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Robert F. Kennedy's Speech Analysis

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Robert F. Kennedy was a United States Senator in New York from 1965 up until his death in 1968. Kennedy was a man who could get his message heard by thousands of people in a very short amount of time due to the uprise in technology. Robert F. Kennedy used his power to say some words regarding the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. earlier that day. Kennedy channeled pathos, and used repetition, as well as appealing to anger, fear, and hope consistently throughout his speech. Robert F. Kennedy sunk his heart into the speech and moved many Americans in his final farewell to MLK Jr., as he pushed forward in supporting African-Americans and racial equality. In Robert F. Kennedy’s remarks to the Martin Luther King, Jr. assassination consisted mainly of pathos. Kennedy reached out into the hearts of the American people and succeeded in his attempts. Kennedy opens his speech with “I’m going to talk to you just for a minute or so this evening because I have some -- some very sad news for all …show more content…

“For those of you who are black -- considering the evidence evidently there is that there were white people who were responsible.” Kennedy doesn’t just shut down these people who were greatly discouraged by the recent events of their biggest voices for their race, but instead, Kennedy tells them that “you can be filled with bitterness, and with hatred, and a desire for change.” He takes their anger and transforms it into hope. Kennedy then says “for those of you who are black and are tempted to fill with -- be filled with hatred and mistrust of the injustice of such an act, against all white people, I would only say that I can also feel in my own heart the same kind of feeling.” Kennedy takes their anger and relates to it. Kennedy then throws pathos into the mixing pot along with his anger. He puts himself in the shoes of the black people of the late 1960s and relates it to a time where he too suffered a loss of a family

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