Links to rhetorical tools:

Here are links to the rhetorical tools used in this class:

Schemes & Tropes -- Perelman & Olbrechts-Tyteca -- Fallacies -- Burke -- Rhetorical Toolbox -- Conspiracy Rhetorics

Thursday, April 23, 2020

Rhetorical Devices & Argument of Anti-Prop 8


This actually relates back to one of the readings we had that discussed how a sign like this was made with good intentions, but black and gay situations are different should not be seen as fully the same thing.

Two things that immediately stick out the stroke weight and the emphasis on the color that was used on the poster, The weight makes the words pop out and people can easily read it if they pass by it. This is the intention of course as the man holding the sign wants to make sure you hear him loud and clear about his opinion. Though he might have just had black sharpie on hand, I have a feeling he also made sure that his poster was devoid of color except for black. He could have colored the word "Gay" in rainbow colors as that is the general color scheme that represents the community, but I believe he put it fully in black to show off that he does believe that gay is truly the new black. The situation of what is happening to gay people is the same in the eyes of this man,

Through this, I believe the poster and the guy holding it has a strong sense of abstract hierarchy and representativity according to the P-OT chart. The guy holding the poster seems to believe that both blackness and gayness are equal to each other in terms of what they go through. It is interesting to note that this hierarchy does not seem to be that he favors one thing over another, but rather he believes that both should be seen in the same light. If anything, he may believe that the topic of being gay is more relevant to today's society than black if being gay is the "new black" after all. This individual is connected to these topics as he is at an anti-prop 8 rally and he is also black, which I believe is the reason why he made the sign in the first place to give his viewpoint on the matter. Although I do not know if he is gay or not, he obviously cares a lot about the community as he is there at the rally to support the gay community. In this sense, I believe he thinks that he is representing the black community and how they should feel about the situation. Though the sign is problematic, he does believe that he is representing both the black and gay community in a way that makes it easier for other people to understand what he believes gay people are going through.

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