Open Letter to Donald Trump about Climate Change:
1) My audience is going to be the entire American Public, focusing on the massive amount of the American Public that still denies climate change. This demographic is fairly diverse, but the thing that connects them is their support for Donald Trump and his claims that Climate change is a hoax and can be denied, leading them to allow its research to be defunded and cancelled.
2) This demographic has a large representation of White, non-college educated citizens of the country. Donald Trump won in 90% of counties where less than 10% of the population had a college education, helping show that that is actually a possible and accurate demographic for the letter. The letter will be to those who voted for Donald Trump, supporting his ideals of removing climate change research under the belief that it is not a valid concern for the american people.
3) Citizens of the United States, Live under the US government and are affected by its policies. Live on the planet earth. Have to deal with the consequences of climate change. Can often significantly be misinformed due to mass media distortions.
4) Our beliefs that Climate change is a real problem. Amount of attention and funding research should be given. That more research will be useful in determining the coming effects of climate change. Caring what happens to the future of the earth, because they are older and Climate Change won't effect them. They have interests that cause them to willfully deny climate change.
5) Only the caring what happens to the future of the Earth would be an insurmountable obstacle in accepting the argument. If this was the case, no matter how much research went into proving the validity of climate change, there would be no way that it would matter to the demographic that no longer cares what happens to the Earth after they die. All other principles should be able to be surpassed by using research to prove that Climate change is a real problem, proving how important research is, and climate change is still being able to be plausibly denied, then only with more research would it be possible to further validate it rather than cut it at a point where people are not convinced. Also, if they willfully deny climate change, the research is what is necessary to further project how devastating the results of climate change will be in order to lead these people to reassess their interests and truly fall in line behind the necessity of treating Climate change as the real issue that it is.
6) We will find common ground in caring about the earth and for our own lives on that Earth. There isn't a single American citizen who doesn't enjoy the beauty that the Earth provides, and if I can just prove to them how the Earth is in Danger and therefor their own and their children's lives, then we can find common ground in wanting to continue research on Climate Change.
7) There is very little room for concession in this argument. I am willing to allow climate change research to be slightly shrunk, but it cannot be defunded and lost altogether. If there are people out there who can still deny climate change, research and proper distribution of that research is the only way to prove to them how real it is and project the impacts it will one day have on us if we don't stop it soon. As climate change is getting worse, we need to keep funding to keep reassessing the damage we are doing to the world.
8) I will probably explicitly acknowledge and respond to objections right at the beginning as basically rebutting to the arguments that my audience would lay down will probably be the majority of the letter. Most people have been introduced to the topic of climate change and have thoughts about it. I will need to start at a place that understand that most people have already made up their mind about the topic, but I will need to slowly push them away from their closed beliefs into at least believing in the possibility of climate change.
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