Anti Smoking Ethos Analysis

Discovering the Truth:
The Operation of Ethos in Anti-Smoking
Advertising
REBECCA FELDMANN
This rhetorical analysis appeared in a journal called Young Scholars in Writing, which publishes articles on rhetoric and composition written by college undergraduates. Feldmann shows how the popular and effective Truth campaign appeals to teens by building ethos and challenging the ethos of tobacco companies.
As you read, look at how she carefully defines concepts up front, which she can then use later in the rhetorical analysis.
In 1998, the Florida Tobacco Pilot Pro- gram (FTPP) launched a $25 million Truth advertising campaign to alert teenagers to the dangers of smoking and to reduce teen tobacco use. The Truth campaign began
when
The Refusal Skills Role Model theme op- erates by explaining why “many attractive role models view smoking as unappealing and demonstrate refusals of cigarette offers”(4). The Smokers’ Negative Life Circum- stances theme stresses that smoking is a barrier to appearing “mature, independent, savvy, attractive, and cool” (4). Many of the advertisements of the Truth campaign em- ploy the Smokers’ Negative Life Circumstances theme stresses that smoking is a barrier to appearing “mature, independent, savvy, attractive, and cool” (4). Many of the advertisements of the Truth campaign employ the Smokers’ Negative Life Circum- stances theme. These commercials revolve around a dictum encouraging teens and young people to “Ask questions” and “Seek truth.” By prompting such discourse, the
Truth advertisements communicate that, unlike the tobacco firms who encourage youth to passively accept their message, this antismoking campaign challenges them to be come “mature, independent, [and] savvy” by prodding these industries for answers and by intelligently drawing out the consequences of smoking. The Truth campaign thus
Good virtue [aretï]
In On Rhetoric, Aristotle says that virtue “is an ability [dynamis], as it seems, that is pro- ductive and preservative of goods, and an ability for doing good in many and great ways, actually in all ways in all things [1366b]” (79). The subdivisions of virtue are
“justice, manly courage, self-control, magnificence, magnanimity, liberality, gentle- ness, prudence, and wisdom” (79–80). “Thegreatest virtues,” he continues, “are neces- sarily those most useful to others. For that reason people most honor the just and the courageous” (80). Indeed, the “just and the courageous” are present throughout all of the Truth ads. Along with wisdom, they comprise the main subdivisions of virtue at work in this form of rhetoric.
One Truth billboard depicts an older man in a bikini holding a cigarette; the cap- tion is “No wonder tobacco executives hide behind sexy models.” This advertisement demonstrates both the “just and the courageous” by implying that tobacco