Rhetorical Analysis Of Our Blind Spot About Guns
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Guns don’t kill people. People kill people. Many believe this, but columnist Nicholas Kristof, author of “Our Blind Spot about Guns,” published in 2014 in the New York Times, disagrees. A rhetorical analysis should consist of: logos, pathos, and ethos. Kristof’s use of logos is strong due to the amount of facts and statistics he offers to his audience, but he fails to strongly use pathos and ethos, due to the lack of these elements Kristof’s argument is weakened. Kristof somewhat effectively argues that if guns and their owners were controlled in the same way that cars and their drivers are, thousands of lives could be protected each year by using persuasive techniques. Kristof’s essay adequately compares car regulations to gun control. He is extremely comprehensive on reasons why we should have gun regulations similar to automobiles controls. Kristof contrasts the statistics of firearm and automobile deaths to move the readers to harmonize with his opinion of the subject. Throughout his work, Kristof uses strong sources that strengthen his credibility and appeal to ethos. He references a book, A Biography by Michael Waldman, the president of of the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law. He quotes Waldman as stating, “Gun control laws were ubiquitous.” He then includes in his own work, “As a distinguished former congressman, Robert Cousins, put in 1910: Pedestrians are menaced every minute of the days and nights by a wanton recklessness of