A British Columnist I admire:

Owen Jones is a British leftist newspaper columnist, who advocates for social justice by laying bare his opinion on unjust newsworthy events. His work reflects a criticism of cultural oppression prevalent in various contexts and the lack of awareness of them. He not only explicitly condemns the right wings for their role in creating these problems, but also highlights that political polarization on these issues further prevents taking action. As a supporter of human rights and an active columnist, he addresses a wide range of global issues; but some of the recurring ones include: refugees’ living conditions, police violence on civilians, deprivation of worker’s rights and villainization of individuals due to distinct reasons. By developing a unique voice and establishing a well-articulated opinion, Owen Jones demonstrates his determination to create recognition for these global issues and persuade the audience to take action towards solving them.

Jones utilizes diverse techniques in his articles to facilitate conveying the global issue. Primarily, he uses a mix of a humorous, informative, critical and sarcastic tone. Whereas the humorous tone serves to create a bond with the audience, the informative tone provides clear evidence- based arguments to the reader. To develop his informative tone, he provides hard facts and statistics; thus appeal to reason and establish credibility. As he uses strong and sometimes condescending diction to describe some rightists, his critical and sarcastic tone is mainly observed through his choice of diction. Secondly, in order to trigger a call to action, he creates appeals to concerns and fears throughout his articles through prophesying, adopting a highly hyperbolic language and using emotive words. The emotive words in conjunction with the usage of inclusive pronouns creates a sense of rapport and eliminates the notion of us versus them; therefore lures the reader to contribute in solving this problem. To further accentuate the pathos that is established, Owen Jones sometimes integrates anecdotes of people who endure the issue as well as visuals to provide tangible consequences of the problem discussed.

Villainization of labour is a common issue that can be observed all over the world. However, how the labour is exploited and treated might differ according to the reason for villainization. Therefore, the reverberations of this issue on labour might be different. In Owen Jones’ article “Eat the rich! Why millennials and generation Z have turned their backs on capitalism”, the labour receives inadequate payment; therefore can’t even afford a house. Since they belong to a lower socio-economic class, they are deemed unimportant. In the novel Ceremony the army workers were also abused. They work harshly during the war, but are not recognized in society once they leave the army. However, the reason behind this mistreatment and marginalization is race. Therefore, it results in an identity crisis in the army workers. Furthermore, in the play “The Death of a Salesman” again a villainization of labour is observed, which stems from the socio-economic differences between the middle and the upper class citizens. Whereas in Owen Jones’ article the illusion of improvement created by the society is criticized, in the play the illusion of social mobility created under the American dream is criticized.