Propaganda And Critical Thinking Exercise

The media can be one of the most biased groups in the world. They can use propaganda techniques to help persuade their audience to come to a certain conclusion (Paul & Elder, 2012). The media may leave out certain facts that could help the audience form a more rounded conclusion, but those facts may not follow the media’s intended perception of the story being reported. The media operates with a particular guideline in order to retain a certain view of the world and how it operates (Paul & Elder, 2012). It is our responsibility to question the information that is presented to us and use our critical thinking skills to come to a knowledgeable conclusion. For this critical thinking exercise, I have chosen to compare two articles that were recently written on President Obama’s new gun control laws.
The Atlantic Article
The first article I researched was an editorial piece written by Clare Foran of The Atlantic which is entitled “Good News for the Gun Lobby” (Foran, 2016). Foran attempts to

The article in The Atlantic uses a form of moral rhetoric to persuade the readers (Writing Commons, 2016). Foran plays on the reader’s morals to show how the lobbyists actually are not against the gun control measures due to the fact that the lobbyist groups and gun manufactures only stand to gain financially from it, which would indicate these groups are driven by financial profit or greed. After reading this article, people may turn against the gun lobbyists for this reason. There is also use of logical rhetoric in this article. The article mentions how Smith and Wesson’s stock rose immediately after the mention of the new gun control measure. The logic is that since the stocks rose right after the announcement, then the gun manufactures and lobbyists only stand to gain from the new measure. The author uses this fact to help convince her audience of her