High School Essay

It is common knowledge that tobacco use is unhealthy. However many people still choose to participate in the harmful act. Back in high school, I wrote a persuasive paper to discourage teenage use of tobacco. The intended purpose of the paper was to inform teenagers of the negative effects of smoking or chewing which would lead the audience to live a tobacco free life. There were many logos in the paper that were meant to shock the reader, for example, smoking takes 14 years off of a person's life span. The use of facts and statistics in the paper made it look more credible because I had a works cited page to back them up.

The paper did not only consist of cold, hard facts, it also appealed to the emotional side of the audience. One of the anecdotes was about a man who smoked as a teenager and had to have multiple amputations later in life. Another story was about a girl who was diagnosed with lung cancer at the age of 20 because she started smoking when she was twelve years old. She died in her late 20's. Teenagers, who were the intended audience, could easily relate to the mythos because all the people started smoking at a young age.

The goal of the paper was to get teenagers to stop smoking. One way that my paper could have been improved was a better form of media. Many teenagers would rather look at a picture than read a paper. A cover or an ad included with the paper would have been advantageous to better reach the audience. Looking back, the paper that I wrote in high school met many of the requirements of a rhetorical situation.