Rhetorical Analysis of Three Op-Eds on E-Commerce

Introduction

The central argument across the three op-eds under review is that e-commerce has changed the way we live and shop. However, the articles do not agree on the nature or extent of that change. They differ in their assessments of how retail has transformed and what lies on the horizon. Amy Koss, writing for the LA Times, likens Amazon.com to Satan. The Editorial Board of the New York Times takes a more measured approach but still advances a doom-and-gloom perspective. Daniel Freedman of the Wall Street Journal is the only one of the three to recognize that Amazon has not extinguished the human desire for contact and sociality, and that retail is not dead but merely reimagining itself — no longer just about offering a product, but about offering an experience, something that cannot be purchased online. This paper performs a rhetorical analysis of the three op-eds to show how they differ and which is the most effective.

Koss and the LA Times

The tone of Koss's piece is gothic and romantic. It opens by describing a mall as a deserted structure — something like an old, ruined castle — where "lost souls" wander and over which Satan (Amazon) has cast his pall. The evidence Koss presents is entirely anecdotal; all of it is witnessed firsthand. She provides no hyperlinks to other web pages or sources of information to support her claims. She is simply telling what she sees and how she perceives it. She describes visiting the mall, observing the closed shops, and speaking briefly with a saleswoman who tells her that everything must go because the store is closing soon. The metaphor Koss employs is that Amazon is the Devil, who has given people everything they want with the click of a button — at the price of dying retailers. Booksellers are losing hope. Everyone is shopping online, and in Koss's telling, losing their humanity. The author supplies little ethos and instead moves quickly into pathos, using vivid imagery to appeal to the reader's emotions. The technique does not always succeed, and the piece sometimes slides into bathos as Koss returns repeatedly to the theme of Amazon as Satan and the e-commerce shopper as someone in the grip of the devil.

The central argument of the op-ed is that Amazon is harmful because it has ruined malls, driven booksellers and other retailers out of business, and assumed near-total control over consumers' shopping habits through the use of "Big Data" (Koss). Amazon sees and knows all, and anticipates every consumer's next move. The argument is couched in Koss's personal narrative of visiting the mall and speaking with booksellers, whose experiences are used to reinforce her own. She provides background information as needed to flesh out a point. The argument is not so much proven as reiterated — like a theme returning in variations throughout the piece. Koss assumes that readers will be sympathetic to her perspective, but her take is somewhat glib and superficial: it is too easy to simply describe Amazon as Satan, and a critical reader is unlikely to fully subscribe to that depiction. Koss uses colloquialisms like "we recite the roll of the dead" to describe the long list of retailers that have closed. Yet her repeated use of terms such as "sinister," "hell," "lost souls," "Satan," and "the damned" signals that she is aiming for a dramatic, visceral effect rather than a literal or logical one. The op-ed is written in essay form and contains no bullet points.

The Editorial Board of the New York Times

The tone of the New York Times piece is less dramatic and more informational, though it too adopts a pessimistic register to convey the urgency of its argument — namely, that the new president must act to protect workers from Amazon's expanding dominance. The approach is evidential: every claim is supported by a fact, and those facts are delivered via hyperlinks so that readers can click through and verify the sources themselves. This is an effective way to establish ethos: the authors assert their credibility by supplying numerous links, making it difficult for a reader to dismiss the piece as unsupported opinion.

The authors make sparing use of metaphor. One notable example is their reference to a "strong safety net" (Editorial Board) — a figure of speech for government assistance that would keep displaced workers afloat while they seek new employment after losing retail jobs to e-commerce. The article deploys ethos to establish authority and logos to make a rational case that e-commerce will not cause permanent unemployment, since new jobs will eventually emerge. It appeals to pathos as well by calling for short-term assistance and inviting readers to empathize with workers caught in the transition.

The structure of the editorial is straightforward. It opens with a portrait of the average worker and documents the job losses attributable to e-commerce. It then discusses the broader impact of e-commerce on retail. The argument — that technology itself is not the problem, but that the pace of change is leaving many workers temporarily unemployed — is reinforced throughout the piece. The writers assume readers will follow their logic, consult the linked sources, and finish the piece feeling motivated to pressure policymakers to ensure that American workers are not left without support. The op-ed avoids colloquialisms and bullet points; the register is formal and direct throughout.

Works Cited

Editorial Board. "As Retail Goes, So Goes the Nation." New York Times, 21 Apr. 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/21/opinion/as-retail-goes-so-goes-the-nation.html.

Freedman, Daniel. "Bricks, Mortar — and Experiences." Wall Street Journal, 20 Aug. 2017.

Koss, Amy. "Amazon.com Is a 21st-Century Deal with the Devil." LA Times, 5 Jun. 2017, http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-koss-the-devil-as-amazon-20170604-story.html.