College athletes should not be paid.

My opponent claims that sports are not as important as academics, I respond to this by stating that sports programs at college are a way for the college to advertise for it's education. You may notice when watching a basketball game or a football game there will be many ads for the school itself. The reason schools wish to improve there athletics department is for greater revenue. Schools use this as a way to get the word out for there school. In this way the athletes should get the credit for the amount of money the school earns because of this. In this way the "students that are making a difference" are benefiting from this extra pay. My opponent responds to my point about full time jobs by stating that being a student is also a full time job with few breaks. I state that this proves my point! Athletes are students too! Athletes have to participate in student activities, and using my opponents logic it is clear athletes have the tougher time, when you have to deal with both the difficult time consumer that is academics AS WELL AS ATHLETICS it becomes nearly impossible to get a job during this time. Thus the added pay would be beneficial to the athletes and should be added. My opponent claims that if any people bring money into the school they should be paid as well, however athletes make up the vast majority of the money made from students. As my statistics showed athletics have made 12 billion dollars. Thus a newspaper job is not as beneficial to the school as athletics. In my opponents point about swimmers he states that they should deserve to be paid as much as the regular athlete. However this cannot be true, as not all sports can be equal. Remember that in the professional leagues the better players are paid more, this is simply part of life. I understand that the swimmers need pay, and I agree they do, but it doesn't matter because it doesn't draw enough attention to the school and thus they are not aiding the school as much as a football player. They do deserve money in replacement for a job, but not as much as the major athletes. My opponent states the following: "But like I said earlier, if an athlete is making money for the school, wouldn't they also be entitled to some of the money? Regardless of whether a high school athlete has a job or not, or would want one, if they make money for the school, it is the same situation as college. " However he fails to remember my other argument, that they cannot maintain jobs. High school athletes can't maintain jobs either way so it doesn't put them at a disadvantage. My opponent claims that 90% of athletic departments lose money, however they lose money strictly within the athletic program, these statistics fail to take into account the advertising the athletic departments bring in. If athletic departments where losing schools money the school could shut it down at any moment, however they don't because they know that it helps them. My opponent responds to my point about "I also don't see how it would be illegal to not pay student athletes. For one, it is legal because it is currently being done. " However if a serial killer where to kill someone and not be caught would that change the fact that it is not illegal? Absolutely not! Just because something is happening that is illegal doesn't mean that it should continue happening! It means that it should be abolished, it is illegal and it is wrong.