In this satirical article published in The Onion the author is satirizing the strategies used by companies to market products to attract its susceptible customers. Using several rhetorical devices to campaign its innovative, revolutionary product: MagnaSoles shoe inserts. Using the fictional MagnaSoles as a model, the article humorously mocks the strategies used by companies to market products. Using an exaggerated or sarcastic tone throughout, it gives the read a true taste of the tactics used in today’s customary advertising. The passage quotes doctors in the field of pseudoscience and uses false scientific nonsense as an appeal to authority, it’s main rhetorical device. Together, these rhetorical devices are used together with ethos and logos to give a hyperbolized version of a modern advertisement.
By using phony complex diction, such as “pseudoscience”, “kilofrankels” and “biomagnetic”, terms that retains no existence in the science world. The Onion’s writer reveals the advertisers’ outrageous front shown in paragraph six and seven. Since “pseudoscience” is a resemblance to science based on misleading assumptions, thus leaving the question would one really want to purchase something that qualifies as “fake” or a “resemblance” to the real deal. As a matter of fact, Magnasoles are insoles and not a living organism, so producing a “biomagnetic field” (a phenomenon of magnetic fields produced by living organisms; it is a subset of bioelectromagnetism.) would simply be impossible. Then there is the term “kilofrankels”, which has no technical definition whatsoever, besides the prefix “kilo” a basic measurement. This is the authors’ façade of fancy diction, and it’s here knocking for the cash.
The author employs, hyperbole to augment, a dramatic tone towards the usage of the product. When the writer includes a testimonial from Dr. Wayne Frankel saying “If the frequency of one’s foot is out of alignment with the Earth, the entire body will suffer” (7), thus inferring without his product one’s body will not be at rest. Overstating, how ridiculous the thought of alignment with the Earth is important enough to cause suffering in the first place. Also by using MagnaSoles “the healing power of crystals to restimulate dead foot cells” (5), since it’s obvious that once something is deceased, there is no stimulating it back to life. This product is overstated to make certain that it sales, the author targets hyperbole since it gives life to objects that are artificial such as MaganSoles.
When using irony, the author mocks meaningless statements that establish the readers’ perception of Magnasoles as non-trustworthy and not a miracle worker. Since its advertised “clearly by an intelligent looking man in a white lab coat “(11), means that MagnaSoles is certainly trustworthy, not, just because he has a “white lab coat “perceiving him as a “doctor”, doesn’t necessarily mean he has the brains to back it up or the credibility. Not only is the product “trustworthy” it’s also a miracle, as Helen Kuhn says “I could barely walk a single step. But after seven weeks with MagnaSoles I’ve noticed a significant decrease in pain. Now I can walk comfortably. Just try to prove that MagnaSoles didn’t heal me!” (10), this is considered meaningless because her injury could have healed in that seven weeks.
Satire is used when products are marketed to consumers, for people fall in the lies of hyperboles, they are blinded by the image irony produces, and are consumed with the complex language that temps them into believing anything boasted before their eyes. Advertisers take advantage of this or anything they practically can get their hands on. MagnaSoles is a great example: cheap, fancy persuasion, and the occasional nonexistent word.