Secondhand Smoke

 

Secondhand Smoke

Smoking is one of the deadliest habits around causing more than four-hundred and eighty thousand deaths each year in the United States. Cigarettes cause a great deal of health issues such as cancer, heart circulation problems, and higher risk of stroke to name a few. Anti-smoking ads have always been known to pack a powerful punch when it comes to causing negative emotions towards smoking. This ad is relevant because fifteen percent of U.S. adults smoke cigarettes, which is equivalent to thirty-six and a half million smoking cigarettes in America alone. The nature of the image chosen is to shock and target feelings of negative emotions out of the audience towards smokers. The innocence of the child and her purity in the image is pointed out and enhanced for the effect that the cigarettes have on a bystander.

The purpose is to inform the audience that not only the person who smokes is affecting their health but also the people around them. Secondhand smoking in relation to children have been linked to causing respiratory infections, ear infections, and a greater risk for sudden infant death syndrome. No sane parent wants to put their child’s life at risk, this anti-smoking campaign is trying to inform the people of the U.S. in a way that will impact the viewer in the most powerful way possible.

This image appeals mostly to ethos in an impactful way leaving the audience to ponder their choices on their daily activities.  Ethos, being emotion, is the emotion that the viewer gets when the picture refers to the little girl as “going to heaven early” because of the second-hand smoke. Clearly the person is bound to feel some type of sadness at the thought of a child passing on to heaven. With this method, the image has a powerful take away on quitting smoking for the benefit of not only to the person who is smoking but to the loved ones surrounding while they a partaking in the activity.

The other two categories of effective writing pathos and logos are present in the image as well. Appealing to pathos, the image comes from a credible source The Child Health Foundation, a foundation specifically targeted for children and how to prevent disease and death amongst children in the U.S. and worldwide. The foundations research and projects have saved millions of lives by all of the data they have collected and the progression of medical advances and treatments they have created as well. Lastly appealing to logos, logically quitting smoking is the healthiest move for people that want to prolong their life or their children’s. Cigarettes contain over seven thousand chemicals, with an estimate of seventy of those chemicals causing cancer and hundreds that are toxic. Also, the hundreds of health issues and diseases. Logically speaking, cigarettes shorten your lifespan by the abundance of health issues that lead to imminent death.

The image has a precise focal point which gives the viewer a powerful message, the young girl in the photo with a halo of smoke around her head. She has an expressionless face in the picture which also has an emotional effect, she isn’t showing signs of any feeling at all. The innocence of the child also shines through in this image, with her watching the parent partake in smoking and just standing there, she knows no better than for that to be normal and that it has no effect, when in reality its damaging their body immensely.

The use of colors in the image are affective in bringing out the girl as well. Dark colors in the background are used to bring out the bright colors of the girl’s clothing. Also, the flowers on the child’s shirt adds to her level of innocence and her “cute” like nature. These factors make her stand even more and makes the image more powerful. The image has the writing “Children of parents who smoke, get to heaven earlier” which is the only text in the image. One sentence is used and the message is clear and effective and causes intense emotions, which is an advertisers dream.

The halo made with the ring of cigarette smoke with that being said, with manipulating by photo-shop and editing, sends a powerful message. The editing of the photo for the halo to be placed on the girl’s head makes the sentence and purpose of the image more impactful. The child then takes the image of an angel, and of course to a religious person they are located in heaven and are not alive. Once again, a dead child is not a pleasant thought for the average person, especially a parent with children of their own. Another compelling aspect of the photo made possible with manipulation is that the little girl is looking at a beam of light. Which again, from a religious perspective can show the process of ascending to heaven.” Making the message of ascending to heaven even more clear by the child looking into the light with a halo around her head.

Smoking and its consequences are known to kill thousands of people a year but the true totality of all of the effects and the people surrounding the smokers kill thousands as well. Never smoking a cigarette and to still have them kill a person who is merely is a danger to children all around the world. Although the health issues as a bystander does not tax the same toll as the person who is actually smoking, it is not fair to the people that chose not to smoke to still be affected by cigarettes. Restaurants everywhere have banned smoking areas but public areas such as on the streets or casinos people may smoke as they please and people around are physically harming innocent people and children. This image is showing that in the most impactful way possible by enlightening parents the effects it has on their children.

Works Cited

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention “Secondhand Smoke (SHS) Facts”

https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/secondhand_smoke/general_facts/index.htm

Center for Disease Control and Prevention “Health Effects of Cigarette Smoking”

https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/health_effects/effects_cig_smoking/index.htm

Are Fish Prisoners?

Red Devil Cichlids, white fish on the left named Arnold, orange fish on the right Esmerelda Last summer when going to the local pet store to buy food for the foster dogs my family is housing, I went for my usual browse around the whole store looking at all the animals. When looking at all the fish tanks, two fish caught my eye. There they were, Arnold and Esmerelda, the South American exotic fish that would soon make a divot into my bank account and take up hours upon hours of my free time during the week to care for. I have never been a fish loving person in the past and thought as harboring fish as pets even to be cruel. I know it’s weird to say but I had to have these fish. A week after reading article after article about the upkeep and care for the tank, what to do to get the fish acclimated, and everything I needed to know to properly take care of these fish, I bought the tank and made the commitment.

Supplies used to clean the fish tank (gravel vacuum, gloves, filters, scrubbing brush, net)  Buying all the supplies to set up the tank and getting the water to a balanced pH level, nitrogen level and temperature took a week. High maintenance fish, yes, I know, but if I had not waited the fish could have immediately died and I would have been out four hundred and fifty dollars. You read that right, I payed almost half a grand for two fish and their home. The supplies that you need that are the absolute minimum are an extendable scrubbing brush, algae correcting fluid, filters, a gravel vacuum, an unused toothbrush to scrub any habitats large rocks, decorations, plants if they are fake, and to clean the outside of the tank very diluted vinegar to keep the glass clean. Every item that I have listed will be used once a week and totally cleaning the whole tank takes around two hours to prevent mold and algae growing out of control. This could lead to death for the animal, tank environments are very temperamental.

Research being done on general knowledge of the species and for diagnosis of ailments Research is top priority when it comes to a sick fish, but it is completely normal for a fish when first introduced to the new tank to get a disease that is called “Ick” for short, and can be compared to the common cold in humans if handled correctly. The fish that I have are not native to this continent, so asking the pet store for advice was a bit of a flop. So, I did what most people do these days, I googled what was happening to my fish and why they were behaving weird. Little did I know I would be stumbling upon a whole new community that I never thought I would be a part of. You would be surprised that there is actually a fish community where people own fish and consider it a hobby of all things. So many people have helped me keep my fish alive just by describing their past problems and how they handled it themselves. Blogs have saved my fishes lives more than I can count so research is definitely a must when you have an exotic animal. Not only are they useful in critical situations but also a lot of the blogs or websites just have general suggestions to better the fish’s environment, or preferred diets that a specific species has.

Medicine, food and tank environment tools  If and when the fish does get sick, which I can guarantee will happen within the first couple of months you have the fish, there are so many options on what you can do to get them back to optimal health. Trust me I know. Knowing where these supplies are nearest to you is essential, majority of fish ailments need to be treated within forty-eight hours of them contracting the disease. Surprisingly Walmart has a wide variety of fish medicine which I never thought would be the case. Aloe, the right pellet food or live food if you are one of those people such as worms or crickets, and “Ick” medicine is always good to have. Making sure your fish is healthy leads to a long life for most exotic pets, Red Devil Cichlids can live up to twenty years!

Feed Rite Pet Supply in Lincoln Park, MI  Shopping for you fish also contributes to their health and environment, of course specifics for certain species are set in place though. So, make sure you, I bet you can guess it, RESEARCH! Live plants versus plastic, if the species is aggressive and can have any other types of fish in the tank, what type of structures they can have inside of the tank, and buying new filter pads every two months is important. But to renew the medicines a trip to the store Local stores are good for this because they have more than a general store like Walmart is going to have.

Pictured here is myself watching my fish!

Having these fish has taken much time out of my day and week but taking care of them and just looking at them when I am bored. I always find myself when I can’t sleep I stare at them when they swim around and I think it’s cool when they just look back at me. It’s very uncommon but Arnold actually like to be pet after he is fed, but if I try to pet him before his meal he will literally bite my finger off. Their species is a carnivorous aggressive predator, so they will actually eat other fish, so I have to be careful with them. 

An argument arises, is it inhumane to keep fish in a tank and for them not to be in the wild? Personally, I think if the owner of the pet is conscious and takes care of them and keeps the animals in a safe and healthy environment then it is not cruel. However, many people disagree and say they need to be free.