"Save the Seals"

PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) is an organization very well known for having controversial and eye-catching ads such as an ad for the "I'd rather go naked than wear fur" campaign in which PETA has a celebrity pose completely nude. For a change, PETA took a more serious approach to an ad featuring a celebrity and for this ad, they chose Steve-O, a daredevil and TV personality. Those who know of Steve-O are aware of his wacky sense of humor and stunts that are both outrageous and painful. Their attention would most likely be brought to a cause even Steve-O is serious about.
PETA was quite clever in coming up with this ad, because it uses all three major rhetoric tools: ethos, logos, and pathos. The use of ethos is quite apparent with "Steve-O for PETA." Why should we trust Steve-O of all people? What does he know? Again, he is known for being a fun-loving and reckless guy, so whatever issue wipes the smile clear off his face must be an important issue.

Since I do not know any women or even girls my age who watch the shows Steve-O appears in, I assume this ad is aimed at teenage boys and young men. Men tend to be less sympathetic towards animals than women are mostly because somehow sensitivity and sympathy equals inadequate masculinity. If someone with as masculine as an occupation (or even appearance for the matter) as Steve-O's shows sympathy, then clearly it is okay for all of the other young men to do the same. In a way, this is a mixture of both pathos and ethos.

This ad appeals to pathos with the word choice. "Each year, many seals are killed" simply would not cut it. More accurate words are used to paint the truly horrifyingly gruesome picture of what happens to seals for their fur such as "slaughter," "massacre", "babies," and "cruel". Also, notice the angry and protective look on Steve-O's face. That helps give the reader the same emotion towards the issue. Plus, can you not help but think the seal drawn on his shirt is adorable? It let's the reader see seals in a more appealing light.

For logos, this ad has a simple, yet powerful paragraph. "Each year, tens of thousands of seals are..." That's enough to grab the reader's attention to the rest of the sentence.

To make an advertisement successful, it needs to have a combination of pathos, logos, and ethos in order to keep the attention of the reader. The reader will need someone they can trust endorsing the ad, the ad to get inside his or her head, and have the facts along with statistics.