The Rhetorical Triangle & Heffernan’s“Comment is King” IDS 3309 Readings – January 2015

Political Rhetoric Today The Partisan Corners of the News The Partisan Corners of the News ( drill.html) Almost as many Americans today get their political news from the Internet as from newspapers Online news is partisan 55% say they believe the Internet increases the influence of those with extreme views Cable news is also very partisan Fox News: audience is 46% Republican, 15% Democrat MSNBC: “Fox’s Liberal Evil Twin” (NYT, 8/31/2012)

What is rhetoric? Rhetoric: “The art of using language to communicate effectively and persuasively.” A Western tradition with roots in Greek society; for centuries served as a central tenet of political discourse and an advanced education (along with Grammar & Logic) With the growth of media outlets and infinite expanse of information brought on by the digital age of communication, rhetoric and the use of language to present information and arguments has become more relevant than ever.

The Rhetorical Triangle

Logos (Rational appeal) Pathos (Emotional appeal) Ethos (Ethical appeal) facts case studies statistics experiments logical reasoning analogies anecdotes authority voices higher emotions belief in fairness love pity justice etc. lower emotions greed lust revenge avarice trustworthiness credibility reliability expert testimony reliable sources fairness

Clicker Poll Think back on a recent argument or debate you may have engaged in. On which of the three elements of the Rhetorical Triangle did you rely most heavily? A.Logos (rational appeal) B.Pathos (emotional appeal) C.Ethos (ethical appeal)

A few examples of rhetorical arguments being made on the cable news networks State of the Union Address Some of the rhetoric on Fox News And on MSNBC

Rhetoric in Debate On Feb. 4, 2014, Bill Nye (the Science Guy) and Ken Ham, founder and chief executive officer of Answers in Genesis, the Young Earth creationist ministry, debated the theory of evolution. Here’s some of what they had to say in this video:video Ken Ham (18:00 – 21:10) Bill Nye (1:13:07 – 1:15:24)

Comment is King

“Comment is King” Virginia Heffernan, NYT, April 26, 2009 Presents an analysis of comments made on the Op-Ed pieces of Anne Applebaum, columnist for the Washington Post Applebaum is pretty middle of the road, a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian, but you wouldn’t know that from the comments made on her articles: “liberal fool”; “a lapsed neo-con addict”; “Zionist stooge liar”; anti-Semitic Comments are not refereed; no “sustained or inventive analysis of Applebaum’s work” emerges from the commentary

“Comment is King” Virginia Heffernan, NYT, April 26, 2009 Heffernan argues that online commentary should become a “cogent part of online journalism” It is instead the “bête noire for journalists and readers alike”; journalists find it “stinging and distracting” while readers won’t take the time to dig through the comments unless they plan on making a comment themselves

“Comment is King” Virginia Heffernan, NYT, April 26, 2009 What’s the problem? Rhythms of the web: early assent, then dissent, early morning weirdness; then fact checking Never reaches the level of true analysis; instead, an echo- chamber develops Echo-chamber is “unpleasant, and it makes it hard to keep listening for the clearer, brighter, rarer voices nearly drowned out in the din.” Something should be done, but Heffernan seems at a loss as to what that “something” might be

And what about YouTube? YouTube comments section: “an infamously troll- ridden Wild West of abuse, ignorance and spam.” In November, 2013, they decided to try and fix it: “YouTube comments will become conversations that matter to you". Channel owners allowed to moderate, block and filter comments; further integration with Google+ Efforts at a civil conversation undermined by first comments under blog post announcing changes.

The Backlash. The Internet was against this move. YouTube co-founder Jawed Karim, the Google+ site's biggest star PewDiePie and 200,000 petition-signers aren't happy "Google is forcing us to make google+ accounts and invading our social life to comment on a youtube video and trying to take away our anonymous profile. They are also trying to censor us unless we share the same worldview as they do

Google responds (but not about G+)

Back to “Comment is King” by Virginia Heffernan Since this article was published, the Times has come up with their own “troll solution”: Comment ranking by readers and Editors at the Times weed-been-there-done-that First blogging assignment Why our memory fails us