Rhetorical Analysis V1: Interracial = Including a Black Person?

While the Interracial Relationships video did an admirable job attempting to address an important issue in today's society, it fails to penetrate the issue at a deep enough level and also to establish pathos with the audience because of its narrow focus on African Americans as well as difficulties with the narrator’s voice and an unclear goal within the video.

The issue of interracial relationships is difficult to tackle and while attempting it at all is admirable in its own right, the very first step that should be taken in every case is a step away from the issue. It’s extremely important that when talking about any issue dealing with race that the author realizes the sheer number and variety of races that populate the world as a whole. Having realized that simple fact, the author will then by necessity be forced to take into account the ways in which an issue has affected every race and not just the race of the author him/herself. This first step is essential to establishing ethos with the audience because in any academic medium, the author of a piece is expected to remain as unbiased as possible so as to allow evidence to prove his/her thesis rather than sheer emotional weight or pathos. The text slide in the video in which the argument finally becomes clear is one that simultaneously seems to complicate the argument by specifically dealing with interracial relationships involving a black individual. Also, practically the only fact in the film was specifically based on a black and white couple, and every picture shown at the end of the video involved at least one black person. The video’s failure to demonstrate its understanding of the problem on a larger scale removes almost every iota of credibility from the video and leaves the video with only a couple of means to get through to the audience.
Along with the video’s narrow focus on the black individual, the lack of properly cited material also brings the author’s credibility into question. The credits only include the first names of the individuals who created it. There are no attributions to the writers of the songs used in the film, or of the movies, interviews, and news clips. The individuals being interviewed were not mentioned or thanked. This loss of credibility weakens the group’s argument.which leads the audience to feel that the argument itself isn’t supported by facts. This can be dangerous in an advocacy film as the film could then have the reverse effect of encouraging its audience towards the opposite point of view from the author, or at the very least, lose the attention of the audience.
The narrator of the film is the next difficulty because of its particular monotone quality. It seems to say a great deal of words with very little substance.