Ethos in Contemporary Smoking Commercial

This creative commercial has many forms of rhetorical argument in its short time span. But where does their credibility come from? One of the first questions to ask is who is behind the making of the piece. And with a little research it is clear The Real Cost campaign was actually started by the FDA or Federal Drug Administration. This is a widely recognized federal agency in the United States Department of Health and Human Services. People tend to trust the United States government so that builds the ethos of the commercial tremendously. The campaign worked so well that it was rewarded a Gold Effie Award in 2015 in the Disease Awareness and Education category. Recognition from a widely acclaimed institution also builds ethos.  

-Mihrete Samuel

Smoking Commercial in History: Logos

Many of this commercials rhetorical arguments are made through logos. The most obvious example being the "National Survey" that is spoken about by the voice over. The commercial claims that doctors all over the nation and in all branches of medicine were asked what brand of cigarettes they prefer and an overwhelming majority claimed it to be Camels. The validity of this statement is questionable but nonetheless the logic here is if all these doctors enjoy this particular brand, then most likely you will as well. Another example of logos lies in the succeeding segment. The voice says, "Why not change to Camels for the next thirty days and see what a difference it makes in your smoking enjoyment." This suggestion is logos because it tries to bargain with the viewer and offers a choice to try it for a little just to try it out. This may seem small but they are trying to come off as having a lot of confidence in their product, this is an important trait of logos. The final description of the cigarettes as "mild" and "good tasting" shows how overcompensating for these traits in a commercial is used to the advertisers advantage.                                 

-Mihrete Samuel

The Audience: 60s Camel Smoking Commercial

In comparison to the other smoking commercial in the 1960s, Camel really maintained a primitive audience, utilizing only one type of community in their ads. In terms of the time, this commercial was pretty diverse in that it reached out to women and obviously acknowledged a woman’s right to smoke as she pleased, or possibly ignored that idea and emphasized the idea of accumulating sales. In this specific example, there were no other forms of minority representation other than women. This distinction makes an interesting point in the advancement of women’s right, but also does not seem to identify racial progression too well. Outside of this specific ad, Camel did cover their bases well with advertisements featuring women solely and African Americans in addition to white males. Directly stemming from our text, the Camel extended its reach over an audience that trusted the opinions and ideas of doctors during that time. While it may not seem very obvious, there were and are many people who do not trust doctors, therefore making such an argument that appeals to trust in doctors does exclude a specific, not necessarily large, portion of Camel’s audience.

The Audience: Camel's Commerical vs. 7000 Chemicals Commercial

The 1960's Camel cigarettes commercial targeted audience members who were hesitant about smoking. The commercial grabbed the audience's attention when it stated "More doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette". This statement gave viewers relief when they discovered that numerous doctors approved of Camel cigarettes. The commercial also gave smokers during this time the validation to continue to smoke.

"The Real Cost" commercial directed their focus on teen viewers. Their goal of the ad is to prevent young adults from smoking by providing the negative effects of cigarettes. The creators of the commercial employed a young actor that teens can relate to. They also utilized scary black creatures to give teens a visual representation of the multitude of toxic chemicals in cigarettes. This ad spreads awareness and helps minimize the amount of young adults that experiment with smoking.

 

-Jena Baguyos

 

Logos in The Real Cost Commercial: "#7000chemicals"

According to LiteraryDevices.net the definition of logos is, "A literary device that can be defined as a statement, sentence or argument used to convince or persuade the targeted audience by employing reason or logic." This contemporary commercial is great because it uses a window of exactly one minute to try and get across a powerful message of the harms of smoking. Although this may seem like a commercial mostly driven by emotion there are many subtle instances of logos. In the first few seconds of the video we see a teenage boy leave the house. The fact that a teenage boy was placed as the main character is an act of logos. This helps the audience deduct that young people are the main audience of this rhetorical piece. The climax of the video at about 50 seconds shows the boy finally ingesting all the monsters and creatures that were approaching and a voice says, "Every time you smoke, there's a toxic mix of over 7,000 chemicals coming for you. That's the real cost." This shows how the action was all building up to the logos which is the statistic of 7000 chemicals entering your body. This helps explain the previous events and strengthens the argument of abstaining from cigarettes.                   
 -Mihrete Samuel

1960s Camel/Smoking Pathos: The beliefs in Smoking

During the 1960s smoking was one of the more common events that could be going on at any given time. Almost everybody smoked, except kids of course unless you were feeling brave, curious, or desired to be like Daddy or Mommy. As mentioned before the definition of smoking was congruent with an idea of relaxation, socialization, and pleasure. Today, smoking is one of the most discouraged actions that any person could partake in particularly because of the information and correlation smoking has too many chronic and usually terminal illnesses such as emphysema, bronchitis, lung cancer, and more. Doctors today are adamant about eliminating smoking, which is almost a reality, but still requires a lot of work. Back in the 60s, Smoking was not seen as an issue and, in fact, was encouraged by doctors in some cases. In this particular example, Camel uses doctors to advertise not only for the usage of cigarettes but the excellence of the Camel cigarette brand. While this is a good technique and imposes a logical understanding of why someone should smoke, there does exist a logical fallacy in that presentation of pathos. Camel is advertising that people should buy Camel brand cigarettes because of its support amongst doctors, but that it also a logical bandwagon. This bandwagon is both effective and ineffective in the sense that that it reaches to the audience and discusses the reason why people should support Camel, but it also does not offer a truly legitimate reason to support Camel. In addition, there is evidence that the link between cigarettes and pulmonary diseases were evident during the sixties, but never really caught full attention until the end of the century. 

-Andrew Maduakor (and the previous article)

1960s Camel/Smoking Ethos: Why did we trust them?

           As smoking gradually came to be known as one of the great American pastimes, the progression and stability of the smoking industry and smoking companies was highly elevated. During the 60s some of the top cigarette brands, Camel, Parliament, Marlboro, and Newport, engaged in advertising to multiple discourse communities, being men, women, African Americans, and more. In addition, advertisements were directed at multiple life scenarios advancing the idea that it's alright to smoke when you're working, on vacation, relaxing, at home, having stress, and a multitude of other scenarios.

          The ethos can be observed in two different ways, understanding more about the credibility of the Camel itself and the understanding the overall ideology behind the author/videographer's choice of scenes. I want to look particularly at the company Camel and how their reputation as a well-known and well-respected cigarette brand contributed to the strength of advertisement. Once again, Camel was one of the more popular cigarette brands at the time which initially contributed to their overall ethos because of popularity solely. A more direct way of addressing ethos that was used in the text was professional support, specifically utilized medical doctors as an example of people who use Camel cigarettes and obviously like the brand. This form of indirect ethos establishes that Camel has versatility amongst the medical community and thus is respectably legitimate. These two ideas, coupled with the intention of diversifying the audience all help to certify the legitimacy of Camel and their cigarettes.