Good Persuasive Speech Topics

What are good persuasive speech topics?

My list of 50 is below.
However whether they are good for you and your audience is something to seriously think about before settling on a topic.

The way to use this list of persuasive speech topics is as a guide to get your creative juices working.

Each idea is simply a starting point - a hook to give your brain something to latch on to.

As you scan the list look for the speech topics triggering more than a flicker of interest. Stop and consider those more carefully. Examine them from as many angles as you can. Apply imagination - shake, rattle and roll that potentially good persuasive speech topic idea around to see whether it fits your needs.

Remember any topic can be handled multiple ways.

Here's an example to show you what I mean. The topic is "Voice Matters".

The Intended Audience: Teachers
Speaker Credibility: Many years of teaching English and drama plus public speaking experience
Speech Angle: to persuade listeners that how their voices sound in their student's ears influences how they are responded to and if they don't like that, they can change it.
Specific Speech Purpose: to have them sign up for a voice workshop
Main ideas:

• voice image - how we are perceived by others is influenced by voice quality
• What is a good quality voice? What personality or character traits are attributed to a person who has a good voice? Use sound clips to demonstrate. Ask for suggestions from the floor. How could that affect students?
• What is a poor quality voice? What do people assume about the speaker with that type of voice? How could that affect students?
• How do you know what you sound like to others? Use prepared sound clip of self to demonstrate.
• Can voice quality or voice image be changed? Why would you do/not do that? Provide researched examples of before and after work on voice.
• Consequences of working/not working on voice image - Give results - better classroom atmosphere, more on-target behavior, less time off with voice strain ...
• How to work on voice image - outline of action and time line involved
• Sign up for workshop and ongoing public speaking course

But someone else might come along looking for a good persuasive speech topic and pick "Voice Matters" too. This time the treatment goes like this:

Image:Ray Smithers

Audience: Job seekers
Speaker Credibility: senior recruitment specialist for a major firm in town
Speech Angle: to persuade listeners that their telephone voice is their initial calling card to getting an interview
Specific Speech Purpose: to have the seekers sign up for course on telephone skills to get the appointment they need
Main Ideas: As illustrated above because the core material is the same or similar but the examples used to carry the persuasive argument and benefits will be relevant to the audience.

Good Persuasive Speech Topics

1. Sport is the new religion
2. Miracles do happen
3. There should be a law against drugged driving
4. Truth and politics seldom mix.
5. We get what we deserve
6. Proverbs speak the truth
7. Natural disasters are the earth's way of restoring balance
8. Exploitative advertising should be banned
9. Love is not a defense or an excuse
10. Adoption of other-race children should be encouraged
11. Space aliens exist
12. Euphemisms are dangerous
13. Children should not be allowed mind altering drugs of any sort
14. Arranged marriages have more chance of succeeding
15. How we pronounce our words matters
16. Assisted suicide should be made legal
17. Government benefits weaken a country
18. Discrimination makes you stronger
19. Private education/schools promote elitism
20. Religion has no place in schools
21. Good or right thinking is a matter of opinion
22. Multi-national corporates should be outlawed
23. Immigration laws are there to protect us
24. Factory farming can be humane
25. To be vegan is the only right and moral way to live
26. Fashion cripples creativity
27. Cars and city centers should not mix
28. Birth control should be compulsory for people with genetically inheritable diseases
29. A young single girl who has a child should give it up for adoption
30. Age gives a face character
31. The earth is smaller today
32. Swearing has lost its shock value
33. Most illness is avoidable
34. Junk mail is essential reading
35. Manners are essential
36. Allowing yourself to have fun is good for your health
37. Reincarnation is the only way to explain some experiences
38. Illness occurs in the mind before it manifests in the body
39. Getting older doesn't mean becoming feeble
40. Safety legislation leads to diminished personal responsibility
41. A big brand doesn't necessarily mean big value
42. Diets do more harm than good
43. Honesty is not the best policy
44. Food does not make you fat
45. Sometimes being cruel to be kind is the only way
46. Advances in medicine are not necessarily good for us
47. Big brother is more alive and well every day
48. Death is not final
49. Community service should be compulsory for everyone
50. Everyone should have the right to wear what they wish

For help turning your good persuasive speech topic into a fully fledged speech check these pages:

• Persuasive Speech Outline
  Find out how to prepare an excellent speech outline using the classic persuasive speech structure: the 5 steps of Monroe's Motivated Sequence, and then download a blank speech outline to complete.
• How to Write a Speech
  Step by step easily followed instructions for refining your outline into an effective speech.
• If you haven't found the topic you want check this link for 50 more good persuasive speech topics
• And last but not least read a sample persuasive speech that follows the persuasive speech outline referenced above.
  Please note though before you go to that page the subject is somber: the affect of suicide on families.

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