Secular Society Amounts to Statism

Thanks, Pro. As I noted in the comments section, I missed my opponent's disclaimer that R1 was for acceptance only (I thought that his R1 contained arguments, so I responded). While I accept my first round being "disregarded," what I posted there can actually be extended to refute his arguments from R2. Rather than copying and pasting them, I will refer the audience back to the previous round to see my rebuttal to his contentions for the sake of brevity. I don't think the audience would appreciate me copying and pasting the entire round if they've already read it, but please extend all of those arguments as that entire round successfully refutes all of Pro's claims from R2. I expect that my opponent will accept the extension of the previous round as my R2 rebuttal, and will respond accordingly in his final round. His first argument was that rights must be derived from a Creator a.k.a. God. Please extend the first paragraph of arguments from my last round, specifically, in which I explained that rights are not necessarily derived from God and why. Also keep in mind that Pro merely references the U.S. Declaration of Independence as a point of reference, but surely the ideas of our Founding Fathers cannot speak for how every culture interprets "rights." In fact, while Pro posits the Creator as the source of our inalienable rights, neither the word "God" nor the word "Creator" appears in the Constitution. Charles Bogle writes, "The clear intent of the Constitution is confirmed by the writings of the two Founding Fathers who were most responsible for establishing the rationale for separation of church and state, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. Jefferson, a Deist who favored a federal government with limited powers, and Madison, a Christian and Federalist, wrote passionately and convincingly from the Enlightenment point of view that human rights are determined by secular, natural laws, and not by any god or religion" [1]. I also explained in the last round that secular states including the U.S. already exist, and why that is acceptable and even preferable in terms of governance (as it avoids religious oppression). Pro writes, "For there to be order in society, enough to ensure the complete removal of God from all government and practice, there must be a potent authority for man to answer to." The second, third and fourth paragraphs of my last round refute this notion. A government does not have to hold a tyrannical monopoly on force and aggression (State) in order to function. Proof are the examples of non-Statist government acting agencies throughout history [2]. Pro's argument essentially boils down to the idea that in order to have a moral authority, you need to reference either God or the State. However, in the last round I explained that this is not true; people derive their moral authority from all different avenues, including secular. Secular humanists are one example [3]. Pro continues, "As we have learned from history, as well as theory, totalitarianism starts with control - namely control over religious beliefs. And as we all know, the removal of religion from all government practice is a property of secularism. Totalitarianism is a form of Statism. The USSR is a great example of this." The flaw in Pro's logic is that he equates the removal of religion from political governance as "control over religious beliefs." However, secularism aims to do the exact opposite. It aims to AVOID control over religious beliefs by not imposing the religious beliefs of some to dictate the laws that govern over the non-religious, or those who adhere to other faiths. While Pro provides the example of the U.S.S.R. as a secular State, in the last round I explained that there are many secular States that are not totalitarian including the U.S. Moreover, I explained how secular societies can and have existed that did not necessarily act as States (a monopoly on government within a given territory). [1] http://www.wsws.org...[2] http://en.wikipedia.org...[3] http://www.secularhumanism.org...