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On August 19, 1992 in Houston, Texas, Mary Fisher, the HIV-positive daughter of prominent Republican fundraiser Max Fisher, gives her keynote speech “A Whisper of Aids” to the Republican National Convention (1). Fisher’s purpose is “to lift the shroud of silence which has been draped over the issue of HIV/AIDS” epidemic (1). Fisher succeeds in her overall persuasiveness by effectively using ethos, logos, and pathos throughout her address to the conservative Republican Party to advocate for awareness, education, and the prevention of HIV/AIDS.
During the time when the general public believes the only way to contract HIV/AIDS is to be homosexual, an addict, or prostitute, Fisher being a white, heterosexual, married mother of two from an upper-class family who contracted the virus from her husband is herself the certifying ethos of this speech (1). She tactfully uses her own circumstances and diagnosis to embody the plight of all in the AIDS community and shows that no one is exempt from this deadly disease. She emphatically states that HIV does not care about race, age, gender, sexual orientation, or political affiliation; all that it asks is “Are you human?” (2). She ceases to be the exception and gains the attention and respect of the American people when she aligns herself with others with HIV/AIDS with her statement:
Tonight, I represent an AIDS community whose members have been reluctantly drafted from every segment of American society. Though I am white and a mother, I am one with a black infant struggling with tubes in a Philadelphia hospital. Though I am female and contracted this disease in marriage, and enjoy the warm support of my family, I am one with the lonely gay man sheltering a flickering candle from the cold wind...
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...ies everyone with a common purpose to not only protect their families, but to also treat their fellow humans with love and understanding.
In retrospect, Fisher’s speech, especially its ethos, would not been as effective if she wasn’t a married mother of two who became HIV-positive by her husband. Her call to the American people to have “the strength to act wisely when we are most afraid leaves no question to what must be done in breaking the silence regarding AIDS, and the action that must be taken to prevent further devastation (3). She successfully uses Aristotle’s Rhetorical appeals to transcend the public’s barriers against the HIV/AIDS epidemic and the people afflicted with the disease.
Works Cited
Fisher, Mary. "A Whisper of AIDS: Address to the Republican National Convention." Gifts of Speech. Republican National Committee, 19 Aug. 1992. Web. 5 Nov. 2013.
Mary Fisher is an American author, artist, and political activist born in 1948. She opted to become an outspoken HIV/AIDS activist after contracting AIDS from her second husband. She is a daughter of the wealthy and powerful republican fundraiser Max Fisher. The speech entitled “A Whisper of AIDS”; she delivered it in Houston, TX on 19 August during the Republican National Convention Address. She delivered this speech and set up nearness and full focus of her audience. Mary Fisher uses appeals of pathos, information, and imagery to shape her ethic sound and response towards this rhetorical situation of HIV/AIDS.
Mary Fisher's speech on HIV and Aids was executed extremely well in almost every way possible. Out of all the aspects of Mary's speech, I felt her establishment of common ground is what made her speech so great. Pearson, Nelson, Titsworth, and Hosek (2016) says “common ground occurs when you and your audience share an understanding of the world”(p.246). Mary did a great job of sharing her understanding and views of HIV and Aids, which is helping to establish common ground with the audience. Also, Mary disclosed things about her personal life that made her establishment of common ground even greater with the audience. All in all, Mary’s use of common ground did great things for her during this speech about HIV
Before the evening of August 19, 1992, Mary Fisher was known as successful television producer and an assistant to president at the time, Gerald R. Ford. Fisher gave the speech “Whisper of AIDS” during the 1992 Republican National Convention Address on August 19th in Houston, Texas. As being HIV positive herself, she became a spokesperson for the disease. HIV, which stands for Human Immunodeficiency Virus, is a deadly disease that is capable of spreading rapidly among humans through bodily fluids. This virus weakens the necessary cells needed to fight infection within the immune system (“HIV/AIDS 101” par. 1). In her speech, she addresses that being aware of the disease is the key to finding a cure. During this state of time, those affected were being discriminated and rejected from society. The purpose of this speech was to get the attention of the audience and persuade them to inform awareness to others about this horrific disease. Mary Fisher’s “Whisper of AIDS” speech successfully demonstrates the qualities of ethos, logos and pathos appeals to
"Jones originally envisioned the AIDS quilt as a message that would call upon the conscience of the nation." (Sturken 186)
Even after the disease and its modes of transmission had been correctly identified, fear and ignorance remained widespread. In the mid 1980s, “AIDS hysteria” became a well known term in the media and public life. For example, a magazine published details about how extensive AIDS/HIV related discrimination became. “Anxiety over AIDS in some parts of the U.S. is verging on hysteria,” the authors wrote; they later published this disturbing example:
She infers that this “cure” isn’t a tangible medical form of treatment, but rather a shift in ideology. It also refers to an approach that addressed the individual as a whole, which will then affect the larger society. This approach is similar to the methods used by the government of Uganda, which focused on the individual versus the society. This typically gives responsibility back to the individual, and encourages them to take care of themselves. If the HIV crisis had significantly dropped within Uganda, it’s not too far-fetched to believe that same approach could be brought to other regions of
Different people define success in many different ways. What is considered success by one person may be viewed as failure by another person. Randy Shilts, a homosexual newspaper reporter / author, attempts to make fundamental changes in America’s opinion on AIDS. In Randy Shilts’s essay, "Talking AIDS to Death," he speaks of his experiences as an "AIDS celebrity." At the core of Shilts’s essay is the statement, "Never before have I succeeded so well; never before have I failed so miserably"(221). Shilts can see his accomplishments from two points of view- as a success and as a failure. Despite instant fame, Shilts is not satisfied with the effects his writings has on the general public. Shilts’s "success" and reasons for failure can both be considered when one decides whether or not his efforts were performed in vain.
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…“With liberty and justice to all”, though this was not the case when the AIDS epidemic first jumped off. I believe that the only reason justice, mercy, and veracity were not served in the beginning of this battle is simply because of majority and minority. AIDS, at first, was only found to be attacking the gay population (minority), but the people that could do something about it, or controlled the money that could help with the situation were not being affected, and didn’t feel threatened by it (majority).
Kayal, Philip. 1993. Bearing Witness. Gay Men's Health Crisis and the Politics of AIDS. Westview Press. San Francisco.
"Demanding that life near AIDS is an inextricably other reality denies our ability to recreate a sustaining culture and social structures, even as we are daily required to devote such time to the details of the AIDS crisis." -Cindy Patton
On August 20th, 1992 Mary Fisher addressed the Republican National Convention in Houston, Texas in what is now one of the most famous speeches given in recent American history. Fisher, the daughter of a wealthy Republican, spoke on the importance being aware of the increasing danger of HIV/AIDS. Speaking from experience, Fisher is able talk about the danger of ignorance from the disease. She deploys metaphors and allusions pertaining to the Holocaust, as well as hypothetical experiences, to address a complacent, if not oppositional, Republican crowd. Fisher attempts to convince her political listeners of the very real danger that comes with ignoring HIV/AIDS. Fisher deploys a combination of the three appeals of logos, ethos and pathos to strengthen her speech as a persuasive argument. She expands upon her discussion by using metaphor throughout as an effective
The goal of Hillary’s speech is to persuade her audience that her ideas are valid, by using ethos, pathos, and logos. Hillary is the First Lady and Senator, she shows credibility as an influential activist for woman rights. “Over the past 25 years, I have worked persistently on issues relating to women, children, and families. Over the past two and a half years, I’ve had the opportunity to learn more about the challenges facing women in my country and around the world” (Clinton 2).
The movie, And the Band Played On, portrays a current issue the U.S. health care system face: the effects of societal perceptions of people who should receive health care support. Those perceived as undeserving are disregarded. Homosexual men were the first to be affected by AIDS in the US, and because of this, the stigma of homosexuality prevented developing health care policy to control the epidemic. Homosexuality was, and to a lesser extent now, not widely accepted. Marginalizing gay individuals was seen in the movie at the beginning, when media coverage on AIDs would not include “homosexual” within the news title (Pillsbury, Sanford, & Spottiswoode, 1993). This represents how media has to be marketed; the broader public will not be interested if a new disease only affects an undesirable population. Another example of this negligence is seen when Phillip Burton is asked to introduce a bill on AIDS. He agrees, but does not hesitate to retort, “They couldn’t get a dime out of this administration with the name gay on it” (Pillsbury, Sanford, & Spottiswoode, 1993). Finally, in order to change the perception, at the CDC conference with blood agencies, they renamed gay related immune deficiency (GRID) to AIDS, and the film cuts to news segments finally covering
“And the Band Played On” was an HBO movie that illustrated the AIDS crisis in the 1980s and early 1990s. The movie touched on subjects concerning the reaction of the gay community, the heterosexual community, and the medical community. It showed not only the research in AIDS, but also the way that the US government dealt with it. The movie expressed the consequences the gay community suffered, the plight of the medical community in researching the disease, and the issue of government response to it.