In the United States, juveniles charged with violent felonies ought to be treated as adult

My opponent has expressed concern over the pro argument's usage of the word "I". Well that is a correct observation, but it does not viably have anything to do with discrediting my argument, as she has not been able to prove that my personal feelings have caused false information to be presented; let it also be observed that she has used the word "I" as well, However, because my opponent finds "I" as a distraction (the intention is for the negative position to be able to debate fairly), and a discrediting one at that, out of courtesy, for the duration of this round, the positive position will cease to mention the word "I" after this paragraph, but other personal pronouns will still be mentioned. My opponent addresses the IQ tests, saying they "could be bias(ed)", but she fails to say against which group they would be biased. She also points out that they test basic knowledge, which really has no weight in arguing for her side. Assuming that she meant IQ test bias would result in less people being able to pass them, this would actually help juveniles in their sentencing and trials to receive lesser sentences. The statistic about IQ tests changing every year is actually a good thing, because it keeps them updated; the world is not the same as it was last year, five years ago, ten years ago, fifteen years ago, and so on. The negative argument misunderstands Schizophrenia, or at least my point about it, because a Schizophrenic can change, under medication, although the disease itself will never be gone. This does not mean that the Schizophrenic or other adults cannot be productive members of society later in life just as juveniles have the same potential. Juveniles' specific individualized mental and potential recovery traits are still available for evaluation in the adult court system. It has been argued by the con that authority figures, environment, and psychological standpoint, should all be taken into account (at least it appears that's what she meant; please correct me if it was a mistaken assumption). There is nothing to prevent any of this from happening in the adult trials, and therefore renders the argument that juveniles should be able to have these things considered during their trials useless. As for the "'only the best for the children' rule" The con's argument that it is against the law to prosecute a juvenile for certain violent felonies is extremely irrelevant, and completely misinterprets the topic that she herself posted, because the law cannot be used to justify a reason not to change the same law; it just makes no sense. Also, my opponent has failed to counter my argument that keeping a system or a popular way of thinking in place is not always the moral thing to do, as we have learned through various examples: slavery, white supremacy, male supremacy, Phrenology, and so on which further invalidates her argument. It is like saying that it is wrong for something to be legal because it is illegal, and uses circular reasoning; now, there could be reasons for something to be illegal but the mere condition of something being illegal does not always make it wrong. My opponent's comment about mentally disabled people shows her misapprehension of the topic, as mentally disabled people do commit crimes, and are part of a the criminal justice system. Mentally disabled people come in all ages. There is no intelligence test to qualify as an adult, therefore a mentally disabled person who is say 47 with the comprehension of a five year old is still an adult. Some of my opponents' statements seem to indicate that she is agreeing with me because she is starting to point out intelligence vs. age. Her statement about mentally disabled people demonstrates that she was not thinking of them as in the category of adults for the purposes of this debate. The last comment that is made in the negative is also inapplicable to the negative position of this debate because adult courts do not take away the ability to evaluate intelligence levels or the ability to evaluate whether the defendant knows right from wrong. The con has also failed to counter many of my arguments, including one of the most important where it is addressed that the con argument has an underlying value of ageism. She does not move to say that her position does not support ageism, and she does not defend ageism; she must do one of these in order to counter my argument. Because of the absence of her responses to some of my most arguments, you can extend me all the way to win the round, and vote negative. http://www.wisegeek.com... http://kucampus.kaplan.edu... http://www.webmd.com... http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu...