The Sign Says It All
Many things, whether you realize it or not, have an ability to persuade you in how you view yourself, your surroundings and the general world around you. Whether it’s a stop sign you follow, a person that influences your actions, or a story that persuades you to change your opinion, there are so many examples everyday in which you encounter. Think about something you pass everyday that convinces you to do something, or has you follow a law and reflect on why it makes you do those actions.
Most of us follow rules, laws and signs that tell us what to do, whether or not it would result in a consequence. For me, it’s a bike sign at UCSB, outside of my dorm of Tropicana Gardens. Everyday I wake up in the morning before 8 am, get on my clothes and walk down the stairs to unlock my bike. The possibility of me passing by this tall, brown, alarming bike sign is inevitable. Personally I think it is dirty and lifeless with a poor choice of colors, but it’s wording seems to be very powerful in getting it’s message across. I still take the time to read it and follow it’s directions because if I didn’t I would probably end up being yelled at by the supervisors of my dorm. The sign says, “Please Walk Your Bike.” It was placed in the hallway the day we got back from Winter Break, just after a five year old child got run over by a bike. The child ended up being taken care of and was fine, but the owners and resident advisors did not want it to happen again. So their idea to help prevent this from happening was to make a sign.
Currently, the sign is very effective and seems to keep everyone from riding their bikes through the hallway which helps with the many possible dangerous situations and keeps the residents at Tropicana Gardens safe. Most people follow the rules because they do not want to get in trouble or get themselves into a bad situation. Although, some people do not care if they will get in trouble for it and choose to ride their bikes anyways. Sometimes I see people getting on their bikes at the end of the hall, where other people come racing around the corner in the parking lot. This has led to many people falling, or almost falling, off their bikes and hurting themselves. The sign seems to only fix certain problems such as people running into children, hurting others or even themselves, until others start to rebel against the sign’s rule. There are still people in the dorm area who choose to follow their own rules instead of ones placed there for everyone’s safety. It has an impact on others’ decisions to do their own thing rather than follow the rules, and soon enough another dangerous incident is going to happen. Certain parts of the sign, such as the pictures and wording on it, makes it appealing to some more than others and is the main reason behind why some people choose to follow it and others do not.
As shown on the sign, it says “Please Walk Your Bike” with the “please” in italics and the “Walk Your Bike” in bold lettering. The four words on the sign make it simple but it also gets the message across in a nice way. By italicizing the “please”, it emphasizes that the supervisors of Tropicana Gardens really want you to walk their bike. There are also two other pictures below the statement. One of the pictures being a red circle with a man shaded black on a bike on the inside with a red slash through it, and the other with a person also shaded black walking a bike, surrounded by a green circle. Both of the symbols persuade the reader through pathos to show that you are not doing the right thing if you are riding your bike, while using the color green to show you are doing the right thing. The colors used in the sign are international symbols; the color red meaning stop or “bad”, green meaning “good” or go and yellow as go slow or yield. They all seem to come from street signs, signals and international agreement on what they represent. Since the colors are world renowned and the symbols are created with those colors, it creates credibility and trust to the viewer. The creators of the sign knew they had to get the viewer to follow it by having a reliable picture, symbol or statement to appeal to their ethos, and in fact it worked. Being able to recognize symbols and colors within the sign makes it easier for me to understand and trust it’s credibility. We have all grown up to realize that we need good reasoning, reliability and recognizable components in order for us to trust the person or thing that we encounter. Without having an identifiable object, color or word, this sign would not work as well as it has been.
Aside from the pictures appealing to emotion, there is another sight of pathos in the bike sign. Your emotional connection to the sign may have to do with your willingness to follow rules and avoid getting in trouble. For me, getting in trouble is the last thing I want to happen, so instead of risking it, I decide to follow the sign and get on my bike in the parking lot outside of the hallways. Although it may not state the consequences on the sign itself, we were all told if we rode our bikes in the hallways we would get a warning and then get written up. If you get written up more than three times, you are kicked out of the dorm. Knowing that this could happen, many of us decide to follow the rule of the sign and avoid the consequences that may lie ahead if we didn’t. The sign exists within a certain context which helps to give it purpose and meaning to those reading it.
While there may not be any facts that persuade us to follow it, there is the logic put into the set up of the wording on the sign, also known as logos. As I already mentioned, the first thing it says is “Please” in italicized letters, which is a nicer way to ask for something out of someone, rather than just stating the rule. The structure of the sign’s words give the reader a subtle start to reading it, and the figures shaded in black also show the viewer the correct way to walk your bike. As said before, the symbols and colors are an international symbol which most people know, and the logic behind using them persuades the person viewing the sign to do it correctly and makes it easier for them to understand. While the wording of symbols may appeal to logos, so does the logic behind knowing one might get in trouble for not following the sign. The creators of the sign noticed that if someone knows the consequences that may occur, then they are more likely to follow the sign than disobey it. For those who are not aware of the consequences, they may be much less likely to accept the sign’s statement and ignore it. The logic behind this sign seems to focus on the audience who will notice the simplicity of it and take into consideration the possible consequences of not following the rules.
For those who do not obey to the sign, I wondered what made them make the decision. I realized that we are always running around, driving and biking to go do things, and we are always in a rush to get places. Sometimes following the rules and laws around us slow us down from getting to our destination and therefore we choose to ignore them. Although you may want to follow the sign and avoid consequences, it’s not enough to keep you from being on time. Exigence, which is responding to a specific need, is shown here through the problem of being on time as a college student, or anyone at all. It leads certain people to not follow the rules of the sign so they can be on time or get to the place they need. Typically exigence is an issue or problem that causes someone to speak up, and in this case, being on time is the issue. Exigence simply has to do with what makes someone to write or speak up in the first place, a sense of urgency, or a need that must be met. This is something that must be understood before the audience, which is the people passing the sign, can move on.
While exigence plays an important role in the persuasion of the sign, so does kairos, also known as the placement of the sign. Kairos means taking advantage of or creating a perfect moment to deliver a particular message. The components of it include timeliness and the awareness of the environment around the rhetorical situation. It makes you think about the circumstances that open moments of opportunity to deliver the particular message you want to get across. The exact placement of this sign is very strategic in telling people to walk their bikes. If it was placed in a different area then it may not be as effective as it is. Just when you plan to hop on your bike and ride out to class, you see the sign and immediately decide to walk your bike.
The sign sets itself directly at the entrance of the gates where you enter into Tropicana Gardens. To be specific, I measured it on Tuesday February 11th at 4:47pm to find that from the center of the hallway, it is 3 feet and 2 inches to the right which covers almost half of the hallway. It moves everyday from people running into the sign on their way out or back to their dorm. Honestly, I think it could be another possible safety issue itself but there are no reported incidents so far. It is full of ethos, pathos and logos, each playing a different part in our response to it’s rule. Certain things about the sign such as kairos, which is the placement of the sign or exigence, which is responding to a specific need, also take part in our reaction. Everyday so far, as people pass by it and read it, it has been successful in trying to get it’s message across.
Skye Shaffer 