The Rush Limbaugh debate as well as other samples of political incivility point out the necessity for the type of instruction available in numerous first-year writing courses, writes John Duffy.
Of all of the terms that would be placed on Rush Limbaugh’s comments that are recent Georgetown University legislation pupil Sandra Fluke — "vile," "misogynistic" and "repulsive" spring to mind — one word which includes room within the conversation is "shock." Limbaugh has produced career that is phenomenally lucrative of reviews, mocking ladies, minorities, and many more with gleeful impunity. In doing this, he's got influenced a tiny but disproportionately noisy military of imitators on talk radio, cable tv, and, increasingly, when you look at the halls of Congress, whoever rhetorical techniques of misinformation, demonization, incendiary metaphors, and poisonous historic analogies have inked much to debase general public discourse.
Toxic rhetoric is actually an undeniable fact of everyday activity, a kind of activity, and a product that is corporate. In addition to Limbaugh, the modern rhetorical scene features pundits such as for example Glenn Beck, whom once mused on-air about killing a general general general public official with a shovel, and talk radio host Neal Boortz, whom compared Muslims to "cockroaches." Politicians may be similarly unpleasant. (more…)