Tournament: harvardwestlake | Round: 3 | Opponent: X | Judge: X “Free Speech” is not racially neutral, and is part of a broader historical tradition that allows anti-black violence to continue virtually unchecked. Gillborn 09 (David Professor of Education at the University of London “Risk-Free Racism: Whiteness and So-Called ‘Free Speech.’” Wake Forest Law Review 44 Wake Forest L. Rev. 535. Summer, 2009. LexisNexis Academic) "Whiteness at various times signifies and is deployed as identity, status, and AND rational and irrational) is determined by, and for, White people.
Their faith in speech as an act of emancipation presumes an access to subjectivity that the black does not have Wilderson 10 – (Frank, Professor of African American Studies at UC Irvine. “Red, White, and Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms.) Unfortunately, cultural studies that theorizes the interface between Blacks and Humans is hobbled in AND its very nature, crowds out and forecloses the Slave's grammar of suffering.
Democracy is not benign, but rather an extension of civil society that is used to legitimize anti-black violence Sexton and Lee 06 Jared Sexton, African American Studies Program, University of California, Irvine, CA, USA, Elizabeth Lee, Department of Geography, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada, “Figuring the Prison: Prerequisites of Torture at Abu Ghraib”, Editorial Board of Antipode, page 1013-1014JC The rituals of torture exposed at Abu Ghraib—staged events both reckless and deliberate AND the so-called post-civil rights era) (Nast 2000).
Seemingly inclusive political movements recreate fungibility. They give the allusion that freedom for the black is the end sought when truly the master’s interests are what is in mind. Black flesh has always been the face of popular revolutions. It is by defining itself as something similar to but not the same as the black that movements like the affirmative have gained traction for their movement. This type of use of the black recreates a state of politics where the black is fungible. Wilderson’10 (Frank. B. Wilderson, Red White and black, 2010. Pg. 30 Frank B. Wilderson is a tenured professor at the University of California Irvine. He has attended the University of Colombia where he got a degree in psychology.) Eltis suggests that there was indeed massive debate which ultimately led to Britain taking the AND created the Human out of culturally disparate entities from Europe to the East.
Blackness is the position of ontological death. The legacy of America and the world at large is not tainted, but predicated on the gratuitous violence enacted onto the black body. Through every era, this violence haunts the structure of politics and every facet of social life, ensuring disenfranchisement, dishonor and discrimination. The plantation is not gone, but only relocated, first as Jim Crow, and now as the Prison Industrial Complex. Ellis 11 (Aime J. Ellis 2011 (PhD in Comparative Politics UT-Austin, If We Must Die From Bigger Thomas to Biggie Smalls, Intro) From recklessly dangerous acts that range from gun and gang violence, rampant drug abuse AND benign neglect, federal withdrawal, and the increased practice of economic privatization.
Natal alienation means the slave never had a starting point in civil society Wilderson 10 – (Frank, Professor of African American Studies at UC Irvine. “Red, White, and Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms.” Pg. 51-56) Whereas Humans exist on some plane of being and thus can become existentially present through AND (110) or, more precisely, in the eyes of Humanity.
Chattel Slavery and the slave ship in particular are foundational to modern systems of domination and neoliberalism – turns case Dillon 13 Stephen, “Fugitive Life: race, gender, and the rise of the neoliberal-carceral state”, P. 69-71 Chattel slavery is central to the contemporary politics of the market in addition to the AND does more than repeat: it envelops, seduces, and multiplies.141
The only means by which we can rectify the violent order imposed by civil society is through its entire destruction. As every contour of social relations is marked by anti-blackness, every aspect of society must be destroyed, dismantled and reconfigured. Farley 05 Anthony Farley Professor or Law @ Boston College. “Perfecting Slavery” Jan 2005 What is to be done? Two hundred years ago, when the slaves in AND the slave must become to pursue its calling that is not a calling.
The role of the ballot is to vote for the debater who better performatively and methodologically offers the best liberation strategy for black bodies. The culture of exclusion and lack of engagement with important conversations about race in status quo LD locks minority debaters out of the discussion. Smith 13 Elijah Smith (2013 Cross Examination Debate Association (CEDA) and National Debate Tournament (NDT) champion), A Conversation in Ruins: Race and Black Participation in Lincoln Douglas Debate, Vbriefly, 2013. VL At every tournament you attend this year look around the cafeteria and take note of AND students who look up to them why risking such an endeavor is necessary.
To accept the slightest degree of racism destroys our humanity, negates the possibility of political order, and could not be accepted by all Albert Memmi 2k, Professor Emeritus of Sociology @ U of Paris, Naiteire, Racism, Translated by Steve Martinot, p. 163-165 The struggle against racism will be long, difficult, without intermission, without remission AND . True, it is a wager, but the stakes are irresistible.
1/14/17
JF Biopower K
Tournament: USC | Round: 2 | Opponent: X | Judge: X Protest link – the law requires a certain degree of social instability and resistance to preserve its functioning. The promotion of social outburst is necessary to sustain the law as a method of domination. Agamben 05 (Giorgio - Univ. Verona Aesthetics Prof, State of Exception, Univ Chicago Press, p. 59-60) 4.6 The stakes in the debate between Benjamin and Schmitt on the state of exception can now be defined more clearly. The dispute takes place in a zone of anomie that, on the one hand, must be maintained in relation to the law at all costs and, on the other, must be just as impla¬cably released and freed from this relation. That is to say, at issue in the anomie zone is the relation between violence and law-in the last anal¬ysis, the status of violence as a cipher for human action. While Schmitt attempts every time to reinscribe violence within a juridical context, Benjamin responds to this gesture by seeking every time to assure it-as pure violence-an existence outside of the law. For reasons that we must try to clarify, this struggle for anomie seems to be as decisive for Western politics as the gigantomachia peri tes au¬sias, the "battle of giants concerning being," that defines Western meta-physics. Here, pure violence as the extreme political object, as the "thing" of politics, is the counterpart to pure being, to pure existence as the ultimate metaphysical stakes; the strategy of the exception, which must ensure the relation between anomic violence and law, is the counterpart to the onto-theo-logical strategy aimed at capturing pure being in the meshes of the logos. That is to say, everything happens as if both law and logos needed an anomic (or alogical) zone of suspension in order to ground their reference to the world of life. Law seems able to subsist only by capturing anomie, just as language can subsist only by grasping the nonlinguistic. In both cases, the conflict seems to concern an empty space: on the one hand, anomie, juridical vacuum, and, on the other, pure being, devoid of any determination or real predicate. For law, this empty space is the state of exception as its constitutive dimension. The relation between norm and reality involves the suspension of the norm, just as in ontol¬ogy the relation between language and world involves the suspension of denotation in the form of a fatigue. But just as essential for the juridical order is that this zone-wherein lies a human action without relation to the norm-coincides with an extreme and spectral figure of the law, in which law splits into a pure being-in-force vigenza without application (the form of law) and a pure application without being in force: the force-of-law. This inscription within biopolitics is at the heart of violence allowing every ‘citizen’ to be devalued and eliminated in the name of sovereign management. Agamben 98 (Giorgio, professor of philosophy at university of Verona, Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life, pg. 139-140) ED 3.3.It is not our intention here to take a position on the difficult ethical problem of euthanasia, which still today, in certain coun¬tries, occupies a substantial position in medical debates and pro¬vokes disagreement. Nor are we concerned with the radicaliry with which Binding declares himself in favor of the general admissibility of euthanasia. More interesting for our inquiry is the fact that the sovereignty of the living man over his own life has its immediate counterpart in the determination of a threshold beyond which life ceases to have any juridical value and can, therefore, be killed without the commission of a homicide. The new juridical category of “life devoid of value” (or “life unworthy of being lived”) corre¬sponds exactly—even if in an apparently different direction—to the bare life of homo sacer and can easily be extended beyond the limits imagined by Binding. It is as if every valorization and every “politicization” of life (which, after all, is implicit in the sovereignty of the individual over his own existence) necessarily implies a new decision concerning the threshold beyond which life ceases to be politically relevant, becomes only “sacred life,” and can as such be eliminated without punishment. Every society sets this limit; every society—even the most modern—decides who its “sacred men” will be. It is even pos¬sible that this limit, on which the politicization and the exceprio of natural life in the juridical order of the state depends, has done nothing but extend itself in the history of the West and has now— in the new biopolitical horizon of states with national sovereignty—moved inside every human life and every citizen. Bare life is no longer confined to a particular place or a definite category. It now dwells in the biological body of every living being. Biopolitical capitalism produces value by dealing out death – the aff’s individualizing approach masks its violence Charkiewicz 5 (Ewa, economist, Green Party leader, researcher and university lecturer combining academic engagement in social movements) “Corporations, the UN and Neo-liberal Bio-politics” Development (2005) 48, 75–83 AT One of my biggest puzzles about CSR is why this discourse, founded on the principle of merging profits and morals, does not investigate how profits are made. The spotlight is on individual companies and not on the systemic problems in the generation of value. I have in part explained it by referring to the operations of pastoral power which individualizes, surveys and differentiates between the good and bad flock, assigns blame, offers confession as the road to redemption, and absolution by audit. Individualizing and normative approaches are static and do not lend themselves to the analysis of processes and power relations, which are contested and dynamic. As Foucault argued pastoral power has historically been imported from the economy of household (oikos), to the economic theories and regulations of the market, and subsequently to the organization of the global economy. It has been concerned with the maintenance of the flock, the household or populations as sources of wealth. Nowadays, the source of wealth and the goal to which pastoral power is deployed is the maintenance and multiplication of financial capital. According to the theory of value developed by Karl Marx profits are made because of what labour adds to production. Marx attributed the sources of profits or surplus value to the difference between what labour added to production within a given time and the time it takes to maintain and reproduce labour-power. Teresa Brennan reworked this theory by introducing the concept of interactive economy linked by the exchange of energy in the living (human and non-human) nature. She argued that the reproduction of labour power cannot take place without or outside the cycles of natural reproduction. Capital intervenes in these cycles, and draws on energy to turn living nature into commodities and money. Value is therefore derived not only from time and energy provided by human labour but from the energy provided by nature as well. In these processes, control over time has been augmented by an ever-increasing spatial expansion. The range and speed in circulation of capital is key to how surplus value is extracted and profits are made (Brennan, 1997, 2000). Theresa Brennan's theory of energetics (generation of value by extracting it from time and energies of human bodies and nature, which she calls living nature) shows that adding value to money requires the input of living nature (human and non-human) into products or services (Marx, 1993; Brennan, 2003). Speed and expansion increase pressures on living nature. Life is consumed and killed in the processes of the reproduction of capital. Those without spending power are redundant human waste. Hidden therefore behind the caring face of biopolitics is its double, the control of life by means of dispensation of death.5 We control the root cause:
biopower uses capitalism to fuel its own sovereignty: this is why sovereigns construct threats to justify resource wars like the war in iraq for oil. 2. biopolitical entities uses capitalism to gain control over other countries for example the us funds and created the world bank to gain leverage over developing countries through loans
Vote negative to endorse the state of whatever being in resistance to sovereign power. Whatever being is the only way to solve. Working within the law only furthers sovereign control of life. Solves case because whateverbeing means that nothing can be distinguished which prevents the state from unequally applying the law and stripping us away to bare life. Caldwell 4 (Anne, Asst Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Louisville, Theory and Event, 7.2shree) Can we imagine another form of humanity, and another form of power? The bio-sovereignty described by Agamben is so fluid as to appear irresistible. Yet Agamben never suggests this order is necessary. Bio-sovereignty results from a particular and contingent history, and it requires certain conditions. Sovereign power, as Agamben describes it, finds its grounds in specific coordinates of life, which it then places in a relation of indeterminacy. What defies sovereign power is a life that cannot be reduced to those determinations: a life "that can never be separated from its form,a life in which it is never possible to isolate something such as naked life. " (2.3). In his earlier Coming Community,Agamben describes this alternative life as "whatever being." More recently he has used the term "forms-of-life." These concepts come from the figure Benjamin proposed as a counter to homo sacer: the "total condition that is 'man'." For Benjamin and Agamben,mere life is the life which unites law and life. That tie permits law, in its endless cycle of violence, to reduce life an instrument of its own power. The total condition that is man refers toan alternative life incapable of serving as the ground of law. Such a lifewould exist outside sovereignty. Agamben's own concept of whatever being is extraordinarily dense. It is made up of varied concepts, including language and potentiality; it is also shaped by several particular dense thinkers, including Benjamin and Heidegger. What follows is only a brief consideration of whatever being, in its relation to sovereign power. "Whatever being," as described by Agamben, lacks the features permitting the sovereign capture and regulation of life in our tradition. Sovereignty's capture of life has been conditional upon the separation of natural and political life. That separation has permitted the emergence of a sovereign power grounded in this distinction, and empowered to decide on the value, and non-value of life (1998: 142). Since then, every further politicization of life, in turn, calls for "a new decision concerning the threshold beyond which life ceases to be politically relevant, becomes only 'sacred life,' and can as such be eliminated without punishment" (p. 139). This expansion of the range of life meriting protection does not limit sovereignty, but provides sites for its expansion. In recent decades, factors that once might have been indifferent to sovereignty become a field for its exercise. Attributes such as national status, economic status, color, race, sex, religion, geo-political position have become the subjects of rights declarations. From a liberal or cosmopolitan perspective, such enumerations expand the range of life protected from and serving as a limit upon sovereignty. Agamben's analysis suggests the contrary. If indeed sovereignty is bio-political before it is juridical, then juridical rights come into being only where life is incorporated within the field of bio-sovereignty. The language of rights, in other words, calls up and depends upon the life caught within sovereignty: homo sacer.
3/4/17
JF Colleges T
Tournament: harvardwestlake | Round: 6 | Opponent: X | Judge: X Interpretation: The aff must defend all public colleges and universities and must not defend that only a single college or combination of colleges ought to remove specific speech codes. DeBois 16 Danny; Danny DeBois (Harvard ’18) debated for Harrison High School in New York for 4 years. He won the TOC, NCFL Grand Nationals, the Minneapple, the Glenbrooks, and the Harvard Invitational (twice). As a coach at Harvard- Westlake in California, his students have won the TOC, Greenhill, the Voices Round Robin, the Kandi King Round Robin, and Loyola, reached finals of NDCA Nationals and Emory, and made the USA Debate World Schools Team; Victory Briefs Jan/Feb Some people will find it a good idea to specify particular public colleges or universities AND speech, not why certain public colleges and universities should have certain procedures.
Violation:
Limits – there’s 1,699 public colleges and universities, solvency advocate doesn’t check back DeBois 16 does the math Danny; Danny DeBois (Harvard ’18) debated for Harrison High School in New York for 4 years. He won the TOC, NCFL Grand Nationals, the Minneapple, the Glenbrooks, and the Harvard Invitational (twice). As a coach at Harvard- Westlake in California, his students have won the TOC, Greenhill, the Voices Round Robin, the Kandi King Round Robin, and Loyola, reached finals of NDCA Nationals and Emory, and made the USA Debate World Schools Team; Victory Briefs Jan/Feb Second, an interpretation allowing specification of particular public colleges and universities is truly limitless AND characterized by bad theory and generic K links, don’t specify an actor.
Multiply that by the thousands of speech codes there are Lukianoff 08 (Greg Lukianoff, "Campus Speech Codes: Absurd, Tenacious, and Everywhere", May 23, 2008 , https://www.nas.org/articles/Campus_Speech_Codes_Absurd_Tenacious_and_Everywhere) For our 2007 report, FIRE surveyed publicly available policies at the 100 “Best AND to our knowledge, the most extensive evaluation of campus codes ever attempted.
Research overload has real world consequences, it’s an independent voter Harris 13, Scott Debate coach for over 25 years, coaches University of Kansas Policy Debate Team, " This ballot," Published on CEDADebate.org Forums. 5/5/13. http://www.cedadebate.org/forum/index.php?topic=4762.msg10246 Debates about what kinds of arguments we should or should not be making in debates AND little to no effect on the teams that refuse to debate the topic.
Anti-cyberbullying laws key to prevent cyberbullying – squo solves and checks off campus behavior Patchin 10. Justin W. Patchin, Professor of Criminal Justice in the Department of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, 09/28/10, "Cyberbullying Laws and School Policy: A Blessing or Curse?," Cyberbullying Research Center, http://cyberbullying.org/cyberbullying-laws-and-school-policy-a-blessing-or-curse//AD Many schools are now in a difficult position of having to respond to a mandate AND election time, so I’m sure your local representative will be all ears…
Cyberbullying is conducive to abuse and kills self worth – impedes the ability to get education, turns case ETCB 16, End To Cyber Bullying, The End to Cyber Bullying (ETCB) Organization was founded in 2011 to raise global awareness on cyberbullying, and to mobilize youth, educators, parents, and others in taking efforts to end cyberbullying, “A Surprising Long-Term Effect of Cyberbullying, ETCB Organization, 2016, http://www.endcyberbullying.org/a-surprising-long-term-effect-of-cyberbullying///AD If someone repeatedly tells the victim online that they is are AND of the abuse upon the psyche of the victim are anything but impermanent.
1/14/17
JF Open Carry CP
Tournament: USC | Round: 2 | Opponent: X | Judge: X Counterplan Text: Public colleges and universities in the United States ought not restrict any constitutionally protected speech, except for open-carry demonstrations.
Open carry protests are constitutionally protected speech Lithwick and Turner 13 Dahlia Lithwick (Writer for Slate) and Christian Turner (Associate professor at the University of Georgia School of Law), 11-12-2013, "A Gun? Or Free Speech? The Strange and Alarming Rise of “Open Carry” Demonstrations.", http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2013/11/open_carry_demonstrations_is_carrying_a_gun_to_a_protest_protected_by_the.html Whether or not open-carry counterdemonstrations are a good thing, they are assuredly a thing. Opponents of gun control strap on weapons and parade around to prove that parading around with weapons is constitutional and that they have a First Amendment right to say so. They increasingly target other meetings for these demonstrations. Open-carry advocates demonstrated at an MDA event in Indianapolis last spring and at a Let’s Roll America event on the Texas capitol grounds last month. This goes beyond the open-carry demonstration at the site of John F. Kennedy’s assassination in Dallas or the open-carry protest at the Alamo in October. What we are seeing is new: These are demonstrations that target gun-control activists at their meetings and demonstrations that attempt to provoke the police into responding. By that definition they are expressive First Amendment activity. The question is whether that activity can and should be limited.
These protests can occur on campus McWilliams 16 Nicholas McWilliams and Nick Roll, 12-5-2016, "Open-carrying protesters walk through campus to campaign for gun rights", http://thelantern.com/2016/12/open-carrying-protesters-walk-through-campus-to-campaign-for-gun-rights/ One week after an attack which left 11 people in the hospital and the attacker shot dead, a group of protesters came to Ohio State, quietly walking through campus with guns strapped across their chests. The protesters were in favor of Ohio House Bill 48, pending legislation which could allow for concealed carry on public college campuses in Ohio, among other places where concealed carry is currently restricted. The bill wouldn’t allow concealed carry outright, but would allow colleges to opt in. University President Michael Drake recently spoke out against the bill during a segment on WOSU. The timing of protest, referred to as “a walk,” just after the attack, was intentional, said Jeffry Smith, the organizer. “The purpose of these walks, in general, is to advocate for conceal and carry … legal conceal carrying in Ohio,” he said. “Secondarily, to engage in dialogue with people about firearms rights and privileges.”
Open carry risks violence by hindering effective law enforcement Johnson 12 Constance N. Johnson (Oklahoma State Senator), 4-25-2012, "Open Carry Is an Invitation to Chaos", http://www.usnews.com/debate-club/should-people-be-allowed-to-carry-guns-openly/open-carry-is-an-invitation-to-chaos The proposal to allow open carry in Oklahoma is unnecessary, redundant, not well thought out, and will lead to dire unintended consequences for Oklahoma citizens and visitors to the state. Oklahoma already permits concealed carry, with a brief course of instruction. To now allow open carry (one proposal would even allow unlicensed open carry), i.e., to put more guns into the hands of more people, is an invitation to chaos, especially given the disparity in who will be armed and who won't. The baseline question is whether those who will be armed will be trustworthy with their advantage over the unarmed. Open carry is unsafe, intimidating, and potentially dangerous, especially given that there are no provisions for proper administration, controls, and protections for the public. Many first-time "toters" will also be untrained in retaining control of their own weapons and may make it possible for others to grab their guns and use them against innocent bystanders. Guns kill the innocent and the guilty equally. When the smoke settles, the dead have no voice. Open carry predicates a well-balanced and rational society in an era when reality suggests differently. Guns consistently factor into these equations in Oklahoma, where domestic violence is epidemic (we rank third in spousal abuse deaths); where there is a history of racially motivated violent actions against people of color, the most notable of which have taken place in Tulsa, where five African-Americans were shot and three died recently, and thousands were killed or made homeless in the 1921 burning of Greenwood; and where there are significant numbers of unanswered and unresolved questions about African-American shooting deaths at the hands of law enforcement. But even law enforcement is fearful of the consequences of allowing people to open carry, out of a concern about not knowing who is the good guy or the bad guy in the midst of a violent encounter. Law enforcement and communities at large view the carrying of any type of weapon, openly or concealed, as a threat to their well-being and public safety.
Demonstrations chill free speech and protest – turns case Blanchfield 14 Patrick Blanchfield (Doctoral candidate and Woodruff Scholar in Comparative Literature at Emory University and a graduate of the Emory Psychoanalytic Institute), 5-4-2014, "What Do Guns Say?", https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/05/04/what-do-guns-say/?_r=0 Contemplating guns as speech, we confront a kind of autoimmune disorder: The tools once instrumental to the birth of our nation, and to the protection of the individual and the state alike, are increasingly turned against both. Guns historically used to midwife and safeguard the right to free speech are now growing ever more cross-wired with it, and speech cannot but be degraded in the process. Citizens in a democracy make a certain pact with one another: to answer speech with more speech, not violence. No matter how angry what I say makes you, you do not have a right to pull a gun on me. But now the gun has already been drawn, nominally as an act of symbolic speech — and yet it still remains a gun. A slippage has occurred between the First and Second Amendments, and the First suffers as a result. The moral bravery political protest demands is no longer enough; to protest in response now requires the physical bravery to face down men with guns.
These pro-gun movements reinforce capitalism – turns case Esposito and Finley 14 (Luigi, Prof Sociology @Barry, Laura, Asst. Prof Sociology and Criminology @Barry, Beyond Gun Control: Examining Neoliberalism, Pro-gun Politics and Gun Violence in the United States, Theory in Action, Vol. 7, No. 2, April) Both neoliberal and pro-gun philosophy reinforce one another in that both presuppose an atomistic view of the world in which people are not understood as part of an interconnected community. Instead, all individuals are assumed to be autarkic subjects concerned almost exclusively with their own private lives. Far from supporting freedom and democracy, therefore, critics argue that what easily results from this social imagery is a depoliticized citizenry that is anathema to an effective democracy (e.g., McChesney 1999). As is well known, a viable democracy requires that people have a strong sense of connection to their fellow citizens. Yet because of the emphasis on self-interest/self-reliance, neoliberalism attenuates democracy by giving individuals a green light to prioritize their self-serving interest over those of a community (e.g., Giroux 2008). The fanatical-like zeal with which many gun supporters prioritize Second Amendment rights over all other rights is consistent with this tendency. While those who support the Second Amendment emphasize the individual's right to own firearms in order to protect his/her personal liberty, safety, or property, this right ignores the fact that individuals are also members of a community. More specifically, an emphasis on the individual's right to own firearms overlooks how that right might infringe on other people's right to live without fear of unprovoked gun violence or unintended gun-related tragedies. And while ardent Second Amendment supporters might argue that guns are a tool to protect human life, there should be little doubt that the logic behind pro-gun/ anti-gun control politics-much like the logic advanced by neoliberal ideology presupposes an "every person to him/herself' type of order as normal and even virtuous. At most, armed individuals might decide to take "heroic" action and come to the rescue of others during incidents such as mass shootings (much like neoliberals suggest that private charity should replace the welfare state as the primary mechanism for dealing with people in need, but the individual's right to own firearms supersedes any communal/societal concern associated with gun violence.
3/4/17
JF Oppression NC
Tournament: harvardwestlake | Round: 1 | Opponent: X | Judge: X The standard is minimizing the material harms of oppression
Adopting the perspective of the oppressed is the only way to account for dominant ideologies that skew our thought processes. Mills 5 Charles W. Mills (John Evans Professor of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy) ““Ideal Theory” as Ideology” Hypatia vol. 20, no. 3 (Summer 2005) Now what distinguishes ideal theory is not merely the use of ideals, since obviously AND specifi c experience in distorting our perceptions and conceptions of the social order.
1/14/17
JF Warming DA
Tournament: USC | Round: 4 | Opponent: X | Judge: X Academia and now government is turning against free speech in the realm of climate science Williamson 16 KEVIN D. WILLIAMSON, roving correspondent for National Review, April 3, 2016 4:00 AM, http://www.nationalreview.com/article/433582/free-speech-climate-science-campus-censorship-only-beginning Premier Shortly after Professor Torcello’s tentative exploration of criminalizing political disagreement, Gawker published an article by Adam Weinstein bearing the straightforward headline: “Arrest climate-change deniers.” Building on Professor Torcello’s argument, Weinstein called explicitly for the imprisonment (“denialists should face jail”) of those working to further particular political goals (“quietist agenda posturing as skepticism”) on climate change. Never mind that protecting people and institutions attempting to further a political agenda is precisely the reason we have a First Amendment. Weinstein dismisses the First Amendment out of hand, with the expected dread cliché: “First Amendment rights have never been absolute. You still can’t yell ‘fire’ in a crowded theater. You shouldn’t be able to yell ‘balderdash’ at 10,883 scientific journal articles a year, all saying the same thing.” Yelling “balderdash” at the conventional wisdom has a very long and proud tradition. (Not that it should matter to this debate, but I suppose I should here note for the record that I hold more or less conventional views on climate change as a phenomenon but prefer mitigatory policies to preventative ones.) The name “Elsevier” is not beloved on college campuses (the modern company is a publisher of academic journals and sometimes is criticized for its pricing), but it is to that company’s spiritual ancestor, the Dutch printing house of Lodewijk Elzevir and his descendants, that we owe the publication of, among other articles of samizdat, the works of Galileo, at that time under Inquisitorial interdict. (The story of Elzevir’s 1636 covert mission to Arcetri to meet with Galileo and smuggle his manuscripts to Amsterdam, a city that was then as now a byword for liberality, would make a pretty good movie.) It isn’t that it’s likely that our contemporary global-warming critics are doing work as important as Galileo’s: It’s that no one knows or can predict, which is the practical case for free expression, which should be of some concern even to our modern progressives, self-styled empiricists and pragmatists who reject the moral case for free expression. I raised some alarm about the Gawker article at National Review, and once again the response was the predictable one: “It’s just Gawker, and it influences no one possessing any intelligence. No sensible person takes Adam Weinstein seriously.” That is all true enough, but it is not only or mainly the intelligent and the sensible who move the world of public policy. We have Kennedys to consider. The subsequent developments are relatively well known: Robert F. Kennedy Jr., speaking at a large climate-change march in New York, called for the imprisonment of those holding impermissible views on global warming and those who with their financial resources support and spread such views. New York attorney general Eric T. Schneiderman opened a case against Exxon, and the attorneys general of Massachusetts and the U.S. Virgin Islands announced their intended participation in this inquisition. (Al Gore was present at the announcement.) Schneiderman’s prosecution, in the words of the New York Times, would focus on “the company’s funding, for at least a decade, of outside groups that worked to dispute climate science.” This is straight from Professor Torcello. The goal of course is to bully institutions, corporations, and particularly donors and the nonprofits sustained by them. Torcello: “The charge of criminal and moral negligence ought to extend to all activities of the climate deniers who receive funding as part of a sustained campaign to undermine the public’s understanding of scientific consensus.” Kamala Harris, the California attorney general who is seeking a Senate seat, announced an identical investigation of her own. The Obama administration has referred the federal question to the FBI for possible prosecution; currently, progressive strategists are pushing for prosecution under the RICO law, a racketeering statute used to prosecute sprawling organized-crime syndicates. “The First Amendment,” Schneiderman proclaimed, “does not give you the right to commit fraud.” Which is of course true. It is also true that the invocation of “fraud” in this instance is something very close to fraudulent. But once the censors work up a head of steam, it is difficult to stop them. This week, Senator Elizabeth Warren bemoaned the fact that businessmen have “become accustomed to saying whatever they want about Washington policy debates,” and she is pressuring the Securities and Exchange Commission to file fraud charges against businesses that lobby against regulations that they believe would hurt them. Senator Warren charges that the businesses in question exaggerate the costs of regulations when lobbying against them in public and do not do so when communicating with investors and shareholders — which is to say, she wants to make a felony out of what amounts to at most hyperbole or political spin.
Campuses are restricting climate denial—Colorado proves. Williams 16 Thomas D. Williams, PhD, “University of Colorado Bans Free Inquiry of Students Questioning Global Warming” 9-6-16 http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/09/06/university-colorado-bans-free-inquiry-students-questioning-global-warming/ Premier In the midst of national debates concerning free speech on college campuses, the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs has opted to clamp down on students who challenge the reigning orthodoxy regarding manmade global warming. Last week, three professors co-teaching a course titled “Medical Humanities in the Digital Age” emailed a statement to all students informing them that anthropogenic climate change is not up for debate in their course. “We will not, at any time, debate the science of climate change, nor will the ‘other side’ of the climate change debate be taught or discussed in this course,” the professors said in their letter obtained by The College Fix. Regarding those inquisitive students who would like to discuss the issue rather than blindly accepting the global warming dogma, the professors “respectfully ask that you do not take this course.” “The point of departure for this course is based on the scientific premise that human induced climate change is valid and occurring,” the letters states. The letter, signed by course instructors Rebecca Laroche, Wendy Haggren and Eileen Skahill, was sent in response to concerns expressed by several students after watching the first online lecture about the impacts of climate change. The professors, backed by University Communications Director Tom Hutton, said that the ban on debate even extends to discussion among students in the online forums. Students are also forbidden from using outside sources for research in the course, and may only reference materials that have been approved by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The decision by the University of Colorado to eliminate free inquiry came hard on the heels of the University of Chicago’s contrary decision to encourage debate and discussion, even on unpopular subjects. In an August letter to incoming freshmen, Chicago’s Dean of Students Jay Ellison reiterated the University’s “commitment to freedom of inquiry and expression” against the restrictive political correctness codes in force on many U.S. college campuses. Countering the trend toward less freedom of expression in higher education, Chicago stated that its commitment to academic freedom “means that we do not support so-called ‘trigger warnings,’ we do not cancel invited speakers because their topics might prove controversial, and we do not condone the creation of intellectual ‘safe spaces’ where individuals can retreat from ideas and perspectives at odds with their own.” In other words, if you are afraid of others disagreeing with you or challenging your ideas, then Chicago is not for you. “You will find that we expect members of our community to be engaged in rigorous debate, discussion, and even disagreement. At times this may challenge you and even cause discomfort,” the letter warned. In an earlier report on freedom of expression, University officials cited former Chicago President Hanna Holborn Gray, who observed that “education should not be intended to make people comfortable, it is meant to make them think.” “Universities should be expected to provide the conditions within which hard thought, and therefore strong disagreement, independent judgment, and the questioning of stubborn assumptions, can flourish in an environment of the greatest freedom,” the report stated. The University of Chicago’s decision garnered plaudits from First Amendment advocates. “Free speech is at risk at the very institution where it should be assured: the university,” University of Chicago president Robert Zimmer said. The university is preparing students for the real world and would not be serving them by shielding them from unpleasantness, said Geoffrey Stone, chair of the committee, law professor and past provost at the U. of C. “The right thing to do is empower the students, help them understand how to fight, combat and respond, not to insulate them from things they will have to face later,” Stone said. Last May, DePaul University cancelled a speech by Breitbart’s Milo Yiannopoulos after protests broke out on campus. When Yiannopoulos tried to reschedule, DePaul declared that he was banned from the University.
Climate skepticism is set to decline despite Trump but greater public skepticism means less political action—Trump cabinet means brink is now. Foran '16 (CLARE FORAN is an associate editor at The Atlantic. "Donald Trump and the Triumph of Climate-Change Denial," The Atlantic, 12/25, https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/12/donald-trump-climate-change-skeptic-denial/510359/) OS The more voters are skeptical of man-made climate change, the easier it may be for politicians to justify inaction. It’s impossible to predict what Trump will do in office, but he already appears poised to dismantle President Obama’s agenda to combat climate change. He also seems willing to fill his administration with individuals who have cast doubt on the scientific consensus. Trump wants Scott Pruitt, the Oklahoma attorney general, to serve as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Pruitt recently co-wrote an article claiming that scientists “disagree about the degree and extent of global warming and its connection to the actions of mankind.” Trump’s choice to run the Energy Department, former Texas Governor Rick Perry, has claimed “the science is not settled” on climate change. And his pick to lead the Interior Department is Republican Representative Ryan Zinke of Montana, who has reportedly said that global warming is “not a hoax, but it’s not proven science either.” Despite significant pockets of skepticism and denial, particularly among conservative Republicans, there are plenty of Americans across the political spectrum who believe that man-made climate change exists. Gallup recently found that a majority of Americans believe human activity is causing global warming, and feel worried about the rise in temperatures. Concern over climate change increased among Democrats and Republicans from 2015 to 2016 with 40 percent of Republicans and 84 percent of Democrats reporting concern this year. If that concern continues to increase, skepticism may decline over time among American voters.
Warming is real, anthropogenic, and causes extinction – default to risk management – costs are inevitable, it’s only a question of magnitude – reducing emissions now is key – climate denial makes change impossible Nuccitelli 14 Dana, MS in Physics from UC Davis and Environmental Scientist at a Private Environmental Consulting Firm in California, March 30, “IPCC Report Warns Of Future Climate Change Risks, But Is Spun By Contrarians,” http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2014/mar/31/ipcc-warns-climate-change-risks The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has just published its latest Working Group II report detailing impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability associated with climate change. The picture it paints with respect to the consequences of continued climate change is rather bleak. For example, the report discusses the risk associated with food insecurity due to more intense droughts, floods, and heat waves in a warmer world, especially for poorer countries. This contradicts the claims of climate contrarians like Matt Ridley, who have tried to claim that rising carbon dioxide levels are good for crops. While rising carbon dioxide levels have led to 'global greening' in past decades and improved agricultural technology has increased crop yields, research has indicated that both of these trends are already beginning to reverse. While plants like carbon dioxide, they don't like heat waves, droughts, and floods. Likewise, economist Richard Tol has argued that farmers can adapt to climate change, but adaptation has its costs and its limits. In fact, the IPCC summary report notes that most studies project a decline in crop yields starting in 2030, even as global food demand continues to rise. The report also discusses risks associated with water insecurity, due for example to shrinking of glaciers that act as key water resources for various regions around the world, and through changing precipitation patterns. As a result of these types of changes, the IPCC also anticipates that violent conflicts like civil wars will become more common. The number of people exposed to river floods is projected to increase with the level of warming over the remainder of the century. Sea-level rise will also cause submergence, flooding, and erosion of coastal regions and low-lying areas. And ocean acidification poses significant risk for marine ecosystems; coral reefs in particular. The general risk of species extinctions rises as the planet warms. More climate change means that suitable climates for species shift. The faster these climate zones shift, the more species will be unable to track and adapt to those changes. "Many species will be unable to track suitable climates under mid- and high-range rates of climate change (i.e., RCP4.5, 6.0, and 8.5) during the 21st century (medium confidence). Lower rates of change (i.e., RCP2.6) will pose fewer problems." The report also estimates that global surface warming of approximately 2°C above current temperatures may lead to global income losses of 0.2 to 2.0 percent. However, "Losses are more likely than not to be greater, rather than smaller, than this range ... few quantitative estimates have been completed for additional warming around 3°C or above." Even in the IPCC's most aggressive greenhouse gas emissions reductions scenario, we only limit global warming to around 1°C above current temperatures. In a business-as-usual scenario, temperatures warm about another 4°C – yet we have difficultly estimating the costs of warming exceeding another 2°C. In other words, failing to curb human-caused global warming poses major risks to the global economy. Nevertheless, there will be a certain amount of climate change that we won't be able to avoid, and the IPCC report notes that adaptation to those changes is also critically important. However, we first need to accept the scientific reality of human-caused climate change in order to plan for what's to come. As a notable counter-example, the state of North Carolina recently introduced a bill that would require state coastal planning to ignore all new scientific research with regards to sea-level rise. Obviously we can't adapt to threats if we deny their existence. However, the IPCC report notes that many governments are already beginning to take steps to adapt to climate change impacts in their regions. The good news is that the IPCC reports that many of these climate risks can be reduced by cutting greenhouse gas emissions and thus avoiding the worst climate change scenarios. The IPCC states with high confidence that risks associated with reduced agricultural yields, water scarcity, inundation of coastal infrastructure from sea-level rise, and adverse impacts from heat waves, floods, and droughts can be reduced by cutting human greenhouse gas emissions. In the end it all boils down to risk management. The stronger our efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the lower the risk of extreme climate impacts. The higher our emissions, the larger climate changes we'll face, which also means more expensive adaptation, more species extinctions, more food and water insecurities, more income losses, more conflicts, and so forth. Contrarians have tried to spin the conclusions of the report to incorrectly argue that it would be cheaper to try and adapt to climate change and pay the costs of climate damages. In reality the report says no such thing. The IPCC simply tells us that even if we manage to prevent the highest risk scenarios, climate change costs will still be high, and we can't even grasp how high climate damage costs will be in the highest risk scenarios. As Chris Field, Co-Chair of Working Group II noted, "With high levels of warming that result from continued growth in greenhouse gas emissions, risks will be challenging to manage, and even serious, sustained investments in adaptation will face limits" We're committed to a certain amount of climate change, and as glaciologist Lonnie Thompson famously put it, "The only question is how much we will mitigate, adapt, and suffer". The latest IPCC report confirms that minimizing adaptation and suffering through risk management by reducing human greenhouse gas emissions is a no-brainer.