AUTUMN REGULAR TOURNAMENT: Atheistic Protection Under the American Constitution.

Thanks for the debate, Con, it's been a good one to start the tournament :)AtheismFirstly, Con claims that I say 'ideologies aren't protected under the first amendment'.But I don't actually say this per se, what I do say is:'If an ideology is just an idea, then they aren't protected. But I think that an ideology isn't just an idea'I hope that clears up the misunderstanding, and demonstrates that Con's rebuttal was a straw-man argument. Con makes multiple referrals to myself supposedly denying that ideologies are protected by the FA, but this is a false accusation and thereby I invite voters to consider it as such.Con then states that, if I think ideologies are protected under the FA, then I concede his arguments.This cannot be true though, because none of Con's argument rest upon the premise that ideologies are protected. If anything, the premise that ideologies are protected is one that affirms the resolution, since atheism is an ideology and would therefore protected by the FA, given the veracity of the premise.Next, Con decides to play semantics by saying that 'interpreting' is synonymous to 'defining'. Anyhow, such a rebuttal is irrelevant to this debate, since 'interpreting' can be used to mean things other than defining. For example, you might interpret a girl dancing with you to indicate her being attracted to you, but that doesn't mean that attraction is defined by dancing.In other words, I interpreted atheism, in this context, to refer to the various persons who express atheistic views - but this isn't to say that I am defining atheism in that way. Just like in the FA wording, 'religion' in the context of religious protection means 'the various persons who express religious belief' despite this not being the formal definition of religion.In regards to ideas, whilst I do accept that the expression of ideas are an inherent part of the ideas themselves, an idea in itself is just a thought in the mind, even if it may also be fundamentally the same thing as the expressions of that thought.PrecedenceCon argues that the pre-1900 rulings are valid but the post-1900 rulings are invalid because the latter 'violates court precedence'. But this isn't sound; since accordance to precedence isn't the be-all and end-all in determining validity of a SCOTUS ruling. Precedence may be important, but not to the extent that it invalidates the post-1900 rulings.For instance, Brown v. Board of Education, by ruling segregation to be unconstitutional, violated the court precedence of Plessy v. Ferguson (1). But it would be absurd to claim that Brown v. BoE was, ipso facto, invalid simply because it violated precedence. Therefore, Con has failed in his attempt to invalidate Joseph Burstyn v. Wilson the basis of precedence alone.Con also tries to validate his cited rulings whilst invalidating Joseph Burstyn v. Wilson by appealing to the fact that some of the Founding Fathers were alive and supposedly didn't object to the rulings that ruled against atheistic expression.However, this is a fallacious 'argument from silence'; the Founding Father's silence on the matter of prohibiting blasphemous talk does not mean that they approved of such prohibition. So Con cannot cogently argue that the court rulings opposing atheistic expression are valid because the Founding Fathers were alive at the time and didn't explicitly oppose it.ConclusionThis has been an interesting debate, and I invite voters to vote impartially and intellectually. I will now summarise the debate.Con makes two main arguments that directly pertain to the resolution:1. Atheism wasn't considered a religion and so shouldn't be defended by the FA.2. There exist 18th/19th century SCOTUS rulings that suggest that atheistic expression isn't constitutionally protected.Whereas I make one main argument:1. Atheistic expression is an inherent part of atheism, just as the expression of belief is an inherent part of that particular belief. Therefore, since atheistic expression is protected by the freedom of speech and peaceable assembly clauses in the FA, atheism as a whole is protected.Con's first argument is a non-sequitur, as I have explained at the end of round 3, since religion isn't the only thing protected under the FA and hence something need not be a religion in order for it to be protected by the FA.Con's second argument fails because he used rulings that were made after the American Founding, which therefore are irrelevant to the state of atheistic protection at the time of the founding. But even if it was appropriate to cite post-founding court rulings, then I could easily just cite Joseph Burstyn v. Wilson, which ruled atheistic expression to be constitutionally protected. There are no valid grounds on which to validate the 18th/19th century rulings against atheistic expression whilst invalidating the 20th century ruling that superseded the previous rulings and ruled in favour of atheistic expression. 'Precedence' isn't a valid distinction because non-accordance to precedence doesn't ipso facto invalidate a Supreme Court ruling. Moreover, the fact that the Founding Fathers were alive during the earlier rulings (and didn't voice any dissent) but were dead during the latter ruling also fails to bear any relevance, since a lack of recorded opposition doesn't equate to approval. To say otherwise would commit the 'argument from silence' logical fallacy (2).My argument remained unrefuted, since Con concedes that expression of a belief is an inherent part of that belief (the first premise of my argument) and fails to argue against classifying atheistic expression as a form of expression that is protected by the FA. His only attempt is to appeal to 18th century court rulings that suggest that atheistic expression isn't protected, but I have already explained multiple times how this appeal is invalid.Therefore, I have refuted both Con's arguments and upheld my own. It is then clear to see that I have fully affirmed the resolution and fufilled my burden of proof. (1) https://en.wikipedia.org...(2) http://www.logicallyfallacious.com...