Rhetorical Analysis Of Why Privacy Matters

Rhetorical Analysis of Glenn Greenwald’s “Why Privacy Matters”1

Is privacy important? In Glenn Greenwald’s TED talk “Why Privacy Matters,” he explains how important privacy truly is. He uses examples from people’s day to day lives and makes viewers think about if their privacy really matters. Greenwald’s speech takes place after the Edward Snowden files, which he reported about, and is passionate about keeping private citizens private. Greenwald uses his talents as a journalist, lawyer, and author to share his opinion on events, mostly political. “Why Privacy Matters” is a powerful argument that reveals why citizens should care about their privacy and want it protected. In this well-structured speech, viewers become convinced as Glenn Greenwald

At the beginning of his TED talk, Greenwald uses ethos when he tells the audience about how he is a journalist that has been working on this project for 16 months, “This is the crux of the work on which I have been singularly focused on for the last 16 months.” He then goes on to mention that he has been working on the Edward Snowden files, where the United States had been surveilling private citizens without them knowing; this point is important because it makes the issue more apparent. Mentioning more specific examples from the Edward Snowden case would have helped the audience better realize what was happening and how serious the issue is/was. Millions of United States citizen’s telephone records were collected, without the users knowing, cables were

Although, there are probably a few people in the world who think they are so “good” and have nothing to hide, that he just has not come across yet. The only aspect Greenwald does not cover in his speech is how extensive surveillance could potentially pay off and be beneficial in stopping events such as terrorist attacks. Stopping potential life-threatening events is a huge benefit of surveillance and is the biggest supporting argument for the opposing side. So, not addressing the biggest opposing argument is a flaw in his speech. Greenwald only mentions terrorists when saying that they do have things to hide, but so do good people, which does not address how there could be a benefit of stopping terrorism through surveillance. He shares in his TED talk, “Equally essential to what it means to be a free and fulfilled human being is to have a place that we can go and be free of the judgmental eyes of other people. There’s a reason why we seek that out, and our reason is that all of us – not just terrorists and criminals, all of us – have things to