Instigator / Pro
18
1641
rating
63
debates
65.08%
won
Topic
#951

Donald Trump Is Racist

Status
Finished

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

Winner & statistics
Better arguments
6
3
Better sources
6
2
Better legibility
3
3
Better conduct
3
3

After 3 votes and with 7 points ahead, the winner is...

Speedrace
Parameters
Publication date
Last updated date
Type
Standard
Number of rounds
4
Time for argument
Two days
Max argument characters
30,000
Voting period
One week
Point system
Multiple criterions
Voting system
Open
Contender / Con
11
1395
rating
22
debates
20.45%
won
Description

Racist: showing or feeling discrimination or prejudice against people of other races, or believing that a particular race is superior to another.

I will be using the reasons stated in my previous debate on this topic.

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:

So, let’s start with the charlottsville rally.

While this goes back and forth. At the end, pro is able to provide evidence that the “rally” Trump was referring to was not simply protesting the statue being removed, but was a white supremacist rally. While con simply denied this, pro sources this claim.

Given who Trump was referring to, and that he appeared to be specifically referencing a night when alt right protesters were shouting Jews will not replace us, this seems fairly clear cut.

This clarification makes the nature of the full quote more ambiguous - was he simply down playing the white supremacism and Neo Nazis in the crowd? This seems to clearly cast down on cons interpretation, and I have to side with con.

In terms of retweeting white nationalists - pro offered clear cut evidence of the present repeatedly retweeting white nationalists. In so doing, pro indicates a pattern of association and support. I find cons defence severely lacking here, he does not offer much of at all to downplay the significance or explain how this could occur without tacit support - with groups that trump should know better than to retweet. I have to side with pro here too.

Pro offers specific, but old example of racist actions taken by trump in his apartments, while not much space is dedicated this seems fairly clear cut - that Trump instructed employees not to allow black individuals - his source shows this was specifically black individuals, not just people on welfare. Con drops this point, thus this goes to pro too.

For Mexicans are rapists, in cons favour was that Trump appeared to be referencing illegal immigrants, what is in pros favour was that he showed almost everything that was said, by Trump. Con appears to drop all of these points. This leaves me with Trump talking about Mexican immigrants, grossly exaggerated. This isn’t wholly to pro, but mostly.

Muslim ban: not much space was dedicated to this, but pro argued trump banned Muslims despite Americans commiting more terrorist acts: this implies a cleat animus towards Muslims - though pro didn’t fully hash out why he believes Muslim has a racial component. So this doesn’t go to pro.

On cons side, con argues that racism isn’t increasing, that Trump isn’t harming blacks: pro gives a good explanation of relevance here: the argument is that Trump is a racist personally, rather than like Hitler, where he was racist in terms of policy - the two are not the same.

Claims about Obama’s or democrats being racist may or may not be true - but don’t effect the resolution.

Other than this there were a few smaller minor claims that were worth little mention as the big claims validate the resolution on their own even if I were to accept or reject the rest.

Because of the clear pattern of behaviour on multiple fronts that were shown by pro - pro clearly demonstrate a pattern of racism and so arguments go to pro.

Sources: these also go to pro. Pros main claims were backed up by sources, vox for unite the right clearly showed his position was accurate and undermined cons counter - con claim what pro was saying was untrue despite it being validated by this source.

The racist apartment offering tore apart cons counter claim that Trump wasn’t racist by demonstrating that action was being taken against blacks - not specifically those on welfare.

These two sources fundamentally undermined cons only counter argument, and clearly bolstered the warrant of pros argument substantially. Con offered minimal sourcing, on largely redundant points (such as stats about racial economic benefits), so largely had no effect on his overall warrant.

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:

Basic rule of debating: Don’t make someone else’s case for them!

S&G: tie
Leans in pro’s favor, but not by enough to take the point. The big thing I would say (to con) here is organization was lacking; I should not have had to dig with CTRL+F to find if argument lines were continued.

Sources: PRO
I hate to say this was by magnitude, but the lack of counter evidence (a single propaganda source in the final round doesn’t count) made it unquestionably in favor of pro. Trump’s white genocide support tweet was the biggest damning one which could not be out argued. R1 sources were just spammed in there at the end, so were not given any weight.

Arguments: PRO
Below I’ve reviewed the different argument segments. Pro showed that Trump is more racist than not, whereas con proved that not every case where Trump seems to be acting racist is necessary due to racist intent... Had the dropped points been argued even to the level of being tied, the issue could have been confused enough to deny pro Burden of Proof; but such did not occur.

So were I con, I would have reorganized pro’s points into categories (such as nicknames and actual actions, or by racial groups), then rewritten it into logical rules of inference such as Modus Ponens and Modus Tollens, to then intercede against the flow of logic.

1. Miss Housekeeping: pro
Dropped.

2. Korean-American intelligence analyst: pro
Dropped.

3. Elizabeth Warren: PRO
Dropped. ... Then rebounded with con trying to prove Trump is superior for his greater amount of Native American blood, for which the Cherokees apparently support him.

4. Mexicans "rapists," "drug lords," and "criminals.": PRO
Con disputed this by saying some are good people, and used the idea that Trump’s fear is generally correct even if the magnitude of it gets misquoted by omission (that would still be racism, but okay...). Pro points out that this leaves a racist belief that the majority are to be feared, then used statistics to further prove the irrationality of the fear. Con counters that anyone (legal or not? I’m forgiving the missing qualifier, but be careful of that) who crosses the border is a bad person...

5. ban on all Muslims: pro
Dropped. ... Somehow came back near the end because Trump failed... Con held off his best point for the final round (when it could no longer be responded to), that Muslim could be defined by religion wholly separate from race; which had it been earlier in the debate could have given him this point (assuming it was then not countered by pro).

6. white nationalist tweets: PRO
I agree with con on the definitions, except for the fact that they came with the “white” qualifier. Bernie Sanders is technically a nationalist, just not a white nationalist. Pro explained this at length when requested, then linked the tweets (never ask someone to give you a source unless you know you can beat it...). When you retreat something from someone named Genocide, you are making an active informed decision to advertise (thus promote) their cause.
Attempting to move the goalpost to other people, is so common that it’s boring. Start a debate about Obama and Clinton if you like, but when discussing Trump the comparisons only hurt him.
This somehow ended on a note that we should pity him for people trying to suppress his freedom of speech...

7. black voters: CON
Some context could have shifted this, but... If pointing to statistics when speaking of problems made someone racist, pro would be damned due to point 4. On this, Trump targeted them as a voting group, and used race, but did not indicate any superiority or inferiority by race rather than opportunity. Sleezy sure, but con showed that this was not proof. ... Trying to prove the democratic party is racist with this point, is getting off the topic (make a debate on it).

8. supremacists were morally equivalent to the people resisting: pro
Dropped.

9. “some very fine people" among white supremacists: CON
Con counters that the media removed context. After awhile pro makes a solid point about Trump supporting some antisemitism from the night before... I am going to give him the benefit of the doubt, that he may not have known (this debate is about if he’s racist, not if he’s a buffoon).

10. discriminated against black people in his apartment building: CON
Con countered this with suggesting it was about if an applicant listed welfare as an income source, not race, and the race was never proven. I hate nit-picking, but this point became about evidence, which was mentioned but not provided (it may have been to another point, such as the R1 source spamming, but was not tied directly to this one).

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:

I will break down the arguments from each allegation speedrace made in the 1st round, I require a few proofs that Trump is racist, not one or two--
"Trump referred to a Miss Universe who was Hispanic as "Miss Housekeeping."
Con claims Trump always likes to use nicknames and this can be grouped into the other ones. Pro responds by saying this deals with specific stereotyping of Latinos being housekeepers. Con does not respond back and this point is dropped by both contestants throughout the debate. Stereotyping is not necessarily the same thing as racism, so this is not a clear and cut example for me.
"Trump was talking to a Korean-American intelligence analyst, and he asked why she wasn't working on North Korea Policy."
Con drops this entire point even though Pro pressed him each round to do so. Since their is no debate on this point, I can't judge an argument point on it. Repeatedly dropped points will perhaps effect the conduct point.
"Trump called Elizabeth Warren "Pocahontas.""
Con contends that Trump was justified because Warren barely has any Indian blood. He seems to contest the overall truth of Warren's claim, which pro weekly responds and says "Calling someone Pocahontas is clearly a racial slur." Con also provides evidence that a N.A. supported Trump and he held an event for them. This is not good proof that Trump is racist.
"Trump has called Mexicans "rapists," "drug lords," and "criminals.""
Trump's quote was "Mexican's are not sending their finest people." Con claims he said this because of the criminals they bring across. Pro brings up stats on racial crime, but whether Trump knew stats or not is irrelevant. This is not a clear and cut example or racism either.
"Trump tried to implement a ban on all Muslims entering the United States."
As con points out, Trump was trying to stop terror attacks and people immigrating into the U.S. He also points out that Muslim isn't even a race but religion, so this point is invalid.
"Trump has retweeted many white nationalist tweets."
Con brings up his retweets had nothing to do with white supremacy. The rest are hypothetical arguments about Trump's staff alerting him or not alerting him. I can't take this as credible especially since you can't know if Trump knew he was retweeting White supremacists.
"When he was trying to get black voters on his side, Trump said “You’re living in poverty, your schools are no good, you have no jobs, 58 percent of your youth is unemployed. What the hell do you have to lose?”"
Con responds by claiming pure truth to his claims, but pro misses the point as he claims Trump said that purely off of race. He also claims Trump never cited all his stats, but this is not enough as you do not always provide sources for your claims, especially in a rally environment. This is not enough to prove Trump's racism, either.
"Trump implied that white supremacists were morally equivalent to the people resisting racism."
Pro does not provide any direct evidence for this and it is a cat fight back and forth about the sourcing. This point was a mess, so I can't award points for this.
"Trump said there are "some very fine people" among white supremacists."
Con provides the context of Trump's quote and his clarification that he wasn't talking about the Nazis and white supremacists. He shows that there were counter protestors of the taking down of the statue that weren't associated with the rally, so with all this, it is very clear Trump was not being racist.
"Trump racially discriminated against black people in his apartment building."
Con responds by saying Trump avoided renting welfare, no matter the race. This was also in the 1900's a long time ago, and the resolution says "IS racist", not "was." Either way, this comment does not prove Trump IS racist in current day.
All of this said, the argument point goes to con as there were not enough clear and cut examples of racism.
Sources: Tied
Spelling/Grammar: Tied
Conduct: Con dropped multiple points, although he did mention most of them later down the debate, it disrupted the flow of those points and didn't allow for nuanced discussion on them. Conduct to Pro.
Good job to both debaters. Interesting debate.