Total votes: 1,434
When I started into this I mistook it for a 4 round debate, with con forfeiting half. With him committing a technical full forfeiture, this vote will be easily outweighed by plenty of others. That said, I do believe con is the clear victor in spite of his self sabotage.
AI's and complexity: con
While an assertion is not always directly challenged after it is made, sometimes it is pre-refuted by arguments that outweigh it. That was the case with the computers, as much as con could have done better on sourcing how it will reshape the world, we have a believable appeal that AlphaGo will contribute to machine learning for vehicles and more (bettering the entire world), vs the inferior (from the debate: brute force to solve less complex problems) AI of AlphaZero which a few chess players can learn a couple tricks from.
Popularity and Age: Draw
Both are old, and have players. Since they're highly comparable on these, I don't see either coming ahead in a way to have comparable weight to quality discussion.
And I got to say, the claim that chess would have died out was too unsubstantiated to require a real defense.
chutes and ladders: commentary only
This was such a weird thing to bring up from the comment section (I actually check such things with a word search, and could not find the "too well known" bit in the comments or the debate proper). The problem with mentioning chutes and ladders, is that when you're making the argument that chess is better because it's more simple, it implies that this obviously more simple thing would be better than chess (in this case a game that is an elongated flipping of a coin). Had con not forfeited, he could have done that pivot for a two pronged assault.
Conduct: Pro
Forfeiture.
Sources:
Two Wikipedia quick facts (one at least was used in an appeal to simplicity), and a YouTuber (without the relevant portion of the video indicated), vs 6 different websites, including Business insider and even a chess website (credit here, as that website is logically pro chess, but used as an argument against chess via the increasing draw problem).
I tend to glance in at sources (as opposed to reading everything within, or watching whole videos), and con's sources made me genuinely learn things and want to go back to read more. Granted, the length of the blockquotes was a bit long, but that is my main hesitation in giving sources to him; to which he overcame with the Verge source going into driving AIs (thereby reinforcing one of his appeals; making it warranted instead of just an assertion).
And as a bonus, my round by round thoughts on the debate (the sources analysis was almost entirely later):
https://www.debateart.com/debates/3151/comment-links/39457
Forfeiture, and foregone conclusion.
Arguments: Pro has one point about book length replies, and due to his choice to forfeit the majority of the debate, I am not reading things in depth... So leaving this tied (especially in light of the other point allocations). Due to repeated forfeitures, the need to consider arguments is waived if not assigning the argument points.
Sources:
No contest. 20 to 0, and their impacts not challenged by pro.
Legibility:
Con's efforts into organization alone would not take this, but one of pro's rounds was a single wall of text (seriously dude, just separate the separate ideas into separate paragraphs)
Conduct:
Forfeiting the majority of the debate.
Con only offered arguments in 1 of 4 rounds. That said, he could have gone somewhere good with the danger factors and the SHOULD in the resolution, but he needed follow up.
Pro on the other hand, in addition to being able to switch gears so well, made a case that it both is a state and with a well worked appeal to authority of the United Nations, that it should be recognized as a state.
Full forfeiture.
That's not what heroes do!
Full forfeiture.
Full forfeiture.
R1:
Pro builds a well sourced case, easily presented in syllogism form. He further outlines why Palestine as a nation would be worse for any human inhabitants, first due to a weird legal system they like, and due to their current rulers (Hamas) who would presumably still be in charge.
Con kritiks that Hamas wouldn't allow it to happen, and further that many locals fear it. He advokates that the two-state solution is better, but is also unattainable.
R2:
Pro accuses con of drifting off topic, by ignoring the benefits if it occurred to instead deny that it would. Pro further reminds us that the fear the locals feel, is likely already worse under current circumstances.
Con concedes... but then doubles down on the Oh Well Kritik...
R3:
Skimmed, and I'm seeing more of the same.
---
Arguments:
Credit to con for their work, but they argued side stepped the resolution, and thereby failed to refute pro's simple case. If annexation would be difficult, is not the topic; rather if the benefits are likely to outweigh the harms. Further bolstering that Hamas sucks, fed straight into pro's case for improved safety for the locals.
I wrote a guide for Kritiks, which I highly suggest reading before trying such a tactic again (the Oh Well, does not rate highly).
https://tiny.cc/Kritik
Sources:
Pro leads on this, but I am leaving this tied.
Legibility:
I did prefer pro's formatting, but that is never enough for the point.
Conduct:
Both were fine. And my dislike of a certain tactic, speaks more toward the argument points.
Concession.
An oddly accurate description for how much they would move each others viewpoints...
Not enough jokes from pro to merit comedic victory. All that remains is a foregone conclusion.
Implicit concession.
Concession.
This will be a weird one as it is counter to a concession, but BoP failure from pro combined with them forfeiting 80% of the debate tip it, along with the desire to give meaningful feedback with a little weight (I fully expect my vote to be outweighed by a bunch of others).
So con makes a snippet of an argument that it is potentially bad (in short, some people are allergic to some things). Pro counters that such is poor reasoning, even pointing out con's source spoke just of one form of the frankincense (strongly implying there are indeed others). And that's where the arguments end. No actual points in favor of frankincense were proposed.
This is a common failing for truism debates, that the instigator considers things self evident, so does not bother putting in the minimal amount of work to properly claim their nearly free win.
Sources (leaning pro, but ultimately still tied):
Con was the only one who integrated any. That said, pro was able to pick about con's source making it pretty much null if not outright leaning in his favor (a direct quotation from it would help). I wish I saw more of this time of clash.
Pro then claims to have had much better sources, via source spam. I don't reward source spam. If no data is drawn from them into the arguments, they get no credit in impact analysis.
Legibility (tied):
Nothing to say, as both were fine.
Conduct (con):
Normally for a concession, I would give con conduct at the expense of arguments. As is, I am leaving that unfactored...
However, pro's choice to miss 4 rounds, is literally twice the weight of con missing 2. I would prefer to leave this vote argument only, but it's hard to ignore that bad of a conduct violation.
Pro blandly advocates in favor of ideals from Hitler, by claiming that races are on a hierarchy of quality and some are just born evil (hence the final solution).
Con immediately hamstrings this by pointing out that if it's a genetic trait present in all white people, as it does not exist in most white people, it therefore does not exist. He then builds a counter case that racism is learned, citing studies showing that if raised in mixed company, no preference for one group over another develops in white people.
Rather than actually defend that there is a genetic angle, pro basically pulls a Luke Skywalker for the rest of the debate asserting against all reason and evidence that it's not true and impossible: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pw2sex1mJNI
Conduct because pro boldly and blatantly lies about con's sources, claiming that the website research gate does not exist; when the link worked fine.
Sources of course for the overwhelming number and quality of sources (even with one link initially having been broken), which were used to show verifiable facts which had a massive impact on arguments.
Legibility:
Pro came ahead in this slightly for better formatting. However, without actual deterrents from con, the point remains tied.
Repeated forfeitures.
Full forfeiture.
Concession.
This is a foregone conclusion. Three paragraphs of unsourced assertions and missing half the debate, vs a detailed well researched multi-tier case. This is only confirmed by the obvious Burden of Proof issue of pro trying to kritik that con's case should be ignored, without first building up a counter case, when pro is in fact the person with primary BoP.
In short:
Given the absolute in the resolution (never, ... for any purpose), with the ability to forgo quarantines and related burdens when crossing borders easily carried the day.
At length:
Pro opens with an attack on the general populace getting vaccinated at all. Which bridges to an appeal that receiving the vaccines shouldn't be forced. And finally something toward BoP that forcing people to show proof would likewise be a violation of peoples rights... And then back to his opinions against getting vaccinated at all for the majority of R1.
Con swiftly gets to topical benefits of forgoing otherwise necessary quarantines for individuals who have already received the vaccine, and bridges to current practice of needing certain vaccines in order to go to school. His assumed benefit of displaying vaccines encourages more people to be vaccinated, is an area of dispute that is a fine example of scope creep.
R2 opens with pro firmly trying to move the goalposts to a related topic of mandatory vaccinations, as opposed to ever being required to show proof if vaccinated. He swiftly moves onto SJW pathos appeals (getting vaccinated is racist, sexist, etc. Sadly Godwin's Law applies, so I don't know if this was an attempt at humor). He does however make a good point that in light of his attacks on the vaccine, con has not proven proof of vaccinations will outright save lives. He then meanders off topic to complain that con has not proven the vaccine itself should be mandatory. He even argues that catching some strains might be beneficial (an interesting idea, but too buried in so much off topic stuff).
Con does a swift killing blow with a reminder that the topic as worded is inclusive to any future covid vaccine which even pro might approve of (this was his opening last round, and was dropped). He repeats his effective appeal to avoiding quarantines and related benefits. He moves back onto explaining schools and stuff... But lets face it, consideration of the resolution is already too far in con's favor unless he slides in a major concession at the end.
Full forfeiture.
Forfeiture.
It should however be mentioned, that this debate begs the question of how a human ought to be treated.
Forfeiture.
Forfeiture.
This was slightly worse than a single round debate, due to pro actively dropping all of con's arguments in R2 via forfeiture.
That said, pro opens with some statements to the effect that the USA's current system is criminal, and kills poor people. It's a good opening.
Con counters with infeasibility due to limited resources and a bad cultural fit stemming from politicians, and points out similar desired benefits could be more easily attained with better regulation (which again, pro made the decision to drop).
One had a single assertion (that the resolution was true), the other had five which directly challenged the one. Pro never defended against any of the claims, save for complaints of sourcing even while his own claim was similarly lacking.
Con forfeited more, but pro called him lazy even while he offered more than five times as much detail in his case. To me the hypocrisy pushes it over the line.
As for if pro might have felt insulted by someone disagreeing with him... For the millionth time: When you start a debate on something, you are literally asking someone to disagree with you!
Arguments: Pro
See review below. Basically pro has a ton of harms inflicted by the removal of a system, and proposes a careful reintroduction of an option to be carefully utilized. Con largely alternates between pure assertion and source bombing without proper analysis, even concluding that teachers are evil and will target minorities more (without first bothering to disprove the benefits, leaving it implicitly unfair to non-minorities to not get those spankings).
Sources: Pro.
This is a landslide. See review below.
...
Doing this in two sections, R1 pro -> R2 con, -> R3 pro, and vice versa.
---Pro’s case, counters, and defense---
Pro makes a well sourced case that the current system does not work as it leads to massive harms throughout life, beginning with hard to grades and related matters, and later criminal activity. So we should (in a controlled manner) resume the old method of paddling, which apparently has no lasting harm.
Con counters that the status quo is still an improvement, and source dumps with minimal offered analysis (there’s literally a warning about this in the voting policy: “An argument composed of more than 50% of quotes is not assured to cross this line but is in clear danger of it.”). On this I really need to spell something out to anyone reading: using something as obviously one sided as nospank.net as a source is a poor showing, it’s about like using abortionismurder.com in an abortion debate. This would be less of a problem were the other side not using a ton of respectable .edu and .gov sources
Con does offer three key conclusions from his source dump: if spankings are allowed, students will embrace violence; students will not be able to stay sane or even focus on schoolwork due to being terrified; and troublemakers will drop out even faster. … My preference on sourcing really would have been those as contentions, with links to sources at the end of each one.
Con ends R2 with a source to say it’s a human rights abuse (for this, the source was left to do all the talking).
In R3 pro almost immediately points to his sources being unrefuted (at this point it is earned to call that out). Pro source steals the one about Asia (a source on those academics to support the source stealing would have been nice), before dialing it back by saying those places go to far. He counters the increased targeting of minorities with the current system doing likewise, and a callback to the seemingly worse harms of it. He wisely catches some of con’s counter evidence clustering in other forms of abuse, which sets such outside the scope.
---Con’s case, counters, and defense---
Con argues they will not remember why they were punished, they might turn into sexual deviants due to having that in their formative years, and students with disabilities are slightly more likely to be punished in a school setting. Plus there are issues of taxpayer consent to how their money is spent.
Pro largely defends citing con’s lack of evidence for claims; and even offering counter evidence, such as in current practice they are indeed told both verbally and in writing why, in addition to having a prohibition on application against disabled students. Pro does however get a bit out of line by jumping to “unrefuted” evidence, since the setup he established forbids R1 rebuttals.
Con repeats, ignoring evidence based challenges, adds that the teachers who do it are doing it are clearly just doing it out of rage (or at least students believe that is why the punishments occur), to commit physical and emotional abuse wholly separate from any misdeeds…
FF .
Definitely a good topic, without a clear right answer.
My gut reaction is that pro didn’t clearly affirm the resolution against the doubt cast by con… The description however is crystal clear on their competing burdens and effective resolutions. To which if I said pro only got 7 out of 10, that is still “on balance” more than the 6 out of 10 con got (these are not precise numbers, they’re just to showcase the general point).
Con ultimately gave too much ground in the wrong places, which left me not convinced his alternate proposal was mutually exclusive to the possibility of spanking (or something else physical but minor) when other methods fail; which was important to meeting his burden that such should not be permitted.
There’s a few points that really stood out to me:
I don’t want to say this is the crux of the debate, but it’s been nagging me... If Gershoff should be trusted or not. When a single researcher’s name gets drug through the mud preemptively, avoid their research when making a case to support the same conclusions as their research. This is important since the impact of anything from them is mitigated by the doubt, whereas any other researcher for the same topic does not suffer that.
Is change needed? Yes. Both sides agree. Ultimately students would be better off with more discipline. I really did not feel much doubt to the benefits pro offered, the challenge seemed to center on character assassinations of teachers and the possibility that there might be an even better way to attain the desired outcome.
Punishment gets into a couple dicey areas. It seems con considers things to only be punishment if the main point is the harm inflicted, which leaves a world of room for things if anything else is the main point and physical discomfort is collateral damage. I found the God assertions on it non-sequitur (waiting for God to handle it, doesn’t solve anything, it’s just wishful thinking and inaction… which might be how we got here). Pro was able to easily show that punishment is justifiable by multiple standards and backed by sources. If con’s proposal of a judicial committee is punishment or not was in dispute, but it sounds like public shame for the troublemakers, to deter the problematic actions; which sounds like a form of punishment with similar mental impacts to the shame of detention, loss of privileges, or even spanking. Con trying to argue schools are worse now because we punish more than when spankings were a thing, made it sound like spankings (even if suboptimal) is a step in the right direction.
Con did really well on rhetoric appeals. They are just not so moving to me, when they feel like flavorful but over the top assertions; instead of warranted arguments. Still, style points here.
more at:
https://www.debateart.com/debates/2979/comment-links/38099
Forfeiture.
Which is sad, I was really looking forward to the controversial opinions or devils advocacy.
I do like a setup, as it states where the money in the proposal would come from (seen times people try to argue it'd be a good, so it doesn't matter that it's infeasible).
R1:
Pro opens with an appeal to emotions of women and children, asserts that it would lower the crime rate (probably true, but some source for this should be used), and more appeal to emotion of claiming if not given they were be sexually harassed in the workplace (immediate irony of where he wants the money to come from).
He moves on for the truism that current politicians have mismanaged the economy, detours through some assumptions about motives, and ends nicely with an Obama quote which in itself pulls some useful statistics (a political fact check on it would have been great at cementing those data points).
Con forfeits.
R2:
Pro expands oh their rhetoric, really focused on the harm of sexual harassment (some source for frequency to support this claim would be really useful). And some definite unlabeled copy/pasting from his previous round.
Con leverages that the policy as proposed would only apply to stay at home moms, specifically excluding male and other homemakers.
Con derails a little into disliking pro's user name.
Con details flaws with the policy not, from it being progressive instead of balanced (I suspect pro will fail to catch this), it encouraging unemployment, and it utilizing a sin tax designed to bankrupt the businesses which fund it (a source showing a history of this would strengthen the point) and intuitively thus make the credit go away.
Con moves on to a coup de grâce (could have lead with this) that it's a tax credit, so the proposed unemployed beneficiaries would not be eligible!
R3:
Pro uses a source about tax credits to defend his proposal, how people can get money back on already paid taxes that year even if they don't owe any more taxes (I admit that I hope con catches what's wrong with this; but if unchallenged it will deflect the otherwise fatal blow).
Pro damages the credibility of his case by making up something con is supposed to have said "oh no women having a choice well we cant have that" (this form of strawman is a huge pet peeve of mine). Pro continues in this vine accusing con of supporting what he calls evil, and saying some really demeaning things about women... Some more edge lord stuff...
Con gives a short analysis for why pro's tax credit thing would not be beneficial to people who paid no taxes, as it would allow money back on already paid income tax, not create money if they were not taxed already. And points out that pro otherwise dropped the arguments.
R4:
Pro attempts to switch the proposal to the non-homemakers getting the tax credit, which is against the very resolution he proposed (unless the homemakers are webcam models being taxed massively by the proposal?).
---
Arguments:
Overwhelming con victory, as he reduced the proposal down to just misunderstandings and implied misogyny. Pro was not able to make the proposal make sense, and outright dropped the majority of the challenges against it, while giving needless insults rather than attempting to patch the holes in his plan.
Honestly, I'm only being this detailed due to the multiple forfeitures, which gave pro a good chance at victory which he did not take proper advantage of.
Conduct:
The multiple forfeits are a problem, but some of pro's behavior was pretty bad too. Were this categorical, I would likely penalize con due to it being multiple rounds missed; even while still giving him the argument points.
As this is choose winner, and 3>1, con wins.
Conduct... I really deplore that level of profanity in a title, so leaving it tied in spite of con's repeated forfeitures. And yes, that title does continuously detract from the debate as I read it.
R1:
Pro asserts that it is a human rights violation.
Con makes a case that the 13 year old hypocrites are doing valuable service against lawbreakers.
R2:
Pro says 12 year olds will kill themselves if online, but they aren't snowflakes for this... This is a pretty clear non-sequitur.
Pro accuses con of being a racist oppressing black people (or at least directly akin to one... very tempted to move conduct to cons favor for this).
Con makes an appeal to the debate being a truism, and gives an analysis that 13 year olds are driving the lawbreakers away from the internet thereby protecting them from online predators.
R3:
Pro insists the 12 year olds are so immature that they start fights if they don't get their way... Which kinda directly feeds into pro's points about the 13 year olds accidently doing them a favor.
Pro claims that only people who use the internet at age 12 survive to become 13 year olds... WTF did I just read?
Pro repeats insults, adds some more, talks about teenagers (no specified certain age) hunting and killing 12 year olds online...
And forfeitures and extensions from there.
Arguments...
I don't think con did exceptionally, however I did not feel pro bet their BoP to affirm the resolution; which is a common danger when you write something you believe is so true that there can be no doubt. The lawbreaking was certainly non-contested, and while the description would like maturity to be off the table, the threats of 12 year olds killing themselves for not getting their way, was really something which hurt rather than supported pro's case. The 13 year olds sound like a terrible solution, but it's not like there was even a single piece of referenced evidence against them (the one piece of evidence pro offered, suggested con is thematically right that they should be kept off the net until 15, as the bullying decreases around then with growing maturity).
Foregone conclusion. One offered a single sentence per round and did not challenge any contentions from the other side when they were offered, the other offered a detailed case (which yes, he did delay seemingly to decrease the effective number of rounds, if not for the other side outright forfeiting I would have to consider conduct against him).
Not a very meaningful debate, but I'll put the five or ten minutes in (who am I kidding, I over think everything and double check my writing incessantly, it will be at least fifteen)...
Pro offers pictures of some birds, which I indeed find subjectively cute, and builds upon that with a good band wagon appeal of a source determining they are the most popular pet bird. And even offers a nice syllogism for how useless they are.
Con basically counters that pro hasn't proven enough of them are cute. I must give con some credit here, as he did not do the lame thing of saying every last one, but merely focused on the vast majority... The problem is that con has not offered sufficient challenge that there are any non-cute ones; there's got to be pictures of them, or some standard of beauty to which they do not conform to cute. Con does offer question of if they are beautiful does that mean they are not cute, but he did not show why these two levels need be mutually excessive.
Anyway, three round debate, to which con forfeited R2, and offered no arguments in R3...
Con's use of the Voynich Manuscript to show one clause of the resolution false, was highly effective. Hypothetically comprehensible was an argument against it that easily could have hurt Mein Kampf even more, so things ultimately ended on a concession.
Pro was able to gain the initiative by proposing a simple standard for evil: the murder of children. He then backed it up with biblical accounts of God doing just that. Con is not really able to defend from this, as saying things like the children were maimed by a bear instead of outright killed, still leaves the main thrust of the point of cruelty to children unhindered. Claiming there were no children before the flood, was an outright non-sequitur.
Pro could have done a bit better, as he missed a critical point with Egypt (in that focusing on how God could have easily changed the Pharaoh's heart, it ignores that in the story it clearly states he did exactly that to force the guy to not obey him). Still, no challenge to God having the means to do otherwise without any difficulty.
I do give con credit for just claiming any innocent God kills goes to heaven (for that, I highly suggest quoting the bible). It was an avenue that could at least be explored further, but it intuitively did not cast sufficient doubt within our limited knowledge and standards (as much as I would love to see that explored directly in a debate).
Con's argument in forfeiture was still more intelligent than most world leaders.
Ironically, pro wins for volume of fire.
R1:
Pro concisely states that audio allows movies to evoke emotion, and calls for his side to claim all music, spoken words, and even silence (a bit of a stretch, as predictably con brings up silent films which were that way not by choice and therefore not as an act of mastery). He attacks one aspect of visual effects that of CGI for only being able to create scenery not characters. He provides a source showing how music can reshape scenes. And declares that music composers are more famous than anyone on the visual side of movies.
Con gives a history lesson, but makes a good point within it about the value in storytelling the visual side gives, and that silent films came before synchronized soundtracks. He does an appeal to the very name of movies (implicitly pointing out they are named for and draw an audience from the visuals, as opposed to soundies, or feelies if you've read Brave New World).
Con rebuts pro's evidence, as the visuals remain the primary focus in the altered scenes; before attacking the scenes for not being masterfully done on the visual side so as to allow quick changes to soundtracks to redefine them. He points out that non-verbal communication accounts for most communication, and masterful actors convey meaning even without words.
R2:
Pro calls cons argument just a red herring, and that since visual effects include CGI we should dismiss any visual effects innovated from before the 1980s (I could be misreading that, but I still don't care for the history lesson argument, particularly not this strange attempt at moving of the goalposts). He does however make a good point against con's appeal to tradition of first equalling more important (which I never bought anyways). And more talk of computer animation as if that was the only visual effect, when at this point con has already used facial expressions from actors which pre-refutes this idea that the only visual effects are computer generated. He then defends his previous evidence, while admitting they were badly acted, because "landscapes and settings cannot give expressions."
He finally ends with evidence of a Star Wars scene without music, but without the evidence of it with music I am left to wonder as to the desired impact.
Con repeats his appeal to the name movies, and repeats his data on sight being by far our primary sense.
Con defends his history lesson, and specifically points out pro's attempt to move the goalposts to all visual effects as CGI. He points to the agreed definitions, and source steals from pro's own Jack Pierce video that CGI was not used but primarily visual effects from the actors themselves (with everything being fixed between repetitions).
Con goes a little far with semantics by calling the very act of rapid pictures as visual effects (https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/hes-out-of-line-but-hes-right). This is built upon earlier things, which I took to be opening rhetoric rather than intended as sound arguments. He also shows CGI characters, disproving pro's claim that CGI cannot give expressions.
At this point the debate could easily be called as a con victory. We need a reason that the audio portion triumphs over the visual portion, rather than being a slave to it.
R3:
Pro restates that sound mastery is harder (which does nothing to prove it's the more important one), and outright insists "the Visual merely adds extra eye candy" and further that it's not "truly necessary." Oh songs have won awards, unlike movies. He does point out a couple movies that the audio was more important than the visuals. And mentions that CGI movies still include sound. And he closes by insisting he only meant to argue CGI effects as opposed to things like "camera angle, etc." from the description.
Con digs into that movies are primarily a visual experience (I seem to have missed any challenge to this from pro). Brings up the Oscars, instantly disproving the implicit claim from pro that movies only win awards for the audio (to be fair, there's a few of those awards for the sound side). And cites Stanley Kubrick to show the visual mastery as more important, via having us watch a clip muted and further describing choreography (as opposed to just saying a certain movie exists and was better by X standard).
R4:
Pro offers a wholly silent argument, perhaps to show the importance of words? Sadly it drops everything, especially the clearly presented visual proof of the greater importance of visuals over audio, and visuals being our primary sense.
Con extends.
Additional details may be round at:
https://www.debateart.com/debates/3021-audio-vs-visual-effects-for-movies?open_tab=comments&comments_page=1&comment_number=13
https://www.debateart.com/debates/3021-audio-vs-visual-effects-for-movies?open_tab=comments&comments_page=1&comment_number=11
Full forfeiture.
Arguments: Pro
In short, too complex and requiring constitutional changes accepted by the states before it could be attempted.
Sources: Tie
They both appear to have done well on their research.
Legibility: Tie
No issues.
Conduct: Tie
Both stayed professional.
R1:
Pro builds a good case for the constitution prohibiting it ("Ex post facto"), and how muddled it all is anyway with Britain. Additionally to attempt it they would have to change the constitution (very hard).
Con argues that Japanese americans sent to concentration camps were given reparations, as were Alaskan Natives for their maltreatment. He further argues that the supreme court would decide, but makes an appeal that it would be justifiable due to historically suffered disadvantages.
R2:
Pro talks about intergenerational trauma, and ties it into reparations at the cost to the current generation (including immigrants from after slavery) being unwarranted for non-systemic issues. He also rebuts issues of scope creep (even making a point of property returns/replacements to still living people within the cases raised).
Con attacks the Ex post facto as not applying to the type of law to be imposed. And that Bill of Attainder would only play into it if it was individuals being sued. He backtracks his evidence as something to show a theme rather than it being directly comparable.
R3:
Pro defends his opening with a good quote from a similar case "‘Laws made to punish actions done before the existence of such laws, and which have not been declared crimes by preceding laws, are unjust. . . .’" This is slightly pre-defended with talk of the point of reparations not being to punish anyone, but that defense is likewise preempted with the talk of newly naturalized citizens who would then have to pay. Finally pro attacks more on the scope of cases in relation to this issue, and reiterates his main points from earlier.
Con drops (while it makes the decision easy, they were already struggling).
Con while gorging himself on long pig, went wholly unrefuted... Poor billy!
Full forfeiture after R1.
Concession.
Concession.
Arguments:
In short, affirming the resolution for the USA became dependant on the german people only being held back from repeating genocide, by laws against denying it happened. There are several obvious problems with this, but in short: Germany <> USA. For the USA, pro basically yielded that it would be ineffective. The hypothetical that it might save millions of lives by preventing the USA from launching a holocaust, was intuitively unwarranted given the lack of such manifesting already (con’s direct challenge here was that it wouldn’t actually do anything here).
Sources:
Neither went very far with these. To which there were a lot of missed opportunities.
Legibility:
Both were fine, but there were a couple tiny issues. As per usual, I would suggest adding in contention headings and perhaps some direct syllogisms.
Conduct:
A couple things that could be nitpicked from both sides, but nothing that significantly distracted from the debate.
More in comments: https://www.debateart.com/debates/2854-holocaust-denial-should-be-outlawed-in-the-usa?open_tab=comments&comments_page=1&comment_number=83
Pro did not read con's case, leaving it unrefuted. A foregone conclusion.
Conduct is tempting for this as well, but the failing was already well covered by the argument points; and it was not quite forfeitures nor did pro become vile.
Concession.
Full forfeit