Instigator / Pro
3
1597
rating
22
debates
65.91%
won
Topic
#3355

Combat units are best off comprised of all men, rather than differing assortments.

Status
Finished

The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.

Winner & statistics
Better arguments
0
3
Better sources
2
2
Better legibility
0
1
Better conduct
1
0

After 1 vote and with 3 points ahead, the winner is...

RationalMadman
Parameters
Publication date
Last updated date
Type
Standard
Number of rounds
3
Time for argument
Three days
Max argument characters
20,000
Voting period
One month
Point system
Multiple criterions
Voting system
Open
Contender / Con
6
1687
rating
555
debates
68.11%
won
Description

No information

The pain of defeat
leaves me once again
crestfallen

---RFD (1 of 3)---
For this debate on if combat units are better off if they exclude all women, pro was not able to sufficiently prove the merits of their case as applicable to all graduated female soldiers (as opposed to just random sampling of trainees). While pro repeatedly showed that female trainees are less effective than male combat veterans, this really doesn’t secure and hold the BoP to be applied to all female soldiers.

The biggest thing that could have improved this debate would have been better organization from pro in R2, seriously, I shouldn’t have to export your case into a word document and reformate it for you.
After that, comparisons using actual combat performance, rather than theoretical ones. While it was pro who pointed this out about cons case, his own case likewise suffered from this (albeit not as badly, seeing how he at least used military specific examples).

I should also mention that for definitions to be binding, they should be in the description. Granted, not much ambiguity in the language to really need them here.

Training and injury:
Pro shows that a high number of women are less suited than men at PT (and that is even with alternative standards). And further, when in training are more likely to be injured in trying (note: I lost several friends to this; and where there are various causes, it really boils down to it being an evil to not offer women some extra weeks of hardening training before boot camp).
Con points out that this is irrelevant due to combat units being composed of graduates from training.
Pro insists all members of military in combat units are just trainees (this is a painfully bad misunderstanding of his own data).
Pro doubles down with a focus on random soldiers in training instead of graduates, by making a big deal out of “CON concedes that significantly fewer women even pass the army fitness test.” Missing the core theme of con’s replies that a group doing worse on average in training are not all the people who will be even considered for a combat role.

Misc:
Pro argues that men usually do better at a bunch of stuff (reaction, taking action, etc.).
Much later pro adds in that boys get distracted by the presence of women.

Comparative:
Pro argues that male-only units perform better at a bunch of stuff evaluated. I've got to say, the focus on wall climbing abilities, implies other assorted jungle gym activities, which unless we redefine combat to kindergarten recess, is not nearly as strong point as pro most likely meant to it be.

---RFD (2 of 3)---
Monty Hall problem:
Con turns this around elegantly by pointing out that pro is speaking of averages among random unknowns from potential future soldiers, ignoring both that units are assembled from graduated soldiers, and further the existence of exceptional women whose abilities may be known.
Pro does a decent job defending that his data was from real world combat units (not real units, and not real combat, but still a decent defense). It fell apart at the end, and was magnified by his accusations that con was lying.

Unique value propositions:
Con brings up that women are better at relationships in workplace settings, which does apply to combat units (trust me, we don't just alternate between chewing bubblegum and kicking ass, there's a ton that needs to be accomplished in order to even get to combat).
Con adds to this an appeal that mixed units are less likely to commit war crimes.
Women apparently have better senses, so are better for guarding (indeed a common task for combat units).
Pro counters that one of cons studies used morale as a metric (presumably the military has no need for any of that?), and a better study would have focused on task completion (agreed on that, but highly disagreed on dismissing morale), and further the article did not seem scientific (catching this was good work on sources)... Pro goes on about this source for awhile...
Pro disputes cons claim that male soldiers have ever committed rape or other war crimes due to it not being sourced... Certain common knowledge stuff does not need to be cited, such as Australia existing, or who the current US president is…
Pro adds that it’s too rare to matter, and that it’s only due to having too high a percentage of men… Why challenge the claim, then agree with it but concede that the problem is due to too high a percentage of men?

“CON does not give a single example of which specific claim is sexist”:
Seriously? Please open a dictionary. For future debates I advise not getting off topic every time someone describes your case with a word you don’t like.

---RFD (3 of 3)---

Conduct:
Missed round.

Sources:
I wanted to favor pro on this, but his counters harmed themselves with being so scatter brained. E.g., quoting a source saying “cohesion” and then claiming con is lying about women being better at that, making me have to read the whole source to find that it used the word “collaboration” instead of cohesion (nearly synonymous words).
Con catches a huge flaw in pro’s sourcing, to which I double checked the source and will quote it directly: “many of of the male study participants had previously served in combat units, whereas female participants, by necessity, came directly from infantry schools or from noncombat jobs.” This seriously sealed everything, defusing so much that pro put emphasis on (had it not been implied earlier, I would likely dismiss it for being such a late addition).
Leaving sources tied due to good effort on both sides (even while leaning toward con in the end).

Legibility:
Weird formatting and dividers from pro, which made reading his case inorganic.

===

Such as if this replied to the above, instead of intuitively beginning another section.

But this is not a reply within the same section it's positioned

===

Oh, and this is sometimes to the above, but not always, sometimes it's a new section... This goes on, seriously harming the ability to track pro's case in R2.

I just finished reading. My opponent tried to brush off that he openly lied about his sources, but the evidence is too clear. I don't think my opponent can walk out from how I pointed out he explicitly misquoted and lied about what his aource said (see comments below) about smelling.

Please vote

-->
@Barney

I would appreciate your vote since you seemed interested and even when you vote against me, you often give constructive feedback

A few more days and I will be gladly done with this debate.
If anyone sees and reads this, please vote when the time comes.

Another example

He made a claim that "females are superior in team cohesion"

And he cites a study that doesn't even say this. They compared teams that are all female and all male in offices to mixed gender teams, and found the gender balanced teams had more "positive experinces" compared to the all female and all male teams. That does not even compare males and females, and if anything it concludes all female teams had less positive experiences, so why would he use this to say females are superior in anything?

I can't wait to see him defend lying about this because it is too explicit in the text.
There is no way around it, so if he concedes, that's a plus for me. If he insists it's true it looks worse for him because I quoted his own source.

He made this claim for example:
"Let me be clear here, the average female is 50% more effective at smelling than men are," from a source that said

"women’s brains that have up to 50% more olfactory neurons"

That is not at all saying they have a 50% more effective sense of smell, the whole article never even suggested who is more effective so either he just lied about it, or he is too imcompetant to know what that means because immediately after this, HIS OWN SOURCE states:

"The authors acknowledge that just finding this difference is not enough to prove that women have a superior sense of smell – it is not even enough to explain the findings of previous studies about differences in ability to differentiate, identify and remember scents and odors" (Medical News Today).

His own source goes against the whole claim he made, entirely. You cannot make that claim from reading your source. So it's settled.
A) He lied about the source or B) He didn't read his own source. Both are bad looks.

I point it out in my round two, and I point out almost every incident where he does this.
He was probably hoping to just drop sources without anyone reading them

It is pretty impossible to lie when you are quoting it.

Just a warning to anyone who will debate this guy in the future, he lies about almost every one of his sources. I am not exagerating, he actually posts something and lies about what it says hoping you won't check over it.

Oh lol I put the add a key thing when I thpigjt I'd be using a lot of abbrevoiations. I left a note to myself in the R1 sorry

-->
@Barney

No, I don't think the issue here is with my understanding of words.
I think the root of the issue has nothing to do with me, or my assertions.

-->
@Novice

It seems like you do not understand the word should, and if you wish to do well in future debates you should look up the definition of should.
https://www.google.com/search?q=should

-->
@Barney

I'm not really following you any more to be honest, im just keeping it known that there isn't a contradiction in that for the same reasons as below

-->
@Novice

Your sentence was in contradiction with itself, even if not the resolution (granted, it could be twisted into a partial concession thereof).

E.g.: I'm not saying people should take a certain course of action, I'm saying it's better if they do because of X Y and Z.

The should is strongly implied by virtue of the argument being that it's better, thus denying the should is contradictory.

What I suspect you meant to say is that you don't believe mixed units must be disbanded or any such thing, merely that they would be better off homogeneous.

-->
@Barney

So you just admitted that the resolution doesn't call for disbanding mixed combat units, and say I made an error by saying I'm not arguing for something you just admitted the resolution doesn't call for?

-->
@Novice

I don't think the resolution calls for disbanding all mixed combat units. I was merely pointing out a noteworthy phrasing error in one of your paragraphs.

-->
@Barney

"The contradiction is you are saying there is a better way to do something, while denying anyone should do things the better way"

I'm not denying that people should do something a better way, that is just not what is resolved, nor is it the argument.
The argument is that male combat units are "in the most favorable or advantageous position" (best off).
It's a different argument to say, we should remove women from combat units. Maybe that could have been a good debate, but it just isn't the resolution today.

And if your argument of contradiction is that I said what is not part of the resolution for me to argue...

How am I annoying? Is it because when you go around insulting me on debates I have, in the comments section, unprovoked and intentionally while you can't take some back?

Get the fuck out of here with your victim-playing shit. You are the aggressor and initial insulter to me in every way, it's documented in the website's history.

-->
@Novice

The contradiction is you are saying there is a better way to do something, while denying anyone should do things the better way. If it's better, that in it of itself implies that it ought to be done that way.

Your student example is an apples to oranges comparison, as one is talking about proficiency in a job to which they will still be employed at roughly the same pay regardless of where they are assigned, the other is denying people a basic education due to racism.

I blocked you because you are annoying, I have no problem debating you.
I have been on this site for about a month and a half, I didn't even know that blocking prevents people from accepting debates, not that I care.

-->
@Barney

Novice blocked me because they're scared of me accepting their debates from here on out xD

you take the four guys from big bang theory and put them against these women:

https://cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/gray/EDNXD27CZBB4RKVSSMTPAVZU64.jpg

They are getting bodied.
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/bigbangtheory/images/a/a6/Group_planning_in_Paintball.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20110828160550

Get where I'm going with this?

Well, that's gonna me my whole case. Your case is implying something has to be absolute apex raw power strength to be optimal in combat based solely on sex. However, many males out there are terrible at combat compared to properly trained female combatants and of course even out of trained combatants plenty of females outdo the males in a variety of categories (especially when flexibility and agility matter in a close combat with a lot of obstacles around).

That's like saying if the claim was "asian students are better at school than African American students"

"Oh, he's arguing that schools should only have asian students"

Please tell me what is the contradiction

Maybe I can illustrate it better for you:
I am saying combat units composed of men alone are best off, defined as "in the most favorable or advantageous position."

So in what way is that a contradiction? I am not arguing that combat units should only be composed of all men regardless if I believe it or not.
That is just not what is resolved.

-->
@Barney

Be extremely specific, what contradiction?

-->
@Novice

"Im not arguing that combat units should only contain men. Simply that it is better off for a combat unit to be comprised of men alone, than any other assortment of sexes."

Bit of a contradiction there.

Having been in a combat unit, having a female medic with us allowed for searches of female detainees.

-->
@Novice

Are you referring to infantry units? Because a combat unit could include fighter squadrons, anti aircraft gunners, sailors, etc.

I just changed the resolution so it's easier to debate. So if you are someone who didn't accept because of the resolution, you can accept now.

Someone please accept the debate.

I think 'unit' especially makes women have advantages (they tend to be more geared to teamwork utility than solo utility) but if it comes down to pure, raw combat and both are at the peak of their respective sex's capacity, then yes the best male trained spies/assassins/mercenaries etc are superior at combat than the best trained females.

So, the real question is if they are continually operating as a unit or rather they function as a unit but often end up 1v1 in the combat.

If it's the former, I can see a case for Con, if it's the latter, I can see a case for Pro.