Critical thinking
This topic shows you how to think critically, find hidden contexts and read between the lines
Logical fallacies appealing to emotions
Mitt Romney commercial
What would Mitt Romney like to say by this ad? He tries to say he is one of us, being a part of the average American family, trying to give voters the sense they can relate to him, feeling he understands problems they are facing.
This is an example of the manipulative technique which tries to affect our emotions. There are multiple ways how it can be used, appealing to emotions from positive to negative, to influence us not to notice lack of meaningful argumentation.
Here are few examples of appealing on such emotions like fear, anxiety, sorrow, hate, prejudice.
Daisy attack, president Johnson commercial 1964
Appeal to fear
Picture examples
Appealing to sorrow
“Ladies and gentlemen, just look at this man, handicapped man at the wheelchair. Do you really think he would be capable of fraud?”
explanation: Argument is trying to arouse sympathy for the destiny of the handicapped person, in spite of his health problem do not correlate neither with his moral nor with capability to fraud the money.