A persuasive speech should utilize the reason and logic to convince the audience that the idea presented is more authentic than other ideas. The aim of the persuasive speech is to capture the attention of the audience and try to convince them to share the attitude or opinion. Persuasive speech or essays utilize strategies such as inductive reasoning, deductive reasoning, the argument from analogy, argument from causes and effects, and circular reasoning among others. With this light, this essay analyzes Nancy Reagan speech, "Just Say No" to determine how it has utilized some of the persuasive strategies or concepts. In summary, Nancy Reagan's speech tries to convince the United States citizens that they should join hands on mitigating the prevalence of substance abuse in the country. In other words, the essay was one of the stepping-stones for the "War on Drugs" in the United States. This paper argues to support that Reagan has effectively utilized the persuasive strategies such as reasoning from the sign, reasoning by analogy, bandwagon technique to persuade the Americans to engage in "war on drugs."
One of the persuasive concepts utilized in the "Just Say No" speech is the reasoning from the sign. Argument from sign reasoning is developed to show that the presence of an event is the sign of some larger situation or condition (Huber & Snider, 2006). Reagan has effectively utilized this concept to appeal to the America on the adverse impact of the drugs and alcohol abuse. Reagan suggests that she had been in the traveling across the country to spread the campaign against "war on drugs." To illustrate the impact of her five years efforts since she started the campaign, she asserts that she has seen new awareness campaign on how threatening and terrible drug abuse is to the American Society (Reagan, 1986). The building of that awareness campaign is the sign of the development and growth of larger campaign against drugs taking place in the United States. She uses another example of how drugs have caused two strokes to a one month baby in a hospital in a Florida to illustrates how drug abuse affects everyone in the American family. That one incident is the sign of the adverse impact of drug abuse on young females and their neonatal babies (Reagan, 1986).
Apart from reasoning from the sign, the speech also applies reasoning by analogy concept. Reasoning by analogy tries to develop common links between similar and dissimilar ideas to convince the audience that the characteristics of two cases are similar, and hence the argument of the first case applies to another case (Huber & Snider, 2006). Reagan argues, "Drugs take away the dream from every child's heart and replace it with a nightmare" (Reagan, 1986). In this case, Reagan applies the figurative analogy to suggest that dream is like ambition and nightmare is like unpromising and terrifying. Among the children, the former is necessary, and the latter is fearful and unpromising for their future. Therefore, Reagan tries to convince her audience that they should not just sit there and watch drugs and substance use damage their children's future. She urges the Americans to stand up and replace the unpromising and terrifying situation, created by drugs, with ambitious and promising situation among the American children.
In addition, Reagan has also utilized the bandwagon techniques to encourage her audience to get concerned about the adverse impact of drugs because everyone is concerned. Bandwagon technique is one kind of propaganda that persuades the audience to agree with the writer's idea because the majority of people have agreed with the same idea. Reagan provides evidence to show how even a one-month-old kid is affected by the drug abuse epidemic. Her argument is that no one is safe and therefore, everyone in the American family should be concerned. She even reveals that drug abuse, "concerns us all because of the way it tears at our lives and because it's aimed at destroying the brightness and life of the sons and daughters of the United States" (Reagan, 1986). With such statement, the audience ought to stand up and join the movement that aims to eradicate the problem in the United States. She also illustrates how children are leading in this war against drugs, encourage the readers to support the children by providing the available resources to eradicate the problem (Reagan, 1986).
In conclusion, Reagan has effectively utilized the persuasive strategies to persuade the American audience that drug abuse is a serious problem in the country, and everyone should get involved in the "war on drugs". The three common techniques applied in her speech include reasoning from the sign, reasoning by analogy, bandwagon techniques. For instance, she demonstrates signs such as the emergence of new awareness to illustrate that her campaign against drug and alcohol abuse have been effective. Other concepts have been used effectively to establish the need and rationale for engaging in war against drugs. She uses the phrase, "Just say no" to encourage her audience to be involved in the movement that creates awareness on the adverse impact of the drug abuse. Briefly, the persuasive aim of Reagan's essay is adoption in such that she urge American to start campaigning against drug abuse.
References
Huber, R. B., & Snider, A. (2006). Influencing through argument. New York: International Debate Education Association.
Reagan, N. (1986, September 14). Nancy Reagan - Women's Political Communication Archives. Retrieved from http://www.womenspeecharchive.org/women/profile/speech/index.cfm?ProfileID=156&SpeechID=582
