Tuesday, December 10, 2013
The Pathos of Righteousness
As we continue to plumb the depths and implications of emotion as a way of knowing, please seek out, share, and contextualize two appeals based on emotion. For each, consider whether or not the same effects could be achieved without employing emotion. Also, explain whether or not these particular uses of emotion are ethical. To do this, you will need to explore and share your definition of ethics. Please complete your post by 9:30 Wednesday evening. Come to class on Thursday having read one another's work. I'll be particularly interested to hear your assessments of your classmates' emotion-free scenarios, and to begin to discuss ethics and their implications.
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1. Identify 2 appeals based on emotions.
ReplyDelete• The commercial with the homeless animals and the sad music telling you to donate to save their lives
• Ray Lewis pump up speeches he used to use before games and his ceremonious chucking of the field turf
2. Consider: could the same effect be achieved without emotion? Is this use of emotion ethical?
• The commercial with the homeless animals with sad music in the background, to get people to donate to their foundation. This gets people to feel bad for the animals and forces them to want to donate. The same effect would not be achieved without emotion during this commercial because the reason they use the sad music is to stir up the sadness that people should feel for these homeless animals. Without emotion, people would look at the puppies, who look like average dogs, and just think “awww cute puppy.” This use of emotion is, in my opinion, not ethical. They are using people’s emotions to get them to spend money on puppies. This is not a very moral thing to do, in my opinion.
• Ray Lewis, before he retired, played for the Baltimore Ravens, and before every game would give a killer pump-up speech and then tears up a handful of his home field’s turf. This pump-up speech involves a lot of yelling about how the team is a strong unit and how they are going to crush the opposing team. This pump-up speech, involving screams and jumping, often got his team excited about the game they are about to play. This same effect would not be achieved and the team would not get as excited about the game, had Ray Lewis, their captian, not gotten as excited as he did. If Ray Lewis, sat down and gave a monotone speech about their mediocre team, then the team would not get pump about the game and may not play as well. This use of emotion is completely ethical. It only gets a football team excited about the game they are about to play. It does not force people to question whether or not it is moral.
For my two appeals based on emotion I chose:
ReplyDelete1. The Us Government showing TV ads during the Vietnam War. These ads showed a communist Vietnamese leader shooting a random civilian (who was not communist) dead in the streets.
2. The commericial on tv about saving abused and neglected animals. This television ad includes sad music, hurt looking animals, and a woman talking about these animals in a heart wrenching way.
For number one, I don’t think that America would have had the same response to the Vietnam War without this video going viral and appealing to people’s emotions of shock and disgust. Without that specific video, I doubt that America would have felt so strongly about helping the war for Vietnam’s freedom. After seeing this graphic video, households around America felt the urge to help. I’m not sure if I would consider this ethical. If I’m talking about ethical in a way that means that something is morally right, no, I don’t think this is ethical. I think it was very wrong to show an innocent man’s tragic death on national television. The person filming had no right to take that video in the first place, and the fact that this was used to persuade people does not seem ethical. If I’m talking about ethical as a way to convince America to help Vietnam, I both agree and disagree. I think that telling America about the horrors of what was occurring in Vietnam makes sense, and is a good reason to help. Because of the emotional appeal, America’s decision was based on this video. One video can portray a different side to a situation, sometimes untruthful, and should not be a main deciding factor in someone’s decision.
For my second one, I think that no matter what way the subject is posed (with or without emotional music), the topic of animal abuse appeals to our emotions. I obviously cannot speak for everyone, but knowing that animals are being tortured and neglected very much so affects my emotions. In summary, I think that whether written, spoken, or sung, this topic appeals to our emotions. To pose this topic without emotions would be difficult. The TV ad does seem ethical to me. With my definition of ethical, being that something is morally correct, this TV commercial is sending a purposeful message to support a cause. The use of emotion draws the person in and really pokes at their empathetic side (unless that person is a psychopath).
My first thought when replying to this post was of a viral video that went around a year ago called Kony 2012. A little backstory; it told the awful story of the conditions in Africa that supplied child soldiers to an evil militia leader called Joseph Kony. And can I just say, it appealed to every maternal or paternal instinct that anyone has ever had. This form of argument is effective. But is it ethical? Hmm.
ReplyDeleteEthics: the moral philosophy that one believes in that helps them prove the difference between right and wrong.
Alright, this is difficult because I also think each person has their own rule of what is ethical and what is not cased on their own experiences,and so its hard to say weather appealing to emotions is ethical for everyone on a global level. However, for me, I can say that appealing to a persons emotions is not ethical. HOWEVER.
Every decision made by anyone, ever, has been colored by the persons emotions. Emotions are an unescapable decision maker in our lives, something that helps us decide things from what we are having to lunch today or if we will get married, or have kids. Emotions are the backbone of decisions, and so its unfair to say that changing emotions is an unethical form of argument. However, purposely manipulating emotions to the extent that the facts become unclear and/or confused is what is wrong. Even if its for a good cause.
You all must have seen, at least once in your life, that silly commercial with the dogs with the huge puppy eyes and the cats who stare at you like you're their long lost best friend while the woman in the background sings a heart wrenching version of the "in the arms of the angels" song. That commercial has made grown men cry. I have friends who change the channel because they can't stand to see the sad puppy eyes. Anyway. That commercial is a direct appeal to the emotions, without the facts that allow for a person to make their own choice about whether or not too support the cause. It almost takes away free will if you think about it, because your emotions are responding without the chance to process any facts or clear evidence, in order to compare the argument with your own viewpoint of the world. So ethical? Nope. Effective? Absolutely.
When thinking about common appeals to emotion I thought about the media first of all. The media's manipulation of emotions can have a strong effect on many people through common ties to their emotional centers.
ReplyDeleteThe first commercial that I'm sure many people have seen is the one about stopping animal abuse. It plays sad music which triggers that sad emotion within us. It also shows pictures of these abused animals that need our help. When portraying the circumstances as they do, emotional appeals tend to sway the decisions of the viewers. Without the background visuals however I believe the sympathy would still be the same--unless someone really did not care for fellow animals at all. No matter what, animal abuse is an emotional subject.
The second commercial that came to mind was one that not as many have seen, however it plays on emotions in a very dramatic way. This commercial is not on television but on the internet. It is a warning about eating disorders. The video shows a teenage girl that appears to be quite heavy set, however the camera then pans to the back of the girl and it shows that she is looking in the mirror and is, in fact, skeletal. The topic of eating disorders is many times misunderstood or dismissed as a phase. When reading about the physiological toll that the disorders have on the sufferer, it is not as influential on peoples emotions as seeing this visual. I believe that this subject would not be understood the same without the use of emotional pull. The strength of emotion is incredibly dramatic.
In general, I think ethics is one’s standard or principles in distinguishing right or wrong.
ReplyDeleteThe appeal that came up into my mind right away is the Chinese TV shows about the Chinese Civil War. People in my parents and my grandparents generations enjoy these kind of TV shows so much that almost half of all the TV shows in China are about the history of Chinese Civil War. I have watched couple of them with parents. They are mostly about how brave the communists are. The soldiers are not afraid of death. The Nationalists are so ruthless but the Red Army is not afraid of them. These TV shows are not only about soldiers, but also about the communist spies or intelligence personnel. The nationalists torture them to force them to tell the secrets but they will rather die than tell anything.
After watching it, I feel so sad about them. I feel I should love my country much more than before because the communist members fought so bravely against the evil Nationalists. They brought me the happy life I have got today. Also, I feel the nationalists were so detestable. My emotion plays a huge part when watching these shows. I believe other people would have the same emotion when they are watching it. If no one uses their emotion when watching these TV shows, they would never be as popular as it is now. People would feel they are so repetitive and boring.
These days in history class, we are learning about the Chinese Civil Wars. I gained a lot of information from a neutral point of view. I realize the Civil War is actually totally different from what I used to think. All I know is information from the communist perspective. Also, I realize that the TV shows only presents the positivity of the communist and the negativity of the nationalist. A lot of crucial elements that may cause civillian’s doubt towards the communist party are banned from being shown through media. Hence, the use of emotion when watching these shows was not ethical because they are really biased, that one is not able to see the real situation. It is not ethical to hate someone or something when only know the biased information about it. All in all, the ethically use of emotion is caused by the unethical media portray, which is manipulated by the government.
The second appeal based on emotion is son or daughter. Almost every parents love their children. However, when there is no love, would anyone still see them as lovely creatures? When they are babies, you have to feed them. If you don’t, they cry. They make poop and pee everywhere. The parents have to spend so much money on them. They sacrifice their time and energy to raise the children. Raising a child is just tiring and tedious. So I believe, if there is no emotion employed, no one would want children. However, the use of emotion here is totally ethical. Every living organism is born to reproduce. Only with the presence of love, people bear child.
Barack Obama “Hope Poster” Propaganda:
ReplyDeleteThe Barack Obama “Hope” poster depicts Barack Obama looking up at the sky, but could be looking into the future; the poster is in red, white and blue, and has the word ‘hope’ written across the bottom. The same effect could have been revealed without the emotional word “hope”. This is because Barack Obama was something new and fresh that had come into the elections of 2008. He was the first black president, with views that benefitted most of America(’s) (middle class). Of course the word ‘hope’ did add to the poster because it gave people something to associate him with and also gave people something to look forward too. Also just the meaning of the word ‘hope’ gives the poster a whole new way to look and think about it. I think that just with the color and Obama’s face gives off Obama a thoughtful leader that cares about America, but when hope is put on the poster I see more of something to look forward to and something that I should believe in. Because Obama is looking towards the sky with a strong look on his face and the poster is in red, white and blue, it portrays a sense of good coming toward America after the last presidency. The use of emotion in this poster is completely ethical because it uses what peoples emotions were on the last presidency (most of them not so good) and channels them into what good could happen in the future. It is also ethical because I don’t think that it exploits anybody it does not uses others to achieve its goal.
St. Judes Childrens Hospital Commercials:
The St. Judes Childrens Hospital commercials usually depict an ill child who sits next to a woman who asks for the tv watchers money to save the many children like the one to her side. I think that if the child was not present in the commercial then the emotional aspect would not have been as effective or as strong. Of course the St. Judes Childrens Hospital itself without the ill child is moving because it is a childrens hospital, but it is not as emotional as having a sickly child in the commercial. With the child in the commercial more people would be willing to donate money to the hospital because they see a child who is suffering and want to help. Most people do not want children to suffer so they are inclined by the sick kid to help. The kid adds the sadness to the commercials because the tv watcher sees what the child is going through. I do not think that this is ethical because it is the exploitation of sick children. To show a sick child on screen just to get money out of people should not be the way people should give to a cause, they should be willing to do this on their own with the commercial or not. A child’s sickness and the person feeling bad for a couple of seconds should not be the reason for someone to give money. This is an example of when people wait for horrible things to happen before they try and do something about it.
Ethical: dealing with morals or the principles of morality; pertaining to right and wrong in conduct.
ReplyDeleteThe first event that I chose that appealed to me emotionally was a scene in my favorite television show Degrassi. In this particular scene one of the protagonists (Adam) suffered a fatal death due to texting while driving. Honestly, the only reason I became more aware about the situation of many teenage deaths being caused by texting and driving is because they killed my favorite character in such a fatal way to relay this message to the large population of teens who watched Degrassi. If it had not been for the producers “killing” Adam, I would not be as aware or feel empathy towards people who die by texting and driving. Texting and Driving is something that happens every day, many commercials were already made on this situation, and it’s nothing new. The main reason I had such a revolutionary mind change is because it affected me different once it was relayed by killing my favorite character, it made me feel extremely sorrowful. If they had not killed Adam, I as well as many other teenagers would be blind to the true fatal effects of death by texting and driving or empathy on such a large extent would not have been felt towards families that lost loved ones in this way. I do believe that the use of sorrow in this situation is ethical because even though they killed my favorite character in Degrassi, as well as many other persons who watch the show, we would not have been so aware about the consequences of texting and driving if he had not been killed in such a fatal way. To appeal to teenagers you have to relay things to us in a way that you know we will be willing to take heed. This is exactly what that episode of Degrassi did.
The other event I chose was the commercial that advertised the dating site Christian Mingle.com. This commercial urges individuals who are Christians to join in order to be happy and find God’s match for them. This appealed to me emotionally through triggering the emotion of anger. This is only because as a Christian, if you want to find God’s match for you, you should have faith and patience and wait for him to send that match and wait on a commercial. This really made me think about how faithful followers of Christianity are, and it made my analyze the world in seeing the ways in which people would literally do anything including compromising their faith to make money. This commercial in my opinion is not ethical because of the principality and moral behind the joy it is suppose to cause. Any commercial promoting any dating site to be in promise of bringing about fake joy and happiness to make money is wrong. Christian mingle or any website promoting dating amongst their believers because it is their supreme beings desire is even worse in being ethical. I believe that if I have not seen this commercial my perception on Christians in the world today would have not been challenged, because I would not have been this angry about a commercial that’s suppose to make people happy.
One popular presentation in the media is the popular advertisement of texting and driving. In this advertisement on most channels a teary eyed narrator is holding up a picture of her sister in happier times. In the photograph the girl is bubbly and smiling. The narrator describes her sister as vivacious and even commented on how she would snort whenever she giggled. The screen then goes to a text message, "k." She then explained that the driver that killed her sister was distracted sending this text message to someone. The advertisement really touch me when she looked directly looked in the camera with tears in her eyes and stated, "Was this text so important that it caused my sisters life?" I'm sure company's message was clearly sent at this point. No text is as important as someone's life. In this situation I don't think that the same effect could be achieved without employing emotion. This is a serious and sad situation that the media wanted to bring awareness to and the best way to have people think before texting and driving is by appealing to their emotion. We think about our sisters, loved ones and try to share the narrator's grief after seeing the presentation. Had the advertisement not appealed to my emotions I would not have remembered the exact content of the message to relate it now from memory. This use of emotion in my opinion is an ethical one. My definition of ethical is conforming to accepted morals of right and wrong. This use of appealing to emotion is ethical because in our society we value human life more way more than a text message that can wait.
ReplyDeleteAnother popular appeal to emotion is the smoking commercial. Again this is another personal narration. There is a man whose considerable old in age in a wheelchair appearing in a really bad condition. He has to speak through a speaker that doctors implanted in his throat. The appearance of the man alone was enough to appeal to our emotion. Seeing a human being in that state of paralysis and helplessness makes us feel really sympathetic and empathetic towards him. We then picture ourselves or loved ones in his position and suddenly feel moved to do something. Whether taking measures to stop smoking or encourage someone we love to stop smoking. This message could have been conveyed without appealing to emotions but probably would not have the effect that this one has. I would describe this presentation as ethical as it is deciding between a long healthy life instead a short pleasurable one. There are people who smoke regarding the fact that it shortens their life span because they rather live a pleasurable short one. Based on how one views life this situation can challenge their ethics. We all as humans have a desire to love ourselves and want to avoid pain and illnesses so by showing the horrors of smoking in the television presentation one is forced to think about their health.
My first example, occurred today, when someone was complaining about how hungry they were, when they saw someone with a snack in their hand; of course, this person eventually began begging to have some of the person’s food. Though I did not feel much emotion when over hearing this, I do realize that this situation appealed to the guilty emotion of the person with the food. Having someone beg for something you have, that they seem to be dying without, triggers a sorrowful and guilty emotion that sometimes leads people to give some of their snack to another person. My second example is a commercial, I can’t exactly remember what it says or what branch of the military it is for (maybe the Navy Seals?). This commercial pictures brave men and women going out on their journeys, training hard in their identical outfits, to save this nation we are all currently apart of. I find this commercial appeals to my gratitude and the emotion of thankfulness (I think thats a word). Seeing those brave people in the commercial, and not being able to picture the hard work they go through, with the triumphant music playing in the background also strongly appeals to emotions as the person asking for food, though they trigger different emotions.
ReplyDeleteWithout emotion, the effects of these situations would definitely not be the same. If someone’s emotions were not appealed to by the person who was begging for food then that “beggar” would not have gotten any food to fill them, just as other people would not feel responsible to join the military and help the nation had their emotions not been touched by or attached to the commercial. The word ethical means “ 1. pertaining to or dealing with morals or the principles of morality; pertaining to right and wrong in conduct. 2. being in accordance with the rules or standards for right conduct or practice, especially the standards of a profession...” (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/ethical). Therefore, to say this use of emotion is ethical, really depends on the situation and the person. In certain times, for example if a person is being blackmailed their scared emotions are appealed to benefit the other person’s desires. In the given situations above, the use of emotion is ethical for the purpose that the conveyors are trying to get across. The person asking for food and triggering the guilt emotion, is really meant to appeal to that person more directly so that they would get the food they wanted. The commercial showing brave soldiers and all the great things they do is really to recruit people who want to feel brave and strong like the pictured ones. These uses of emotion, in my opinion, cannot be considered unethical because they do not seem to be going against the definition of ethics. They do not go against rules of correct conduct on their own, however how each person handles each situation depends entirely on the person.Basically, what I was trying to say in this unorganized post, is that examples of advertisements in some way (among many other things), need to have the presence of emotion to achieve its desired effect on the population. In these two examples specifically, the use of emotion is ethical, because it was needed solely to achieve its goal; while it can manipulate one’s emotions, it does not necessarily suggest a way of being unethical.
I don’t know where to begin talking about my definition of ethics. Since I was introduced to the word last year, I have not yet established my own definition of “ethics”, I have a good idea of what it is, but cannot explain it to someone else. The dictionary defines it to be “pertaining to or dealing with morals or the principles of morality”. This is the first part of the definition, but I think that it does not completely embody my definition of “ethics”, because moral is part of an individual, whereas ethics should be a judgment of something bigger. Moral and ethics are different from each other. For example, a thief may have no moral, but I’m not sure if he is unethical. The other part of the definition: “pertaining to right and wrong in conduct”, this part sounds more fitting to my idea of “ethics”, but only because it’s broader. In the end, it was resolved that ethics pertains to right and wrong of societal conduct.
ReplyDeleteWhen a friend asked me to define “ethics”, I couldn’t, so she translated the term into Chinese, a word meaning “moral”. I disagreed, and we had a mini-argument/discussion about whether the Chinese word is really the translation of “ethic”, why does “moral” come up when “ethic” is looked up? Interesting, especially in Chinese…maybe I’m just being too sensitive to the implications of right or wrong of society in China. As I continue to explain and give examples of ethics, I think she became more confused, so suddenly she said “Stop talking about it!” This was the emotional appeal, I was sorry that she couldn’t get what I was describing to her, but at the same time, I was a little annoyed that this was taking so long, and I have no solid grasp of it either. So I told her that I couldn’t give her the definition of ethics, because she has to understand it to her own perception and language. If emotion were not present in this scenario, our discussion would have gone on forever, and no real agreement would be reached, and I wouldn’t remember that everyone’s idea of ethics and moral and society is different.
In China, grade school students are all part of the Young Pioneers, an organization that is an extension of the Chinese Communist Party. Members of the league are required to wear a uniform red scarf that is part of the league flag. It is inculcated to the wearers of the red scarf, that the red pigment of the scarf comes from the blood of martyrs of the Communist Revolution in China, therefore, the scarves should be worn with reverence. This is an extremely emotional appeal made to young children who will probably really believe that they are wearing a scarf dyed by blood. These children are really proud to be a member of the league, because they believe that the predecessors of the League were very brave and honored. The children wouldn’t be so proud of their membership of the league if this appeal of emotion were not used.
The first appeal of emotion is not unethical, but not ethical either, because I’m sure if the first appeal was a case that could be judged by ethic. In another sense, there was another appeal for emotion in the first case, when my friend says that she cannot define ethics, because she does not know it in her language. In this scenario, this appeal is not right, because it’s not something that I can explain clearly to her by making a word that means ethical in Chinese. In the second appeal of the red scarf, the use of emotion is definitely not ethical because it lingers on the edge of brainwash, in the sense that it inculcates young children to love something that they have no choice over, or understanding of.
The first emotional appeal I can think of is a YouTube video about meat production that I watched earlier this year: “Farm to Fridge- the Truth behind Meat Production”. This graphic video shows pigs, cows, chicken, and lamb being slaughtered for meat, egg, and dairy production. It appeals to ones emotion by graphically displaying the horrible living conditions, the torture, and the traumatic experience animals go through during their whole life. For most of the animals in this video, slaughter is what they are born for. Some of the images this short film displays are baby pigs being killed, skinned, and drained. It shows cows being tortured with a hot iron and the horrific conditions they live in their whole lives. And the video also shows chickens trapped in a small area, while male baby chicks are graphically murdered. This video really opened my eyes to what truly happens during meat production, especially with large, commercial companies. Through the graphic images and horror stories, this short film has an emotional effect on the viewer. Without emotion this video would not have achieved the same sad, angry, and shocked result had it not included images that appealed to the viewer’s emotion. My definition of ethical is something that involves ones morals and values and how one uses their knowledge or understanding of them. For this video to have an effect on the viewer, it had to appeal to their emotions. In my opinion, the use of emotion in this video is ethical, for it is exploiting graphic and horrific images to aid the viewers understanding of the issue. Although it only shows one side of the issue, it is ethical for it educates the viewer about the truth.
ReplyDeleteThe second emotional appeal is one that I think we can all relate to. Our parents…. My parents, especially my mother, have been using emotion to get a result from me, my entire life. A simple example of this is when they want/need me to do something. They will say things like “Think about everything I have done for you.” or “Your right….don’t worry. I’ll do it. Let me just add it to the list of things I have to do today (longggg sigh—then the puppy eyes)” or my favorite “I’m your mother. Deal with it.”. These appeals use emotion for they manipulate your mind into thinking you are at fault and thus make you feel guilty. Whether or not this is ethical is hard for me to answer because, well, what if my mom read this one day. However, since this is a class, I will just go for it. Again, my definition of ethical is something that involves ones morals and values and how one uses their knowledge or understanding of them. Although I don’t believe this appeal of emotion is necessarily wrong (they are my parents after all) but it is not ethical. This emotional appeal manipulates the mind into misunderstanding reality. In my opinion, tricking someone into thinking that they are at fault when they truly aren’t is not ethical. It goes against my morals
1) I think a lot of people get manipulated by their parents in order to do things (this is not always a bad thing, it can just be a little bit of a hassle). For example, my mother uses her emotions to her advantage, when I’m home on break and she isn’t. “Our house looks a little dirty, it would be so nice if someone would vacuum for me…work has just been wearing me out lately,” she says as she looks at me, the only person in the house.
ReplyDelete2) In my opinion, the easiest way to manipulate someone is to make them scared, which is why I view fear is a very dangerous situation. Fear can cause people to change huge aspects of their lives, such as where they live, what their actions are. People who rob businesses are an example of people who use fear to manipulate others. If someone is placed at knife/gun point in front of a large masked human, it’s almost guaranteed that that person will be frightened, and more likely to be easily manipulated. It’s even more if the words “give me the money or else” are involved (or something along those lines, I don’t have firsthand experience. Only my extensive knowledge of action movies. By extensive I mean nonexistent).
Obviously these are very different circumstances. One is very mild and a little persuasive, while the other can be quite dangerous and manipulative. The second example is not ethical. Using fear to gain something for yourself is selfish and evil. The person being manipulated gets nothing in return, and can even lose things like money, or a sense of comfort. Ethical means “of or relating to moral principles or the branch of knowledge dealing with these.” The word moral is most important to me.
Moral: concerned with the principles of right and wrong behavior and the goodness or badness of human character
Let’s use the names Mark and Tom. If Mark pushes Tom to do something using emotions, and that something would only benefit Mark (and might negatively affect Tom) than that is not moral. It shows mark has a pretty bad human character, he’s selfish and doesn’t think about how his actions affect others. This use of Pathos isn’t ethical.
If Tom pushes Mark to do something using emotions that will benefit Mark (and in the best situation, people around Mark, or just people in general) than that is ethical. Tom is helping Mark. He could be majorly changing his life, like a little lesson, or could be majorly changing his life. It doesn’t matter, as long as it betters Mark’s life, it is ethical.
In order for Pathos to be ethical, it can’t have a negative effect on the manipulatee. It can’t force the manipulatee to do something. It should just be a suggestion that will help the manipulatee if the advice is taken.
Identify 2 appeals based on emotions
ReplyDeleteOne type of appeal based on emotion is used in blackmail. A robber comes to my house and tells me “Give me all your diamonds or I will shoot your family.” And in turn, I give him my diamonds. The robber uses my emotions against me to take advantage of me and get what he wants. Due to the fact that most people have some type of emotional connection to their family, it is fair to assume that I would give up diamonds for my family’s lives. This is an appeal based on emotion because the outcome of the situation depends on my emotions. Because my emotions toward my family are stronger than my emotions toward to my diamonds, then I make my decision to let him take the diamonds. If emotions did not exist, then the burglar probably wouldn't blackmail me because it would not be guaranteed that he would receive diamonds. He would have nothing to rely on to let me give up my diamonds.
Another appeal based on emotion that I thought of was those instances when we say “Let’s do something great in honor of our veterans”, or “ Let’s do something great in loving memory of our fallen soldiers”. We immediately think of the tough fight that our soldiers go through for us, and it triggers sentimentality for most. People show a lot of emotion when it comes down to the topic of soldiers and war partly because of the gruesome bloodshed and loss that they have to deal with, and also partly because none of these people really desire to go to war. In the IB English class, we are reading the war memoir The Things They Carried, which gives a detailed view of a war life. Personally, knowing all that the soldiers go through evokes lots of emotions, and it makes sense for it to have such a great effect on a person. The most common emotions that war evokes are sadness and guilt, and these emotions are usually strong enough to make people more likely to act on them. This is why when someone says “Let’s do something great in honor of our veterans”, people usually agree with it.
Could the same effect be achieved without use of emotion? Is this use of emotion ethical?
I believe that emotion is so prominent in every human being that the same effect could not be achieved without the use of it. If the burglar didn't bring my family into the situation and just demand me to hand over my diamonds, then I would tell him no and that would be the end of story. The burglar wouldn't achieve his goal of getting me to hand over my diamonds. Often times, emotions are used in order for people to get what they want. There is a fine line between using emotion to get what you want in an ethical (moral, just)way, and using it in an unethical way. This all depends on the situation. For example, saying “Let’s do something great in loving memory of our fallen soldiers” is not unethical because it is out of respect, but it is somewhat unethical because it uses your emotions, but saying “ Give me your diamonds or I will shoot your children” is completely unethical. In conclusion, there will be some immorality in every appeal based on emotion because of the fact that it is dragging out your emotions, something that you can not necessarily deliberately change to achieve its goal; but the amount of immorality that the appeal has depends on its motive.
The first appeal based on emotion that I thought of was when I was on the phone with my mom last night and we got on the topic of plans for spring break. I really want to go to Florida, but my mom is still on the fence about it, so in order to get her to basically say yes, I said “mom, pretty pretty please! I love you so much and I promise I’ll try really hard in school and I just really really need to go to florida, please mom?”. This is an appeal based on emotions because it has a little bit of guilt tripping with some begging and ‘puppy dog eyes’, which all manipulate a person’s emotions. I do not think that this could work without emotion because the emotion is what triggers my mom to feel bad if she says ‘no’ so instead she says, ‘yes’ or ‘okay, maybe I can work something out’. Also the emotion of love plays a huge part, my mom loves a lot so of course she is more likely to not say no because she wants me to be happy; without that emotion, there would be no connection and my mom wouldn’t really even care about what would make me happy and she wouldn’t feel bad about saying no. In my opinion, this use of emotion is ethical; if something is ethical, to me, that means that it is in accordance with one’s own morals and does not go against laws of right and wrong. In this case, sure, I probably shouldn’t beg my mom and make her feel bad in order to get her to say yes to things, so it does go against my morals a bit, but on the other hand, I don’t do it a lot and I’m not doing something terribly bad, and it’s honestly something that most kids have done at least once.
ReplyDeleteThe second appeal based on emotion that I thought of was of those animal commercials with the hurt and abused animals and the really sad music and sad person talking about how much the animals need help. I love animals and I think that it is horrible that they have to go through those kind of things in their lives, but even if I didn’t I feel like I would get a little teary during these commercials. The sad photos and sad music and sad voice over really bring out sad emotions in most people who watch it. I do not think that these types of commercials would have the same effect without emotion because they would not trigger people’s sense of care or exaggerated desire to help out. People would probably just think ‘oh it’s just another animal’. I’m not really sure if this particular use of emotion is ethical because of course I really do believe that animals should never be abused and if they are then they should get all of the help that you need, but I also think that the use of all of the sad stuff is a little over board and manipulating, it makes it seem like all these foundations just want more money. A lot of the extra things make people think ‘oh it’s another one of these commercials again? all they want is money’ and it steers away from the simple and most important fact that these animals need help. I do think that some emotional trigger is needed, but I think that to be ethical, the manipulation factor should be toned down a little.
• The proper moral principles that govern people are what I define as ’’ethics’’.
ReplyDeleteTwo emotional appeals :
• Articles about the 1994 Tutsi Genocide. Every genocide memorial week in Rwanda, newspapers or TV shows show some pictures of greatly affected genocide survivors. There is one picture that I once saw of a survivor who had scars all over his head because he had been axed. I personally, as a person whose family was greatly affected by the genocide, whenever I see pictures of orphans, survivors or other people who were killed in the 1994, I find myself crying all of a sudden. This picture of a survivor, who was axed, raised my emotions, and I do believe that it can raise other people’s emotions as well. I believe that this survivor’s picture appealed to many people. For the part of the media that exposed the picture, I believe that it is ethical according to my definition. I think that showing the scars or the injuries of the genocide survivors or showing the negative impact of the genocide to people is not bad. I find this good and proper because in this case, the media are trying to warn people of the dangers that are caused by genocides and their bad impacts on human life. Such emotions that one captures from terrible pictures like the one mentioned or videos help them to become better people.
• Another example I can give, is the one of M&M’s commercials that shows how a chocolate piece was doing anything for love, as it said to the lady that it loved. The commercial ends when the lady starts eating the chocolate which is so unfair because the chocolate piece or man had given her all his love. This commercial appealed to my emotions because it shows how unfair it is for someone loves you and does not get the same love in return. Or, how someone might me good to you and you repay them by being bad to them. Even though the main intention of the commercial is not related to my feelings about the commercial, I think that this was not ethical. I do not understand if the advertisers were trying to advertise themselves through a hurting commercial like that or maybe they were trying to trigger people’s emotions through that. I do not understand if they get the reaction that come to people’s minds like me when they see that commercial because the commercial means way more than m&m’s.The commercial also demonstrates a part of life that hurts many people (doing something good and getting the worst out of it).