The logos that underlies the modern environmental poster is
well known and accepted by the majority of the American public. There are
countless environmental studies that have come to
the same conclusion: across the globe, humans are having huge, often
irreversible impacts on the environment via fossil fuel combustion,
deforestation, poaching, overfishing, inefficient waste management, and dumping
of toxic waste, just to name a few. Specifically, the poster refers to the degradation of
polar ice caps, a problem directly related to global warming.
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| Study done by NASA |
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| Study done by Science Daily |
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| Image available on education-portal.com |
Above are only a few studies concerning global warming that
reveal trends that are well known by many Americans. The first graph is the
result of a study done by NASA, showing the steady increase in global temperature
since the late 19th centuries. The second diagram is a bit more
alarming. A study done by science daily, this chart shows relative global
temperatures of regions on June 2014, using color gradients. It is clear that
most of the globe is much warmer than average, with many regions reaching
record high temperatures. Finally, the last chart shows the dramatic
disappearance of polar ice caps within a span of just 31 years (September 1979-
September 2010).
But honestly, I imagine that these figures aren’t very
alarming to most people. Most everyone knows that the globe is getting hotter
and that the polar ice caps are melting.
The poster implies that one would be ignorant not to be informed of
these environmental issues with its snarky parenthetical, “see world news for
details.” And that’s the crux of the poster. The poster suggests in a satiric
tone that the polar ice caps will melt if current trends continue and people
remain complacent regarding environmentalism. It is saying that no number of
studies, no appeal to logos seems to have swayed the American public, and if this continues, the polar ice caps will undoubtedly disappear, only to be preserved in our memory by ice cube souvenirs.
I think another important message in the poster is in the symbol of the iceberg. The illustration plays off of the cliché phrase "the tip of the iceberg," suggesting that there is more to the issue of global warming hidden below the surface. It says that logically, people should not just take for granted the superficial points of the climate debate, but should do further research to draw their own conclusions about the logical source of climate-related problems.
ReplyDeleteI like how you included data relating to the poster to back up the logos. People should be more educated about the environmental problems to change the current trends. Good job relating the appeal to logos to the satirical poster
ReplyDelete-Allyson