Gee, I hope no one pays attention to this anymore. I just had to try this, once.

Ok, done. With something you'll never know about, hopefully.

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How it all comes together

So, this is what I can state with some confidence will have some slight relation to what my final paper may be on:

WATCO: Parental Criticism on Disney's animated movie output

Claim: Parental criticism has made Disney's animated movie output less proactive

Reason: Because parental criticism sets strict standards that do not tolerate any deviation from expectation.

Assumtion: Whatever sets strict standards that do not tolerate any deviation from expectation makes the subject of its criticism less proactive.

Audience: Mostly the parents who are always so ready to crticize Disney for any little thing it does wrong.  Being ready to fly off the handle makes it less likely that Disney will do good things in its movies.  It is getting skittish, and will bow to popular demand.  It is especially annoying when people find so many faults with the older Disney movies.  They were made a log time ago, and had to respond to the critiques of parents in their own time.  Disney is getting so attuned to popular sentiment that their movies will be obsolete in just a few years.  This is not good.  We should focus criticizing their over-all themes that will always be wrong, no matter what year it is.  We should not focus on the little things that do not really matter.

Responding to Counter Arguments, mostly

To address myself to the main counter-argument against me, I will first have to re-hash the counter arguments that will probably be made against my enthymeme, which should probably also be re-hashed...Ok, I will state my claim again, and then the main counterargument.

My Claim/Reason-Disney's specialized output has lost its ability to innovate, because it created a conservative, easily-angered audience.

Counterargument-The audience is encouraging Disney to be more proactive, so it cannot be making Disney less proactive.  If everyone is saying that Disney should take its ideas into the 21st century, how would this make it more likely to create movies that belong back in 1937?

Ok, here is my answer to the counter-argument.  I am not talking about conservative in the traditional, moral sense.  I am not saying that all parents are parochial Republicans.  What I am saying is that the parents of today are very definitive in what they think is right and what they think is wrong.  My definition of conservative for this paper is someone who is unwilling to accept that they are not always right.  (I will probably have to come up with a new word to express this in my paper, since conservative is waaaaaaaaaay too politically charged.)  So, someone can be proactive and also conservative for my purposes.  Someone who thinks that being proactive is the only correct way to be is a conservative, because they do not see the value of tradition.

Yeah, I am already seeing trouble with conservative.  So, instead of conservative, I will say...inflexible, or scrupulous, or picky.  Those words are so much better.  What I want to say is that parents who are being too picky are forcing Disney to only respond to what they want.  Disney has lost the ability to introduce new things to its audience, because its audience is not interested in new things.  Its audience is only interested in...what it is interested in.

So, even though parents are encouraging Disney to "be proactive", they really just mean "follow what we want from you more closely".  If the popular trend is racial equality, Disney is encourage to be more proactive and include its first colored princess.  Can you imagine what the parents would have done if The Princess Frog, or whatever it's called, was released before the Civil Rights movement?  It would be like Disney putting in a homosexual couple today.  The audience members are not asking for new things, unless they have already thought of them.

Just to clarify

It occurred to me that my new media plan has absolutely no relation to how my blog actually went.  So I just want to clarify what is and was going on:

1/20 and 1/22 were posts completely dedicated to developing my Enthymeme.

1/29 was my first truly semi-followed Enthymeme, as well as when I Defined Key Terms.

2/12 and 2/19 were my attempts at Rhetorical Analysis.

2/26 was another, better Enthymeme, and when I Argued the Other Side.

3/5 is when I will Answer the Arguments Against my Enthymeme.

I might do a final wrap up on 3/12.

A definitive argument and preemptive strike

Ok, I have an argument that I think I can actually back up and write a paper on, etc.  Ahem...

WATCO: Disney's specialized output on ability to innovate

Claim: Disney's specialized output has lost its ability to innovate

Reason: Because Disney's specialized output caters to a very conservative, easily angered group.

Assumption: Whatever caters to a very conservative, easily angered group loses its ability to innovate.

Audience: I am writing to the people who always want Disney to try new and progressive things, like adding homosexual couples to fairy tales.  Disney cannot be that progressive, because it is playing to perhaps the scariest audience in the world-over-protective parents.  Let's face it-kids watch Disney.  Why?  Because their parents trust it to be as nice and not-indoctrinating, and warm-fuzzy as possible.  If Disney suddenly came out with an R-rated movie, no one would ever watch it.

Aha!  Now for a preemptive strike by showing that I know all the counter-arguments that will be raised against me:

Parents are criticizing Disney for being too Conservative.  Their first black princess came out less than a year ago!  Parents aren't complaining about that.  They are complaining about old stereotypes that Disney has not changed since 1937.  Pixar is new and progressive, and they aren't getting angry parent's picketing.  Disney's specialized output should help it to innovate.  They don't have to worry about pushing a language or violence barrier, so they can focus on social commentary.  Knowing your audience helps you talk to them better.  What do you mean that parents are conservative and easily angered?

No, no clue at all

So, I'll probably have to push my media plan back another week, since I am only now sure of how to rhetorically analyze something. 

Work-"Are Disney Movies Really the Devil's Work?" by K. Marling (I've tried everything to link it, and it just won't, so you can find it on BYU's library website)

Argument-No, Disney is not of the Devil (dang, looks like I was wrong).  Disney is responding to the surrounding culture.

Audience-The people who always find reasons to think that Disney is of the Devil.  (You know...Ariel is teaching children to hate authority...Why are all the girls blonde...Maybe even, ahem, that Disney, sort of, hurts families, ha ha, etc)

Goal- To help them recapture their ability to see Disney like children seeing for the first time, and help them see movies in their cultural context.

How- The author starts with humor and a sticky story to get attention, then makes herself credible by giving lots of examples as to why her view is correct.  She is also very moderate in her views, never calling those with different opinions idiots.  She shows change over time, making herself more credible and moderate by showing how any black and white view is wrong in this situation.

Effective-Yes.  She cites some of the most popular and classic disney movies everyone knows by heart, and then introduces the context people might miss.  For example, Snow White was being put out during the Great Depression, so "Whistle While you Work" is more about people's desperation to have a job than female subservience.  And just compare Cinderella to Mulan.  Not just in story line, but in looks, too.  What?  We're saying that you can be a Disney protagonist without blonde hair and blue eyes?  Looks like it. 

Do I actually have a clue about Rhetorical Analysis?

I tried a new approach this time-find a source I'd like to cite and see what it tells me about Disney.  So I found a few sources, and what I got out of them was this: Disney was able to make just what it wanted at one point, but now it is like Mc Donald's responding to carb crunch and making a salad.  Disney is now accountable to the public. 

So here's a new idea that will probably be discarded by me before the end of this blog:

The commercial success of Disney has made it more dependant on the likes and dislikes of the public, not the other way around.  Ooh, I can even tie Pixar into it.  When it first started out, no one really knew what it was, so no one cared.  Now that it is wildly successful, the public is telling it what to make.  Like sequels.  Instead of a window to the future, Disney has become a magic mirror, only capable of reflecting, and slightyl jazzing up, the real world.

A good source for me to rhetorically analyze is this commentary by K. Marling.  It argues what I am now (yes, just for now, since I will probably not stick to it, but you never know...) thinking, that Disney is merely following what it sees in society.

The article is pretty sticky, starting out with an anecdote, and not fully giving away its position until readers are hooked.  The author actually starts out by arguing the opposite side of the argument than what the paper tries to prove is correct.  This is a good way to get the proper audience to read the rest of the article.  It starts out with very familiar images, then gives a few unexpected twists to interest people.  However, it does get technical and detailed in the middle, where it is most dangerous.  Readers, like myself, are liable to get over our first interest and then despair when we see that we are nowhere near the end.  We can just barely hang on with the help of her chronological arrangement, and her very logical argument.  A is followed by B in a clear manner that won't confuse anyone.  The work cites very familiar Disney movies to prove its points, which is something I want to do in my paper. 

In fact, this paper is a lot like something that I could write and turn in for this class.  It has some ideas about stickiness and the rhetorical situation, though it is not perfect.  It is comforting to know that not even professors know how to write the perfect persuasive paper.