Revised: Humans Aren't the Only Victims of War

There's something about the death of a dog that just strikes a chord with nearly everyone. Perhaps it has something to do with the dog's innocence and unyielding loyalty, but whatever it is, I seem to linger on images like this every single time. While iwastesomuchtime.com (I know, but it's addicting) typically displays funny internet memes, statuses, and comics, sometimes a meaningful image like this appears and makes me stop for a minute. Sometimes that's all rhetors really want from their audience: a moment of thought and appreciation towards the topic displayed.

Dogs have been used in warfare since the time of the Ancient Egyptians, and have been a valuable part of the military since. They are commonly used for scout duty, to warn of enemy attacks, find the injured, and to carry supplies and messages during combat. In fact, some sources estimate that each military dog saves about 150 lives in combat. And yet, just like the thousands of other soldiers fighting for our freedom and security in a far off nation, we as Americans tend to forget their sacrifice, and need to be reminded of it every so often.

Just like in O'Brien's How To Tell A True War Story, I think the death of animals is used to draw emotion from the audience, especially because the death of soldiers unfortunately faces apathy from the general public in today's world. The composition of this photo draws the audience down the soldier's arm to the sweet dog below, then pulls our attention to the memorial that the subjects are looking at as well. Here we see a memorial for 25 dogs that have given their lives, perhaps unknowingly so, for the noble pursuit of freedom. The man and dog staring at the memorial are paying their respects, (even if the dog doesn't understand the significance of the memorial) and the man is taking a moment to show his best friend his love. All this emotion makes the audience feel emotionally connected to the dog pictured and the other dogs that have given their lives, because the death of something so pure can be felt by all. This makes the audience aware and grateful for the jobs of dogs in the military that perform jobs humans are incapable of doing.

This image is meant to catch the audience attention and maintain it long enough for them to appreciate the value of dogs in the military and all that they do as man's loyal best friend. The image captures the audience's attention, raises awareness about the sacrifice of others, and creates an emotional bond strong enough that the image remains in the audience's head long after they have scrolled past.

Nickel and Dimed Part 2: Evaluation

Barbara Ehrenreich's novel was one of the most eye-opening things I've ever read. After traveling to 3 different parts of America and working "unskilled" jobs for minimum wage or less, Barbara wrote her experiences down so that middle and upper class Americans could see the people we have been blind to for so long. In her Evaluation chapter, Ehrenreich writes of her "success" at preforming the jobs (in fact, this "success" was intentional mediocracy in order to preserve her strength during never-ending shifts on her feet) and ultimate failure at keeping herself housed and fed in each of the situations.

Since Ehrenreich no longer is using her personal experience to draw emotion from her audience, in her evaluation she uses logic and statistics to back her argument instead. She argues that the pricing of housing is too high because of "the market, stupid. When the rich and poor compete for housing on the open market, the poor don't stand a chance" (199). To validate her argument, Ehrenreich incorporates statistic after statistic, based on her own personal calculations and those of governmental evaluations of the low-wage working class, throughout her novel.

Another effective rhetorical device was Ehrenreich's incorporation of an analogy between low-wage workers and rats to demonstrate the damage to self-esteem that unskilled labor can cause. Barbara writes, "there is ample evidence that animals - rats and monkeys, for example - that are forced into a subordinate status within their social systems adapt their brain chemistry accordingly, becoming 'depressed' in humanlike ways....[humans] depend for our self-image on the humans immediately around us - to the point of altering our perceptions of the world so as to fit in with theirs" (211). This analogy provides further understanding for the audience, who can easily recall times when they've made, say, their dog feel ashamed by telling him he has been bad, and then relate this experience to their knowledge of humans. This draws sympathy from the audience, and effectively helps open their eyes to the plights of the poor, and perhaps even donate their time and energy to helping fix the problems described in the novel.

Overall, Ehrenreich's Evaluation chapter effectively helped draw conclusion to her novel and give her readers the "so what?" they needed.

Tentative agreement reached to end NHL Lockout

Tim Panaccio, writer for Comcast Sportsnet Philly, was one of the first reporters to write about the NHL lockout that ended early this morning. His article focused on the details of the negotiations, such as the new 2013-14 salary cap and the "heroic" actions of Scot Beckenbaugh, who worked to bring the two sides together for compromise. The article is focused towards sports fans with a good bit of background knowledge on the NHL lockout, (some things seemed to go right over my head) but was generally informative enough for the general public to understand.

The most interesting rhetorical device used, in my opinion, was the delivery of the article—which consisted mainly of facts about the negotiation and a couple interviews. The article came with a video shown at the top of the page, so that Internet viewers don't have to feel bothered with reading the article if they just want the facts. This is a trend I have been noticing more and more often amongst news sources, and it seems to reflect the growing laziness and television-dependency of Americans. Furthermore, the article itself is broken down so that the most important information is given in the beginning of the article (an arrangement found in most articles) in order to fill in viewers with only a couple minutes to read. The article also consists of several sentences or sentence pairs that stand alone, rather than fully thought-out paragraphs, so that the overall effect feels more like a checklist than an article. Unfortunately, this style has also become increasingly popular, so as to make the article feel more progressive and easier on the eyes.

Overall, the article could have been written a little more thoughtfully, with a bit more analysis of the information provided, but since Panaccio's intent was to get the essential information about the end of the lockout to the public as fast as possible, his article was in fact very effective.

 http://www.csnphilly.com/hockey-philadelphia-flyers/flyers-talk/Tentative-agreement-reached-to-end-NHL-L?blockID=820411&feedID=695