Question

Read the passage below. Then click on the answer to the question that follows the passage.

(1)"Secret Medical Breakthrough!" screams the headline.
(2)"Melt Pounds Away While You Sleep!"
(3)Then there's "The Cure For AIDS Is Right In Your Refrigerator!"
(4)Or how about "Swiss Scientists Promise: You'll Never Have Another Cold!"
(5)Advertisements and "news" stories like these appear in every supermarket tabloid and in the back pages of innumerable other publications.
(6)They all seem based on the same doubtful premise: "Doctors don't want you to know the truth, but we're going to tell you anyway."
(7)Don't let tabloid headlines tempt you into spending your hard-earned money.
(8)The gullible readers who swallow these claims never seem to stop and ask why, if these stories of amazing cures and sure-fire remedies are true, they haven't made headlines in newspapers and other publications.
(9)An AIDS cure?
(10)A genuine weight-loss plan that involves no dieting or exercising?
(11)If such stories were true, you wouldn't be reading about them first in the supermarket checkout aisle.
(12)If the public stopped supporting these publications, they would no longer be able to falsely raise hopes for thousands of readers.
The primary purpose of this paragraph is to ?
a. explain the difference between tabloids and other newspapers.
b. persuade readers not to support tabloids.
c. tell amusing facts about tabloids.

Answer 1

b. persuade readers not to support tabloids

Step-by-step explanation:

I got it right on the test.

Answer 2

b. persuade readers not to support tabloids

Step-by-step explanation:

There are various statements in this passage used as examples to show how tabloids fool readers and give irrelevant information. It can be determined that the overall passage has a negative tone to it. The word "news" is put in quotation marks to emphasize the fact that such information cannot be termed news as done in the tabloids.

"Don't let tabloid headlines tempt you into spending your hard-earned money."

The above statement clearly tells the reader to not waste money on tabloids. It also states that they "falsely raise hopes" of the reader and later disappoints them.