According to a study in 2008, only 3.2% of the population in the United States are vegetarians. Many people have different opinions on whether killing animals for food is an moral practice or not due to their own set of beliefs. In that small percentage of vegetarians is Jonathan Safran Foer, the author of the article “Against Meat” in the book They Say, I Say. He discusses about why he became a vegetarian through a narrative of different times throughout his own life. His purpose for writing this article is to persuade other individuals to become more self aware of what they value, how they were established, and why they’re important. This article was written by Foer in 2009 which is around the time that obesity became highlighted as a much…show more content… Foer takes vital stages of his life, categorizes them, and individually describes where he was as a vegetarian in that moment. The use of personal stories throughout his article may allow the readers to connect it to their own experience. Another way he connects with his readers is by using rhetorical devices. For example, he states “Every factory-farmed animal is, as is a practice, treated in ways that would illegal if it were a dog or a cat” (Foer 257). Foer uses an analogy to compare farm animals to dogs and cats which will allow for the reader to appeal to pathos. The reader should feel remorseful when reading this quote because they may have a animal at home they love, but they continue to eat meat. This may cause them to think about their moral choices which proves that Foer’s article is effective in pathos. Not only does Foer use his own personal experience to make his point, he uses his grandmother’s. The use of the anecdote describing his grandmother’s experience through World War II justifies his main points even more so. He starts off her story with “My grandmother’s survived World War II barefoot, scavenging Eastern Europe for other people’s inedibles: rotting potatoes, discarded scraps of meat, skins and the bits that clung to bones and pits” (Foer 448). However, he ends…show more content… He uses his personal experiences and credibility through his personal narrative to show that values do matter and they play a big role one’s choices to target his audience of people who are concerned with their diet. His chronological personal stories of starting and stopping vegetarianism shows why he is one, how it is important, and what he had gone through leading to it. He showed his audience his purpose of persuasion was not only to have more people become vegetarians, but also for those people to follow their values when making a choice. Through rhetorical analysis of this article, It is proven that Jonathan Safran Foer highlighted his main point, supported it through the five A’s, and explained it throughout the use of the three appeals to convey that it’s important to consider being a vegetarian but more important to follow your
