There are so many ways to define rhetoric using many different words. Some that may come to mind are persuasion, influence, deceit, along with many others. All of these words influence people, because it is the power of how the rhetor communicates their message.
Some people may think that Rhetoric is always a form of manipulation. But is it true? Yes, it is always a different kind of manipulation but it may not be malicious. Meaning, someone might manipulate you into buying a candy bar at the store because of such a great sale. But at the end of the day they just persuaded you to do something with no harm, so that is not malicious. But, the way Nick Naylor convinced people to smoke cigarettes in Thank You for Smoking was malicious. Because he knew that cigarettes brought harm to people and he did nothing about it, because he only cared about getting his paycheck.
One of the main questions to ask about rhetoric is "is it bad?" In the case of the movie Thank You for Smoking the use of rhetoric was bad. All of the following words come to mind when thinking of this movie, bad influence, bad manipulation, deceit, destructive.
Depending on the situations that you are in will determine the different ways that you define rhetoric.
So, there is not one set definition for this term.
There definitely is no set definition for the word rhetoric. I do think that there is a difference between manipulating and persuading someone to do something. Manipulating someone is like controlling them to do what they want. Persuading someone is using facts to get the opposing side to agree with your point.
ReplyDeleteI agree with what you say about manipulation not always being about something malicious. The person manipulating another person to buy a candy bar is not malicious, therefore when people hear the word manipulation they should not automatically assume that it is malicious. There is manipulation that can be malicious though, like you pointed out with Nick Naylor convincing people to smoke.
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