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Barney

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Total comments: 2,702

Almost the goal of communism... As we know from the genocide in Ukraine, not quite the goal of communism for them to be "living" a horrible life.

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@Americandebater24
@Savant
@CatholicApologetics

>Reported Vote: Americandebater24 // Mod action: Removed
>Voting Policy: info.debateart.com/terms-of-service/voting-policy
>Points Awarded: 5 to con
>Reason for Decision: See Comments Tab.
>Reason for Mod Action:
While arguments could do with a little more detail, they are at worst borderline (which would not result in vote deletion).

Sources on the other hand fall into the trap of one side having more, which while indicative of good things, falls short of the standard.

Sources are optional and if awarded require a strong quality lead. Sources go to the side that better supported their case with relevant outside evidence and/or analysis thereof. If both sides have done their research due diligence, these points are usually tied.
A side with unreliable sources may be penalized, but the voter must specify why the sources were unreliable enough to diminish their own case (such as if the other side called attention to the flaws, thereby engaging with sources in a more effective manner with impacts to arguments; thereby flipping the source and harming the opposing argument).
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Americandebater24
12.10.2024 06:21PM
This was an interesting debate. but my vote goes to Con for several reasons. The first reason is that I believe Con did an excellent job of pointing out that the catholic church has a great number of contradictory teachings. Con also correctly asserts that it is the pro's job to establish infallibility beyond a reasonable doubt. Pro tries to make a good argument by citing that Jesus made promises and that the catholic church is under a "principle of divine protection of err." Unfortunately, Pro never establishes this to be a fact. Plus, as Con rightly pointed out, authority is not the same thing as infallibility.

For Pro to have won this debate, they would have had to have shown that the Catholic Church has never been wrong even one time in its history. Not only does Pro fail to do that, but that would also go against Catholic teachings that dictate all humans are fallible by nature. I further appreciate that Pro tried to make a rational argument by differentiating Personal error from error in doctrines, but that is nothing more than a typical tactic for a losing argument. You cannot get out of examples of error by the church by saying it was the person's flaws and not the teachings. If the doctrine is flawless, it will be error-free no matter who is teaching it.

I am also awarding Con the more reliable sources votes because while both sides primarily use bible sources, Con has at least provided some non-biblical sources to their arguments which offers a more reliable and diverse perspective.

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I might be the last true hopeless romantic, and even I'll wholly agree that it matters. The degree that it matters is debatable, but not that it matters at all.

Phantom of the Opera for example is a tragedy because in French culture she had no choice, the cat murderer was traditionally handsome so she had to go with him.

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Initial start to a RFD write-up

I do use the 7 point voting paradigm. Conduct is worth 1 point, and can override other allotments, but is not guaranteed to do so.

Legibility:
When conversing online, break stuff into separate lines. Wall of text is horrible, even when not lengthy.

Double line breaks are rarely a bad option (this would have done well with a single).

Arguments:
"profiting off of slavery" this point from pro was actually well executed in R1, even while the subtlety of it would go over the heads of most.

"entrepreneurial encouragement plans" was interesting. It borders on a kritik, but is good to toss in there that there would be more effective ways to uplift people. Con's counter "infrastructure typically helps only the lowest rungs, meaning that the middle chunk is left completely un-aided" this is self defating, since it's the lowest which are in need of help.

"on July 29, 2008, the U.S. House of Representatives passed HR. 194, a resolution apologizing for slavery and the subsequent discriminatory laws against African Americans"
Not quite sure how that fixes anything, and it's weirdly recent if all the problems went away 150 years ago.

Pro's overall theme is that reparations would be giving in to the very racism it's supposed to be counteracting

Con gets off to a bad start with accusing pro of being emotional. Way too much time gets wasted on this. And pathos appeals are still appeals.

But we swiftly gets into how it could be done in a done racist manner by taxing everyone (that needs to be built out more)... This: "We have to build the base of the pyramid before we place the capstone, so to speak." with a couple sources added would have done it perfectly.

"You refuse to recognize that African Americans are still disadvantaged by the ripples of slavery" a link on generational wealth would have carried the day.

"I also think that unicorns should be created and Teddy Roosevelt should be brought back to life for another term." My favorite line of the debate. Teddy Roosevelt in particular (my favorite shirt brant is RSVLTS).

...

Both argued over who were the real slave owners... Either the very wealthy and evil elite, or the founding fathers and other very wealthy elites (plus every farm owner... which again, I keep saying give links because certain claims are pretty doubtful; slaves were expensive for starters). Con does well here near the end with the reminder of slavery laying the groundwork for this country: "as a third of the southern white population owned them and all of America got cheap goods from them"

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Could be a good debate. Might fall into a battle over semantics, but we'll see.

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Well he might make it illegal to not...

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@Best.Korea

Much better if they argue your certainly she would win, means the election was stolen! Just like in 2016! … And no, to the best of my knowledge Trump never admitted he could have been mistaken on that election being rigged.

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The question missing from the debate setup is is this a bet with wait and see, or a debate about probable outcomes as of November 4th?

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Them's fighting words!
/joke

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@Public-Choice

When I checked JustFactsDaily, they had some rant against "fact checkers," totally missing the irony. I probably should have bookmarked that.

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@Public-Choice

> I, personally, think that the immigrants who eat cats and dogs are not remotely close to a true representative sample of all immigrants.
It's not a representative sample of any known immigrants, at least those who exist outside of hallucinations suffered by a couple old men (assuming they're not just crying wolf in desperation for attention; which to me would still be unsound minds). The single case anyone could point to on it, was a US citizen who ate a cat (but she did have dark skin, so white supremacists love to claim that means illegal immigrant).

> I am the great-grandson of immigrants on my father's side.
Everyone who isn't an immigrant this generation, is descended from immigrants (arguably save for purebred natives).

> My real, honest, assessment of 2024 is that both prospects are not good. But Trump is diet fascism while Harris is full-blown fascism. I will take diet fascism over full-blown fascism any time.
Good take on it. I've been doing a lot of court stuff lately, and my research shows that judges and juries alike favor anyone who starts from a more middle ground (Johnny Depp's trial for example, he outright admitted to abusing alcohol and such, which not trying to come off as perfect made him believable).
FYI, I don't live in a swing state, so on presidential elections I will always vote third party as a vote of no confidence for the main two.

> The Trump of 2016 was about deregulation, lower taxes, and more individual bodily autonomy.
I'd disagree on the bodily autonomy part...

> The Trump of 2024 is not about many of these same things. And with his handling of COVID, the only reason he has my vote is because he said he would never do it again.
Covid was a shit sandwich, and still is. But I do not blame Trump for an international pandemic (the big blunders on it were usually local politicians, thinking about re-election rather than the wellbeing of their people).

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@Best.Korea
@Americandebater24
@Math_Enthusiast

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>Reported Vote: Best.Korea // Mod action: Not Removed
>Voting Policy: info.debateart.com/terms-of-service/voting-policy
>Points Awarded: 1 to con
>Reason for Decision: See Votes Tab.
>Reason for Mod Action:

This vote was not reviewed until after the debate window had closed, at which point it is impossible to remove.

Handling the unusualness of a video reply (without such being pre-agreed), is an area of voter discretion. It is however unfortunate that no voter weighted the arguments.
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@Public-Choice
@Moozer325

Note: As an immigrant (no one likes being accused of eating dogs and cats), I am too biased to fairly assign points... But I can give some feedback.

On the setup I would suggest have a more direct comparison with shared BoP. Trump > Harris vs Harris > Trump. This means if equal (or near equal) voters should leave it a tie (not that they're likely to on such heated matters).

Government Education:
"The Education system in America has consistently been on the decline since 1776" that instantly seems too broad to support. Like did we even have public schools back then? That I wonder this, speaks of biting off more than you can chew (or at least that the voter can chew), it's akin to breaking the suspension of disbelief. And the article does not speak of 1776, which ruins this from the onset...
Con's reply got to the heart of the matter that language subtly shifts, and while pro is right that we would have trouble understanding GW, he would not understand "skibidi," so this shift is non-indicative of anything other than a shift has occurred.
AFTERTHOUGHT: Trump has already been president, if he was going to have an impact in making education better than 1776, shouldn't that have already occurred? Or did it continue to get worse by the stated standard?

Price Controls:
Con catches that Trump and Harris are agreed on the need for it.

Economic Policy:
Con shows tariffs under Trump lead to inflation.
Pro does well defending that tariffs can be useful according to non-partisan economists.

Honesty:
I have really mixed feelings about this point even being brought up...
The best of this was just pro pointing out that Trump claims to shit gold (sorry, greatest economy ever, nothing went wrong, not even covid). It intuitively undermines any claim of success on any of his measures (but it's not Trump claiming them in the debate, it's pro presenting evidence to support points... instantly making him far superior than Trump by many standards).
Con shits the bed in his response, echoing many mentally stunted individuals who will not shut up about "what about Bill Clinton?" Once you start addressing Biden bad to prove anything about Harris, you've lost the audience. And this is while I wholly agree that the WP sucks donkey dick... The Justfactsdaily website is is course not the best because of their deranged commentary about off topic subjects (fact checking is bad, how dare anyone fact check, oh and here's a graph showing us fact checking... PolitiFact shows itself to be massively superior with a dry take on matters, and various times catching Harris and her team in blunders (less than the other side, but when it happens they seem to report it)).

Healthcare:
A good point raised by con that Trump harmed healthcare, but it would have been improved with showing what Harris' plans for healthcare are.
Pro is able to well defend this by showing harms to poorly implemented government plans.

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I can already tell that were I voting, I'd end up leaving sources a tie. Both have some poor sources and some good ones; it's in an area where I'd say both have done their due diligence, with neither is showing true comparative excellence.

Arguments would inevitably go to whomever can stay on topic longer.. But this is without knowing of any interesting contentions raised after those initially listed.

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@Public-Choice
@Moozer325
@Owen_T

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>Reported Vote: Owen_T // Mod action: Not Removed
>Voting Policy: info.debateart.com/terms-of-service/voting-policy
>Points Awarded: 5 to con
>Reason for Decision: See Votes Tab.
>Reason for Mod Action:

The vote was found to be sufficient per the site voting policy standards.

Special Rules in the description are not strictly enforced by moderation, but a voter may (and unless Kritiked in the debate, usually should) choose to abide. If doing so, that there are such rules should be explicitly stated to opt for alternative moderation.

note: Additionally that setup has plenty of leeway. One cannot argue that Art is a better clown than Homie, without referencing Homie for comparison (likely to include his shortcomings); to do otherwise would make the argument for Art somewhat non-sequitur (similarly you could argue he's a better cook than Bob, but without knowing if Bob is a good or bad cook it's indeterminant).
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@Americandebater24
@Savant
@CatholicApologetics

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>Reported Vote: Savant // Mod action: Not Removed
>Voting Policy: info.debateart.com/terms-of-service/voting-policy
>Points Awarded: three to pro
>Reason for Decision: See Votes Tab.
>Reason for Mod Action:

The vote was found to be sufficient per the site voting policy standards.
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@AnonYmous_Icon

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>Reported Vote: AnonYmous_Icon // Mod action: Not Removed
>Voting Policy: info.debateart.com/terms-of-service/voting-policy
>Points Awarded: 1 to pro, 3 to con
>Reason for Decision: See Votes Tab.
>Reason for Mod Action:

The vote cannot be removed as the voting period has ended. The vote also did not effect the outcome out the debate (otherwise I would have procrastinated far less).

What about the pathos was better and worse would vastly improve the vote. Please do review the voting standards before voting again. That said, the vote by doing a mixed allotment to both sides implies the absence (or at least minimalistic amount) of bias.
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@WyIted

Well said.

I suspect it will be argued 1 therefore 2, which is the angle I’d personally attack since I can’t even imagine how someone would prove that negative…

People do body mods for self confidence all the time. Proving that it’s a sickness AND not an identity issue (regardless of if it’s caused by a sickness), seems neigh impossible.

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@Ferbalot

Thank you for the invite, but I’m trying not to engage in any formal debates at least until I’ve got a certain project off the ground.

Anyways I was criticizing “A Fetus is a human being, Murder is wrong, therefore abortion is wrong”

It’s a bad non-sequitur. Might as well say “I like vanilla ice cream, therefore abortion is wrong.”

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I think my cat could out logic this setup. Namely by killing something and feeling no remorse, ergo either not murder or murder is not automatically wrong.

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This could be very interesting.

It is without a doubt an uphill battle, since slavery is horrible is firmly the status quo.

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@Best.Korea
@Americandebater24

If you’d both like, I can delete this debate.

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@addvocate

Your fundamental weakness is lack of sources. When the other side has some well laid out evidence, bringing your own is highly beneficial.

More or less, right now you’re saying “this is my opinion” for which you want to add on “and these experts agree.”

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@gugigor

To get into Grad School, I needed my undergraduate grades to average out to about that.

The downside I see, is that if 90% was the passing standard, it would not allow flexibility of having a mediocre performance at any one class canceled out by higher ones. Also with that in mind, an angry teacher would have more power.

There are of course advantages in pushing people to do better.

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@Yesterdaystomorrow

It was a TV show about AI's controlling people.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Person_of_Interest_(TV_series)

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Person of Interest did a really cool analysis of this.

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@Americandebater24

“ It is unfortunate that I must only give a better legibility vote for Pro because the topic itself is highly subjective and thus I cannot give either side the better argument vote.”

Legibility needs to be explained. Like what in con’s case made reading it difficult?

I have no disagreement with that argument allotment. While it could be expanded, not awarding arguments has a much lower burden of explanation.

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@Americandebater24
@Owen_T
@CatholicApologetics

Owen_T your vote has been taken down for insufficient explanation of sources… There needs to not just be quantity, but something notable about how they were leveraged to bolster at least one contention.

Arguments could also do with more detail. Like what’s a contention pro excelled at? And (I haven’t read the debate, so I could be missing a big area of discussion) it seems odd on a debate about comparable probabilities, to agree that something is impossible, but then wholly dismiss that as missing the point of the debate.

Conduct would not have been warranted for annoyance with a flawed argument tactic. However it is something quite valid against arguments (not referring to this specific debate).

And in general every point other than arguments shouldn’t be for mild tipping of the scales, but for comparable excellence. I’ll even advise to consider winning arguments to make it a slightly higher burden to get any additional points on top of that.

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Owen_T
09.07.2024 08:44PM

Reason:
I'm an agnostic, and I agree with Con, but CatholicApologetics knows his stuff.
Starting with arguments:
Pro presented a strong case, and backing it up with quite a few sources. And then there is Con, who's arguments did not make sense to me.
For example, the resurrection is medically impossible. Well yeah of course it is. That's literally the whole point.
He then goes on to argue the apostles being martyred means nothing, even though they knew the objective truth, as Pro pointed out.
These are just two examples, but there are more things like this.
As mentioned before, Pro used many sources to back up all of his arguments. Con didn't do a bad job with sources, Pro was just better.
I was tempted to give Pro the conduct point to, as Con kept bringing up arguments that had already been well debunked, and that makes me livid when it happens to me.

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@Swisse

Good catch!

The main problems I suspect people will throw at you are morals of indentured servitude, retirement, and the creation of much needless busy work.

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I make that argument regarding their leadership, but when applied to the broad category it doesn't hold water.

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@Trent0405
@Americandebater24
@Owen_T

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>Reported Vote: Trent0405 // Mod action: Not Removed
>Voting Policy: info.debateart.com/terms-of-service/voting-policy
>Points Awarded: conduct to con
>Reason for Decision: See Votes Tab.
>Reason for Mod Action:

The vote was found to be sufficient per the site voting policy standards.

Arguments must always be reviewed even if left a tie (in which case less detail is required, but some reason for said tie based on the debate content must still be comprehensible within the vote).

While the voter did not cover every issue, they indeed covered the meat and potatoes. Leaving the meat and potatoes a tie based on their analysis is fine.

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🤯 🤯🤯

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Curious to see what crazy take is used on this one...

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I do get more use out of my lap than my computer. ;)

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FYI, the outcome of debates like this get very subjective to emotions.

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I’ll have to come back to this when I'm more focused.

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Since the voting period is over, there's no risk of influencing any decisions. A couple thoughts...

The shit those politicians get up to is fucking weird! I was initially just making fun of them a little as a fun side-note to the debate, but then pro took major offense at me calling misogynistic cultists “misogynistic cultists,” so I treated it as an exploitable weakness concerning the 14th Amendment... I believe in isolation the kritiks here would have carried the day, but in this over-sized debate they got lost under so much other debris.

I generally will advise for any debate when key players are attacked on ethical grounds, to just briefly acknowledge it then dismiss it as scope creep. As a couple voters pointed out, what ought to be doesn't define what is. The constitution can be corrupted and unfortunately still be the constitution.
Letting me poison the well so much, risks the audience letting their disdain for a serial rapist (sorry, serial /attempted/ rapist) influence their opinion of Kavanaugh's performance as a justice and in turn not want to agree that he had any power. Oh and Todd Akins, you can literally endure yourself to the audience with something like “Yes yes, he was a piece of shit… Thank jove he’s dead… But him having been dead for awhile now, means he probably didn’t get to serve as mentor to those brand new justices.” Which in turn would splash mud back in my face by showing low relevance to one of my chosen weapons.

The tanned eunuchs was a micro-point about hypocrisy, but mainly just there to entertain. They were planned for a final joke at the end concerning what type of livestock occasionally bit their dicks off… I think I was going to imply donkeys at gloryholes, and add as if to redeem them that they aren't such asses as to think it was people being forced to perform.

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@Americandebater24
@WyIted

Pro's R2 was missing sound. So effectively a missed round.

Con's didn't have anything new to respond to, and ended up feeling a bit forced. That said, there is merit to letting the police handle the matter... I do feel here that the generated voice couldn't handle this properly, as the material was so ripe for jokes at Germany's history which it would not have been able to carry.

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@Casey_Risk

Thanks for voting!

> Con, for whatever reason, brings up the Dobbs decision
It was already brought up with mention of repelling Roe v. Wade. But yes, my tactic there was largely to invalidate the appeal to authority with both a greater appeal to authority and with ethos and logos appeals. In hindsight I do totally get yours and Wylted's point that it doesn't always matter what ought to be the case but purely what is. Plus, it let me tie in their great teacher Todd Akin, who is positively always fun to mock.

> Pro also points out the contradiction in saying that abortion was typically allowed before the quickening, but also that many enslaved women were forced to remain pregnant.
I admit I still tilt my head in confusion at this. I do believe it's self evident that different classes of people exist, plus I thought I proved pretty well that they were not all black slaves being raped and forced to give birth to increase the number of chattel, and that 13th amendment raised those who were mistreated to that degree to the level of those who were (most often) mistreated far less.

> I feel like this point goes to Pro.
No objection there. I actually considered ignoring everything pro said in R1 and just going into the 13th, but thought that would be disrespectful to the work he put in; as you concluded, not all points need to be won.

> He tries to make a separation between institutional slavery and sex slavery,
IMO some commentary from the authors of intent of the 13th could have carried this (particularly since those guys were men of their time, and while not all evil, I doubt any were feminist). As is, at least to me it fell closer to renaming slaves "Peons" or "Student Athletes" rather than actually not slaves.

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If either of you set your voice to that annoying AI woman, I will vote against you automatically... Well, at least on legibility.

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@whiteflame

Thank you for voting.

> simply stating that the current Supreme Court establishes it as unconstitutional.
That was why I attacked Trump's appointees so much, to bring into question if their decisions are valid.

> I think Pro got too hung up on points regarding tradition and custom as rights
I also got hung up there. When undermining the 14th Amendment, one of Trump's "Justices" has repeatedly made the declaration that that nothing can be a right unless it was first a tradition. I find that mentality to be quite ill informed to say the least, but from it I could make a few implicit arguments, such as if that's valid they're coming for your guns next.

> abortion either is an issue left up to the states by the Constitution or it isn’t.
Wholly agreed. That something has completely failed, doesn't mean it is not the law. I argued the aughts because it's a powerful appeal along all three of ethos, pathos, and logos (this one the weakest). Much of it is fallacious, but still undeniably stirring appeals.

> I don’t believe that either definition is mutually exclusive from the other
I agree. Inside a debate I can argue in black and white terms to talk smack about someone moving the very goalposts they had set, but definitions are generally holistic.

> and simply calling Con’s definition “subjective” and “made-up” isn’t enough to dismiss it entirely.
Wasn't actually my definition.

> I think Pro had an opportunity here to accept this and argue that women having this constitutional right as slaves who were subjected to rape and torture is a pretty distinct scenario from women today...
I'd like to think that would have been the path I would have argued were I on the other side. But yes, outside of the debate I'll wholly agree that women being turned into a type of slave by the states today, only somewhat compares to women as literal slaves their whole lives back then. A big one toward that would be something I pointed out inside the debate, that laws were passed to force children of slaves to themselves be slaves; that was the type of slavery the 13th abolished; even if a woman is a slave for 9 months, her children are not, so right there it's notably different.

> there’s too much distracting information in this debate
Guilty. I did not mean for there to be as much. But it got loaded, then overloaded.

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@Americandebater24

Nice R1.

Glad to see I wasn't the only one thinking of the mistake in the trolly problem (inaction =/= murder; even while option of murder /may/ be better justified than said inaction).

The problem of other countries fearing the same, was also a good point, but it probably should have been expanded upon. It brings my mind to the problem after someone kills baby Hitler, in that their future is gone, so they're just a madman who butchered a baby for some quasi-religious belief that the baby as evil.

If you haven't already, you should read That Hideous Strength by C.S. Lewis, and if in the mood for something lighthearted which deals with one in a million chances, Guards! Guards! by Sir Terry Pratchett.

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Love the trolly problem, and look forward to cons rebuttals
https://youtu.be/DtRhrfhP5b4?si=5MTTyV2R0FUIl8jE

If doing more math in videos, I suggest Excel (or Google Sheets).

I’d also be curious as to the basic assumptions for that population total.

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@Americandebater24
@WyIted

Arguments for consideration ought to be placed within the arguments tab.

As a voter, I am not convinced of not high IQ by performance in another debate. So the mostly meaningless conduct point will not be assigned for a that.

As a debater, I well understand the tactic of identifying a weakness and pressing it (such as in the other debate mentioned, calling a serial /attempted/ rapist a rapist and other such slights).

As a moderator Inhavent finished that video and have to get back to work.

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@CatholicApologetics

What was your opinion of the Thomas Jefferson argument?

To improve it in future, I'd be good to know your thoughts on why it failed at the onset and/or how it was refuted.

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But Pontius Pilote did not exist, so how can there be a devil and his talking cat walking around Moscow?!

I’m referring to The Master and Margarita

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The title of this debate reminds me of a kritik I did on the rationality of belief in God. If memory serves, I argued for the less controversial figure of Santa Clause... Of course it's rational to believe in Santa, all the other kids do, your parents are telling you he's where the presents come from (and they do come... also whatever crimes you did are fine because you're still on the all-knowing nice list).

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