Outcome 3: To produce complex, persuasive arguments that matter in a variety of contexts.

The purpose of this outcome is to be a persuasive writer and convince the audience of your stance. This is such an important skill for any writer to have, because in any medium of writing you need to be well phrased in persuasion. Whether you are a fiction writer or a journalist, you are always writing to persuade your readers of something. If you write fantasy, then you're trying to convince your audience that this world is truly dynamic and vivid enough, and the characters are actually experiencing their world. If you're a journalist, then you need to constantly convince your readers that world news is actually happening and back it up with sources and evidence. 

For this outcome, I chose the assignment Critical Conversations. This assignment's goal was to write a letter to an imaginary editor and persuade them that my comic idea was worthwhile. To summarize, I wrote this letter detailing the plot and characters of my comic, and more specifically the goals I wanted to achieve by writing it. I did go back and revise this assignment because I felt like I was lacking in deeper explanation and analysis. When discussing the premise, I felt like I didn't do a good enough job of making sure to be non-inflammatory. So I added a paragraph describing how "my goal is not to alienate any singular minority or attack anyone", because in order to persuade this imaginary editor I have to make sure to not be too harsh with my ideas. If I am too polarizing or harsh, then there will be a portion of the future audience that would be offended and put off by my comic. To prevent this, I edited my letter to make it more appealing to the public.

I felt like this letter was quite well organized, because I make my way from describing the plot to the characters and then finally the overall message. I think the most important piece of this is emphasizing that this comic is supposed to be an allegory, which I mention multiple times. This connects to Outcome 3 because it provides relevant context ("The crisis is going to be an allegory for the COVID-19 pandemic", "it is clear that America has become more divided and bipartisan than ever before", "The zombies simply play a role in highlighting this division, as COVID-19 did during this past year"). This context is very important in understanding the overall theme of my comic, and it emphasizes the creativity of the comic as well. This pushes the imaginary editor to be more persuaded toward publishing this comic, which satisfies the requirements of Outcome 3.

The attached images are from LOONA's music video for the song "Why Not?".

why not do it?