March Beginners Tournament : The United States should place a ban on all semi-automatic weapons"

I’m not sure why my opponent did not attempt to rebut my framework this round, as he will be getting the last word in this debate either way. It just means that I am not able to defend my framework against my opponent’s rebuttal. Anyhow, I’ll continue, but that’s something that I wanted to point out. Just one more thing: This debate has gone highly off-topic. In this round I will mostly be pointing out how my opponent’s points have missed the point of this debate, and why he has not sufficiently refuted my arguments. Defense of my case 1 ) Highly impractical for the U.S There were two main points in this contention, and although my opponent appears to have commented on it, his rebuttals are quite fallacious, and incomplete. - There is a strong gun culture in the U.S, making a permanent ban on semi-automatic weapons impractical, due to strong opposition from guns-rights advocates. This point was dropped by my opponent. What he basically said to address this point, was that he was aware of this fact, and because he was aware of it, it would not be an issue. That is effectively dropping the argument, as my opponent offers no sources or arguments to prove that this would not be an issue. - There are uses for Semi-automatic weapons in sporting. My opponent places a lot of emphasis on rebutting this argument. It was made to show that it does have at least some SIGNIFICANT uses in areas like sporting. He also says that those sports could use other types of weaponry instead of semi-automatic weapons, and while that’s true, such a change would require a change in the nature of the sport. My opponent may think that’s okay, because it would be worth it because a ban would ‘save lives’. However, that’s an unsubstantiated assumption. My opponent hasn’t given any reason to believe why that’s the case. 2/3) Criminals don’t listen to laws/Black Market My opponent drops that only about 3-11% of crimes are committed with legally obtained weapons, as he has not refuted that point. So, in essence, he concedes that the effect of a ban on semi-automatic weapons on criminals would be negligible. My opponent’s point about laws setting social norms is unclear. Criminals usually do not follow social norms. I suppose what my opponent means to say here is that over-time, the possession of semi-automatic weapons will be considered as something that does not follow the social norms (due to the ban), and thus resulting in less overall possession of semi-automatic weapons, leading to less crime. This may sound great in theory, but it’s quite unrealistic. First off, my opponent assumes that there is no limit to how much the law can influence ‘social norms’. Anti-drug laws are a great example of this, seeing as marijuana is a prohibited drug in many states, but many people today strongly believe that it should be legalized [1], thus disproving the myth that government has control over social norms. This is of course not to say that government has absolutely no control over social norms, but rather that its influence is very limited, and is only effective when the majority of people in society do not feel as if their rights are being infringed upon by this attempt to influence social norms. To address Pro’s next rebuttal, I’ll remind the voters that this debate is not about restrictions, it’s about bans. The two are quite different. This is again analogous to the drug situation. Restrictions on drug use is quite different from a ban on drugs. This is especially true due to the fact that states that have legalized drugs are experiencing economic benefits and less crime compared to states that have not legalized certain drugs.[2] I won’t elaborate on this analogies because that would result in drifting from the point of the topic, but I think it’s safe to say that the analogy is fair, and applies well here. Pro’s point about the black market is again not consistent with the resolution. He’s made a claim that black markets have not been much more of a problem since gun restrictions have been placed. This is both a bare assertion, and it has little to do with the resolution. As I said earlier, there is a clear difference between restrictions and bans. The fact remains that a ban on semi-automatic weapons would shift at least some business to the black market. He also mentions that the ban would reduce suicide rates. That is not the only factor of the gun-ban topic. My opponent says that option A (banning semi-autos) is worth it because result B (it lowers suicide rates), but he ignores result C and D.. Some examples of those would be homicides (I notice he mentions homicide rates being reduced, but he actually meant suicide rates which he confirmed in the comments), or self-defense cases. 4) The Second Amendment My point about the second amendment does not contradict or refute my framework in any way. The point was meant to tie back to the first contention, where I mentioned that there would be opposition towards a gun-ban from gun-rights advocates. The next point my opponent makes appears to attack a more generalized position on gun-rights that my opponent assumes I am arguing for. This is irrelevant because that is not what the debate is about. This point was not about conspiracy theories about the Government becoming authoritarian, but rather about the fact that the average citizen should have protection to prevent coercive entities from overstepping their bounds. Again, to clarify, it is not a conspiracy theory that something will happen, but rather a precaution against something that may happen. My opponent’s next question asks: “Because if the presence of the Second Amendment was to ensure that Congress does not attempt to do something unconstitutional towards the ‘Right to Bear Arms’ this puts forward the question that what should prevent the average person from owning deadly weapons such as an RPG-7 or an anti-tank missile?” The answer is actually that these weapons are/would not be very common, and would be very hard to get, as the average gun store would probably not be selling those anyways. 5) Self-Defense The statistic my opponent used is cherry-picked evidence. Conveniently, the states he compares are basically Southern states vs. Northern states. Since Southern states are closer to the U.S - Mexico Border there will clearly be higher drug crime in those areas as well. This would obviously result in a greater use of guns. My opponent has not taken this into account. These criminals will likely not be affected by a semi-automatic weapon ban, as they are already criminals - they probably won’t have any problems getting a gun illegally. This would result in only the average citizen being defenseless, rendering the ban counter-productive. 6) Analysis of the Federal Assault Weapon Ban The analysis of the ban wasn’t meant to show whether or not the ban resulted in an increase of crime. I just pointed out something that the graph showed, but I didn’t place much emphasis on that. The analysis showed that the ban was ineffective. It’s not an argument from silence, because what pro is calling ‘an argument from silence’ wasn’t the argument I was making anyways. My opponent also makes a point about Australia’s gun restriction program. While I agree that gun crime has been going down after the ban took place in Australia, I think it would be more relevant and reliable to check out statistics of specific states in the U.S. States like New Hampshire, Maine, and Iowa, have relatively high gun ownership percentages, while also having very low gun murder rates per 100000 people. [3]. The source may be Wikipedia, however, the wikipedia article does compile its data from these two reliable sources: [4][5] It also refutes my opponent’s 5th rebuttal on Self Defense. This is not a new argument, rather it’s a new statistic, because, as my opponent is claiming, I have already made this argument, and I am simply defending it from my opponent’s rebuttals. Anyways, my opponent again points out that government can set the social norms. What he’s not mentioning is that there is a limit to this ability, especially when it involves such a sensitive topic such as this. I also do not need to prove that more guns = less crime, so my opponent is attacking a strawman. In Conclusion My opponent has not met the BoP that a ban on semi-automatic weapons would indeed reduce overall crime in the U.S. Nor has he proved that there is any net benefit to the U.S in doing such a thing. My opponent has also dropped several key points in my arguments. For those reasons, vote Con! Sources [1] http://tinyurl.com... [2] http://tinyurl.com... [3] http://tinyurl.com... [4] http://tinyurl.com... [5] http://tinyurl.com...