Americans are living too long. They are trying to prolong life and delay death. One such person, Ezekiel Emanuel wrote "Why I Hope to Die at 75," and he argues that living too long is a loss (1). He is stating that he does not like this trend. Emanuel does not hope to extend his life as long as possible. He reasons that he would live a complete life by the age of 75. In arguing why he wants to die at 75, Emanuel effectively convinces his audience with emotional appeals, relatable examples, and statistics despite his doubt in his conclusion.
Emanuel begins his essay by convincing his audience why living too long is a loss. Today, American people will do anything to try to cheat death. Emanuel addresses this as the "American immortal" (2). He appeals to the reader's emotion with words such as "feeble" "ineffectual" and "pathetic" to describe elderly people. These words are
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These statistics logically support his argument. The second statistic shows the readers that elderly people will always have to depend on someone as they advanced in age.
Towards the end of his essay, Emanuel misguides everything that he addressed. The use of emotional appeals, relatable examples, and statistics made his essay sound persuasive however, at the end he says, " I retain the right to change my mind and offer a vigorous and reasoned defense of living as long as possible" (Emanuel 9). Then what was the point of writing this essay? He wrote nine pages full of credible information just to say he could change his mind about everything. Emanuel weakened his argument with this statement. His readers would have been convinced if he hadn't written that