Chris Porter
ENG 105-14
January 29, 2012
Rhetorical Analysis
Spandex is No Good!
In the essay, “What You Eat is Your Business”, Radley Balko writes to tell his audience about how the government is trying to control people’s health and eating habits by restricting food, taxing high calorie food, and considering menu labeling. Balko includes in his essay that government restricting diets and having socialist insurance is not helping the obesity problem, but it is only making it worse because it not allowing people to take their health in to their own hands so they have no drive to lose weight or eat healthy. In his essay, Balko is targeting society, including those who may be obese, he is trying to show them that the laws our
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In Balko’s essay, he used the logical appeal to show his audience that his essay has factual information in it. He uses the logical appeal to let his audience know that he is using logical information; he used actual legislature and details of our country’s insurance system as examples of logical and factual information. An example the of logical appeal in Balko’s essay is “Senator Joe Lieberman and Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown, among others, have called for a ‘fat tax’ on high calorie foods. Congress is now considering menu-labeling legislation, which would force restaurants to send every menu item to the laboratory for nutritional testing“(158). Another factual piece of information Balko used was, “For decades now, America’s health care system been migrating toward socialism. Your well-being, shape, and condition have increasingly been deemed matters of ‘public health’ instead of matters of personal responsibility.” (158). Balko uses these examples of legislature and the health care system to make his views on our country’s obesity issue to relate to his audience’s logic because they may have some background knowledge about things that they have seen or read on these issues. In Balko’s essay, he used the ethical appeal to show his audience that his essay has credible and believable information in it. He uses the ethical appeal to
Knowing what an author of an article or any journal entry means is one of the most important part of understanding the authors point. There are numerous ways how this can be achieved. One of the most commonly used methods in the field of communication is through the use of rhetorical analysis. Rhetorical analysis, or what is also sometimes called as rhetorical criticism refers to a process where an individual identifies, analyzes, and then interprets the presence of symbolic artifacts in a particular text or reading, which may include words, images, phrases, ideas, and even discourses, to get the overall meaning of that text or reading. The objective of this paper is to use rhetorical analysis, and the three underlying appeals or concepts namely
Ethos: How is the language appropriate to the audience? Who are the depictions in the advertisement attempting to reach? Logos: Does the advertisement contain factual data and statistics? Does the advertisement contain citations from experts?
In "What You Eat Is Your Business" I agree with Radley Balko that people should care more about what they eat, the authorities should not be involved in that at all. In my opinion is wrong that the government is also trying to make other people pay for obese people's mistake, or lifestyle. Someone else's weight should not be a public topic since is something so personal, but with the states not allowing insurance companies charge a higher wages on obese people what is going to drive them to lose the weight necessary? also with the authorities paying for their food and medication it is even harder for them to stop living the way they do. But I do agree with one thing in "What You Eat Is Your Business," which is that fast food companies and restaurants
Balko’s next thought is that, we are more responsible for everyone else’s health and less responsible for our own. He said, “Margo Wootan of the Center for Science in the Public Interest has said, “We’ve got to move beyond ‘personal responsibility.’” The largest organization of trial lawyers now encourages its members to weed jury pools of candidates who show “personal responsibility bias.” The title of Jenning’s special from last December—“How to Get Fat Without Really Trying”—reveals his intent, which is to relieve viewers of responsibility for their own condition. Indeed, Jennings ended the program with an impassioned plea for government intervention to fight obesity.” This evidence is sufficient, representative, accurate, and relevant. He is quoting a public health figure and recent media coverage of initiatives promoting increased government involvement in public health. The next claim Balko has is that, “the best way to alleviate the obesity “public health” crisis is to remove obesity from the realm of public health.” He has great ideas, but his evidence isn’t supported by facts or numbers that show that his idea would solve the
The writer of “The Sleep Over Question” used different types of appeals to pursued the reader in her writing. Amy Schalet used the three types of appeals: Ethos, Pathos and Logos. By using these appeals she is reinforcing her argument and pursuing the audience that her ideas are valid or more valid than someone else and this corresponds to each type of appeals and to the subject of the reading and to the goal of the writer. So a good argument will contain at least traces of all three appeals, skilled rhetors analyze their audiences to determine which of the three would be most persuasive to that particular audience. Then they construct arguments that emphasize that particular appeal.
The idea is that people have the freewill to choose what they eat. As a result, they are responsible for their own bodies, including the illnesses that may befall them. In that sense, people who are obese have no one else to blame but their self. Worse, demanding for healthcare coverage on obesity makes people irresponsible for their diet. In “What You Eat is Your Business,” Radley Balko argues that “bringing government between you and your waistline” is not the proper way to address obesity. Rather, the government has to “foster a sense of responsibility in and ownership of our own health and well-being.” In other words, removing the responsibility away from the people who are eating unhealthy food is a way to tolerate such behavior. As a result, people do not develop a sense of responsibility over their own bodies. To a certain extent, their obesity becomes the fault of others and the obese individual becomes acquitted of fault when, in the first place, it was the person’s decision to consume unhealthy food on a regular
Radley Balko gives us the pros of “who’s responsible for our weight”. Balko being a Libertarian he believes that we as a nation are fighting obesity totally in the wrong way. He feels that the Government should not be allowed to intervene or impose in what we eat or how much we consume. He argues that Americans should take more responsibility of their own actions. His thoughts are if people are more responsible of their own eating habits then other wont be made to pay for others consequences ,or unhealthy choices and maybe we would think twice about how we eat and then the threat of obesity would began to remove its self-quicker from our community(523).
Obesity is a rising epidemic that has long plagued the citizens of America. Unfortunately, the fight to end obesity has opened a gateway for governmental control over the personal lives of American consumers. At first glance, many Americans might be convinced that congress’s efforts to eliminate this concerning health issue is favorable to society as a whole. But on closer investigation, it is easily seen that the governments influence on such a personal matter produces the antithesis of beneficial and ultimately aids in nurturing obesity. In Radley Balko’s essay “What You Eat Is Your Business”, he is rightfully insists that the anti-obesity regulations and restrictions set by the government wrongfully alleviates American consumers of their individual responsibility for their own well-being by transforming health care from a private to a public issue, stripping them of the personal incentives needed to learn about, charge, and be rewarded for their physical health.
Second, appeals to emotion. The meaning of that is making the reader think with their heart more than their mind. This method makes the readers see the issue or problem in a different way. That strategy plays in the reader emotions to get their agreement toward an issue.
As this semester comes to an end it is time to look back on all the lessons learns and assignment that I have spent so many hours on. Throughout this class we have been taught how to properly pose an argument and also perform a rhetorical analysis. The main key terms we have studied and come to are the logical appeals; ethos, pathos, and logos. Ethos is a logical appeal to ethics. It is used to convince another of their character or credibility. Logos is used to appeal to logic, this is where through research is mandatory to persuade by reason. Finally Pathos is used to appeal to emotion, it is used to try and instill a connection with the reader and subtly persuade them to the side they are arguing for. We have completed quite a few assignments
The government presently has programs in place that are meant to urge people to deal with their weight. Cities generally have parks which supply free exercise-related areas to the public. While the government offers resources for people to challenge obesity, the government should “let each [person] take responsibility for [their] diet and lifestyle.”(Balko) An individual, not the government, pays the consequences of obesity in their value of life. In fact, the government should not pay for any backlash of obesity, because it removes a person’s own accountability, but “we’re likely to make better decisions when someone else isn’t paying for the consequences.” (Balko). Obesity does not occur in a day or a week, but through a sequence of choices and routines, which form a lifestyle. A law highlights a problem and provides a solution, this procedure is often efficient in dealing with the problem. But as for the growing problem of obesity, solutions suggested are usually short term regulations which cannot always connect a multi-generational problem. Instead of taking away temptations, such as fast food chains or unhealthy foods, the government should continue encouraging people to live a healthy life. The benefit of healthy living is that it is not limited to today, if prioritized, healthy living can become a long-lasting
A self-described libertarian, Radley Balko first published " What You Eat is Your Business" on Carto Institute in 2004. Balko asserts that individuals are becoming irresponsible of one's health and well-being by seeking congress legislation to take action, manipulate food option, and health care expense as an attempt to decrease obesity. Accordingly, within the decades, America's health care has been a public matter instead of the consequences and better choices of lifestyle in ownerships of individuals. For instance, Balko questions the ideas of President Bush investment of $200 million for anti-obesity, state legislature across the country banning snacks or soda from school campuses and senator Joe Lieberman creating "fat tax" on high-calorie
Obesity is commonly agreed to be a negative condition for humans, also recent movements have encouraged more open acceptance of fatter people. Obesity causes damage to individuals and hurts the health of the overall population. According to Ian Clark, obese people are “sicker, less happy, make less money and live shorter lives.” So is it fair that the rise in acceptance of obese people could lead to increasing pressures on public health? Expert opinions on the answer are divided. Many say that the government and even fellow neighbors should step in, while others claim that the spending of public funds would be too great for something people should control themselves. This disagreement arises yet again from a difference in reason. More conservative experts might reason that obesity should be in the hands of the public, and not the government. A more liberal expert might reason that the individual is too weak willed or desperate to escape obesity, and thus needs the support of a government to lose weight. In the end, obesity poses the same risks whether one is more conservative or more liberal, and the disagreement arises from a difference in
Eward-Mangione, A.(n.d.) Rhetorical Appeals: An Overview. Retrieved from Writing Commons website: http://writingcommons.org/rhetorical-appeals-an-overview. The purpose of the text is to explain the
Obesity is occurring in a diverse age range of individuals in the United States. When the thought of obesity in the U.S. comes to the minds of individuals, it is originally thought that not much of the country's population is obese; however, these conceptions are incorrect. In an article “The New War on Obesity” by Consumer Report’s, they state, “The U.S. currently holds the unenviable title of most overweight nation on earth, with more than a third of citizens now considered obese” (3). This horrific incident began the moment an individual made an unhealthy food choice. The food choice