whiteflame

Pro only has the argument of defeating Russia, which he never really impacts out. Meanwhile, the economic effects that Con brings up and the nuclear impacts are better weighed and largely go unaddressed due to those forfeits. Con outweighs Pro.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ppTaynxNwq_BgyoFDJ-iHLcwvzdSUVggXmUFp-2nRiE/edit?usp=sharing

I'll admit, my thoughts on this one got a bit jumbled, took a while to disentangle them. Hope the RFD makes more sense than it initially did in my head.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pPhrTTUvy7qNY3sYNsPDVlu3g-B-f2yjHFaUyhS0F8g/edit?usp=sharing

Good points made by both sides, though I think there should have been more of a shared set of knowledge about these two fighters up front. Would've made this more focused and, potentially, introduced more opportunities to make the fight a bit more even. Tl;dr: Aang just has a bigger set of tools at his disposal and it's unlikely that Naruto's strength and durability would be enough to secure him the win.

Well, I haven't done an intense RFD in a while, but it felt like this one earned it (hence the delays on posting it). Let me know if you have any questions. Really solid debate by both sides.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KtgIdfp9WgKOlHRt2MCWENA5H9-joBej805xXlpupao/edit?usp=sharing

There's not really any weighing analysis of the presented points by either side, so the best I can do is some side-by-side comparisons of the presented positions and how well given points stand in the end.

Pro argues that it's better to do PPG because it affords injured players a chance to compete. He argues that the threshold of 58 games is fair because it reaches a threshold of 70% of games, and that wins within those games imply a greater scoring capability than would be captured in an average across all games. He presents a link and asserts that the winners of this title are all deserving.

Breaking this down, I think Pro's first point is his strongest, but needed some more analysis to increase its weight. In particular, I think some analysis of the pressure athletes would be under to return to the court before they are fully healed would have made this point stand out more. The remaining points seem rather arbitrary, as Con points out. Pro tries to justify this by saying that it's "a significant sample size," but since that's also a bare assertion, I don't have any reason to favor it. Similarly, the link doesn't establish anything positive or negative about that list of scorers, so just saying that they're "pretty dynamic scorers" doesn't do anything to help your position.

Con argues that PPG is misleading, that durability should be a factor in determining the scoring title, that 58 games as the baseline could be used to game the system, and that there have been instances where players did not get their due as a result.

The first point isn't particularly strong since it's unclear what "misleading" means in terms of harm. Is it that fans are confused by the result? Players? Coaches? Does it being misleading somehow affect outcomes? I end up buying Pro's point that this is an issue of semantics. If it's been known and accepted as is for years, then the actual harm of the terminology being a little wonky isn't clear. The second point suffers from a similar problem to Pro's first until it gets into the 58 game threshold, which I'll get to shortly. It's unclear from Con's argument why durability should be under consideration. Con mentions socialism and puts "load management" in quotes, but he doesn't explain why toughness is a meaningful metric. Con also says that it's beneficial to be "playing through his injuries", which is unjustified and seems counter-intuitive, especially when we're talking about the most dynamic scorer and not the MVP, as Pro points out. The third point is more meaningful, especially since we get a concrete example, but telling me Michael Jordan won the award 10 times instead of 11 doesn't seem like a massive loss. It helps that Con provides a link here that suggests greater harm affecting more people, though Con really should be doing more than just pointing to a single player to make his point.

That just leaves Con's main point: that players might game the system. I think this does have broad implications for the NBA, so it clearly has a potential for high impact. The problem is that is comes off as just that: potential. If players are "using the games against top defenses as rest days" or sitting out games they could easily play in for spurious reasons, then there should be evidence that that is happening. What I see is data that shows that some players are winning the title with lower numbers of games played, but that doesn't demonstrate the point that players are gaming the system, it just suggests that there could be gaming happening.

And this is where that lack of weighing analysis gets tricky. Pro's main point is that giving injured players a chance to get the title is a net positive, which is good for some players, but Pro doesn't spell out any broader implications. Con's main point is that players might game the system and that sometimes that results in some worthy players losing out on the title, which does have a more solid impact given that there is a list of actual players who haven't gotten the title as a result of the PPG system, but Con implies a much broader effect than he demonstrates.

I end up voting Con by a narrow margin. I think Pro's argument had the most potential, but it just comes off as "let's give injured players a chance," which is a nice sentiment, but not a potent impact sans expansion. It doesn't help that I don't get discrete examples of players who have been helped by this, just the suggestion that there are many. Meanwhile, even if I don't fully buy Con's argument that players are gaming the system, at the very least I have a concrete set of people who have been affected by the PPG system in a way that does not reflect their record, so I can see an actual harm. That admittedly lower impact harm beats Pro's potential benefit.

Not a lot to say on this one. The lack of sauce from Pro definitely didn't help his case since he needed some support for a lot of the claims he was making about how debaters are being negatively affected by the awarding of conduct. That might be true, but if you want to balance that against the claims your opponent is making, you need to establish how big of an impact that is and I don't see that happening anywhere.

Meanwhile, Con's impacts are just more striking. Preventing tied debates, addressing bad behaviors, and providing an avenue for more detail in votes are all relatively simple to weigh out and understand, yet I don't see a lot of response from Pro beyond "arguments can address this." At a certain point, you're just creating a multifactorial category for voting that includes conduct, which doesn't seem better. I need to see a balance between those two positions, but I don't really understand how you could meaningfully factor conduct in and still assess convincing arguments without weighing one more than the other, potentially turning the three argument points into the only conduct allocation and exacerbating all the problems Pro presents.

Also, since I'm voting this way, it seems only fair that I give Pro conduct. Con proved that conduct should "effect" your points in a debate, and he forfeited a round, so here we are.

Round 1: Con
Round 2: Pro
Round 3: Pro
Round 4: Con
Round 5: Pro

Pro takes it 3-2.

Stand out tracks for each side:
Pro - Moonbeam by Waterflame x F-777. Jived hard with this one from the opening beats and it was just a great time throughout.
Con - Distance by Apashe ft. Geoffrey (VOLAC Remix). While HALUNA's vocals probably stood out the most across the songs you posted, this was my favorite marriage of vocals and electronica.

I think this debate could have been much easier to argue (and judge) if there was some agreement regarding what else is available to the persons with each of these items. Maybe it would have made more sense if it had been clarified up front (and both sides should have worked on this) what someone would “usually” have access to in order to determine what’s missing from those circumstances and how these particular items could fill those needs. If someone has regular access to clean water and an assortment of pots and pans, then the kettle doesn’t serve much of a unique function. If someone has regular access to the internet or a library, then a single school book doesn’t serve much of a unique function. At several points, both sides try to dictate what should and should not be considered “usual,” but the scattershot approach makes it very difficult to come down on a single view, which is what makes deciding this so difficult. Different circumstances change the game dramatically.

And here is where I’ll address a couple of niggling issues brought up by Con. The possibility of selling an item does seem outside of the scope of this debate. If it was within the scope of it, then Pro could simply establish that he had the most expensive dildo and/or kettle as his items, which would likely price higher than the book, and afford him the ability to buy everything he could ever need. It breaks the structure of the debate and I think Con had to do more to justify doing so. Similarly, while it could be argued what the background of the individual with these items would be, I think the fact that they have these particular items doesn’t imply anything about the individuals who have them. It may be more likely that someone who has a school book is a student, but the absence of a book doesn’t make them less likely to be a student. More importantly, since the debate is over whether these items improve their circumstances rather than an array of other factors that could also influence their outcomes, it comes down to the use of those items, not assumed other factors, to determine who wins this debate.

It also doesn’t help that there seems to be a split between arguing about basic survival and facilitating a generally improved lifestyle. Neither side makes any effort to weigh these points against one another, so you’re inviting your voters to weigh in. To me at least, survival seems like the most basic element here: if a person dies because they don’t have one of these items on one side, then that impact matters most to the debate. Both sides treat the threat on one’s personal safety as though it is an ever-present concern, so protecting oneself from active threats of death as well as being able to prepare sustenance are the more pressing concerns established in the debate, and therefore the ones I view as highest impact. So while sexual gratification, family structures and sex education may be important for mental health and wellbeing, and while STDs affect long-term health, they are minor impacts in this debate. Similarly, while reading a book might offer numerous avenues to success, those benefits are all so long-term and tenuous that they end up being minor. If there had been more exploration of the dildo as a tool of self-defense or if the specific contents of the book could have been discussed as a means of survival, maybe these would have remained important. Absent any argument that these benefits outweigh the much more pressing concerns I’ve mentioned, these two vanish into the background.

That just leaves the cooking implements. Both can sterilize water (the kettle is made specifically for that purpose, but the skillet can still perform it), so that’s non-unique. Both have issues with cleaning – a kettle requires more intensive cleaning, whereas cleaning a skillet can impact the skillet’s span of usefulness. The kettle can potentially be used as a means of training, though this is a long-term survival issue and the amount of benefit you can get from it, given the possibility of breaking the kettle or spilling water during training, is unclear. Both can cook different things, though the skillet is more diverse in terms of what you could prepare with it. In terms of self-defense, the kettle does retain heat for longer afterward if it has water in it. Still, the shape and size of the skillet does lend itself better to self-defense as demonstrated in the video, even if not everyone could wield it well (the same problem exists with the kettle – it’s not exactly simple to wield a kettle full of hot water without burning oneself, and even then, it wouldn’t constantly be under heat).

I end up voting for Con. The skillet has the edge in variety of food preparation and self-defense. If longer term issues were better weighed against these, they almost all favor Pro, but given that we somehow have to arrive at a point where the dildo can provide all those benefits, it’s not enough to outweigh Con’s benefits.

These are generally pretty subjective for me. Suffice it to say that, while I think both sides had some solid barbs, it seemed like Con ran out of his best after the first round whereas Pro was prepared with quite a few, all of which were specific and many of which were biting. I won’t speak to the rapping itself, but Light had Lelouche’s number over much of this rap battle. That Shirley line, in particular, was brutal.

Simply put, Pro gave himself a near-impossible burden of proof and didn't achieve it. Con successfully showed that chess doesn't meet the bar of the "highest form of intelligence" via his analysis of what specific elements make it disjointed from any evaluation of individual intellect.

There's not too much for me to cover in the case proper because it's mostly conceded by the nature of Con's case. There is no disagreement in this debate about whether a zygote has personhood. The debate becomes entirely semantic: does the phrase "begins as conception" contain within it the zygote? I'd say this argument falls apart in three distinct respects.

First, the lack of response to the definition Pro provided at the beginning of the debate. Pro quotes it twice within his argument, and I don't see any response from Con on that front. If you want to argue that the definitions of specific terms like "at" preclude it being defined this way, then I think you need to directly address that definition. State clearly that his definition as written is incorrect or incongruous with the topic. You seem to be alluding to that position, but I don't see Con ever stating that that's his argument or challenging the definition as given by Pro directly and in full.

Second, the distinction that Con is using regarding the amount of time spent in a given process just doesn't work. The only distinction that's being made is based on how long the length of time involved is, and it honestly doesn't make a lot of sense as a basis for distinction. A moment may be distinct from other periods of time, but that distinction seems arbitrary.

Finally, I think as soon as Con conceded that Pro's interpretation was common usage, he lost this argument. If you want to make this kind of technical argument and really work hard to establish that there are specific meanings to word that are unalterable for the sake of common usage or other reasons, then you need to have an alternate standard. I didn't see one, and frankly, I bought more of Pro's interpretation on the context as well. The kinds of absurdities that Con suggests would occur in language if we allowed it just don't stack up.

As such, I vote Pro.

So tempted to give this debate to Pro because Con blasphemed against pineapple on pizza... truly, the travesty is dismissing the miracle that is Hawaiian pizza. Unfortunately, the topic of this debate is not a scathing rebuke of Con's anti-taste tendencies, so I must sally forth into the morass that is abortion.

On that front... yeah, this isn't much of a contest.

Pro gets lost in an argument about why abortion is immoral, and that's a problem for reasons Con mentions several times. First and foremost, that does not establish that abortion is not healthcare. Pro's only argument to this effect is that it ends the life of the unborn and therefore is not care for them. As Con points out, that doesn't mean no health care is occurring or that the mother isn't receiving said care. You can argue that it's immortal for the mother to receive said care at the cost of the unborn, but that argument could not affirm the resolution, which is not an on balance statement - it's an absolute.

Similarly, while Pro does establish multiple times that the Bible is anti-murder and, at least to some degree, anti-abortion as a result, it's not sufficient to sell his argument that abortion is murder, particularly as Con makes the argument that what is moral is what's best for the majority of parties involved. Rather than arguing that there's a great moral value to more of the unborn living out their days post-birth, Pro makes the perplexing choice of saying that all of the unborn go to heaven and then just... saying murder is bad anyway. There's a guarantee of heaven for every abortion. There is a far lesser likelihood of heaven for everyone else. Pro had to argue that there's some good that is being lost that eclipses the gain of certainty regarding heaven. Pro doesn't do that. Again, this is an absolute: even if I buy that there's a decent chance that abortion should be defined as murder, Con makes a significant case against that, so at the very least there's uncertainty in Pro's assertion.

Ergo, despite his truly deplorable conduct and terrible sense of taste, I vote Con.

Frankly, I think this is pretty lopsided. Pro basically ignores anything and everything about Light except the very broad strokes, so the details are rendered irrelevant almost from the outset, which is disappointing. More on the frustrating side, though, is Pro's decision to retroactively modify the resolution in his second round, and then accuse Con of doing the same thing in the subsequent round. It's honestly baffling because Pro does not, as far as I can tell, state in his first round his interpretation of the resolution beyond just including it verbatim. He then goes on to argue in subsequent rounds that only his opinion really matters... or I guess my opinion as a judge? I honestly am having a hard time deciding which he's going for. If it's the first, that only Pro's opinion on this matters, then I don't know why he's bothering to argue the rest. It doesn't matter, right? Pro's opinion is decided and that, according to him, ends the debate. He "selfishly" (I don't understand how it's selfish) believes that Light shouldn't kill people. That's not really a moral framework, but it's something, I guess.

Meanwhile, if Pro really is focused on audience interpretation of what they selfishly believe, then I have trouble understanding why that yields a vote for Pro. I'm a voter. I've been told to embody my own selfishness in my vote. I don't want bad things happening to me. Fine. I've also been told that Death Note isn't real, so Light's not coming after me, so he's not unjustified because he could come after me. I've been told that other people might come after me following his example, but Con presents data that suggests the opposite and I don't see a response to that data. So if I'm being selfish, I want more violent media because that is an effective outlet for people who might otherwise pursue violent ends. My selfishness, my aim to protect myself, yields a vote for Con.

And none of that even covers the utilitarian angle from Con. I'll note that he's the first to provide an interpretation of the resolution and burdens, so if the issue here is that someone is trying to reinterpret the resolution by adding words, while I could say that both sides have done a bit of that, Con is also the first to do it and arguably is justified in clarifying the resolution in the absence of any clarity from Pro. More importantly, I don't see an adequate response to utilitarianism. Pro's response starts and ends by arguing that people are selfish and don't act in a utilitarian manner. Fine. Is and ought are two different things. The reality that people won't act in a manner that follows utilitarian ethics when presented the opportunity in many cases doesn't mean utilitarian ethics is wrong, it just means we tend to act selfishly. Appealing to common choices doesn't demonstrate an ought to me. It doesn't explain why we should be selfish, it just tells me that I am more likely to be selfish. I can agree with Pro's position that selfishness is more common and that even Con is a flawed human being who doesn't adhere to utilitarianism while still seeing it as a strong justification for Light's actions. And if, as Pro suggests in R2, there are no lives saved and there is no utilitarian benefit to be had in the Death Note world, then utility only matters insofar as people commit violent acts in the real world more or less based on Light's character. And, again, as Con pointed out, the data correlation suggests less.

Ergo, whether I'm being selfish or embodying utilitarianism, I'm voting Con. All that leaves me with is whether I should just go with Pro's opinion because... I guess he has it? I'm not sure, and every time he keeps mentioning how it's either his opinion or the voters', it just confuses me further. I'll be selfish and value my opinion above his, which, again, yields a Con vote. Also sources to Con for actually providing some insight into Light as well as data to support his argument.

There really isn't much to this debate since neither side is challenging the others' arguments. The only real question is whether Pro or Con have the framework right. Pro's framework is that it should be based on how such a person affects the society they are in. Con's framework is that it should be a question of whether it is preferable for the individual with the powers. I don't think either side made all that convincing of an argument for why their view should be preferred outside of resolutional analysis (Pro basically just says that it's going to affect the broader society, Con says it won't, and the hypotheticals just balloon from there). So, I'll focus on the topic.

"It is preferable to have Batman's Skills than to have Superman's Superpowers"

That's not particularly clear. Much as Con ends up pointing to it in the final round (too late) to argue that "preferable to have" implies a "for the individual with these skills" somewhere, that doesn't seem like a better approach than "for their society." Neither seems clearly implied. What Con fails to mention, though, is the extended resolution in the description:

"Resolved: Given an "otherwise Average person" (they are well meaning, not a villain!), it is better that they have Batman's skills and abilities, than to have Superman's powers. Assume this is happening in the real world."

This not only challenges Con's approach to the resolution, given that it is now referring to an external "they," but places it in the context of being an average person in a broader society. I think there is a case to be made here that even this framing should place focus on what is better from that average person's perspective, but I needed to see that laid out and in Con's first published round. In the absence of that, and without either side giving me much in the way of further resolutional analysis, all I see is the societal context of that average person. And given that Pro's the only one really arguing from that perspective, I vote Pro.

RFD given here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jVxP1adCyjBcL1B1GpKCW4XeCzZv93yVZQHWyI2wwWA/edit?usp=sharing

Let me know if you have any questions or issues with it you'd like to discuss.

Nothing really to add. Seems like it could have been a good debate, but it’s a FF from Pro.

Much as I could bring up dropped points, this really comes down to whether Pro has a case or not and... yeah, I don't see one. I understand that you missed the first round, but you have the burden of proof to demonstrate that the resolution is true. Simply saying that laws shouldn't be based on subjectivity and that the unborn have the capacity for development aren't affirming the resolution. You can't just stop at responding to your opponent on this - you have to establish your case, build an argument that there it is objective to say that abortion is murder and that the capacity for development establishes it as such. Pro's responses didn't do that, so he fails to meet his burden.

The topic is "Ben Solo should return," which is pretty specific insofar as it tells us what should happen, but pretty broad in terms of what that means. I think Pro's correct that there should be a both a means by which Ben Solo can return and a reason for him to return, but Pro notably provides very little in the way of reasoning as to what's likely to happen should he come back to the series. Instead, much of Pro's argument focuses on how he could return (so that's one part of it), and how his death was a negative for the narrative surrounding his character, i.e. by preventing further exploration of elements like the dyad, abruptly halting the hopes of his parents, snuffing out the Skywalker line, and providing a cynical means for redemption. I don't see much analysis of what the series is likely to do now that his character is back in the story. I get some of that in R3, where Pro argues that it could allow for exploration of the WBW (doesn't seem specific to the character) and that Ben could then "grapple with his horrifying decisions, witness the Resistance and those around him who were victimized process those decisions," but there are two problems with this. First, it's presented for the first time in R3, making it a final round argument that does allow some response from Con, but is nonetheless pretty unfairly positioned to afford him minimal response. Second, all of that seems like Pro's imposition of what he wants on the character. I buy that they would likely continue the dyad and even the exploration of the WBW would necessarily have to happen if he returned from there, but it's up to Pro to justify why Ben would interact with the Resistance and face accountability as a foregone conclusion.

Coming back to the issue of how he could return, I do think this is a double-edged sword for Pro. I don't think there's any argument that can be made that a fictional character in a universe where other characters have had fake out deaths could have themselves had a fake out death, and with the WBW in play, there is clearly some wiggle room when it comes to the act of physically dying. Like Con, I don't buy that the lack of a Force ghost opens the way for this to happen, and I do think it opens a novel route to return from death that has not been presented just like this before (even Ahsoka isn't a 1-to-1 comparison).

The problem is that if I buy that Disney can revive this character in this way, I also have to buy that those very "discordant" issues that have accompanied the Disney sequels are likely to continue with Ben's survival. And that's a problem for Pro's argument. He says that "allowing a story that fills some of the gaps with Ben Solo is nothing but an opportunity for repair and growth," but seems to simultaneously acknowledge that Disney has a bad track record when it comes to making fulfilling narratives. Con notes several times that the efforts to bring back certain characters, particularly Palpatine (who gets referenced as a major example of a character similarly returning from the dead), have had substantially negative effects on the narrative of the series. So while I agree that the way Ben was taken out of the series was negative for a variety of narrative reasons, I'm not seeing a good reason to believe bringing him back will improve upon his or the general narrative of the series.

So, the best I can do is point to the exploration of the dyad and the WBW, and I have to compare them with broader effects on the lore of the series that result from Ben having even less basis for returning than Palpatine. Since neither side is particularly forthcoming on the impact level (why should I care so much about any of this?), I'm forced to look at things from my perspective. The dyad and WBW can potentially be explored through other characters (Ahsoka already did some of the latter) and I just generally have trouble seeing either of them as important when compared with setting an even broader standard of who comes back and from what. While revival of the supposed dead happens with some regularity, I can see bigger problems with people just generally mistrusting anything that looks like a death on screen. While the lore the Disney cannon may not be "borderline unsavable" as Con claims, the concept of a relatively untrained Jedi managing to reach and return form the WBW does present its own set of questions that I think have broader effects on enjoyment of the series as a whole. Therefore, I vote Con.

Really don’t know what Pro was trying to do here. If you’re trying to define the circumstances of European colonists acquiring Native American land as something other than stealing, then it has to be clear what the distinction is. The problem is that Pro multiple times and through his own argument acknowledges that this meets the definition of stealing, he just argues that it also meets the definition for other terms and that, in some cases, those other terms are considered paramount. Even if that’s accurate, that does not mean that stealing did not occur, which is the case Pro had to make. Con showed that, via broken treaties at minimum, land was stolen from the Native Americans, though honestly Pro’s whole case was effectively turned against him, leading me to vote Con.

I'll keep this brief.

The long and short of it is that the existence of a creator deity is not sufficient to affirm the resolution. The burden is heavily on Pro for this debate, as he has to defend the existence of a deity that meets the definition presented in the description:

"A person without a body (i.e., a spirit) who necessarily is eternal, perfectly free, omnipotent, omniscient, perfectly good, and the creator of all things”.

Pro's opening arguments potentially demonstrate some of this, and I could go into specifics about how well those points work, but that "perfectly good" point is the basis for Con's arguments on the problem of evil, and is at greatest issue when it comes to determining whether Pro sufficiently demonstrated that a god that meets all these standards does exist.

And that makes the lack of rebuttal to Con's final round pretty glaring. I recognize that you were only allowed to respond to points presented in the second round in your final round, but with such exhaustive counter-rebuttals and with Pro having the greater burden, the lack of response does Pro no favors. I buy that it's necessarily possible to make normative judgements that don't require that God be the arbiter of what is moral, I buy that a deity would be able to circumvent all manner of alternative means of circumventing cascading harms, and that if the probabilistic argument favors Con on this issue, then he necessarily takes the debate. There's potentially the interesting issue of whether said deity has an obligation to stop evil, but whether that's true or not isn't particularly relevant when the problem is the lack of support for that "perfectly good" segment of the definition. Even if god lacks that obligation, Pro would have to demonstrate that a perfectly good being would not have to act in a manner that does not stop or prevent suffering in instances like John Wayne Gacy. I don't see any demonstration of that, nor do I see Con argue that the kind of suffering inflicted in this instance is not evil. It also doesn't help that Con's argument about the probability of an evil god vs. a good god demonstrates that there's no greater likelihood for either one that Pro has demonstrated.

As such, I vote Con. Good debate, though. I think this might have been more interesting if the definition wasn't so specific and multifaceted.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1OeG7sXs7flNcpz10YpyANIzX8v0W8CHuK5rhVlcD95k/edit?usp=sharing

Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/10Cl335wqe2lqnXWR8x4ePvEKfqTUBUUmgh4vluwFqBk/edit

Let me know if you have any questions.

"I don't care anymore, have a free unrated win."

Was going to read through this and post a more detailed vote, but if that R2 from Con isn't a concession, I don't know what is. Also doesn't help that Con's second round was, essentially, just a posted forfeit with no contribution to the debate, which meant Con only had one round of substance. If Con is fine giving Pro a "free" win, so he gets arguments. Could probably give conduct too, but at least Con announced it.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XSTWIyY2dQfTWxMR75N0La52ySOLVJFCpuQ_PDoL1ao/edit?usp=sharing

Good selections by both sides, loved listening to these.

Pro sets a criterion for interpreting the resolution that can be written as "only silly people would vote Con." Con says we should all be silly. I see no reason not to embody that.

There really isn't much for me to say here. I've read through his arguments on similar debates before and there isn't much different here. He establishes that legalization improves outcomes for users by showing that the legal market would produce safer drugs, going through the chemical basis for the difference.

By contrast, Con's arguments focus entirely on a comparison to alcohol, which is notably not backed up by any sources. The case he's making has some potential merit: legal alcohol causes a lot of deaths, ergo legal heroin could also cause a lot of deaths. What's missing from this argument are the warrants for these points. It's not enough for Con to argue that legal alcohol causes deaths - if illegal alcohol caused greater numbers of deaths (Pro argues that prohibition had terrible effects resulting from contamination), then arguing that making it legal increased the damage alcohol causes is just wrong on its face. It's not enough to simply state that legal alcohol is dangerous; you have to compare the danger posed by illegal alcohol to that of legal alcohol. Pro is the only one I see doing that, and the case isn't favorable for Con. Similarly, it's not enough to argue that legalizing heroin is automatically going to cause a great deal of deaths simply because legalizing alcohol did. They're different drugs. Con had to establish the harms resulting from heroin, not merely coast on the known harms of alcohol. Finally, if you want to make the argument that the regulations that currently apply to alcohol and cannabis represent a unique harm when applied to heroin (which I believe is Con's point, if I'm reading him correctly), then that point needs to be warranted. What is it about existing regulations for these drugs that would make them more damaging when applied to heroin?

Con's case is a lot of suggestion and assertion, but lacks any meaningful support for his central claim, while Pro's case has a great deal of unaddressed material and support for his claims. As such, arguments and sources to Pro.

Fundamentally, the biggest question is this: when does a representation of capitalism in SK become accurate? There necessarily must be a point where a portrayal of that system becomes accurate - any point before that is necessarily inaccurate. That's a pretty straightforward scale and the most important thing for both debaters here to define.

So, how does each side do this?

Pro makes it rather clear that exaggerating elements of the primary message necessarily slips into inaccuracy, regardless of whatever else the story may do correctly in its portrayal. He points out several examples of exaggeration in the story, which Con largely concedes as exaggerations. So if Pro is correct in his framing of the debate, he wins.

Con also makes a pretty clear alternate framework that includes a checklist of items the show must include for SG to be an accurate portrayal, and this list is largely dropped by Pro. So if Con is correct in his framing of the debate, he wins.

While there are other reasons I considered, there's one central reason that makes the decision for me: I know what Pro's threshold is, whereas I'm uncertain where Con's resides. Both sides agree that SG has a primary message that relates to capitalism and the harms it causes in SK, so both sides agree regarding what issues could and could not be exaggerated under Pro's framework, even if there's disagreement regarding whether that framework is valid or what details can be exaggerated. The problem with Con's framework is that I don't know why this particular checklist of items is both necessary and sufficient to establish accuracy. Con keeps telling me that every example Pro mentions is unimportant, while these are important. I can agree that these themes are bigger picture, that they are more important as take-aways from the SG story, and that they are relevant to capitalism in SK. Assuming these are sufficient, how many can I take away before SG becomes inaccurate? Why doesn't the exaggeration Pro cites detract from their relevance? I agree that they make watching SG more engaging, but that doesn't support their accuracy. I think Con came up with a good set of reasons why certain elements of SG are accurate representations of capitalism in SK, but having individual accuracies in its messages and even being broadly relevant does not establish that the primary message of SG as a whole is accurate. Without a clear bar on which to weigh that accuracy more holistically beyond a few examples that largely just establish what falls solidly into either camp rather than what is close to the line between accurate and inaccurate, I have to go with the clearer metric, and that puts me in Pro's camp.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1xj6CGLcLVPaADISnQKLxi8tnfmPCzc1v3xTt8zqfbpY/edit?usp=sharing

Not an easy decision for a bunch of reasons that I probably explained in too much detail, but here we are. I think both debaters did a good job presenting their points, but you both could have done quite a bit to make this a much simpler debate to judge by focusing on the bigger picture and how this debate was likely to be evaluated (or explaining how it should be).

TL;DR: I think a lot of the technical issues don't end up being important to the outcome of the debate, as it still comes down to a straight up evaluation of the net benefits of Pro's case, and, due to a combination of Pro doing more work on the impact level and a shared assumption of solvency, Pro comes out on top in a narrow decision.

Not too much to say here. I buy Con's definition of "accurate," though it's odd that the definition Con is arguing against is the very one he put into the description as the instigator. Once that's established, there's not a lot else to talk about here. Con establishes that his comparison allowed to deviate in some ways from the existing system in South Korea, and he demonstrates through his argument that there are multiple accurate applications of existing issues under the capitalist system in South Korea showcased in the show Squid Game. They may not be perfect or, as Pro argues multiple times, accurate representations of what the majority of people experience in South Korea under their existing economic system, but that doesn't mean that these aren't accurate depictions of what anyone experiences.

Telling me that this would be more accurate for China doesn't tell me that it's inaccurate for South Korea. Telling me that capitalism has positive attributes or that capitalism may not be the direct cause of all these problems isn't enough, either. It's too broad, and doesn't get at the specific cases Con brings up in his argument. I need direct responses to the comparisons that Con is making in order to show that he is making inaccurate comparisons. At most, what I see from Pro is that he's demonstrating that Squid Game paints with a broad brush, but not that it's inaccurate in representing how at least a sizeable minority experience the economic system that exists/has existed in South Korea recently, and since neither side is particularly willing to explain what goes beyond a "slight" or "acceptable limit" for deviation "from a standard," it's unclear that Pro has met any threshold for demonstrating inaccuracy, which is his burden in the debate. Therefore, Arguments to Con.

Pro gets conduct because of the forfeit.

Unfortunately, not much to say here. I thought Con might be able to present an interesting argument about when personal perception affects the way societies interact with individuals, and there were certainly the makings of such an argument in Con's first round, but they're missing key warrants. Forfeiting the next 3 rounds guaranteed a loss, and particularly with Pro's extensive response, the lack of continued argument from Con is glaring. Hence, arguments and conduct to Pro.

There's really not too much for me to say here.

I agree with Con that this debate got pretty far off topic as you each went into discussions of behavior rather than the existence of distinct genders. It didn't help the debate to go off on this tangent or any of the others regarding how either side felt on the issue. It's a fact debate. Debate the existence of the fact.

Pro basically lets Con both get the ball rolling and, by virtue of his position in the debate, have the last word, which is never a great combination, but it's still possible to win even giving yourself that kind of handicap. I will say that Pro automatically wins conduct due to the forfeit, but let's talk about the arguments.

First off, by conceding that intersex occurs in humans, Pro concedes the debate. If I buy his argument that gender and sex are identical, then intersex + male + female = 3 genders. That's more than 2, so I consider that a concession of the debate overall.

Second, I'm not really sure I understand Pro's argument. He largely dismisses the definition provided for gender by Con, arguing that a social construct is not objective fact and therefore does not exist. In that case, I think Pro needed to offer an alternate definition rather than just saying that Pro's definition is flawed. If you want to argue that the lack of any external validation necessarily makes the entire concept of a social construct or self-definition invalid because it is fabricated within the mind, then there needs to be another definition on the table. Asserting over and over again that sex and gender are the same doesn't offer a definition - it's just Pro clarifying his own views on the issue, not providing any way to externally validate his views. The closest I get to that is an argument from R2 about how job applications use the term gender in the same way he would use sex, which doesn't tell me why they're correct. Again, this is a fact debate. You have to establish that this is the fact. So, whether I agree with Pro or not, Con's the only one that's providing me with a definition I can use to adequately explain what gender is. Even if it's entirely fabricated, if that's part of the definition of gender, then I'm forced to accept that gender is fabricated... which isn't a great position for Pro to be in, since that necessarily means there can be more genders resulting from that fabrication.

So, long story short, Pro is asking judges to do a lot with his arguments and not really justifying it. He's asking that judges conflate sex and gender because the definition for gender necessitates some subjectivity, but doesn't tell me why subjectivity invalidates the definition or provide me an alternate definition to work with. He cherry-picks portions of his opponents' definition to make the case for him, but excludes essential context. Even if I end up agreeing entirely that the perception of gender clashing with sex is delusional, that only establishes that gender and sex should consistently align, not that gender doesn't exist at least somewhat independently of sex (they can be wrong in their perceptions of themselves, but that doesn't make the perception nonexistent nor does that tell me that that perception is not their assumed gender). I think if the debate had stayed a little more focused on the topic, this might have been more interesting, but as it is there's just not a lot to pick up from Pro's side in the debate, whereas Con better establishes the facts regarding gender. So that's where my vote goes.

I think when it comes to weighing what issues are most important in this debate, I'm just not getting enough reason to weigh issues of freedom/liberty over more tangible harms. I know a large part of Pro's argument comes from the position that harms are worse with drugs that are currently legal, and while I take his point, I don't think that does anything to move the needle. I can acknowledge that there are hypocrisies in existing drug policies and see that legalization of these particular drugs is still damaging, even if the harms they cause are less than the harms of currently legal drugs like alcohol and tobacco. In fact, the argument could have been made that their legalization is part of the reason they're so harmful, and that piling on with more legal drugs doesn't yield a positive impact just because those drugs cause lesser harms.

Still, there's a lot to take in here with regards to the actual harms of these drugs, and I think both sides could have done a better job in this department. Pro argues extensively about the chemistry of these drugs, and while that point is interesting, I don't think it does much for his position except limit the degree of harm caused by these drugs, assuming that they're not adulterated. I think the better point is that those adulterants are only likely to be in these drugs currently because they are illegal, i.e. the chief cause of harm is the adulterants and legalizing them removes those adulterants. Pro also argues that legalization reduces the number of instances where law enforcement actively utilizes drug laws to inflict harms by planting drugs or just securing larger prison sentences that aren't warranted. I think the latter could use more explanation (there are good points there but Pro doesn't spend much time fleshing them out), but the former is decent, albeit limited in actual quantity of cases to a couple of examples.

Con's argument to this effect is initially strong, arguing that an increase in the number of people using these drugs (both sides kind of just assume that will happen) yields an increase in the number of addicts and he shows pretty clearly that addiction is bad. I don't think he's winning on the numbers of addicts, and while the adolescent point initially looks like it could bolster it, the argument just seems to disappear after R2. The trouble with this argument is that, while I buy that the number of addicts would increase, it's more difficult to buy that their circumstances would be anywhere near as bad as they are now with the presence of adulterants. I think when Con drops the issue of adulterants, it kind of sinks the whole argument that more addicts is worse than leaving these drugs illegal, mainly because the vast majority of harms are associated with the adulterants, not the addiction (bad though that is). I think Pro also makes the point well that different levels of addiction/abuse make that harm more variable than Con lets on. I think what could potentially have bolstered this point the most was the argument about regulation or lack thereof. I don't love the fact that Pro is still defining how his system would work all the way out in R3, and some of his claims about how the system would function seem to rely on some pretty loose assumptions of how these drugs would enter the market and be regulated. I think there was room to argue that this system might not be much better than the existing black market, relying on sufficient chemists to monitor marketed products and the assumption that the drug companies peddling them would not modify the recipe in ways that might not be easily caught, introducing their own adulterants. There just isn't enough of an argument here, though - Con keeps his points too general to the failures of a hybridized system rather than engaging with the specifics of Pro's system. I also just don't buy that cartels would assume substantial control over the government. That scenario needed more warrants and evidence for what happens in a legal system.

Overall, while Pro did forfeit a round (hence Conduct), I think he's winning on bigger issues of safe use of drugs in the absence of black market adulterants and preventing abuses of the legal system that cost lives. While Con has some solid points about addiction, they just don't gain the kind of steam they need to overcome these issues.

...This was a slog to read. The debate just gets incredibly repetitive after the first round and I read completely through the third before I started skipping large chunks of the same points being made over and over.

It's very simple. Pro has a general argument about why these psychoactive substances should be legalized and provides reasoning that's largely based on free access being a general good. That's fine, albeit it remains poorly weighed against safety concerns in the end. I've judged a debate by Pro before and I still don't buy the "what about this other dangerous thing that's allowed right now?" argument. It's an argument that utilizes existing hypocrisy in the legal structure as a basis for legalizing something, which may make sense on a level of fairness, but since fairness is never weighed as an impact, it feels a bit empty.

That being said, none of this matters. Con never argues against any of it beyond saying that safety matters more, so fine, let's talk about safety.

Con's sole argument against the resolution is that cocaine is bad. The entirety of his reasoning for this comes in R1, where he says "it brings about cardiovascular issues which escalate to stroke and brain seizures." and cites an article by Mark Shrayber. First off, usually a good idea to provide a link to the article so that your opponent and your audience can read your evidence, especially since this was your only source. Second, just because you say something about health harms that can result from drug usage doesn't mean that you've weighed your argument. Stroke and brain seizures are terrible, but how often do they happen and at what dosages? The article goes into some detail on this, but Con relies entirely on voters and his opponent to read into his source. You can't weigh these points just by claiming them over and over again. You can't get any extra weight just by saying that there's a safety risk that can be triggered on first use, one that could even result in death. That's a big impact, but it matters a lot more when you give numbers, and Con cannot rely on the article to provide those without quoting them in his argument.

More importantly, though, that argument has multiple counters from Pro. I see several places where he talks about mixing drugs and the effect those mixed drugs have on the body. Even if I buy Con's argument wholesale that pure cocaine presents a substantial risk, Pro tells me that the mixing of ingredients that happens on the black market results in deadlier drugs. So, at minimum, there's a boost to safety of cocaine use among those who are already using it on the illegal market, and since I don't know if or how much cocaine usage would expand post-legalization, that point stands pretty strong. But let's say I'm not entirely sure how that safety balances with the safety of pure cocaine usage. Pro also has this benefit for every other drug on his list, and with no apparent harms resulting from their usage in their pure forms (Con builds his entire case on cocaine), Pro is, essentially, achieving absolute safety for every drug on the market aside from cocaine. That's a huge safety impact, and the only response I see to all this is that the government currently makes these drugs illegal, so they must be dangerous. That's a broad appeal to authority that isn't based on any evidence. It's a weak response to the kind of biochemical information that Pro provides, and it doesn't suffice.

So, frankly, it's pretty obvious Pro is winning this on the safety level, but also beyond it since he's the only one arguing issues of freedom and fairness, despite those likely being smaller impacts overall. Pro, don't let the debate get dragged out like this in the future. You basically had this locked up by the end of R2 and you just have to stay focused on the key issues. Letting Con distract you and get under your skin could only hurt your position.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/19uUewHSDGqs7WovrdFw3Wp_OjDOJkSl0izkiT95eygQ/edit?usp=sharing

It really was a great debate, guys. I don't mean to come off as though this was really one-sided because it wasn't. Both sides had strong cases to build from and, while better choices could have been made by both sides, you both made strong efforts throughout and it showed in the result. Definitely a future HoF addition and a great way to cap off the tournament.

That’s a shame. I think there’s an argument to be had here, even if it’s a little wonky given how these worlds work so differently. Still, full forfeit and concession give the debate to Pro.

Not too much to say on this one.

Pro provided a framework for his case that goes unaddressed, essentially arguing that unjust laws should not exist and that any law that inflicts structural violence is inherently unjust while providing room to argue that the net effect of a given law needs to be positive to warrant its existence. Con never directly addresses this, but he makes the case that the net effect of existing law is positive, which by itself still would not be sufficient to fully push back on this framework. That's already a problem as Con doesn't provide a competing framework. Moreover, Pro's argument includes a large stretch on human rights and that all laws ought to respect them, providing thought experiments to impact this out. I don't see any responses to these. That just leaves benefits to immigrants, which are basically dropped (Con argues that things would be worse for them, but each of his points get turned against him since they only apply due to the existence of border security), effects on the economy, which Con did talk about, and ownership of public spaces, which seems somewhat tangential to the issues of the debate but also goes dropped. That's a lot to leave on the table.

Con's arguments keep moving over the course of the debate, as he doesn't really defend previous points he has made. There is no implied "can" in the resolution, I buy Pro's response - "should" debates engage with fiat as a given. A difficult immigration system and the troubles with changing it could have been a disadvantage because changing laws tends to result in political fallout, but Con doesn't talk about that. Much of Con's position on the US economy is based on the existence of big numbers, e.g. the 500,000 people who would immigrate, but it's never clear what those numbers mean. Pro tells me a lot about what happens with each individual who comes into the US and what the cost per person is. If Con wants to argue that his statistics are flawed when numbers get too high, then it needs to be clear what the numbers we should expect are. You can't just keep saying that these numbers are big and hope to get anywhere - the cost has to be clear. Con does get to that a bit in R2 where he talks about the potential job cost for native-born people, but Pro brings a mess of sources to the table as a counter and shows that this is a correlative effect, not one necessarily driven by immigration. Con also argues that Pro's plan somehow favors immigrants, which doesn't follow - allowing entry and access doesn't mean providing special privileges. Con does hint at bigger issues, particularly in his final round where he mentions that the US has to prioritize its own citizens (would've been really nice to hear about social contracts as an alternate framework) and that it has no responsibility to foreigners (again, there are frameworks that this would build into really well), but they aren't early or fleshed out enough to affect the debate.

Vote to Pro. Also, sources to Pro. There's just a lot more support for the points he's making and much of the support that Con uses is for points he later drops.

The difference between the two given arguments is that Pro talks about it from the perspective of justification (i.e. were these characters justified in taking their actions and having their perspectives), whereas Con focuses solely on Light and talks about how it’s tragic that he had options taken away from him. An argument could have been made that this was a greater form of tragedy (opportunity cost), but there are 3 problems.

1) Con doesn’t discuss Anakin at all, so he provides no meaningful comparison. Discussing how Anakin’s life and contributions could have been different had he not been pressured to join the Jedi would be similar, but that comparison has to be made if you’re going to make this point. Light isn’t tragic in isolation, he has to be more tragic to win this debate.

2) Pro already made the argument that Light chose to pick up the Death Note. I need a response to that. Telling me he was bestowed with the Death Note doesn’t change the fact that he actively chose to pick it up and use it. You can argue that it, as well as the influence of Ryuk, makes it difficult to call it a choice, but I need to see that point. In the absence of it, the opportunity cost argument is weak because he would always choose some line of thought like this. The Death Note is a tool to push his aims, it does not direct his actions.

3) If you’re going to push this perspective, you have to cover what makes it tragic. There’s a definition for tragic character in the description:
“Tragic Character- The protagonist of a tragic story or drama, in which, despite their virtuous and sympathetic traits and ambitions, they ultimately meet defeat, suffering, or even an untimely end.”
So you have to engage on that level. You have to establish that Light has or had virtuous and sympathetic traits and ambitions. Pro largely focuses on motives, but that provides a bit of support on this level. Con does not. When Con’s argument is:
“Light would have spent the rest of his life pursuing something more meaningful and putting his high intellect to good use.”
That’s not enough. It suggests that Light might have been sympathetic if he hadn’t gotten the Death Note, not that he is sympathetic, even before he received the Death Note. Beyond that, it’s just a suggestion that he might have behaved differently, for which Con provides no support. There’s an argument to be made here about following in his father’s footsteps or talking about his pursuits, but I’m not going to fill in the blanks for you. There has to be a reason for me to see him as sympathetic based at least on what I can reasonably predict would happen, and Con’s not giving me a reason to predict it beyond basic assertion. That’s always going to be overwhelmed by clearly sympathetic history.

I vote Pro.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/16FJlWjQTz74VUHxP64ubjpXkG5FTII-CAJpeU1y254I/edit?usp=sharing

Close debate. Let me know if you have any questions/concerns.

Long story short, the case Pro is making seems largely nebulous whereas Con's case is more defined, which gives him the advantage. When you're talking about "justified" as you both did in this debate (there's been a rash of topics using this word in reference to history lately and, frankly, I think all of them could do with better discussion of that word, its context in these topics, and how each side could use it), those definite impacts are going to stand out because it's an issue of net benefits, i.e. were the American colonies/world better off for having had the American revolution? When you frame it like that, the side that can better articulate both its link story and impacts is going to come out ahead.

So let's dive into those.

Pro's position largely comes down to three points: colonists were justified in rebelling against 1) taxation without representation, 2) violations of other rights, and 3) a status quo that would yield a much greater US in the future. The last of those really isn't relevant, no matter how many times Pro restates it. Long-term changes that the US chose to make are not directly connected with the Revolution at any point in the debate. Pro cites the Constitution (I don't see a direct quote, but he mentions it), but doesn't provide the kind of direct link required to make a case for the impetus of the Revolution itself being directly tied to the later outcomes like banning slavery. Points 1 and 2 give Pro a little bit of ground, but they're nebulous because it's never clear what the negative impact was. I buy that the British government was oppressive, but I don't know what that means for the colonists living under that oppression. Con points out the taxation only amounted to 1-1.5%, and while that might still be difficult to manage, it's up to Pro to demonstrate how. I also don't see a response to Con's point about how this amount was justified, since the British spent more on the colonies than they were bringing in from taxation. Similarly, telling me that a lack of representation is damaging is not enough - you have to give me specifics on how it harms the people who lack it. Pro keeps referencing "a series of events that demonstrated the British government's failure to protect the colonists' rights and interests," but I see more of a specified path to revolution from Con than I do from Pro (Pro provides a link in R1 that provides some of the surrounding events, but Con is the first to mention The Boston Massacre and I don't see the path up to that incident or anything that came after from Pro). It's all very vague, and while these points suggest that there were justifications, none of them have any weight. Even if I consider the future of the US, how do I weigh that as a justification against the harms Con cites? Pro gives me no indication.

As for Con's case, he largely turns Pro's impacts by referencing specific events and weighing his impacts. If I buy the slavery point Pro was making, Con tells me it would have happened earlier if the colonies were still colonies. He tells me the Native Americans would have been better off as well. I've got quibbles with these points, but I don't see responses from Pro. Moreover, he gives me much more direct harms: the cost of war (lives and dollars) and the loss of support from England (military and otherwise) are solid points that, again, go unaddressed. I don't think that these points are necessarily going to win the day in this debate regardless of what Pro had done, but I need something to counterbalance all this, and I'm not getting much, and when these impacts are largely or entirely conceded, they loom large on my flow. It doesn't help that Con suggests a number of other possible methods to manage the relationship without war, and while I think that's largely extra topical, Pro does nothing to argue that back, so I'm left thinking that Pro's arguments may have justified doing something, but not necessarily revolution.

All this leads me to vote Con. I also award Con sources because, frankly, he's doing a lot more across all the points. Pro's single source doesn't help him much.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-_r6dww3Ecfw_GifxdL4-8f_W7fedWRygMIFAgMufAc/edit

Let me know if you guys have questions.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/157u04sNvUb3Qqir5XhwYK9QE0wIwhL6wqAL0FWpF2wE/edit?usp=sharing

It was a good debate, guys, even if it felt like it was missing some big picture crystallization at the end. Let me know if you have any questions about the decision.

Con is correct in arguing that the burden on Pro is very large. However, there are two reasons why Pro still wins this debate.

One, Pro has an absolutely massive argument sitting in this debate that is never countered in any way. Con doesn't contest his definitions, nor does he address any of the points about how indoctrination occurs, when it occurs, and how that is universal. Instead, Con provides a weak argument based entirely on anecdote where someone (he doesn't cite who it is) demonstrated the capacity for critical evaluation, which is irrelevant to the topic and this definition of indoctrination, and points to someone in the comments, which is vague and also unproven.

Two, simply stating that Pro has a high burden accomplishes nothing. Saying that the absolute nature of the resolution makes it hard to support doesn't help your side unless you also give me a lot of instances that contradict that resolution. Arguing that there might be countless people out there for whom the resolution is not true is ipse dixit - it's an assertion without proof. You can't use that as a case against Pro - you have to actually demonstrate the flaw, not just claim that there is likely is one. Pro demonstrates his case with evidence. Con leaves it up to voters' imaginations.

Con conceded the debate.

The biggest problem with this debate is that it gets to bogged down in the back-and-forth on specific arguments that it largely doesn't go anywhere after the first round. There are additional arguments sprinkled in and further rebuttals, but the cases are made at the outset and neither side does a whole lot to expand on the essential points of their side, since you're both so caught up in the line-by-line. I think the opening rounds by both sides are good, but until the last round, neither side really takes a step back and evaluates the bigger picture.

ME and CE are clearly defined in the description. The distinction is solely on one level: who should control production and pricing - the government or the people? There's a lot tangled up in that, but as this is also limited to two countries with known systems (Cuba and Vietnam), there are pretty discrete limits to what can be discussed. So it's good that both sides talked a lot about where these countries are right now on that sliding scale and why elements of ME or CE have been helpful or harmful to them. I thought there would be a lot more discussion of what it would take to push each of these countries in either direction, but that was surprisingly limited. Instead, a lot of the discussion moves to other countries and their implementation of ME and CE, which seems to complicate things more by introducing a variety of other factors that might explain those differences. If one side had really focused their on what this shift would look like within these countries - talked about implementation and weighed the harms and benefits of both directions - I think that would have been an easy way for me to decide the debate.

As it stands, though, there's not actually that much for me to mention. There's surprisingly little acknowledgement by either side of the failings of the system they're defending, especially after R1, since both sides spend the rest of the debate focusing on hyping up their system and attacking the other. It makes me question whether a lot of the positive points apply to absolute ME or CE, but that's just a general frustration. The back-and-forth largely favors Con, since he sources more of his rebuttals and those support more specific points that apply to how these affect economies. One of the bigger examples of the contrast between the two sides is Pro's consistent claims of financial collapse juxtaposed with Con's focus on poverty, income inequality, economic growth and capacity to rebound from crisis. There's just a lot more steps present in Con's points that, while not always effective in turning Pro's points, at least introduce enough doubt that none of Pro's points come through unscathed. By contrast, the comparisons to other countries and, in particular, the authoritarianism argument emerge relatively unscathed and while their value as a Kritik is... questionable (I don't see voters specific to buying the Kritik and it largely just morphs into a disadvantage with a distinct link story), it's also the strongest connection we have to how countries behave when they are pushing towards a CE structure.

I don't think either side runs away with this debate, but while I'm not fond of the "add up impacts and give them a score" RFD structure, it's hard to ignore just how many rebuttals and counter-rebuttals Con is employing and how the responses to those from Pro lack the specificity and support to match them. It's also the only basis I have for voting in this debate, as neither side provides a framework that would make certain points stand out. It's just a straight up "who's winning on the flow" situation. As such, I vote Con.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1xgJoMKpTOpfa799-qqqrfcyVYXnuUgNU_q6-QReNgx4/edit?usp=sharing

Good debate, guys. Sorry to hear that it's your last, RM.

Full forfeit. Best of luck to both debaters in the rest of the tournament, hope Lxam can participate in future rounds.

Unfortunately, full forfeit. Good luck in the finals, Austin, and hope whatever kept Lxam busy is soon alleviated or remedied.

Full forfeit.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Eq13NnfB2hB2g13R2XwvuUY1oEvad0nDMlmPV-nq8Yg/edit?usp=sharing

Interesting debate, guys. If you have questions or concerns, feel free to tag me in a comment or message me directly.

I consider an argument generated by AI to be plagiarism, so that would be reason enough to grant the debate to Pro, though the full forfeit definitely doesn't help.