There should not be a mandatory seatbelt law

Alright, time to finish this. === 1. My opponent has interpreted my definition of freedom as 'Might makes right. ' This is a little bit inaccurate - I am simply stating that the freedoms a person has are related to their ability to do things. It doesn't necessarily make right. What I mean by this is that freedom is not inherently good or bad. My opponent's first point was that these laws take away freedom - I am simply saying "So what? That does not have any implications on its own. " Let me give an example that might be more easy to see with. Bob is a would-be murderer. He approaches a friend of his, venting his frustration: Bob: Bah! Anti-murder laws should not exist. Friend: Why's that? Bob: Because they take away my freedom to kill people. Do you see what Bob has just done? He is begging the question. These laws are supposed to take away freedom. For Bob's argument to be valid, he would first have to independently show that people should actually have the freedom to murder one another. You see, it is the same with this debate we are having now. With the other three points, we will find that either people should have the right to not wear a seatbelt without violating the law, or we will find that people should not have the freedom to not wear a seatbelt without violating the law. I believe I have sufficiently shown that this point has no significance of its own - whoever wins the rest of the debate wins this point. We can see another example of this begging the question in my opponent's third round: "What it comes down to is if the person stood up for what was right and died, or did the person die because they submitted to an unjust law? " This is assuming right away that the law is unjust, but that is pretty much exactly what we are debating. My opponent also brings up a quote I failed to address in a previous round: "A person is involved in an accident and they survive the crash . .. because they were not wearing a seat belt, then they must . .. be cited" This is technically true, but it doesn't mean anything in practice. While seatbelts are mandatory by law, police officers have the ability to enforce or not to enforce the law, depending on the circumstances. Further, the cop will not be able to know whether or not a person was wearing a seatbelt while actually driving. And further, I did address my opponent's above statement - it just wasn't as direct as he must have wanted. I stated that laws are NOT made so that every single thing will always be perfect, they are made so that OVERALL, society will benefit. Sure, there will be times when laws do not make sense, exceptions if you will. However, we keep these laws around because despite their flaws, they serve a useful purpose. In the case of seatbelt laws, they save lives. And lastly on this point, we have one more fallacious statement: "This is not supposed to be a socialist country, but rather a constitutional republic which protects individual's (emphasis added) rights and freedoms. " Is it? My opponent certainly hasn't shown that it is, he's just assuming it is, because that lets him jump to his desired conclusion. === 2. I never said that revenue generation is not a consideration at all for seat belt laws. In fact, it is one of the reasons why seat belt laws should remain. To say that these laws should not exist requires an advocacy - it requires that someone change things - those someones would be state lawmakers in this case. These lawmakers not only want to protect their constituents, but they also want to ensure the strength of their government. Seat belt laws actually fulfill BOTH of these wants! Legislators have no substantial legitimate reason to get rid of these laws, thus the laws should remain. However, it is obvious that revenue generation is not the primary reason for seat belt laws. They are simply a positive secondary side effect thereof. This is evidenced by the fact that in most states, police cannot stop you solely for not wearing a seatbelt. This reduces the revenues a state can reap from the law, if they did want to harvest money from it. Also, remember that even with these restrictions, the law states that seatbelts are mandatory. === 3. My opponent points out that in one of my sources, the fine for adults who break the law is $10, while the fine for minors is $51.50. He assumes that this is because 'they' feel guilty enforcing it. First off, I'll point out that legislators make the law, and police officers enforce it. Police officers do not determine the fines, so the guilt they have enforcing it cannot possibly affect the fines. Let me conjure up a separate explanation: money is a bigger problem for minors than it is for adults. Paying a small fine like $50 isn't too bad for an adult with a good-paying job - the real incentive to wear a seatbelt for this age group comes from the trouble one must go through when given a citation. Further, minors are still forming their driving habits, so it is much more important to get them to wear seatbelts. My opponent also brings up a supposed Police Officer he knows who refuses to uphold the law. That is only a testament to the hidden flexibility of a mandatory seat belt law. Sure, the law might make it mandatory that seatbelts be worn, but cops don't have to enforce it all the time. In fact, if all cops were like my opponent's supposed acquaintance, then my opponent would have nothing to complain about. In fact, it accomplishes the same thing as his advocacy, removing the laws, except is saves us the trouble of actually removing the laws - therefore, it is a superior advocacy, assuming the goals my opponent seeks are worthwhile. My opponent then reveals the real reason he opposes seatbelt laws - a personal experience. My opponent was in an accident, and he didn't wear a seatbelt, and he walked away uninjured. My opponent must be making a very hasty generalization, I assume - to advocate that therefore seatbelts don't help increase safety overall. In fact, the facts bear me out on it - seatbelt-wearing people die half as often in crashes as non-seatbelt wearing people. I have already given the source for this, and it has not been contested. === 4. My opponent admits that it is impossible to know which type of accident you will be in. However, from this, he somehow concludes that each person should decide whether or not to wear a seatbelt. That makes little sense - if individuals have no information about which type of accident they might get into, they are quite unqualified to make that decision. Here is something we DO know, though. When we consider all accidents on average, wearing a seatbelt is half as likely to kill you as not wearing a seatbelt. This is not a statistic concerned with individual accidents, it is a comprehensive statistic including all accidents. Fortunately, we have a body that can make decisions on this same scope - the government. We know that overall, in all accidents, seatbelts increase safety. Therefore, on this same scope, we have each person wear a seatbelt. Let me give an example to make the point more clearly, before this is all over. Let us say that there are two different games in a casino. Game A has odds that will, on average, provide you with twice the winnings of Game B. It is optimal, therefore, to play Game A with all of your money, and not play Game B at all. You see, the Government is the one playing in this casino, and we are its money. Of course, unlike money, we are autonomous decision makers. However, even with autonomous decision-making money, it would be best to at least try to make your money go towards Game A rather than Game B. That is exactly what the government is doing. One last thing before I go: my opponent left me with a link to supposed statistics at the end of his R3. The link is a 404 - the page is not found - at least at the time of this writing.