Campaigning, Oral d'Anglais - Seats and Forms of Power

CAMPAIGNING, I’M AN ACTIVIST

SEATS AND FORMS OF POWER

(to) talk people into having a patriotic behavior

(to) draw people’s attention

(to) hammer ideas into people

(to) raise people’s awareness

(to) encourage people to

(to) remind people of their civic duties

(to) entice people into

(to) struggle

(to) strive

(to) convince

(to) advise

(to) warn

(to) prevent people from

(to) manipulate

(to) promote

(to) influence

(to) win people’s hearts

persuasive

effective

involved

endangered

mindful

convincing

A target

A demonstration

A strike

A campaign

I – WAR PROPAGANDA

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UNCLE SAM (initials U.S.), a common national personification of the American government. The poster was used to recruit soldiers for both WWI and WWII.

[pic 2]

Rosie the riveter, a cultural icon of the US, representing the American women who worked in factories during WWII, many of whom produced munitions and war supplies.

The women sometimes took entirely new jobs replacing the male workers who were in the military. Rosie the riveter is commonly used as a subject of feminism and women’s economic power.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42787869 

Reasons for a government to launch a similar campaign of awareness

• Elections:

(To) talk young adults into registering at the city hall

(to) convince people of their voting duty

• Unusually low temperature (ex. In France in January 2017): (to) raise people’s awareness on saving energy to avoid electricity shortage

• The flu epidemic (ex. In France in January 2017): (to) draw people’s attention so they wash their hands… now that it’s too late to get the shot

Etc…

II – PRESSURE GROUPS

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A lobby: engagement to influence a government or council, change the laws and act in favor of an organization or campaign for a specific cause.

Lobbies are interest groups that defend ideas and try to influence legislation (as regards economics, health, environment…) thanks to debate, information and also money and interests.

They influence people into making a decision that correspond to the particular interest.

The National Rifle Association of America (NRA) is a powerful lobby that promotes the right to own and bear arms to protect individuals and their families according to the Second Amendment of the United States Bill of Rights.

It was created in 1871 in NY. It rejects any gun regulation by the government. In 2010 in the USA, 48 states allowed citizens to carry firearms in public and 80 million Americans out of 305 million owned one gun or more.

From the NY Times

Some policies pushed by advocates of gun safety laws don’t reduce gun deaths. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try; we just need a new approach.

In most advanced countries, gun homicides are as rare as deaths from falling tree limbs or plane crashes.

THANK YOU FOR SMOKING

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkbdbRjMX2Y

Nick Naylor who was lobbying for tobacco industries gives his opinion during a senate hearing about the necessities of a warning label on cigarettes. He’s against this idea.

Academy of Tobacco Studies:

• financed and controlled by tobacco industries
• unreliable results
• Nick Naylor used to be its vice president

Cigarette smoking:

• Everyone agrees it is harmful but Nick Naylor doesn’t believe that a warning label will change anything contrary to the senators. To his mind, education is what can make a difference.

Vermont cheese: one of the senators is from Vermont, a state which is famous for its cheese and who has interests in this business. Naylor attacks this senator, stating that eating cheddar can also be considered as dangerous, causing many heart attacks. He suggests putting a warning label on Vermont cheese.

Nick Naylor is smiling, he looks confident, whereas the members of the committee try to remain serious/nonplussed (stern-looking), and seem sometimes taken aback, surprised by what they hear, especially the senator from Vermont. The people in the audience are obviously amused, captivated by Nick Naylor’s answers.

Nick Naylor is surprising and can create quite an effect in front of the assembly, there is always an unexpected turn of events when he starts speaking, he takes people by surprise, he is quite a talker, a big mouth.

He strikes back unexpectedly, changes the subject with elegance, he sows doubt, enough nonsense to confuse the audience, he is drowning the fish!

The US Senate

Two senators per State are elected every 6 years. The Senate sits in Washington D.C. and his main role is to vote federal laws.

A bill (proposition de loi) can be introduced from one of the chambers (the senate or the House of Representatives / both = Congress). The law is submitted to a commission which during a public session auditions the witnesses. This is when lobbies intervene.

[pic 4]

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/17/movies/17smok.html

III – PREVENTION

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Prevention aims at

• making people change
• warning them
• raising their awareness: a recent phenomenon that aims at making people conscious of social behavioral problems such as smoking, polluting, using animals or people for experiments etc.

The goal of public propaganda is to bring about specific changes in behavior for the good of the society.

It may refer to

• health and medicine: with measures to prevent diseases and injuries (rather than cure them or treat their symptoms)
• general safety
• crime: to attempt to reduce crime, deter criminals
• hazard: the process of risk study elimination (ie. Choking hazard written on toy tags, medicine…)
• pollution: activities that reduce the amount of pollution
• risk: to reduce the potential loss for a given action, activity, inaction…
• …

Ex. Buy Nothing Day

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