Climate Change Rhetorical Analysis

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Pages: 5

Effectiveness of Emotion in Climate Change.

Environmental challenges have become the real urgency of the world: sea levels are rising, glaciers are melting, extreme weather events are occurring, and biodiversity is declining. Ecosystems like Puerto Rico and Palau have been destroyed by severe storms, making it extremely difficult for residents to continue living on vulnerable islands. The cause of all this is climate change. Advocates such as Greta Thunberg and Zach Efron have made efforts to expose the harsh realities of climate change that will happen if the attention of policymakers does not switch to the overheating earth. On the other hand, researchers like Yadvinder Malhi are discovering the threats and solutions revolving around climate
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In Thunberg's speech, she mentions that people and ecosystems are suffering and dying because of climate change, yet all the people in politics care about is the economic standpoint of the country (Thunberg 274). She gives her audience at the conference a sense of guilt and betrayal, saying that they are the ones responsible for the mass number of people suffering and the habitat loss for species. Similarly, in the middle of the Netflix documentary Down to Earth with Zac Efron, Zac meets a family whose house was destroyed by severe storms and does not have the money to clean up the crumbled house or the workforce to lift the debris. With climate change being the cause of the horrible destruction of homes in Puerto Rico, it gives the viewers of the series a feeling of empathy towards the lives ruined by the storms. The feeling of empathy, much like guilt, can sway one’s opinion on topics like climate change, as individuals do not want to see others suffer. The documentary does an effective job of showing the impacts of climate change, allowing viewers of the series