Students have been trained for years to follow the pattern of structuring the thesis statements around their essays' main points. I call this the "laundry list" thesis statement. It isn't presenting an argument, which is the purpose of the thesis statement. It presents the points to the argument, which means the thesis has been created out of smoke and mirrors. In the lecture below, we will talk about how to work on a thesis that does more than listing main points along with general guidelines regarding what a thesis should and should not be.