Red White and Beer
The author uses a set of rhetorical devices to directly or ironically elucidate a number of “More American than thou” strategies used by the advertising campaigns of beer commercials. One of his points was to describe the visual power of using arbitrary definitions of “American”; he points fun at what he says mainly happens in Miller Beer commercials: “Burly, American men go around, drenched in perspiration, shaking each other’s hands in a violent and patriotic fashion.
Although the author never directly discusses his criticisms, he uses hypothetical and humor to convey his points: “Another possible explanation is that, since there are never any women in the part of America where beer commercials are made, the burly men have become lonesome and desperate for any form of physical contact. ” With that, the author also implies another trope that women are not part of the “manly, American” targeted demographic, further discrediting the aforementioned strategy integrity. The author commercially sees both hypothetical and anecdotal evidence to ridicule “American” beer commercials.
By creating a dichotomy between the commercial trope of “burly men building things or doing work while also being under the influence of alcohol, because America”, he describes a moment of his life where he and his friends helped another friend move. The moving friend wanted to move his belongings from a fourth floor walk-up apartment to another fourth floor walk-up apartment. He recalls him and his friends making the alcohol- induced decision to efficiently transfer the items by dropping them out the Indo while his friend “was racing around, gathering up the broken pieces of his life and shrieking at us to stop helping him move”.
This shows that the author prefers to disparage what American beer commercials define as “American” while ironically exalting their intended purpose: “But if you want to talk about real patriotism, Of course, you have to talk about beer commercials. ” Commercials in the United States have the intended purpose to elicit a specific emotional response, disregarding any illogical implications or ideals that are presented. Beer commercials, implied by the author, have followed a trend of creating a self imposed “American” ideal using an arbitrary definition of “American”.
