Beer, in moderation, is healthier for you than milk.

I must correct my opponent first of all, in that I did read his response. It was not specified in the first round as to how an average person is defined. In fact, the parameters he sets up are so strange that it becomes impossible to adapt them in any manner of coherency. I will illustrate the importance of this later. I will start my response by saying that my opponent's failure is not in his presentation of data (which I believe to be faulty anyhow), but in his very resolution. My opponent was simply wrong when he said that I am excluded from the realm of "average healthy person". In fact, I believe there are huge, blatant errors in his classification of an "average" person to begin with. What my opponent lists as exceptions in proper detail are the following: 1. Pregnant women 2. Diabetics 3. People on prescription medication 4. People who drive or operate heavy machinery. The percentage of pregnant women in the population is not negligible, but still a small percentage. However, my opponent's key argument about the "Average" person seems to conflict heavily with his resolution statement. A. My opponent's restriction on people who drive. . http://wiki.answers.com... The number of people who drive in America is roughly 30 million, an extraordinarily conservative calculation based on the following facts derived from my source: 1. There are roughly 60 million registered cars 2. There are roughly 2 cars to each person This does not include cars which are functional and unregistered, or people who share cars/rent cars. As such, the most conservative would be 30 million out of 300 million or roughly 10% of the population. If my opponent is excluding drivers from his definition of an "Average" person, what will he restrict next? People who eat hamburgers? People who watch baseball? B. Another exception that my opponent lists are diabetics. There are currently 24 million diabetics in this country and not a single one of them is "average" according to my opponent. Diabetes is one of the most prevalent medical conditions today, affecting over 8% of all Americans. While this number may seem insignificant, please consider how many people in a room of 100 will suffer dire consequences from what my opponent proposes. C. And finally, a whopping 44% of Americans are taking at least one prescription medication, and 17% are taking at least three at once. . http://www.medscape.com... A key factoid for any Pharmacy student or medical student in general is the knowledge that alcohol interacts negatively with most if not all prescription medication. The physiology is complicated to explain, but generally speaking, both alcohol and prescription medications are processed by the liver, and simultaneous processing can lead to disastrous results. Alcohol in moderate amounts may have a slightly positive effect on blood pressure if taken over time and regularly, but when combined with blood pressure medications they can have terrible side effects, amplifying the effects of blood pressure medications. Since most blood pressure medications work throughout the day, and since alcohol has a much shorter cycle, it can have unpredictable effects on people taking those medications. Cholesterol lowering drugs, statins, interact violently with alcohol, with many being completely contraindicated since it could lead to liver toxicity and death. . http://askville.amazon.com... Both Cholesterol and Blood pressure medications make up the vast majority of prescription drugs in America. It is absurd not to categorize them as "average". How then, can my opponent continue to speak about beer being healthy for the average person, when he clearly has no idea what the average person is, and when he is heavily restricting massive amounts of people who for all intents and purposes make up the statistically average US citizen? In addition to those issues, my opponent also has poor justification for classifying me outside the realm of "average". It would be acceptable for him to say that my allergy to alcohol is rare, but it should not discount me from his population. It would be more extraordinary for a person to not have any allergies at all than to react badly to alcohol. There should be no question that I am both an average person and healthy, because I am. It just so happens that I have a sensitivity to alcohol. Though not exactly an allergy, my hypersensitivity to alcohol stems from the "Asian Curse", a lack of the enzyme Alcohol dehydrogenase that breaks ethanol down into acetic acid. The lack of this enzyme causes the toxic intermediate acetaldehyde to build up in larger concentrations for people like myself, leading to terrible side effects and exaggerated effects of alcohol consumption in shorter lengths of time. . http://en.wikipedia.org... Half of the Asian population is categorized as having this sensitivity, thus, amongst my fellow Asians, I am average. Let us also not forget that China itself has 1/6 of the world's population, and I am not counting Japan, Korea, Thailand, Vietnam, etc. Simply put, my opponent's assertion that this particular sensitivity means I am not average, is unjustified and a bit absurd. In fact, his entire argument around designating an "average" person is absurd. Not only is he restricting a massive number of "average" Americans (Americans who would be greatly harmed by beer as opposed to milk) from his resolution, but he also inexplicably wishes the audience to believe that the presence of an ethic trait is enough to categorize a person as abnormal. Even setting this aside, my opponent (despite what he as said previously) made no mention in this debate as to what he meant by "you". When people say "hey you! " in a conversation between the two of us, I assume he is referring to me. Thus, since this word "you" is used both in the resolution and my opponent's extended resolution, why would I believe otherwise? I did not understand my opponent's overly complicated explanation as to what is "average" or not, but I consider myself a healthy and average person. What law states that the average person must react well to alcohol? As such, I must restate my argument: My opponent is addressing me in both resolutions. I would have much more health detriment from drinking beer than from drinking milk. Thus, the resolution is negated. I look forward to my opponent's response. Thank you.