Rhetoric Blog 5

There is a sense of finality in writing this. Will I ever use this blog again? What class would I use it for? Should I continue writing these because I enjoy it and have a place to articulate my thoughts? Rhetoric was an interesting class, to say the least. I would say I’m a more effective person for taking it. I read scientific papers for my other classes with more intent. I enjoy the literature I read and the television I watch; as it has more meaning now. Most of all, I handle discourse better from taking this class.

This class brings to mind a lot of things in my life, as rhetoric is inherently human. Mostly though, I end up ruminating on a friendship I had with a coworker before I transferred to Bloomsburg. This is due to the effect on my life this person had and the discourse we engaged in. I often joke about this to my family that I’m alone often now because unlike my days early in college, I am no longer forced to spend 8 or more hours with the same two or three people. This was the first time a person actively had challenged my views without attacking me for having them, despite our differences we were good friends, and this class solidified that lesson for me. 

The discourse included political, religious, and philosophical discussions in both this class and the friendship I had. There were times where I actively disagreed but I was taught to listen in both. It’s really amazing what you can learn when you just listen to what someone is saying. I said this in my first blog, what persuades a person reveals a lot about who they are, and I still believe is true. 

We are drawn to what speaks to our mind and soul. When I put this in light of my own faith, one of the books that have rhetorically appealed to me the most is Ecclesiastes. The message seems desolate and obsolete to many people, but the last verse of the book, the conclusion, is what I believe makes it strangely optimistic rather than nihilistic. “Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man” (Ecclesiastes 12:13). Behind this verse is a book, making statements such as “there is no remembrance of people of old, and even those who are yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow them” (Ecclesiastes 1:11) or “I returned and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favor to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all” (Ecclesiastes 9:11). These are dark, the book quite literally declares life is chaotic and you have no control over it. Yet the ending statement is asking us to keep the commandments of God because it is your duty. I enjoy this dichotomy. On the one hand, we are being told life is random and it does not matter how good you are because bad things will happen to you, and on the other hand we are being told to essentially be good in spite of this. 

The debate about what truly defines goodness in a person interests me, but the rhetoric of Ecclesiastes persuades me to these thoughts. However chaotic and miserable life may be to you, that should not dictate your level of goodness. To be a good person is usually very boring, it’s not putting up Facebook posts showing how good you are, or declaring your moral character over other people, but it is small steps taken behind the highlight reels of our lives that are taken for no other reason than that it is the right thing to do.

This is better articulated after taking English 225, but a very rhetorical lesson I learned from that friendship as well. By seeing them take small steps to do the right when it did not benefit them, in my early years of college I learned to do the same. These lessons were further driven into me when our textbook defined a rhetorician as a good person who speaks well. Though no one is always capable of doing good, it is the small, continuous, boring efforts to do so behind our delivery that make us this. I’ve learned a lot this semester.