In the United States, Hate-Crime enhancements are unjust.

Ok, let's start from the top of my opponent's argument: "My argument is based on a syllogism: Major Premise: The action of punishing and suppressing freedom of speech and thought is unjust Minor Premise: Hate Crime Enhancements punish and suppress freedom of speech and thought. Conclusion: Hate Crime Enhancements are unjust. A=B, B=C, therefore A=C" If it is assumed that his syllogism is correct just because of his property, the Transitive Property Fallacy is being preformed. Transitive' s never really prove anything, because not all relations are transitive. Also, I would like to argue against the soundness of his statements. I already disproved the soundness of his "Major" premise in my above argument. Therefore, the soundness has been broken in his syllogism. Opponent: "Even if suppressing freedom of speech is just, Con has conceded that suppressing freedom of thought is unjust." We are arguing Hate Crime Enhancements which are punishments against actions not thoughts. Speaking is an action. I already ruled out that punishment of freedom of speech is unjust -- it can be just. Therefore his second premise does not stand If you delete the first premise, you can't get the same conclusion out of just the second one. Let's give it a go: Premise: Hate Crime Enhancements punish and suppress freedom of speech and thought. Conclusion: Hate Crime Enhancements are unjust. Doesn't work anymore. One only needs to disprove one of the two premises in order to conclude that a syllogism is not valid. _____________________________________ Now that we have completed the syllogism tid bit of our debate, let me move on to the second installment. ***First off, I do not enjoy it when people are outright arrogant in their arguments. I leave it up to the judges to decide what they believe, not assume what they will believe or flaunt that I am right or beating my opponent or showing up my opponent.*** Now then... 1. "It also means that the government is favoring one idea over another, and like I said in my case - which my opponent did not respond to - it is not the responsibility of the government to say which ideas are right and wrong." In fact, it is the government's responsibility to say what ideas are right and wrong. Communism, Nazism are both not parts of our government. The government has agreed that those ideas are wrong for our country. Customs preformed in many cultures are not tolerated in America. The ideas of prostitution, recreational drug use, genital mutilation, etc. are all banned in the United States. The government does have say in what ideologies are right and wrong, and that is why we have laws (no murder, no rape, etc). As for the Mill quote, I do believe I commented on it even without directly bringing up Mill's name: Me: "If racists are educated, given a proper anthropological and biological class, they will learn that race is not even considered true any longer. They will learn that their claims of "race" are meaningless. Letting them make this ugly speech is letting them infect others with their eroded logic. Education cures misuse of our First Amendment rights, Mr. Bok is right, but where Mr. Bok is wrong is when he says that we should keep allowing them to voice their opinions. No, what we should do is change the school curriculum to teach scientific fact and not opinion. If opinions insult you, that may be legitimate, but if facts insult you, you are ignorant." 2. Hate speech is not the same as a valid opinion. There is no fact in hate speech, and therefore it can not be used in a valid discussion. That is why I believe it has nothing to offer. Say if we figure something out like "Oh, maybe atheists REALLY DO eat babies!" We can use this as actual discussion, but if they make irrational statements like, "Atheists all destroy families!" then we can not have a proper discussion with them. As for misunderstanding the idea of free speech... I think I do understand it quite well. I just like to add the idea of valid speech to it. I don't believe in slander, in other words. And I think I pointed out the Mill bit in section 1. As for examples of hate speech (immediate or not) leading to violence: 1. Danish Cartoons 2. World War II 3. Sports Violence 4. Irish Protestants Vs. Irish Catholics 5. Rodney King 6. Salman Rushdie Maybe if people were more educated on real differences and not false made up hate speech differences between them, these problems wouldn't occur. All I am saying is we should advance logical thinking and not illogical thinking that leads to violence and hate and disorganization. It is not in the government's best interests for its citizens. 3. An individual has all the right in the world to be a part of any private organization in which they please, but once they start actions with their prejudice is when things get on the hazy side. Why shouldn't a hate crime be punished? Again, it was a form of motivation. Someone stalking a person for days before killing them deserves a higher sentence then someone killing in the heat of the moment. Someone beating someone because they are black, for example, is different from someone beating someone for money. The first is irrational. There is no need (the person beating for money may need it desperately). The person beating because of racist notions has no personal need or gain. 4. Again, the case had nothing to do with hate speech. My opponent says he was not trying to justify hate speech, but what my opponent must realize is that is exactly what he must do. His whole debate is that punishing hate speech is unjust. Now he must explain why hate speech specifically. I explained my reasoning for his example above, and stick to it. It was not a good enough example. There are lots of forms of free speech that are banned from us. For example, you can't go outside at 3 am in your car with a loudspeaker blaring out the stock market quotes. Even child porn can be debated as "free speech." But we don't allow it for obvious reasons. ___________________________________________________ Opponent: "FURTHERMORE, as I showed at the start of my response, my opponent essentially accepted my syllogism by failing to respond to all parts of the syllogism, and instead focused only on a part of one of the premises." What I said earlier to counter this directly: I already ruled out that punishment of freedom of speech is unjust -- it can be just. Therefore his second premise does not stand If you delete the first premise, you can't get the same conclusion out of just the second one. Let's give it a go: Premise: Hate Crime Enhancements punish and suppress freedom of speech and thought. Conclusion: Hate Crime Enhancements are unjust. Doesn't work anymore. One only needs to disprove one of the two premises in order to conclude that a syllogism is not valid. ________________________________ And as for this little statement he made: "Please don't allow my opponent, Vi_Veri, to respond to the arguments centered around the suppression of freedom of thought. She already conceded that suppressing freedom of thought is unjust, and she also already conceded that hate crime enhancements suppress freedom of thought. These arguments have been extended, and we must ignore any response to them in her future responses." What I concede and don't concede should not be of your authority to suppress. I beg my opponent to please leave the judging up to the judges. If I so fancied I could end this argument and start talking about ponies for the next argument, and that still wouldn't be under your authority to suppress. Again, please leave it up to our judges and don't suppress my arguments. If I make a mistake, it is my fault and it would help you in the end. Regards, Vi