Did He Use That Rhetoric Correctly?

Mirjana Kentera

Professor Mullikan

English Comp 1

Morrill Hall, Room 208

3 October 2011

Did He Use That Rhetoric Correctly?

The author Juan Williams argues in his opinion article, “Will Young Voters Sink Obama in 2012?” that if young voters do not get out and vote come election day 2012, then they will never be able to get out from under their mountain of student loan that they have put themselves under. Williams then mentions a recent poll in which 44% of people between the ages of 18 and 29 that vote, “disapprove of disapprove of how [President] Obama has handled [the problem with] youth unemployment, while only 31% [of voters from this age group] approve.” This discontent, Williams states, will be potentially disturbing to the Democratic Party. Then Williams, through many appeals to the reader’s ethos, pathos and logos tries to give some reasons as to why young voters should get out and vote, but also what may happen if they do.

Fox News has made itself available through several mediums. Fox News TV Channel is available to over 102 million households in the US and further to viewers internationally. As of August 2010, FoxNews.com has been averaging and estimated 24 million visitors each month. A poll was taken of the political views of their audience and of the poll’s respondents, 18% identified as liberal, 41% identified as moderate and 40 % as conservative, while 37% identified as Republican, 40% identified as Democrat, and 23% identified as independent/other.

Although William’s Article doesn’t say anything in particular about William’s credibility as a political writer for this article, (in other words, Williams doesn’t write anything about himself in his article) a segment regarding Williams’ ethos was attached to the end of his article by a third party. The segment states that Juan Williams is an author, writer, and Fox News Political Analyst. It also mentions the title of his most recent book as being: Muzzled: The Assault on Honest Debate. In telling his audience this, this third party wants us to understand that Williams is a credible author when it comes to writing an article on politics because he is a Political analyst. Being a Political Analyst means he is trained in evaluating goals, cultures, values, motivations, society and ideologies of politics and the people involved in it. By mentioning Williams wrote a book, the third party wants the audience to know that he is a good enough writer to get one of his books published. Then the third party also states that it was Williams’ most recent book. This has the audience infer that Williams has written a number of other books as well as the one they mentioned. In telling the audience this information, this third party has attempted to make Williams seem credible to the audience through the use of ethos.

Williams gives the reader a reason for needing young voters to vote this election, through pathos, by quoting Lauren Asher, the president of the Institute for College Access and Success. Asher stated that "Things like buying a home, starting a family, starting a business, saving for [the voter’s own] kids' education may not be options for people who are [still or in the middle of] paying off a lot of student debt.” By throwing in this quote, Williams paint a gloomy picture. He is trying to have is audience picture one of two things. One, parents caught in this debt that have one or two kids, are unable to put their child/children through any kind of college, for lack of money. Or picture number two, which is a world where people get married and do not even have kids because they are so far in debt that they do not want to have a child that cannot have the opportunity of higher education like so many others before them could. Either one of these pictures conveys an emotion of unhappiness or grief, for the bleak future that is to come if student loans are unable to be paid off. Another area where Williams makes one last attempt to appeal to his audience is at the end of the article when he says “If those young voters stay home on Election Day, they will be ceding the election to seniors at the heart of the Tea Party — no friends to Democrats.” In stating this, Williams is able to convey the feeling of ambition to his audience. Williams is hoping that by filling them with this ambition he is provoking some feeling in his audience to just get up and go vote for the right thing lest the Tea Party movement wipe out the Democratic Party.

In this article, Williams makes use of simple logic in several instances to help get his point across to his audience in a way that hopefully they will understand. One argument in which Williams specifically uses logos to help his argument is when he states, “Even if young people find a way to repay their loans, their high level of under- and unemployment is an ongoing threat to Democrats.” Here Williams appeals to the simple logic of: if the debt (as supposedly put there by the democrats) still remains, then chances of anyone voting for a Democrat are very slim. In this way, Williams was able to appeal to his reader’s logic to, in a way, get them to see who they should vote for, and who these people stand for. He is trying to get people to see that voting makes a difference and who you vote for will also make a difference. Williams says, “Young black and Hispanic voters have a close identification with the first president of color. But young white people do not” in his article. In this quote for example, Williams is using simple logic in talking about voters and their connection to the current President. It is visually obvious to virtually anyone, that the minority groups of Mexican and African Americans would feel a certain closeness to President Barack Obama, because he himself is obviously, visually of the African American race. Though the second part about the white voters not feeling this closeness is not necessarily as obvious but still holds some truth. It’s safe to say that usually people of the same race feel a closeness to one another, and that people of different races do not have that bond, though they may have others. In this way Williams uses logic to support his argument.

Throughout this article Williams successfully and effectively uses ethos, pathos and logos in conveying his opinions and feelings to his audiences. The rhetorical designs of Williams’ article prove to be consistent to his intended audiences explained previously. He plays to their emotions and logical understanding so that he can have the audience see it his way, and understand his desire for certain people in office as opposed to others. Williams was able to convey a bit of ethos, pathos and logos into his article, very subtly, using other’s quotes, and different hypothetical examples about how times are and how they could be if his article is heeded by his audience.

Works Cited

Williams, Juan. “Will Young Voters Sink Obama in 2021?” Fox News.com. 27 September 2011. WEB . 01 October 2011.