Thank you for smoking is a satirical comedy about a lobbyist whose job is to promote tobacco use at a time when the disease burden secondary to smoking threatens to cripple the nation. The film presents how industries, media and the government interact to influence the consumers’ decision. While the use of rhetoric, such as fallacies and twisted truths, is evident throughout the film, it is most evident midway when the chief spokesman, Nick Naylor, assists his son with his assignment. The son, Joey Naylor, enquires why the American government is the best and in response, the father argues it is because of America’s ‘endless appeals system’ (Thank you for smoking). His response seamlessly captures the tone of the movie as much as it represents the extensive use of a combination of fallacious arguments and twisted truths. This essay attempts to analyse the use of fallacies and twisted truths to appeal to the emotion of the Naylor says he does his job because every person has a mortgage to pay, aligning himself with hundreds of people who hold the same belief. His justification appeals particularly to homeowners who have to pay a mortgage because they understand why he needs to be a lobbyist regardless of the client he works for. That everyone must financially support himself or herself is a reason enough to appeal to the audience. The genetic fallacy accepts or discredits a claim based on the circumstances under which the claim originates. If the source is credible, the society takes the claim without questioning. In Thank you for Smoking, Nick Naylor uses this fallacy to sway the emotion of the audience. According to the film he is “the president of and chief spokesman for the Academy of tobacco Studies’, a position that sounds notable as it is professional. Based on Nick’s position the audience takes him as a credible source of information, making it easy for him to
Rationale This Further Oral Activity will be presented on a T.V. show format (based on the show “The Gruen Transfer”), with the host focusing on the false advertising of well-known health foods and drinks. This FOA will focus on the persuasive language and manipulative strategies used by businesses to influence and mislead consumers into believing false perceptions of their product, using case examples to support the evidence presented. The purpose of this FOA is to inform the audience on the plethora of manipulative and persuasive language used in advertising for ‘supposedly’ healthy products, while the target audience is Australian T.V. viewers 18-50 who are interested in the influence of advertising. The context of the piece is based on today’s world of marketing and how persuasive advertising strategies can influence Australian consumers.
American musician, Jerry Garcia, states, “Constantly choosing the lesser of two evils is still choosing evil.” This is essentially the underlying principle of comparing two kinds of harmful effects, as one can try outshine the other but will still be detrimental. In the article, “Tune Out, Light Up”, Dave Kopel is trying to persuade readers in the article that watching television is worse than smoking cigarettes. The article poses an overall unsuccessful argument, as it expresses the views thoroughly with certain support and tries to use various appeals but fails to suggest essential evidence and realistic views. This article is trying to show how smoking cigarettes is better than watching television, as it goes into numerous points of how television can destroy many more years off of lives than smoking, making it less preferable than cigarettes. Kopel uses the classical appeals of pathos,
Scientists and lobbyists share a primary purpose; they both serve to influence the status quo. Both Alfred Kinsey, a scientist, and Nick Naylor, a lobbyist, challenge the boundaries of their society. Whereas Kinsey stimulates the sexual aspect of his society, Naylor pokes at the value of ethics in a cigarette consuming society. The representation of argument is apparent in these films; Kinsey argues for a societal change in the awareness and education of human sexuality whereas Nick Naylor defends the cigarette industry as the Vice-President of the Academy of Tobacco Studies. In the film Thank You for Smoking and Kinsey, the rhetoric of argumentation is represented by two men that share allegiance to their work; however, the motive behind their work differs in galactic proportions.
Highlighting the theme of conflicting perspectives throughout Geoffrey Robertson's, 'The Trials Of Oz,' in particular his essays, The Romans in Britain and The Trials of Oz, is the bias nature of Geoffrey Robertson as he attempts to adopt his view of events, personalities and situations, to convince the reader on the validity of his argument. A perspective is a point of view, and a conflicting perspective is where two point of views clash. Similarly to this, is Jason Reitman's film'Thank You For Smoking' which is a satire of the perception of promoting smoking, but not to the level in which it is disregarded, as no character smokes on film.
Peter Brimelow’s article “Thank You for Smoking….?” is an essay that looks at a rather extreme perspective on smoking. Brimelow starts off by describing the many actions that are taken against the tobacco industry; he writes that in some states, the government is trying to make the tobacco industry pay certain health care costs. However, he then goes on to state that smoking may actually be good for one’s health. He uses various sources to show that smoking has positive effects on our bodies; he states the decrease in risk in numerous diseases. Brimelow uses medical journals to show that smoking decreases the risk of diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. He also talks about some of the ways smoking enhances certain skills, “A battery of studies show that cigarettes really do stimulate alertness, dexterity and cognitive capacity” (Brimelow 141). Brimelow does pick a tough subject to talk about, but for the most part he does a good job writing his article and distributing information to the reader to support argument.
Laird, Pamela, “Consuming Smoke: Cigarettes in American Culture.” University of Colorado at Denver. Author of Advertising Progress: American Business and the Rise of Consumer Marketing. 1998
Because you regularly smoke tobacco, which is one of the most avoidable risk factors for cancer, I wish to inform you of a research article that reveals progression toward understanding the mechanism by which tobacco smoke damages the genome, an organism’s complete set of DNA, and creates the mutations that ultimately cause cancer.
Thank you for smoking, it’s what big companies like Marlboro and Camel want to let us know, and keep smoking. Tobacco has been around for thousand of years, but today’s cigarettes contain many harmful and poisonous toxins. Yet, its simple: Tobacco smoking kills, reduces economic productivity, and strengthens poverty. But lets be frank, everyone’s aware of these issues already, everyone’s out to get cigarette companies; however, there’s a bigger problem. What happens when cigarette companies target today’s children?
This is a compare and contrast rhetorical analysis paper focusing on a print billboard advertisement and television commercial. The billboard advertisement is centered on a smoking death count, sponsored by several heart research associations. In addition, the television Super Bowl commercial illustrates how irresistible Doritos are, set in an ultrasound room with a couple and their unborn child. The following paragraphs will go in depth to interpret the pathos, logos, and ethos of both the billboard and the television advertisements.
There is little to no mention of any statistics that might show when, and thereby, why, cigarette smoking gained popularity. The author also fails to provide cultural context in many areas. Alleged masculine values in America are presented as fact, when there is no evidence, aside from the author’s word, that this is true. The arguments would be much stronger had the author successfully differentiated between correlation and causation. At times, the article is unbalanced, such as the argument surrounding post-World War Two advertising. Within the article, it is unproven that there was a spike in cigarette smoking in men. It was also unproven that the advertisements had an effect. The article ignores the possibility that the increase in smoking among men was merely a consequence of reaching a few opinion leaders. As cigarettes are such an addictive product, simple curiosity in the privacy of one’s home may have turned some men into smokers.
...to people who pick up the habit of Smoking. The audience range from young adult to Adults that can be influenced to smoke or pick up the habit. There are people losing limbs, having to spend their life in a wheel chair or use an artificial larynx in order to speak, basically losing their life or forced to live with it.
Although the Tobacco Industry recently paid enormous fines to the US Government and Individual states, they continue to promote smoking and influence young human beings world wide to use their products through multi dimensional advertising. For decades Americans were not told the truth about the dangers of smoking. The media stayed silent because it did not want to lose the hundreds of millions of dollars it made from cigarette advertising.
charged with covering up the addictive properties of nicotine and finding ways to exploit it to increase profits. For example, in Wigand’s interview for 60 Minutes, he says that tobacco companies view cigarettes only as a delivery device for nicotine. He also says they take advantage of the addictive properties by manipulating and adj...
Height, hair color, eye color and sex are just a few examples of ways our DNA has shaped us. But could it be possible that our DNA also effects the way we behave in society. It is possible that genetics effect us is more ways that we may have imagined. Dr. Peter B. Neubaur believes that shyness, eating disorders, obsessive behavior and psychological illness can all be traced back to our genetics. Sexual orientation is also believed to be derived from genes in our body which determine what sexual preference we prefer. Violence and other types of crimes can be linked back throughout a person’s lineage to witness that other family members have been committed similar crimes without ever meeting one and other.
“…..Nearly half the adult population regularly performs a bizarre act which is necessary neither for the maintenance of life nor for the satisfaction of social, sexual, cultural, or spiritual needs; an act which is acknowledged, even by its adherents, to be harmful to health and even distasteful” (Aston and Stepney 1982: VII). Regarding the above statement a vast majority of anti-smoking campaigners believe that the restriction on smoking in public locations should be increased and effective actions should be taken by governments in order to reduce the consumption of tobacco. On the other hand, addicted smokers consider smoking prohibition as interference in their civil freedom. Though they argue that they have the right to smoke whenever and wherever they want; governments consider passive smoking’s threats as a major priority to deal with. This essay will discuss the policies taken by governments to decrease or even stop smoking among the public. Moreover, it will present smoker’s arguments regarding their right to smoke in public places.