Martin Luther King Jr.

uses a number of literary techniques in order to persuade his

audience. Throughout his argument he relies heavily on examples and conjectures that portray a
heavy use of pathos. He uses more general examples of comparing the rights that the black
population had at this time, with the rights that the Vietnam war was fought for. This is a very
effective way to appeal to emotion.
Martin Luther King Jr. displays the wrongfulness and irony in, at that time, the current
situation that the black population was subjected to. We were taking the black young men who
had been crippled by our society and sending them eight thousand miles away to guarantee
liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem. In
this quote Martin Luther King Jr. explains that it was simply cruel to take the young black
population from where they live, a place that did not guarantee them equal rights as whites, and
force them to fight for rights they did not posses in America. He brought this example to surface
to show the irony in what was going on and to show the ironic predicament that the black
population was subjected to. Martin Luther King Jr. is attempting to appeal to the audience's
sense of emotion in order to have them come to their own conjecture on the unfairness and irony
of the situation that the black population was in. The argument he is forming is based on how
unjust it was for the blacks to be forced to fight in the Vietnam war; furthermore, how unjust the
American involvement in the Vietnam war was. Martin Luther King Jr. continues to build his
argument based on the moral views of his audience. He uses examples that force his audience to
truly think and comprehend the unjust and morally wrong situation that was forced upon the
blacks. And so we have been repeatedly faced with the cruel irony of watching Negro and white
boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation that has been unable to seat them
together in the same schools. In this quote Martin Luther King Jr. uses a word choice that shows

the oppressive unjust cruelty that was taking place in America at that time. Martin Luther King
Jr. strings together words that appeal to any reasonable and morally sound person's sense of
emotion. His word choice in this quote highlights what he is talking about and the argument he is
forming about the Vietnam war. He explains the cruel irony in the fact that the black and white
men fought and died together, but could not go to the same school together. This example serves
to reinforce his argument, and it also depicts another instance where Martin Luther King Jr. relies
on an appeal to pathos to persuade his audience.
The argument Martin Luther King Jr. is forming is based on logical strings of evidence
and connections that depict the unjust involvement in the Vietnam war.