On Skid Row

Watching “On Skid Row” came as a shock to me when I watched it in class. I always had a heart for the homeless, tossing spare change to them when I caught a red light at an intersection. The video helped a lot in clearing up a stereotype that is placed on the homeless. The generalized stereotype is that those who are homeless hit a serious problem that caused them to lose their money and now they have given up and don’t want to try anymore. Their spirits are broken and now they want others to fix it for them, instead of giving their all. The video took a different approach on the travesty escalating in Los Angeles. It really hit home and made me want to go out and voice an opinion on the matter. You see human beings suffering beyond belief! For God’s sake there are little children starving in the street! If this doesn’t scream intervention, then I don’t know what does. I loved how it had that piece on the teenager that gave his story on the matter. It was extremely nice to see that sponsors bought the boy a camera so that he can record behind the scenes on skid row and the life he lives day in and day out.
The author of “On Skid Row” effectively targeted the issue as a serious concern and one that needs to be addressed asap. The purpose of the video was to address the turmoil that the homeless and economically poor are suffering in south LA. The genre being used in this video is a documentary. The audience that is trying to be reached is those living on the rich side of LA. The documentary shows how on one side of LA you see huge corporations and tall buildings and just down the street you see buildings and people in shambles. You can even make the argument that the audience also was for those who seek to help out those in need. Any agency that works on providing care to those in need would be their target so that awareness can be raised on this terrible matter.
The rhetorical triangle is used in full effect in this video. From the start you logos being used when statistics on how New York and Los Angeles are compared. The argument is that these two cities were statistically the same years back, however now they are not. Due to New York’s plan to clean up the streets, they have significantly reduced the number of homeless on the street. In Los Angeles, however, the number has significantly grown since. The video uses pathos when it shows clips of how the children are suffering and the environment they are growing up in. A prime example of this is when you take the little boy who witnessed a murder from the window sill next to him. It is hard to fathom as a young adult what that could do to me, let alone an 11 year old boy. Lastly, he uses ethos when he named organizations that were trying to help the situation. He interviewed people living in these predicaments and got a first-hand experience of what it was like.
All in all I found the video to be very persuasive and effective. The video’s strongest arguments were those of logos and pathos. Using statistics from the start to support its claim were very intelligent. From the onset, you had the emotions showing clips of these poor children suffering in dire need of help. It gave me a feeling of guilt and helplessness, like I wasn’t doing enough to help justify this cause. The video brought awareness to a cause that needed attention extremely bad.