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 27, 2017

BLM - The Rhetorical Analysis Table of the Articles



The #BlackLivesMatter Analysis Tables


Twitter Page: #TamirRice

Name of Author or Article
The Principle – Fallacy, Perelman, Schemes, etc.
Quote or Example
Analysis
Tommy TheFamily
@tommythefamily
Fallacy – Hasty Generalization, Accident, and Bandwagon.

Possible Wishful Thinking and No True Scotsman set-up. 
“Nothing was learned by ANY police deparment from the #TamirRice murder.

Business as usual.

Every cop wants to be a #KillClubMember in the US.”
Tommy TheFamily has a valid point to say that Tamir Rice was another victim of police shootings, but the final line appeals to several fallacies.

Hasty Generalization, as there is no sample size specified of police shooting or blacks killed by police numbers to track. It is assumed to be true based on other similar occurrences, but a larger sample size is required to make that argument and to provide evidence.

Accident, as “Every cop wants to be a #KillClubMember …” would mean that all cops want to shoot suspects dead upon contact, even if the suspect surrenders.

Bandwagon, because other people think this way, it must be true that all police are murdering scumbags! Look at Traveon Martin and other cases, with other Twitter users calling cops “racist pigs” and “murderers!” Therefore, they are murdering and racist pigs!

Wishful Thinking is possible in that maybe Tommy TheFamily wants all cops to be murderers and call them out for their actions.

No True Scotsman may be possible in the sense that Tommy TheFamily could be setting up a position of “All Cops are Killers” and no police officers that refuse to murder suspects are really cops at all. If this were the case, only a true cop is a cop that would be able to kill a suspect, regardless of state of action.
(Picture of Teddy Bear on Sidewalk)

Schemes & Tropes:

Angle- low angle

Implied Distance – close-ups

Figures – Abstract
N/A
A teddy bear, lying on the ground in a green jacket and abandoned. It is abstract not on an art standpoint, but symbolically. It represents Tamir Rice, and yet it is just a teddy bear. Or so it seems.

The author (The Root @TheRoot) likely chose this picture as the teddy bear represents youth, as it is a toy. Tamir Rice was young when he was murdered, and was supposedly playing with toy guns when he was gunned down by police…
Su Zie
@suzannapomade
Perelman: Abstract Values and Hierarchies
“ <Sad emoji> (2) until justice is served we will keep coming back!! #EmmettTill #TamirRice Y’all see the resemblance <Eyes wide emoji> #RestInPower <Black Fist emoji>”

(There is also a picture of Emmett Till and Tamir Rice, side-by-side.)
Justice is an abstract value, and justice for the dead and those victimized expresses a hierarchy of abstract values. Not to mention, there is an overt comparison of the two boys, whom were victimized by white people. (Emmett Till was killed for “cat calling” a white lady, Tamir Rice was killed by police when he supposedly was waving a toy gun on a playground.)
Noura Erakat
@4noura
Perelman: Sacrifice ???
“Prosecutor though it was reasonable to use deadly force against a black child playing in a park. We still haven’t done right by u #TamirRice
Although not overtly stated, this tweet seems like it could be used to motivate others to end the police shootings of black citizens, making Tamir Rice’s death not in vain. The last line seems to imply, at least to me, that Tamir’s death was not acceptable, but he will be the signal for change and will be the beacon of hope amid the challenges ahead. Upon successful change, he will be remembered as a hero.

(So, while he was “sacrificed” unintentionally, could his “sacrifice” bring forth the change that BLM seeks?)






Video: One Month in Ferguson – The Death of Michael Brown, by The Young Turks  

Name of Author or Article
The Principle – Fallacy, Perelman, Schemes, etc.
Quote or Example
Analysis
(Previously stated above)
 Fallacies – Slippery Slope and Quantifier Shift
The police’s premeditated mobilization of the riot gear and armed forces.
Slippery Slope – The police assumed that there would be a riot due to the shooting of Michael Brown. While this is a precautionary measure, the riot gear should have come out AFTER riots and violent protest had begun.

Quantifier Shift occurred because the police assumed that Michael was armed and was uncooperative when confronted by police. The police then assumed that uncooperative suspects usually intend arm to police, and assumed the stereotype that M. Brown was a dangerous black suspect, so they shot him. They turned the belief that some black suspects are dangerous to ALL black suspects are dangerous, and then they gunned Michael down.

Schemes & Tropes:
Arrangement – Climax
The entire movie, as it states the events as they occurred.
The effect shows the escalation of the situation of Ferguson as tensions rise and police attempt damage control. Also, this effect allows the viewers to simulate “being there” in the middle of the protests, the backlash, and the tense atmosphere.

Schemes & Tropes:  Visual – Saturation
See the pictures from 0:03 to 0:08 in the video.
A lack of clarity and a mixing of colors in contrasting photos (some dark and bleak, some mixed in vibrant colors) represent the ups and downs of the situations in Ferguson. There is a beacon of hope and a chance for justice, as there are the ugly circumstances surrounding the death of young Michael Brown, whom was killed by police. The situation deteriorates, yet there are people whom remain hopeful amid the chaos. That is what the photos represent.

Perelman: Observed Facts/Truths

Abstract and Universal Values

Abstract Hierarchies
The film is stated (in the comments) to present just the facts, but the central conflict is of the morality of police and the people in regards to the shooting. It is justice vs. human life.
Observed Facts and Truths are given from the dialogue in the video, stating dates, times, events, etc. as they occurred and how they occurred. The narrator remains unbiased to claims, and represents the events in a way that this is not a political issues, but a social and human issue.

The police represent the abstract value of justice against the abstract hierarchy of the people, whom want safety and security from the police, and whom value human life. The dilemma occurs when Michael Brown is killed. The police claim Michael was attempting to reach for an officer’s gun and dispatching him was a just thing to do to save the officer’s life and possible other lives, but the people believe Michael was gunned down due to racism within the police force.

Was justice served, or was Michael a victim (rather a suspect) of the police force?

Perelman:

Presence – Time and Space
Make it feel close, make it feel urgent!
By utilizing local news footage and video shot by pedestrians, the documentary brings Ferguson up close, and makes it personal. It also shows the tense and heated atmosphere between the police and the populace, giving urgency to a dire situation that is quickly turning into a powder keg.

Perelman:

Enthymeme ???

The film obviously makes no claims about the situation in Ferguson, only reporting the reactions of the people and the true events; yet, it is as The Young Turks shot the documentary in a way to incite the viewers to care about Ferguson, to call out the racism that is likely in the police force, and to get the viewers to acknowledge the issues and take action! Perhaps…it only sets a stage; the viewer has to make the decision.

It is like what Morpheus said to Neo in The Matrix: “…I can only show you the door. You’re the one that has to walk through it.”

Amplification
The movie takes the entire situation of Ferguson and breaks it down in a small pieces, progressing through the story one event at a time and as the events occur.
Again, one event is told at a time of the “bigger picture,” and it is told as the event occurs in the story. There is little else to say.

Analysis – Philosophical
The documentary is pure facts, that is the definition of Perelman’s philosophical argument piece.
The entire movie is a compression of all the events and occurrences in a fact-by-fact basis of story-telling.

Justice

(The Quasi-logical argument device, not the value of Justice)
The police utilization of force among suspects, most of which are African Americans.
Do the police always need to shoot the suspects? Is the gun the go-to option in all cases? Why not use a taser or pepper spray, or even a nightstick?

Transivity
The reaction to Michael Brown’s death.
Police shoot Michael Brown = Michael Dies, Michael’s Death = Protests & Riots, so the Police Shooting of Michael = Protests and Riots.

Succession – Pragmatic
(ditto as above)
By police shooting Michael Brown (whom was said to be armed, but no evidence of this was found), it can be assumed that public outrage resulted from the wrongful killing of Michael Brown, if not Brown being murdered in cold blood by police. We could also evaluate the tensions and the civilian-police relations before and after the shooting.

Intention ?
Did the police shooting Michael Brown reveal true racism in the police force?
It may be possible police wrongfully killed Michael under suspicion of his behavior and the intel that he was in possession of a weapon, which may or may not have been the case. However, if Michael was unarmed and white police officers still shot him despite cooperation, then there may be racist cops in the blue.

Prestige
The actions of the police – were they of accident or intention to murder?
By this point, most people believe the officers involved murdered Michael, and their actions reveal racism within the police force. If this is true or not, we do not yet know of for certain; however, it seems more likely every day.

Representativity
Do the actions of the police officers reveal racism in the entire department?
This is still being debated, but most people believe that this act was of racism and reveals that some police officers may be racist. Regardless of what is the truth, police are experiencing poor relations with the police, and this needs to be fixed!!!





Press: Salon.com – Black lives blackout: Has the mainstream media forgotten about police violence and African-American resistance? By Chauncey Alcorn

Location:

Name of Author or Article
The Principle – Fallacy, Perelman, Schemes, etc.
Quote or Example
Analysis

 Schemes & Tropes: Profanity
“The people who have influence are being distracted by the grabbing of the pussies…”

“As long as our black and brown brothers and sisters are still dying and there is no accountability, I will march until I can’t march no longer…And even then, I’ll haunt y’all motherfuckers!”
I love a journalist or a citizen not afraid to push the boundaries by using swearing. It is fucking liberating and it is fucking amazing (pardon my language!).

That’ll send a message to the deniers and nay-sayers, and it will get everyone’s attention!

 Fallacy – Black and White (no pun or dry humor is intended here)
“The movement for black lives is alive and well across America and on social media, but you probably wouldn’t know that from watching CNN.” …
“But Donald Trump is our president now and the mainstream media apparently no longer has the bandwidth to cover alleged discriminatory treatment and brutality inflicted on African-Americans by the police.
So if the Press isn’t covering police brutality on black citizens, then they are focusing exclusively on the Trump Administration (and not the weather, local news, global issues, etc.).

I find it funny that people argue that social media is ineffective when it comes to delivering news, yet people are now mad that the conventional broadcast news on television is not report what is being reported on social media.

However, my opinion does not matter – what matters is that there is only so much room on TV for programs, and news networks have to carefully select what they want to report on in their limited broadcast time. Perhaps it is not that the media outlets have forgotten about black lives lost to police and only choose to highlight Trump, but maybe that the traffic generated by Trump is demanded more by the public than the stories of black lives lost, and the media stations choose to fill the program schedule accordingly…

Yes, black people whom are slain by police deserve to “have their stories told” and to have justice served, but maybe mainstream media does not have the room to put the stories into the program, or maybe the public do not want to see it…or worse, the public is now desensitized to black slaying by police! My suggestion is to encourage media outlets to cover the stories of police killing black people, or to embrace social media fully over traditional cable news.

Perelman:

Presumptions
The entire article assumes that the mainstream media would rather focus on Trump, and would ignore police violence against blacks in order to do so.
I would like to point above for my full coverage of this point, but I will add that it is possible that mainstream media may be unaware that this issue of police continuing to gun down blacks is still prevalent, and that there is still a want and need of the people to have it reported.

I can only say that either the mainstream media should be contacted directly and be encouraged to cover these stories, or people should abandon the mainstream media if it does not listen and move exclusively to social media.

Loci – Quantity

More news coverage of blacks being gunned down by police (whom may be racist) is better!

That is what this article is claiming and what it wants to achieve. I rest my case.




Did I miss anything from Perelman? Did I overlook a Fallacy? Did I cover all the Schemes and Tropes within?

If you spot anything that I missed, feel free to notify me and I will do my best to correct the issue.

Thank you for reading! See you next time.

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