Category Archives: enthymeme

Enthymeme (en’-thy-meem): 1. The informal method [or figure] of reasoning typical of rhetorical discourse. The enthymeme is sometimes defined as a “truncated syllogism” since either the major or minor premise found in that more formal method of reasoning is left implied. The enthymeme typically occurs as a conclusion coupled with a reason. When several enthymemes are linked together, this becomes sorites. 2. A figure of speech which bases a conclusion on the truth of its contrary. [Depending on its grammatical structure and specific word choice, it may be chiasmus].

“Make sure to lock the door.” She looked at me with a puzzled expression on her face.

I thought it was amazing that we found our way to her mud and bark champole—the dome-seeped structure where her people lived. There were no roads, just dirt paths crisscrossing everywhere. Svelto said, “We have no locks here.” Then I remembered: Svelto’s culture is lockless. Burglary is not a crime—it is an art form. This is inevitable in a lockless culture. When I told Svelto to lock her door, I was reminding her of something that’s “normal” in my culture, failing to realize that the norm was not operative in Elvizonia.

There were so many things I had to unlearn to live comfortably there. We had met in a cocktail lounge in New York, and married when we got tired of dating, and then, moved to Elvizonia. She had done an amazing job of assimilating to the dominant US cultural norms—it was like she was from New Jersey or Ohio.

When we got to Elvizonia, she expected me to assimilate. I complied. I had to get a tattoo of her face just below my belly button. The tattoo artist used a sharpened stick dipped in ink made from some kind of blackberries and hot sauce. It made me cry and Svelto was expected slap my face every couple of minutes during the tattooing. The tattoo was terrible. It looked like an ink blot with a nose and scraggly hair. But, in the aesthetics of Elvizonia it was considered a “superb” work of art.

The food was great. I developed a love of potatoes and mutant rabbits—the rabbits had very long ears and only one hind leg. Of course, the lack of one leg made it easy to collect them for dinner (or lunch for that matter). They would claw at the ground and spin around. You just picked them up and put them in a sack. The extra long ears were like carrying handles! Pick ‘em up, bag ‘em, and carry ‘em home.

For me, one of the strangest things of all was the Zeckszoot (Sexsuit). It was a fleece onesie —green for males and red for females—it was mandatory to wear during sex. Failure to wear a Zeckszoot could result in a fine, or even imprisonment. There were peepholes in every champole, and local officials had to be informed of your intention to have sex so they could observe through your peephole, making sure regulations were being followed.

As you can imagine, Elvizonian culture was too much of a stretch for me. My ethnocentricity was disabling. I lost the love of my life. I look at my tattoo of her face and feel the painful burden of my failure at cultural sensitivity. But then! There was Svelto!

She was working in the cocktail lounge where we met. She saw me and came over to my table. She said “Follow me.” We went back into the storeroom. She sad “Wait my little rabbit” and stepped behind a tall stack of boxes. In about a minute, she stepped out from behind the boxes. She was wearing an Elvizonian sex suit. She held up a green sex suit, wriggled it around and threw it at me. I recognized the “sex suit throwing ritual” as an Elvizonian hookup gesture—a one-off—a “just for fun.” I put on my suit and put my hands under my armpits—making wings of my arms. I flapped toward Svelto. We circled behind the boxes. Nobody was watching.

Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu)

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Enthymeme (en’-thy-meem): 1. The informal method [or figure] of reasoning typical of rhetorical discourse. The enthymeme is sometimes defined as a “truncated syllogism” since either the major or minor premise found in that more formal method of reasoning is left implied. The enthymeme typically occurs as a conclusion coupled with a reason. When several enthymemes are linked together, this becomes sorites. 2. A figure of speech which bases a conclusion on the truth of its contrary. [Depending on its grammatical structure and specific word choice, it may be chiasmus].

Him: It’s raining outside. You better take an umbrella.

Her: You’re bossing me around again. What is the umbrella’s function? Tell me how it will help with rain? Something’s missing here. I know you think it’s common sense, but where I come from we use umbrellas for shade—to keep from roasting in the desert sun.

Him: Whoops! The umbrella, as you just told me, is a tool to put over your head to block the sun. Similarly, with its mushroom shape, when you put it over your head in the rain, it can block the rain and keep you dry.

Her: Ah ha! Now I get it. By the way, your bathroom towels feel a little stiff, you better change them.

Him: What? Stiff?

Her: I’m not sure why, but stiffness in towels means there are filthy dirty. Sniff them, and you’ll know what I mean. They don’t smell “fresh.” Put the two together—smelly and stiff—and it’s laundry time.

Him: Wow! Oh my God! There’s something wrong with that? Where I come from smelly and stiff towels are tolerated in single men’s bathrooms as a sign of manliness and the biological drives that make men, men. If you find my towels offensive, I can accommodate you by doing my laundry. I hate doing it, but we’re developing a relationship, leeway is important.

Her: Wow! That’s a revelation! I thought you were just a disgusting slob with the hygiene skills of a pig. I was going to start calling you Mr. Oinker, Ha ha!

Him: Oh. My towels’ “smell” can be fixed by a washing machine. What about your smell? I’m really really hesitant to say this, but you smell faintly of poop. Where I come from, that’s a sign of really poor hygiene. But maybe where you’re from a smelly butt is a good thing, like the smell of spicy pumpkin pie or chestnuts roasting on an open fire.

Her: Oh, really? I’m sorry. I’ve been forgetting to use your bidet. I am not used to the hygiene methods here. Where I come from, we just throw a handful of Plaster of Paris on our spread butt cheeks. When it hardens we squat over a bucket and the butt-cast drops into the bucket. The buckets are picked up and replaced every week, and the contents ground up, sanitized, and repackaged for reuse. Most of use “Disaster Master Plaster,” Less popular is “Booty-Wise Absorbent Plaster.” But they are really the same. Butt plaster is butt plaster. Where I come from, butt fragrance is a primary source of attracting mates. One of our most popular love songs is “Just One Sniff.” The greatest movie of all time is “Buttzilla.”

Anyway, what about your breath? It smells like mint candy. I’m sorry, but I find it repulsive. Where I come from it should smell like the swamps of our ancestors—a bit like mashed hard-boiled eggs mixed with beer and crude oil.

Him: Whoa! I feel Ike I’m losing touch with reality, but I can accept these differences, simply as differences, with no need to judge. I am open-minded and deeply sensitive. I am a 21st Century man. As long your otherness is not a pretext to kill me, I am willing, if not able, to see you as a person, not a thing. Come here. Sit next to me and we can find out what we have in common.

Her: You are a barbarian. I brought a bottle of “Dregknoker,” the most popular intoxicating beverage where I come from. Let’s drink all of it. That’s what we do where I come from.

POSTSCRIPT

They drank the bottle of “Dregknoker.” He drank more than her. When he came out of his stupor, she was gone. He had no recollection of what happened after they started drinking. But his umbrella was gone, and his towels smelled like Febreze. There was a tube of what looked like toothpaste called “Schwamp Jaw” on his bathroom sink. There was a cone-shaped piece of Plaster of Paris in the bathroom trashcan and an opened bag of “Disaster Master Plaster” alongside the trashcan on the floor.

Aside from the itching, he felt pretty good. He was proud of his adaptability and his 21st-century sensibilities toward “others.” Then he turned on his TV. He was on “Home Invaders,” a FOX reality Tv show that mocked liberal values. “Liberals” were befriended in bars, identified by their political T-shirt imagery and by listening in on their conversations. Subsequently, they were “visited” and “spoofed” by presenters, who spent about a week getting to know them and earning their trust as fellow liberals and as their “new besties.”

He went outside to the parking lot and lit his Febreze-soaked towels on fire using what was left of “Drogknoker” to get them going. He squeezed out the “Schwamp Jaw” in a circle on the blaze.

He kept the bag of “Disaster Master Plaster.” As he slipped off the edge of tolerance and caritas, he thought, “I have been wronged. I have been made a fool. Vengeance will be mine. Everywhere, there are cracks that need to be filled, and I shall fill them with plaster.” At that moment “The Midnight Troweler” was born, and NYC would go on high alert as he began his bizarre plastering capers. He wore a full-body red leotard with a crude drawing of a dripping trowel on the chest. He had a red balaclava. He had a belt pouch filled with “Disaster Master Plaster” and holsters holding his trowel and a Taser. He cackled as he looked at the glow of his Taser’s electric arc. He had the address of the “Home Invasion” presenter that made such a fool of him, mocking his tolerance, and his humane outlook on life. Once he was a Philosophy Professor, teaching ethics. Now, he was the “Midnight Troweler.” Now he was going to get revenge. But it didn’t happen. Not yet, at least. His plaster hardened in his belt pouch before he even got out of his house.

He would redesign his belt pouch and build a zip-lock sandwich bag into it to keep his plaster moist.

POST-POSTSCRIPT

He was working on his pouch when the doorbell rang. It was the presenter. They looked deeply into each other’s eyes and the next episode of “Home Invaders” was born. It was titled “The Apology” and showed how alcohol, MDMA, and sex can help people bridge their differences. God only knows what will happen when he sees it on TV.

Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu). Bracketed text added by Gorgias.

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