Resolved: High School Public Forum Debate Resolutions should not confront sensitive religious issues

I would like to start by thanking my opponent for continuing the debate, and would like to apologize for my use of a quote from the Bible. I did not realize that the use of Bible quotes is strictly forbidden, and thus I ask the judges to ignore it and not factor it into their evaluation for affirmative or negative. I will start by defending my case, then I will answer my opponent's questions, and then I will pose some of my own. In regards to my first contention, my opponent has asserted that my first contention does not pertain to the topic. However, I clearly linked my contention to the topic. "High School Public Forum Debate should not confront sensitive religious issues. " Sensitive religious issues should not be debated in public forum because they religion, regardless of how it is brought into the topic, has no place in debate. Religion is filled with contradictory "values" and has nothing to offer to debate. My opponent has even decided not to argue against religion being hypocritical or lacking in proper moral values, thus my contention still stands. I would also like to point out that my opponent spent most of his rebuttal to my first contention bringing up his own contention, even if it was left untitled. Essentially, he wrote a contention stating that debating sensitive religious topics leads to awareness, education, and tolerance. This has nothing to do with my contention, which was set forth to prove that religious is hypocritical and thus lacks any value in a debate. As such, he was raising a new contention in round 3, which was strictly against the rules he set forth. Therefore, I ask the judges to disregard the latter half of my opponent's first rebuttal, as it clearly violates the rules. In regards to my second contention, I must remind the Negative that we are discussing Public Forum debate only, and thus any effect on Public Forum debate is significant. The effects on LD or Policy, though, are irrelevant to the topic. My opponent claims that, based on what I said, not allowing sensitive religious topics would essentially take away every Public Forum topic. However, this is not true. The topic deals with sensitive religious issues, and an issue is not constantly sensitive. At current times, when the debates over Ground Zero are still heated, the topic can easily be considered sensitive or offensive to people at either extreme of the spectrum, regardless of the political aspects involved. A topic that is not currently the center of media attention and does not involve such heavy religious aspects should be chosen instead. Just because Public Forum was originally made with the intent to debate about recent and popular topics does not automatically make it right to debate about such topics. Existing does not inherently make something proper or correct. Changes obviously need to occur in how Public Forum chooses its topics, to avoid insulting the students involved. Now I will proceed to answer my opponent's questions. 1. My examples in the first contention are related to the debate room because debate is about logic and facts. Religion does not have facts; it has faith. Religion also is illogical in the sense that the holy books that man religions are based off of contradict themselves frequently. Because of this, religion has no inherent value in debate and thus topics that could easily draw religion into debate should be avoided. Hence, sensitive religious issues should not be confronted by High School Public Forum debate. 2. Hypocrisy takes away from the debate environment in that it is a logical fallacy, and lacks any value in the first place. Hypocrisy in a debate setting takes the form of contradicting points. If one side of a debate makes points regarding a topic, but then makes points opposite those points, it creates a confusing setting for judges who are trying to evaluate what point each side is making and how effectively that side represented that point. Thus, hypocrisy has no place in the debate environment. 3. This particular topic did not prove to cause high emotions, however the topic of the previous year did. The topic of the previous year regarded the Islamic Mosque, and many students from my school (University High school has a varied student body, of which almost a fifth identity as Muslim) because upset over the course of debates. They had difficulty representing the negative side because they had to argue against a point they felt strongly about, and were often insulted by the other side when representing the affirmative side. Some pulled out of the debate beforehand or during the course of the debate. 4. The Negative side may strengthten its case by debating that the Islamic religion should not be introduced more strongly near Ground Zero. Some of this may involve attacking Islamic beliefs, probably indirectly. An example would be that, "Islamic terrorists caused the Ground Zero incident. " Or "The introduction of a Mosque would upset the local residence. " Either of these contentions could involve points that would offend students. 5. Regardless of fees, Public Forum is still a public event. A fee does not make an event private. A private event is a specific event that only a select body of individuals may particiape in. Poor students may still become involved in Public Forum debate, regardless of their income. The NFL offers poor students other ways to pay the $100 fee. If you cannot afford to pay the money, a parent may volunteer to judge three events. Doing so would voids the $100 fee. Event fees can also be paid for by a student's school if he or she cannot afford it. This is what my school does for me. 6. Yes, not debating is a reasonable alternative. But not debating an issue would mean a particular body of students with a particular perspective on the topic would not be involved, and would thus rob Public Forum debate of its diversity and value. 7. An argument block is an argument given beforehand to "block" an argument that you believe your opponent is likely to bring up. It is a standard debate tool used in Public Forum, though few students actually refer to it as an "argument block. " I just like to call it that. 8. Religion in itself is not hypocritical. However, the majority of religions (note the plurality) that currently exist are hypocritical. Just because a person follows a hypocritical belief does not mean he or she is dumb or hypocritical, though, as he or she may choose to only read or believe in particular aspects, or may find a certain value in it that he or she believes overrides the hypocrisy. Now I will pose a few questions. 1. Is having a modern and controversial topic worth insulting or angering the students involved in Public Forum debate? 2. Is diversity in background and opinion important in Public Forum debate? 3. If students choose to not go to an event because it is offensive to them, would that reduce the diversity of the Public Forum body? 4. What value does hypocrisy have for debate? 5. What value does religion have in debate? 6. If a topic is sensitive in a religious sense, even if there are political or economic aspects involved, isn't it likely that religion will be involved in the debate? My sources for this stage of the argument were: 1. . http://abclocal.go.com... 2. . http://midwestoutreach.org...'an-burning-and-double-standards 3. . http://newsgroups.derkeiler.com...