Identify as many persuasive techniques as you can find on the site.
Peta (http://www.peta.org/) uses an abundance of the Basic/ Intermediate/ Advanced persuasion techniques. The following is a list of them and in what way does Peta employ them to their website:
· Association: Peta uses this technique by associating the actions that the website is taking with helping the world to be a better place. So if one feels like giving charity they can associate Peta with being one of those organizations that are for a good cause.
· Bandwagon: Peta kind of does this by showing how celebrities do this so should you, or in another point of view if you like animals and want to protect them why don’t you like this organization.
· Beautiful people / celebrities: Pamela Anderson and many other celebrities that are associated with Peta are always used as the face of the organization and sometimes if the celebrity does something against animals e.g. wears fur they will receive very bad publicity on-behalf of Peta.
· Fear: although this is the opposite of association the website of Peta still does this since it tries to strike fear into the audience by showing them how much animals are suffering and pictures that are quite disturbing.
· Humor: Peta does try to this by adding to its items under the shop tab things like “MCcruelty I’m hati’n it” which is a humors way to view McDonald yet it has a clear meaning behind it.
· The Big Lie: Peta does use this since there are a lot of things that they fail to explain and rather jump to conclusions. E.g. under the shop tab there is a shirt that says ‘meat is murder’ and another one that says ‘ people who wear fur are bad’
· Charisma: I am not sure if this can apply to the organization itself but I think that Peta tries to be bold, strong and confident as an animal rights advocate.
· Extrapolation: this is kind of like the big lie technique.
· Name-calling: Peta is a pretty noticeable factor of name-calling in Hollywood. If a celebrity speaks for animal right they are suddenly the face of Peta, and on opposite side if they use fur they are seen in a very negative light by the organization and that sometimes may affect their reputation.
· Scientific Evidence: This sometimes used by Peta on their website when they are trying to present some data or have some science theory that supports their cause.
· Simple Solutions: This sort of applies to Peta when they are saying that the world can be a cruel place but if you help the animals it can become much better, which may seem as a simple solution but in the real world its more complicated than that.
· Straw man: this technique can be seen in Peta when they are trying to make all the fast food restaurants responsible for a lot of trouble which may seem as an Ok thing to do but when they start blaming these corporations for all the misfortune in animal cruelty it becomes a bit unfair toward these food companies since they are not the only factor that is cruel to animals.
Do you think these techniques are effective?
Yes and no. I personally am not the greatest fan of Peta so some of the techniques used don’t really affect me and they come out very exaggerated to me, but some of them really make me think about the way animals are being treated around the world which makes me want to stop these violent acts. In my opinion I would an animal rights supporter but for now I’d rather be a human rights activist since there are many who are in need of our help and their rights and those are more of a priority in my eyes.
Are they Propaganda? Is Propaganda ever justified?
I don’t think so given that Peta already has a lot of supporters is pretty famous in Pop culture so I won’t see them trying to deliver only half the truth since they already have quite a large audience. I believe propaganda can be justified when it works for a good reason but nowadays a lot of people around the world are demanding to know the truth and the whole story and this places a large amount of pressure on governments, large companies and advertisements.
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