Declare Your Independence Rhetorical Analysis

Declare your Independence, is an article that tries to persuade Americans to “opt-out” of unhealthy eating, and start eating healthy like we once did. Joel Salatin uses numerous modes of persuasion, such as emotions and other rhetorical strategies, to inform the audience on different methods to end unwholesome eating.
First, Declare your Independence argues that people need to learn how to cook in order to break the trend of unhealthy eating. They do this by providing different data and real life stories that the author has encountered during his everyday life. The first fact that really impacted me was the amount of meals that we consume in our own vehicles. Americans consume almost a quarter of their meals in their own cars (182). Another

thing is we consume way too many pre-cooked, heat and go meals that we just throw in the microwave. These are both very unhealthy for our bodies. The last thing that I am going to talk about on cooking, really blew me away. The author was delivering food to a buying club when a women pulled him aside and asked him a very surprising question. The lady asked, “How do I cook a hamburger?” The author responded with “Are you kidding me (182)?” This is the biggest problem that Americans face today, they simply don’t know how to cook anymore. By providing these different strategies, the author is hoping that Americans start minimizing fast food intake and start preparing fresh home cooked meals.
In addition to home cooked meals, the next thing we need to do is start buying locally grown produce.

The reading provides us with a very emotional activity that the author tries on people and they are really blown away by it. It goes like this, imagine walking down an isle at Wal-Mart and as your walking past the different items, think of where you could purchase these items locally. The people are blown away when they actually start thinking about this and realize that a majority of their goods could be bought within a hundred-mile radius. We just have to open our minds to new things. Another thing that backs this idea up are super markets. Super markets are growing very rapidly around the country and make it very easy for people to buy fresh produce around their home towns. Since the author already has us eating home cooked meals, he hopes that he has convinced us through logical thinking to shop for produce

locally.
Another big thing that he wants his audience to do is buy what’s in season. He does this by telling them about canning and dehydrating vegetables for winter time use. Joel states, “In our basement, we have hundreds of quarts of canned produce on the shelves (186).” With all of this fresh produce stored right in the pantry, his family has access to it all winter long. The author uses his own experiences to show how this is possible. Doing this he is using ethos in order to show that he is credible to talk about this particular sector of food.
Lastly, in Declare your Independence, Joel wants Americans to start planting their own gardens and producing food for personal use.

He is amazed every time he sees urban people using gardens. This has to be the easiest way to obtain fresh produce. Another good idea is taking advantage of community gardens. This gives people the opportunity to get outside and work with others to feed their communities. The last thing that the author mentioned in his article really surprised me. He says, “For others, it may be three or four chickens laying eggs in an apartment (186).” This was something that I never imagined people doing. He starts talking about ordinances and how people should ignore them and defy. I would have to disagree with him on this particular point. Could you imagine having someone in Ames raising chickens in an apartment complex? Me either! There are certain points where some people go too far and this is a great example. Throughout this section of the article the author painted many pictures in the reader’s heads and this really helped me understand what he was trying to get across to his

audience.
We, as Americans, are faced with the option of “opting out” of unhealthy eating, and faced with the opportunity to better ourselves as well as our neighbors. If we start doing the simple steps that the author showed us in the reading, we could see a dramatic change in the health of Americans.