2nc - Willmalson Vs. Halogen

Jordan Bakke 2NC – willmalson vs. Halogen

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Topicality..................................................................................................................................................2 Violation / “We meet”...........................................................................................................................................................2 Voters......................................................................................................................................................................................2

Criterion...................................................................................................................................................3 Will’s arguments....................................................................................................................................................................3 Reasons to prefer...................................................................................................................................................................3 Encouraged vs. discarded argumentation.............................................................................................................................3 His criterion vs. his prima facie burden................................................................................................................................4 Scientific education...............................................................................................................................................................4 Wasted time..........................................................................................................................................................................4

On-case.....................................................................................................................................................5 Not “on-case”........................................................................................................................................................................5 Detriment to academic benefit..............................................................................................................................................5 Advocacy encroachment.......................................................................................................................................................5 Me not backing out...............................................................................................................................................................6

Will’s “plan text”.....................................................................................................................................7

Jordan Bakke 2NC – willmalson vs. Halogen

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TOPICALITY Violation / “We meet” His only response is to define the word “should”, even though this has nothing to do with his case having nothing to do with the USFG’s environmental policy. Maybe I wasn’t clear enough? His case does nothing to stand resolved that the USFG is obligated to significantly reform its environmental policy. A sentence in the introduction saying he thinks they should reform their policy doesn’t cut it. The American Heritage Dictionary defines “resolved” as “to find a solution to; solve.” For example, a logical paradox can be “resolved” if someone shows how its contradictory elements don’t necessarily contradict each other. We’re talking about a very similar kind of “resolved” here – to “stand resolved” means to find a solution to a problem by significantly reforming the USFG’s environmental policy. Will gives no plan to reform any policies. He leaves the way to fulfill the obligation for reformation of environmental policy lost in mental space somewhere, and so he stands he’s not topical.

unresolved. Which means

Voters The organization of his 2AC topicality section requires much guesswork to figure out which responses he applies to which arguments, but I gather he tried to cop out of the voters by saying “in reality, I never said that” in response to my point about his prima facie burden. However, his reasoning behind this had nothing whatsoever to do with whether or not he needs to stand resolved: that the USFG should significantly reform its environmental policy. If anything, he agrees that he needs to stand resolved, since he puts forth the effort to try to prove that he does stand resolved. So, my point still stands – In order to win this round, Will must stand resolved: that the USFG should significantly reform its environmental policy. It’s pretty simple logic that if he doesn’t stand resolved, then he doesn’t win the round. Why must he stand resolved? Because he agrees that he does. With 900 words left, the 2AC was his chance to argue that topicality isn’t a voter. Don’t let him do that in the 1AR, or I’ll ask you to disregard it as a new argument in the rebuttals. I also add another voter: Under my criterion, no plan leaves him with nothing on which to vote. After you vote for my criterion, what happens next? Well, according to me, the only kind of position that can get an affirmative team an affirmative ballot is the type of the action following the word “should” in the resolution. That type of action is a significant reformation of the government’s environmental policy. Will’s type of action is a discursive battle, not a political reformation. So, under my criterion, Will doesn’t even have a position. That harms the education of debate similarly to how my lack of offense against his global warming statements detriments the educational opportunity of debate. So, under my criterion, vote negative to discourage him from discarding the educational opportunity of clashing positions.

Jordan Bakke 2NC – willmalson vs. Halogen

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CRITERION (Wow, I really want to rename this to “framework” now. lol)

Will’s arguments He included four cards saying that kritiks are delicious. My responses to all of them are: First, I like kritiks, too! In my criterion, one of us can win by convincing you that voting for the other guy would encourage a mindset or method of debating that’s damaging in real life. A debate about policies and one about language and philosophy can coexist in the same round. Variety is great for debate. I like rounds in which topicality, a kritik, a weird theory argument, a couple disadvantages, and a counterplan are all run. My criterion welcomes that type of debate. Shanahan and Buschke would approve if all rounds were like this, since in all of them, the philosophical and linguistic foundation of arguments is questioned. Second, Will’s authors talk about kritiks, not strictly about kritikal affirmatives. That’s according to him in CX. He tries to cross-apply their defense of kritiks to his criterion. But he can’t just cross-apply praise of kritiks (within policy rounds) to his type of “debate” that completely eliminates debate about policies. As Shanahan writes, “Kritiks are a part of contemporary “policy” debate.” He doesn’t write that kritiks should replace policy debate. Nor does he write that more time in policy rounds spent on kritiks is always necessarily better (until the entire round is a kritikal debate).

Reasons to prefer Encouraged vs. discarded argumentation “argumentation, because well, debate is arguing”? That’s it? He misses the point of my argument, which I’ll repeat in different words: Under my criterion, we have to argue to win; under his, we don’t. I completely agree that debate is arguing. Under my criterion, debaters are motivated to put forth the intellectual effort to argue because the ballot is the reward if they win arguments. Under his criterion, this isn’t even debate any more. All the ballot motivates us to do is to say something “enlightened”. It requires none of the clash that makes debate what it is. There’s nothing in his criterion about me needing to contradict his “advocacy”. Who cares if I agree? I’m just as enlightened as he is, and that’s all that matters, if you vote for whoever is most enlightened. I win here. Vote negative to preserve argumentation, since if we don’t have to win arguments to win the competition, then we’re in the wrong activity. We debate to make ourselves better communicators and researchers, but most importantly, to sharpen our logical and persuasive skills. The ballot is the motivation for people to improve their argumentation, but not under his criterion. Argumentation is an incredibly valuable skill. Even if in policy debate, we argue primarily about imaginary policies, we still develop the skills to use logic, to tell truth from propaganda, to convince people, etc. His “fiat is imaginary!” spiel overlooks the inherent benefit of sharpening our minds. We can do that when we debate “imaginary” policies. Furthermore, the argumentative process is used all the time (albeit in a ludicrously intellectually deprived manner) in real world (ZOMG!) decision making. In real life, you should think deeply and use plenty of logic when making decisions. You

Jordan Bakke 2NC – willmalson vs. Halogen

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should consider possibilities (even if they’re “imaginary”) before acting. You should get other people’s opinions and use critical thinking to compare opinions (i.e. argumentation). Policy debate prepares us to do that. On a minor note, I said in the 1NC that his criterion turns debate into a miniature research paper contest. I take that back, since I apparently added my own little assumption that his criterion requires us to support our statements. I was wrong, since in the first CX, he defined “enlightened” as “factually correct”. Since he seems to be fond of substituting words with definitions, let’s interpret his criterion: “you should vote for the team that provides the most factually correct discourse surrounding climate change”. Not the team who provides the highest quality research. His criterion vs. his prima facie burden Cross-apply my topicality responses like he just did, since his only defense is that he’s topical, rather than that topicality doesn’t matter. You can’t vote for someone whose self-imposed prima facie burden and criterion contradict each other. Scientific education Cross-apply what I’ll say under “detriment to academic benefit”. The fact that I don’t need to lift a finger to research or to communicate the details of a position in order to win is why you vote against his criterion – unless you want to scare away 99% of judges and to let people get away with winning like I am without doing their research. Wasted time LOL. Being hung up on the “fiat is imaginary” mantra, he ignores the entirety of my argument. I guess I’ll just rehash and repeat it so it doesn’t look like I dropped it: Under his criterion, all we accomplish is wasting the opportunity for quality climatological research. An hour spent copy/pasting cards from briefs into a Scribd document and typing responses to an opponent on the internet accomplishes WAY less than an hour spent in a scientific research library reading climatology articles in peer-reviewed journals, taking notes, learning how climatology works, maybe even conversing with professional scientists, etc. I’m okay with choosing an argumentative policy debate over a library research day because it provides me with an opportunity (rigorous argumentation in a competitive setting) that I wouldn’t get by reading books in a library. His criterion eliminates argumentation, leaving nothing to the round but making factual statements about climate change. You should vote against his criterion because it encourages us to spend time hashing out our relatively little climatological knowledge for you, rather than learning what to say in the first place.

Jordan Bakke 2NC – willmalson vs. Halogen

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ON-CASE Not “on-case” lol Detriment to academic benefit What I’m doing detriments the potential academic benefit of this exercise. That’s exactly my point – I don’t need to be educational. This is what I can get away with if Will’s criterion requires nothing of me but to agree with the facts. I would have argued with him about climate change if his criterion required us to contradict each other. However, I’m not naïve enough to do that in this round, since he could just use the profoundness of my arguments to try to prove that education happens under his criterion. In a perfect world, every negative team would make the discussion interesting and educational. However, because the world isn’t perfect, you need a criterion that forces negative teams to provide factually supported arguments if they want to win. If he uses this criterion at tournaments, then negative teams will do this all the time. Not only would that bore 99% of judges to death and beyond, but it wouldn’t accomplish much in the way of environmental education. That’s why you can’t let him win with this criterion. Advocacy encroachment This is where one of us will win under Will’s criterion. I argue that his criterion allows me to agree with him; he argues that by agreeing with him, I agree with an affirmative ballot. Here’s why I win: First, his criterion has nothing to do with winning arguments. Agreement with Will about climate change equals support for an affirmative ballot? Says who? If all we have to do to win is provide enlightened discourse about climate change, then why do we HAVE to disagree? Cross-apply the reason of argumentation to prefer my criterion over his. His assumption that an affirmative ballot equals agreement with his advocacy is unfounded, as it 100% contradicts his criterion. If he changes the rules of debate, then he needs to play by those rules. (And if he decides he wants to play by my rules, that doesn’t work because he still doesn’t play by them, seeing as he has no plan to significantly reform the USFG’s environmental policy.) Second, agreeing with his facts is the best way for me to win. If the round is all about “real world benefits” and recognizing apocalyptic global warming as a fallacy, then why should I argue with that? Will basically prescribed the way to provide the most enlightened discourse surrounding climate change and to best impact the real world: recognize anthropogenic global warming as a fallacy, reject and undermine the idea of apocalyptic global warming, and prepare ourselves for the future. Yet he tries to turn the debate into a soapbox for battling propaganda and then expects me to play the role of a propaganda-spreading global warming alarmist. I’m not falling for that. Under his criterion, I just need to be enlightened. Under his “reformation”, in order to be enlightened, I need to join him in the battle against propaganda. I’ll gladly step up to the plate. Therefore, I’ve done all I need to do, and there’s no way you can fairly give me a loss.

Jordan Bakke 2NC – willmalson vs. Halogen

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I’m turning this whole advocacy encroachment thing into an independent reason to vote negative. The reason is as follows: Will doesn’t give me fair ground. The following doesn’t have much to do with his criterion itself, but rather, with how he tries to avoid the implications of his criterion. Notice what he does – he sets up the round so that whoever takes the moral and scientific high ground automatically wins, he takes that high ground, and then he criticizes me when I try to stand on that ground with him. He sets up the round (I don’t even call this a “debate” any more, FYI) so that I have no chance at winning. Not only is he hypocritical (since he doesn’t play by his own rules that he imposes via his criterion), but he makes this a one-sided activity that is neither fun nor motivating nor worth all these keystrokes. Vote negative to maintain debate’s status as an exciting, inspiring, and worthwhile competition. My form of debate, even though it requires people to contradict each other, still allows people to take whatever moral and scientific ground they want to claim. After all, a kritik can only appear as early as the 1NC, after the affirmative team has actually made it clear what they defend and how they communicate. In order to challenge a plan, the negative team doesn’t have to choose a moral stance that directly contradicts that of the affirmative (even though they’re more than welcome to do so). There are ALWAYS more ways than one to make a policy meet a given system of ethics agreed upon by both teams, and every single policy in the world has weaknesses that can be picked apart by the negative team without a complete moral aversion. On the level of policy debate, just being “enlightened” doesn’t cut it – you actually have to win arguments, even if you’re not as “enlightened” as your opponents because you can’t access all those cool academic databases and libraries. On the level of kritiks, there are a myriad of ways to pick apart the linguistics and morals of an opponent (while leaving other aspects of the case untouched), so we have liberty to argue what we want to argue. In my kind of debate, you can win even if you’re wrong, as long as you beat your opponents’ arguments. The power to win is within your mind, not locked up in a scholarly database. In his kind of “debate” (I still use that word reluctantly), in which he contradicts his own rules, the negative team has no chance once the affirmative team claims the facts on their side. I’m afraid you can’t vote for that. Me not backing out Don’t worry, I have no intention on backing out of the battle against propaganda. ;-)

Jordan Bakke 2NC – willmalson vs. Halogen

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WILL’S “PLAN TEXT” He’s trying to show how his “plan” fits under my criterion. My response is that His plan doesn’t equal a significant reformation of the USFG’s environmental policy. My criterion requires him to provide the type of the action following the word “should” in the resolution. That action is a significant reformation of the USFG’s environmental policy. His “plan” may be to galvanize a discursive battle against propaganda, but his “plan text” says nothing whatsoever about the USFG’s environmental policy. Therefore, under my criterion, he gives you nothing to vote for, and so you vote negative big time on topicality.