Resolved: Blackmail should be legalized

In Contention 1, I explained that the two components of blackmail, asking another for money for silence/proposing a non-disclosure agreement and revealing embarassing information are legal. He responds by contending that extortion is a part of blackmail and that blackmail should be illegal because it is coercive. I have two responses. First, blackmail is distinct from extortion because extortion definitionally involves a threat to carry out some sort of illegal action. As Professor Walter Block of the University of Central Arkansas explains, "Extortion is the demand for money or other valuable consideration, coupled with the threat to do something which both is and should be illegal. For example, 'Give me X of your money or I will kidnap your children' . . . In very sharp contrast, blackmail is the demand for money or other valuable consideration coupled with the threat do something which both is and should be legal. " (Same source as in the first round. ) As I established in my first speech and as my opponent concedes, it is absolutely legal to reveal embarrasing or damaging information about another person to the public. This means that blackmail is not equivalent to extortion because the end result of the threat is to do something that is completely legal to do in the first place, while the end threat of extortion is to do something that is absolutely illegal. My second response is that coercive mechanisms are not inherently illegal and are permissible in our society. When a teacher commands a student to work hard if he does not wish to earn a poor grade in her class, she is using a coercive mechanism to elicit proper behavior. When drug companies charge excessive amounts of money on chemotherapy drugs that people are forced to purchase when they obtain cancer, the companies are using coercive methods to earn as much money as possible. Just because the act is coercive, however, does not mean that it should be inherently banned. Rather, we must regulate it as much as possible. The impact of this argument ties into my contention 2 because I am providing for better regulation of blackmail through the creation of contracts, which is something that he is not doing by keeping blackmail illegal. The second contention was largely unanswered; the only response that he makes is that an individual could approach someone with false information. First, this is nonresponsive because contracts could still occur in this situation. If I do not wish someone to reveal false information, I could potentially make a regulated contract with them anyways. The fact that the information may be false is immaterial to my ability to make government-enforced contracts with that individual. Second, however, the actions that my opponent is proposing are illegal due to laws against libel and slander. "In common law jurisdictions, slander refers to a malicious, false,[2][not specific enough to verify] and defamatory spoken statement or report, while libel refers to any other form of communication such as written words or images. [3] Most jurisdictions allow legal actions, civil and/or criminal, to deter various kinds of defamation and retaliate against groundless criticism" (Source: . http://en.wikipedia.org...;). What my opponent is proposing, then falls under the realm of extortion rather than blackmail because propogating false, damaging information with malicious intent falls under the bounds of slander, which is illegal. This means that these actions would still be prohibited in a world in which blackmail was legalized. My opponent's third point is that the blackmailer could ask for something that the blackmailee does not have. This, however, is not illegal. If the store asks for more money for a t. v. than I am willing to pay, it has not committed an illegal action. This also does not negate the second contention because this could be resolved in the contract-making process.