Instigator / Pro
7
1472
rating
32
debates
48.44%
won
Topic
#3925

Abortion Should be Illegal.

Status
Finished

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

Winner & statistics
Better arguments
0
6
Better sources
4
4
Better legibility
2
2
Better conduct
1
1

After 2 votes and with 6 points ahead, the winner is...

RationalMadman
Parameters
Publication date
Last updated date
Type
Standard
Number of rounds
5
Time for argument
Two weeks
Max argument characters
30,000
Voting period
One month
Point system
Multiple criterions
Voting system
Open
Contender / Con
13
1709
rating
565
debates
68.23%
won
Description

Rules:
Only topic to be discussed is weather abortion should be illegal, or legal.

If Con choses to defend abortion being legal, they must:
1. State when the cutoff point for abortion should be (because if there is no cutoff point, then they are defending homicide.)
2. When they answer #1, they must have a reason to why that point should be the cutoff point.

The only exception is that Pro does agree to Cons side of the argument, if they chose to argue that the mother will die if she does not get an abortion.

Both sides must reply to their opponent first with a counterargument.
Then they may proceed to the rest of their argument.

Criterion
Pro
Tie
Con
Points
Better arguments
3 point(s)
Better sources
2 point(s)
Better legibility
1 point(s)
Better conduct
1 point(s)
Reason:

Effectively, con missed a single round, and pro decided to drop con's entire case.

Most importantly, pro decided to drop that denied abortions creates a net harm for society; particularly the existing children of the woman choosing to receive an abortion. This is contrasted with a lack of benefit, as con pointed out the abortions will still occur, just in an unsafe manner.

One point there was actually a little back and forth on was early chemical abortions compared to contraceptives vs later surgical abortions... I wish they had delved deeper into this, but it seems it falls most closely to an extension of contraception, as opposed to the procedure pro described for a pathos appeal.

Criterion
Pro
Tie
Con
Points
Better arguments
3 point(s)
Better sources
2 point(s)
Better legibility
1 point(s)
Better conduct
1 point(s)
Reason:

Arguments: R1PRO and R3CON are the main argument rounds, so I will focus on those.

In R1PRO, PRO's main argument revolves around proving that abortion is morally wrong, because it kills a developing human, and the majority of abortions are made because of bad decisions.

In R3CON, CON's main argument seeks to prove that the total detriment to society due to banning abortions outweighs the wrongness of an abortion. He cites extensively from sources in order to prove his points, namely that people will perform unsafe abortions anyway - and that abortion access benefits society in numerous ways.

I weighed these arguments and decided that overall, CON's argument was more convincing because he outweighed PRO's arguments in terms of societal benefit (the standard on which laws are passed), and his arguments were also more relevant to the resolution; PRO focused on theoretical moral aspects, while CON focused on impacts in the real world.

Sources: Tied - CON used sources more extensively, but not enough to justify the point.

S/G: Tied

Conduct: According to the Voting Policy, "the disrespect of even a single forfeiture necessitates this penalty UNLESS there is reason to withhold it."

Although CON forfeited, PRO's conduct was worse. He first attempted to impose an arbitrary, never-agreed upon rule that forfeitures somehow caused the loss of a debate, and this was the only thing he said for the rest of the debate. This behavior is inherently against the spirit of debate - instead of trying to actually rebut CON's arguments (which he had two rounds to do), he tried to get an auto-win on a non-existent technicality.