The Fault In Our Stars should be banned from all public schools

As such, this will be my last round of argumentation, and should Pro find the time to post next round, that will make us mostly even, though I will provide a concluding summary in R4. With that, I'm going to start back on burdens. Pro has failed the meet the majority of his burdens I sketched out in R2, unless voters assume he has met them merely by presenting a case. The only burdens he's addressed to any extent are the first and second. I'll get into those on each of his contentions. He has not, as of yet, shown that the harms are substantial or unique, and has failed to provide any reasoning for why schools should act as the enforcers or prove the solvency of his case. I would argue that the reason he hasn't met these burdens is because he cannot do so. I'll go through each one and explain why. 3. Substance I established in the previous round that Pro has to show that the harms the book engenders are substantial enough to overcome appreciable losses to student freedoms " both in terms of freedom of the press and freedom of thought. All of Pro's harms are far outweighed by this one, which affects all students, whether they would have read the book or not. That makes this both a broader and deeper impact, and one Pro must overcome in order to win this debate. 4. Impact of book This is explained by my case. I've shown real world impacts to the removal of the book, and the objective benefits of its presence. Weighing our cases against one another will show if Pro has fulfilled this burden. 5. Uniqueness Pro's case comes down to two sets of impacts " setting a bad standard for adolescent love, and that schools shouldn't support bad behavior in the books they stock. Pro behaves as though this is unique to TFIOS. Let's list some other books that do the same or worse: The Catcher in the Rye " premarital sex, sexual scenes, excessive violence, alcohol abuse To Kill a Mockingbird " sex, rape, incest The Color Purple " sexually explicit, rape Brave New World - "makes promiscuous sex 'look like fun'" A Farewell to Arms " "sex novel"[1] And this is just 5 of the books that have been viewed as concerning throughout the ages, leading to numerous challenges. I sincerely doubt Pro would argue for banning these books as well, though if he chooses to do so, we can have that discussion. The number of books that include a character who is smoking are too numerous to count. The number that include underage drinking is similarly massive " Running With Scissors, the Harry Potter books (butterbeer, anyone? ), and the Game of Thrones series certainly fit that bill. Disrespect in young adult novels is practically a staple, not to mention creepy stares (Twilight is pretty much nothing but stares, not to mention a relationship between a 107 year old vampire and a teenager). Is Pro going to support the banning of The Hunger Games, a book where children are forced to fight one another til only one is standing? That seems a lot worse than any of the claims he's making against TFIOS. 6. Agent of Action The silence here is deafening. I've given a specific reason why schools should not be the actors here. I would say that denying access to this book is a good thing, parents are by far the better actors, as they are only affecting the freedoms of their own children, as they are allowed to do by law. Schools are not allowed to make those same judgments, nor should communities be allowed ot make those judgments for all students. 7. Solvency I covered last round why I believe the ban will be ineffective, and even shown that such a ban increase interest in the book, leading more kids to seek it out. Pro will have to show that my arguments are false. 8. Impact of ban I also covered the benefits of TFIOS pretty clearly, and being that they're fully articulated, with substantial impacts and strong warrants supported by evidence, Pro has quite a wall to climb here. Rebuttals: Generally, Pro fails to prove why middle and high schoolers in all parts of the country are susceptible to the messages he says TFIOS imparts. Even if he's right that there are harmful messages, Pro needs to do more than just state that those exist " he needs to show that there's an actual, measurable harm to students in these levels of education, and demonstrate how that harm plays out. He'll need to show how that harm is pervasive throughout the U. S. So far, Pro has not done so. Contention 1: Note that while Pro tries to meet the first burden here, all of his arguments are simply subjective claims of harm, lacking any warrants or support sufficient to turn them into objective harms. He says that the book is about "deception, sex and shameful habits," but never supports any of those claims, failing to note that the only sex that occurs is near the end of the book, and is coupled with Augustus receiving information that his cancer has metastasized, essentially a death sentence here. He says they set a "bad example" for teenage love, but never states why teenage romance, or even teenage/unmarried sex, is harmful. I would contend that they set an example for conquering the desire to think only about oneself when faced with mortality. He proceeds to spend much of the rest of his first contention assaulting Augustus and his character, stating that he's creepy, "not an accurate representation of a teenage boy in love," poorly written and focused on sex. None of this suffices as a reason to ban the book. He can hate on the character all he wants, but this is all a subjective evaluation of the character with no reasoning for why it should result in a ban of the book itself. Being focused on sex is practically a staple of adolescent male characters in books, and being stereotyped, odd or boring is no reason whatsoever to ban a book. Contention 2: Pro makes the claim that allowing the book in school libraries is somehow an endorsement of the actions contained within. This claim is absolutely baseless. If it was true, there would be no book on the shelves in which someone is killed, or a book in which someone is raped or curse words are spoken. Pro will have to establish a link between allowing the book's presence and an explicit or implicit endorsement of all the actions in that book in order to make this stick. For the sake of argument, though, let's go through these harmful actions. Pro points to the usage of cigarettes, saying that Augustus's metaphorical usage of a cigarette as a way of showing that he has some control over his life is somehow "shameful behavior" that "shouldn't be used. " He fails to support either of these statements, ignoring the fact that THIS IS A YOUNG MAN DYING FROM CANCER. Pro will have to show why this lifeline is harmful to readers, rather than providing a unique and interesting way to gain some control over a life that's wholly out of his hands. Speaking as a Jew, I found the kissing in Anne Frank's house to be odd, but an effective metaphor. Anne Frank had lived her last days with nothing but her bonds to those around her to keep her company, knowing that she was living on borrowed time. The fact that romance should bloom in such a place between two cancer patients seems all too fitting. I don't know where Pro is getting at with his claim that the book showcases parents who "don't give any care in the world about the whereabouts of their children," this is just plain absurd. I'm not going to support underage drinking and tampering with private property, but these are hardly reasons by themselves to support a ban. Pro is going to need to support this argument that cancer is used "as a justification for the bad things the protagonists do," that's completely unwarranted. I do hope that this debate continues, and I leave it to Pro to do it. 1. . http://www.ala.org...