Donald Trump or Aristotle?
Whether we support Trump or not, I think we all can agree his speech and persuasion abilities are some of the best in history. He has a way of saying nothing yet everything we want to hear. How is this possible? One of Trump’s speeches used some interesting rhetorical moves. He spoke at a Christian college pulling on their heart strings saying, “In America, we worship God not the government.” He told his audience he would bring back “Merry Christmas” rid of “Happy Holidays”, and he would always allow them to have a place to worship their Savior in America.
Trump also then started telling them to never give up, never quit. This seems to be a universal message that everyone always comes back to because everyone can think of one thing they want more than anything but everyone shuts them down. Take Nike’s campaign Just Do It for example, the message is not to let anyone stop you, just keep going because eventually you’ll break that wall and come out successful. Trump ended his speech with, “And you will have the faith to replace a broken establishment with a government that serves and protects the people.” Basically telling them it’s their turn to make a difference and choose a government system that will make a difference and keep America one with God.
In another speech in Manchester, Trump used a phrase “really, really powerful penalties for really bad pushers and abusers.” According to Aristotle an Enthymeme is “sort of an syllogism.” This means a phrase or picture doesn’t really give us any specific direction of what it means, we are suppose to fill in the blanks. Trump is truly the enthymeme king. In the same speech in Manchester he said, “Other countries don’t play games…but the ultimate penatly has to be the death penatly.” By saying playing games we have an idea in our head of what this means. This is so successful for him because this way he can have his audience create the picture they want to create rather than give them one they may or may not like.
Trump’s rhetoric follows a lot of what Aristotle theroized. Appealing to people’s emotions, having passion, logic, and knowing the loops of communicating to people on an ordinary level. Whether Trump has studied Aristotle, Hall, or McGee’s works or not he is hitting all the right buttons to being a great communicator.
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