Alexandra Smith
Final Paper
CAS 201
Final Assignment: “A Whisper of AIDS”
On August 19, 1992, a 44-year-old Caucasian mother of two and HIV positive woman by
the name of Mary Fisher gave a speech at the Republican National Convention about AIDS
awareness and compassion titled, “A Whisper of AIDS.” Fisher was using rhetoric to promote
awareness of HIV and AIDS throughout the United States in her deliberative speech. She said
that 200,000 Americans were dead or dying and millions more were infected. One of the main
points that Fisher addressed was that nobody is safe from contracting AIDS because the disease
does not discriminate if you are Caucasian, African American, homosexual, poor, man, or
woman. She pointed out the fact that Kenneth Doka established in his book, AIDS, Fear, and
Society:
Humans often cope with potential threat by minimizing it, and, in essence, hoping it will
recede on its own. There is always a force that seeks to believe even in the midst of
disease that an epidemic has run its course or a disease is less of a threat than perceived.
(57)
Fisher pointed out that she was a living example that AIDS can target anyone; she came from a
wealthy family, was 44 years old, and a mother of two young children; not a likely candidate for
a disease that is known to strike homosexuals and IV drug users. Instead of ignoring the issue of
HIV and AIDS, she addressed it head on in front of a large group of conservatives at the
Republican National Convention. Rhetoric can be powerful and deceiving at the same time and
one can learn a lot about the motives of a speech by examining it using Kenneth Burke’s pentad.
Before I discuss the pentad, it will be useful to explain the rhetorical situation of Fisher’s speech.
The rhetorical situation can be defined as the context of a rhetorical event that consists of the
exixence or the reason why the speech is being given, the audience, and the constraints.
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An important exigence of Fisher’s speech is the question of why the Republican Party
wanted her specifically to speak about AIDS at the convention. AIDS was first discovered in the
early 1980s, and by 1992, the Republican Party was getting a reputation for ignoring nonconservative issues of political importance. The Christian Right and its conservative supporters
shifted strategic gears in the decade of the 1990s. According to Craig Rimmerman, author of
From Identity to Politics the Lesbian and Gay Movements in the United States: “The 1992
Republican national convention in Houston demonstrated that the Republican Party could ill
afford to ignore their demands for a more conservative social agenda, which included opposition
to lesbian and gay rights.” I believe that the Republican Party’s strategy was to choose a “safe”
person to speak about AIDS, and by safe I mean that she was Caucasian, financially stable, and a
woman in her 40’s with children. Fisher was not the typical type of person to be infected with the
AIDS virus and surely the Republican Party would have been scorned and appalled by their own
party if they had an IV drug user speaking on the subject; they wanted a speaker with family
values that would help them keep their conservative ethos. In this way, rhetoric proves to be
deceiving because the Republican Party wanted to be seen a certain way so they used someone to
their own advantage, yet the message being portrayed by Fisher about AIDS was still very
powerful and moving.
Elizabeth Glasser, who was in a similar situation as Fisher in that she was a Caucasian
woman, heterosexual, and also a mother, spoke at the Democratic National Convention in July
1992. I found it interesting that both the Democratic and Republican Parties chose women to
speak. In Katie Hogan’s book, Women Take Care: Gender, Race and the Culture of AIDS, she
expands on the conceptions of gender and AIDS.
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AIDS becomes an opportunity to revamp deeply conservative conceptions of gender.
There is no doubt that the devotional mother/good woman icon is exploited to de-gay
AIDS, that such strategy epitomizes widespread homophobia and racism, but there are
serious consequences of such a process for ideas about women, whatever their sexual
identity (47).
Learning that Elizabeth Glaser gave her speech before Fisher did also made me wonder if the
Republican Party was simply trying to keep up with the Democratic Party on important issues at
the time. Because both parties chose a heterosexual person infected with AIDS to speak at their
conventions, it could be implied they figured that heterosexuals would receive more sympathy
than the stereotypical people to have AIDS. Again, this proves that rhetoric can be deceitful
because the audience may have had no idea about the circumstances surrounding both parties’
choices of speakers, yet their messages were powerful and persuasive. Though it seemed like the
Republican Party’s exigence was to use Fisher, we can’t forget that she had an exigence of her
own; she wanted to reach people who weren’t apathetic about AIDS.
The exigence of “A Whisper of AIDS” is Mary Fisher’s belief that AIDS and HIV
needed much more awareness. Around the time she gave her speech, “Physicians and politicians
knew little about gay lifestyle practices. In some cases, they may have been reluctant to become
identified with a disease that was popularly defined as a gay or homosexual illness” (Doka 63).
She wanted America to know that those living with AIDS are human, too.“Because people with
HIV have not entered some alien state of being. They are human” (Fisher). Fisher wanted the
audience not to feel ashamed to talk about AIDS. “You are HIV positive, but dare not say it. You
have lost loved ones, but you dare not whisper the word AIDS. You weep silently. You grieve
alone. I have a message for you. It is not you who should feel shame.” With her personal
exigence Fisher proved that rhetoric is powerful, especially because she spoke from personal
experience.
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Even though the Republican National Convention was televised and her audience was
anyone viewing her speech, Fisher was speaking directly to the audience. The audience of her
speech was full of powerful conservatives such as George H. W. Bush, his wife Barbara, and
Dan Quayle (Republican National Convention). “She said the Bushes had personally helped and
supported her since July 1991, when she found that she had contracted the H.I.V. virus, which
causes AIDS, from her former husband” (Kelly). I believe that she spoke directly to them
because she knew how much power they could have in making a difference for the face of and
ultimately the acceptance and awareness of HIV and AIDS. “To the millions who are strong, I
issue the plea: Set aside prejudice and politics to make room for compassion and sound policy.”
Though Fisher had the attention of some of the most powerful people in the world,
speaking at such an important event could also prove to have unfavorable consequences. Her
audience could be considered a constraint because the Republican Party had been targeted by
critics and was viewed as narrow minded about diversity. “Homosexual issues, which for months
were derided with winks and nods by Republicans as they talked of family values, have flared
into the open at the party’s national convention here and on the streets outside the Astrodome”
(Schmalz). Most of the reactions from the audience proved to be favorable.
Ms. Fisher's poignant, intimate talk struck the Astrodome audience into silence, and in
some cases, tears. Many of the delegates at first seemed not to be listening. They could be
seen chatting and wandering about the floor. But as she went on, the room gradually fell
to attention. By the middle of her speech almost everyone was staring up at the podium,
quiet and with grave expressions (Kelly).
Though Fisher’s speech had a great reaction and connection with the audience, there were
exceptions. “A television camera caught Vice President Dan Quayle, standing in his box in the
rear of the hall, glad-handing a beaming Arnold Schwarzenegger” (Kelly).
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Another constraint of Fisher’s speech was the topic: HIV and AIDS. Even today in 2011,
HIV and AIDS can be a very touchy subject. Despite the fact that a cure for AIDS and HIV has
not been found, the world doesn’t seem to be very accepting of those who are infected with the
HIV virus.
The consequences of stigma and discrimination are wide-ranging: being shunned by
family, peers and the wider community, poor treatment in healthcare and education
settings, an erosion of rights, psychological damage, and a negative effect on the success
of HIV testing and treatment (HIV & AIDS Stigma).
To this day, discrimination of those with AIDS makes it difficult to fight the epidemic on a
global level. On a national level, the discrimination can inhibit governments from taking action
against the virus and on an individual level AIDS can make sufferers hesitant to seek treatment
due to shame. In August 2008 the United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said: "Stigma
remains the single most important barrier to public action. It is a main reason why too many
people are afraid to see a doctor to determine whether they have the disease, or to seek treatment
if so.” For Fisher to speak so boldly and openly about a topic that is still discriminated against
today could have been a considerable constraint for her. By utilizing powerful rhetoric, Fisher
was able to overcome the constraint of a tough subject.
Fisher may have offended some people but she carefully worded her speech so the
audience didn’t think she was there for a pity party. “I want your attention, not your applause.”
Also along the lines of the topic of AIDS, Fisher’s audience most likely never had to deal with
what she was going through and the topic may have been new to them. Fisher shocked her
audience into silence, possibly because this topic was usually not spoken about publicly. “The
delegates fell silent as Ms. Fisher spoke of her two young children” (“Teaching Mercy to
Republicans”). To grasp their attention she had to prove to the audience that they and their loved
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ones could be in danger as well as anyone. “We may take refuge in our stereotypes, but we
cannot hide there long, because HIV asks only one thing of those it attacks. Are you human?”
Her speech is important because it breaks through stereotypes about AIDS, boldly asks for
awareness, and is highly personal at all at the same time.
Ms. Fisher spoke from the same podium that showcased the former Presidential candidate
Patrick Buchanan, who once said that AIDS was God’s revenge on homosexuals. She
spoke before delegates from the religious right who are likely to view AIDS in terms of
sin and to Republican operatives who are prepared to exploit anti-gay and anti-AIDS
hysteria for political gain. (“Teaching Mercy to Republicans”)
By exposing something so personal about herself in front of a large audience Fisher was able to
grasp their attention and get her point across.
Kenneth Burke’s Pentad is a useful theory to analyze Fisher’s speech. “The pentad
contains five terms: act, actor, agency, scene, and purpose. They are roughly based on five of the
standard questions journalists use for any good story: who, what, when, where, and why” (Smith
282). The “who” is the agent or actor, the “what” is the action that is taken or the act that makes
the drama, the “when” and “where” is Burke’s scene, and the “why” is the purpose of the act.
Burke also added a “how” because it reveals the agency by which the act is achieved. By using
the pentad to break down a speech, one can understand why it was successful or unsuccessful
because filling in the information in the pentad is an interpretation in which constructive
criticism can follow.
The agent in Fisher’s speech is Fisher herself. The act or the “what” of her speech is her
topic and the speech itself. The scene of Fisher’s speech was not only her physical surroundings
in the Astrodome in Texas, but also the strict moral values of the Republican Party. The agency
is the group who holds the power to make Fisher’s speech possible; the Republican Party itself.
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The purpose of her speech is the reason for the act and the thesis of her speech; AIDS needed
more awareness and compassion.
According to Smith, “Burke established what he called ratios between each of the
constituents as a means of opening up the rhetorical situation to further analysis” (Smith 283).
The ratios in the speech being analyzed help to determine what controls what, or who controls
whom. The two ratios that connected and stuck out in Fisher’s speech were agent and agency.
Agent and agency were interesting to me because I found it almost ironic that the Republican
Party chose Fisher to speak at the convention. It is true that in the world you cannot have evil
without good and this proved to be true in why the Republican Party used Fisher to deliver her
message. If the Republican Party would have had a homosexual man speaking on AIDS, the
audience would probably view him as “evil” whereas Fisher was almost an exception of AIDS
because she was considered “good” by the audience due to the fact that she was wealthy,
Caucasian, and a female. If one really analyzes the agency and agent, they can be lead to believe
that they reinforce the Republican Party’s views that anyone who contracted AIDS from being
homosexual or an IV drug user was still viewed as immoral and unacceptable. In this way, the
Republican Party, as the agency inadvertently maintained their stereotype of not accepting
homosexuals. Fisher, as the agent, helped the Republican Party to maintain their stereotype and
even though her topic defied decorum, her ethos boosted decorum. This proves that rhetoric is
powerful and deceiving because the Republican Party was portraying a powerful message by
having Fisher speak of AIDS yet they proved rhetoric to be deceiving because they were using
someone who was “safe” to keep with their values.
Kenneth Burke’s pentad enhances and challenges my rhetorical analysis of Fisher’s
speech in a few ways. The pentad enhances my analysis of her speech because it helped me to
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analyze the motives behind the agency and how the agency can use the agent for its own
purposes. The pentad also enhanced my analysis because it forced me to ask questions about
parts of the speech that I wouldn’t have thought about otherwise, it helped me to see in which
ways rhetoric can be powerful and deceiving. Burke’s pentad challenges my analysis of Fisher’s
speech because I had to identify the act, actor, agency, scene, and purpose; it was a challenge to
match everything in the speech with the pentad. Using the pentad to analyze the speech was
challenging but it also proved to be helpful because it made me think deeply about the scene, act,
agency, actor, and purpose of the speech once I figured out what they were.
Decorum was an important aspect of Fisher’s presentation of “A Whisper of AIDS.”
Decorum can be defined as behavior that keeps with good taste and propriety or appropriate
social behavior. I learned in the class textbook that Cicero’s notion of decorum sent the speaker
to find tropes and figures, which would help fashion the rhetorical situation. In Fisher’s case,
tropes and figures were used to help meet the expectations of the audience so that she could
connect with them through language. Fisher used an allegory to paint a bigger picture of the
situation of AIDS. “I am one with the lonely gay man sheltering a flickering candle from the cold
wind of his family’s rejection.” In using that allegory, Fisher was able to say that though she
wasn’t the typical person to contract HIV, she was still a sufferer, just like homosexuals. I
believe that in using an allegory, Fisher was able to tell the audience that everyone who has
AIDS should be treated equally, no matter what their race, gender, social standing, age, or sexual
preference is. Another important aspect of Fisher’s decorum was the event that she was at, the
Republican National Convention. Decorum at a Republican event in 1992 was very important
and those who spoke at Republican events were expected to be very conservative. Fisher met the
Republican expectations because she had good morals and fit their “family value” agenda, yet
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she didn’t meet the decorum because she was infected with HIV, something that many
Republicans like Patrick Buchanan believed homosexuals deserved. The topic of Fisher’s speech
defied Republican decorum, but Fisher’s values boosted her credentials and ethos so that her
situation balanced out perfectly and was acceptable for the audience to hear.
The biggest lesson that can be learned from analyzing the rhetorical situation of Fisher’s
speech is the connection of rhetoric with power and deceit. Aristotle defined rhetoric as “the
faculty of discovering in any particular case all the available means of persuasion.” What
Aristotle didn’t say was that rhetoric is the faculty of discovering, in the correct case, all the
available means of persuasion. In essence, one takeaway point is that rhetoric isn’t always used
for the right reasons. As I learned from studying the Republican Party’s motives behind Fisher’s
speech, rhetoric can be used for political gain. Rhetoric, along with ability to be deceitful, can
also be extremely powerful and persuasive at the same time. In his Essay Concerning Human
Understanding, John Locke derisively proves the connection between power and deceit in the
context of rhetoric:
“It is evident how much men love to deceive and be deceived, since rhetoric, that
powerful instrument of error and deceit, has established its professors, is publicly taught,
and has always been in great reputation: and, I doubt not, but it will be thought great
boldness, if not brutality in me, to have said much against it.”
Even in the 1690’s Locke was able to realize that rhetoric can be used for good and evil and still
understood that no matter what reason it was used for, it can still be an extremely powerful form
of human art.
By pushing through stereotypes and revealing shocking personal facts about herself,
Fisher was able to make known the seriousness of AIDS and who it can affect. She clearly
proved the exigence of her speech over and over again without being redundant; AIDS needed
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more awareness and compassion. Fisher handled the constraints of a tough audience and touchy
subject while keeping the audience engaged. Kenneth Burke’s pentad proved to be useful in
analyzing her speech because the use of it makes the reader realize that the Republican Party
inadvertently lived up to their stereotype of holding prejudices against people like homosexuals
and IV drug users. Though rhetoric is powerful, it can also be deceiving, but sometimes
deception is what makes rhetoric powerful. Fisher gave her speech at a tough time in history, as
AIDS was a fairly new and taboo topic that she bravely chose to tackle and ultimately changed
the face of AIDS awareness and compassion for the better.