Propaganda Project
Amrin Haque
PROPAGANDA 1
- Appeal to Popular - In this piece of war propaganda, appeal to the popular is used very obviously. The phrase, “Your chums are fighting, why aren’t you?” basically states that everyone else is fighting so the audience should too. This is appeal to the popular as the audience is urged to also takes the position as the other men seem to be apart of the cause.
- Bandwagon - Due to the phrase stated and also the image of the soldiers fighting, the men who aren't enlisted in the war yet feel as if they should be apart of the war. This a fallacy because the speaker is making the audience feel that they need to be apart of the war and fight on when they have the right not to fight.
- Appeal to guilt - The audience may feel guilt for not partaking in war. The poster makes the audience feel like the need to become a soldier and be apart of war as it mentions "why aren't you?". This is a fallacy because you don't need to be a soldier in the war but the poster indirectly forces you to want to do it.
RHETORICAL SITUATION
- Audience - The audience at the time were the men in America who hadn’t joined the military yet. The government wanted to more people to fight in the war to make it easier for a win.
- Speaker - The speaker is an American war supporter who wants more people to be recruited into war.
- Exigence - Due to WW1 and America now recently joining, there needed to be more men being ready to fight.
- Context - The poster was created during the time of WW1, specifically around 1917 when the US joined after being neutral for a bit. America at the time had just joined the war after being instigated by Germany’s submarine attacks.
- Purpose - The poster’s ambitious tone and diction highlights the idea of joining war in the positive light. This allows the audience to want to be apart of something that will put their life on the line as the poster makes the idea of war something that is lighthearted. The speaker’s intention was to get more people to become soldiers in WW1 so they could win the war.
- Color
- Black - The color black in the picture was used to emphasize the soldiers in the poster compared to the light background. This causes the audience to take a notice on the soldiers as they read the text
- Blue - The blue symbolizes words like trust, loyalty and confidence. It also makes us feel comfortable and sound. This was used because soldiers are men of trust, loyalty and confidence. Any willed man would believe the same for themselves and think they would be fit to join. Also, the toned down blue treats war as something lighthearted and calm, which is actually the opposite, but makes the audience think that being apart of war is not dangerous at all.
- Symbolism
- Soldier - the speaker puts soldiers on the poster because they want the audience to become soldiers. They are showing the strength of the soldier and how that could be other men in the audience.
- Text
- "Chum" - by using this word, the speaker is creating a connection that the men in war are people you know. They are your friends, neighbors, coworkers. This enables the audience to feel a sense of familiarity and comfort as the audience would know others at war.
- "Your" and "You" - By using words like "you" and "your", the speaker is directly pointing towards the audience, making them think more about their position on whether they should go to war or not. When the attention is pointed towards you, you think more about what you should do.
PROPAGANDA 2
- False Dilemma - False dilemma is being represented in this piece of propaganda as we are only given to options which are “black” or “white”. There is no grey area in which we are allowed to choose from. This forces the audience to fall into an either or situation as they feel they need to choose the side that is being well represented when there is more than one answer to issue at hand
- Appeal to Guilt - The fallacy of appeal to guilt is being implemented because in the propaganda piece, the devil in being compared to the baby. This is a really huge and drastic comparison. This causes the audience to feel guilt that they ever agreed to any ideas of abortion that aren’t even mentioned in the poster as the idea of abortion is represented by the devil while pro life is represented by a baby.
- Appeal to Fear - There is an appeal to fear in this poster as the audience and majority of the world fear the idea of the devil. The devil is a bad being that nobody wants to be associated with or apart of leading the audience to support the idea of pro life to avoid being in ties with “devilish” ideologies.
RHETORICAL SITUATION
- Audience - The intended audience are pro-choice people that support the right for women to get abortions. The secondary audience are people who are neutral about pro-choice/pro-life and are either not interested or are confused about what side they are on.
- Speaker - The speaker is a supporter of the pro-life movement. The speaker doesn't support the right for an abortion and believes that abortion equates to the death of an innocent life.
- Exigence - The speaker was motivated to make this piece because they are many people who still weren't a supporter of the pro-life movement or where neutral and the speaker wanted to garner more support.
- Context - This poster was created during current times which is the 21st century. Currently, there is a huge debate on the issue of pro-life vs pro-choice in the government. This poster was created from the side of those who are pro-choice who don't support abortion.
- Purpose - The speaker’s purpose was to convince those against the ideas of pro-life to become a pro-life supporter. People who are pro-life want to make abortion illegal throughout the US and by gathering more support, their plans on banning abortion would work.
- Color -
- Red - the speaker uses the color red, a violent and bloody color as negative connotation on the idea of abortion. It also represents the colors of the devil, a villain in the eyes of majority.
- White - the speaker uses the color white to to represent the innocence and purity of a baby. This wholesome color allows for a positive connotation to the left hand side of the propaganda picture.
- Black - the black color, being placed on the right hand side where the red also is again represents the evil side that is linked to the devil. Black represents darkness and produces a eery and negative connotation.
- Text -
- The text in the middle of the red and white halves that says “abortion” in all capital lettering with a slash againsts it shows the speakers agenda of not supporting abortion.
- The text questioning which hand we would rather hold traps us into choosing either or and is in all capital letters again, emphasizing the question that the reader is asked.
- The main text, written in red on the white backdrop and white on the red backdrop gives us the two big options. Either the baby or the devil. Both written in the opposite colors of the background to emphasize even more the two big choices.
- Placement
- The placement of the photo shows half the poster with an adult hand holding the hand of a baby while the other half of the poster shows an adult hand hold the hand of a baby devil. The placement allows us to have a visual look of the two options that were given in deciding whether to support abortion or not.
- Symbolism
- Devil hand - the devil’s hand shows the hands of abortion. This represents the decision that if supporting abortion, you would be taking the life of someone innocent and not even born into the world, therefore, taking sides with the devil, a being that is evil and malevolent. Also alongside the devil is the devil’s pitchfork; presumably to pitch people into the fires of hell.
- Baby hand - this baby’s hand is the hand of pro-choice. By not supporting abortion, you are allowing for all lives to be born and not killed in the womb. The baby is innocence and kindness. In a way, by seeing the baby’s small and precious hands, the reader would feel guilt in supporting abortion.
PROPAGANDA 3
- Bandwagon - The speaker uses bandwagon because in a sense, the reader might feel isolated to the fact that “1.5 million” people and more are using these lollipops to suppress their appetite to lose weight making you feel like you’re the only one not making any effort in trying to become skinny.
- Appeal to popularity - Again, when the billboard states that “1.5 million” people and counting buy and uses these lollipops, it makes the reader believe that these lollipops really work to suppress appetite and convince the reader that they are legit and that society approves it as so many people use it.
- Appeal to emotion - For those with body insecurities, seeing in big words, “Got Cravings!” and “Flat Tummy” in big letters makes the reader urged to get the lollipop. This is due to the idea that those with insecurities would relate and feel bad about their cravings and would want a flat tummy. The reader is made to feel bad about themselves and want to change their body through these lollipops that makes one starve.
RHETORICAL ANALYSIS
- Audience - The audience are people that are body insecure and want to lose weight or people that had the goal of losing weight in general
- Speaker - The speaker is a worker or workers at Flat Tummy Company that support the appetite suppressant lollipops
- Purpose - The purpose of the billboard is the convince the audience to purchase the lollipops
- Exigence - Knowing that people of this current generation and time were body insecure due to social media it was a great idea to take advantage of that and promote this appetite suppressant lollipops that basically equate to starvation.
- Context - This piece was made in the 21st century. This is a time of mass media and high body standards that many people are affected by and insecure by.
- Color -
- Pink - The color used in the background of the billboard is a millennial and trendy pink color that many of the audience would be intrigued by. It is a bright but also comforting color that is well received by many people of current times
- Text -
- The big text in big letters attracts the audience. Also by using current words like “babe” and by incorporating hashtags, it makes the audience attracted to the relatable format of the text
- Symbolism -
- The model in the picture with the lollipop symbolizes a cool, skinny and pretty girl that many would find desirable and would want to achieve what the model has. And by making the model use the lollipop, it makes the consumer feel that the lollipops are more legitimate as a pretty and skinny model is using it.
PROPAGANDA 4
- Ad Hominem - Kaepernick in this poster is being attacked because of his belief going against the belief of the speaker. He is being attacked by being represented as a “snowflake” that whines about everything while being chained to his multi million dollar contract. As being represented as “modern oppression”, the audience would get annoyed that a rich football player would be someone who is oppressed.
- Appeal to ridicule - By ridiculing Kaepernick and showing him as a millionaire with a pacifier, they are enabling the audience to think of him as a whiny rich child who's opinion is unnecessary and not needed. This is a logical fallacy because the attack of how much money he makes has nothing to do with why he is protesting and kneeling during the anthem.
- Straw Man - The speaker is using the straw man fallacy here because instead of showing the action of Kaepernick's intentions of him kneeling during the anthem to gain attraction to the topic of police brutality on black people, the speaker is showing a distorted version of what he thinks Kaerpernick is doing which is being a whiny spoiled boy who is feeling attacked.
- Purpose - The purpose of the poster was to say that the idea of supporting football players who kneel during the national anthem to protest against oppression is faulty and is for attention.
- Speaker - The speaker is someone who does not support the actions of football players who kneel during the anthem and believes they are a bunch of sensitive rich snobs. The speaker holds the right wing agenda and beliefs a he believes in a "safe space" and doesn't respect the leftist ideologies of Kaepernick.
- Audience - The audience are the people of America that are aware of political and social situations.
- Context - This poster was created in the 21st century. This is a time where there still a lot of police brutality and most is targeted towards black people. Kaerpernick, a football player from the 49ers began to kneel during the anthem as a way to get ahold of people's attention as he protests police brutality and racial inequality.
- Exigence - The speaker either does not agree to Kaepernick's ideas or does not know why Kaepernick is kneeling and assumes he is trying to disrespect the flag so the speaker felt the need to address the situation and give his opinion on the actions of Kaepernick.
SYMBOLS
- The pacifier and bottle represents that Kaepernick is a child. To pacify someone is to make them stop whining and crying and the use of the pacifier is showing how sensitive and child like Kaepernick is.
- The chain represents that Kaepernick is chained down to his money. It symbolizes that he wants all this attention but wants to still be tied to his multi million dollar contract
- The white chair, as said in the poster is a "safe space". A "safe space" is a place where people feel marginalized can come together and discuss their feelings without any bias. Some people believe this space to be a place of oversensitivism and coddling of people, which was the belief of the speaker in the poster.
TEXT AND PLACEMENT
- The text, written in black over a white background is made to grab our attention about how the picture of Kaepernick below it is "modern oppression". The placement of the speech bubble to the side while Kaepernick is sitting up front represents how Kaepernick was able to grab the everyone's attention and put the anthem to the side. Which the speaker does not support and it trying to show how Kaepernick's distraction is working.
MY PROPAGANDA
RHETORICAL SITUATION
- Purpose - The purpose of this advertisement poster is to motivate people to purchase a waist trainer because they believe that the waist trainers will get them a small waist.
- Audience - The intended audience are consumers that are insecure about their bodies and want a drastic different in their bodies in a small time period. This is specifically leaned more towards women who are greatly affected by the media. The secondary audience are people that aren't insecure but already had the intention to possibly lose weight and get a smaller waist in the first place.
- Speaker - The speaker is someone apart of the company that is trying to making the audience purchase their products.
- Exigence - The speaker made this poster so they could reach an audience that would be motivated to buy their product so they could make more money and sell more waist trainers.
- Context - The poster was made in current times so the 21st century where mass media influences many people and majority of the world has access to this media. Many people of now are insecure due to the body standards and expectations put out by the media. This includes magazines, tv shows, clothing companies, etc. This is also during a time where people want instant results and have less patience. Everything is fast paced.
FALLACIES
- False Authority - Appeal to authority is used in this poster because an extremely famous "self made" billionaire, Kylie Jenner is wearing the waist trainer. Although she isn't talking about the waist trainer in the poster, she is wearing it and by doing that, is promoting the waist trainers. Kylie Jenner is promoting that the waist trainer could work, but she is in no position to actually know if it works. Her claim could be correct, but she isn't a body or fitness expert that understands how the human body works.
- Appeal to Emotion - Appeal to emotion is used in this poster as the poster evokes either envy or insecurity from the audience. When looking at the girl in the poster with a good body, you would either feel envy and jealousy that you lack in those qualities the model has or you would feel insecure because you would look at her body and feel ashamed of yours. This is a fallacy that messes and twists with the audiences emotions in order for them to be shamed into purchasing a waist trainer to make them feel better about their bodies.
- Bandwagon - Bandwagon is used in the poster as it says that "Millions of pretty girls have it. So should you!". By saying that millions of other girls are using the waist trainer, you feel like it not only works because so many people use it but also feel like you should purchase the trainer because everyone has it because everyone should have a small waist! This is a fallacy because they're making the audience feel like they should be part of the loop too although the product might not even work.
- Appeal to Flattery - There is appeal to flattery when the speaker says "Put a nice waist that the nice face" and, "Millions of pretty girls have it". Both these phrases flatter the audience as both are compliments that make the audience feel better about themselves. This helps motivate the audience again to purchase the waist trainer more because they feel better about themselves even before having the product. The appeal to flattery fallacy allowed us to ignore the actual product and how it works and focus into compliment the audience instead.
TEXT AND COLOR
- The intention of the text was to make it big and noticeable. I purposely used aesthetic and trendy colors like bubblegum pink and royal blue to attract the audience more as it seems like a product that would be "cool". The gray background is intended to be more of a neutral background in contrast to the bright text and model.
SYMBOL
- By using a gorgeous model with a skinny waist, I made the audience try to feel envy. I did so in attempting to make the audience want to have the model's body as their own body and in so end up buying the waist trainer
PART ONE
I had to do a lot of research in the beginning. Initially, it took me a while to find 4 good pieces of propaganda that contained a lot of fallacies in them. So even before started the process, I had to research and understand more fallacies so I would be able to both visually and verbally see them in the variety of posters. There was also added research time because I had to look for 4 different types of propaganda. A few being political propaganda, war propaganda and more. After finding my 4 pieces and getting approval from Mrs. Alexander, I still struggled with my analysis of those pieces. It took me a while at first to find logical fallacies for the posters and I realized I still didn't fully get a grasp on them. Thankfully, the Nizkor Logical Fallacy List helped me out a lot in understanding a huge variety of fallacies and I was able to find some in the 4 pieces. The other aspects of the project were not too difficult for me. I understood rhetorical situation for the most part because I already had a good understanding of it from the previous year but did have to go and research exigence and got a little confused on context at first but was able to understand it after Mrs. Alexander explained it to the class. I felt that analyzing text, placement and symbolism was not of too much difficulty because I have been learning and understand topics as such for a long time. Logical fallacies on the other hand did take me a while to get and I still get a little confused at times. For example, on Propaganda 2 it didn't take me long to easily understand the meaning of poster like the color, text, stance etc. But I was stuck on finding fallacies for a long time until I looked back on the Nizkor Logical Fallacy List.
PART 2
I kept my propaganda piece straight and to the point. The poster is advertising propaganda encouraged to make the audience purchase a waist trainer. The visual rhetoric I used was pathos and ethos. I used no logos in the piece as there is nothing logical and good about a waist trainer. In fact, it can be dangerous. As the intended audience was body insecure people, building emotion in them would be key into them purchasing the product. By mentioning how they could become pretty and have a small and nice body but also to be to see a famous figure with one of society's ideal bodies enables the audience to want to buy a waist trainer to fix their insecurity. Visually, ethos was built through Kylie. She makes the waist trainer more credible and believable as people tend to believe the opinions and actions of an authoritative figure like a celebrity. The logical fallacies I ended up using were appeal to flattery, bandwagon, appeal to emotion and false authority. All of these fallacies would easily end up pushing the audience into buying a waist trainer. There were texts in the poster that compliment the audience, making them overlook the actual validity of the product which is appeal to flattery. Another piece of text stated that "Millions of pretty girls have it. So should you" creates a bandwagon fallacy as it makes the buyer seem the the product is legitimate because everyone has it and also making the buyer feel the need to get it as everyone else is trying for a small waist and so should they. Appeal to emotion allowed for the intended insecure buyer to feel the need to buy something that would make them feel better about themselves. The model in the picture is beautiful and has a great body which then creates envy and want for the body and in turn makes the audience buy the waist trainer.