Bestiality should be illegal

CONTENTION 1: Bestiality should be illegal because humans tend to have an undue influence over animals. Overview Unable to refute the substance of my arguments, CON shifts to attempting to refute them syllogistically. In doing so, he ignores the entirety of my previous two rounds. This can be seen in questions like “what makes influence undue and what does that have to do with the proper legality of sex? ” As my definition in R1 showed, undue influence is “such influence as prevents a person from exercising his own will and substitutes in its place the will of another. ”. The existence of such influence is the justification for statutory rape laws regarding children. Humans wield an even greater degree of undue influence over animals than they do children. We have statutory rape laws in place with good reason. The idea of consent is not so simple as a “yes. " We presume children cannot consent because we know how easy it is for adults to say “yes” regardless of whether the answer reflects their will. The Sanduskys of the world have demonstrated such time and time again. Animals are even easier to control and one can engage in all sorts of abusive behaviors with them without law enforcement agents being any the wiser. 1.1.1. See overview 1.1.2. Strawman fallacy. (1) Adults have dominion over children. (2) Therefore adults can unduly influence children into saying “yes” to having sex with adults. (3) Consent to sex brought about through undue influence is not true consent. (4) Therefore we should presume that children cannot consent to sex with adults. 1.1.3. CON has done nothing to challenge the major premise. 1.2.1 Nope, CON isn’t challenging anything. If he were, he would have addressed the explanations of statutory rape I’ve put forward in the very paragraph he’s quoting from (as well as throughout R1). 1.2.2 Again, CON simply hasn’t reviewed my arguments. I’ve discussed the reason we make this presumption about children. The same reasoning can be applied to animals since animals are even more susceptible to undue influence. CON appears to agree that people shouldn’t be able to rape animals. His problem is that he thinks consent is simply fave-value agreement. 1.2.3 CON had his opportunity to make an affirmative argument in both of his previous rounds. If he makes one in the next round, disregard it. 1.2.4. CON goes back and forth with himself on a tangent, concluding that my reasoning is circular because I claim that we should presume that animals cannot consent. The problem is that he disregards the basis of this presumption. First, humans have dominion over animals. CON could post all the silly dog humping videos in the world, but none of that changes the fact that pets can and are made to do just about anything their masters tell them to do, whether it be out of reward or punishment mentality. Second, there’s consent at face value and then there’s true consent. Given the relationship between pets and their monsters, most of their behaviors aren’t actually consensual. What CON is telling you is that Sandusky didn’t rape those little boys and that the law was wrong to presume he did. That because the little boys didn’t resist during any of these acts, it was ‘consensual’ and we are to accept that. There’s more to the idea of consent than a simple “yes” or “no” or even a lack of resistance. If someone can unduly influence you into having sex, that’s not truly consent, hence the presumption numerous societies have adopted. 1.2.5. [No Space]. 1.2.7. [No Space] CONTENTION 2: Bestiality is dangerous to human society 2.1. Irrelevant (see R2 explanation). 2.2.1 Also irrelevant. Making laws from the standpoint of public policy (i. e. health concerns) does not require that every single instance of X be detrimental to society. Every single instance of going past 70 mph is not detrimental to society, but we nonetheless have laws saying that one cannot exceed 70 mph on certain roads. 2.2.2. CON’s argument is non-sequitur. He assumes that because penal cancer is common in Brazil, that the research I provided is false. This completely disregards the research’s findings however. The fact remains that subjects engaging in animal sex were 42% more likely than other groups to get penal cancer. The fact that there are other ways to get penal cancer in Brazil is immaterial to the research’s findings. He repeats his ad hoc argument regarding Denmark, this time asserting that “if bestiality caused penile cancer it would be higher in Denmark. ” Higher compared to what? CON’s argument is based on unsupported assumptions (i. e. that Denmark’s cancer rate was about the same before bestiality was legalized, that there isn’t a social stigma against bestiality in Denmark, etc). I couldn’t agree more with CON when he tells us that bestiality is a risk factor as opposed to the cause of penile cancer in Brazil just as I’d agree with many that speeding and drunk driving are risk factors as opposed to the causes for vehicular homicide (killing somebody with a car). 2.2.3. CON appears desperate to find a connection between homosexuality and bestiality. As I pointed out in the last round, there’s no comparison. If two human males are having anal sex, chances are, the dominant partner has the sense to clean himself, use a condom and stop if the condom tears or if the submissive partner is in pain. CON is pretty much using sophistry and asking you to disregard common sense by comparing human sex with animal sex. I don’t tolerate any of the disgusting behaviors my dog engages in, but him being a dog, he’s disgusting by nature. He’s going to do something disgusting no matter how many precautions to prevent this. 2.3. If CON agrees that zoonoses can be contagious, then there’s nothing to discuss here. 2.4. Animal meats are well regulated and people tend to clean their faces after their dogs lick. Animal semen pumped into orfices is a different matter entirely. 2.5. No proof of a right to animal sex. 2.6. Just because people already find an activity repulsive/reprehensible doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be a law against said activity. Murder and thievery are good examples of barred activities that society is already strongly against.