Logos and Pathos and their Role in Arguements

I have recently read a research brief from the National Institute for Civil Discourse titled  Classical Rhetoric, Contemporary Science and Modern Civil Discourse.  The article mentions how in certain scenarios the use of pathos in the argument overshadows the use of logos.  my view on the matter of the use of pathos is primarily based on that.

Source; https://pixabay.com/en/emoticon-tongue-emotion-expression-25518/

I am of the opinion that pathos does indeed have its place in an argument, but it should not overshadow logic and rational reasoning. A big role of pathos, in my mind, is to help relate the topic and viewpoint to the audience. A bad example of pathos is to use manipulative rhetoric to cause an emotional response. An example of this bad use of pathos can be seen in my third blog post, which contains a link to an article about violence in doom. In the article are twitter posts showing the viewpoint of individuals against the violent game. My main issue with these posts is their use of pathos. In doom the player has to kill demons, but in the posts they never tell the reader that the game is about violently killing demons. Instead they use the word bodies to intentionally mislead people in thinking that the game is about killing humans. So in short, an emotional argument that relies solely on emotional appeal is not a good argument in my opinion.

An Opinion on Game Violence Controversy.

Source: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/doom-launched-by-bethesda-at-e3-2015-swiftly-criticised-for-being-too-violent-10319985.html

The screenshot of the above article, "Doom launched by Bethesda at E3 2015, swiftly criticised for being too violent" by Andrew Griffon on the Independent is, as the title suggests, about how some people are being critical of a game over how violent it is. It is my opinion that this goes back to the whole violent video games cause violent behaviors in real life. I am nettled that some people are still upset that games can show excessive fictional violence against fiction beings, in this case the beings in question are demons.

A Comment on Comments

Recently I have read an article on The Atlantic titled "About Those Banners at Old Dominion" by Adrienne Lafrance. The article was about the fraternity chapter that put up some very offensive banners. With news articles I like to entertain myself by reading the comment sections, but I noticed some very interesting comments being written. 

The most of the commenters I see agree that the banners can be offensive. I say can be, because some of the comments were that people shouldn't be so fragile, which is often met with criticism.  The main debate for a large part of the comment section was does this merit this type of media response. Some people say it does, others are concerned that stories about these banners might cause people to overlook other issues, such as stray land mines and woman having acid thrown on them. 

source: https://pixabay.com/en/fawkes-fawkes-mask-guy-anonymous-157941/

One of the reason I like to read comment sections is to look at the arguments people make, and a key part of that is how trustworthy they appear to be. Some of the people in the comments looked to have high credibility were those who are polite, offer thought out explanations for their opinions, and acknowledged the opinions of other while still being polite. On the other hand, you have people who's comments appear to have a low credibility. These people often start comment chains with a comment that only insults the article, without offering an explanation. They may or may not also be degrading in their reply to an opposing view, often leading a reply with a facial expression, such as an eye roll. Reasons for this behavior are numerous for example lack of quality control and anonymous posting. Despite this I do find comment sections to be a great place for people to discuss their opinions.

Rhetorics: the art of getting what you want

  We all have been in a situation a some point where we have to convince someone. Recently, I had to convince my sibling to go to a movie with the rest of the family. It was a matinee, and my sibling always sleeps the day away. In the end we went to see the movie and he slept till dinner. Rhetoric can be boiled down into some basic decisions, some of those being looks, media used, and word choice.

Source:https://pixabay.com/static/uploads/photo/2014/09/23/08/57/group-457336_640.jpg

  In class on Monday 8/24, We were tasked with choosing five words to describe our selves for a job,  date, and roommate. We then had to get into groups and sort the lists into those three categories. It wasn't the first time I had to do an activity like this. It was a clear word difference between how a person described themselves for a job, because they wanted to look desirable to an employer. Between the other two it was a bit harder to distinguish, if they didn't use words to describe themselves as better lovers. The difficulty probably comes from the fact that the writer wanted to appear desirable to a person they want to live with. In the end the situations in the activities were about making yourself look desirable to the intended audience.