelling, intrinsic to human culture, serves various purposes, from passing down traditions to marketing brands in the modern age.”
• “Yoga, beyond physical postures, is an ancient practice promoting holistic well-being, spiritual growth, and mental clarity.”
• “The Louvre Museum, housing thousands of artworks, narrates a history of art, culture, and the evolution of human civilization.”
• “Photography, from daguerreotypes to digital, captures moments in time, influencing art, journalism, and how society perceives reality.”
• “Mount Everest, standing as the highest peak, isn’t just a mountaineer’s challenge but a symbol of human perseverance and our relationship with nature.”
• “Mars exploration, beyond the realm of science fiction, provides insights into planetary evolution, life beyond Earth, and the future of human space colonization.”
• “Coral reefs, often called the rainforests of the sea, are vibrant ecosystems, vital to marine life, coastal economies, and indicate global climate health.”
• “Shakespeare’s ‘Hamlet’ doesn’t merely tell a tale of revenge but delves deep into themes of existentialism, morality, and the human psyche.”
• “Quantum mechanics, a foundation of modern physics, challenges classical notions, introducing concepts like superposition and entanglement, reshaping our understanding of reality.”
• “The Pyramids of Giza, not just architectural marvels, offer insights into ancient Egyptian beliefs, astronomical knowledge, and societal organization.”
• “Hydrogen as an energy source, while in its infancy, holds potential to revolutionize the energy sector, offering a cleaner alternative to fossil fuels.”
• “The cultural phenomenon of Anime, originating in Japan, transcends entertainment, reflecting societal issues, personal identities, and diverse genres of storytelling.”
• “Meditation, rooted in ancient traditions, serves as a tool for mental well-being, stress relief, and cognitive enhancement in our fast-paced modern world.”
• “The French Revolution, while a bloody period, led to the overthrow of monarchy, shaping modern political ideologies, rights, and global democratic movements.

An informative essay thesis statement is a condensed form of your essay’s primary argument, serving as a roadmap for your readers. The process of developing such a statement requires synthesizing the main idea of your topic and presenting it in a concise manner to captivate and inform your audience from the beginning.

How do you write a thesis for an informative essay? – Step by Step Guide

• Understand the Prompt : Before you can create a thesis, understand the prompt or the topic you’re addressing. This ensures your thesis aligns with what you are expected to write about.
• Research Thoroughly : Dive deep into your topic. Gather all necessary details, facts, and data that will help you get a comprehensive view of the subject.
• Identify the Main Idea : What is the primary message or insight you want your readers to grasp? This will form the core of your thesis.
• Keep it Specific : Your thesis should not be overly broad. Instead, focus on a specific aspect of the topic that your essay will explore.
• Make it Clear and Concise : Your thesis statement shouldn’t be a complex sentence. It should be clear, direct, and easy for the reader to understand.
• Avoid Opinions : An informative essay provides information and insight. It doesn’t try to persuade the reader or present the writer’s personal opinion.
• Review and Refine : After drafting your thesis, read it aloud. Does it flow? Is it clear? Make necessary revisions until it fits your essay’s scope and direction perfectly.

Tips for Writing an Informative Essay Thesis Statement

• Stay Neutral : Your thesis shouldn’t convey bias or opinion. Stick to facts and neutral language.
• Position it Right : Traditionally, the thesis statement is positioned at the end of the introduction to guide the reader into the main body.
• Stay Focused : Your thesis should be specific to the points you’ll be making in your essay. If a point doesn’t support your thesis, consider removing it from your essay.
• Seek Feedback : Before finalizing your thesis, seek feedback. Fresh eyes can offer valuable insights and catch inconsistencies.
• Revisit After Writing : Once your essay is complete, revisit your thesis. Does your essay deliver what your thesis promises? If not, tweak it so that it aligns with your essay’s content.

Crafting a compelling thesis for an informative essay is a balancing act between providing clear, concise information and sparking curiosity in readers. By following the aforementioned steps and tips, writers can guide their audience seamlessly through the information while ensuring comprehension and interest.

Text prompt

• Instructive
• Professional

Write a Thesis Statement for Informative Essay on the process of recycling plastics.

Create a Thesis Statement for Informative Essay about the history of the internet.

Developing a Thesis Statement

Many papers you write require developing a thesis statement. In this section you’ll learn what a thesis statement is and how to write one.

Keep in mind that not all papers require thesis statements . If in doubt, please consult your instructor for assistance.

What is a thesis statement?

A thesis statement . . .

• Makes an argumentative assertion about a topic; it states the conclusions that you have reached about your topic.
• Makes a promise to the reader about the scope, purpose, and direction of your paper.
• Is focused and specific enough to be “proven” within the boundaries of your paper.
• Is generally located near the end of the introduction ; sometimes, in a long paper, the thesis will be expressed in several sentences or in an entire paragraph.
• Identifies the relationships between the pieces of evidence that you are using to support your argument.

Not all papers require thesis statements! Ask your instructor if you’re in doubt whether you need one.

Identify a topic

Your topic is the subject about which you will write. Your assignment may suggest several ways of looking at a topic; or it may name a fairly general concept that you will explore or analyze in your paper.

Consider what your assignment asks you to do

Inform yourself about your topic, focus on one aspect of your topic, ask yourself whether your topic is worthy of your efforts, generate a topic from an assignment.

Below are some possible topics based on sample assignments.

Sample assignment 1

Analyze Spain’s neutrality in World War II.

Identified topic

Franco’s role in the diplomatic relationships between the Allies and the Axis

This topic avoids generalities such as “Spain” and “World War II,” addressing instead on Franco’s role (a specific aspect of “Spain”) and the diplomatic relations between the Allies and Axis (a specific aspect of World War II).

Sample assignment 2

Analyze one of Homer’s epic similes in the Iliad.

The relationship between the portrayal of warfare and the epic simile about Simoisius at 4.547-64.

This topic focuses on a single simile and relates it to a single aspect of the Iliad ( warfare being a major theme in that work).

Developing a Thesis Statement–Additional information

Your assignment may suggest several ways of looking at a topic, or it may name a fairly general concept that you will explore or analyze in your paper. You’ll want to read your assignment carefully, looking for key terms that you can use to focus your topic.

Sample assignment: Analyze Spain’s neutrality in World War II Key terms: analyze, Spain’s neutrality, World War II

After you’ve identified the key words in your topic, the next step is to read about them in several sources, or generate as much information as possible through an analysis of your topic. Obviously, the more material or knowledge you have, the more possibilities will be available for a strong argument. For the sample assignment above, you’ll want to look at books and articles on World War II in general, and Spain’s neutrality in particular.

As you consider your options, you must decide to focus on one aspect of your topic. This means that you cannot include everything you’ve learned about your topic, nor should you go off in several directions. If you end up covering too many different aspects of a topic, your paper will sprawl and be unconvincing in its argument, and it most likely will not fulfull the assignment requirements.

For the sample assignment above, both Spain’s neutrality and World War II are topics far too broad to explore in a paper. You may instead decide to focus on Franco’s role in the diplomatic relationships between the Allies and the Axis , which narrows down what aspects of Spain’s neutrality and World War II you want to discuss, as well as establishes a specific link between those two aspects.

Before you go too far, however, ask yourself whether your topic is worthy of your efforts. Try to avoid topics that already have too much written about them (i.e., “eating disorders and body image among adolescent women”) or that simply are not important (i.e. “why I like ice cream”). These topics may lead to a thesis that is either dry fact or a weird claim that cannot be supported. A good thesis falls somewhere between the two extremes. To arrive at this point, ask yourself what is new, interesting, contestable, or controversial about your topic.

As you work on your thesis, remember to keep the rest of your paper in mind at all times . Sometimes your thesis needs to evolve as you develop new insights, find new evidence, or take a different approach to your topic.

Derive a main point from topic

Once you have a topic, you will have to decide what the main point of your paper will be. This point, the “controlling idea,” becomes the core of your argument (thesis statement) and it is the unifying idea to which you will relate all your sub-theses. You can then turn this “controlling idea” into a purpose statement about what you intend to do in your paper.

Look for patterns in your evidence

Compose a purpose statement.

Consult the examples below for suggestions on how to look for patterns in your evidence and construct a purpose statement.

• Franco first tried to negotiate with the Axis
• Franco turned to the Allies when he couldn’t get some concessions that he wanted from the Axis

Possible conclusion:

Spain’s neutrality in WWII occurred for an entirely personal reason: Franco’s desire to preserve his own (and Spain’s) power.

Purpose statement

This paper will analyze Franco’s diplomacy during World War II to see how it contributed to Spain’s neutrality.

• The simile compares Simoisius to a tree, which is a peaceful, natural image.
• The tree in the simile is chopped down to make wheels for a chariot, which is an object used in warfare.

At first, the simile seems to take the reader away from the world of warfare, but we end up back in that world by the end.

This paper will analyze the way the simile about Simoisius at 4.547-64 moves in and out of the world of warfare.

Derive purpose statement from topic

To find out what your “controlling idea” is, you have to examine and evaluate your evidence . As you consider your evidence, you may notice patterns emerging, data repeated in more than one source, or facts that favor one view more than another. These patterns or data may then lead you to some conclusions about your topic and suggest that you can successfully argue for one idea better than another.

For instance, you might find out that Franco first tried to negotiate with the Axis, but when he couldn’t get some concessions that he wanted from them, he turned to the Allies. As you read more about Franco’s decisions, you may conclude that Spain’s neutrality in WWII occurred for an entirely personal reason: his desire to preserve his own (and Spain’s) power. Based on this conclusion, you can then write a trial thesis statement to help you decide what material belongs in your paper.

Sometimes you won’t be able to find a focus or identify your “spin” or specific argument immediately. Like some writers, you might begin with a purpose statement just to get yourself going. A purpose statement is one or more sentences that announce your topic and indicate the structure of the paper but do not state the conclusions you have drawn . Thus, you might begin with something like this:

• This paper will look at modern language to see if it reflects male dominance or female oppression.
• I plan to analyze anger and derision in offensive language to see if they represent a challenge of society’s authority.

At some point, you can turn a purpose statement into a thesis statement. As you think and write about your topic, you can restrict, clarify, and refine your argument, crafting your thesis statement to reflect your thinking.

As you work on your thesis, remember to keep the rest of your paper in mind at all times. Sometimes your thesis needs to evolve as you develop new insights, find new evidence, or take a different approach to your topic.

Compose a draft thesis statement

If you are writing a paper that will have an argumentative thesis and are having trouble getting started, the techniques in the table below may help you develop a temporary or “working” thesis statement.

Begin with a purpose statement that you will later turn into a thesis statement.

Assignment: Discuss the history of the Reform Party and explain its influence on the 1990 presidential and Congressional election.

Purpose Statement: This paper briefly sketches the history of the grassroots, conservative, Perot-led Reform Party and analyzes how it influenced the economic and social ideologies of the two mainstream parties.

Question-to-Assertion

If your assignment asks a specific question(s), turn the question(s) into an assertion and give reasons why it is true or reasons for your opinion.

Assignment : What do Aylmer and Rappaccini have to be proud of? Why aren’t they satisfied with these things? How does pride, as demonstrated in “The Birthmark” and “Rappaccini’s Daughter,” lead to unexpected problems?

Beginning thesis statement: Alymer and Rappaccinni are proud of their great knowledge; however, they are also very greedy and are driven to use their knowledge to alter some aspect of nature as a test of their ability. Evil results when they try to “play God.”

Write a sentence that summarizes the main idea of the essay you plan to write.

Main idea: The reason some toys succeed in the market is that they appeal to the consumers’ sense of the ridiculous and their basic desire to laugh at themselves.

Make a list of the ideas that you want to include; consider the ideas and try to group them.

• nature = peaceful
• war matériel = violent (competes with 1?)
• need for time and space to mourn the dead
• war is inescapable (competes with 3?)

Use a formula to arrive at a working thesis statement (you will revise this later).

• although most readers of _______ have argued that _______, closer examination shows that _______.
• _______ uses _______ and _____ to prove that ________.
• phenomenon x is a result of the combination of __________, __________, and _________.

What to keep in mind as you draft an initial thesis statement

Beginning statements obtained through the methods illustrated above can serve as a framework for planning or drafting your paper, but remember they’re not yet the specific, argumentative thesis you want for the final version of your paper. In fact, in its first stages, a thesis statement usually is ill-formed or rough and serves only as a planning tool.

As you write, you may discover evidence that does not fit your temporary or “working” thesis. Or you may reach deeper insights about your topic as you do more research, and you will find that your thesis statement has to be more complicated to match the evidence that you want to use.

You must be willing to reject or omit some evidence in order to keep your paper cohesive and your reader focused. Or you may have to revise your thesis to match the evidence and insights that you want to discuss. Read your draft carefully, noting the conclusions you have drawn and the major ideas which support or prove those conclusions. These will be the elements of your final thesis statement.

Sometimes you will not be able to identify these elements in your early drafts, but as you consider how your argument is developing and how your evidence supports your main idea, ask yourself, “ What is the main point that I want to prove/discuss? ” and “ How will I convince the reader that this is true? ” When you can answer these questions, then you can begin to refine the thesis statement.

Refine and polish the thesis statement

To get to your final thesis, you’ll need to refine your draft thesis so that it’s specific and arguable.

• Ask if your draft thesis addresses the assignment
• Question each part of your draft thesis
• Clarify vague phrases and assertions
• Investigate alternatives to your draft thesis

Consult the example below for suggestions on how to refine your draft thesis statement.

Sample Assignment

Choose an activity and define it as a symbol of American culture. Your essay should cause the reader to think critically about the society which produces and enjoys that activity.

• Ask The phenomenon of drive-in facilities is an interesting symbol of american culture, and these facilities demonstrate significant characteristics of our society.This statement does not fulfill the assignment because it does not require the reader to think critically about society.

Drive-ins are an interesting symbol of American culture because they represent Americans’ significant creativity and business ingenuity.

Among the types of drive-in facilities familiar during the twentieth century, drive-in movie theaters best represent American creativity, not merely because they were the forerunner of later drive-ins and drive-throughs, but because of their impact on our culture: they changed our relationship to the automobile, changed the way people experienced movies, and changed movie-going into a family activity.

While drive-in facilities such as those at fast-food establishments, banks, pharmacies, and dry cleaners symbolize America’s economic ingenuity, they also have affected our personal standards.

While drive-in facilities such as those at fast- food restaurants, banks, pharmacies, and dry cleaners symbolize (1) Americans’ business ingenuity, they also have contributed (2) to an increasing homogenization of our culture, (3) a willingness to depersonalize relationships with others, and (4) a tendency to sacrifice quality for convenience.

This statement is now specific and fulfills all parts of the assignment. This version, like any good thesis, is not self-evident; its points, 1-4, will have to be proven with evidence in the body of the paper. The numbers in this statement indicate the order in which the points will be presented. Depending on the length of the paper, there could be one paragraph for each numbered item or there could be blocks of paragraph for even pages for each one.

Complete the final thesis statement

The bottom line.

As you move through the process of crafting a thesis, you’ll need to remember four things:

• Context matters! Think about your course materials and lectures. Try to relate your thesis to the ideas your instructor is discussing.
• As you go through the process described in this section, always keep your assignment in mind . You will be more successful when your thesis (and paper) responds to the assignment than if it argues a semi-related idea.
• Your thesis statement should be precise, focused, and contestable ; it should predict the sub-theses or blocks of information that you will use to prove your argument.
• Make sure that you keep the rest of your paper in mind at all times. Change your thesis as your paper evolves, because you do not want your thesis to promise more than your paper actually delivers.

In the beginning, the thesis statement was a tool to help you sharpen your focus, limit material and establish the paper’s purpose. When your paper is finished, however, the thesis statement becomes a tool for your reader. It tells the reader what you have learned about your topic and what evidence led you to your conclusion. It keeps the reader on track–well able to understand and appreciate your argument.

Writing Process and Structure

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Getting Started with Your Paper

Interpreting Writing Assignments from Your Courses

Generating Ideas for

Creating an Argument

Thesis vs. Purpose Statements

Architecture of Arguments

Working with Sources

Quoting and Paraphrasing Sources

Using Literary Quotations

Citing Sources in Your Paper

Drafting Your Paper

Generating Ideas for Your Paper

Introductions

Paragraphing

Developing Strategic Transitions

Conclusions

Revising Your Paper

Peer Reviews

Reverse Outlines

Revising an Argumentative Paper

Revision Strategies for Longer Projects

Finishing Your Paper

Twelve Common Errors: An Editing Checklist

How to Proofread your Paper

Writing Collaboratively

Collaborative and Group Writing

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Writing a Paper: Thesis Statements

Basics of thesis statements.

The thesis statement is the brief articulation of your paper's central argument and purpose. You might hear it referred to as simply a "thesis." Every scholarly paper should have a thesis statement, and strong thesis statements are concise, specific, and arguable. Concise means the thesis is short: perhaps one or two sentences for a shorter paper. Specific means the thesis deals with a narrow and focused topic, appropriate to the paper's length. Arguable means that a scholar in your field could disagree (or perhaps already has!).

Strong thesis statements address specific intellectual questions, have clear positions, and use a structure that reflects the overall structure of the paper. Read on to learn more about constructing a strong thesis statement.

Being Specific

This thesis statement has no specific argument:

Needs Improvement: In this essay, I will examine two scholarly articles to find similarities and differences.

This statement is concise, but it is neither specific nor arguable—a reader might wonder, "Which scholarly articles? What is the topic of this paper? What field is the author writing in?" Additionally, the purpose of the paper—to "examine…to find similarities and differences" is not of a scholarly level. Identifying similarities and differences is a good first step, but strong academic argument goes further, analyzing what those similarities and differences might mean or imply.

Better: In this essay, I will argue that Bowler's (2003) autocratic management style, when coupled with Smith's (2007) theory of social cognition, can reduce the expenses associated with employee turnover.

The new revision here is still concise, as well as specific and arguable.  We can see that it is specific because the writer is mentioning (a) concrete ideas and (b) exact authors.  We can also gather the field (business) and the topic (management and employee turnover). The statement is arguable because the student goes beyond merely comparing; he or she draws conclusions from that comparison ("can reduce the expenses associated with employee turnover").

Making a Unique Argument

This thesis draft repeats the language of the writing prompt without making a unique argument:

Needs Improvement: The purpose of this essay is to monitor, assess, and evaluate an educational program for its strengths and weaknesses. Then, I will provide suggestions for improvement.

You can see here that the student has simply stated the paper's assignment, without articulating specifically how he or she will address it. The student can correct this error simply by phrasing the thesis statement as a specific answer to the assignment prompt.

Better: Through a series of student interviews, I found that Kennedy High School's antibullying program was ineffective. In order to address issues of conflict between students, I argue that Kennedy High School should embrace policies outlined by the California Department of Education (2010).

Words like "ineffective" and "argue" show here that the student has clearly thought through the assignment and analyzed the material; he or she is putting forth a specific and debatable position. The concrete information ("student interviews," "antibullying") further prepares the reader for the body of the paper and demonstrates how the student has addressed the assignment prompt without just restating that language.

Creating a Debate

This thesis statement includes only obvious fact or plot summary instead of argument:

Needs Improvement: Leadership is an important quality in nurse educators.

A good strategy to determine if your thesis statement is too broad (and therefore, not arguable) is to ask yourself, "Would a scholar in my field disagree with this point?" Here, we can see easily that no scholar is likely to argue that leadership is an unimportant quality in nurse educators.  The student needs to come up with a more arguable claim, and probably a narrower one; remember that a short paper needs a more focused topic than a dissertation.

Better: Roderick's (2009) theory of participatory leadership  is particularly appropriate to nurse educators working within the emergency medicine field, where students benefit most from collegial and kinesthetic learning.

Here, the student has identified a particular type of leadership ("participatory leadership"), narrowing the topic, and has made an arguable claim (this type of leadership is "appropriate" to a specific type of nurse educator). Conceivably, a scholar in the nursing field might disagree with this approach. The student's paper can now proceed, providing specific pieces of evidence to support the arguable central claim.

Choosing the Right Words

This thesis statement uses large or scholarly-sounding words that have no real substance:

Needs Improvement: Scholars should work to seize metacognitive outcomes by harnessing discipline-based networks to empower collaborative infrastructures.

There are many words in this sentence that may be buzzwords in the student's field or key terms taken from other texts, but together they do not communicate a clear, specific meaning. Sometimes students think scholarly writing means constructing complex sentences using special language, but actually it's usually a stronger choice to write clear, simple sentences. When in doubt, remember that your ideas should be complex, not your sentence structure.

Better: Ecologists should work to educate the U.S. public on conservation methods by making use of local and national green organizations to create a widespread communication plan.

Notice in the revision that the field is now clear (ecology), and the language has been made much more field-specific ("conservation methods," "green organizations"), so the reader is able to see concretely the ideas the student is communicating.

Leaving Room for Discussion

This thesis statement is not capable of development or advancement in the paper:

Needs Improvement: There are always alternatives to illegal drug use.

This sample thesis statement makes a claim, but it is not a claim that will sustain extended discussion. This claim is the type of claim that might be appropriate for the conclusion of a paper, but in the beginning of the paper, the student is left with nowhere to go. What further points can be made? If there are "always alternatives" to the problem the student is identifying, then why bother developing a paper around that claim? Ideally, a thesis statement should be complex enough to explore over the length of the entire paper.

Better: The most effective treatment plan for methamphetamine addiction may be a combination of pharmacological and cognitive therapy, as argued by Baker (2008), Smith (2009), and Xavier (2011).

In the revised thesis, you can see the student make a specific, debatable claim that has the potential to generate several pages' worth of discussion. When drafting a thesis statement, think about the questions your thesis statement will generate: What follow-up inquiries might a reader have? In the first example, there are almost no additional questions implied, but the revised example allows for a good deal more exploration.

Thesis Mad Libs

If you are having trouble getting started, try using the models below to generate a rough model of a thesis statement! These models are intended for drafting purposes only and should not appear in your final work.

• In this essay, I argue ____, using ______ to assert _____.
• While scholars have often argued ______, I argue______, because_______.
• Through an analysis of ______, I argue ______, which is important because_______.

Words to Avoid and to Embrace

When drafting your thesis statement, avoid words like explore, investigate, learn, compile, summarize , and explain to describe the main purpose of your paper. These words imply a paper that summarizes or "reports," rather than synthesizing and analyzing.

Instead of the terms above, try words like argue, critique, question , and interrogate . These more analytical words may help you begin strongly, by articulating a specific, critical, scholarly position.

Read Kayla's blog post for tips on taking a stand in a well-crafted thesis statement.

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• How to Write a Thesis Statement | 4 Steps & Examples

How to Write a Thesis Statement | 4 Steps & Examples

Published on January 11, 2019 by Shona McCombes . Revised on August 15, 2023 by Eoghan Ryan.

A thesis statement is a sentence that sums up the central point of your paper or essay . It usually comes near the end of your introduction .

Your thesis will look a bit different depending on the type of essay you’re writing. But the thesis statement should always clearly state the main idea you want to get across. Everything else in your essay should relate back to this idea.

You can write your thesis statement by following four simple steps:

• Start with a question
• Write your initial answer
• Develop your answer
• Refine your thesis statement

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Table of contents

What is a thesis statement, placement of the thesis statement, step 1: start with a question, step 2: write your initial answer, step 3: develop your answer, step 4: refine your thesis statement, types of thesis statements, other interesting articles, frequently asked questions about thesis statements.

A thesis statement summarizes the central points of your essay. It is a signpost telling the reader what the essay will argue and why.

The best thesis statements are:

• Concise: A good thesis statement is short and sweet—don’t use more words than necessary. State your point clearly and directly in one or two sentences.
• Contentious: Your thesis shouldn’t be a simple statement of fact that everyone already knows. A good thesis statement is a claim that requires further evidence or analysis to back it up.
• Coherent: Everything mentioned in your thesis statement must be supported and explained in the rest of your paper.

Prevent plagiarism. Run a free check.

The thesis statement generally appears at the end of your essay introduction or research paper introduction .

The spread of the internet has had a world-changing effect, not least on the world of education. The use of the internet in academic contexts and among young people more generally is hotly debated. For many who did not grow up with this technology, its effects seem alarming and potentially harmful. This concern, while understandable, is misguided. The negatives of internet use are outweighed by its many benefits for education: the internet facilitates easier access to information, exposure to different perspectives, and a flexible learning environment for both students and teachers.

You should come up with an initial thesis, sometimes called a working thesis , early in the writing process . As soon as you’ve decided on your essay topic , you need to work out what you want to say about it—a clear thesis will give your essay direction and structure.

You might already have a question in your assignment, but if not, try to come up with your own. What would you like to find out or decide about your topic?

For example, you might ask:

After some initial research, you can formulate a tentative answer to this question. At this stage it can be simple, and it should guide the research process and writing process .

Now you need to consider why this is your answer and how you will convince your reader to agree with you. As you read more about your topic and begin writing, your answer should get more detailed.

In your essay about the internet and education, the thesis states your position and sketches out the key arguments you’ll use to support it.

The negatives of internet use are outweighed by its many benefits for education because it facilitates easier access to information.

In your essay about braille, the thesis statement summarizes the key historical development that you’ll explain.

The invention of braille in the 19th century transformed the lives of blind people, allowing them to participate more actively in public life.

A strong thesis statement should tell the reader:

• Why you hold this position
• What they’ll learn from your essay
• The key points of your argument or narrative

The final thesis statement doesn’t just state your position, but summarizes your overall argument or the entire topic you’re going to explain. To strengthen a weak thesis statement, it can help to consider the broader context of your topic.

These examples are more specific and show that you’ll explore your topic in depth.

Your thesis statement should match the goals of your essay, which vary depending on the type of essay you’re writing:

• In an argumentative essay , your thesis statement should take a strong position. Your aim in the essay is to convince your reader of this thesis based on evidence and logical reasoning.
• In an expository essay , you’ll aim to explain the facts of a topic or process. Your thesis statement doesn’t have to include a strong opinion in this case, but it should clearly state the central point you want to make, and mention the key elements you’ll explain.

If you want to know more about AI tools , college essays , or fallacies make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples or go directly to our tools!

• Ad hominem fallacy
• Post hoc fallacy
• Appeal to authority fallacy
• False cause fallacy
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A thesis statement is a sentence that sums up the central point of your paper or essay . Everything else you write should relate to this key idea.

The thesis statement is essential in any academic essay or research paper for two main reasons:

• It gives your writing direction and focus.
• It gives the reader a concise summary of your main point.

Without a clear thesis statement, an essay can end up rambling and unfocused, leaving your reader unsure of exactly what you want to say.

Follow these four steps to come up with a thesis statement :

• Ask a question about your topic .
• Write your initial answer.
• Develop your answer by including reasons.
• Refine your answer, adding more detail and nuance.

The thesis statement should be placed at the end of your essay introduction .

Cite this Scribbr article

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McCombes, S. (2023, August 15). How to Write a Thesis Statement | 4 Steps & Examples. Scribbr. Retrieved September 3, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/academic-essay/thesis-statement/

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How to Write a Strong Thesis Statement: 4 Steps + Examples

What’s Covered:

What is the purpose of a thesis statement, writing a good thesis statement: 4 steps, common pitfalls to avoid, where to get your essay edited for free.

When you set out to write an essay, there has to be some kind of point to it, right? Otherwise, your essay would just be a big jumble of word salad that makes absolutely no sense. An essay needs a central point that ties into everything else. That main point is called a thesis statement, and it’s the core of any essay or research paper.

You may hear about Master degree candidates writing a thesis, and that is an entire paper–not to be confused with the thesis statement, which is typically one sentence that contains your paper’s focus. 

Read on to learn more about thesis statements and how to write them. We’ve also included some solid examples for you to reference.

Typically the last sentence of your introductory paragraph, the thesis statement serves as the roadmap for your essay. When your reader gets to the thesis statement, they should have a clear outline of your main point, as well as the information you’ll be presenting in order to either prove or support your point. 

The thesis statement should not be confused for a topic sentence , which is the first sentence of every paragraph in your essay. If you need help writing topic sentences, numerous resources are available. Topic sentences should go along with your thesis statement, though.

Since the thesis statement is the most important sentence of your entire essay or paper, it’s imperative that you get this part right. Otherwise, your paper will not have a good flow and will seem disjointed. That’s why it’s vital not to rush through developing one. It’s a methodical process with steps that you need to follow in order to create the best thesis statement possible.

Step 1: Decide what kind of paper you’re writing

When you’re assigned an essay, there are several different types you may get. Argumentative essays are designed to get the reader to agree with you on a topic. Informative or expository essays present information to the reader. Analytical essays offer up a point and then expand on it by analyzing relevant information. Thesis statements can look and sound different based on the type of paper you’re writing. For example:

• Argumentative: The United States needs a viable third political party to decrease bipartisanship, increase options, and help reduce corruption in government.
• Informative: The Libertarian party has thrown off elections before by gaining enough support in states to get on the ballot and by taking away crucial votes from candidates.
• Analytical: An analysis of past presidential elections shows that while third party votes may have been the minority, they did affect the outcome of the elections in 2020, 2016, and beyond.

Step 2: Figure out what point you want to make

Once you know what type of paper you’re writing, you then need to figure out the point you want to make with your thesis statement, and subsequently, your paper. In other words, you need to decide to answer a question about something, such as:

• What impact did reality TV have on American society?
• How has the musical Hamilton affected perception of American history?
• Why do I want to major in [chosen major here]?

If you have an argumentative essay, then you will be writing about an opinion. To make it easier, you may want to choose an opinion that you feel passionate about so that you’re writing about something that interests you. For example, if you have an interest in preserving the environment, you may want to choose a topic that relates to that. 

If you’re writing your college essay and they ask why you want to attend that school, you may want to have a main point and back it up with information, something along the lines of:

“Attending Harvard University would benefit me both academically and professionally, as it would give me a strong knowledge base upon which to build my career, develop my network, and hopefully give me an advantage in my chosen field.”

Step 3: Determine what information you’ll use to back up your point

Once you have the point you want to make, you need to figure out how you plan to back it up throughout the rest of your essay. Without this information, it will be hard to either prove or argue the main point of your thesis statement. If you decide to write about the Hamilton example, you may decide to address any falsehoods that the writer put into the musical, such as:

“The musical Hamilton, while accurate in many ways, leaves out key parts of American history, presents a nationalist view of founding fathers, and downplays the racism of the times.”

Once you’ve written your initial working thesis statement, you’ll then need to get information to back that up. For example, the musical completely leaves out Benjamin Franklin, portrays the founding fathers in a nationalist way that is too complimentary, and shows Hamilton as a staunch abolitionist despite the fact that his family likely did own slaves. 

Step 4: Revise and refine your thesis statement before you start writing

Read through your thesis statement several times before you begin to compose your full essay. You need to make sure the statement is ironclad, since it is the foundation of the entire paper. Edit it or have a peer review it for you to make sure everything makes sense and that you feel like you can truly write a paper on the topic. Once you’ve done that, you can then begin writing your paper.

When writing a thesis statement, there are some common pitfalls you should avoid so that your paper can be as solid as possible. Make sure you always edit the thesis statement before you do anything else. You also want to ensure that the thesis statement is clear and concise. Don’t make your reader hunt for your point. Finally, put your thesis statement at the end of the first paragraph and have your introduction flow toward that statement. Your reader will expect to find your statement in its traditional spot.

If you’re having trouble getting started, or need some guidance on your essay, there are tools available that can help you. CollegeVine offers a free peer essay review tool where one of your peers can read through your essay and provide you with valuable feedback. Getting essay feedback from a peer can help you wow your instructor or college admissions officer with an impactful essay that effectively illustrates your point.

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9.1 Developing a Strong, Clear Thesis Statement

Learning objectives.

• Develop a strong, clear thesis statement with the proper elements.
• Revise your thesis statement.

Have you ever known a person who was not very good at telling stories? You probably had trouble following his train of thought as he jumped around from point to point, either being too brief in places that needed further explanation or providing too many details on a meaningless element. Maybe he told the end of the story first, then moved to the beginning and later added details to the middle. His ideas were probably scattered, and the story did not flow very well. When the story was over, you probably had many questions.

Just as a personal anecdote can be a disorganized mess, an essay can fall into the same trap of being out of order and confusing. That is why writers need a thesis statement to provide a specific focus for their essay and to organize what they are about to discuss in the body.

Just like a topic sentence summarizes a single paragraph, the thesis statement summarizes an entire essay. It tells the reader the point you want to make in your essay, while the essay itself supports that point. It is like a signpost that signals the essay’s destination. You should form your thesis before you begin to organize an essay, but you may find that it needs revision as the essay develops.

Elements of a Thesis Statement

For every essay you write, you must focus on a central idea. This idea stems from a topic you have chosen or been assigned or from a question your teacher has asked. It is not enough merely to discuss a general topic or simply answer a question with a yes or no. You have to form a specific opinion, and then articulate that into a controlling idea —the main idea upon which you build your thesis.

Remember that a thesis is not the topic itself, but rather your interpretation of the question or subject. For whatever topic your professor gives you, you must ask yourself, “What do I want to say about it?” Asking and then answering this question is vital to forming a thesis that is precise, forceful and confident.

A thesis is one sentence long and appears toward the end of your introduction. It is specific and focuses on one to three points of a single idea—points that are able to be demonstrated in the body. It forecasts the content of the essay and suggests how you will organize your information. Remember that a thesis statement does not summarize an issue but rather dissects it.

A Strong Thesis Statement

A strong thesis statement contains the following qualities.

Specificity. A thesis statement must concentrate on a specific area of a general topic. As you may recall, the creation of a thesis statement begins when you choose a broad subject and then narrow down its parts until you pinpoint a specific aspect of that topic. For example, health care is a broad topic, but a proper thesis statement would focus on a specific area of that topic, such as options for individuals without health care coverage.

Precision. A strong thesis statement must be precise enough to allow for a coherent argument and to remain focused on the topic. If the specific topic is options for individuals without health care coverage, then your precise thesis statement must make an exact claim about it, such as that limited options exist for those who are uninsured by their employers. You must further pinpoint what you are going to discuss regarding these limited effects, such as whom they affect and what the cause is.

Ability to be argued. A thesis statement must present a relevant and specific argument. A factual statement often is not considered arguable. Be sure your thesis statement contains a point of view that can be supported with evidence.

Ability to be demonstrated. For any claim you make in your thesis, you must be able to provide reasons and examples for your opinion. You can rely on personal observations in order to do this, or you can consult outside sources to demonstrate that what you assert is valid. A worthy argument is backed by examples and details.

Forcefulness. A thesis statement that is forceful shows readers that you are, in fact, making an argument. The tone is assertive and takes a stance that others might oppose.

Confidence. In addition to using force in your thesis statement, you must also use confidence in your claim. Phrases such as I feel or I believe actually weaken the readers’ sense of your confidence because these phrases imply that you are the only person who feels the way you do. In other words, your stance has insufficient backing. Taking an authoritative stance on the matter persuades your readers to have faith in your argument and open their minds to what you have to say.

Even in a personal essay that allows the use of first person, your thesis should not contain phrases such as in my opinion or I believe . These statements reduce your credibility and weaken your argument. Your opinion is more convincing when you use a firm attitude.

On a separate sheet of paper, write a thesis statement for each of the following topics. Remember to make each statement specific, precise, demonstrable, forceful and confident.

• Texting while driving
• The legal drinking age in the United States
• Steroid use among professional athletes

Examples of Appropriate Thesis Statements

Each of the following thesis statements meets several of the following requirements:

• Specificity
• Ability to be argued
• Ability to be demonstrated
• Forcefulness
• The societal and personal struggles of Troy Maxon in the play Fences symbolize the challenge of black males who lived through segregation and integration in the United States.
• Closing all American borders for a period of five years is one solution that will tackle illegal immigration.
• Shakespeare’s use of dramatic irony in Romeo and Juliet spoils the outcome for the audience and weakens the plot.
• J. D. Salinger’s character in Catcher in the Rye , Holden Caulfield, is a confused rebel who voices his disgust with phonies, yet in an effort to protect himself, he acts like a phony on many occasions.
• Compared to an absolute divorce, no-fault divorce is less expensive, promotes fairer settlements, and reflects a more realistic view of the causes for marital breakdown.
• Exposing children from an early age to the dangers of drug abuse is a sure method of preventing future drug addicts.
• In today’s crumbling job market, a high school diploma is not significant enough education to land a stable, lucrative job.

You can find thesis statements in many places, such as in the news; in the opinions of friends, coworkers or teachers; and even in songs you hear on the radio. Become aware of thesis statements in everyday life by paying attention to people’s opinions and their reasons for those opinions. Pay attention to your own everyday thesis statements as well, as these can become material for future essays.

Now that you have read about the contents of a good thesis statement and have seen examples, take a look at the pitfalls to avoid when composing your own thesis:

A thesis is weak when it is simply a declaration of your subject or a description of what you will discuss in your essay.

Weak thesis statement: My paper will explain why imagination is more important than knowledge.

A thesis is weak when it makes an unreasonable or outrageous claim or insults the opposing side.

Weak thesis statement: Religious radicals across America are trying to legislate their Puritanical beliefs by banning required high school books.

A thesis is weak when it contains an obvious fact or something that no one can disagree with or provides a dead end.

Weak thesis statement: Advertising companies use sex to sell their products.

A thesis is weak when the statement is too broad.

Weak thesis statement: The life of Abraham Lincoln was long and challenging.

Read the following thesis statements. On a separate piece of paper, identify each as weak or strong. For those that are weak, list the reasons why. Then revise the weak statements so that they conform to the requirements of a strong thesis.

• The subject of this paper is my experience with ferrets as pets.
• The government must expand its funding for research on renewable energy resources in order to prepare for the impending end of oil.
• Edgar Allan Poe was a poet who lived in Baltimore during the nineteenth century.
• In this essay, I will give you lots of reasons why slot machines should not be legalized in Baltimore.
• Despite his promises during his campaign, President Kennedy took few executive measures to support civil rights legislation.
• Because many children’s toys have potential safety hazards that could lead to injury, it is clear that not all children’s toys are safe.
• My experience with young children has taught me that I want to be a disciplinary parent because I believe that a child without discipline can be a parent’s worst nightmare.

Writing at Work

Often in your career, you will need to ask your boss for something through an e-mail. Just as a thesis statement organizes an essay, it can also organize your e-mail request. While your e-mail will be shorter than an essay, using a thesis statement in your first paragraph quickly lets your boss know what you are asking for, why it is necessary, and what the benefits are. In short body paragraphs, you can provide the essential information needed to expand upon your request.

Thesis Statement Revision

Your thesis will probably change as you write, so you will need to modify it to reflect exactly what you have discussed in your essay. Remember from Chapter 8 “The Writing Process: How Do I Begin?” that your thesis statement begins as a working thesis statement , an indefinite statement that you make about your topic early in the writing process for the purpose of planning and guiding your writing.

Working thesis statements often become stronger as you gather information and form new opinions and reasons for those opinions. Revision helps you strengthen your thesis so that it matches what you have expressed in the body of the paper.

The best way to revise your thesis statement is to ask questions about it and then examine the answers to those questions. By challenging your own ideas and forming definite reasons for those ideas, you grow closer to a more precise point of view, which you can then incorporate into your thesis statement.

Ways to Revise Your Thesis

You can cut down on irrelevant aspects and revise your thesis by taking the following steps:

1. Pinpoint and replace all nonspecific words, such as people , everything , society , or life , with more precise words in order to reduce any vagueness.

Working thesis: Young people have to work hard to succeed in life.

Revised thesis: Recent college graduates must have discipline and persistence in order to find and maintain a stable job in which they can use and be appreciated for their talents.

The revised thesis makes a more specific statement about success and what it means to work hard. The original includes too broad a range of people and does not define exactly what success entails. By replacing those general words like people and work hard , the writer can better focus his or her research and gain more direction in his or her writing.

2. Clarify ideas that need explanation by asking yourself questions that narrow your thesis.

Working thesis: The welfare system is a joke.

Revised thesis: The welfare system keeps a socioeconomic class from gaining employment by alluring members of that class with unearned income, instead of programs to improve their education and skill sets.

A joke means many things to many people. Readers bring all sorts of backgrounds and perspectives to the reading process and would need clarification for a word so vague. This expression may also be too informal for the selected audience. By asking questions, the writer can devise a more precise and appropriate explanation for joke . The writer should ask himself or herself questions similar to the 5WH questions. (See Chapter 8 “The Writing Process: How Do I Begin?” for more information on the 5WH questions.) By incorporating the answers to these questions into a thesis statement, the writer more accurately defines his or her stance, which will better guide the writing of the essay.

3. Replace any linking verbs with action verbs. Linking verbs are forms of the verb to be , a verb that simply states that a situation exists.

Working thesis: Kansas City schoolteachers are not paid enough.

Revised thesis: The Kansas City legislature cannot afford to pay its educators, resulting in job cuts and resignations in a district that sorely needs highly qualified and dedicated teachers.

The linking verb in this working thesis statement is the word are . Linking verbs often make thesis statements weak because they do not express action. Rather, they connect words and phrases to the second half of the sentence. Readers might wonder, “Why are they not paid enough?” But this statement does not compel them to ask many more questions. The writer should ask himself or herself questions in order to replace the linking verb with an action verb, thus forming a stronger thesis statement, one that takes a more definitive stance on the issue:

• Who is not paying the teachers enough?
• What is considered “enough”?
• What is the problem?
• What are the results

4. Omit any general claims that are hard to support.

Working thesis: Today’s teenage girls are too sexualized.

Revised thesis: Teenage girls who are captivated by the sexual images on MTV are conditioned to believe that a woman’s worth depends on her sensuality, a feeling that harms their self-esteem and behavior.

It is true that some young women in today’s society are more sexualized than in the past, but that is not true for all girls. Many girls have strict parents, dress appropriately, and do not engage in sexual activity while in middle school and high school. The writer of this thesis should ask the following questions:

• Which teenage girls?
• What constitutes “too” sexualized?
• Why are they behaving that way?
• Where does this behavior show up?
• What are the repercussions?

In the first section of Chapter 8 “The Writing Process: How Do I Begin?” , you determined your purpose for writing and your audience. You then completed a freewriting exercise about an event you recently experienced and chose a general topic to write about. Using that general topic, you then narrowed it down by answering the 5WH questions. After you answered these questions, you chose one of the three methods of prewriting and gathered possible supporting points for your working thesis statement.

Now, on a separate sheet of paper, write down your working thesis statement. Identify any weaknesses in this sentence and revise the statement to reflect the elements of a strong thesis statement. Make sure it is specific, precise, arguable, demonstrable, forceful, and confident.

Collaboration

Please share with a classmate and compare your answers.

In your career you may have to write a project proposal that focuses on a particular problem in your company, such as reinforcing the tardiness policy. The proposal would aim to fix the problem; using a thesis statement would clearly state the boundaries of the problem and tell the goals of the project. After writing the proposal, you may find that the thesis needs revision to reflect exactly what is expressed in the body. Using the techniques from this chapter would apply to revising that thesis.

Key Takeaways

• Proper essays require a thesis statement to provide a specific focus and suggest how the essay will be organized.
• A thesis statement is your interpretation of the subject, not the topic itself.
• A strong thesis is specific, precise, forceful, confident, and is able to be demonstrated.
• A strong thesis challenges readers with a point of view that can be debated and can be supported with evidence.
• A weak thesis is simply a declaration of your topic or contains an obvious fact that cannot be argued.
• Depending on your topic, it may or may not be appropriate to use first person point of view.
• Revise your thesis by ensuring all words are specific, all ideas are exact, and all verbs express action.

Writing for Success Copyright © 2015 by University of Minnesota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

Want to create or adapt books like this? Learn more about how Pressbooks supports open publishing practices.

II. Getting Started

2.5 Writing Thesis Statements

Kathryn Crowther; Lauren Curtright; Nancy Gilbert; Barbara Hall; Tracienne Ravita; and Kirk Swenson

To be effective, all support in an essay must work together to convey a central point; otherwise, an essay can fall into the trap of being out of order and confusing. Just as a topic sentence focuses and unifies a single paragraph, the thesis statement focuses and unifies an entire essay. This statement is like a signpost that signals the essay’s destination; it tells the reader the point you want to make in your essay, while the essay itself supports that point.

Because writing is not a linear process, you may find that the best thesis statement develops near the end of your first draft. However, creating a draft or working thesis early in the writing project helps give the drafting process clear direction. You should form your thesis before you begin to organize an essay, but you may find that it needs revision as the essay develops.

A thesis is not just a topic, but rather the writer’s comment or interpretation of the question or subject. For whatever topic you select (for example, school uniforms, social networking), you must ask yourself, “What do I want to say about it?” Asking and then answering this question is vital to forming a thesis that is precise, forceful, and confident.

In the majority of essays, a thesis is one sentence long and appears toward the end of the introductory paragraph. It is specific and focuses on one to three points of a single idea—points that are able to be demonstrated in the body paragraphs. It forecasts the content of the essay and suggests how you will organize your information. Remember that a thesis statement does not summarize an issue but rather dissects it.

Working Thesis Statements

A strong thesis statement must have the following qualities:

• It must be arguable.  A thesis statement must state a point of view or judgment about a topic. An established fact is not considered arguable.
• It must be supportable.  The thesis statement must contain a point of view that can be supported with evidence (reasons, facts, examples).
• It must be specific. A thesis statement must be precise enough to allow for a coherent argument and remain focused on the topic.

Examples of Appropriate Thesis Statements

• Closing all American borders for a period of five years is one solution that will tackle illegal immigration.
• Compared to an absolute divorce, no-fault divorce is less expensive, promotes fairer settlements, and reflects a more realistic view of the causes for marital breakdown.
• Exposing children from an early age to the dangers of drug abuse is a sure method of preventing future drug addicts.
• In today’s crumbling job market, a high school diploma is not significant enough education to land a stable, lucrative job.
• The societal and personal struggles of Troy Maxson in the play Fences symbolize the challenges of black males who lived through segregation and integration in the United States.

Pitfalls to Avoid

A thesis is weak when it is simply a declaration of your subject or a description of what you will discuss in your essay.

Weak Thesis Statement Example

My paper will explain why imagination is more important than knowledge.

A thesis is weak when it makes an unreasonable or outrageous claim or insults the opposing side.

Religious radicals across America are trying to legislate their Puritanical beliefs by banning required high school books.

A thesis is weak when it contains an obvious fact or something that no one can disagree with or provides a dead end.

Advertising companies use sex to sell their products.

A thesis is weak when the statement is too broad.

The life of Abraham Lincoln was long and challenging.

Ways to Revise Your Thesis

Your thesis statement begins as a working thesis statement, an indefinite statement that you make about your topic early in the writing process for the purpose of planning and guiding your writing. Working thesis statements often become stronger as you gather information and develop new ideas and reasons for those ideas. Revision helps you strengthen your thesis so that it matches what you have expressed in the body of the paper.

You can cut down on irrelevant aspects and revise your thesis by taking the following steps:

• Pinpoint and replace all non specific words, such as people, everything, society, or life, with more precise words in order to reduce any vagueness.

Pinpoint and Replace Example

Working thesis:  Young people have to work hard to succeed in life.

Revised thesis:  Recent college graduates must have discipline and persistence in order to find and maintain a stable job in which they can use, and be appreciated for, their talents.

Explanation:  The original includes too broad a range of people and does not define exactly what success entails. By replacing those general words like people and work hard , the writer can better focus their research and gain more direction in their writing. The revised thesis makes a more specific statement about success and what it means to work hard.

• Clarify ideas that need explanation by asking yourself questions that narrow your thesis.

Clarify Example

Working thesis:  The welfare system is a joke.

Revised thesis:  The welfare system keeps a socioeconomic class from gaining employment by alluring members of that class with unearned income, instead of programs to improve their education and skill sets.

Explanation:  A joke means many things to many people. Readers bring all sorts of backgrounds and perspectives to the reading process and would need clarification for a word so vague. This expression may also be too informal for the selected audience. By asking questions, the writer can devise a more precise and appropriate explanation for joke and more accurately defines their stance, which will better guide the writing of the essay.

• Replace any linking verbs with action verbs. Linking verbs are forms of the verb to be , a verb that simply states that a situation exists.

Replace with Action Verbs Example

Working thesis:  Kansas City school teachers are not paid enough.

Revised thesis:  The Kansas City legislature cannot afford to pay its educators, resulting in job cuts and resignations in a district that sorely needs highly qualified and dedicated teachers.

Explanation:  The linking verb in this working thesis statement is the word are . Linking verbs often make thesis statements weak because they do not express action. Rather, they connect words and phrases to the second half of the sentence. Readers might wonder, “Why are they not paid enough?” But this statement does not compel them to ask many more questions.

• Who is not paying the teachers enough?
• How much is considered “enough”?
• What is the problem?
• What are the results?
• Omit any general claims that are hard to support.

Omit General Claims Example

Working thesis:  Today’s teenage girls are too sexualized.

Revised thesis: Teenage girls who are captivated by the sexual images on the internet and social media are conditioned to believe that a woman’s worth depends on her sensuality, a feeling that harms their self-esteem and behavior.

Explanation:  It is true that some young women in today’s society are more sexualized than in the past, but that is not true for all girls. Many girls have strict parents, dress appropriately, and do not engage in sexual activity while in middle school and high school. The writer of this thesis should ask the following questions:

• Which teenage girls?
• What constitutes “too” sexualized?
• Why are they behaving that way?
• Where does this behavior show up?
• What are the repercussions?

This section contains material from:

Crowther, Kathryn, Lauren Curtright, Nancy Gilbert, Barbara Hall, Tracienne Ravita, and Kirk Swenson. Successful College Composition . 2nd ed. Book 8. Georgia: English Open Textbooks, 2016. http://oer.galileo.usg.edu/english-textbooks/8 . Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License .

Relating to lines; a way of explaining information logically and/or sequentially; can refer to the chronological relaying of information.

A brief and concise statement or series of statements that outlines the main point(s) of a longer work. To summarize is to create a brief and concise statement or series of statements that outlines the main point(s) of a longer work.

To analyze closely or minutely; to scrutinize every aspect. Unlike the fields of biology, anatomy, or medicine, in rhetoric and writing, dissect does not refer to the cutting apart of a physical body but to the taking apart the body of an argument or idea piece by piece to understand it better.

A logical, rational, lucid, or understandable expression of an idea, concept, or notion; consistent and harmonious explanation.

Assertion or announcement of belief, understanding, or knowledge; a formal statement or proclamation.

Without a defined number or limit; unlimited, infinite, or undetermined.

An altered version of  a written work. Revising means to rewrite in order to improve and make corrections. Unlike editing, which involves minor changes, revisions include major and noticeable changes to a written work.

Not relevant; unimportant; beside the point; not relating to the matter at hand.

Attractive, tempting, or seductive; to have an appealing and charismatic quality.

To influence or convince; to produce a certain or specific result through the use of force.

2.5 Writing Thesis Statements Copyright © 2022 by Kathryn Crowther; Lauren Curtright; Nancy Gilbert; Barbara Hall; Tracienne Ravita; and Kirk Swenson is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Katherine Miller

Opinion Writer and Editor

In Harris’s Ads, Project 2025 Is No Longer a Joke

Every week on The Point, we kick things off with a tipsheet on the latest in the presidential campaign. Here’s what we’re looking at this week:

Donald Trump will speak to the Fraternal Order of Police board of trustees on Friday in North Carolina, then hold a rally near Wausau, Wis., on Saturday. Tim Walz will be in Pennsylvania on Wednesday and Thursday. After a fairly busy Labor Day weekend, Kamala Harris’s plans are so far light for the week — but presumably both she and Trump will be prepping for next week’s debate.

On Thursday, Judge Tanya Chutkan will hold a status hearing in the federal Jan. 6 case, in which Trump is still charged with four felony counts, after a variety of filings from both Trump’s team and prosecutors last week. We might find out more about what, if anything, will happen with the case before the election.

Just to give you a sense of how soon the election is in a world of absentee and early voting: In North Carolina, officials will begin mailing absentee ballots on Friday. That’s basically the earliest that happens, but over the next few weeks, more and more states will mail out absentee ballots or open early voting locations.

One thing, tonally, that came up during the Democratic convention was the shift toward more jokes about Trump versus the very solemn and dark approach often taken by President Biden. That sometimes created jarring swings in tones, particularly during the nightly segments on Project 2025, which often were delivered pretty ironically. A specific policy agenda like Project 2025 can either be a serious problem or an object of joking derision for critics, but it’s harder for it to be both, at the same time, from the same person. On television, however, the Harris campaign is running a dark, non-joking ad about Project 2025 with a vintage voice-over that feels like something from the 1990s or 2000s.

As we get closer to the election, it can be hard to keep up with what to read. Here’s some informative reporting from the last week worth checking out: Jazmine Ulloa of The Times drove around Pennsylvania looking for Nikki Haley voters and interviewed them about their diverging plans for the fall. David Weigel of Semafor took a look at the Trump campaign’s strategy in embracing Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard. There was a great article by Richard Rubin of The Wall Street Journal on what Harris’s tax plans would actually mean.

Zeynep Tufekci

Opinion Columnist

Inspectors Found Mold and Meat Residue at a Boar’s Head Plant. How Could This Happen?

“How could this happen?” is a natural question to ask after hearing that nine people are dead and dozens have fallen ill from eating deli meats tainted with listeria, a hardy, deadly bacterium that can survive refrigeration and freezing. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that this is certainly an undercount.

But amid the tragedy, Americans should also pause to ask, “How does this not happen all the time?”

The sobering Department of Agriculture inspection reports from a Boar’s Head plant in Jarratt, Va., make it clear that the failures are inexcusable. There are repeated citations for noncompliance with crucial rules like avoiding dripping or standing water (which can facilitate listeria growth). But the same inspection reports should also remind us of the extensive efforts — comprehensive regulations and diligent inspectors — to ensure that such failures are scandals rather than everyday events.

The U.S.D.A. inspectors duly noted that plastic or tarp was covering pipes — signs of a temporary fix to a leak. They noted small pieces of meat residue on food contact surfaces, even if those pieces were as small as one-fifths of an inch long. They noted pooled blood on the plant floor and rancid smells in coolers. They noted if any product was unlabeled. They noted “black moldlike substances” ranging from as small as a pinhead to the size of a quarter on walls. They noted when workers were on their phones while operating equipment. And so on.

It’s easy for companies to complain about excessive regulation, but consumers shouldn’t forget how hard it is to keep mass-produced food safe. Your food is kept safe quietly, day after day, because of extensive regulations born of experience and science. Eagle-eyed inspectors who notice even the tiniest bit of misplaced raw meat can save lives.

As this tragic listeria outbreak reminds us, regulations don’t work without accountability. When companies shirk their responsibilities, swift consequences should kick in, before someone dies or falls ill. Reports by the U.S.D.A. so far show there were no enforcement actions against Boar’s Head in the past year, despite these reports. It is unclear what penalties, if any, the company will face. Whatever they are, one can only hope they will deter other failures.

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Bret Stephens

A Vague, Vacuous TV Interview Didn’t Help Kamala Harris

Kamala Harris didn’t hurt herself in her interview this week with CNN’s Dana Bash. She didn’t particularly help herself, either.

On the positive side, she came across as warm, relatable and — to recall Barack Obama’s famous 2008 exchange with Hillary Clinton — more than “ likable enough .” Harris refused to be baited into the identity-politics trap, emphasizing that she was running for president “for all Americans, regardless of race and gender.” And she had a nice line of attack against Donald Trump, observing the distinction between leaders who measure their strength according to whom they “beat down,” as opposed to those who measure it based on whom “you lift up.”

Less positive: She was vague to the point of vacuous. She struggled to give straight answers to her shifting positions on fracking and border security other than to say, “My values have not changed.” Fine, but she evaded the question of why it took the Biden administration more than three years to gain better control of the border, which it ultimately did through an executive order that could have been in place years earlier. It also didn’t answer the question of why she reversed her former policy positions — or whether she has higher values other than political expediency.

Harris also relied on a few talking points that may not serve her well in the next two months. She mentioned price gouging, but Americans probably won’t believe that grocery chains with razor-thin profit margins are the real culprits when it comes to their rising food bills. Her $100 billion plan to give first-time home buyers $25,000 in down payment support would mainly be an incentive for ever-higher home prices. Even Trump may be smart enough to explain just how inflationary the gimmick could be.

A bigger weakness in the interview was the presence of Harris’s running mate, Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota. Though he delivered a fine speech at the Democratic National Convention (brightly enhanced by his cheering son, Gus), he was transparently evasive in answering Bash’s questions about his misstatement about his military service, false claims about a D.U.I. arrest and misleading statements about his family’s fertility treatments. If there are other lies or untruths in Walz’s record, the campaign ought to get ahead of them now.

As for Bash, she is an intelligent and insistent reporter who isn’t afraid to ask follow-up questions when she gets flighty answers. But there was too much fluff in this interview to lay to rest doubts about Harris’s readiness for the highest office. Tougher questions next time, please.

Michelle Cottle

Opinion Writer

Kamala Harris’s TV Interview Was a Solid First Effort

I think that went pretty well, don’t you?

After all the hand-wringing about how Kamala Harris has been avoiding extended media interviews, the Democratic presidential nominee did a solid job tonight in her sit-down with CNN’s Dana Bash.

Did we get a deep dive into Harris’s policy positions? No, we did not. But that was not the point of this interview. This was about Harris introducing herself to Americans in her new role — and proving a few basic things to everyone.

Let’s zip through just a few of the things Harris needed to do — and how she did:

For starters, the vice president fielded awkward questions without ducking them and without getting flustered. This included multiple inquires about why, since 2019, her positions have changed on issues like fracking and border security.

Her response was that her values have not changed but her experience as vice president has given her a different perspective and made her appreciate the importance of achieving consensus. You may not like that answer, but she was confident and unapologetic in explaining herself.

The not-getting-flustered part was as important as the answers themselves. She absolutely needed to avoid giving any opening for the MAGA trolls — who are obsessed with machismo and performative toughness — to accuse her of being overly emotional or weak or easy to rattle. Amusingly, Bash looked more flustered than Harris did for most of the interview.

Moving right along: Harris needed to come across as serious and thoughtful and, well, presidential.

Mission accomplished. She consistently struck a tone that was reassuring and self-assured. She was serious and at times even a bit salty — as she was when contrasting the decency of President Biden with the utter indecency of Donald Trump. But she never seemed nasty or even super angry, which was also vital, since women simply cannot get away with that like men can. I’m sorry, but you know it’s true.

Bonus: She looked the part. Dignified. Put together. Confident. Steady. All the things.

Even as she projected strength and seriousness, Harris needed to give people a sense of her as a real person, to let them peek behind the curtain a bit. Her story about the morning that Biden called to tell her that he was stepping aside did this nicely. There were baby nieces and pancakes and bacon involved. What could be more American?

Does Harris still have questions to answer and concerns to allay? Yep. The self-defining is not yet done. But this felt like a good first effort.

Valerie Pavilonis

Opinion Editorial Assistant

Punish the Creators of Deepfakes, Not the Women in Them

On Wednesday, South Korean authorities began an investigation into a sprawling network of non-consensual, sexually explicit A.I. photos and videos of women and girls. “Deepfake videos may be dismissed as mere pranks,” said the South Korean president, Yoon Suk Yeol, at a cabinet meeting this week, “but they are clearly criminal acts that exploit technology under the shield of anonymity.”

Deepfakes aren’t just South Korea’s problem; incidents involving politicians, celebrities and ordinary women have been reported in India , the United States , and Britain . A 2023 study by an online security company found that pornography makes up 98 percent of all deepfake videos — and that 99 percent of the people portrayed in those videos are women.

Advances in technology are frequently twisted from their original use and employed to humiliate women. I remember being enthused by online video as a 10-year-old, until I learned about revenge porn and rape videos , which document, for all time, the abuse of women and girls. Spy cameras were first used by actual spies (for better or worse); they then became tools to spy on women — especially South Korean women — in public restrooms, hotels and changing rooms. (Between 2013 and 2018, 30,000 spy camera incidents were reported in South Korea).

The new deepfake crisis is even more blatant. Apps and websites solely for “nudification,” in which a user uploads a clothed photo of someone in order to generate an undressed version, abound. And in the United States, many sexual deepfakes are often the work of teenage boys , which complicates prosecution.

Some U.S. jurisdictions are taking action. A few weeks ago, San Francisco filed a lawsuit in state court seeking to take down 16 such websites, and similar bills have recently been signed into law in Washington, South Dakota and Louisiana. But as with anything on the internet, regulation is like fighting a hydra: once you take down one site, more follow. As for South Korea, on Thursday, the government vowed to increase penalties on those found to have shared sexual deepfakes.

But Korean authorities, and authorities everywhere, should take care to avoid one common mistake: telling women to change their behavior, somehow, to make up for stagnant legal action. In the face of violence, women are often shamed into making themselves smaller, while their harassers walk free of consequence. Governments have an opportunity while A.I. technology is still nascent to do the opposite: to expose, shame and punish harassers.

Gail Collins

Whale Beheading, Bear Carcass Dumping and Trump Boosting, Oh My!

Our presidential folklore is awash with animal stories. Remember Franklin Roosevelt’s dog Fala? No? Well, it was a while ago. President Biden is a big dog lover, but his pets were exiled to Delaware after multiple biting episodes. Jill Biden brought in a cat to fill the void.

Kamala Harris has been photographed cuddling puppies, but if there’s going to be any Republican animal stories during the campaign this fall, chances are they’re going to be sort of unpleasant. Donald Trump doesn’t like animals — naturally, since they draw attention from him. And now he’s got a new supporter who’s famous for his run-ins with their corpses.

Yeah, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. once allegedly chain-sawed the head off a dead whale on a beach, bungee-corded it to the roof of his car and drove it five hours to the family home. Some years ago, Kennedy’s daughter Kick Kennedy called the episode “the rankest thing on the planet.”

People, does that remind you of anything? Back when Mitt Romney was running against Barack Obama, his son once told the story about a family vacation in which Romney put Seamus, their pet Irish setter, in a roof crate for a 12-hour drive to Canada. Apparently, Seamus weathered the trip fine, but the presidential campaign in 2012 was very boring . As a diversion, I decided to try to see how many times I could mention the story before Election Day. Diligent readers counted around 80 mentions.

How would you compare the whale incident with that? Does it make you miss Romney? Yes, he was boring, but we’ve certainly learned how much worse a candidate can be. Don’t forget: Kennedy also dumped a dead bear cub in Central Park. His explanation was that he’d found it on the side of a road and decided to take it home to refrigerate its meat. Then, upon realizing that he was late to a steakhouse dinner, he changed his mind and left the carcass in the park, creating a stir he called “amusing.”

Kennedy, you may remember, says he once suffered from memory issues because of a dead worm in his brain. He’s now supporting Trump for president, and Trump might even consider giving an administration job to his new pal.

No further comments seem necessary. Just remember that whale.

David French

Jack Smith’s New Case Against Trump Is Much Stronger Than His Old One

When thinking about including charges in an indictment, prosecutors can decide which claims to make by asking whether the charge is strong or weak. In other words, does the evidence clearly support the charge, or would they be stretching either the evidence or the legal theory to make the case?

But there’s another, related calculation, and that’s asking whether the claim is clean or complicated. By “clean,” I mean simple and direct. Is this a charge, regardless of the strength of evidence, that the jury will find easy to understand? Obviously, the best possible case to bring is one that’s both clean and strong: The statutes and evidence are straightforward. The case is relatively easy to make.

And that’s exactly how I’d describe the new Jack Smith indictment of Donald Trump . I disagree strongly with the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling, but to the extent there is any silver lining in that dark constitutional cloud, it’s that for Smith, less is truly more.

Even absent the immunity ruling, Smith’s first indictment would have given Trump room to argue that he was doing nothing more than using the levers of government power to investigate election fraud, a classic function of the Department of Justice. His actions were corrupt and unprecedented, but their official nature gave him hope for a defense.

Trump’s fake electors scheme, by contrast, was a campaign function, not an exercise of presidential power.

In fact, during the oral argument in Trump v. United States, Amy Coney Barrett elicited a series of representations from Trump’s counsel that a number of claims in the original indictment involved Trump’s private conduct. For example, she asked if it was private conduct when “three private actors; two attorneys, including those mentioned above; and a political consultant helped implement a plan to submit fraudulent slates of presidential electors to obstruct the certification proceeding, and petitioner” — Trump — “and a co-conspirator attorney directed that effort.”

Trump’s attorney affirmed, “That’s private.”

Not only is that private; it’s among the strongest claims in the whole case. There was never a credible argument for fake electors. And by conspiring to submit fraudulent electoral votes, Trump’s conduct fits squarely within precedent for federal offenses .

If Trump wins the presidency again, the case will disappear. But if he loses, he’ll stand trial, and Smith has now brought a much better case against the former president.

Frank Bruni

Contributing Opinion Writer

Why Kamala Harris Might Just Win North Carolina

When Vice President Kamala Harris started talking policy with a heavily promoted speech about voters’ top concern — the economy — where do you suppose she did it?

My home state, North Carolina. And my governor, Roy Cooper, was the Democrat chosen to introduce her on the climactic final night of the party’s convention.

But then Donald Trump stages a rally in North Carolina seemingly every other week — often enough that I’m terrified he’ll build and start hanging out at some Tar Heel analogue of Mar-a-Lago. He’s fixated on this place.

For good reason. North Carolina has 16 Electoral College votes — the same as Georgia, one more than Michigan and only one fewer than Ohio. And they appear to be in play. On Tuesday, the Cook Political Report moved North Carolina into the tossup category .

The state hasn’t voted Democratic in a presidential election since 2008, when Barack Obama won, but Joe Biden lost here in 2020 by only about 75,000 votes, or under 1.4 percentage points.

And 2024 is different. Political analysts here tell me that they’re struck by the burst of energy for the Harris campaign and its significant investment in the state, where, according to the Pew Research Center, about 23 percent of eligible voters are Black, in contrast to 14 percent nationally. They haven’t seen anything like it since 2008.

Additionally, Michael Bitzer, a professor of politics and history at Catawba College in Salisbury, N.C., noted that in the Republican presidential primary here, Nikki Haley received hefty percentages of the votes in urban counties even though her campaign by then was a lost cause. That suggests a potent anti-Trump sentiment among moderate Republicans and independents.

There’s yet another distinctive dynamic this time around. The slate of Republican candidates for statewide office is MAGA fury through and through. Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, the Republican nominee for governor, is a firebrand with a history of misogynistic, homophobic, antisemitic and altogether deranged remarks . Michele Morrow, the Republican nominee for superintendent of public instruction, has suggested that Cooper, Biden, Obama, Hillary Clinton and Anthony Fauci should be executed for treason — and that Obama’s killing should be televised.

Asher Hildebrand, a fellow professor at Duke University’s School of Public Policy, said that while that extremism probably won’t “push too many voters to the polls for Harris, it very well might keep some Trump voters home.”

And in an election potentially decided by one measly percentage point, such disaffection absolutely could turn North Carolina blue.

Jesse Wegman

Editorial Board Member

Even the Supreme Court Can’t Save Trump From Himself

If you’re going to subject yourself to one of Donald Trump’s social media tirades, it’s generally best to do so with a strong drink close at hand. Every now and then, however, the former president’s all-caps screeds offer a useful road map to understanding the basics of whatever issue he’s raving about — as long as you flip everything he says right-side up.

On Tuesday, Trump took to his failing website , Truth Social, to rage against the special counsel Jack Smith’s new and improved indictment against him for inciting the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

“For them to do this after our Supreme Court Victory on Immunity and more, is shocking,” Trump wrote. The new indictment, he claimed, “has all the problems of the old Indictment, and should be dismissed IMMEDIATELY.”

Poor Trump. He was confident that after the Supreme Court — his Supreme Court — went rogue last month and immunized him from prosecution for virtually all “official” acts, he was in the clear.

But the Supreme Court’s bonkers decision did leave a few doors open for criminal prosecutions of former presidents, and Smith has taken full advantage of them. His new indictment, while nine pages shorter than the original, retains all the same fraud, obstruction and conspiracy charges. It leaves out only the actions that the court’s majority ruled were unquestionably immune, such as Trump’s attempts to force the Justice Department to investigate nonexistent voter fraud in swing states. In this regard, it very conspicuously does not have “all the problems of the old indictment.”

Nor is it accurate to say, as Trump did, that “you’re not even allowed to bring cases literally right before an Election.” He was referring, presumably, to the Justice Department’s so-called 60-day rule , which is not actually a rule but a general guideline that prohibits taking overt steps that could influence how people vote in an upcoming election.

This is a sensible caution in a rule-of-law society, but it doesn’t apply to existing cases that are already filed and under the control of the judicial branch, as Smith’s prosecution of Trump has been for more than a year.

In fact, this is only an issue because Trump, abetted by the right-wing majority of the Supreme Court, has appealed and delayed the proceedings at every step. The justices had multiple opportunities to fast-track Trump’s appeals as early as December. They rejected all of them with no explanation, waiting until the very last moment to issue a ruling with zero constitutional support.

Now Trump is acting as if it’s all so unfair — or “lawfare and weaponization,” as he put it. So flip that right-side up: He’s the person who chose to weaponize the law, and the presidency, no one else. If the rule of law means anything, it means that he will face accountability for his actions, sooner or later.

Kamala Harris and Tim Walz Are Road-Tripping Through Georgia. Could They Actually Win There?

I can see why many people might not consider late August the best time to head to the Deep South. So hot. So sticky. But this week strikes me as the perfect moment for the Democratic presidential ticket to take a quick bus tour around southern Georgia.

Hot off their multiday love fest in Chicago, Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are making clear they intend to play hard for Georgia, a battleground state, and not just in the politically blue, population-rich metro area of Atlanta. With the presidential race promising to be tight and ugly, they are wisely venturing outside the party’s usual comfort zones and are sending a message similar to the one from their preconvention road trip around Pennsylvania: We will show up in every part of the state and fight for every vote.

It seems worth noting that southern Georgia has an abundance of Black voters, a demographic the Democratic Party was feeling very shaky about when President Biden was looking like the nominee — and is hoping to re-energize now that Harris is at the top of the ticket. But even before Biden stepped aside, the party was investing in the area. “The South Georgia region is a priority for the campaign,” a representative for the Harris team told NBC . “We have nearly 50 full-time staff across seven offices in the area, including Valdosta. We have hosted more than 500 events in the region since May 31.”

Team Trump is not conceding any ground. Last week Donald Trump’s running mate, JD Vance, headlined an event in Valdosta, a majority-Black city not too far from the Florida state line. (Although it was Vance’s cringey stop at an area doughnut shop that wound up being widely shared on social media.)

So far, Trump has a polling edge in the state. But his troubled history with Georgia, where he is widely believed to have cost Republicans a Senate seat or two in recent years, makes it tricky terrain. Also, he has struggled to let go of his feud with the state’s popular governor, Brian Kemp. Just a few weeks ago, Trump trashed Kemp at a rally in Atlanta. This freaked out more than a few Republicans, and some kind of truce was brokered. Last week, Kemp endorsed Trump on Fox News.

Still, there is a whole lot of bad blood swirling around the state, and the entire situation feels unsettled — and potentially exploitable by the Democrats.

A postconvention bus tour feels like a good place to start.

Serge Schmemann

After Israel’s Hostage Rescue, Could There Finally Be a Cease-Fire Deal?

The rescue of an Israeli hostage held by Hamas in Gaza on Tuesday was hailed as something of a miracle in Israel. But it did little to quell the anger among many Israelis over Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s resistance to a cease-fire deal that would bring home all the remaining hostages — dead and alive.

The details of the rescue were not immediately clear. The Israeli military spoke of a “complex military operation.” Unnamed senior Israeli officials told The Times that commandos were scouring Hamas tunnels when they came upon Farhan al-Qadi, 52, a member of Israel’s Bedouin minority who was working at a kibbutz when he was seized in the Hamas raid of Oct. 7. In either case, he was the eighth hostage to be freed by the military.

With the latest rescue, 108 Israeli hostages remain in Gaza, including 13 whose deaths have been confirmed, according to Haaretz. The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, a group that represents the families of the hostages, said that the rest cannot hope to be freed by military operations. “A deal is the only way to secure the return of the remaining 108 hostages — the living for rehabilitation and the murdered for proper burial,” it said in a statement .

A deal seemed tantalizingly close at the end of May, when President Biden reported progress toward a phased cease-fire that would lead to the liberation of all remaining hostages and end the grueling fight that has taken more than 40,000 Palestinian lives. But since then, both Netanyahu and Yahya Sinwar, the elusive Hamas leader in Gaza, have repeatedly put roadblocks in the way of an agreement, with Netanyahu insisting on the full destruction of Hamas and Sinwar saying he would accept only a permanent end to hostilities. Last week Secretary of State Antony Blinken, told reporters that a bridging proposal offered by Washington was probably the best — and possibly the last — opportunity for a deal. The last round of talks ended in Cairo on Sunday without one.

Netanyahu’s insistence on a decisive victory has placed him at odds not only with the hostages’ families but also with the Israeli military, which questions whether a total victory over Hamas is feasible and is concerned about a potential clash with Hezbollah. More broadly, polls have shown that a majority of Israelis support a cease-fire in exchange for the hostages.

Al-Qadi did not join the debate as he profusely thanked those responsible for his liberation. But in a meeting with the Israeli president, Isaac Herzog, al-Qadi urged the government “to do everything to bring people home.”

“Twenty-four hours without sleep,” he said. “People are suffering, suffering you can’t imagine.”

Tulsi Gabbard’s Trumpy Transition Is Now Complete

Step back, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. You aren’t even the most interesting ex-Democrat-turned-MAGA-tool to endorse Donald Trump this month.

For my money, that would be Tulsi Gabbard, the former House member and 2020 contender to unseat President Trump.

Gabbard has been on quite the political journey. She never got much traction in her 2020 race. But she did win herself a small but intensely passionate following based heavily on her isolationist leanings — which, admittedly, are more electrifying than most, thanks to her penchant for making indulgent statements about bloodthirsty strongmen such as Bashar al-Assad and Vladimir Putin. Indeed, Gabbard’s soft-on-Russia musings have been at times so striking that Hillary Clinton publicly called her “a Russian asset,” prompting Gabbard to sue Clinton for defamation. (Gabbard later dropped the suit.)

Gabbard quit the Democratic Party in 2022 and became an independent, saying it had fallen “under the complete control of an elitist cabal of warmongers driven by cowardly wokeness,” and promptly began making nice with the red team. She hit the campaign trail for Republican candidates in the midterms. She spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference . Conveniently, she was already a hot guest on Fox News.

For this election, she has settled snugly into the MAGA fold — all the more so since Kamala Harris became the Democratic nominee. Gabbard has been helping Trump with his debate prep . During a primary debate in 2019, you may recall, Gabbard hit Harris hard from the left — successfully enough to leave a mark and tick off Harris . Trump, who has been struggling to figure out how to deal with his new opponent, is clearly hoping some of Gabbard’s mojo rubs off on him.

Just in case anyone had any doubts as to her new allegiance, Gabbard endorsed Trump on Monday. They appeared together at a National Guard conference in Detroit, on the third anniversary of the bombing in Afghanistan that killed 13 U.S. service members. A National Guard veteran, Gabbard asserted that Trump “understands the grave responsibility that a president and commander in chief bears for every single one of our lives.”

The next day, Trump announced that Gabbard was joining his transition team, as is Mr. Kennedy.

Team Trump is presumably betting that bringing on former Democrats will send a signal that his campaign is the one with a big tent and mainstream appeal. But when we’re talking about characters as … colorful as Gabbard and Kennedy, I’m betting the signal to many voters is that Trump’s G.O.P. is the home of the politically strange.

‘Free Speech’ Should Not Shroud Criminal Activity

The detention in France of Pavel Durov, the founder and chief executive of the messaging app Telegram, has sparked a loud outcry about free speech. Elon Musk has portrayed the arrest on his X account as an ominous threat to free speech, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. referred to the app as an “encrypted, uncensored” platform and said “the need to protect free speech has never been more urgent.”

It’s a curious case, and the French government hasn’t helped matters by releasing information in dribs and drabs. While it is possible that there are free speech issues entangled here, some early details suggest the issue may be one of criminal activity.

On Monday, the French prosecutor said in a statement that Durov — who is a citizen of France, Russia, St. Kitts and Nevis and the United Arab Emirates — was being held for questioning in connection with an investigation into criminal activities on the app, including the trading of child sexual abuse material as well as drug trafficking, fraud and money laundering. Notably, Telegram explicitly boasts that it has never disclosed user data to any government, ever.

Questions have long swirled around Telegram. Contrary to widespread belief, Telegram is not encrypted in any meaningful sense. That would be “end to end” encryption, so that even the company couldn’t read users’ messages. Telegram — and anyone it chooses — can read all group chats, and there is no way to fully encrypt them. Those very large groups are the main attraction of the platform.

Private chats on Telegram also lack end-to-end encryption by default. Here, though, users can undergo an onerous process to turn on end-to-end encryption, which then applies only to that conversation. Even the protection provided to private chats is murky: Cryptography experts have long questioned whether Telegram’s limited encryption actually meets security standards.

Durov was born in Russia, where Telegram is used widely. The Kremlin has Durov’s back: It issued a statement that unless more evidence is provided, Durov’s detention may be “a direct attempt to limit freedom of communication.” Russian antiwar activists have long wondered how the Kremlin seems to know so much about their activities on Telegram. (Good question.)

Free speech is an important value, but protecting it does not mean absolving anyone of responsibility for all criminal activity. Ironically, Telegram’s shortage of end-to-end encryption means the company is likely to be more liable simply because it can see the criminal activity happening on its platform. If, for example, Telegram did not cooperate with authorities at all after receiving legal warrants for information about criminal activities, that would mean trouble even in the United States, with its sweeping free speech protections.

Neel V. Patel

Opinion Staff Editor

Faced With the Boeing Starliner’s Flaws, NASA Gets a Couple of Things Right

Odysseus may lay claim to the most delayed and perilous trip back home, but the NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams are giving him a run for his money. What was supposed to be a weeklong mission to the International Space Station will now be an eight-month stay in space, after the spacecraft they launched aboard, the Boeing Starliner, experienced some unexpected glitches .

Boeing has been utterly humiliated by the Starliner’s failure, not least because the company’s rival, SpaceX, will take Wilmore and Williams home. But it’s NASA that deserves applause: Faced with an unsettling turn of events for its human spaceflight program, the agency has gotten a couple of things right.

It got the first thing right nearly a decade ago. In September 2014, NASA awarded contracts to both SpaceX and Boeing for their commercial crew programs, effectively saying it would pay two companies to develop new spacecraft capable of ferrying astronauts to and from the space station. The veteran aerospace firm Boeing was awarded $4.2 billion, while the newcomer SpaceX was awarded $2.6 billion.

While both companies’ programs were mired in delays, SpaceX eventually vaulted ahead of Boeing and pulled off a successful crewed flight to space in 2020. Boeing remained sluggish. Throughout this period, NASA emphasized that the whole reason it gave contracts to two companies in the first place was in case one company hit snags. The wisdom of that choice is on full display now, as Wilmore and Williams can return home on a SpaceX mission, after the Boeing mission went awry. Redundancy paid off.

NASA got one other thing right during this debacle. Though Wilmore and Williams are trapped in space until February, the agency is wisely playing it safe. There isn’t much reason to think the Starliner couldn’t securely bring the astronauts back to Earth. But NASA is choosing not to risk a repeat of the tragic Challenger and Columbia disasters. Taking risks is a fundamental part of spaceflight, but the United States is no longer in a race to beat the Soviets. NASA can and should take its time to reduce the odds of risk whenever possible. It’s the right thing to do.

The astronauts’ delayed return must be truly aggravating for both of them and their families. But it’s unquestionably preferable to an alternative outcome that would put them both in any sort of elevated danger.

Pamela Paul

Gus Walz Brought Out Both the Joy and the Cruelty

Gus Walz’s unbridled emotional reaction last week at the Democratic National Convention to the nomination of his father, Gov. Tim Walz, embodied both the humanity that lies beneath the political process and the momentousness of the political process itself.

In other words, Gus reacted the way he did because he recognized the import of his father’s nomination. And because the man onstage was his father — “That’s my dad!” — a man who raised and supported and accepted and loved him for who he is, a 17-year-old boy with anxiety and a learning disorder and, as Tina Brown wrote in her gorgeous essay on Friday, a human being like any other.

Gus’s reaction was beautiful. And then things got ugly .

In response to Gus’s exuberance, Ann Coulter posted on X, “Talk about weird …” (She later took her post down.) “Sorry, but this is embarrassing for both father and son,” the conservative radio host Jay Weber posted. “If the Walzs represent today’s American man, this country is screwed,” he said, adding a crude insult of the teenage Walz. (He, too, removed his post.)

Perhaps they didn’t know the context. They didn’t know anything about Gus Walz beyond the politics of his father. They didn’t realize they should have been kind. Few people do before issuing a least-charitable-interpretation potshot. People’s private lives, their psychological state, their family or personal circumstances and their disabilities are often invisible. This is as true for public figures as it is for private citizens. Gus didn’t deserve “special” treatment — he deserved the kind of treatment any person does.

If nothing else, Gus reminds us of what an unfiltered human reaction looks like and what a sharp contrast it makes with the noxious swill of performance, hot takes and low blows that passes for online political commentary.

Let’s dwell on that contrast for a moment. Gus’s surge of emotion offered an image of us at our all-too-human best. Those who chose to disparage him reeked of our all-too-human worst. Gus Walz showed us what it means to really care about other people. His critics made clear they’ve forgotten how.

Patrick Healy

Deputy Opinion Editor

Harris Has the Momentum. But Trump Has the Edge on What Matters Most.

Every Monday morning on The Point, we kick off the week with a tipsheet on the latest in the presidential campaign. Here’s what we’re looking at this week:

We’ll know soon what kind of polling bounce Kamala Harris got out of her very good convention in Chicago. I’m especially curious how she’s faring in Pennsylvania and Georgia, which are the most critical battlegrounds in the race. Given Harris’s and the convention’s focus on themes like patriotism, small-town values and the economy, I can see her gaining a couple of points in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. The Democrats’ hammering of Trump on abortion is also going to help Harris in Pennsylvania and Arizona, where abortion rights is a hot-button issue.

The Democrats’ Joyfest is Over. Now Comes The Slugfest.

But consider this: Harris has won the vast majority of news cycles since she declared her candidacy. And yet, she is only two or three percentage points ahead of Trump in the national polling average and effectively tied with him in the seven swing states that will decide the election. Structural factors — polarization, the gender gap, Republicans’ advantage in the Electoral College — are keeping this race tight.

To that end, with early voting only weeks away, the battle between Harris and Trump will be to find the best strategies for the three most important elements of this campaign.

Defining the race: Harris wants to make the race about the future, freedom and unity; Trump wants to make the race about the past, his presidency and threats to the country. Harris has effectively cast the race as a choice between her and Trump, which helps her because he is so unpopular. But there is still time for this to change, especially if an unexpected or outside event suddenly shifts voter attention to safety or national security.

Defining Harris: So far, Harris is also winning on this front, positioning herself as the candidate of change — an appealing image to many voters. Trump is trying to define her as “ dangerously liberal ” and as the de facto incumbent, but even some Republican strategists tell me that they don’t see strong evidence this is catching on. Trump will campaign in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania later this week; watch for whether he starts trying to define her anew.

Defining Trump: The former president is struggling. He is trying to appeal to moderate and independent voters by opposing a national abortion ban and talking about the economy; if he had the discipline to bear down on the cost of living, trade and immigration, he’d be doing better than he is in Pennsylvania, where those issues resonate. But as the Democratic strategist Doug Sosnik put it to me, the only way Trump can win the presidency is by turning out his vote strongly and edging out his opponent with sufficient numbers of swing voters — which is what he did successfully in 2016.

Right now, Harris has the momentum, but I think the Electoral College currently favors Trump . Nothing will be more critical than the Sept. 10 debate to define the race, Trump and Harris. A debate changes things in an instant. Just ask Joe Biden.