Article Analysis

The article I chose to analyze is the second one, “The Endangered Species Act Must Be Repealed.” I picked it because I found it the most convincing and I wanted to know why.
The author used a lot of effective devices, even if they are not part of good rhetoric. To begin, the introduction states that he is the former executive director of the Exotic Wildlife Association, which establishes some Ethos. Most of us don’t know what that is, though, and it’s actually an organization to protect people who privately own exotic animals. He isn’t really trying to save these animals; he just wants to make sure that people who own them have certain rights. While this may look like a credit to him in the beginning, further investigation proves it doesn’t give him any authority.
He also begins his article with a dramatic introduction. He makes drastic comparisons between the United States Government and dictatorships and the U.S.’s slow progress in moving away from a government approach to wildlife conservation to the rest of the World’s.
Another device is his use of “facts”. He throws out a ton of information and plays on his reader’s ignorance. When reading this the first time, I took in every word he said because it made sense and why would he try to lie to his audience? I doubt someone more involved in the issue would believe most of his argument because they know better. However, because I don’t know much about the issue, and he has a large vocabulary and specific examples of how the ESA is a bad program, I can’t help but want to believe him.
The biggest tool the author uses is Pathos, or emotional appeal. Specifically, he plays upon empathy. He wants us to feel sorry for the poor souls that are being hounded by the Fish and Wildlife Services because they have endangered species on their property. By citing a situation where the FWS did a number of inappropriate things and stopped once a lawsuit came up, the author effectively makes his audience mad and we feel betrayed by the government’s handling of the situation. The other example talks about all of these houses that got burned down because a couple was not able to clear their land of brush and that frightens us because what if it happened close to our home?
While all of this makes the article believable, there are some definite fallacies. For example, where does all of this information come from? “No species privately owned and commercially valued has ever gone extinct,” he states. How can he know that? He also makes a lot of assumptions or guesses as to what is possible if the ESA is reformed. He has no evidence that things will be better. He claims that more animals go extinct under this act than probably would if it didn’t exist. Another thing is he does not represent any of the good things the ESA has done. He is very one sided in his presentation. Lastly, he plays way too much on the audience’s emotions. He has very few logical appeals, and is ethos is iffy at best. His whole argument is based on making the reader feel bad for the common man, the farmer, the providers of our country. This is very effective in convincing us, but an argument needs more substance than he provides.