Rhetorical Analysis Of Make Conversation Great Again By David Banks

As is stated on his website “davidabanks.org”, David Banks holds a PhD in Science and Technology Studies From Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute among other degrees. In today’s society one might think such accomplishments would naturally give his thoughts the value of being credibly and eagerly shared. Unfortunately, this is not the case when criticizing the work of such a charismatic speaker as Sherry Turkle as he did in his article “Make Conversation Great Again". In an age where delusions are sold to the first bidder only to be later recognized as “fake news”, is real thought failing us because it’s not being sold?

Banks opens his article with a blatant and uninhibited appeal to Sherry Turkle's audience by substantiating her successes to …show more content…
Although this was a brilliant way to present the first point in his argument, I might suggest that this is the beginning of where he went wrong in the success of his presentation. Banks appeals to the Ethical (ethos) segment of his argument by introducing a common question in many industries of today’s society “who benefits?” ,before fully addressing the other two. While this is an adequate way to intrigue any educated interest, in my experience the ethical argument cannot come first for the majority of the population and absolutely must be sidelined with a stronger emotional appeal.Banks is questioning whether or not we can trust Turkle, without reminding us why we are emotionally engaged enough to care. Rather than successfully following through with such an implicative question, Banks jumps straight into a general summarization of Turkle’s work. Through doing this he sets his audience up to skim through his thoughtful commentary until throwing us into another emotionally charged statement in the third paragraph. Why bother proposing a thought he doesn’t care for us to think through with him if only for …show more content…
Addressing the important issue of mis-information “...acting on bad information...people with the right information have to spend more time correcting the record and not enough time thinking about remedies.”. This is an issue in and of itself which could be extensively expanded upon in another setting, instead he brings it up here in relation to Turkle with no real solution as at this point he has danced between invalidating and validating her work so repeatedly I can’t expect the reader to have any clear understanding as to what his real argument is or even what might be a solution. Nearing the end of the article Banks seems to have lost any reservation he might have previously had in a supposed desire to connect with his readership and even goes so far as to saying her work is only good for “...dividing the world into priests and