30. Does Your Water Need More Ions?

http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2013/03/ionized_and_alkalinized_water_ridiculous_health_fad_debunked.html

On March 22, Kent Sepkowitz; writer at Slate, writes an article on healthy fads, and asks the public, if our water needs more ions? To introduce his article, he begins saying that after many years of people neglecting water, today it seams to be emerging as a cutting-edge healthy food. Sepkowitz states that this may be because of Gatorade, because go the chemicals that are in it, he goes on to say that the inventors where trying to prevent football players in Florida, from collapsing with the heat, but they didn't think if would become a "sports drink."He then talks about some statistics and the money that companies had to use in order to support their industries. Sepkowitz also says that American water needs to be self-improved, because the number of Americans who get sickened by the tap water is minuscule. After setting his "theme" He goes into the body of his article, and starts talking about who ionized water is so exciting. Sepkowitz says how water ionization and alkalization is another fad of science that can be used for support. He ends his article with a very strong argument, that combines his thesis statement and his arguments, and overall reaches the public, when he says; "Eventually it is the physician who seems the narrow-minded, dim-witted charlatan stuck on boring Earth, heavy shoes pulled down by gravity. Because it turns out that it is not science that people want but science fiction."

In this article Sepkowitz uses many rhetorical devices. Throughout his article, his diction is very strong, he states his thesis and supports it with fact evidence, and makes his thesis stronger, when he ends with a shocking yet truthful sentence. Sepkowitz uses allusions to companies, and their incorporations, the biggest one he states is Gatorade, and how the makes of it where just trying to prevent they footballers to not collapse in the Floridian heat weather. In a way he also uses irony, to state that water has know been considered a "healthy food" because of the influence that Gatorade had in the market, and how it is full of unhealthy things. His thesis is to show the importance of ionized water and how it has affected the public today. Sepkowitz main audience are nutritionist and or people who do sports, because he states about "healthy food" and how athletes need water to replace the sugary and other substances contained in the Gatorade bottle.