Zach Wahls is privileged. He is straight, white, and male, who also happens to have a great home life, and not one, but two moms. “My Two Moms” is a true story about a man, Zach, who was raised by two women. It specifically focuses on how his personal identity isn’t impacted by his parents’ sexual orientation. He also emphasizes how normal he is despite having two moms. Zach accomplishes to argue his view by utilizing the persuasion strategies of pathos and ethos: by showing how relatable his family is through personal stories of triumph and tragedy. However, Zach rarely used logos to help persuade the audience to see his perspective on why gay marriage and families resulting from gay marriage should be viewed as normal. Why is this? Although Zach barely used logos to persuade the audience, he is able to prove his point with pathos and …show more content…
From the first chapter, Zach made a wise choice in declaring himself as a reliable speaker on the topics of gay marriage. The story starts with him preparing and ultimately delivering his speech to the Iowa Legislature on marriage equality: “Good evening, Mr. Chairman. My name is Zach Wahls. I’m a sixth-generation Iowan and an engineering student at the University of Iowa, and I was raised by two women. “(p. 7). Choosing to display the use of ethos so early on in the story proves to be a successful tactic on Zach’s part. He is able to simultaneously erase any of the reader’s doubts involving him not being the best choice for speaking about marriage equality while giving reassurance to the audience that he is the right person to talk about this topic. Ethos only played a small, yet powerful role in Zach’s argument. Majority of the books focuses on Zach persuading through the use of pathos. This is done in two ways: by relatable and personal experiences. The latter is crucial, not only to prove his argument, but also used as a way to show that even an unconventional family structure can be
This, paired with most of her argument being built upon options rather than facts diminishes the validity of her argument. Had Worthen addressed the issues that may appear as a counter to note taking or provided evidence that doesn’t rely on strictly options from a few hand picked professors, her article would have done a stellar job in creating awareness of the lecturing loosing its credibility. Worthen could 've easily found statistics to back up her argument concerning lecturing and if that wasn’t possible, a survey could’ve been just as good. Understandingly, the options do address the ethos and pathos of a persuasive essay but the logos is also significant part. One may be on the fence due to its absence when dealing with an
Growing up as a happy and popular young man, Zack creates himself a perfect reputation which left room for love and smothering from his mother and two sisters. His mother and sisters love him very much and show this love by being at his every beckoning. Winifred is no exception; the love for Zack is shown by the extraction, “How be you wash my bike for me, Pose, Love?” I would be halfway to the kitchen for bucket and rags before he stopped speaking. [And] I was Zachary’s willing slave. Slavery in fact, was a vogue in our house.”(Wilson,101). Zack from a very young age is overwhelmed with love and good deeds sent in his direction. He takes advantage of these kind gestures and never really appreciates what was being done for him. This lack of appreciation and constant smothering is noticed by his father at later stages in the story and creates a level of confliction between them throughout the story. His father makes the mistake of not saying anything about his disagreement with the way Zack is treated and allows the conflict to continue. “Even Dad took a long time to wake up. You wouldn’t think a fourteen – or sixteen-year-old-boy could hoodwink a father… [And] Dad would just leave the room and go out to his work shed and sit and rock and rock in that old chair of his.” (Wilson,103). His father new there was a problem but did not act on it until the situation reached its climax which resulted in Zack leaving home. The problem is allowed to escalate at the time. The father does not play as big of a role in Zack’s life. Due to mothers love for Zack she allows him to get away with a lot of things that most mothers would not. One day she baked a cake for the church bazaar and left a sign warning nobody to eat it. She came home to find a slice gone and realised it was Zack that took the slice.
A short speech from a politician during the Civil Rights era is “For the Equal Rights Amendment”, delivered by Shirley Chisholm. In this speech, Chisholm uses ethos, pathos, and logos to argue her point of equal rights. An example of ethos that could be found in the speech is when Chisholm says “The Constitution they wrote was designed to protect the rights of white, male citizens. As there were no black Founding Fathers, there were no founding mothers -- a great pity, on both counts. It is not too late to complete the work they left undone. Today, here, we should start to do so.” This would serve as an example of ethos because Chisholm is showing creditably by mentioning why the Constitution was wrote. Additionally, she challenges what the
Although pathos has it’s spot in arguments and writing in general, logos, or logic, usually persuades older audiences better. Parents will have different values than kids do, and using logos is the best way to go to convince parents. She starts off by explaining her own experience with technology and how she thinks it has been the same experience for everyone. However, further on in the article to say that her thesis is wrong. “When I began my research, I expected to find hordes of teenagers who were escaping “real life” through the Internet.” Later on Boyd says, “To my surprise — and, as I grew older, relief — that differed from what most youth want.” Someone who always claims that they are one hundred percent right all the time is someone who probably is not right one hundred percent all the time. By calling herself out, she has proven that she is a much more reliable source than someone else who have studied family dynamics for ten years and have, somehow, always been
Effectively communicating an idea or opinion requires several language techniques. In his study of rhetoric, Aristotle found that persuasion was established through three fundamental tools. One is logos, which is used to support an argument through hard data and statistics. Another is ethos, which is the credibility of an author or speaker that allows an audience to conclude from background information and language selection a sense of knowledge and expertise of the person presenting the argument. The impact of pathos, however, is the most effective tool in persuasion due to the link between emotions and decisions. Although each of these tools can be effective individually, a combination of rhetorical devices when used appropriately has the ability to sway an audience toward the writer’s point of view.
bell hooks ties in the three elements of argument, ethos, pathos, and logos in her essay, "Keeping Close to Home: Class and Education," by telling us about the many events of her life. hooks establishes credibility, or ethos, unintentionally, through descriptions of her achievements and character. hooks appeals to the readers logic, or logos, by giving real world examples from her personal experiences. She also appeals to the readers emotions, or pathos. Pathos is the aspect of argument she uses most heavily. hooks does this by talking about family, peers, feelings, and change. hooks shows us ,in her essay, credibility, logic, and emotion using the stories of her life.
In Shakespeare’s play, The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, pathos, logos and ethos are evidently and effectively used to persuade the audience into believing Caesar was not ambitious and that he was an innocent man. Throughout the speech the citizens were easily persuaded, but Anthony’s intellectual speeches made the audience question and imagine what they have turned into. Anthony used these three rhetorical appeals to win back the citizens just like many people do today. The power of pathos, logos and ethos in a speech can change one mind in an instant and if successfully used can change a mind to be fully persuaded without confusion.
Ethos or the ethical appeal is based on the character, credibility, or reliability of the writer. There are many ways to establish good character and credibility as an author:
By appealing so much to pathos, his letter focuses more on emotionally convincing and persuading the reader to accept his claim, rather than providing facts and logic to his argument. His combined use of logos and ethos also adds an aspect of logic and reason to his argument, as well as further showing his credibility and connection to the subject as the author. His use of the three rhetorical devices helps to bolster and support his claim, while also personalizing and connecting with the
Lars Eighner uses the appeal of ethos the most prominently in his book to prove he is credible, followed by an appeal logos by applying logic and pathos using stories.
One example of Ethos is “I started out just a mom-fighting for the life of her child. But along the way I learned how unfair America can be today, not just for people who have HIV, but for many,many people-poor people, gay people, people of color, children.” She shows to the audience that she understands the struggles of the aforementioned groups, because she has HIV. She understands just how unfair America can be to people who don’t fit in. She knows that she doesn’t seem like the best representative for the group of people she mentioned, but she wants the audience at the DNC to know that she has their best interests at heart. Mrs. Glaser wants the DNC audience to join her in the fight against AIDS. Glaser also uses Pathos in her speech. “Exactly four years ago, my daughter died of AIDS. She did not survive the Reagan Administration. I am here because my son and I may not survive four more years of leaders who say they care, but do nothing.” In this appeal Mrs. Glaser is appealing to her audience’s emotions, especially the emotions one feels when talking about their family like love and empathy. She mentions that her daughter has died because of this disease and that her son and herself are dying as well to show that this is a disease that can affect anyone and that it is crucial to work on cures or vaccinations to prevent others from suffering the way her family has. No mother or father
If a statement attempts to persuade the audience by making a reasonable claim and offering proof in support of that claim. In my opinion, the best logos moment for Clinton is when she claim ¨ So you gotta ask yourself — why won 't he release his tax returns? And I think there may be a couple of reasons. First, maybe he is not as rich as he says he is. Second, maybe he 's not as charitable as he claims to be. Third, we don 't know all of his business dealings but we have been told through investigative reporting that he owes about $650 million dollars to Wall Street and foreign banks. Or maybe he does not want the American people, all of you watching tonight…¨ this was a useful tool to make people doubt about Trump honesty and integrity. Trump had a good logos argument with the Iran deal. ¨This is one of the worst deals ever made by any country in history. The deal with Iran will lead to nuclear problems. All they have to do is sit back 10 years and they don 't have to do much. And they 're going to end up getting nuclear.¨ both of the candidates have ups and downs in the debate. We can compare and contrast both of the candidates from the words they express, since being a president words
... even kill your black brothers and sister.. when your first name becomes nigger and your middle name becomes boy..”, are examples of ethos appeal because they was even used as a professional use or comparing to someone else to show what is right, or even to show other people pain that the blacks community goes through. There are even logos appeals, “ Is organized religion too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nations and the world?”, King states his opinion in a question to show an idea that should be considered, even if the reader does not agree with him, it also makes the reader question their own ideas or opinion on the topic.
Aristotle’s rhetorical triangle links three elements of arguing together: the speaker, the story, and the audience. The relationship between the elements determines the speaker’s argument and whether it will be successful in oratory or literature. Ethos, Logos and Pathos are each different aspects of the argument that must be balanced in order to succeed in persuading or convincing an audience. Ethos, or character, relates to the speaker’s credibility that the audience appeals to: it is useful when persuading a group of people to trust what you are saying or doing. Logos, or logic, is a way of convincing and appealing by reason, truth, and facts. Pathos relates to the audience’s emotions and their response to what the speaker is saying.
Aristotle believes that there are three important rhetoric devices used in the art of persuasion. These rhetoric appeals are most commonly known as pathos, ethos, and logos. Pathos is used for creating emotional appeals like anger or happiness to persuade the audience on a certain claim. Ethos, in arguments, creates a sense of trustworthiness between the author and audience to make an appeal credible. Logos uses strategies of logic like inductive and deductive reasoning to persuade viewers. In a 1995 Nike advertisement known as, “If you let me play,” pathos, logos, and ethos are rhetoric devices utilized to portray a better way of life for young girls that are involved in sports.