Advertising is typically intended to persuade and motivate current or potential customers to lean more towards your desires(s). Everyone wants to take whatever approach will be most appealing to as many people as possible when trying to promote an argument or product. The key to successfully persuading people comes from realizing the importance of analyzing all arguments and considering the other sides of things before forming your own argument. First, you must educate others about what it is you’re trying to promote rather than blatantly pushing your product or views on someone else. Not only will informing people help them to create a logical opinion, but it will minimize the amount of ignorance people show towards the subject. As I examined the first two advertisements in chapter 17 of “ Everyones an Author” I observed that it displays two very opposing groups of people protesting about gun control. The images were taken after the violent Sandy Hook shooting in 2012.
Both images represent one of the two positions in the argument of gun control, and how it can or cannot forestall tragedies like Sandy Hook from happening again in the United States. The left image consists mainly of women, and a few men holding up signs that depict who they are and how they’re against gun violence. The picture shows mothers, grandmothers, and even vets coming together to promote gun control. Having the men and women state their titles of whom they are, make the picture more relatable in the sense that the people in the image are just like everyone else. They are people who came together with hopes to protect their loved ones and themselves from another public shooting. The image also displays the sad and devastating expressions on these peoples faces. This pulls in the emotional appeal of anyone looking at this image to attempt to get them to feel for them and maybe look at this argument from the opposite side of their own viewpoint. Now the image on the right takes the other side of this argument, that is for gun rights and the 2nd amendment. The people in this image are using “ the right to bear arms” to fuel their position in the argument.
Most seem to have intense faces that are focused on protecting their rights to gun ownership. No women are to be found in this image so without necessarily intending it, the image seems to come off a little more hostile and serious due to the all-male presence. The overbearing presence of a large crowd full of angry men with a great deal of passion for gun rights can really have a huge impact on this argument. A more political standpoint is taken in the image on the right, caring more for their constitutional rights as opposed to the people on the left caring more for the safety of other people. It’s easy to conclude that the two images fall on completely different sides of the spectrum when it comes to how they appeal to people. The image of people fighting for gun rights shows a crowd angrily protesting for their beliefs to gun rights, and the image on the left portrays a devastated group of people who are saddened by what guns have done to our society and that wish to prevent any furthermore destruction from guns.
The emotional appeal in the picture has a cast a heavy shadow on peoples hearts and really makes you think about how many people lives have been negatively affected at the hands of a gun and how easy it is for someone to own an assault rifle. Each person in the image on the left is different but all came together for a common goal, and that really makes the viewers wonder what they have experienced or gone through to get to where they are which is at the protest where the image was captured. The picture of the protestors who are pro 2nd amendment really has no emotional appeal on the viewer. In fact, they all look like angry humans, who are selfishly protesting their pro-gun agenda, rather than considering the lives of other and the 25 lost souls of children that were gruesomely taken from this earth just days prior to their protest. Both Of these pictures reflect on the intelligence of these people in one way or another. Admittedly it is hard to form an opinion and judge them from just one picture why these people are protesting, what they believe in, and who they are.
But the images reflect the intelligence of the entirety of the group. With the people in the left image stating who they are, it brings a little more insight into the fact that all of these people are different But care enough about others and themselves to come together and protest something they strongly believe needs change. The emotion that appears in their facial expressions shows that they are there for a reason that they care enough about gun control to protest that it should be stronger. when looking at the image on the right the main source of intelligence is that they know their constitutional right to the Second Amendment.
They obviously cared deeply enough about their right to have a gun and will without a doubt fight to keep that right. There is zero diversity in this picture. You only see white males defending their right to own a rifle. The lack of diversity in this image makes their argument less credible as it is only appealing to a very specific group of people, therefore making it hard for other people outside of this group to side with them. Not only are these images Polar Opposites in what they stand for but how they appeal to viewers. they each cause us to think very cautiously and differently about each argument. Arguments can be formed and supported in so many different ways, Stem from one common disagreement. without the people in the picture on the left protesting for gun control, the image on the right would not be able to exist because those people wouldn’t feel the need to defend their right to the Second Amendment. The bigger the approach on the viewers’ emotions the more likely they are to be efficient and getting people to side with them.
