Question

"Here's a
Food
Wrapper You
Can Eat"
by Randy Rieland
Consider the cheese stick. It is not
a beautiful food. It also isn't
particularly healthy. Cheese sticks
are about as commonplace as
snack food gets.
Yet in the packaged version that
ends up in so many kids' lunch
boxes, each cylinder of mozzarella
or cheddar is individually wrapped,
like a high-end truffle. And, every
day, thousands of those little
pieces of plastic wrap are thrown
in the trash.
But that may not be the case for
long.
Two researchers at the U.S.
Department of Agriculture (USDA)
have developed a film made from
a milk protein. The film can be
eaten with the cheese. Which
means that it may not be too long
before we have a wrapper we can
eat. It also could be healthy. Edible
plastic exists, but it's largely made
of starch, not protein.

Use the passage to answer the
question.
For what rhetorical purpose
does the author repeatedly
refer to cheese sticks as
common, everyday snacks?
Doing so reinforces the
scope of the problem
because the example
allows the audience to
put into context how
much plastic goes into
the trash daily.
Doing so connects a
complex scientific
problem to an everyday
item, allowing people
who could not otherwise
understand the impact
of plastics to grasp the
concept.
Doing so reinforces the
need for a solution to
the plastic crisis which
addresses cheese
sticks in particular,
because they are a
major source of the
problem.
Doing so connects the
solution the author
wants the audience to
like to a snack most of
them probably enjoy
eating, making it more
appealing.

Answer 1

Doing so reinforces the scope of the problem because the example allows the audience to put into context how much plastic goes into the trash daily.

Explanation: Repeating that cheese sticks are commonplace emphasizes how widespread the waste is (thousands of little pieces of wrap tossed every day), making the environmental problem feel larger and more immediate.