Resolved: In the US, plea bargaining ought to be abolished
The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.
After 6 votes and with 14 points ahead, the winner is...
- Publication date
- Last updated date
- Type
- Standard
- Number of rounds
- 4
- Time for argument
- Three days
- Max argument characters
- 30,000
- Voting period
- Two weeks
- Point system
- Multiple criterions
- Voting system
- Open
Round Structure. I will cede the first round so that Pro can go first.
I will offer my constructive, and then we will alternate between Pro and Con until the final round, in which Pro is required to waive.
Other than that, standard rules apply.
In other words, don't post new args in the final round. Don't be a di**.
That's about it.
Both sides ask me to weigh their respective policy/status quo by the consequences.
Pro, somehow immediately starts talking about justice and setting up a debate partially on the premise of justice.
In general, the argument pro makes is fairly intuitive: people being forced to plead guilty to crimes they didn’t commit is necessarily bad. For guilty people, pros position didn’t seem entirely clear in terms of how it fit into the weighting he asked for. Sure there are impacts on the guilty people, but there’s no tying back to that premise.
Con rounds out his argument here, by arguing, effectively that the criminal justice system depends on plea bargains due to amount of time spent in the court system, prison overcrowding and that the innocent would end up spending more time in prison due to relying on public defenders.
Pro could have offered a counter plan, I felt his argument that without plea bargains - prosecutors would be more selective, and that drugs crimes would be lessened in penalty necessarily.
This argument feels intuitive, while con is arguing the negative side from the point of view of individuals, pros argument makes it feel that the governments side would suffer as well, and pros second round hashes some of these out.
If this had been included within pros initial plan (and thus have the fiat), this would have been pretty reasonable but con goes basically points out that cons implication that this would necessarily happen is not guaranteed. In fact much of cons argument in round three around the evidence and justification for why pros claimed mitigation may not happen: the public support for example is excellent
At the end of this, both sides of this ask me to vote on consequences: I felt that neither side really gave me much in the way of establishing the overall consequences on balance of both side. Whilst one possible outcome from pro was better justice and potentially not crippling the CJS, the mitigation’s pro offered did not seem well enough hashed out, compared to cons issues.
Neither side felt well anchored to the way I was told to vote: injustice vs crippling the system. I wanted to go for pros intuitive arguments; but there was not enough there, and con did just enough to cast doubt on their possibility.
As a result, I have to go with the most substantial and solidified consequences.
Arguments to con.
I am a US citizen who considers plea bargaining to be legal blackmail- essentially, make our [prosecutors, judges] jobs easy or we will increase your punishment. Nevertheless, this voter finds that Pro’s case fails to persuade.
Pro’s opener is problematic.
*Waiting six months in jail for a trial is a major consequence. Few defendants who fail to make bail have a chance to retain present employment over that kind of time. This claim needed lots of stats but got none.
*31 innocents convicted of major crimes some time before 2009 is a clear and specific miscarriage of justice but that statistic by itself conveys no sense of the scope and scale of the problem. If Pro only offers 31 miscarriages of justice than perhaps the problem isn’t as bad as this reader assumed.
*When Pro does get down to stats, errors really harm the impact: 95% felony plea bargains seems true but not substantiated by any of Pro’s sources, 18% of exonerated pled guilty is also not substantiated by Pro’s sources but seems plausible (my research came up with 11%), 83% of DNA tests point to other perp (what? That can’t be true. What set of DNA tests are we talking about? Neither Pro or Pro’s sources elucidate.)
*as a voter who finds most drug sentences too onerous and nonproductive, stats that show that plea bargains reduce drug sentence is counter-persuasive.
*Pro’s defense (won’t clog courts) was minimal but fine.
Con’s opener was better.
Increased costs of public defense
Increased costs of incarceration
Clogged courts
I consider the clogged courts arguments a wash- Alaska vs. El Paso, Pro depends on Drug decriminalization which remains a fairly wild variable, Con depends on a status quo response to clogged system which seems unlikely.
This voter considers the harm of jailing innocent far more consequential than the harm of increased justice system costs. However, we have to weigh these consequences with a strong sense of scale- is a handful of unjust imprisonments worth substantially fewer costs? Pro really needed to give this voter a sense of the scale of unjust imprisonments to a degree sufficient to outweigh the costs of public defense and increased incarceration that were well established by Con and barely contested by Pro.
Arguments to Con.
All other points equal for what amounts to a grown-up contest reflective of actual policy decision-making. Nice work.
Kiss my goddamn ass.
I could go either way here.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Mwn5fqefLFhv_dlBxBhm9ET0ABqX7MhN9OTSIpXYCzI/edit?usp=sharing
I'm evaluating this premise by premise. I'll start with Pro's and then do Con's.
Pro's C's:
C1: Plea bargaining prevents justice
Pro argued that plea bargaining forced innocent's into a sentence that they did not deserve and the guilty to get lighter sentences. Con's only rebuttal is that the alternative would be public defenders entering into trials with barely any preparation for the case at all. Pro's only defense is that Con did not respond to the many statistics that he cited.
This was a very disappointing contention. Pro started it out very well, but Con barely rebutted it. Furthermore, Pro didn't even address what Con said, instead resorting to simply point out what Con didn't do.
Overall, defenders not being able to be prepared is a safe reason for them to get plea bargains for their clients, so I have to award this point to Con because Pro did not respond to it.
C2: Plea bargains are unnecessary
Pro argues that guilty pleas are still going to be used, and cites Alaska as an example. Con rebutted quite a bit by showing how plea bargains still continued in Alaska, plus the fact that Alaska barely had any felony convictions. He also gave an example of El Paso, where plea bargains were banned and courts were clogged. Pro did not even attempt to defend his source, so because of that, this point goes to Con as well.
Now I will do Con's contentions.
C1: Increased Reliance on Public Defenders
Con argues that public defenders are currently being swamped and that plea bargains help them lift the load a bit better. Pro rebuts by saying that guilty plea rates will still stay the same, so defenders won't be that swamped. Con defended by pointing back to his El Paso source which showed that the caseload doubled when plea bargains were abolished. Pro didn't respond, so this point goes to Con.
C2: Worsens Prison Conditions Due to Overcrowding
Con argues that prisons become worse because they are more crowded since there are more trials due to a lack of plea bargaining. Pro rebuts by saying that various reforms through the government would nullify this. Con then correctly points out that Pro gave no evidence that the government would make those reforms. Because of this, he gets this contention.
C3: Court Clog
Con argues that courts would be clogged with trials if there were no plea bargains. Pro's rebuttal is that the government will make reforms that nullify this, but Con defends extensively by showing how the government has an incentive not to make these reforms and also by showing sources that say that not all of America is on board with those reforms. Pro didn't respond, so Con gets this point.
Overall, this was a disappointing debate. It started out amazing (I didn't even know this was a topic up for discussion), but after each party rebutted once, they defended just a little and ended. I expected a lot more clashing and defending.
That said, Con did a better job of critiquing Pro's points, as well as of defending his own, so I'm giving Con arguments.
Sources:
Con uses a ridiculous amount of statistics to back up his points. Although Pro did use some too, Con critiqued them very well, and Pro never disputed Con's. Pro also cited whole passages from his sources, which I consider to be wrong. Sources should be used for verification of facts, not for whole arguments. I'm giving sources to Con.
Good job to both debaters. :)
*Tied In All Other Categories
Yes I did. I could argue the con position as well, and think the con position is less abstract giving it an advantage, but I have a legitimate interest in addressing the massive injustices caused by allowing people to plea bargain
Did you want to take the Pro position?
Any chance you would do this debate again. It should be easy for you since your first round is already written?
Thank you. I'm trying to get past my biases on the matter and think about what works for everyone.
Interesting suggestions. Will have a chat with bsh about them in the am
C Tribunal.
This system would send all reported votes into a public tribunal that can be voted on by anybody on the website. This would give the public a voice in whether or not the vote was fair or not. The key here is to put the power in as many hands as possible. It's not that I don't trust any particular moderator. But no moderator can make the right decision all of the time.
I could probably come up with more. But I've already went on too long.
Sorry, ran out of filibustering space :)
I've thought at length about this and I see the possible problems with a completely open system, so I've brought a few suggestions.
1. Sectioned Ballots. = This would consist of turning the voting card into a type of homework assignment. There's lots of ways you could do this. You could have a section for each round of the debate and they must fill out a description for each round. This could even be reduced further by having the debaters frame their premises in a formatted section during the start of each round. The second option would be optimal, but would limit the flexibility of debate styles and would require probably too much footwork on the coding end. The advantage to the first option is that it's just flexible enough to fit all standard formats and would also make it easier to vote. I think the best way to moderate this option would be to put more general focus on the effort that the voter puts into their vote. Pragmatically speaking, it's more important that the voter's RFD is sincere rather than whether or not it's logical. In the end, none of us can really say that one methodology of logic is superior to another on any specific topic. Only in a broad sense.
2. Public Moderation.
This one is more vague because I honestly don't know the best way to implement it. But the general idea would be to have a downvoting type system similar to what you say on youtube. There's several ways to do this.
A. Tournament system. In this system, Vote can be liked or disliked and only the votes at the top X spots of the list will count toward the debate. This could also be done in intervals. (X spots are full vote Y votes are half votes, etc.)
B. Fall off system. This would be a system that would delete a vote if it gets downvoted too much. Up votes don't have to exist in this system, but they could as a counterbalance to stop unfair downvoting.
C. Tribunal. to be continued.
I feel like the current voting system leaves much to be desired. This is not in direct reference to my personal experience with the site, because for the most part, my votes have been handled more or less how I probably would have handled them under the current standard.
Let's call it the problem of judgement.
To vote objectively, one needs an objective standard.
The current voting system is certainly not arbitrary, but it doesn't have a truly objective standard.
Voters are objectively required to assess the arguments in an itemized fashion, but there is no rigid standard by which to control how these things are judged.
So far, the closets thing I've seen to regulating this problem is the standard that "the voter may not draw an outside conclusion". It's certainly a good start, but it has problems itself.
It would logically follow, that for a voter to vote, they'd have to at least take on one outside conclusion when weighing the burden of proof at the end.
to elaborate. If one is judging two arguments using only what the debaters have said, then the voter will be stuck with whatever convoluted logic that is presented by the debaters.
In general, the voter must judge whether they "believe" said arguments respectively.
But this causes a problem. If a voter believes or disbelieves based solely on the confines of the debater's arguments, then the voter is essentially trapped in a forced dichotomy where they must only adopt confidence based on two possible lines of reason that may not even logically follow with the burden of proof.
Ultimately, the voter is forced to believe or disbelieve based on their own general attitudes toward things. This means there will always be a subjective element and many voters will outright vote in a post hoc fashion (checking the points box first and explaining it after, I'm sure nobody's 100 percent innocent of doing this even if it was because they read the debate first)
I wondered about that, lol...
It was actually me who hit the report button by mistake :haha:
Lol
I think I may have reported the debate. I subscribe to debates that are near their final round and then unsubscribe when I vote. I accidentally report a Ronnie as I’m on mobile and end up clicking the wrong one :P
Than you!
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>Reported Vote: IsaiahDude543 // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 7 points to Pro
>Reason for Decision: Big V all the way
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter re-voted in a way that can only be interpreted as a deliberate choice to ignore site voting policy, which was explained to him when his previous vote was removed. Further attempts to vote without making any genuine effort to meet the standards set out in the site's voting policy will result in the loss of the voter's voting privileges.
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Yeah and that's why I didn't go as hard against your case as I did as I didn't htink it would be fair. I'd love to redo this debate. I think I needed some more evidence in my rebuttals. Had I provided that, I think I would have won.
Thanks for the vote. Yeah, I didn't realize I could only defend. I wanted to add more refutations. It would have been unfair as it was the end of the debate though.
No problem
Lol! Thanks for listening to our rambling. Blamonkey is a tough cookie to beat.
20 minutes of my life down the drain, that's every vote I've ever given for a debate between either of you, y'all talk too much lol
I'm so sleepy right now that I posted this comment to the wrong debate xD
Thanks for a great RFD!!
I care about the integrity of the voting process and will report any vote that doesn't meet the standards on my debate - especially the ones who are on my side.
I don't mean this in a rude way, but I'm surprised your reporting a vote that would help you. It's something that would take guts for me.
Already done. Even though the vote will be removed, I cannot remove votes on my own debate even when it clearly does not meet our standards. The vote has already been reported and bsh1 will get to it as soon as he can.
You might want to report the vote by IsaiahDude543.
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>Reported Vote: Dustandashes // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Pro for arguments
>Reason for Decision: So I came to this debate with a totally open mind, I didn't have a particular opinion about this matter. This was a fantastic debate and both debaters cleary know what they are talking about. In honestly, I believe blamonkey did a fantastic job of working within the framework of consequentialism. Dare I say he might have done a better job at this than virtuoso... On the surface. What was not negated however was the resolution. I feel virtuoso conclusively proved in his opening statement that plea bargaining is indeed a miscarriage of justice. Regardless of what would happen to this prison system if we were to abolish plea bargaining is not nearly as bad a consequence as innocent people going to prison. So I feel, although this debate was really close, virtuoso took this one. Thank you guys
>Reason for Mod Action: To award argument points, the voter must (1) survey the main arguments and counterarguments in the debate, (2) weigh those arguments and counterarguments against each other, and (3) explain, based on the weighing process, how they reached their decision. The voter performs none of these steps; therefore, their vote is insufficient. The voter may re-vote by performing these steps. The voter can access site voting policy here: https://www.debateart.com/rules
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>Reported Vote: IsaiahDude543 // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Pro for arguments and conduct, 2 points to Con for sources
>Reason for Decision: I feel that this is the right choice
>Reason for Mod Action: To award argument points, the voter must (1) survey the main arguments and counterarguments in the debate, (2) weigh those arguments and counterarguments against each other, and (3) explain, based on the weighing process, how they reached their decision. To award sources points, the voter must (1) explain how the debaters' sources impacted the debate, (2) directly assess the strength/utility of at least one source in particular cited in the debate, and (3) explain how and why one debater's use of sources overall was superior to the other's. To award conduct points, the voter must (1) give explicit examples of misconduct, (2) show how this misconduct was either excessive, unfair, or in violation of mutually agreed upon rules of conduct pertaining to the text of the debate, and (3) compare each debater's conduct in the debate. For all points awarded, the voter performs none of the requisite steps to award those points. The voter can access site voting policy here: https://www.debateart.com/rules
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Thank you
He buddy. Great debate! I definitely think that you won.
bump
u
m
p
bumping for votes
not sure if there are reliable polling for it.
What percentage? Can you provide a source?
yep
Do you know how many people support abolishing plea bargaining?
I’m a student and part time retail worker
What's your job?
I’ll post my arguments when I get home from work
Thanks. He’s a great debater. I thoroughly enjoyed our last debate.
Blamonkey is good at debating. He's is as of the time of this comment 8-0. I wish you good luck.
Cool! Sorry, I forgot to post.
My opening arguments are ready whenever you are.