On May 7, 2014, First Lady of the United States Michelle Obama turned to new media to express her concern over the kidnapping of more than 200 young Nigerian girls by the terrorist group Boko Haram. Her tweet, along with an accompanying photo highlighting the trending hashtag #BringBackOurGirls, ramped up an argument over what the interna- tional community could do to stop an organization responsible for thou- sands of deaths in northeastern Nigeria. In bringing her appeal to Twitter, the First Lady acknowledged the persuasive power of social media like Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and innumerable political and social blogs. The hashtag itself, it would appear, had become a potent tool for rallying audiences around the globe to support specific ideas or causes. But to what ends?

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Just weeks before Obama’s notable appeal, a U.S. State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki drew attention with a tweet of her own aimed at countering attempts by Russian social media to co-opt the U.S. State Department’s #UnitedforUkraine hashtag:

The Russian government, it seems, having just annexed the Crimea region and threatening all of Ukraine, was showing more skill than Western nations at using Twitter and other social media to win propa- ganda points in the diplomatic crisis. Yet Psaki’s response via Twitter earned her disapproval from those who interpreted her social media riposte as further evidence of U.S. weakness. For instance, Texas senator Ted Cruz tweeted in reply to Psaki:

Even Michelle Obama took heat for her earnest appeal on behalf of kidnapped girls the same age as her own daughters. While celebrities such as Amy Poehler and Mary J. Blige posted supportive items, Obama’s tweet got quick international pushback from those who argued (in 140 characters) that the anti-terrorist use of drones by the U.S. military was no less reprehensible than the tactics of Boko Haram. And domestic crit- ics saw Obama’s message as a substitute for real action, with columnist Jeffrey Goldberg chiding well-intentioned activists with a dose of reality:

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Clearly, social media play out on crowded, two-way channels, with claims and counterclaims whizzing by, fast and furious. Such tools reach audiences and they also create them, offering an innovative way to make and share arguments. Just as important, anyone, anywhere, with access to a phone, tablet, or other electronic device, can launch arguments that circle the globe in seconds. Social networking and digital tools are increasingly available to all.

We’ve opened this chapter with dramatic, perhaps troubling, examples of Twitter controversies to introduce our claim that argu- ments are all around us, in every medium, in every genre, in everything we do. There may be an argument on the T-shirt you put on in the morning, in the sports column you read on the bus, in the prayers you utter before an exam, in the off-the-cuff political remarks of a teacher lecturing, in the assurances of a health center nurse that “This won’t hurt one bit.”

The clothes you wear, the foods you eat, and the groups you join make nuanced, sometimes unspoken assertions about who you are and what you value. So an argument can be any text — written, spoken, aural, or visual — that expresses a point of view. In fact, some theorists claim that language is inherently persuasive. When you say, “Hi, how’s it going?” in one sense you’re arguing that your hello deserves a response. Even humor makes an argument when it causes readers to recognize — through bursts of laughter or just a faint smile — how things are and how they might be different.

More obvious as arguments are those that make direct claims based on or drawn from evidence. Such writing often moves readers to recog- nize problems and to consider solutions. Persuasion of this kind is usu- ally easy to recognize:

The National Minimum Drinking Age Act, passed by Congress 30 years ago this July, is a gross violation of civil liberties and must be repealed. It is absurd and unjust that young Americans can vote, marry, enter contracts, and serve in the military at 18 but cannot buy an alcoholic drink in a bar or restaurant.

— Camille Paglia, “The Drinking Age Is Past Its Prime”

We will become a society of a million pictures without much memory, a society that looks forward every second to an immediate replication of what it has just done, but one that does not sustain the difficult labor of transmitting culture from one generation to the next.

— Christine Rosen, “The Image Culture”

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R E S P O N D. Can an argument really be any text that expresses a point of view? What kinds of arguments — if any — might be made by the following items?

a Boston Red Sox cap

a Livestrong bracelet

the “explicit lyrics” label on a best-selling rap CD

the health warnings on a package of cigarettes

a Tesla Model S electric car

a pair of Ray-Ban sunglasses

Why We Make Arguments

In the politically divided and entertainment-driven culture of the United States today, the word argument may well call up negative images: the hostile scowl or shaking fist of a politician or news “opinionator” who wants to drown out other voices and prevail at all costs. This winner- take-all view turns many citizens off to the whole process of using rea- soned conversation to identify, explore, and solve problems. Hoping to avoid personal conflict, many people now sidestep opportunities to speak their mind on issues shaping their lives and work. We want to counter this attitude throughout this book.

Some arguments, of course, are aimed at winning, especially those related to politics, business, and law. Two candidates for office, for example, vie for a majority of votes; the makers of one smartphone try to outsell their competitors by offering more features at a lower price; and two lawyers try to outwit each other in pleading to a judge and jury. In your college writing, you may also be called on to make arguments that appeal to a “judge” and “jury” (perhaps your instructor and class- mates). You might, for instance, argue that students in every field should be required to engage in service learning projects. In doing so, you will need to offer better arguments or more convincing evidence than poten- tial opponents — such as those who might regard service learning as a politicized or coercive form of education. You can do so reasonably and responsibly, no name-calling required.

There are many reasons to argue and principled ways to do so. We explore some of them in this section.

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Arguments to Convince and Inform

We’re stepping into an argument ourselves in drawing what we hope is a useful distinction between convincing and — in the next section — persuading. (Feel free to disagree with us.) Arguments to convince lead audiences to accept a claim as true or reasonable — based on informa- tion or evidence that seems factual and reliable; arguments to persuade then seek to move people beyond conviction to action. Academic argu- ments often combine both elements.

Many news reports and analyses, white papers, and academic articles aim to convince audiences by broadening what they know about a sub- ject. Such fact-based arguments might have no motives beyond laying out what the facts are. Here’s an opening paragraph from a 2014 news story by Anahad O’Connor in the New York Times that itself launched a thousand arguments (and lots of huzzahs) simply by reporting the results of a recent scientific study:

Many of us have long been told that saturated fat, the type found in meat, butter and cheese, causes heart disease. But a large and exhaus- tive new analysis by a team of international scientists found no evi- dence that eating saturated fat increased heart attacks and other cardiac events.

— Anahad O’Connor, “Study Questions Fat and Heart Disease Link”

Wow. You can imagine how carefully the reporter walked through the scientific data, knowing how this new information might be understood and repurposed by his readers.

Similarly, in a college paper on viability of nuclear power as an alter- native source of energy, you might compare the health and safety record of a nuclear plant to that of other forms of energy. Depending upon your findings and your interpretation of the data, the result of your fact-based presentation might be to raise or alleviate concerns readers have about nuclear energy. Of course, your decision to write the argument might be driven by your conviction that nuclear power is much safer than most people believe.

Even an image can offer an argument designed both to inform and to convince. On the following page, for example, editorial cartoonist Bob Englehart finds a way to frame an issue on the minds of many students today, the burden of crushing debt. As Englehart presents it, the problem is impossible to ignore.

In the excerpt from his book

Disability and the Media:

Prescriptions for Change,

Charles A. Riley II intends to

convince other journalists to

adopt a less stereotypical language

for discussing diversity.

LINK TO P. 527

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Arguments to Persuade

Today, climate change may be the public issue that best illustrates the chasm that sometimes separates conviction from persuasion. The weight of scientific research may convince people that the earth is warming, but persuading them to act on that knowledge doesn’t fol- low easily. How then does change occur? Some theorists suggest that persuasion — understood as moving people to do more than nod in agreement — is best achieved via appeals to emotions such as fear, anger, envy, pride, sympathy, or hope. We think that’s an oversimplifi- cation. The fact is that persuasive arguments, whether in advertise- ments, political blogs, YouTube videos, or newspaper editorials, draw upon all the appeals of rhetoric (see p. 21) to motivate people to act — whether it be to buy a product, pull a lever for a candidate, or volunteer for a civic organization. Here, once again, is Camille Paglia driving home her argument that the 1984 federal law raising the drink- ing age in the United States to 21 was a catastrophic decision in need of reversal:

What this cruel 1984 law did is deprive young people of safe spaces where they could happily drink cheap beer, socialize, chat, and flirt in a free but controlled public environment. Hence in the 1980s we immediately got the scourge of crude binge drinking at campus fraternity keg parties, cut off from the adult world. Women in

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that boorish free-for-all were suddenly fighting off date rape. Club drugs — Ecstasy, methamphetamine, ketamine (a veterinary tranquilizer) — surged at raves for teenagers and on the gay male circuit scene.

Paglia chooses to dramatize her argument by sharply contrasting a safer, more supportive past with a vastly more dangerous present when drink- ing was forced underground and young people turned to highly risky behaviors. She doesn’t hesitate to name them either: binge drinking, club drugs, raves, and, most seriously, date rape. This highly rhetorical, one might say emotional, argument pushes readers hard to endorse a call for serious action — the repeal of the current drinking age law.

Admit it, Duchess of Cornwall. You knew abandoned dogs need homes, but it was heartrending photos on the Battersea Dogs & Cats Home Web site that persuaded you to visit the shelter. WPA Pool/Getty Images

R E S P O N D. Apply the distinction made here between convincing and persuading to the way people respond to two or three current political or social issues. Is there a useful distinction between being convinced and being persuaded? Explain your position.

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Arguments to Make Decisions

Closely allied to arguments to convince and persuade are arguments to examine the options in important matters, both civil and personal — from managing out-of-control deficits to choosing careers. Arguments to make decisions occur all the time in the public arena, where they are often slow to evolve, caught up in electoral or legal squabbles, and yet driven by a genuine desire to find consensus. In recent years, for instance, Americans have argued hard to make decisions about health care, the civil rights of same-sex couples, and the status of more than 11 million immigrants in the country. Subjects so complex aren’t debated in straight lines. They get haggled over in every imaginable medium by thousands of writers, politicians, and ordinary citizens working alone or via political organizations to have their ideas considered.

For college students, choosing a major can be an especially momen- tous personal decision, and one way to go about making that decision is to argue your way through several alternatives. By the time you’ve explored the pros and cons of each alternative, you should be a little closer to a reasonable and defensible decision.

Sometimes decisions, however, are not so easy to make.

www.CartoonStock.com

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Arguments to Understand and Explore

Arguments to make decisions often begin as choices between opposing positions already set in stone. But is it possible to examine important issues in more open-ended ways? Many situations, again in civil or per- sonal arenas, seem to call for arguments that genuinely explore possi- bilities without constraints or prejudices. If there’s an “opponent” in such situations at all (often there is not), it’s likely to be the status quo or a current trend which, for one reason or another, puzzles just about everyone. For example, in trying to sort through the extraordinary com- plexities of the 2011 budget debate, philosophy professor Gary Gutting was able to show how two distinguished economists — John Taylor and Paul Krugman — draw completely different conclusions from the exact same sets of facts. Exploring how such a thing could occur led Gutting to conclude that the two economists were arguing from the same facts, all right, but that they did not have all the facts possible. Those missing or unknown facts allowed them to fill in the blanks as they could, thus leading them to different conclusions. By discovering the source of a paradox, Gutting potentially opened new avenues for understanding.

Exploratory arguments can also be personal, such as Zora Neale Hurston’s ironic exploration of racism and of her own identity in the essay “How It Feels to Be Colored Me.” If you keep a journal or blog, you have no doubt found yourself making arguments to explore issues near and dear to you. Perhaps the essential argument in any such piece is the writer’s realization that a problem exists — and that the writer or reader needs to understand it and respond constructively to it if possible.

Explorations of ideas that begin by trying to understand another’s perspective have been described as invitational arguments by research- ers Sonja Foss, Cindy Griffin, and Josina Makau. Such arguments are interested in inviting others to join in mutual explorations of ideas based on discovery and respect. Another kind of argument, called Rogerian argument (after psychotherapist Carl Rogers), approaches audiences in similarly nonthreatening ways, finding common ground and establish- ing trust among those who disagree about issues. Writers who take a Rogerian approach try to see where the other person is coming from, looking for “both/and” or “win/win” solutions whenever possible. (For more on Rogerian strategies, see Chapter 7.)

The infographic “Speak My

Language” by Santos Henarejos

explores how technology has

affected the way we communicate

around the world.

LINK TO P. 585

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R E S P O N D. What are your reasons for making arguments? Keep notes for two days about every single argument you make, using our broad definition to guide you. Then identify your reasons: How many times did you aim to con- vince? To inform? To persuade? To explore? To understand?

Occasions for Argument

In a fifth-century BCE textbook of rhetoric (the art of persuasion), the philosopher Aristotle provides an ingenious strategy for classifying arguments based on their perspective on time — past, future, and pres- ent. His ideas still help us to appreciate the role arguments play in soci- ety in the twenty-first century. As you consider Aristotle’s occasions for argument, remember that all such classifications overlap (to a certain extent) and that we live in a world much different than his.

The risks of Rogerian argument © David Sipress/The New Yorker Collection/The Cartoon Bank

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Arguments about the Past

Debates about what has happened in the past, what Aristotle called forensic arguments, are the red meat of government, courts, businesses, and academia. People want to know who did what in the past, for what reasons, and with what liability. When you argue a speeding ticket in court, you are making a forensic argument, claiming perhaps that you weren’t over the limit or that the officer’s radar was faulty. A judge will have to decide what exactly happened in the past in the unlikely case you push the issue that far.

More consequentially, in 2014 the federal government and General Motors found themselves deeply involved in arguments about the past as investigators sought to determine just exactly how the massive auto com- pany had allowed a serious defect in the ignition switches of its cars to go undisclosed and uncorrected for a decade. Drivers and passengers died or were injured as engines shut down and airbags failed to go off in subse- quent collisions. Who at General Motors was responsible for not diagnos- ing the fault? Were any engineers or executives liable for covering up the problem? And how should victims of this product defect or their families be compensated? These were all forensic questions to be thoroughly investigated, argued, and answered by regulatory panels and courts.

From an academic perspective, consider the lingering forensic argu- ments over Christopher Columbus’s “discovery” of America. Are his expeditions cause for celebration or notably unhappy chapters in human history? Or some of both? Such arguments about past actions — heated enough to spill over into the public realm — are common in disciplines such as history, philosophy, and ethics.

Mary Barra, the chief executive officer of General Motors, testifies before a congressional panel looking into problems with ignition switches in the company’s cars. AP Photo/Ron Sachs/ picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images

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Arguments about the Future

Debates about what will or should happen in the future — deliberative arguments — often influence policies or legislation for the future. Should local or state governments allow or even encourage the use of self-driving cars on public roads? Should colleges and universities lend support to more dual- credit programs so that students can earn college credits while still in high school? Should coal-fired power plants be phased out of our energy grid? These are the sorts of deliberative questions that legislatures, committees, or school boards routinely address when making laws or establishing policies.

But arguments about the future can also be speculative, advancing by means of projections and reasoned guesses, as shown in the following passage from an essay by media maven Marc Prensky. He is arguing that it is time for some college or university to be the first to ban physical, that is to say paper, books on its campus, a controversial proposal to say the least:

Colleges and professors exist, in great measure, to help “liberate” and connect the knowledge and ideas in books. We should certainly pass on to our students the ability to do this. But in the future those liber- ated ideas — the ones in the books (the author’s words), and the ones about the books (the reader’s own notes, all readers’ thoughts and commentaries) — should be available with a few keystrokes. So, as counterintuitive as it may sound, eliminating physical books from col- lege campuses would be a positive step for our 21st-century students, and, I believe, for 21st-century scholarship as well. Academics, researchers, and particularly teachers need to move to the tools of the future. Artifacts belong in museums, not in our institutions of higher learning.

— Marc Prensky, “In the 21st-Century University, Let’s Ban Books”

Arguments about the Present

Arguments about the present — what Aristotle terms epideictic or cere- monial arguments — explore the current values of a society, affirming or challenging its widely shared beliefs and core assumptions. Epideictic arguments are often made at public and formal events such as inaugural addresses, sermons, eulogies, memorials, and graduation speeches.

Amy Davidson’s article “Four Ways

the Riley Ruling Matters for the NSA”

predicts some probable outcomes

of an important Supreme Court

decision.

LINK TO P. 786

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Members of the audience listen carefully as credible speakers share their wisdom. For example, as the selection of college commencement speakers has grown increasingly contentious, Ruth J. Simmons, the first African American woman to head an Ivy League college, used the oppor- tunity of such an address (herself standing in for a rejected speaker) to offer a timely and ringing endorsement of free speech. Her words per- fectly illustrate epideictic rhetoric:

Universities have a special obligation to protect free speech, open dis- course and the value of protest. The collision of views and ideologies is in the DNA of the academic enterprise. No collision avoidance tech- nology is needed here. The noise from this discord may cause others to criticize the legitimacy of the academic enterprise, but how can knowledge advance without the questions that overturn misconcep- tions, push further into previously impenetrable areas of inquiry and assure us stunning breakthroughs in human knowledge? If there is anything that colleges must encourage and protect it is the persistent questioning of the status quo. Our health as a nation, our health as women, our health as an industry requires it.

— Ruth J. Simmons, Smith College, 2014

Perhaps more common than Smith’s impassioned address are values arguments that examine contemporary culture, praising what’s admira- ble and blaming what’s not. In the following argument, student Latisha Chisholm looks at the state of rap music after Tupac Shakur:

With the death of Tupac, not only did one of the most intriguing rap rivalries of all time die, but the motivation for rapping seems to have changed. Where money had always been a plus, now it is obviously more important than wanting to express the hardships of Black com- munities. With current rappers, the positive power that came from the desire to represent Black people is lost. One of the biggest rappers now got his big break while talking about sneakers. Others announce retirement without really having done much for the soul or for Black people’s morale. I equate new rappers to NFL players that don’t love the game anymore. They’re only in it for the money. . . . It looks like the voice of a people has lost its heart.

— Latisha Chisholm, “Has Rap Lost Its Soul?”

As in many ceremonial arguments, Chisholm here reinforces common values such as representing one’s community honorably and fairly.

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R E S P O N D. In a recent magazine, newspaper, or blog, find three editorials — one that makes a forensic argument, one a deliberative argument, and one a cere- monial argument. Analyze the arguments by asking these questions: Who is arguing? What purposes are the writers trying to achieve? To whom are they directing their arguments? Then decide whether the arguments’ pur- poses have been achieved and how you know.

Are rappers since Tupac — like Jay Z — only in it for the money? Many epideictic arguments either praise or blame contemporary culture in this way. Michael N. Todaro/ FilmMagic/Getty Images

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Kinds of Argument

Yet another way of categorizing arguments is to consider their status or stasis — that is, the specific kinds of issues they address. This approach, called stasis theory, was used in ancient Greek and Roman civilizations to provide questions designed to help citizens and lawyers work their way through legal cases. The status questions were posed in sequence because each depended on answers from the preceding ones. Together, the queries helped determine the point of contention in an argument — where the parties disagreed or what exactly had to be proven. A modern version of those questions might look like the following:

● Did something happen?

● What is its nature?

● What is its quality or cause?

● What actions should be taken?

Each stasis question explores a different aspect of a problem and uses different evidence or techniques to reach conclusions. You can use these questions to explore the aspects of any topic you’re considering. You’ll discover that we use the stasis issues to define key types of argument in Part 2.

Did Something Happen? Arguments of Fact

There’s no point in arguing a case until its basic facts are established. So an argument of fact usually involves a statement that can be proved or disproved with specific evidence or testimony. For example, the question

Occasions for Argument

Past Future Present What is it called? Forensic Deliberative Epideictic

What are its concerns? What happened in the past?

What should be done in the future?

Who or what deserves praise or blame?

What does it look like? Court decisions, legal briefs, legislative hear- ings, investigative reports, academic studies

White papers, proposals, bills, regulations, mandates

Eulogies, graduation speeches, inaugural addresses, roasts

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of pollution of the oceans — is it really occurring? — might seem rela- tively easy to settle. Either scientific data prove that the oceans are being dirtied as a result of human activity, or they don’t. But to settle the mat- ter, writers and readers need to ask a number of other questions about the “facts”:

● Where did the facts come from?

● Are they reliable?

● Is there a problem with the facts?

● Where did the problem begin and what caused it?

For more on arguments based on facts, see Chapters 4 and 8.

What Is the Nature of the Thing? Arguments of Definition

Some of the most hotly debated issues in American life today involve questions of definition: we argue over the nature of the human fetus, the meaning of “amnesty” for immigrants, the boundaries of sexual assault. As you might guess, issues of definition have mighty consequences, and decades of debate may nonetheless leave the matter unresolved. Here, for example, is how one type of sexual assault is defined in an important 2007 report submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice by the National Institute of Justice:

We consider as incapacitated sexual assault any unwanted sexual contact occurring when a victim is unable to provide consent or stop what is happening because she is passed out, drugged, drunk, inca- pacitated, or asleep, regardless of whether the perpetrator was respon- sible for her substance use or whether substances were administered without her knowledge. We break down incapacitated sexual assault into four subtypes. . . .

— “The Campus Sexual Assault (CSA) Study: Final Report”

The specifications of the definition go on for another two hundred words, each of consequence in determining how sexual assault on col- lege campuses might be understood, measured, and addressed.

Of course many arguments of definition are less weighty than this, though still hotly contested: Is playing video games a sport? Can Batman be a tragic figure? Is Hillary Clinton a moderate or a progressive? (For more about arguments of definition, see Chapter 9.)

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What Is the Quality or Cause of the Thing? Arguments of Evaluation

Arguments of evaluation present criteria and then measure individual people, ideas, or things against those standards. For instance, a Washing- ton Post story examining long-term trend lines in SAT reading scores opened with this qualitative assessment of the results:

Reading scores on the SAT for the high school class of 2012 reached a four-decade low, putting a punctuation mark on a gradual decline in the ability of college-bound teens to read passages and answer ques- tions about sentence structure, vocabulary and meaning on the col- lege entrance exam. . . . Scores among every racial group except for those of Asian descent declined from 2006 levels. A majority of test takers — 57 percent — did not score high enough to indicate likely suc- cess in college, according to the College Board, the organization that administers the test.

— Lyndsey Layton and Emma Brown, “SAT Reading Scores Hit a Four-Decade Low”

The final sentence is particularly telling, putting the test results in con- text. More than half the high school test-takers may not be ready for college-level readings.

In examining a circumstance or situation like this, we are often led to wonder what accounts for it: Why are the test scores declining? Why are some groups underperforming? And, in fact, the authors of the brief Post story do follow up on some questions of cause and effect:

The 2012 SAT scores come after a decade of efforts to raise test scores under the No Child Left Behind law, the federal education initiative crafted by President George W. Bush. Critics say the law failed to address the barriers faced by many test takers.

“Some kids are coming to school hungry, some without the health care they need, without the vocabulary that middle-class kids come to school with, even in kindergarten,” said Helen F. Ladd, a professor of public policy and economics at Duke University.

Although evaluations differ from causal analyses, in practice the bound- aries between stasis questions are often porous: particular arguments have a way of defining their own issues.

For much more about arguments of evaluation, see Chapter 10; for causal arguments, see Chapter 11.

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What Actions Should Be Taken? Proposal Arguments

After facts in a controversy have been confirmed, definitions agreed on, evaluations made, and causes traced, it may be time for a proposal argument answering the question Now, what do we do about all this? For example, in developing an argument about out-of-control student fees at your college, you might use all the prior stasis questions to study the issue and determine exactly how much and for what reasons these costs

STASIS QUESTIONS AT WORK

Suppose you have an opportunity to speak at a student conference on the impact of climate change. You are tentatively in favor of strength- ening industrial pollution standards aimed at reducing global warming trends. But to learn more about the issue, you use the stasis questions to get started.

Did something happen? Does global warming exist? Maybe not, say many in the oil and gas industry; at best, evidence for global warm- ing is inconclusive. Yes, say most scientists and governments; cli- mate change is real and even seems to be accelerating. To come to your conclusion, you’ll weigh the facts carefully and identify prob- lems with opposing arguments. What is the nature of the thing? Skeptics define climate change as a naturally occurring event; most scientists base their definitions on change due to human causes. You look at each definition care- fully: How do the definitions foster the goals of each group? What’s at stake for each group in defining it that way? What is the quality or cause of the thing? Exploring the differing assessments of damage done by climate change leads you to ask who will gain from such analysis: Do oil executives want to protect their investments? Do scientists want government money for grants? Where does evidence for the dangers of global warming come from? Who benefits if the dangers are accepted as real and present, and who loses? What actions should be taken? If climate change is occurring natu- rally or causing little harm, then arguably nothing needs to be or can be done. But if it is caused mainly by human activity and dangers, action is definitely called for (although not everyone may agree on what such action should be). As you investigate the proposals being made and the reasons behind them, you come closer to developing your own argument.

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are escalating. Only then will you be prepared to offer knowledgeable suggestions for action. In examining a nationwide move to eliminate remedial education in four-year colleges, John Cloud offers a notably moderate proposal to address the problem:

Students age twenty-two and over account for 43 percent of those in remedial classrooms, according to the National Center for Develop- mental Education. . . . [But] 55 percent of those needing remediation must take just one course. Is it too much to ask them to pay extra for that class or take it at a community college?

— John Cloud, “Who’s Ready for College?”

For more about proposal arguments, see Chapter 12.

Appealing to Audiences

Exploring all the occasions and kinds of arguments available will lead you to think about the audience(s) you are addressing and the specific ways you can appeal to them. Audiences for arguments today are amaz- ingly diverse, from the flesh-and-blood person sitting across a desk when you negotiate a student loan to your “friends” on social media, to the “ideal” reader you imagine for whatever you are writing. The figure on the next page suggests just how many dimensions an audience can have as writers and readers negotiate their relationships with a text, whether it be oral, written, or digital.

As you see there, texts usually have intended readers, the people writers hope and expect to address — let’s say, routine browsers of a

The No Child Left Behind Act was signed in 2002 with great hopes and bipartisan support. AFP/Getty Images

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READING AND UNDERSTANDING ARGUMENTS22

newspaper’s op-ed page. But writers also shape the responses of these actual readers in ways they imagine as appropriate or desirable — for example, maneuvering readers of editorials into making focused and knowledgeable judgments about politics and culture. Such audiences, as imagined and fashioned by writers within their texts, are called invoked readers.

Making matters even more complicated, readers can respond to writ- ers’ maneuvers by choosing to join the invoked audiences, to resist them, or maybe even to ignore them. Arguments may also attract “real” readers from groups not among those that writers originally imagined or expected to reach. You may post something on the Web, for instance, and discover that people you did not intend to address are commenting on it. (For them, the experience may be like reading private email intended for someone else: they find themselves drawn to and fasci- nated by your ideas!) As authors of this book, we think about students like you whenever we write: you are our intended readers. But notice how in dozens of ways, from the images we choose to the tone of our language, we also invoke an audience of people who take writing argu- ments seriously. We want you to become that kind of reader.

So audiences are very complicated and subtle and challenging, and yet you somehow have to attract and even persuade them. As always, Aristotle offers an answer. He identified three time-tested appeals that speakers and writers can use to reach almost any audience, labeling them pathos, ethos, and logos — strategies as effective today as they were in ancient times, though we usually think of them in slightly different terms. Used in the right way and deployed at the right moment, emo- tional, ethical, and logical appeals have enormous power, as we’ll see in subsequent chapters.

Writer

Readers existing in writer’s mind:

intended/ideal readers

Readers

Readers as they actually exist:

real readers

Text

Readers represented in the text:

invoked readers

social, cultural, institutional, economic, lingu istic,

ge ogra

ph ic

nt ex

Readers and writers in context

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C H A P T E R 1 EVERYTHING IS AN ARGUMENT 23

R E S P O N D. You can probably provide concise descriptions of the intended audience for most textbooks you have encountered. But can you detect their invoked audiences — that is, the way their authors are imagining (and perhaps shaping) the readers they would like to have? Carefully review this entire first chapter, looking for signals and strategies that might identify the audience and readers invoked by the authors of Everything’s an Argument.

Emotional Appeals: Pathos

Emotional appeals, or pathos, generate emotions (fear, pity, love, anger, jealousy) that the writer hopes will lead the audience to accept a claim. Here is an alarming sentence from a book by Barry B. LePatner arguing that Americans need to make hard decisions about repairing the coun- try’s failing infrastructure:

When the I-35W Bridge in Minneapolis shuddered, buckled, and col- lapsed during the evening rush hour on Wednesday, August 1, 2007, plunging 111 vehicles into the Mississippi River and sending thirteen people to their deaths, the sudden, apparently inexplicable nature of the event at first gave the appearance of an act of God.

— Too Big to Fall: America’s Failing Infrastructure and the Way Forward

If you ever drive across a bridge, LePatner has probably gotten your attention. His sober and yet descriptive language helps readers imagine the dire consequence of neglected road maintenance and bad design decisions. Making an emotional appeal like this can dramatize an issue and sometimes even create a bond between writer and readers. (For more about emotional appeals, see Chapter 2.)

Ethical Appeals: Ethos

When writers or speakers come across as trustworthy, audiences are likely to listen to and accept their arguments. That trustworthiness (along with fairness and respect) is a mark of ethos, or credibility. Show- ing that you know what you are talking about exerts an ethical appeal, as does emphasizing that you share values with and respect your audi- ence. Once again, here’s Barry LePatner from Too Big to Fall, shoring up

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READING AND UNDERSTANDING ARGUMENTS24

his authority for writing about problems with America’s roads and bridges by invoking the ethos of people even more credible:

For those who would seek to dismiss the facts that support the thesis of this book, I ask them to consult the many professional engineers in state transportation departments who face these problems on a daily basis. These professionals understand the physics of bridge and road design, and the real problems of ignoring what happens to steel and concrete when they are exposed to the elements without a strict regi- men of ongoing maintenance.

It’s a sound rhetorical move to enhance credibility this way. For more about ethical appeals, see Chapter 3.

Logical Appeals: Logos

Appeals to logic, or logos, are often given prominence and authority in U.S. culture: “Just the facts, ma’am,” a famous early TV detective on Dragnet used to say. Indeed, audiences respond well to the use of reasons and evidence — to the presentation of facts, statistics, credible testimony, cogent examples, or even a narrative or story that embodies a sound reason in support of an argument. Following almost two hundred pages of facts, sta- tistics, case studies, and arguments about the sad state of American bridges, LePatner can offer this sober, logical, and inevitable conclusion:

We can no longer afford to ignore the fact that we are in the midst of a transportation funding crisis, which has been exacerbated by an even larger and longer-term problem: how we choose to invest in our infra- structure. It is not difficult to imagine the serious consequences that will unfold if we fail to address the deplorable conditions of our bridges and roads, including the increasingly higher costs we will pay for goods and services that rely on that transportation network, and a concomitant reduction in our standard of living.

For more about logical appeals, see Chapter 4.

Bringing It Home: Kairos and the Rhetorical Situation

In Greek mythology, Kairos — the youngest son of Zeus — was the god of opportunity. In images, he is most often depicted as running, and his most unusual characteristic is a shock of hair on his forehead. As Kairos

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dashes by, you have a chance to seize that lock of hair, thereby seizing the opportune moment; once he passes you by, however, you have missed that chance.

Kairos is also a term used to describe the most suitable time and place for making an argument and the most opportune ways of expressing it. It is easy to point to shimmering rhetorical moments, when speakers find exactly the right words to stir an audience: Franklin Roosevelt’s “We have nothing to fear but fear itself,” Ronald Reagan’s “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall,” and of course Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a dream . . .” But kairos matters just as much in less dramatic situations, whenever speakers or writers must size up the core elements of a rhetorical situa- tion to decide how best to make their expertise and ethos work for a particular message aimed at a specific audience. The diagram below hints at the dynamic complexity of the rhetorical situation.

But rhetorical situations are embedded in contexts of enormous social complexity. The moment you find a subject, you inherit all the knowledge, history, culture, and technological significations that sur- round it. To lesser and greater degrees (depending on the subject), you also bring personal circumstances into the field — perhaps your gender, your race, your religion, your economic class, your habits of language. And all those issues weigh also upon the people you write to and for.

Context —

Media

Writers Speakers

Texts Message

Readers Viewers Listeners

The rhetorical situation

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READING AND UNDERSTANDING ARGUMENTS26

So considering your rhetorical situation calls on you to think hard about the notion of kairos. Being aware of your rhetorical moment means being able to understand and take advantage of dynamic, shifting circumstances and to choose the best (most timely) proofs and evidence for a particular place, situation, and audience. It means seizing moments and enjoying opportunities, not being overwhelmed by them. Doing so might even lead you to challenge the title of this text: is everything an argument?

That’s what makes writing arguments exciting.

R E S P O N D. Take a look at the bumper sticker below, and then analyze it. What is its purpose? What kind of argument is it? Which of the stasis questions does it most appropriately respond to? To what audiences does it appeal? What appeals does it make and how?

Ronald Reagan at the Berlin Wall, June 12, 1987: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!“ © Dennis Brack/ PhotoShot

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C H A P T E R 1 EVERYTHING IS AN ARGUMENT 27

CULTURAL CONTEXTS FOR ARGUMENT

Considering What’s “Normal”

If you want to communicate effectively with people across cultures, then learn about the traditions in those cultures and examine the norms guiding your own behavior:

as “normal” or “right.” Such assumptions guide our judgments about what works in persuasive situations. But just because it may seem natural to speak bluntly in arguments, consider that others may find such aggression startling or even alarming.

- tion to how people from groups or cultures other than your own argue, and be sensitive to different paths of thinking you’ll encoun- ter as well as to differences in language.

principles, or political assumptions. People across the world have different ways of defining family, work, or happiness. As you present arguments to them, consider that they may be content with their different ways of organizing their lives and societies.

within a given group. Don’t expect that every member of a community behaves — or argues — in the same way or shares the same beliefs. Avoid think- ing, for instance, that there is a single Asian, African, or Hispanic culture or that Europeans are any less diverse or more predictable than Americans or Canadians in their thinking. In other words, be skeptical of stereotypes.

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Emotional appeals (appeals to pathos) are powerful tools for influencing what people think and believe. We all make decisions — even including the most important ones — based on our feelings. That’s what the Food and Drug Administration hoped to capitalize on when it introduced nine tough warning labels for cigarettes, one of which you see above. One look at the stained, rotting teeth and the lip sore may arouse emotions of fear strong enough to convince people not to smoke.

In the second panel, Bob Dorigo Jones, an opponent of lawsuit abuse, takes concerns about product liability in a different direction, publishing a book entitled Remove Child before Folding: The 101 Stupidest, Silliest, and Wackiest Warning Labels Ever to make us laugh and thereby, perhaps, to wonder why common sense seems in such short supply. In the third panel, editorial cartoonist for the Indianapolis Star Gary Varvel uses the anti-smoking meme to point out a potent irony in burgeoning cam- paigns to legalize marijuana.

Arguments Based on Emotion: Pathos

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The arguments packed into these three images all appeal to emotion, and research has shown us that we often make decisions based on just such appeals. So when you hear that formal or academic arguments should rely solely on facts to convince us, remember that facts alone often won’t carry the day, even for a worthy cause. The largely successful case made this decade for same-sex marriage provides a notable example of a movement that persuaded people equally by virtue of the reasonableness and the passion of its claims. Like many political and social debates, though, the issue provoked powerful emotions on every side — feelings that sometimes led to extreme words and tactics.

Of course, we don’t have to look hard for arguments fueled with emo- tions such as hatred, envy, and greed, or for campaigns intended to drive wedges between economic or social groups, making them fearful or resentful. For that reason alone, writers should not use emotional appeals rashly or casually. (For more about emotional fallacies, see p. 72.)

Reading Critically for Pathos

On February 24, 2014, Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa, fresh from two “fact- finding” trips to Cuba, described his experiences on the Senate floor in a rambling, forty-minute speech, praising that island nation’s accomplish- ments in health care and education and urging a normalization of Cuban–American relationships. Later that day, Florida senator Marco Rubio, expecting to speak about growing repression in Venezuela, found it impossible to ignore Harkin’s rosy view of the “fascinating” socialist experiment ninety miles from the coast of the United States. Seizing a kairotic moment, the first-term senator delivered a passionate fifteen- minute rejoinder to Harkin without a script or teleprompter — though Rubio did use posters prepared originally for the Venezuelan talk. After a sarcastic taunt (“Sounded like he had a wonderful trip visiting what he described as a real paradise”), Rubio quickly turned serious, even angry, as he offered his take on the country Harkin had toured:

I heard him also talk about these great doctors that they have in Cuba. I have no doubt they’re very talented. I’ve met a bunch of them. You know where I met them? In the United States because they defected. Because in Cuba, doctors would rather drive a taxi cab or work in a hotel than be a doctor. I wonder if they spoke to him about the out- break of cholera that they’ve been unable to control, or about the

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READING AND UNDERSTANDING ARGUMENTS30

three-tiered system of health care that exists where foreigners and government officials get health care much better than that that’s avail- able to the general population.

The speech thereafter settles into a rhythm of patterned inquiries designed to raise doubts about what Senator Harkin had seen, Rubio’s informal language rippling with contempt for his colleague’s naïveté:

I heard about their [the Cubans’] wonderful literacy rate, how every- one in Cuba knows how to read. That’s fantastic. Here’s the problem: they can only read censored stuff. They’re not allowed access to the Internet. The only newspapers they’re allowed to read are Granma or the ones produced by the government. . . .

He talked about these great baseball players that are coming from Cuba — and they are. But I wonder if they informed him [that] every single one of those guys playing in the Major Leagues defected. They left Cuba to play here. . . .

So it’s great to have literacy, but if you don’t have access to the information, what’s the point of it? So I wish somebody would have asked about that on that trip. . . .

I wonder if anybody asked about terrorism, because Cuba is a state sponsor of terrorism. . . .

Language this heated and pointed has risks, especially when a young legislator is taking on a genial and far more experienced colleague. But Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, isn’t shy about allowing his feelings to show. Segueing to his original topic — growing political repression in socialist Venezuela — he uses the kind of verbal repetition common in oratory to drive home his major concern about Cuba, its influence on other nations:

Let me tell you what the Cubans are really good at, because they don’t know how to run their economy, they don’t know how to build, they don’t know how to govern a people. What they are really good at is repression. What they are really good at is shutting off information to the Internet and to radio and television and social media. That’s what they’re really good at. And they’re not just good at it domestically, they’re good exporters of these things.

Rubio’s actual audience in the U.S. Senate was very small, but today all speeches from that chamber are carried nationwide and archived by C-SPAN, and in the age of YouTube, bits and pieces of political addresses reach many listeners. Former speechwriter and Wall Street Journal colum- nist Peggy Noonan was among those who caught Rubio’s remarks and

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blogged about them: “We have pressed in these parts for American politi- cal figures to speak clearly and with moral confidence about American sympathies in various international disputes. Rubio’s speech is honest political indignation successfully deployed.” You can watch the entire speech on C-SPAN’s Web site (listed as “Rubio Speech on Venezuela”) to see if you agree. And though Cuba and the United States did re-establish diplo- matic relationships roughly ten months after the Harkin/Rubio exchange, issues raised by both senators — from health care to the immigration status of Cuban baseball players — will likely be argued for years to come.

R E S P O N D. Working with a classmate, make a list of reasons why speakers in highly charged situations might need to use emotional appeals cautiously, even sparingly. What consequences might heightened emotional appeals lead to? What is at stake for the speaker in such situations, in terms of credibil- ity and ethos? What are the advantages of evoking emotions in support of your claims or ideas?

Using Emotions to Build Bridges

You may sometimes want to use emotions to connect with readers to assure them that you understand their experiences or “feel their pain,” to borrow a sentiment popularized by President Bill Clinton. Such a bridge is especially important when you’re writing about matters that readers regard as sensitive. Before they’ll trust you, they’ll want

As originally aired on C-SPAN2 on February 24 2014

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assurances that you understand the issues in depth. If you strike the right emotional note, you’ll establish an important connection. That’s what Apple founder Steve Jobs does in a much-admired 2005 commence- ment address in which he tells the audience that he doesn’t have a fancy speech, just three stories from his life:

My second story is about love and loss. I was lucky. I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz [Steve Wozniak] and I started Apple in my par- ents’ garage when I was twenty. We worked hard and in ten years, Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over four thousand employees. We’d just released our finest creation, the Macintosh, a year earlier, and I’d just turned thirty, and then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew, we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so, things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge, and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our board of directors sided with him, and so at thirty, I was out, and very publicly out. . . .

I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heavi- ness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods in my life. During the next five years I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the world’s first computer-animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world.

— Steve Jobs, “You’ve Got to Find What You Love, Jobs Says”

In no obvious way is Jobs’s recollection a formal argument. But it prepares his audience to accept the advice he’ll give later in his speech, at least partly because he’s speaking from meaningful personal experiences.

A more obvious way to build an emotional tie is simply to help read- ers identify with your experiences. If, like Georgina Kleege, you were blind and wanted to argue for more sensible attitudes toward blind people, you might ask readers in the first paragraph of your argument to confront their prejudices. Here Kleege, a writer and college instructor, makes an emotional point by telling a story:

I tell the class, “I am legally blind.” There is a pause, a collective intake of breath. I feel them look away uncertainly and then look back. After all, I just said I couldn’t see. Or did I? I had managed to get there on my own — no cane, no dog, none of the usual trappings of blindness.

The excerpt from Shabana Mir’s

book Muslim American Women on

Campus opens with comments that

unify the undergraduate experience.

LINK TO P. 702

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C H A P T E R 2 ARGUMENTS BASED ON EMOTION: PATHOS 33

Eyeing me askance now, they might detect that my gaze is not quite focused. . . . They watch me glance down, or towards the door where someone’s coming in late. I’m just like anyone else.

— Georgina Kleege, “Call It Blindness”

Given the way she narrates the first day of class, readers are as likely to identify with the students as with Kleege, imagining themselves sitting in a classroom, facing a sightless instructor, confronting their own preju- dices about the blind. Kleege wants to put her audience on the edge emotionally.

Let’s consider another rhetorical situation: how do you win over an audience when the logical claims that you’re making are likely to go against what many in the audience believe? Once again, a slightly risky appeal to emotions on a personal level may work. That’s the tack that Michael Pollan takes in bringing readers to consider that “the great moral struggle of our time will be for the rights of animals.” In introduc- ing his lengthy exploratory argument, Pollan uses personal experience to appeal to his audience:

The first time I opened Peter Singer’s Animal Liberation, I was dining alone at the Palm, trying to enjoy a rib-eye steak cooked medium-rare.

A visual version of Michael Pollan’s rhetorical situation. © Robert Mankoff/The New Yorker Collection/The Cartoon Bank

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If this sounds like a good recipe for cognitive dissonance (if not indi- gestion), that was sort of the idea. Preposterous as it might seem to supporters of animal rights, what I was doing was tantamount to reading Uncle Tom’s Cabin on a plantation in the Deep South in 1852.

— Michael Pollan, “An Animal’s Place”

In creating a vivid image of his first encounter with Singer’s book, Pollan’s opening builds a bridge between himself as a person trying to enter into the animal rights debate in a fair and open-minded, if still skeptical, way and readers who might be passionate about either side of this argument.

Using Emotions to Sustain an Argument

You can also use emotional appeals to make logical claims stronger or more memorable. That is the way that photographs and other images add power to arguments. In a TV attack ad, the scowling cell phone video of a disheveled political opponent may do as much damage as the insin- uation that he bought his home on the cheap from a financier convicted of fraud. In contrast, a human face smiling or showing honest emotion can sell just about any product — that’s why indicted political figures now routinely smile for their mug shots. Using emotion is tricky, how- ever. Lay on too much feeling — especially sentiments like outrage, pity, or shame, which make people uncomfortable — and you may offend the very audiences you hoped to convince.

Still, strong emotions can add energy to a passage or an entire argu- ment, as they do when Walter Russell Mead, editor-at-large of the Ameri- can Interest, argues about what really motivates Americans to donate lavishly to many colleges and universities. As you read the following excerpt, notice how the author paints vivid pictures of people at college sporting events, describes the emotions at those games, and then argues what schools really need to do to win contributions:

But if you want to understand why so many generations of Americans have sent so much dough back to the campuses where they wasted some of the happiest years of their lives, watch the intensity of the tens of thousands of fans who attend these events. Look at the shirt- less boys with faces and torsos painted in the school colors; look at the cheerleaders on the fields, the “waves” surging through the stands.

American universities, those temples of reason (at their best), are tribes. The kids bond to each other and to their schools in the heat of

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the intense emotions that these contests generate. Those shirtless kids covered in paint, shivering in the November weather as they cheer their team on, will be prosperous, middle-aged alumni one day — and when they are, they will still be stirred by the memory of the emotions and the loyalty that brought them out to the field.

If you want your alumni to give, you first have to make them fall in love with your school. This is not about having better chemistry pro- grams or more faculty with higher name recognition than the school up the road. It is not about scoring higher on world indices of univer- sity quality. It is about competition, drama, intensity, about hope and fear, collective celebrations or collective disasters, seared into young and impressionable hearts where they will never be forgotten — and where they will be annually renewed as each sport in its season pro- duces new highs and lows, new hopes and fears. Alumni watching their schools’ games on TV, or celebrating or mourning their schools’ results each week with friends, family and colleagues, are renewing their ties with their alma maters affirming that being an “Aggie” or a “Tar Heel” is an identity, not a line on the resume.

This is why most of them give. It is irrational and tribal love. It is intense emotion, not a vague sense of obligation or philanthropy. They want to beat State.

— Walter Russell Mead and The American Interest staff, “It All Begins with Football”

Mead’s claim, emotional in itself, may not be exactly what college and university administrators and faculty want to hear. But in using language this evocative, he makes his argument memorable, hoping perhaps to make general readers admit how they have felt and acted themselves.

Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images

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It’s difficult to gauge how much emotion will work in a given argu- ment. Some issues — such as racism, immigration, abortion, and gun control — provoke strong feelings and, as a result, are often argued on emotional terms. But even issues that seem deadly dull — such as reform of federal student loan programs — can be argued passionately when pro- posed changes in these programs are set in human terms: reduce support for college loans and Kai, Riley, and Jayden end up in dead-end, low-paying jobs; don’t reform the program and we’re looking at another Wall Street– sized loan bailout and subsequent recession. Both alternatives might scare people into paying enough attention to take political action.

Using Humor

Humor has always played an important role in argument, sometimes as the sugar that makes the medicine go down. You can slip humor into an argument to put readers at ease, thereby making them more open to a proposal you have to offer. It’s hard to say no when you’re laughing. Humor also makes otherwise sober people suspend their judgment and even their prejudices, perhaps because the surprise and naughtiness of wit are combustive: they provoke laughter or smiles, not reflection. Who can resist a no-holds-barred attack on a famous personality, such as this assessment of Twilight star Kristen Stewart:

The original scoffing, scowling, stammering, stuttering, gaping open mouth, temper-tantrum throwing, lip-biting, hair-flipping, plank of wood moody actress . . . A tape recorder in a mannequin could do her job.

Humor deployed cleverly may be why TV shows like South Park and Modern Family became popular with mainstream audiences, despite their willingness to explore controversial themes. Similarly, it’s possible to make a point through humor that might not work in more sober writing. People argue endlessly about eating the right foods, typically defined by diet gurus who favor locally sourced, organically grown, and profoundly dull vegetables. Wall Street Journal columnist Ron Rosenbaum will have none of that. With new research suggesting that fatty diets may have unanticipated health benefits, Rosenbaum deploys some high-calorie humor to argue for the pleasures of dining lavishly:

Preventing obesity is a laudable goal, but it has become the rationale for indiscriminate fat hunters. It can shade into a kind of bullying of

Cartoonists Nick Anderson, Alfredo

Martirena, and Larry Lambert make

pointed arguments, even as they

make audiences laugh.

LINK TO P. 751

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the overweight, a badgering of anyone who likes butter or heavy cream. To the antifat crusaders, I say: Attack fatty junk food all you want. I’m with you. But you can deny me my roasted marrow bones when you pry them from my cold, dead hands.

I’m not suggesting that we embrace these life-changing food expe- riences just on grounds of pure pleasure (though there’s much to be said for pure pleasure). As it turns out, the science on the matter is changing as well. We are discovering that fatty delights can actually be good for you: They allow Spaniards, Italians and Greeks to live lon- ger, and they make us satisfied with eating less. I’m speaking up not for obesity-generating fat, then, but for the kind of fatty food that leads to swooning sensual satiety.

Roast goose, for instance, is a supremely succulent, mind-alteringly flavorful fatty food. In most of America, roast goose would be viewed as the raven of cardiac mortality, hoarsely honking “never more.” And listening to the doctors on cable TV, you might think that it’s better to cook up a batch of meth than to cook with butter.

Eating fatty foods has become the culinary version of Breaking Bad: a dangerous walk on the wild side for the otherwise timid consumers of tasteless butter substitutes and Lean Cuisine.

— Ron Rosenbaum, “Let Them Eat Fat”

Our laughter testifies to what some people have thought all along: people who want us to eat tofu are the real problem. Note the pleasure Rosenbaum takes in the emotive power of words themselves: swooning sensual satiety; the raven of cardiac mortality, hoarsely honking “never more.”

A writer or speaker can even use humor to deal with sensitive issues. For example, sports commentator Bob Costas, given the honor of eulo- gizing the great baseball player Mickey Mantle, couldn’t ignore problems in Mantle’s life. So he argues for Mantle’s greatness by admitting the man’s weaknesses indirectly through humor:

It brings to mind a story Mickey liked to tell on himself and maybe some of you have heard it. He pictured himself at the pearly gates, met by St. Peter, who shook his head and said, “Mick, we checked the record. We know some of what went on. Sorry, we can’t let you in. But before you go, God wants to know if you’d sign these six dozen baseballs.”

— Bob Costas, “Eulogy for Mickey Mantle”

Similarly, politicians may use humor to deal with issues they couldn’t acknowledge in any other way. Here, for example, is former president

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George W. Bush at the 2004 Radio and TV Correspondents’ Dinner dis- cussing his much-mocked intellect:

Those stories about my intellectual capacity do get under my skin. You know, for a while I even thought my staff believed it. There on my schedule first thing every morning it said, “Intelligence briefing.”

— George W. Bush

Not all humor is well-intentioned or barb-free. In fact, among the most powerful forms of emotional argument is ridicule — humor aimed at a particular target. Eighteenth-century poet and critic Samuel Johnson was known for his stinging and humorous put-downs, such as this comment to an aspiring writer: “Your manuscript is both good and original, but the part that is good is not original and the part that is original is not good.” (Expect your own writing teachers to be kinder.) In our own time, the Onion has earned a reputation for its mastery of both ridicule and satire, the art of using over-the-top humor to making a serious point.

But because ridicule is a double-edged sword, it requires a deft hand to wield it. Humor that reflects bad taste discredits a writer completely, as does satire that misses its mark. Unless your target deserves riposte and you can be very funny, it’s usually better to steer clear of such humor.

Using Arguments Based on Emotion

You don’t want to play puppet master with people’s emotions when you write arguments, but it’s a good idea to spend some time early in your work thinking about how you want readers to feel as they consider your persuasive claims. For example, would readers of your editorial about campus traffic policies be more inclined to agree with you if you made them envy faculty privileges, or would arousing their sense of fairness work better? What emotional appeals might persuade meat eaters to consider a vegan diet — or vice versa? Would sketches of stage props on a Web site persuade people to buy a season ticket to the theater, or would you spark more interest by featuring pictures of costumed performers?

Consider, too, the effect that a story can have on readers. Writers and journalists routinely use what are called human-interest stories to give presence to issues or arguments. You can do the same, using a particular

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C H A P T E R 2 ARGUMENTS BASED ON EMOTION: PATHOS 39

incident to evoke sympathy, understanding, outrage, or amusement. Take care, though, to tell an honest story.

R E S P O N D. 1. To what specific emotions do the following slogans, sales pitches, and

maxims appeal?

“Just do it.” (ad for Nike)

“Think different.” (ad for Apple computers)

“Reach out and touch someone.” (ad for AT&T)

“By any means necessary.” (rallying cry from Malcolm X)

“Have it your way.” (slogan for Burger King)

“The ultimate driving machine.” (slogan for BMW)

“It’s everywhere you want to be.” (slogan for Visa)

“Know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing!” (tag line for Calvin Klein jeans)

“Don’t mess with Texas!” (anti-litter campaign slogan)

“American by Birth. Rebel by Choice.” (slogan for Harley-Davidson)

2. Bring a magazine to class, and analyze the emotional appeals in as many full-page ads as you can. Then classify those ads by types of emo- tional appeal, and see whether you can connect the appeals to the sub- ject or target audience of the magazine. Compare your results with those of your classmates, and discuss your findings. For instance, how exactly are the ads in publications such as Cosmopolitan, Wired, Sports Illustrated, Motor Trend, and Smithsonian adapted to their specific audiences?

3. How do arguments based on emotion work in different media? Are such arguments more or less effective in books, articles, television (both news and entertainment shows), films, brochures, magazines, email, Web sites, the theater, street protests, and so on? You might explore how a single medium handles emotional appeals or compare different media. For example, why do the comments pages of blogs seem to encourage angry outbursts? Are newspapers an emotionally colder source of information than television news programs? If so, why?

4. Spend some time looking for arguments that use ridicule or humor to make their point: check out your favorite Twitter feeds or blogs; watch for bumper stickers, posters, or advertisements; and listen to popular song lyrics. Bring one or two examples to class, and be ready to explain how the humor makes an emotional appeal and whether it’s effective.

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Whenever you read anything — whether it’s a news article, an advertise- ment, a speech, or a text message — you no doubt subconsciously ana- lyze the message for a sense of the character and credibility of the sender: Is this someone I know and trust? Does the PBS reporter seem biased? Why should I believe an IRS official? Is this scholar really an authority on the subject? Our culture teaches us to be skeptical of most messages, espe- cially those that bombard us with slogans, and such reasonable doubt is a crucial skill in reading and evaluating arguments.

For that reason, people and institutions that hope to influence us do everything they can to establish their character and credibility, what ancient rhetors referred to as ethos. And sometimes slogans such as “All the News That’s Fit to Print,” “Fair & Balanced,” or “Lean Forward” can be effective. At the very least, if a phrase is repeated often enough, it begins to sound plausible. Maybe CNN is the most trusted name in news!

But establishing character usually takes more than repetition, as marketers of all kinds know. It arises from credentials actually earned in

Arguments Based on Character: Ethos

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C H A P T E R 3 ARGUMENTS BASED ON CHARACTER: ETHOS 41

some way. In the auto industry, for instance, companies such as Toyota, General Motors, and Nissan are hustling to present themselves as envi- ronmentally responsible producers of fuel-efficient, low-emission cars — the Prius, Volt, and Leaf. BMW, maker of “the ultimate driving machine,” points to its fuel-sipping i3 and i8 cars as evidence of its com- mitment to “sustainable mobility.” And Elon Musk (who builds rockets as well as Tesla cars) polishes his good-citizenship bona fides by sharing his electric vehicle patents with other manufacturers. All of these com- panies realize that their future success is linked to an ability to project a convincing ethos for themselves and their products.

If corporations and institutions can establish an ethos, consider how much character matters when we think about people in the public arena. Perhaps no individual managed a more exceptional assertion of per- sonal ethos than Jorge Mario Bergoglio did after he became Pope Francis on March 13, 2013, following the abdication of Benedict XVI — a man many found scholarly, cold, and out of touch with the modern world. James Carroll, writing for the New Yorker, identifies the precise moment when the world realized that it was dealing with a new sort of pope:

“Who am I to judge?” With those five words, spoken in late July [2013] in reply to a reporter’s question about the status of gay priests in the Church, Pope Francis stepped away from the disapproving tone, the explicit moralizing typical of popes and bishops.

— James Carroll, “Who Am I to Judge?”

Carroll goes on to explain that Francis quickly established his ethos with a series of specific actions, decisions, and moments of identification with ordinary people, marking him as someone even nonbelievers might listen to and respect:

As pope, Francis has simplified the Renaissance regalia of the papacy by abandoning fur-trimmed velvet capes, choosing to live in a two- room apartment instead of the Apostolic Palace, and replacing the papal Mercedes with a Ford Focus. Instead of the traditional red slip- ons, Francis wears ordinary black shoes. . . . Yet Francis didn’t criticize the choices of other prelates. “He makes changes without attacking people,” a Jesuit official told me. In his interview with La Civiltà Cat- tolica, Francis said, “My choices, including those related to the day-to- day aspects of life, like the use of a modest car, are related to a spiritual discernment that responds to a need that arises from looking at things, at people, and from reading the signs of the times.”

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READING AND UNDERSTANDING ARGUMENTS42

In that last sentence, Francis acknowledges that ethos is gained, in part, through identification with one’s audience and era. And this man, mov- ingly photographed embracing the sick and disfigured, also posed for selfies!

You can see, then, why Aristotle treats ethos as a powerful argumen- tative appeal. Ethos creates quick and sometimes almost irresistible connections between readers and arguments. We observe people, groups, or institutions making and defending claims all the time and inevitably ask ourselves, Should we pay attention to them? Can we rely on them? Do we dare to trust them? Consider, though, that the same questions will be asked about you and your work, especially in academic settings.

Thinking Critically about Arguments Based on Character

Put simply, arguments based on character (ethos) depend on trust. We tend to accept arguments from those we trust, and we trust them (whether individuals, groups, or institutions) in good part because of their reputations. Three main elements — credibility, authority, and unselfish or clear motives — add up to ethos.

To answer serious and important questions, we often turn to profes- sionals (doctors, lawyers, engineers, teachers, pastors) or to experts (those with knowledge and experience) for good advice. Based on their backgrounds, such people come with their ethos already established.

AP Photo/L’Osservatore Romano, Riccardo Aguiari

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C H A P T E R 3 ARGUMENTS BASED ON CHARACTER: ETHOS 43

Thus, appeals or arguments about character often turn on claims like these:

● A person (or group or institution) is or is not trustworthy or credible on this issue.

● A person (or group or institution) does or does not have the authority to speak to this issue.

● A person (or group or institution) does or does not have unselfish or clear motives for addressing this subject.

Establishing Trustworthiness and Credibility

Trustworthiness and credibility speak to a writer’s honesty, respect for an audience and its values, and plain old likability. Sometimes a sense of humor can play an important role in getting an audience to lis- ten to or “like” you. It’s no accident that all but the most serious speeches begin with a joke or funny story: the humor puts listeners at ease and helps them identify with the speaker. Writer J. K. Rowling, for example, puts her audience (and herself ) at ease early in the commencement address she delivered at Harvard in 2008 by getting real about such speeches:

Delivering a commencement address is a great responsibility; or so I thought until I cast my mind back to my own graduation. The com- mencement speaker that day was the distinguished British philoso- pher Baroness Mary Warnock. Reflecting on her speech has helped me enormously in writing this one, because it turns out that I can’t remember a single word she said. This liberating discovery enables me to proceed without any fear that I might inadvertently influence you to abandon promising careers in business, the law, or politics for the giddy delights of becoming a gay wizard.

You see? If all you remember in years to come is the “gay wizard” joke, I’ve come out ahead of Baroness Mary Warnock. Achievable goals: the first step to self improvement.

— J. K. Rowling, “The Fringe Benefits of Failure, and the Importance of Imagination”

In just a few sentences, Rowling pokes fun at herself, undercuts the expectation that graduation addresses change people’s lives, slides in an allusion from her Harry Potter series, and then even offers a smidgen of advice. For an audience well disposed toward her already, Rowling has likely lived up to expectations.

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READING AND UNDERSTANDING ARGUMENTS44

But using humor to enhance your credibility may be more common in oratory than in the kind of writing you’ll do in school. Fortunately, you have many options, one being simply to make plausible claims and then back them up with evidence. Academic audiences appreciate a reason- able disposition; we will discuss this approach at greater length in the next chapter.

You can also establish trustworthiness by connecting your own beliefs to core principles that are well established and widely respected. This strategy is particularly effective when your position seems to be — at first glance, at least — a threat to traditional values. For example, when former Smith College president Ruth J. Simmons describes her professional self to a commencement audience she is addressing (see Chapter 1), she presents her acquired reputation in terms that align per- fectly with contemporary values:

For my part, I was cast as a troublemaker in my early career and accepted the disapproval that accompanies the expression of unpopu- lar views: unpopular views about disparate pay for women and minor- ities; unpopular views about sexual harassment; unpopular views about exclusionary practices in our universities.

— Ruth J. Simmons

It’s fine to be a rebel when you are on the right side of history. Writers who establish their credibility seem trustworthy. But some-

times, to be credible, you have to admit limitations, too, as New York Times columnist David Brooks does as he wrestles with a problem com- mon in our time, an inability to focus on things that matter:

Like everyone else, I am losing the attention war. I toggle over to my emails when I should be working. I text when I should be paying attention to the people in front of me. I spend hours looking at mildly diverting stuff on YouTube. (“Look, there’s a bunch of guys who can play ‘Billie Jean’ on beer bottles!”)

And, like everyone else, I’ve nodded along with the prohibition ser- mons imploring me to limit my information diet. Stop multitasking! Turn off the devices at least once a week!

And, like everyone else, these sermons have had no effect. Many of us lead lives of distraction, unable to focus on what we know we should focus on.

— David Brooks, “The Art of Focus”

Making such concessions to readers sends a strong signal that you’ve looked critically at your own position and can therefore be trusted when

In “Attention Whole Foods

Shoppers,” Robert Paarlberg

cites research from respected

organizations to support his stance

on what makes food sustainable.

LINK TO P. 610

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C H A P T E R 3 ARGUMENTS BASED ON CHARACTER: ETHOS 45

you turn to arguing its merits. Speaking to readers directly, using I or you or us, can also help you connect with them, as can using contractions and everyday or colloquial language — both strategies employed by Brooks. In other situations, you may find that a more formal tone gives your claims greater credibility. You’ll be making such choices as you search for the ethos that represents you best.

In fact, whenever you write a paper or present an idea, you are send- ing signals about your credibility, whether you intend to or not. If your ideas are reasonable, your sources are reliable, and your language is appropriate to the project, you suggest to academic readers that you’re someone whose ideas might deserve attention. Details matter: helpful graphs, tables, charts, or illustrations may carry weight with readers, as will the visual attractiveness of your text, whether in print or digital form. Obviously, correct spelling, grammar, and mechanics are impor- tant too. And though you might not worry about it now, at some point you may need letters of recommendation from instructors or supervi- sors. How will they remember you? Often chiefly from the ethos you have established in your work. Think about that.

Claiming Authority

When you read or listen to an argument, you have every right to ask about the writer’s authority: What does he know about the subject? What experiences does she have that make her especially knowledgeable? Why should I pay attention to this person? When you offer an argument yourself, you have to anticipate and be prepared to answer questions like these, either directly or indirectly.

How does someone construct an authoritative ethos? In examining what he describes as “the fundamental problem with President Obama’s communications ethos,” Ron Fournier, editorial director of National Jour- nal, explains that authority cannot be taken for granted:

He and his advisers are so certain about their moral and political standing that they believe it’s enough to make a declaration. If we say it, the public should believe it.

That’s not how it works. A president must earn the public’s trust. He must teach and persuade; speak clearly, and follow word with action; show empathy toward his rivals, and acknowledge the merits of a critique. A successful president pays careful attention to how his image is projected both to U.S. voters and to the people of the world.

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READING AND UNDERSTANDING ARGUMENTS46

He knows that to be strong, a leader must look strong. Image matters, especially in an era so dominated by them.

— Ron Fournier, “Is the White House Lying, or Just Bad at Crisis Communications?”

Of course, writers establish their authority in various ways. Sometimes the assertion of ethos will be bold and personal, as it is when writer and activist Terry Tempest Williams attacks those who poisoned the Utah des- erts with nuclear radiation. What gives her the right to speak on this sub- ject? Not scientific expertise, but gut-wrenching personal experience:

I belong to the Clan of One-Breasted Women. My mother, my grand- mothers, and six aunts have all had mastectomies. Seven are dead. The two who survive have just completed rounds of chemotherapy and radiation.

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