Silent Spring free essay sample

Carson denounces the simple act of farming by backing up her argument with literary prose and scientific facts. Carsons implementation of sarcasm lets the audience know that farmers are set on a the ends justify the means philosophy. â€Å"The results probably gratified the farmers, for the casualty included some 65,000 red-winged blackbirds and starlings. † (23-25) Sarcastically portraying farmers as evil monsters, Carson forces lawmakers to emotionally come to terms with the fact that, one way or the other, farmers are promoting a mass murder of fauna. As a result, the legislative body of America would feel the need to pass a law or at the very least a resolution to put a stop to these horrific proceedings. But the focus is not entirely on farmers as an isolated group. Rhetorical questions become a way for Carson to get her real audience: parents and workers of middle-class America; to reflect pensively upon the actions of those who authorized the use of parathion. She also uses another example and writes â€Å"In California orchards sprayed with this same parathion, workers handling foliage that had been treated a month earlier collapses and went into shock, and escaped death only through skilled medical attention. † She uses these two examples to make Americans aware that they are not only affecting animals and the environment, but also their own people. The author also employs the repetition of a multitude of questions to not only get the reader thinking but to emphasize how rarely the American people seem to ask these questions to themselves. She asks â€Å"Does Indiana still raise any boys who roam through the woods and fields and might even explore the margins of a river? Is so, who guarded the poisoned area to keep out any who might wander in, in misguides search for unspoiled natured? † This question most likely provoked many parent readers because she explained that curious children might stumble in the poison and result in an untimely death. Carson continued with her question repetition in the next paragraph and asks â€Å"who has made the decision that sets in motion these chains of poisoning, this ever-widening wave of death that spreads out..? † and continues with a few more questions. Carson uses this repetition to prove a  point and make Americans aware that not only do they not think things through but also don’t really care about the environment they are living in. Carson displays a cause-and-effect type of rhetorical strategy to present to the American people how they are exploiting the environment and the harmful effects that are occurring because of it. She describes this in her passage when she asks â€Å"Who has made the decision that sets in motion these chains of poisoning, this ever-widening wave of death that spreads out like ripples when a pebble is dropped into a small pond? † She uses this strong simile as a perfect cause and effect image that one pebble can cause hundreds of ripples in the water. Her readers are that pebble and she is explaining that one destructive decision can cause many worst effects. She also describes how, because the farmers spread out parathion on the river, many animals’ lives were taken. Carson also shows the cause and effect that it has on people as well as she explains how the workers at the California orchards almost died because of the poisons the farmers were releasing. Carson tactilely uses this cause and effect type of strategy to show her readers what the American people are doing to the environment and the lives they are taking. Overall, Rachel Carson uses exquisite rhetorical strategies to prove her point and trying to transform the Americans attitude towards the environment. She constructs her argument very nicely by giving examples, reviling the truths and the blindness of the American people and the cause and effects of poor treatment of the environment.