We run the risk of being brainwashed and not even know it. We are constantly recieving visual messages that are used to persuade us and we dont even question them, we just take in what the visual rhetoric may mean to us and accept the messages. For example, there are magazines everywhere constantly giving women ideas of what they should look or dress like. Magazines are often blamed for young girls having unrealistic ideas of what their bodies should look like but it's not just the yound who are affected, everyone is in search of what the media has defined as success for us. Success is now defined by the ownership of the "latest" and so many American's have gone into debt trying to meet that definition of success. When did we all become persuaded of this idea? Almost every second of every day we have been feeding our minds with the images that are everywhere constantly planting the seed in our head of what will make us happy. We don't question images the way we would question the newspaper or any information given in a text format. In a text format,rhetorical terms are used to persuade the audience one way or the other by comparing and contrasting the subject matter. Usually the writer uses facts, point of view, and argumentive statements in order to suade the reader in a particular direction.

Some of the tools used to persuade an audience are persuasive themes,master narratives,content and technical signatures, audience resonance and effects.
Persuasive themes is a subject chosen in order to influence the audience. For example, those commercials about children starving in 3rd world countries, they are asking for donations and when you watch innocent children in these conditions it is effective. They could have easily chosen a million other topics to persuade the audience to donate but it is the starving children that brings tears to our eyes.
Master Narratives are effective because they are stories that are specific to that culture or environment. For example, as I mentioned in one of my previous blogs, as a child my mother would persuade me to go to bed on time by telling me a story about a ghost that was out seeking her children. Other cultures might find this inappropriate parenting and in order to persuade one must know the audiences' background.
Content and technical signatures are about having structure and particular characteristics. Finally, audience resonance and effects has to do with being aware of how your communications tactics affects the audience and being able to measure the succesful outcome.
Given the right words and strong arguments anyone can be persuaded to believe just about anything.