Rhetoric, Rhetoric, Rhetoric

This week was all about rhetoric. Rhetoric, rhetoric, rhetoric.

To be honest, ideas of categorizing and structuring the persuasive techniques of writing bored me to death last year (sorry, Mrs. Chatel). Now, however, I've learned to look past my disgust with the bland dissection of it to realize that debate is actually, like, cool. Like, really cool.

When we are young children, we are so prone to taking whatever we are told and absorbing it, without question, like a sponge. It is only when we grow up and begin to see multiple viewpoints on topics are we able to break away to form our own opinions. The ability to doubt, is so important, I find, in discovering one's own identity, and it is one I'm still honing today.

When I was in middle school, I believed that I was an atheist; I was proudly atheist and all those other religious people are stupid and don't know what they're doing and I'm right and they're obviously wrong. It was only because I was surrounded by this youth culture filled with atheist beliefs and thoughts and because I really hadn't been that much exposed to religion growing up, that I so vehemently believed this. I was proud in my self-discovery, when I really didn't have much of a clue about what was going on.

Now, I find that I really have absolutely no idea what I think about religion. In a passage in The Reason for God, by Tim Keller, he stresses the importance of doubt and re-thinking things. I remember reading an editorial last year on the importance of self-doubt in essay-writing. It is this doubt that acts as a safeguard against the tempting effects of appeals, emotional, ethical, and logical.