Last Week Tonight John Oliver Analysis

Last Week Tonight is a news/satire program hosted by John Oliver. During the program, Oliver discusses current events and attempts to persuade the general audience in his viewing. In the episode “The NCAA,” Oliver attempts to get the audience on his side about unfairly compensated Student-Athletes using logic, credibility, and emotion. This essay will analyze the effectiveness of his persuasive methods. In this episode, John Oliver uses evidence to back up a majority of his statements in his attempt to persuade the audience. Evidence was portrayed occasionally in a comedic way to support Oliver’s agenda. This is show when Oliver uses footage of sponsorships of an NCAA basketball tournament dubbed “March Madness,” showing how even the ladder used to cut the net of the basketball goal, a tradition after you win a game, is sponsored. Oliver also uses evidence in a serious manner when he shows the contract forcing athletes to concede to being amateurs and the large rulebook that is required to be signed by the …show more content…
At the end of the program, Oliver shows a skit of a new NCAA game that shows more than just playing a basketball game. It showed being able to play as an athlete all the way through college to a realistic level which includes losing scholarship for reasons like injury and accepting monetary compensation and also being yelled at by the coach and falling asleep during practice from exhaustion. Oliver uses the satirical game to help make NCAA games more “realistic” according to a commercial he showed during the program. Oliver also uses a reference of Mariah Carey’s movie career when the NCAA states that Universities do not make much profit. Using the satiric comparison as “just doing it for the love of the game.” Satire helps the audience find logic and reasoning through inferred counterarguments and Oliver uses it to help the audience come to his conclusion by