Everywhere we look, we are faced with people, organizations, and groups making an argument. We have looked at how these arguments are made and the techniques employed to persuade us. We know that now with the election coming to a close, the debates, adds, and mailings are speaking the loudest. This begs the question: what other mediums are trying to persuade us through their arguments?
I would like you to pick one of the three songs presented here. Listen to one and then, determine what argument is being made. Once you have identified the argument, explain how they are trying to persuade us: facts and stats, author credibility, or emotional appeals. Reference a specific part of the song lyrics or video that has helped you to come to this understanding.
Here are the three song links:
Cage the Elephant
Martina McBride
Common ft and Will.i.am
Happy listening!
53 comments:
I chose the song by Martina McBride.
She's trying to persuade the listeners that everyone goes through some kind of pain whether it's something similar to yours or even the complete opposite. You should care about what they are going through because there is always a reason why. You should try to help in anyway possible.
"But I'll come down and get my hands dirty and together we'll make a stand,. Somewhere cross the parking lot some bands playin out of tune. City streets are gonna burn if we don't do something soon"
Jordan Frederick 4-5*
I chose the song by Martina McBride. In this song she says how everyone has their own problems that they go through, but love can always be the answer. If you have love, you can get through anything.
I chose the song by Cage the Elephant, "Ain't no rest for the wicked". This song to me was speaking about the perspectives of too much of the world and how Black and White people see everything. The band offers a variety of examples in which a person is doing something bad but for the right reasons, and then of people doing bad things for all of the wrong reasons as well. These two different types of people serve as the examples of the people who are always being looked at for either who they are or what they did and not both. I feel as though the message being made here is that people will sometimes have to do bad things in order to make things in the world right; that there is a higher cause for their lesser evils. Also that there are people who will hide behind their title or an organization to do bad things.
-Ricky Pawlowski
I chose the song by Cage the Elephant. The song to me is about people breaking the law to gain money. The Lyrics "I saw a preacher man in cuffs he was taking money from the church he stuffed his bank account with righteous dollar bills." Then to the course saying "There aint no rest for the wicked." It talks about people having bills to pay and mouths to feed.
-Chase Gorgan 3*
I chose the song "Ain't No Rest For The Wicked" by Cage the Elephant. The argument or statement it is trying to make is that even though we as humans know it is wrong to steal, kill, and act in unethical ways, people still do it because they have to survive. It has been this way for a while, and I personally don;t see a change in humanity. The lyrics, "I've got bills to pay, I've got mouths to feed, there ain't nothing in this world for free. No I can't slow down, I can't hold back though you know I wish I could.", explains that people will do bad things to get what they need. The song persuades you with emotional appeal because the situations portrayed can be real life to some people who are struggling.
Erica Jacks 7-8
I chose the song "Love's the Only House" by Martina McBride. The argument being made is that no matter what life brings you, good or bad, love is what's going to help you get through it. She is trying to persuade us by using examples that are potential real life situations, like a girl becoming pregnant and her significant other leaving her. Even though she has nothing and maybe even no one to help her out, the song shows that there are good people out there willing to help you in anyway possible, even if it's just buying a carton of milk.
I chose the song "Ain't No Rest For The Wicked" by Cage the Elephant. The argument of the song is humans know it is wrong to break the law in such ways as killing, robbery and prostitution, but people still do it because they need to survive. The lyrics, "I've got bills to pay, I've got mouths to feed, there ain't nothing in this world for free. No I can't slow down, I can't hold back though you know I wish I could.", explains that people will do whatever it takes to get what they need to survive. The song persuades you with emotional appeal because the situations portrayed can happen in real life and people that are struggling financially may be able to relate.
Kristina M. 1*
I chose the song "ain't no rest for the wicked" by cage the elephant.
Looking at this song, I believe that its about surviving in this world, no matter who you are, you need money. It doesn't matter how much or how little you stand out in society, but you have a job to do, we all do. Theres no true rest until you've fully earned your keep and had things settle down. Of course, people will often overlook the fact that the money we're trading is just a piece of paper, that we can value the equivalent to precious metals, gems, resources, weapons, and just about anything else. In using money, we fail to recognize its true value and have become a nation solely relying on others to make things for us. While its a broken system, its one we'll have to live with for awhile.
Eric.S 3rd period
I chose the song "Ain't no rest for the wicked" by Cage the Elephant. The arguement that is being portrayed is right vs wrong and what is the limits to what people should do in order to get by, support their family, or fufill their own greedy fantasies. The persuasion technique being implemented in the song is an emotional appeal. It attempts to show that the people that are commiting crimes had to do what they did because they have, "...Bills to pay... Mouths to feed" . It tries to make you feel bad for them because they have sunk so low as to sell their bodies, mug, and steal from others.
I chose Love`s the Only house by Martina McBride. She persuades the fact that with love (either for your family or for friends, you can get you through anything. Through the good and the bad, you need people to love you and to care for you in times of sorrow or excitement. You need to share your love and emotions with people. Author credibility is used in this because it is telling a real story. A quote that stands out is "This world is moving so fast" beacause this is true for lots of people, it is hard to keep up with everything going on in the world today.
-Madison 3*
Cage the Elephant's "Ain't No Rest for the Wicked" argues that people will do anything for money. There is an example of a prostitute, a man attempting to rob the narrator, and even a preacher under arrest because he stole money from the church. People tend to forget their morals when it comes to money, because in their eyes, money can buy happiness. They say that they are committing their crimes to keep their families alive, but in reality they're committing their crimes because they are taking the easy way out, instead of working for money like most others do.
I chose Ain't no Rest for the Wicked by Cage the Elephant. To me, this song spoke about how everyone is under the illusion that the world is driven by one all-ruling factor - money; and that sometimes money can make people do stupid things, things that will only lead to more trouble. I'm not so sure that this song offers a fix to this "problem", but then again, why should it. No one group of people can go about answering all the questions this world gives us, but it only takes one person to get the ball rolling, and that's for certain.
Adam Hetzel
3rd Period
I chose "A Dream"
He's trying to get young people to chase after their dream. He uses Martin Luther King's "I have a Dream" speech to show how he chased his dream and made a differece. He's appealing to emotions, because most people can relate because everyone has a dream. I feel like he is targeting to young african american in the video but he relates it to anyone who is told they can't. He's trying to tell them they can. He shows he went through the same stuggle but overcame it when he says," Given this game with no time to practice,Born on the Black list, told I'm below average"and,"With a story to tell, my eyes see the glory and well,The world waitin' for me to yell "I Have a Dream"
-Sammie Heilman 1 period
I chose the song by Cage The Elephant. In this song, the argument that is being made is that people don't have a lot of money and would basically do anything, even if it was bad, to get money. They are trying to persuade us by giving us examples of what people do to get money. An example that supports my argument is when the song says "There ain't no rest for the wicked, Money don't grow on trees. I got bills to pay I got mouths to feed there ain't nothing in this world for free."
Kaitlyn Jindra 4/5
I chose the song "Love's the Only House" by Martina McBride. I think the message she is trying to portray through the song is that love is the only thing that can really help someone to heal. Everyone goes through pain, whatever form that may take, but it is love that helps us to get through it and come out on top. There is a lot of evil, and pain and sadness in the word, but there is also a lot of love. Everyone has pain, but everyone loves. It is this love that everyone can have and come under (the house). The emotional appeal causes the listener to want to reach out and be the person who loves those in pain. It causes you to want to be the change... to be the love!
I chose to listen to the song by Cage the Elephant, "Ain't No Rest for the Wicked." Listening to the song, the artist is arguing that nothing in the world is free, and that we all must deal with things in life, such as having "mouths to feed," and "bills to pay." The artist, in the song, is additionally warning another that even though he cannot stop him from making poor decisions, there "ain't no rest for the wicked/ until we close our eyes for good." The lyric writer may have been trying to portray a message in his writing to someone, warning them about their actions even though they have no definite control over them. Yet near the end of the song, the singer tells of a preacher being handcuffed for stealing, and then claims that "...we're all the same... we all seek to satisfy those thrills," the thrills of breaking the rules and in a sense, being "wicked." The lyric writer may have had some form of experience with that, as many songwriters put events and occurrences into music.
Collin Mahoney, 4-5th
I chose the song by Cage the Elephant.
I believe this song is trying to argue that a lot people do unethical things because they feel that they have to. The song's refrain gives the reasoning for their actions; they need money, and they have families to feed. It shows people doing wrong things for the right reasons as well as wrong things for the wrong reasons. The lines "I can't hold back. Though you know I wish I could,oh no there ain't no rest for the wicked,until we close our eyes for good" imply that the "wicked" people in the song may regret their actions. They may have felt that they didn't have control over their situation. I believe that by giving many different situations the writer is trying to say that wickedness and evils are found everywhere in life. They are not restricted to one social group.
Nicole Rouge 7-8
The main purpose of the argument in the song by Will.i.am was that people have dreams. They should go out there and achieve them. Because as he quoted in the song, Martin Luther King Jr. said “I HAVE A DREAM” and so he chose to live out his life trying to fulfill that dream. The way Will.i.am tries to convey this message is through means of credibility; for example, the way he uses MLKJ’s few words in the song proves that he uses a credible source (an influential speaker during the civil rights movement that followed his dream to have no segregation between blacks and whites).
I chose the song "Ain't No Rest for the Wiccked" by Cage The Elephant. The argument being made is that it is a hard life for hard working people. People try finding money any way they can even though they wish they could stop. The band is persuading the audience with emotional appeals because he says specific examples of people they encountered that told them how hard their lives were.
What led me to this assumption is this line in the song,
"There ain't no rest for the wicked. Money don't grow on trees. I got bills to pay, I got mouths to feed. There ain't nothing in this world for free."
Kyle Howe 4-5
My song was by Common
Hes trying to persaude the listeners that there is discrimation and it has decreased as years went on. Also, we should remember what people had to do to get us to this point and how they changed us.
"remember the king cause he once was a king thank my homie"
Mario Asturi 4-5
The song i pick was "A Dream." I feel like in this song he is trying to get the message out to the youth of America. He uses Martin Luther Kings "I had a dream" speech. That speech is obviously very impacted on the African Americans. I feel like the video was to tell everyone if you were ever told you weren't good at something or was ever told no, you can do it.
With a story to tell, my eyes see the glory and well,
The world waitin' for me to yell "I Have a Dream"
Breanna Hartory 4/5
I chose Love's the Only House. To me it seems like she is trying to argue that other ways of coping with pain are not enough, and that love is the only thing that can truly heal anyone's pain. There may be very different kinds of pain with many different kinds of solutions, but love is the only true solution.
I chose the song “Love’s The Only House” by Martina McBride. I think she is trying to persuade us to take responsibility of the pain and suffering we cause as human beings and counteract it with love because love is the only thing that balances out all the pain. Martina says, “the pain’s gotta go somewhere”. She uses emotional appeals to persuade us of this when she says, “Down across the river and you see a ghetto there/And we got children walking around with guns/And they got knives with drugs and pain to spare/And here I am in my clean, white shirt/With a little money in my pocket and a nice warm home/And we got teenagers walkin' around in a culture of darkness”.
-Samantha Hoyt
I chose the song by Common.
I absolutely love this song and always have. It's been on my iPod forever. They're rapping about the imagery which is intended to reinforce the song's messages of perseverance in the face of discrimination, and hopes for a more racially tolerant world.
"In search of brighter days, I ride through the madness. Struggle is my address, where pain and crack lives. Gunshots comin' from sounds of blackness. Given this game with no time to practice. Born on the black list, told I'm below average." Those lyrics are basically saying being born african american leaves you with struggles that you were not prepared for, and people considering you 'below average' for that minor difference. Hoping to one day live in a world where color is merely just a color.
Marissa Walczak 1
I chose "Love's The Only House" by Martina McBride. In the song, she is saying that love is a strong support system, just as the house is a strong foundation for living. This support system can help one cope
with his or her pain or suffering. This system doesn't always have to come from the people closest to you. It can be a complete stranger. I came to this
understanding by finding a few examples of emotional appeals. The first line that stood out
to me, containing this appeal, was toward the end of the song. She says, "I said hey I'll cover you honey cause the pain's gotta go somewhere." This act of kindness shows that there
are still people in the world who care enough to help people and took away the pain and suffering because of the love expressed. A stranger demonstrating an act of kindness
is something that everyone has/ will experience once in their lives. Another line was when she said
"But I'll come down and get my hands dirty and together we'll make a stand." This is showing how she feels that we must work together to be the support for people who do not have it.
This line has the power to inspire listeners to do so. And another line that reiterates that point is: "And here I am in my clean, white shirt/
With a little money in my pocket and a nice warm home/And we got teenagers walkin' around in a culture of darkness/Livin' together alone, and all I can say is"
She again tries to inspire others to be the support that we all once needed and that others around us still need. this love will help people survive and
get through hard times.
I chose the Cage the Elephant song, “There Ain’t No Rest For The Wicked”. It seems the message is that bad people are not committing crimes just for the sake of being a bad person; they are forced to do bad things because they need to get money somehow to survive. The singer is trying to use emotional appeal by having the criminals explain that they have no other option, and using the terrible news coverage to relate to the listener. I came to the realization that the author is saying money, or lack thereof, causes people to become desperate and commit crimes. In the song, when the author discusses when he was robbed, the robber explains he is not after a life, he just needed money. Also, in the chorus it says “money don’t grow on trees…” which explained why criminals need to commit crimes, and how nothing is free so they need some way to make money.
I believe the argument for cage the elephant is that no matter how hard life is such as money issues, not enough food or some other hardship one must keep on moving on until your life is gone for good. In the lyrics it says “I saw a preacher in cuffs taking money from the church… but still I can’t say much cause we are all the same oh yes, we all seek out to satisfy those thrills.” This illustrates that sometimes everyone is in some type of trouble and do anything they can to get ahead.
I listened to "Ain't No Rest for the Wicked" by Cage the Elephant,, and I think that the argument in the song is very clear; a lot of bad people aren't bad because they want to be, they're bad because they HAVE to be. Both the prostitute and the robber say "We got bills to pay, We got mouths to feed." They aren't doing these things because they are truly bad people. They do it in order to satisfy their daily needs. In fact, they say "You know we wish we could." So, I believe the argument in this song is quite clear.
I chose to listen to the song by Cage the Elephant, "Ain't No Rest for the Wicked." In this song it explains what we all know and have learned to accept, the fact that there are crimes and wickedness in the world and there isn't much we can do about it. He says very surely in the song that “No there ain't no rest for the wicked Until we close our eyes for good”. He gives a few examples through the song of how people all around are struggling to make ends meet any way they can. He validates the wicked things we see everyday exactly how most people do “Money don't grow on trees, got bills to pay,I got ,mouths to feed, Ain't nothing in this world for free” you go through the song understanding everything he says as truth, we see it every day on the news, the wicked never sleep. At the end though he reverses it and makes the listener think and question everything that was just said. “But even still I can't say much,Because I know we're all the same, Oh yes we all seek out to satisfy those thrills”. This forces us to ask the question, do we do these wicked things to get by and survive in life, or do them, or even keep on doing these things to “satisfy those thrills”.
The song "A Dream" by Common ft. Will.i.am is about moving toward freedom of expression. The artist outlines the different oppressive forces that hold people back from following their dreams. He tells how he comes from a rough background that he must overcome. By comparing his resistance to his fate and the burdens of his inferiority to the resistance of the Civil Rights movement, he taps into the feelings that his audience associates with those events. His argument is that his dream coincides with the dream of Martin Luther King Jr. The pursuits he aims for are part of King's broader hope that all of humanity can chase what they wish for.
I chose the song "Love's the only House" by Martina McBride. Her argument is that the only thing that can ease and comfort pain is love. She argues this through using real life examples and emotional appeals. "Down across the river and you see a ghetto there And we got children walking around with guns And they got knives with drugs and pain to spare And here I am in my clean, white shirt With a little money in my pocket and a nice warm home." The contrast between the children on the street and the speaker makes the listener see more clearly how much pain these children feel, and implies that the one thing they don't have, love, is where their pain can be eased.
Jennifer Sens 7-8
I chose the song by Cage the Elephant, "Ain't No Rest for the Wicked". The message in this song is clear, the control that money has over our current society. On top of this that someone will do nearly anything to make a few bucks. There's a part in the song when the lead singer is sort of jumped from behind and has a gun placed to his head. He asks the assaulter what made him want this life where he responds, "...Money don't grow on trees/ I got bills to pay/ I got mouths to feed/ Ain't nothing in this world for free." This just shows how our society based on money and possessions deciding social status and what not has affected people in their quest for acceptance.
I picked the song by Will.I.Am I fell like the song is persuading listeners that he has this idea and thought of what he believies in and one day it will come true and he will fight and fight till his dream comes true and show, as if he were MLK jr him self.
The song I chose was "Ain't No Rest For The Wicked" by Cage the Elephant.
The argument that's proposed in this song is that people who are wicked are always watching their backs and are constantly living in fear of being caught. They're trying to persuade us by naming things that has happened to them (or at least the singer, Matthew Shultz). He first mentions a prostitute, who mentions that she had to remain a prostitute simply to stay alive and make money. Another man comes up trying to mug him because he also needs the money to stay alive. And finally, when he gets home, he says that some preacher took many from the church, and was caught by authorities, which shows that bad people really have to be careful. Also, he keeps using the word "we" when talking about wicked people, which leads me to believe that he is wicked himself. If that's the case, then this whole song just shows how if you're wicked, you need to be careful, or you'll have your money taken from you by a mugger (maybe not that, but something bad will happen to you).
I chose the song Cage the Elephant.
The song making the argument that nothing in this world is free. It will make a person to go to great lengths to get money to help support their life. The band shows examples of people going far in situations to get the money.
"A Dream" by Common ft. Will. I. am's song is about beating oppression. Throughout the music video images of oppressed people, such as the Jewish during the Holocaust and the African Americans during the Civil Rights movement. As these images are shown the phrase "I have a dream" is repeated. This is an allusion to Martin Luther King's speech "I Have a Dream". The purpose for this speech was to motivate the minorities to not give up on their plight for equality. In the same way the phrase is used to convey the same feeling. This song motivates any one who is put down and unhappy to continue to work through their problems. Just like in the Holocaust and the Civil Rights movement, the people worked on and eventually were given the freedom that Common sings of. Just like them we are able to "work it out".
I chose the song "A Dream" by Common feat.Will.I.Am
The song is used to encourage people to follow their dreams and liberate themselves from anything that may be holding them back from doing so. The artist wrote the song coming from the perspective of someone who grew up in a rough neighborhood with "gunshots coming from the sounds of blackness", but the song is relate-able to anyone who has a dram they want to chase after. The argument being made is that no one should ever give up on themselves or their dreams.
-E.Zaranec 7/8
I chose "A Dream" by Common feat.Will.I.Am and the message is that if you have a dream, go after it can change the thinking of others. Like how Martin Luther king did by say," I have a dream." He spoke he's words and changed the world still to come. He spoke his mind and his dream came reality. The song is trying to tell you that if you have something you want to do, say, or even try then go out and do it because if a black man can change the laws and give black people freedom just wonder what you can do.
I chose "Ain't No Rest For The Wicked" by Cage the Elephant. I believe the message of the song to be how corrupt people can be in the name of profit. One example the narrator uses is a prostitute, he asks her "Why'd you do this to yourself?" and she responds "There ain't no rest for the wicked, Money don't grow on trees, I got bills to pay, I got mouths to feed, There ain't nothing in this world for free."; a verse which repeats several times through the song. These lyrics assist in showing why people do the things they do, and really can reflect the views of a lot of people in today's society. The song appeals to the listener's emotions with the line "I got bills to pay, I got mouths to feed" as it is especially meaningful in today's economic state.
I chose the Cage the Elephant song. It's about how people will do almost anything for money in order to either provide basic commodities, like their "bills to pay "and mouths to feed," or just to attempt to make themselves happy, as in the case of the preacher in cuffs. Everyone has done something bad or something they're not proud of. Like the people in the song, it's about how we rationalize what we did that helps us move on with our lives. It is true that nothing is this world is free. Everything has a price, even if it's not an immediate cost.
I chose the song "ain't no rest for the wicked" by cage the elephant
I believe this song is about the evils of capitalism. Capitalism pins everybody against each other, so we have to compete against one another instead of working together as a society. "Until we close our eyes for good." meaning until we stop seeing only money in our eyes. Capitalism makes even good people do bad things when they get desperate to eat and pay the rent.
Tyler Tenny 3*
I believe that the song by Martina Mcbride is about love being the best healing process. All the pain in the world can be healed with love. Also, home is a place for healing and for there to be no pain, and the title states that, "Love's the Only House," saying that love is a place for healing and comfort.
Cady R 4-5
I chose the song, "Ain't No Rest for the Wicked" by Cage the Elephant. In this song, the artists seems to be trying to portray the message that sometimes people have to do bad things to survive and make their lives work. The artist gives examples of people doing bad things for all the bad reasons, but also bad things for what one could consider good reasons. I feel that the artist is trying to say that people are always being looked at as good or bad for their action, when sometimes people don't know the person's motivation.
I chose the song "A Dream" by Common. The argument he is trying to get across is that even when people fight for freedom, it is not always apparent in our country. In the chorus the lyrics are "I got a dream that one day imma look deep into myself". This shows he is realizing to make a change, you have to first start with yourself. Common draws on Martin Luther King, JR. as well as the Holocaust to make his argument.
Sean Ward 4-5
I picked the song Love’s the Only House by Martina McBride.
Throughout the song, McBride comments on the disparity in the world, highlighting all of the bad and unfortunate things that are happening. She says if you drive far enough into the ghetto, you’ll see “children walking around with guns / And they got knives and drugs”. Then, throughout all of the malady, she argues that the only way to really take care of it is through love, and not more hatred. She donates money to buy milk for someone in the store who can’t afford it, and demonstrates how love can actually solve a problem. She argues the love is the only thing big enough to absorb all of the pain in the world. Hatred and violence won’t do it, so we all may as well show love.
I chose the song by Cage the Elephant: "Ain't No Rest For The Wicked"
Cage the Elephant is persuading listeners to believe that people don't do bad things unless they don't have to. They are doing this by making the emotional appeal, such as when they stated that a man "put a gun up to [the singer's] head./ He made it clear he wasn't looking for a fight" The is meant to mean the man did it because he felt he had to, not that he wanted to.
Jacob Coseo
I picked the song ain't no rest for the wicked. I believe this song says that people like the hooker and the mugger do things becuase they "have mouths to feed" and theny need to servive. However there are also people in the world like the preacher who do things just to "stuff his bank accounts with dollar biils".
I chose "a Dream" the argument he is trying to make, is that if you have a dream than go for it. He sings about the strugles he has been through and the hard ships and how he has a dream that one day america and the people will work it out like he says in the song. He uses MLK's i have a dream speech and scenes from a movie to convay his message.
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