COM 210-020
2/24/17
Blog #1
Trump's New Vision
Most
Americans are still shocked from this year's presidential election. Many are
supportive of President Trump's new visions and ideas, while others...not. A
recent movement President Trump's administration purposed was the idea of
enforced deportation of illegal immigrants, regardless if they are criminals or
hard workers (Shear, M. D., & Nixon, R., 2017). “President Trumps states
that, the No. 1 priority is that people who pose a threat to our country are
immediately dealt with” (Shear, M. D., & Nixon, R., 2017). Obama’s
administration made a policy towards illegal immigrants stating that those
undocumented immigrants convicted of a serious crime be deported. Now President
Trump’s new enforcement is not only the criminal undocumented immigrants
deported, but also all illegal aliens that are not a citizen of the United
States of America. President Trump’s new enforcement on the illegal immigration
policy has caused a mixed and competing uproar with all people of this country.
This
isn’t just your basic liberal versus conservative battle we have going on here,
this is a battle for people's lives, people's workers, and their children's
futures. Americans for this new immigration policy are supportive of Trumps
actions towards illegal immigration. They believe that these illegal aliens are
taking “advantage of the system” by not paying the proper taxes, taking our
jobs, and causing uncommitted crimes. Americans against Trumps new policy state
that the illegal immigrates work the hard labor jobs which “real Americans” do
not want.
The
demographics being targeted here are the Latin Americans and Mexicans. In the
article, “New Trump Deportation Rules
Allow Far More Expulsions” by the New York Times, aims for the target
audience, called the moderates. Your moderate audience is usually uninformed,
apathetic, or yet to form an opinion on a current issue. The New York Times
stayed generally neutral towards this topic, which is beneficial to any
audience, especially the target one. “A fact sheet released by the
Department of Homeland Security said, using the acronym for Immigration and Customs Enforcement. “All of
those present in violation of the immigration laws may be subject to
immigration arrest, detention, and, if found removable by final order, removal
from the United States” (Shear,
M. D., & Nixon, R., 2017). The above
quote is an example of the authors’ having a non-bias view, stating only the factual
information given to them. Persuasion over politics is difficult and it is
often hard to be objective. Overall, this article stayed neutral, letting the
audience make their own decisions for themselves about what is right and wrong.
The techniques this article used were more of an informative speech rather than
pure persuasion by informing the public on this new immigration policy stating
actual facts and quotes from the Trump administration rather than talking about
their own opinion.
NBC
NEWS article titled, “Trump Enforcement Plan Has Immigrants Bracing for Raids,
Deportation” by Suzanne Gamboa was the second article read. After reading this
article, Gamboa inflicted her liberal views in many of this articles
information. Many of her quotes were about how bad this policy is and how
against people are towards it. “I think they are otherwise law abiding people
and the new administration is broadening the scope so much, they are under
threat and they are afraid of coming out (into public areas) even a little bit”
(Gamboa, 2017). She did not get all sides of the story and instead got biased
yet credible sources. NBC NEWS is targeting the sympathetic audience who
already agree with the speaker’s views. NBC NEWS used a minor form of the Mere
Exposure Theory as well.
Both
articles are informative about Trump’s new immigration vision. The New York
Times stayed neutral therefore targeting the moderate audience while NBC News stuck
with the liberal views of the sympathetic audience, who already agree with the
speaker.
Work Cited:
Gamboa, S. (2017, February 21). Trump enforcement
plan has immigrants bracing for raids, deportations. Retrieved February 22,
2017, from
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/trump-enforcement-plan-has-immigrants-bracing-raids-deportations-n723771
Shear,
M. D., & Nixon, R. (2017, February 21). New Trump Deportation Rules Allow
Far More Expulsions. Retrieved February 22, 2017, from
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/21/us/politics/dhs-immigration-trump.html?_r=0
Immigration, having been one of the central issues to Mr. Trump's campaign, has certainly become one of the main political battlegrounds in the early months of this administration. Remember that our goal here is not to assess the relative merits of any argument, but rather to examine closely the way persuasive strategies are used - especially within the broad narratives that emerge from these controversies. I appreciate the choice of these two articles, but remember that the goal here is to explore the competing narratives emerging from the issue.
ReplyDeleteYour description of the immigration issue - as being "a battle for people's lives, people's workers, and their children's futures" - would indicate the framing that you would consider to be appropriate. This is a decidedly different frame from those who would consider illegal immigration to be a dangerous drain on the nation's resources. Where one person would express concern for a family and their future, another person would wonder why there is so much concern for the future of an individual who knowingly broke immigration laws to be here in the first place. Are existing laws only applicable to those who have yet to illegally enter the country? Then, once they have entered illegally, are those laws null and void to their situation?
You suggest that the audience for the NYTimes report is "Latin Americans and Mexicans" and then later "moderates." But consider who reads the NYT - and thus the audience for whom editors will choose stories and reports. The NYTimes (as well as NBC news) is a demonstrably left-leaning publication, well aware of the political inclinations of their respective audience. You suggest that one statement in the report is "an example of the authors’ having a non-bias view, stating only the factual information given to them;" but that is drawing a broad conclusion out of a narrow context. Any article represents a particular viewpoint - and so cannot be assessed in small pieces. Be careful in your role as an objective analyst - you seem anxious to justify the validity of the article you say you are evaluating.
Take a look at a few right-leaning sources (Wall Street Journal, National Review, Weekly Standard) or Libertarian sources (Reason) or even some of the more extreme sources on both left and right (VOX, Breitbart, RedState, Huffington Post) for more articles and descriptions of the immigration issue. Our class is about developing the capacity to recognize persuasive techniques objectively, rather than simply joining in the debate.
Please let me know how I can help.