It's Not about You
DAVID BROOKS
Over the past few weeks, America's colleges have sent
another class of graduates off into the world. These
graduates possess something of inestimable value. Nearly
every sensible middle-aged person would give away all
their money to be able to go back to age 22 and begin
adulthood anew.
But, especially this year, one is conscious of the many ways
in which this year's graduating class has been ill served by
their elders. They enter a bad job market, the hangover from decades of
excessive borrowing. They inherit a ruinous federal debt.
More important, their lives have been perversely structured. This year's
graduates are members of the most supervised generation in American history.
Through their childhoods and teenage years, they have been monitored, tutored,
coached and honed to an unprecedented degree.
Yet upon graduation they will enter a world that is unprecedentedly wide
open and unstructured. Most of them will not quickly get married, buy a home
and have kids, as previous generations did. Instead, they will confront
amazingly diverse job markets, social landscapes and lifestyle niches. Most will
spend a decade wandering from job to job and clique to clique, searching for a
role.
No one would design a system of extreme supervision to prepare people for a
decade of extreme openness. But this is exactly what has emerged in modern
America. College students are raised in an environment that demands one set of
navigational skills, and they are then cast out into a different environment
requiring a different set of skills, which they have to figure out on their own.
Worst of all, they are sent off into this world with the whole baby-boomer
theology ringing in their ears. If you sample some of the commencement
addresses being broadcast on C-Span these days, you see that many graduates
are told to: Follow your passion, chart your own
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CHAPTER 6
RHETORICAL ANALYSIS
(109)
course, march to the beat of your own drummer, follow your dreams and
find yourself. This is the litany of expressive individualism, which is still
the dominant note in American culture.
But, of course, this mantra misleads on nearly every front.
College grads are often sent out into the world amid rapturous talk of
limitless possibilities. But this talk is of no help to the central business of
adulthood, finding serious things to tie yourself down to. The successful
young adult is beginning to make sacred commitments—to a spouse, a
community and calling—yet mostly hears about freedom and autonomy.
Today's graduates are also told to find their passion and then pursue
their dreams. The implication is that they should find themselves first
and then go off and live their quest. But, of course, very few people at age
22 or 24 can take an inward journey and come out having discovered a
developed self.
Most successful young people don't look inside and then plan a life.
They look outside and find a problem, which summons their life. A relative
suffers from Alzheimer's and a young woman feels called to help cure that
disease. A young man works under a miserable boss and must develop
management skills so his department can function. Another young woman
finds herself confronted by an opportunity she never thought of in a job
category she never imagined. This wasn't in her plans, but this is where
she can make her contribution.
Most people don't form a self and then lead a life. They are called by a
problem, and the self is constructed gradually by their calling.
The graduates are also told to pursue happiness and joy. But, of course,
when you read a biography of someone you admire, it's rarely the things
that made them happy that compel your admiration. It's the things they
did to court unhappiness — the things they did that were arduous and
miserable, which sometimes cost them friends and aroused hatred. It's
excellence, not happiness, that we admire most.
Finally, graduates are told to be independent-minded and to express
their inner spirit. But, of course, doing your job well often means suppressing yourself. As Atul Gawande mentioned during his countercultural
address last week at Harvard Medical School, being a good doctor often
means being part of a team, following the rules of an institution, going
down a regimented checklist.
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READING AND UNDERSTANDING ARGUMENTS
Today's grads enter a cultural climate that preaches the self as the center of a
life. But, of course, as they age, they'll discover that the tasks of a life are at the
center. Fulfillment is a byproduct of how people engage their tasks, and can't be
pursued directly. Most of us are egotistical and most are self-concerned most of
the time, but it's nonetheless true that life comes to a point only in those
moments when the self dissolves into some task. The purpose in life is not to
find yourself. It's to lose yourself.
Understanding Brooks's Binaries
RACHEL KOLB
Connects article
to personal
experience to
create an ethical
appeal.
Provides brief
overview of
Brooks's
argument.
States Brooks's
central claim.
Transition
sentence.
As a high school and college student, I was given an incredible range of educational and extracurricular options, from
interdisciplinary studies to summer institutes to
student-organized clubs. Although today's students have more
opportunities to adapt their educations to their specific
personal goals, as I did, David Brooks argues that the structure of the modern educational system nevertheless leaves
young people ill-prepared to meet the challenges of the real
world. In his New York Times editorial "It's Not about You,"
Brooks illustrates excessive supervision and uncontrolled
individualistic rhetoric as opposing problems that complicate
young people's entry into adult life, which then becomes less
of a natural progression than an outright paradigm shift.
Brooks's argument itself mimics the pattern of moving from
"perversely structured" youth to "unprece-dentedly wide
open" adulthood: it operates on the basis of binary
oppositions, raising familiar notions about how to live one's
life and then dismantling them. Throughout the piece, it relies
less on factual evidence than on Brooks's own authoritative
tone and skill in using rhetorical devices. In his editorial,
Brooks objects to mainstream cultural messages that sell
students on individuality, but bases his conclusions more on
general observations than on specific facts. His argument is,
in itself, a loose form of rhetorical analysis. It opens by telling
us to "sample some of the commencement addresses being
broadcast on C-Span these days," where we will find
messages such as: "Follow your passion, chart your own
course, march to the beat of your own drummer, follow your
dreams and find yourself." As though moving down a
checklist, it then scrutinizes the problems with this rhetoric of
"expressive individualism." Finally, it turns to Atul
Gawande's "countercultural address" about working
collectively, en route to confronting the
111
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READING AND UNDERSTANDING ARGUMENTS
individualism of modern America. C-Span and Harvard
Medical School aside, however, Brooks's argument is aston
ishingly short on external sources. He cites no basis for
Comments claims such as "this year's graduates are members of the
critically on
most supervised generation in American history" or
"most
author's use of successful young people don't look inside and then plan a life,"
despite the fact that these claims are fundamental to his
observations. Instead, his argument persuades through
painting a picture—first of "limitless possibilities," then of
young men and women called into action by problems that
"summon their life"—and hoping that we will find the
illustration familiar.
Instead of relying on the logos of his argument, Brooks
assumes that his position as a baby boomer and New York
Times columnist will provide a sufficient enough ethos to
validate his claims. If this impression of age and social
status did not enter our minds along with his bespecta
cled portrait, Brooks reminds us of it. Although he refers
.
to the theology of the baby boomer generation as the
author's
"worst of all," from the beginning of his editorial he allots
himself as another "sensible middle-aged person" and
distances himself from college graduates by referring to them
as "they" or as "today's grads," contrasting with his more
inclusive reader-directed "you." Combined with his repeated
use of passive sentence constructions that create a confusing
sense of responsibility ("The graduates are sent off into the
world"; "the graduates are told"), this sense of distance could
be alienating to the younger audiences for which this editorial
seems intended. Granted, Brooks compensates for it by
embracing themes of "excellence" and "fulfillment" and by
opening up his message to "most of us" in his final paragraph,
but nevertheless his self-defined persona has its limitations.
Besides dividing his audience, Brooks risks reminding us
that, just as his observations belong only to this persona, his
arguments apply only to a subset of American society. More
specifically, they apply only to the well-educated middle to
upper class who might be more likely to fret after the
implications of "supervision" and "possibilities," or the
CHA P T E R 6
RHETORICAL ANALYSIS
readers who would be most likely to flip through the New
York 'Times.
Brooks overcomes his limitations in logos and ethos
through his piece's greatest strength: its style. He effectively
frames cultural messages in binaries in order to reinforce the
disconnect that exists between what students are told and
what they will face as full members of society. Throughout
his piece, he states one assumption after another, then
prompts us to consider its opposite. "Serious things"
immediately take the place of "rapturous talk"; "look|ingj
inside" replaces "look[ing| outside"; "suppressing yourself"
becomes an alternative to being "independent-minded."
Brooks's argument is consumed with dichotomies,
culminating with his statement "It's excellence, not happiness,
that we admire most." He frames his ideas within a tight
framework of repetition and parallel structure, creating
muscular prose intended to engage his readers. His repeated
use of the phrase "but, of course" serves as a metronomic
reminder, at once echoing his earlier assertions and refening
back to his air of authority.
Brooks illustrates the power of words in swaying an
audience, and in his final paragraph his argument shifts
beyond commentaiy. Having tested our way of thinking, he
now challenges us to change. His editorial closes with one
final binary, the claim that "The purpose in life is not to find
yourself but "to lose yourself." And, although some of
Brooks's previous binaries have clanged with oversimplification, this one rings truer. In accordance with his adoption of
the general "you," his concluding message need not apply
only to college graduates. By unfettering its restrictions at its
climax, Brooks liberates his argument. After all, only we
readers bear the responsibility of reflecting, of justifying, and
ultimately of determining how to live our lives.
WORK CITED
Brooks, David. "It's Not about You." Everything's an Argument.
Ed. Andrea A. Lunsford and John J. Ruszkiewicz. 6th ed.
Boston: Bedford, 2013,108-10. Print. Rpt. of "It's Not about
You." New York Times 30 May 2011.
113
Closely analyzes
Brooks's style.
Analyzes
author's
conclusion.