RESOLUTION: Free speach is a lie, people do not speak their minds as they were told to.
BOP: Only on PRO as the instigator of the debate, unless stated otherwise in the description.
POSITION: CON
Definitions:
- Freedom of speech: the right, as stated in the 1st and 14th Amendments to the Constitution of the United States, to express information, ideas, and opinions free of government restrictions based on content. A modern legal test of the legitimacy of proposed restrictions on freedom of speech was stated in the opinion by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. in Schenk v. U.S. (1919): a restriction is legitimate only if the speech in question poses a “clear and present danger”—i.e., a risk or threat to safety or to other public interests that is serious and imminent. Many cases involving freedom of speech and of the press also have concerned defamation, obscenity, and prior restraint (see Pentagon Papers).
- A lie: something untrue that is said or written to deceive someone
Framework and burden analysis
PRO has the burden to prove that the right to free speech is untrue and was written with the intention to deceive people. As an added part of the resolution, the statement "people do not speak their minds as they were told to" must be substantiated as well. I must show his case is insufficient to support these claims.
CONSTRUCTIVE
Since PRO's case has not yet been revealed due to his forfeiture, I have nothing to adress. I will however point out how his case is self-refuting. Winning this debate would require PRO to utilize his right to free speech, thus defeating the first part of his resolution. Moreover, he couldn't possibly write arguments necesary to winning the debate, without speaking his mind in the process, thus defeating the second part of the resolution. The mere existence of this debate and this site in general disproves the resolution. Ignoring these obvious points still doesn't leave the resolution intact. Free speech is by definition a freedom granted citicens. You can lie about having granted this freedom, but that just means there is no such right. A nonexistent right cannot be "false", the only lie would be to claim it existed. The moment you actually grant freedom of speech by writing it down into the law, it exists, and claiming it does is by definition a truthful statement. If a government proceeds to violate these rights by oppressing the people and their expressions, the right to free speech must necesarily exist in order to be violated. Free speech (or any other right) can be granted or denied -- acknowledged or ignored -- violated or respected. But the right itself can never be a lie. You could only ever lie ABOUT free speech and its position in different parts of the world. I am now very curious about PRO's case.
->99% of what you hear has been said before. In turn, 99% of that is shaped by influences around the speaker
Was this said before?
They do. It's just that birthing, and then expressing, a truly original thought is surprisingly hard. 99% of what you hear has been said before. In turn, 99% of that is shaped by influences around the speaker, such as by peers and pop culture and the newsmedia.
But there's nothing necessarily wrong with that. The first time you thought of it, it was novel to you, and worth saying to you.