“Vegetarian is the New Prius” is an online article written by Kathy Freston in the Huffington Post, a politically liberal American online news website, in the year 2011. Freston quoted a word made by president Hoover “a chicken in every pot and a car in every garage”, and then explained that people are having second thoughts about the excessiveness of cars causing global warming. She resumes by talking about reports from United Nations about livestock and the fact that it is an important contributor to many things such as; water and air pollution, loss of biodiversity, land degeneration, and global warming. Freston claims that the Prius is good for the environment because of its low emissions. However, the real issue is not vehicle emissions, but the raising of preparing livestock for food. Freston continues by saying that a significant problem is the gases produced, not only carbon dioxide but also nitrous oxide and methane and that these gases come from farmed animals. She ends by saying that becoming a vegetarian has never been easier due to the huge amount of vegetarian-friendly foods that have come in recent years.
The logical appeal is the major appeal in the article. Freston uses strong evidence from sources such as reports published by the United Nations that says, “The livestock sector emerges as one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global.” This is compelling because it shows the reader that the United Nations even perceive the issue of environmental problems. Freston continues by saying “the U.N. report says almost a fifth of global warming emissions come from livestock – that’s more emissions than from all of the world’s transportation combined.” This can be alarming for the reader and effective because it shows again that the U.N. had noticed that the raising of livestock for human consumption is larger than the fuel emissions of the entire world. Freston further states that the U.N. reports that “Animal agriculture takes up an incredible 70% of all agricultural land and 30% of the total land surface of the planet. As a result, farmed animals are probably the biggest cause of slashing and burning the world’s forests. Today, 70% of former Amazon rainforest is used for pastureland, and feed crops cover much of the remainder.” This is an effective use of the logical appeal because it gives numbers the reader can relate to and can raise the alarm for the reader as well.
In addition to the logical appeal, Freston uses the emotional appeal by evoking feelings that the reader can relate to. She uses emotionally charged words in her writing such as “slaughter”, “meat-ravenous culture”, and “cesspool” to evoke sympathy towards the animals and understanding as to why the reader should become vegetarian. Freston also uses the emotional appeal when she talks about the actor Leonardo DiCaprio “cruising in his hybrid Toyota Prius” and how he has “defined the gold standard for environmentalism.” She evokes sympathy because DiCaprio is a well-known actor who many people like and see him as someone to look up to, by using him she can gain more support.
Freston’s weakest appeal is the ethical appeal. She does use sources such as the United Nations but doesn’t use her personal experiences or personal testimony to help gain the readers support. She does use the celebrities such as DiCaprio, Alec Baldwin, Bill Maher and Paul McCartney who have all gone vegetarian to help gain support in her article. But not every reader will care what these celebrities have on their plates for dinner.
Freston’s main method of development is cause and effect. She spends a majority of her time explaining to the reader that the consumption of livestock is the leading cause of global warming. She does this when she states that “animal agriculture takes up an incredible 70% of all agricultural land, and 30% of the total land cause of slashing and burning the world’s forest” as the cause and the effect is “these forests serve as “sinks” absorbing carbon dioxide from the air, and burning these forests releases all the stored carbon dioxide.” She also explains that carbon dioxide isn’t the only gas the reader needs to be aware of but also “gases like methane and nitrous oxide, enormously effective greenhouse gases with 23 and 296 times the warming power of carbon dioxide.” The cause of these gases is the livestock and the effect is global warming. That is Freston’s main point of her article.
Overall, Freston’s argument can be successful for most readers because she gives valid points and effective statistics and percentages the reader can relate to. However, her argument could have been more effective if she had used her own experiences, she could have gone further to say that becoming vegetarian helps the world but can also help you in saving money and helping you feel better.