Resolved: cyberbullying should be a criminal offence

First I will answer my opponent's questions. Then I will pose a few of my own. 1. How am I reducing harm to the victim For the victim, a harm is never directly reduced by imposing penalties. You can't undo damage done to somebody by harming somebody else. I have made it clear from the outset that my model does not give the victim rehabilitation or undoes the abuse. What it does do is give the victim justice. It gives the victim peace of mind that their attacker is unlikely to take the same action again. It restores their faith in the justice system. It protects them from future harm, as other would-be attackers know that this particular victim will tell the police. The benefits to the victim are indeed numerous. However, even these cannot be considered in isolation. They ignore the benefits to the other stakeholders as well ... the community and the attacker. These are equally numerous. My opponent also mentions his belief that these laws won't work. First, see my rape analogy that I deal with in question 9. Second, even if justice is not done for the victims, which I do not concede, then at least justice will be seen to be done. This is important because only then is the role of the state fulfilled. Third, most importantly, this argument is a subjective construction. The only objective argument my opponent has launched here is a reference to the first amendment, which I debunked in my speech. You can, in fact, prove mens rea (guilt of mind) beyond reasonable doubt using a text message. One would not accidentally text "you are a loser" to somebody without meaning to cause them pain. 2. How is cyberbullying used by pedophiles Cyberbullying is used by pedophiles, usually over the internet, to get young children to feel weak and control them. Not affecting this argument is your new rule that you will only debate this topic within the context of the teenage years, because first I made it before you unfairly shifted the context, and second because teenage pedophiles do in fact exist. Also see my rant under question 8. 3. Exploitation not grounds for criminalization Agreed. But that's not to say it's not a harm that can be remedied. By criminalizing something that does have such grounds, cyber-bullying, the harm is automatically corrected. It is, so to say, a positive externalize. 4. Cyberbullying not a small crime Usually it is. My opponent is right to point out that sometimes it is not, but as my opponent also points out, in these cases other laws deal with the situation adequately - for example, identity theft legislation. 5. Bullying only a harm to the victim First my opponent's example - schoolyard bullying - is silly. The internet is anonymous so bullies feel safer [1]. Often there is also less supervision and less ability for the victim to escape the bully [2]. Second, even schoolyard bullies can terrorize a family, who become concerned for a child's safety. They can in fact scare all who love and care for that child. Being a person who was often terrorized and hurt at school, by both other students and staff members, I know that my family suffered incredibly. My personal story might be a bit of an extreme example, but it underscores the point that bullies bully not just the victim alone. 6. Why is law more effective than education Because you cannot have education until you have the law. When I was at school, my teachers told me and my class all the time not to smoke cigarettes. That didn't stop about a quarter of my leaving year becoming smokers as soon as they left boarding school. Why? There was no law banning them. By way of contrast, we were also told not to take ecstasy. To the best of my knowledge (and because we were a very small school, my knowledge is pretty good), only one person from my form has ever even tried ecstasy, and none of them are regular "users". Why? Ecstasy is illegal. If you get busted you are screwed, figuratively speaking. Besides, it is not as though teenagers are unaware of the news and what goes on around them. Recently in New Zealand "texting" was banned in cars. Today, only about one or two fines are given for this a month, and even that rate is dropping (apparently)! Despite the fact, of course, that the biggest group of mobile-phone using drivers are teenagers. 7. Are teens aware of the fact they may not possess child porn? Yes. Yes they are. Ask them. If they are not, then it goes to show that your local education system fails. It's certainly on our curriculum. But without the law, you could never teach the kids these things, as I have stated. 8. We're not debating adults anymore First, you can't differentiate between adults and teens in a pure virtual world, so this ruling is itself of no practical significance and so totally void anyway. Second, substitute adults with kids and the argument is completely true even if it stood. Third this point is an implementational detail, and like I said, I do not want to have a false dichotomy between implementations. Fourth the ruling is officially challenged by my side of the house on the grounds that it is unfair to introduce a new element of context after context has been set and my arguments have been made. I expect a response from the chair justifying this ruling, otherwise we declare it moot. Until then, this point stands. 9. How is rape like cyberbullying? Like I said before, unknown attacker, hard to prove the intentions of both parties, and as you predicted would happen if cyberbullying was illegal, very low conviction rate. My questions: 1) How many more innocent children need to die before my opponent agrees this harm must be remedied? 2) Can my opponent show any significant costs that warrant cyberbullying's exclusion from the social contract? 3) On education, how and why will that be any more effective than the law? Don't you agree that it is your onus to prove this, not the other way around? 4) Why is difficulty of conviction a valid ground for not convicting? 5) Do you believe it is important for our kids to grow up in an environment free from fear? 6) Do you believe that any measure to counteract false victimization in our society is fundamentally good by virtue of this fact? 7) Why do you think that, despite large-scale internet anti-cyberbullying educational campaigns, cyberbullying still goes on? [1] - http://www.brighthub.com... [2] - http://en.wikipedia.org...