Bowling For Columbine Essay

In the documentary Bowling for Columbine, Michael Moore suggests that the American society has been warped by guns and by the violence that surrounds them. As he sets out to explore the obscure reasoning behind the events at Columbine High School which claimed many lives, Moore supports his stance by incorporating statistics, and anecdotal evidence from Americans, demonstrating the easy accessibility to firearms and the harm caused by their use. Moore strives to illustrate this brutality as a very severe matter, in order to move the citizens of the United States toward making a difference pertaining to gun control laws and the NRA. In response to the horrific tragedies of the Columbine shooting, the “happiness is a warm gun scene” displays both a stern yet humorous tone to analyze why gun violence is so prominent in the United …show more content…
The most salient technique Moore uses within this scene is pathos, which is an emotional appeal to the audience's values and beliefs. His argument relies heavily on his audience's emotional connection to the Columbine Shooting, as well as other events involving gun violence. Within this scene Moore uses irony and juxtaposes an upbeat soundtrack containing the Beatles song “Happiness is a warm gun” about anti-gun violence with not so blissful footage that is quite disconcerting, starting out with kids shooting paintball rifles at an amusement park, to a blind target shooter who is a little too comfortable with an assault rifle, to real occasions of gruesome killings with shotguns. This has an emotional impact on the viewer and it shows the journey of someone with a gun, and how it can just start with shooting at a range, but later can be turned into actual killing. In this montage of clips two contrasting emotions are drawn, with the song the audience feels joyful, yet when viewing the videos they become more alarmed and subsequently frightened. The