Kare Anderson "Be an Opportunity Maker" Ted Talk
Kare Anderson highlights the importance of making opportunities in this TED Talk. She advocates that people need to work together and find people they work well with rather than work alone. This is very important in society, as many jobs depend on people working effectively together.
Anderson starts out by mentioning that she was diagnosed as phobically shy and is a stutterer. She uses pathos by appealing to emotions, saying that people like this often feel invisible or talked around. By talking about this, she shows that she struggles socially, and the fact that she still believes in being an opportunity maker shows that almost anyone can be one. Furthermore, she establishes credibility by appealing to shy people’s struggles and showing them that they can be opportunity makers too. She establishes ethos early on, making the rest of the TED Talk easier to trust. After establishing credibility, Anderson delivers several compelling arguments. She mostly uses logos by showing examples of people working well together and being opportunity makers. She talks about an up-and-coming actress who loved public art and wanted a regulation for it to be in each new building in Los Angeles. She believed that public art was a great way to get people to engage and connect. Anderson helped her meet people that shared her interests. They spoke in front of the Los Angeles City Council, and Anderson says that they not only passed the regulation but half of them even asked to pose with them afterwards. She also mentions an example in which the husband of the actress had racquetball courts that one of the actress’s allies could teach, as he focused on exercise. The man became a successful teacher. Both of these cases show that working as a team is often more effective than working alone and that opportunities arise when people work with others. Anderson overall makes good arguments for her case. If people worked together more, the American Dream might be more accessible. Many large companies today have rich owners yet poorly paid workers (Sawyer). America is filled with greed and selfishness. If people worked together more, many people in America would not be in as hard of situations as they are. This ties into Courtney E. Martin’s TED Talk about working in communities. When people work together, more opportunities arise. I agree that it is good to work together and seek opportunities. I am shy and I sometimes struggle in groups, but I want to be able to work effectively with others. I do think, however, that sometimes it is better for opportunities to come when we are alone, as peer influence can affect our opinions and decision. Sometimes this is positive, but sometimes this is negative. I believe we need a combination of working together and coming up with our own ideas. |