Tournament: Any | Round: 1 | Opponent: Any | Judge: Any
1 - Generic Theory/T
2 - Generic K's
3 - Generic Framework or substance (like a Util framework or impact turns, not that I read util much lol)
SO - September October
ND - November December
JF - January February
MA - March April

Tournament: Apple Valley | Round: 5 | Opponent: Byram Hills RP | Judge: Abbey Chapman
A) Interp—both debaters must disclose at least the following from all AC’s and NC’s read at TOC bid distributing tournaments on the Nov/Dec 2016-2017 qualified immunity: first, complete tag lines to all cards; second, first 3 words and last 3 words of all cards; third, the standard used to delineate what counts as offense and not offense with the claims to the warrants for that standard and fourth, taglines to all evidence read. If they do not, they must minimally have a wiki page with contact information.

B) Violation—I have a screenshot of the aff’s wiki page. They have not disclosed anything, let alone created a wiki page or provided contact info.  

C) Standards—

1. Equal Playing Field- disclosure levels the playing field since everyone knows what everyone else is running. Saying this helps big schools is bullshit since they already know what you are running through scouting. Bietz 10
   Bietz, Mike (Mike Bietz is a former President of the National Debate Coaches Association and is the current debate coach at Harvard-Westlake School in Los Angeles.) “The Case for Public Case Disclosure.” May 2010.
   As I outlined above, big teams already get many, many more flows than the smaller teams just because they have more debaters, more judges and more coaches. Open disclosure gives everyone access to the same information. Additionally, it helps the “little guy” even more because for many of these debaters, the option of going to a lot of tournaments isn’t available. Open case disclosure gives them the ability to see what other teams are running prior to showing up to the tournament. Thus, there is an added benefit of equalizing not only information at a tournament, but also equalizing (to some degree) the playing-field for people who do not have the resources to travel as much.
   2. Clash
   3. Academic Integrity

Tournament: Valley | Round: 6 | Opponent: Bronx ZP | Judge: Preetham
Obviously I can read framework on other topics so the interp will be slightly different, but the idea is that you should prob be topical.
Interpretation: The affirmative must defend the prohibiting the production of nuclear power.
Prohibition implies legal implementation: Prohibit is defined
com/browse/prohibit
“to forbid (an action, activity, etc.) by authority or law”
Violation: You just defend “misfitting”, not the resolution.
Prefer: 

1. Topical version of the aff
   2. Limits
   Only limited topics protect participants from overload which materially
   affects our lives outside of round.
   Harris 13
   Scott Harris (Director of Debate at U Kansas, 2006 National Debate Coach of the Year, Vice President of the American Forensic
   Association, 2nd speaker at the NDT in 1981). “This ballot.” 5 April 2013. CEDA Forums.
   http://www.cedadebate.org/forum/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=4762.0;attach=1655
   The limits debate is an argument that has real
   AND
   I feel their impact in my everyday existence.
   Limits turn solvency. Research shows that research overload leads to
   superficial education, meaning we won’t learn about the aff or anything
   else.
   Chokshi 10 Niraj Chokshi is a former staff editor at TheAtlantic.com, where he wrote about technology. He is currently
   freelancing How Do We Stop the Internet From Making Us Stupid? JUN 8 2010
   http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2010/06/how-do-we-stop-the-internet-from-making-us-stupid/57796/
   When it comes to focus, turning on the spotlight
   AND
   how do we fight back? Carr offers some advice:
   3. Agnostic Constraints
   In the political realm, a stable point is needed to begin discussion.
   Mouffe 1 (Chantal Mouffe, “The Democratic Paradox,” pgs. 19-20; 2000)
   Once pluralism is recognized as the defining feature of modern democracy, we can ask what is the best way to approach the scope and nature of a pluralist democratic politics. My contention is that it isonly
   in the context of a perspective according to which 'difference' is construed as the condition of
   possibility of being that a radical democratic project informed by pluralism can be adequately formulated. Indeed, I
   submit that all forms of pluralism that depend on a logic of the social that implies the idea of 'being as presence, and sees 'objectivity' as belonging to the 'things themselves', necessarily lead to the reduction of plurality and to its
   ultimate negation. This is indeed the case with the main forms of liberal pluralism, which generally start by stressing what they call 'the fact of pluralism', and then go on to find procedures to deal with differences whose objective
   is actually to make those differences irrelevant and to relegate pluralism to the sphere of the private. Envisaged from an anti-essentialist theoretical perspective, on the contrary, pluralism is not merely
   a fact, something that we must bear grudgingly or try to reduce, but an axiological principle. It is taken to be constitutive at the conceptual level of the very nature of modern
   democracy and considered as something that we should celebrate and enhance. This is why the type of pluralism that I am advocating gives a positive
   status to differences and questions the objective of unanimity and homogeneity, which
   is always revealed as fictitious and based on acts of exclusion. However, such a view does not allow a total pluralism and it is important
   to recognize the limits to pluralism which are required by a democratic politics that aims at challenging a wide range of
   relations of subordination. It is therefore necessary to distinguish the position I am defending here from the type of extreme pluralism that emphasizes heterogeneity and incommensurability and according to which pluralism
   — understood as valorization of all differences — should have no limits. I consider that, despite its claim to be more democratic, such a no limits perspective
   prevents us from recognizing how certain differences are constructed as relations of subordination and should
   therefore be challenged by a radical democratic politics. There is only a multiplicity of identities without any common denominator, and it is impossible to distinguish between
   differences that exist but should not exist and differences that do not exist but should exist.
   The resolution is the best starting point because it an accepted dividing point where
   debaters base their positions on dividing the issue presented in the resolution. Meaning
   there is an aff and a neg definitionally to partake in defending sides of the discussion
   around the resolution as the stable point.
   The affirmative failure to be topical means they are justifying the
   stasis point unilaterally—this re-entrenches violence the affirmative
   claims to solve. Also destroys any productive discussion.
   Mouffe 2 (Chantal Mouffe, “The Democratic Paradox,” pgs. 21-22; 2000)
   When we envisage democratic politics from such an anti-essentialist perspective, we can begin to understand that, for democracy to exist, no social agent should be able to claim any mastery of the foundation of society. This
   signifies that the relation between social agents becomes more democratic only as far as
   they accept the particularity and the limitation of their claims; that is, only in so far as they recognize their mutual relation as one from which
   power is ineradicable. The democratic society cannot be conceived any more as a society that would have realized the dream of a perfect harmony in social relations. Its democratic character can only be given by the fact that
   no limited social actor can attribute to herself or himself the representation of
   the totality. The main question of democratic politics becomes then not how to eliminate power, but how to constitute forms of power which are compatible with democratic values. To
   acknowledge the existence of relations of power and the need to transform them, while renouncing the illusion that we could
   free ourselves completely from power — this is what is specific to the project that we have called 'radical and plural
   democracy'. Such a project recognizes that the specificity of modern pluralist democracy — even a well-ordered one — does not
   reside in the absence of domination and of violence but in the establishment of a set of institutions
   through which they it can be limited and contested. To negate the ineradicable character of antagonism and to aim
   at a universal rational consensus — this is the real threat to democracy. Indeed, this can leads to violence being unrecognized and
   hidden behind appeals to 'rationality', as is often the case in liberal thinking which disguises the necessary frontiers and forms of exclusion behind
   pretences of 'neutrality'
   Engagement is an independent voter which is pre-requisite to K
   impacts- if debaters can’t even participate in the round without it,
   then we cannot further any critical discussion. Mouffe 3
   Mouffe 4 (Chantal Mouffe, “The Democratic Paradox,” pgs. 85; 2000)
   Another point of convergence between the two versions of deliberative democracy is their common insistence on the possibility of
   groundsing authority and legitimacy on some forms of public reasoning and their shared belief in a form of rationality
   which is not merely instrumental but has a normative dimension: the 'reasonable' for Rawls. 'communicative rationality' for Haber- mas. In both cases a strong
   separation is established between 'mere agreement' and 'rational
   consensus'. and the proper field of politics is identified with the exchange of arguments among reasonable persons guided by the principle of impartiality.
   Both Habermas and Rawls believe that we can find in the institutions of liberal democracy the idealized content of practi- cal rationality. Where they diverge is in their
   elucidation of the form of practical reason embodied in democratic institutions. Rawls emphasizes the role of principles of justice reached through the device of the 'original
   position' that forces the participants to leave aside all their panicularities and interests. His conception of 'justice as fairness' - which states the priority of basic liberal principles
   - jointly with the 'constitutional essentials' provides the framework for the exercise of 'free public reason'. As far as Habermas is concerned. he defends what he claims to be a
   strictly proceduralist approach in which no limits are put on the scope and content of the deliberation. It is the procedural constraints of the ideal speech situation that will
   eliminate the positions which cannot be agreed to by the participants in the moral 'discourse'. As recalled by Benhabib, the features of such a discourse are the following:
   (I) participation in such deliberation is governed by the norms of equality and
   symmetry; all have the same chances to initiate speech acts, and to question, to
   interrogate, and to open debate; (2) all have the right to question the assigned topics of the conversation; and (3) all have the right to initiate reflexive
   arguments about the very rules of the discourse procedure and the way in which they are applied and
   carried out. There are no prima facie rules limiting the agenda of the conversation, or the identity of the panicipanrs, as long as any excluded person or group can justifiably
   show that they are relevantly affected by the proposed norm under question.'
   For this perspective the basis of legitimacy of democratic institutions derives from the fact that the
   instances which claim obligatory power do so on the presumption that their
   decisions represent an impartial standpoint which is equally in the interests of all. Cohen, after stating that
   democratic legitimacy arises from collective decisions among equal
   members, declares: 'According to a tklibmztivt conception, a decision is collective just in case it emerges from arrangements of binding collective choices that
   establish conditions of flu public reasoning among equals who are governed by the Jedsions.'IO
   In such a view it is not enough for a democratic procedure to take account of the interests of all
   and to reach a compromise that will establish a modus vivendi. The aim is to generate
   'communicative power' and this requires establishing the conditions for a
   freely given assent of all concerned, hence the importance of finding procedures that would guarantee moral impartiality.
   Only then can one be sure that the consensus that is obtained is a rational
   one and not a mere agreement. This is why the accent is put on the nature of the deliberative pro- cedure and on the types of reasons
   that are deemed acceptable for compctent participants. Benhabib puts it in the following way:
   4. Fairness
   Violations of competitive equity prevent effective dialogue and
   participation.
   Galloway 7 Ryan Galloway 7, Samford Comm prof, Contemporary Argumentation and
   Debate, Vol. 28, 2007
   Debate as a dialogue sets an argumentative table, where all parties receive a
   relatively fair opportunity to voice their position. Anything that fails to allow participants to have their
   position articulated denies one side of the argumentative table a fair hearing. The affirmative side is set by the topic and fairness
   requirements. While affirmative teams have recently resisted affirming the topic, in fact, the topic selection process is rigorous,
   taking the relative ground of each topic as its central point of departure. Setting the affirmative reciprocally sets the negative. The
   negative crafts approaches to the topic consistent with affirmative demands. The negative crafts disadvantages, counter-plans, and
   critical arguments premised on the arguments that the topic allows for the affirmative team. According to fairness norms, each side
   sits at a relatively balanced argumentative table. When one side takes more than its share,
   competitive equity suffers. However, it also undermines the respect due to the other
   involved in the dialogue. When one side excludes the other, it fundamentally denies the personhood
   of the other participant (Ehninger, 1970, p. 110). A pedagogy of debate as dialogue takes this respect as a
   fundamental component. A desire to be fair is a fundamental condition of a dialogue that takes
   the form of a demand for equality of voice. Far from being a banal request for links to a disadvantage,
   fairness is a demand for respect, a demand to be heard, a demand that a voice backed by literally months upon months of
   preparation, research, and critical thinking not be silenced. Affirmative cases that suspend basic fairness norms operate to exclude
   particular negative strategies. Unprepared, one side comes to the argumentative table unable to meaningfully
   participate in a dialogue. They are unable to “understand what ‘went on…’” and are left to the whims of time and power
   (Farrell, 1985, p. 114). 

Drop the debater
Competing Interps

Tournament: TFA | Round: Octas | Opponent: Westwood RM | Judge: Sims, Melin, Wright
Interp: The aff must defend the passage of a post-fiat policy action in which the right to housing is guaranteed.

1. Government-guaranteed right to housing entails implementation, including enacting laws and creating agencies to ensure the right.
   Golay and Ozden 07 Christophe Golay and Melik Özden (advisor to the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food; Director of the CETIM's Human Rights Programme and permanent representative of the CETIM to the United Nations). “The Right To Housing.” CETIM. 2007. http://www.cetim.ch/legacy/en/documents/bro7-log-A4-an.pdf
   3. The Obligation to Protect the Right to Adequate Housing. The obligation to protect the right to adequate housing requires that governments prohibit third parties from preventing the enjoyment of the right to housing in any way. This applies to individuals, business enterprises and other entities. Governments must, for example, enact laws that protect the population from land and property speculation. They must create competent bodies to investigate violations and must assure the means of effective redress for victims, most notably through access to the courts. Governments must also intervene when powerful individuals or business enterprises evict persons from their land or their housing, by bringing to law those responsible and by guaranteeing restitution and/or compensation for the victims. The Special Rapporteur on the Right to Adequate Housing, in several of his reports, has denounced the negative effects of the privatization of public services.41 He emphasizes that the government has the duty to guarantee, for example, that privatization of water will not have negative effects on access to water and to adequate housing for the population. Such privatization has very often entailed price increases that have made water unaffordable for the poorest. In Manila, for example, the price of water quadrupled between 1997 and 2003 after the privatization carried out by Lyonnaise des Eaux.42 In all cases of privatization of public services, including water or electricity, the government must continue to guarantee the protection of the right to adequate housing, including/especially for the poorest. The government is also responsible for intervening to avoid all discrimination in access to housing. A government that does not, for example, guarantee that no person shall be refused housing because of his/her sex, nationality or origin, nor prevent other forms of discrimination, violates its duty to protect the right to housing.
   Violation: You don’t defend the topic.

Vote Neg:

1. Ground
   Violations of competitive equity prevent effective dialogue and participation which turns the case.
   Galloway 07 Ryan, Samford Comm prof, Contemporary Argumentation and Debate, Vol. 28, 2007
   Debate as a dialogue sets an argumentative table, where all parties receive a relatively fair opportunity to voice their position. Anything that fails to allow participants to have their position articulated denies one side of the argumentative table a fair hearing. The affirmative side is set by the topic and fairness requirements. While affirmative teams have recently resisted affirming the topic, in fact, the topic selection process is rigorous, taking the relative ground of each topic as its central point of departure. Setting the affirmative reciprocally sets the negative. The negative crafts approaches to the topic consistent with affirmative demands. The negative crafts disadvantages, counter-plans, and critical arguments premised on the arguments that the topic allows for the affirmative team. According to fairness norms, each side sits at a relatively balanced argumentative table. When one side takes more than its share, competitive equity suffers. However, it also undermines the respect due to the other involved in the dialogue. When one side excludes the other, it fundamentally denies the personhood of the other participant (Ehninger, 1970, p. 110). A pedagogy of debate as dialogue takes this respect as a fundamental component. A desire to be fair is a fundamental condition of a dialogue that takes the form of a demand for equality of voice. Far from being a banal request for links to a disadvantage, fairness is a demand for respect, a demand to be heard, a demand that a voice backed by literally months upon months of preparation, research, and critical thinking not be silenced. Affirmative cases that suspend basic fairness norms operate to exclude particular negative strategies. Unprepared, one side comes to the argumentative table unable to meaningfully participate in a dialogue. They are unable to “understand what ‘went on…’” and are left to the whims of time and power (Farrell, 1985, p. 114).

2. Limits
Only limited topics protect participants from research overload which materially affects our lives outside of round.
Harris 13 Scott Harris (Director of Debate at U Kansas, 2006 National Debate Coach of the Year, Vice President of the American Forensic Association, 2nd speaker at the NDT in 1981). “This ballot.” 5 April 2013. CEDA Forums. http://www.cedadebate.org/forum/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=4762.0;attach=1655
The limits debate is an argument that has real pragmatic consequences. I found myself earlier this year judging Harvard’s eco-pedagogy aff and thought to myself—I could stay up tonight and put a strategy together on eco-pedagogy, but then I thought to myself—why should I have to? Yes, I could put together a strategy against any random argument somebody makes employing an energy metaphor but the reality is there are only so many nights to stay up all night researching. I would like to actually spend time playing catch with my children occasionally or maybe even read a book or go to a movie or spend some time with my wife. A world where there are an infinite number of affirmatives is a world where the demand to have a specific strategy and not run framework is a world that says this community doesn’t care whether its participants have a life or do well in school or spend time with their families. I know there is a new call abounding for interpreting this NDT as a mandate for broader more diverse topics. The reality is that will create more work to prepare for the teams that choose to debate the topic but will have little to no effect on the teams that refuse to debate the topic. Broader topics that do not require positive government action or are bidirectional will not make teams that won’t debate the topic choose to debate the topic. I think that is a con job. I am not opposed to broader topics necessarily. I tend to like the way high school topics are written more than the way college topics are written. I just think people who take the meaning of the outcome of this NDT as proof that we need to make it so people get to talk about anything they want to talk about without having to debate against Topicality or framework arguments are interested in constructing a world that might make debate an unending nightmare and not a very good home in which to live. Limits, to me, are a real impact because I feel their impact in my everyday existence.

T's a voter
Competing interps

Tournament: UT | Round: Triples | Opponent: Southlake Carroll RP | Judge: Drew Burd
Plan Flaw- you have no implementable actor, you say United States, not USFG. The US is a landmass, it can't do anything.

Plan Flaw is a voter

1. Presumption
   2. Jurisdiction
   3. 1AR shift kills fairness and education

Tournament: TFA | Round: Doubles | Opponent: Clear Brook GR | Judge: VIncent, Andrews, Davies
Interpretation: If the affirmative defends a parametricized advocacy they must have a solvency advocate that defends all the planks of the plan text.

Violation: 

Net Benefits:

1. Limits

theory's a voting issue (fairness drop debater competing interps no rvi's)

Tournament: Grapevine | Round: Octas | Opponent: Law Magnet MG | Judge: Chris Vincent, Travis Fife, Rodrigo Paramo
Interp: All theory spikes that can be offensively extended to take out a potential neg position must be read at the top of the AC. To clarify, I don't care if aff RVIs is at the bottom of the AC, but something like "neg T interps must be disclosed" or "reject advantage CP's" should be at the top.
Violation: At bottom.
Strat skew. Voter- fairness. Drop debater. Competing interps. No RVI

Tournament: Strake RR | Round: 1 | Opponent: Lake Highland MK | Judge: Sullivan, Graham
Interpretation: The affirmative must defend the hypothetical implementation of a government policy where the public colleges in the United States get rid of restrictions on constitutionally protected speech.
Resolved reflects policy passage before a legislative body.  Parcher 01
(Jeff, Fmr. Debate Coach at Georgetown University, February, http://www.ndtceda.com/archives/200102/0790.html)
(1) Pardon me if I turn to a source besides Bill. American Heritage Dictionary: Resolve: 1. To make a firm decision about. 2. To decide or express by formal vote. 3. To separate something into constituent parts See Syns at *analyze* (emphasis in orginal) 4. Find a solution to. See Syns at *Solve* (emphasis in original) 5. To dispel: resolve a doubt. - n 1. Frimness of purpose; resolution. 2. A determination or decision.  (2) The very nature of the word "resolution" makes it a question. American Heritage: A course of action determined or decided on. A formal statemnt of a deciion, as by a legislature. (3) The resolution is obviously a question. Any other conclusion is utterly inconcievable. Why? Context. The debate community empowers a topic committee to write a topic for ALTERNATE side debating. The committee is not a random group of people coming together to "reserve" themselves about some issue. There is context - they are empowered by a community to do something. In their deliberations, the topic community attempts to craft a resolution which can be ANSWERED in either direction. They focus on issues like ground and fairness because they know the resolution will serve as the basis for debate which will be resolved by determining the policy desireablility of that resolution. That's not only what they do, but it's what we REQUIRE them to do. We don't just send the topic committee somewhere to adopt their own group resolution. It's not the end point of a resolution adopted by a body - it's the prelimanary wording of a resolution sent to others to be answered or decided upon. (4) Further context: the word resolved is used to  emphasis the fact that it's policy debate. Resolved comes from the adoption of resolutions by legislative bodies. A resolution is either adopted or it is not. It's a question before a legislative body. Should this statement be adopted or not. (5) The very terms 'affirmative' and 'negative' support my view. One affirms a resolution. Affirmative and negative are the equivalents of 'yes' or 'no' - which, of course, are answers to a question.

Violation: I don't defend implementation

Net Benefits:

1. Ground
   2. Stable Advocacy
   3. T Version is just defending implementation

Voter:
Fairness.
Drop debater.
Competing interns.
No RVI.

Tournament: Grapevine | Round: 3 | Opponent: Prosper EH | Judge: Lyndie Ho
A) Interpretation: The aff must explicitly specify a comprehensive role of the ballot and clarify how the round will play out under that role of the ballot in the form of a delineated text in the 1AC. To clarify, the aff must: 

1. Clarify how offense links back to the role of the ballot, such as whether post-fiat offense or pre-fiat offense matters and which comes first. 

2. Clarify how to weigh and compare between competing advocacies i.e. whether the role of the ballot is solely determined by the flow or another method of engagement. 

Violation: Didnt, also shifty in CX

Net Benefits:

1. Engagement
   impacts
   a) Resolvability
   b) link turns rob
   c) fairness

Fairness is a voting issue. Debate is a competitive game, and rigging that game in your favor denies respect for the participants. Galloway 7
Ryan Galloway 7, Samford Comm prof, Contemporary Argumentation and Debate, Vol. 28, 2007
Debate as a dialogue sets an argumentative table, where all parties receive a relatively fair opportunity to voice their position. Anything that fails to allow participants to have their position articulated denies one side of the argumentative table a fair hearing. The affirmative side is set by the topic and fairness requirements. While affirmative teams have recently resisted affirming the topic, in fact, the topic selection process is rigorous, taking the relative ground of each topic as its central point of departure.¶ Setting the affirmative reciprocally sets the negative. The negative crafts approaches to the topic consistent with affirmative demands. The negative crafts disadvantages, counter-plans, and critical arguments premised on the arguments that the topic allows for the affirmative team. According to fairness norms, each side sits at a relatively balanced argumentative table.¶ When one side takes more than its share, competitive equity suffers. However, it also undermines the respect due to the other involved in the dialogue. When one side excludes the other, it fundamentally denies the personhood of the other participant (Ehninger, 1970, p. 110). A pedagogy of debate as dialogue takes this respect as a fundamental component. A desire to be fair is a fundamental condition of a dialogue that takes the form of a demand for equality of voice. Far from being a banal request for links to a disadvantage, fairness is a demand for respect, a demand to be heard, a demand that a voice backed by literally months upon months of preparation, research, and critical thinking not be silenced.¶ Affirmative cases that suspend basic fairness norms operate to exclude particular negative strategies. Unprepared, one side comes to the argumentative table unable to meaningfully participate in a dialogue. They are unable to “understand what ‘went on…’” and are left to the whims of time and power (Farrell, 1985, p. 114). 

Drop debater. CI. No RVI

Tournament: Apple Valley | Round: 5 | Opponent: Byram Hills RP | Judge: Abbey Chapman
Identities are socially constructed through norms and values are precede and condition the subject. Black Identities have been constructed through society as antagonistic and decadent. Polizzi ’13. “Pursuing Trayvon Martin Historical Contexts and Contemporary Manifestations of Racial Dynamics” 2013 Edited by George Yancy and Janine Jones – Chapter 13: “Social Presence, Visibility, and the Eye of the Beholder A Phenomenology of Social Embodiment” by David Polizzi  LW-DD
“In its most general sense, the social presenting of the body refers to the way in which the body flesh becomes viewed and constructed from a variety of social interactions and social contexts. At its most mundane, the body of the individual or the embodied subject retains what Merleau-Ponty has called an intervolvement with world that is experienced as a fluid and open shared possibility for embodied existence.2 However, in the absence of such openness, the possibility for embodied subjectivity is denied and the body is reduced to that of a shadow, or pathological artifact of social visibility. The recent killing of Trayvon Martin provides yet another tragic reminder as to how the black flesh body continues to be constructed as the manifestation of social threat and danger. As such, the contours of these constructed fears are not only present within the visibility of the physical body, but also come to represent a type of geographical demarcation or territorialization whereby the body may be "legitimately" pres- enced as a problematic body. Such a dynamic evokes the "invisible wall" described by Kenneth Clark: that cultural line of demarcation that separates the racially marginalized from those who wield social power. Trayvon Martin's killing represents not only the way in which his killer constructed the meaning of his presence, but the way in which the social context of that presencing was employed by him to further "justify" the legitimacy of this construction.  In this chapter I explore the phenomenolbgy of the social presencing of the black body through the work of Merleau-Ponty and his notion of embodied subjectivity. I also include a description of Drew Leder's notion of the absent body relative to the way in which these theoretical constructs may help to better understand the tragic killing of Trayvon Martin. I will begin with a brief description of embodied subjectivity outlined by Merleau-Ponty in his classic text. Phenomenology of Perception.  THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF THE BODY AND ANTI-BLACK RACISM  Merleau-Ponty and Embodied Subjectivity  In the Phenomenology of Perception, Merleau-Ponty formulates his theory of the body or what he describes as embodied subjectivity. From this vantage point, embodied subjectivity becomes a theory of human perception, and I would argue a theory of ethics as well, which encounters the world from a specific perspectival point of view, thereby allowing for a particular profile of an object or other embodied subjects to appear.4 Unlike empiricism (Behaviorism), which understands the body as an ob ject among other objects, or intellectualism (Idealism), which recognizes the body as an extension of consciousness, here the body is taken up as a lived-body, as incarnate-subjectivity, which is inseparable from the world. Shabot describes this process as follows: In perception, thus a deep ambiguity takes place regarding the rela tionship of subject-object: no apparent distance separates the subject from the object in perception, and the object is recognized only as the sum of multiple subject perspectives of it, from his/her concrete position. By theorizing flesh body and world in this manner, both becomes "intervolved" within a system of meaning that can never be viewed in isolation. Ultimately, then, this relationship between individual and world reveals the situated nature of our existence which both acts and is acted upon by the world. "The body is the vehicle of being in the world, and having a body means being united with a definite milieu, merging with certain projects, and being perpetually engaged therein." Merleau-Ponty's theory of the body becomes the description by which human existence is situated and its specific meanings experienced and lived. It becomes the point from which we take up the projects of our lived-experience. The intervolvement with world, according to Merleau- Ponty, becomes the ground from which existence rises up to embrace a world and by so doing gives birth to a contextualized constellation of meaning. These meanings are not independent of me, they inhabit me and I them. The context, in which I find myself, is one that also extends beyond me, taking in a world shared by others, and it is through this shared relationship with the world that the other becomes recognizable to me. But how does this recognition of the other come about?” (173-175)  

Our epistemology and structure of recognition has been overtaken by white value. Dominant forms of knowledge production are antiblack. Warren ‘15 (Calvin Warren “Black Nihilism and the Politics of Hope” CR: The New Centennial Review, Vol. 15, No. 1, 2015, pp. 215–248 — KW)
“The problem that confronts the black nihilist is one of epistemology, especially¶ when the dominant epistemology privileges metaphysical forms of antiblack¶ organizations of knowledge. The field of knowledge is uneven and¶ reflects the asymmetrical power relations that sustain anti-black violence in¶ modernity. The difficulty in expressing black nihilistic thought is that it is¶ situated in the tense space between hermeneutics and epistemology. If we¶ think of epistemology as an anti-black formation, then every appeal to it will¶ reproduce the very metaphysical violence that is the source of black suffering.¶ Nihilistic Hermeneutics allows us to fracture epistemology, to chip away at its¶ metaphysical science, and to enunciate from within this fissure. Vattimo¶ provides a cogent explanation of the distinction between epistemology and hermeneutics in his reading of Richard Rorty’s Philosophy and the Mirror of¶ Reflection (1981 ): ‘ Epistemology is founded on the presumption that all discourses are commensurate with and translatable among each other, and that the foundation of their truth consists precisely in this translation into a basic language, that is, the one which mirrors facts themselves. Hermeneutics instead admits that there is no such single unifying language, and tries to appropriate the language of the other rather than translate into its own tongue . . . Epistemology is the discourse of normal science, while hermeneutics is discourse about as yet incommensurable discourses. (Vattimo 1988, 149) Read through the register of anti-blackness, we can understand epistemology as the violent attempt at discursive and linguistic unification—the compulsion to establish a unifying ground of language. Because blackness is placed outside of the “customary lexis of life and culture,” as Hortense Spillers (2003 ) reminds us, blackness speaks an inassimilable language, an “anti-grammar” that resists linguistic/epistemological domination—what we call “translation” (221 ). Anti-black epistemology is somewhat schizophrenic in its aim: it at once posits blackness as an anti-grammatical entity—paradoxically, a nonfoundation-foundation that provides the condition of possibility for its own existence—and at the same time, and in stunning contradiction, it forces a translation of this anti-grammar into a system of understanding that is designed to exclude it. This tension between grammatical exclusion and compulsory inclusion is part of the violence of captivity. A hermeneutical practice that acknowledges the impossible translation of blackness without forcing its annihilation (through translation/domination) is the only way we can understand the nihilist. Put another way, black nihilism shatters the coherence of anti-black epistemology and cannot be “known,” or rendered legible, through traditional epistemology.”

The State survives and reproduces itself and its white norms through the politics of hope. False hope traps black individuals into a continuous cycle of evolving antiblack violence. Warren ‘15 (Calvin Warren “Black Nihilism and the Politics of Hope” CR: The New Centennial Review, Vol. 15, No. 1, 2015, pp. 215–248 — KW)
“Within this piece, we get a sense that black fidelity to the Political is tantamount to the Lacanian notion of drive —one perpetuates a system designed to annihilate—participation, then, follows another logic. The act of voting, according to Farred, is legitimate in and of itself; it is a means as an end  (or a means without an end, if we follow Agamben’s logic 2000 ). The means, the praxis of voting, is all there is without an end in sight. African American political participation is an interminable cycle of reproduction, a continuous practice of reproducing the means of reproduction itself. This irrational fidelity to a means without an end gives rise to “the politics of despair” representation for its own sake and the apotheosis of singular figures—and a politics without hope: ‘ African American fidelity, however, takes its distance from Pauline “hope”—like faith, hope is predicated upon a complex admixture of expectations and difference. In this respect, the African American vote is not, as in the colloquial sense, hopeful: it has not expectations of a shining city appearing upon an ever distant, ever retreating, hill in the unnamed-able future. Fidelity represents the anti-Pauline politics in that its truth, its only truth, resides in praxis. (223)‘  This brilliant analysis compels us to rethink political rationality and the value in “means”—as a structuring agent by itself. What I would like to think  through, however, is the distinction between “hope” and “despair” and “expectations” and “object.” Whereas Farred understands political participation as an act without a political object, or recognizable outcome—without an “end,” if we think of “end” and “object” as synonyms—I would suggest that the Politics of Hope reconfigures despair and expectation so that black political action pursues an impossible object .We can describe this contradictory object as the lure of metaphysical political activity: every act brings one closer to a “not-yet-social order.” What one achieves, then, and expects is “closer.” The political object that black participation encircles endlessly, like the Laconian drive and its object, is the idea  of linear proximity—we can call this “progress,” “betterment,” or “more perfect.” This idea of achieving the impossible allows one to disregard the historicity of anti-blackness and its continued legacy and conceive of political engagement as bringing one incrementally closer to that which does not exist—one’s impossible object. In this way, the Politics of hope recasts despair as possibility, struggle as triumph, and lack as propinquity.  This impossible object is not tethered to real history, so it is unassailable and irrefutable because it is the object of political fantasy.  The politics of hope, then, constitutes what Lauren Berlant would call “cruel optimism” for blacks (Berlant 2011 ). It bundles certain promises about redress, equality, freedom, justice, and progress into a political object that always lies beyond reach. The objective of the Political is to keep blacks in a relation to this political object—in an unending pursuit of it. This pursuit, however, is detrimental because it strengthens the very anti-black system that would pulverize black being. The pursuit of the object certainly has an “irrational” aspect to it, as Farred details, but it is not mere means without expectation; instead, it is a means that undermines the attainment of the impossible object desired. In other words, the pursuit marks a cruel attachment to the means of subjugation and the continued widening of the gap between historical reality and fantastical ideal. Black nihilism is a “demythifying” practice, in the Nietzschean vein, that uncovers the subjugating strategies of political hope and de-idealizes its fantastical object. Once we denude political hope of its axiological and ethical veneer, we see that it operates through certain strategies: 1 ) positing itself as the only alternative to the problem of anti-blackness, 2 ) shielding this alter native from rigorous historical/philosophical critique by placing it in an unknown future, 3 ) delimiting the field of action to include only activity recognized and legitimated by the Political, and 4 ) demonizing critiques or different philosophical perspectives.”

The only possibility of liberation starts with a strong nihilism that self excommunicates from the state in order to find new meaning and values outside of the values constructed by the state- the alt is to cede the political entirely. Warren ‘15 (Calvin Warren “Black Nihilism and the Politics of Hope” CR: The New Centennial Review, Vol. 15, No. 1, 2015, pp. 215–248 — KW)
“The black nihilist recognizes that relying on the Political and its grammar¶ offers nothing more than a ruse of transformation and an exploited hope.¶ Instead of atheism, the black nihilist would embrace political apostasy : it is the¶ act of abandoning or renouncing a situation of unethicality and immorality— in this sense, the Political itself. The apostate is a figure that “self excommunicates” him-/herself from a body that is contrary to its fundamental belief system. As political apostate, the black nihilist renounces the idol of anti-blackness but refuses to participate in the ruse of replacing one idol with another. The Political and God—the just and true God in Carter’s analysis— are incommensurate and inimical. This is not to suggest that we can exclude God, but that any recourse to the Political results in an immorality not in alignment with Godly principles (a performative contradiction). The project to align God with the Political (political theology) will inevitably fail. If anti blackness is contrary to our beliefs, self-excommunication, in other words “black nihilism,” is the only position that seems consistent

Tournament: Harvard Westlake | Round: 3 | Opponent: PCDS PW | Judge: Varad Agarwala
The 1AC's endorsing of "democracy to come" relies on metaphysical constructs that depend on the continuance of anti-black violence.
Warren 15
Warren, Calvin. Assistant Professor at George Washington University, “Black Nihilism and the Politics of Hope”: The New Centennial Review, Vol. 15, No. 1, 2015, pp. 215–248
For the black nihilist, anti-blackness is metaphysics. It is the system of thought and organization of existence that structures the relationship between object/subject, human/animal, rational/irrational, and free/enslaved—essentially, the categories that constitute the field of Ontology. Thus, the social rationalization, loss of individuality, economic expansionism, and technocratic domination that both Vattimo and Heidegger analyze actually depend on anti-blackness.5 Metaphysics, then, is unthinkable without anti-blackness. Neither Heidegger nor Vattimo explores this aspect of Being’s oblivion—it is the literal destruction of black bodies that provide the psychic, economic, and philosophical resources for modernity to objectify, forget, and ultimately obliterate Being (nonmetaphysical Being). We might then consider black captivity in the modern world as the “perfection” of metaphysics, its shameful triumph, because through the violent technology of slavery Being itself was so thoroughly devastated. Personality became property, as Hortense Spillers would describe it, and with this transubstantiation, Being was objectified, infused with exchange value, and rendered malleable within a sociopolitical order. In short, Being lost its integrity with the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade; at that moment in history, it finally became possible for an aggressive metaphysics to exercise obscene power—the ability to turn a “human” into a “thing.” The captive is fractured on both the Ontological and ontic levels. This violent transubstantiation leaves little room for the hopeful escape from metaphysics t

hat Heidegger envisions. Can the black-as-object lay claim to DaSein? And if so, how exactly does hermeneutic nihilism restore Being to that which is an object? If we perform a “philosophy of history,” as Vattimo would advise, we understand that metaphysicians, and even those we now consider “post- metaphysicians,” constructed the rational subject against the nonreasoning black, who, according to Hegel, Kant, Hume, and even Nietzsche was situated outside of history, moral law, and consciousness (Bernasconi 2003; Judy 1993; and Mills 1998). It is not enough, then, to suggest that metaphysics engenders forms of violence as a necessity, as a byproduct; thinking itself is structured by anti-blackness from the very start. Any postmetaphysical project that does not take this into account will inevitably reproduce the very structures of thought that it would dismantle. Hermeneutic nihilism provides a discursive frame to understand the intransigence of metaphysics as the residue of anti-blackness in the contemporary moment. The black nihilist, however, must part ways with Vattimo concerning the question of emancipation. For Vattimo, hermeneutic nihilism avoids “passive nihilism.” Passive nihilism is characterized by strands of fatalism or by melancholic nostalgia for lost foundations. To avoid this situation, Vattimo introduces hermeneutics as an alternative to passive nihilism and conceives of hermeneutics as the natural result of an accomplished nihilism—namely, after the weakening of metaphysical Being, hermeneutics replaces metaphysics as a self-consuming “foundation.” He attempts to move beyond the metaphysical remnants found in the theories of Gadamer, Ricoeur, and Wittgenstein and think of hermeneutics as competing interpretations that reduce the violence of secure foundations. This of course provides the possibility for a radical democracy and a reconfiguration of Ethics, Law, and the Political. Ultimately, this weakening of metaphysical Being allows the human to project him-/ herself in the world, what Vattimo calls “projectionality,” and engage in the unique project that constitutes existence. This is the crux of emancipation for Vattimo. We, ironically, find ourselves back in the province of “progress,” “hope,” “betterment,” all the metaphysical instruments that constrain the very life that he would emancipate. This, of course, is unavoidable, for he can only twist these concepts and reclaim them as part of a postmetaphysical agenda. Vattimo’s hermeneutic nihilism is not very much different than political theology and democratic liberalism. It is a discourse of hope, a politics of hope that advances the belief that we can weaken metaphysics and reduce suffering, violence, and pain. When it comes to black suffering, however, we are compelled to hold up the mirror of historicity and inquire about the possibilities of emancipation for the black-as-object. Anti-blackness is the residue that remains, the intransigent substance that makes it impossible to destroy metaphysics completely. The black nihilist must confront this residue, but with the understanding that the eradication of this residue would truly end the world itself. Black emancipation is world destructive; it is not an aperture or an opening for future possibilities and political reconfigurations (Wilderson 2010). The “end of the world” that Vattimo envisions does not take into account that pulverized black bodies sustain the world—its institutions, economic systems, environment, theologies, philosophies, and so forth. Be- cause anti-blackness infuses itself into every fabric of social existence, it is impossible to emancipate blacks without literally destroying the world. More- over, this means that black emancipation will not yield a new world or possibilities for reorganization—black emancipation is the nihilistic “solution” that would destroy the field of all possible solutions. In this sense, black emancipation becomes something like death for the world—with all its Heideggerian valences. Black bodies and black suffering, then, pose a problem for emancipatory logic. If literal black bodies sustain modernity and metaphysics—through various forms of captivity, terror, and subjection—then what would emancipation entail for blacks?

Tournament: Harvard Westlake | Round: 3 | Opponent: PCDS PW | Judge: Varad Agarwala
Politics are structurally anti-black—claiming we should push for progress generates cruel optimism that supports the propogation of more anti-black violence.
Warren 15
Warren, Calvin. Assistant Professor at George Washington University, “Black Nihilism and the Politics of Hope”: The New Centennial Review, Vol. 15, No. 1, 2015, pp. 215–248  
The politics of hope, then, constitutes what Lauren Berlant would call “cruel optimism” for blacks (Berlant 2011). It bundles certain promises about redress, equality, freedom, justice, and progress into a political object that always lies beyond reach. The objective of the Political is to keep blacks in a relation to this political object—in an unending pursuit of it. This pursuit, however, is detrimental because it strengthens the very anti-black system that would pulverize black being. The pursuit of the object certainly has an “irrational” aspect to it, as Farred details, but it is not mere means without expectation; instead, it is a means that undermines the attainment of the impossible object desired. In other words, the pursuit marks a cruel attachment to the means of subjugation and the continued widening of the gap between histor- ical reality and fantastical ideal. Black nihilism is a “demythifying” practice, in the Nietzschean vein, that uncovers the subjugating strategies of political hope and de-idealizes its fantastical object. Once we denude political hope of its axiological and ethical veneer, we see that it operates through certain strategies: 1) positing itself as the only alternative to the problem of anti-blackness, 2) shielding this alter- native from rigorous historical/philosophical critique by placing it in an un- known future, 3) delimiting the eld of action to include only activity recog- nized and legitimated by the Political, and 4) demonizing critiques or different philosophical perspectives. The politics of hope masks a particular cruelty under the auspices of “happiness” and “life.” It terrifies with the dread of “no alternative.” “Life” itself needs the security of the alternative, and, through this logic, life becomes untenable without it. Political hope promises to provide this alternative—a discursive and political organization beyond extant structures of violence and destruction. The construction of the binary “alternative/no-alternative” ensures the hegemony and dominance of political hope within the onto-existential horizon. The terror of the “no alternative”—the ultimate space of decay, suffering, and death—depends on two additional binaries: “problem/ solution” and “action/inaction.” According to this politics, all problems have solutions, and hope provides the accessibility and realization of these solutions. The solution establishes itself as the elimination of “the problem”; the solution, in fact, transcends the problem and realizes Hegel’s aufheben in its constant attempt to sublate the dirtiness of the “problem” with the pristine being of the solution. No problem is outside the reach of hope’s solution— every problem is connected to the kernel of its own eradication. The politics of hope must actively refuse the possibility that the “solution” is, in fact, another problem in disguised form; the idea of a “solution” is nothing more than the repetition and disavowal of the problem itself. The solution relies on what we might call the “trick of time” to fortify itself from the deconstruction of its binary. Because the temporality of hope is a time “not-yet-realized,” a future tense unmoored from present-tense justifications and pragmatist evidence, the politics of hope cleverly shields its “solutions” from critiques of impossibility or repetition. Each insistence that these solutions stand up against the lessons of history or the rigors of analysis is met with the rationale that these solutions are not subject to history or analysis because they do not reside within the horizon of the “past” or “pres- ent.” Put differently, we can never ascertain the ef cacy of the proposed solutions because they escape the temporality of the moment, always retreat- ing to a “not-yet” and “could-be” temporality. This “trick” of time offers a promise of possibility that can only be realized in an inde nite future, and this promise is a bond of uncertainty that can never be redeemed, only imagined. In this sense, the politics of hope is an instance of the psychoanalytic notion of desire: its sole purpose is to reproduce its very condition of possibility, never to satiate or bring ful llment. This politics secures its hegemony through time by claiming the future as its unassailable property and excluding (and deval- uing) any other conception of time that challenges this temporal ordering. The politics of hope, then, depends on the incessant (re)production and proliferation of problems to justify its existence. Solutions cannot really exist within the politics of hope, just the illusion of a different order in a future tense. The “trick” of time and political solution converge on the site of “action.” In critiquing the politics of hope, one encounters the rejoinder of the dangers of inaction. “But we can’t just do nothing! We have to do something.” The field of permissible action is delimited and an unrelenting binary between action/ inaction silences critical engagement with political hope. These exclusionary operations rigorously reinforce the binary between action and inaction and discredit certain forms of engagement, critique, and protest. Legitimate action takes place in the political—the political not only claims futurity but also action as its property. To “do something” means that this doing must translate into recognizable political activity; “something” is a stand-in for the word “politics”—one must “do politics” to address any problem. A refusal to “do politics” is equivalent to “doing nothing”—this nothingness is constructed as the antithesis of life, possibility, time, ethics, and morality (a “zero-state” as Julia Kristeva 1982 might call it). Black nihilism rejects this “trick of time” and the lure of emancipatory solutions. To refuse to “do politics” and to reject the fantastical object of politics is the only “hope” for blackness in an anti- black world.
“Progress” does not exist, anti-black violence is only increasing as the very structures of anti-blackness only take new political forms.
Warren 15
Warren, Calvin. Assistant Professor at George Washington University, “Black Nihilism and the Politics of Hope”: The New Centennial Review, Vol. 15, No. 1, 2015, pp. 215–248
Perverse juxtapositions structure our relation to the Political. This becomes even more apparent and problematic when we consider the position of blacks within this structuring.1 On the one hand, our Declaration of Independence proclaims, “All men are created equal,” and yet black captives were fractioned in this political arithmetic as three- fifths of this “man.” The remainder, the two- fifths, gets lost within the arithmetic shuffle of commerce and mercenary prerogatives. We, of course, hoped that the Reconstruction Amendments would correct this arithmetical error and finally provide an ontological equation, or an existential variable, that would restore fractured and fractioned black being. This did not happen. Black humanity became somewhat of an “imaginary number” in this equation, purely speculative and nice in theory but difficult to actualize or translate into something tangible. Poll taxes, grandfather clauses, literacy tests, and extra-legal and legal violence made a mockery of the 14th Amendment, and the convict leasing system turned the 13th Amendment inside out for blacks. Yet, we approach this political perversity with a certain apodictic certainty and incontrovertible hope that things will (and do) get better. The Political, we are told, provides the material or substance of our hope; it is within the Political that we are to find, if we search with vigilance and work tirelessly, the “answer” to the ontological equation— hard work, suffering, and diligence will restore the fractioned three- fifths with its alienated two-fifths and, finally, create One that we can include in our declaration that “All men are created equal.” We are still awaiting this “event.” Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. placed great emphasis on the restoration of black being through suffering and diligence in his sermon “The American Dream” (1965): And I would like to say to you this morning what I’ve tried to say all over this nation, what I believe rmly: that in seeking to make the dream a reality we must use and adopt a proper method. I’m more convinced than ever before that violence is impractical and immoral . . . we need not hate; we need not use violence. We can stand up against our most violent opponent and say: we will match your capacity to in ict suffering by our capacity to endure suffering. We will meet your physical force with soul force. Do to us what you will and we will still love you . . . we will go to in those jails and transform them from dungeons of shame to havens of freedom and human dignity. Send your hooded perpetrators of violence into our communities after night and drag us out on some wayside road and beat us and leave us half dead, and as difficult as it is, we will still love you. . . . Threaten our children and bomb our churches, and as dif cult as it is, we will still love you. But be assured that we will ride you down by our capacity to suffer. One day we will win our freedom, but we will not only win it for ourselves, we will so appeal to your hearts and conscience that we will win you in the process. And our victory will be double. The American dream, then, is realized through black suffering. It is the humiliated, incarcerated, mutilated, and terrorized black body that serves as the vestibule for the Democracy that is to come. In fact, it almost becomes impossible to think the Political without black suffering. According to this logic, corporeal fracture engenders ontological coherence, in a political arithmetic saturated with violence. Thus, nonviolence is a misnomer, or somewhat of a ruse. Black-sacrifice is necessary to achieve the American dream and its promise of coherence, progress, and equality. We find similar logic in the contemporary moment. Renisha McBride, Jordon Davis, Kody Ingham, Amadou Diallo, Aiyana Stanley-Jones, Frederick Jermain Carter, Chavis Carter, Timothy Stansbury, Hadiya Pendleton, Oscar Grant, Sean Bell, Kendrec McDade, Trayvon Martin, and Mike Brown, among others, constitute a fatal rupture of the Political; these signifiers, stained in blood, refuse the closure that the Political promises. They haunt political discourses of progress, betterment, equality, citizenship, and justice—the metaphysical organization of social existence. We are witnessing a shocking accumulation of injured and mutilated black bodies, particularly young black bodies, which place what seems to be an unanswerable question mark in the political field: if we are truly progressing toward this “society-that-is-to-come (maybe),” why is black suffering increasing at such alarming rates? In response to this inquiry, we are told to keep struggling, keep “hope” alive, and keep the faith. After George Zimmerman was acquitted for murdering Trayvon Martin, President Obama addressed the nation and importuned us to keep fighting for change because “each successive generation seems to be making progress in changing attitudes toward race” and, if we work hard enough, we will move closer to “becoming a more perfect union.” Despite Martin’s corpse lingering in the minds of young people and Zimmerman’s smile of relief after the verdict, we are told that things are actually getting better. Supposedly, the generation that murdered Trayvon Martin and Renisha McBride is much better than the generation that murdered Emmett Till. Black suffering, here, is instrumentalized to accomplish pedagogical, cathartic, and redemptive objectives and, somehow, the growing number of dead black bodies in the twenty-first century is an indication of our progress to- ward “perfection.” Is perfection predicated on black death? How many more black bodies must be lynched, mutilated, burned, castrated, raped, dismembered, shot, and disabled before we achieve this “more perfect union”? In many ways, black suffering and death become the premiere vehicles of political perfection and social maturation. This essay argues that the logic of the Political—linear temporality, bio- political futurity, perfection, betterment, and redress—sustains black suffering. Progress and perfection are worked through the pained black body and any recourse to the Political and its discourse of hope will ultimately reproduce the very metaphysical structures of violence that pulverize black being. This piece attempts to rescue black nihilism from discursive and intellectual obliteration; rather than thinking about black nihilism as a set of pathologies in need of treatment, this essay considers black nihilism a necessary philosophical posture capable of unraveling the Political and its devastating logic of political hope. Black nihilism resists emancipatory rhetoric that assumes it is possible to purge the Political of anti-black violence and advances political apostasy as the only “ethical” response to black suffering.
The alternative is political apostasy. The only ethical action is self-excommunication from metaphysical structures of violence.
Warren 15
Warren, Calvin. Assistant Professor at George Washington University, “Black Nihilism and the Politics of Hope”: The New Centennial Review, Vol. 15, No. 1, 2015, pp. 215–248
“The black nihilist recognizes that relying on the Political and its grammar¶ offers nothing more than a ruse of transformation and an exploited hope.¶ Instead of atheism, the black nihilist would embrace political apostasy : it is the¶ act of abandoning or renouncing a situation of unethicality and immorality— in this sense, the Political itself. The apostate is a figure that “self excommunicates” him-/herself from a body that is contrary to its fundamental belief system. As political apostate, the black nihilist renounces the idol of anti-blackness but refuses to participate in the ruse of replacing one idol with another. The Political and God—the just and true God in Carter’s analysis— are incommensurate and inimical. This is not to suggest that we can exclude God, but that any recourse to the Political results in an immorality not in alignment with Godly principles (a performative contradiction). The project to align God with the Political (political theology) will inevitably fail. If anti blackness is contrary to our beliefs, self-excommunication, in other words “black nihilism,” is the only position that seems consistent

Tournament: Strake RR | Round: 3 | Opponent: Earl Warren NO | Judge: Lonam, Navanati
A focus on materiality is important – without debate being about concrete policies we end up engaging in abstract ideal theory that says lets be epistemically disobedient but not actually explain what the hell that does for oppressed bodies
Curry 14 Dr. Tommy J. Curry The Cost of a Thing: A Kingian Reformulation of a Living Wage Argument in the 21st Century. 2014
Despite the pronouncement of debate as an activity and intellectual exercise pointing to the real world consequences of dialogue, thinking, and (personal) politics when addressing issues of racism, sexism, economic disparity, global conflicts, and death, many of the discussions concerning these ongoing challenges to humanity are fixed to a paradigm which sees the adjudication of material disparities and sociological realities as the conquest of one ideal theory over the other. In “Ideal Theory as Ideology,” Charles Mills outlines the problem contemporary theoretical-performance styles in policy debate and value-weighing in Lincoln-Douglass are confronted with in their attempts to get at the concrete problems in our societies. At the outset, Mills concedes that “ideal theory applies to moral theory as a whole (at least to normative ethics as against metaethics); since ethics deals by definition with normative/prescriptive/evaluative issues, it is set against factual/descriptive issues.”At the most general level, the conceptual chasm between what emerges as actual problems in the world (e.g.: racism, sexism, poverty, disease, etc.) and how we frame such problems theoretically—the assumptions and shared ideologies we depend upon for our problems to be heard and accepted as a worthy “problem” by an audience—is the most obvious call for an anti-ethical paradigm, since such a paradigm insists on the actual as the basis of what can be considered normatively. Mills, however, describes this chasm as a problem of an ideal-as-descriptive model which argues that for any actual-empirical-observable social phenomenon (P), an ideal of (P) is necessarily a representation of that phenomenon. In the idealization of a social phenomenon (P), one “necessarily has to abstract away from certain features” of (P) that is observed before abstraction occurs. This gap between what is actual(in the world), and what is represented by theories and politics of debaters proposed in rounds threatens any real discussions about the concrete nature of oppression and the racist economic structures which necessitate tangible policies and reorienting changes in our value orientations. 

Becoming is impossible where oppression stops the process: material policy is key
Braidotti 06 The Ethics of Becoming Imperceptible By Prof. Rosi Braidotti Utrecht University Deleuze and Philosophy, ed. Constantin Boundas, Edinburgh University Press: Edinburgh, 2006, pp. 133-159.
We lost so many of its specimen to dead-end experimentations of the existential, political, sexual, narcotic, or technological kind. Although it is true that we lost as many if not more of our members to the stultifying inertia of the status quo - a sort of generalized ‘Stepford wives’ syndrome - it is nonetheless the case that I have developed an acute awareness of how difficult changes are. Which is not meant as a deterrent against them, on the contrary: I think that the current political climate has placed undue emphasis on the risks involved in pursuing social changes, playing ad nauseam the refrain about the death of ideologies. Such a conservative reaction aims at disciplining the citizens and reducing their desire for the ‘new’ to docile and compulsive forms of consumerism. Nothing could be further removed from my project than this approach. I simply want to issue a cautionary note: processes of change and transformation are so important and ever so vital and necessary, that they have to be handled with care. The concept of ethical sustainability addresses these complex issues. We have to take pain into account as a major incentive for and not only an obstacle to, an ethics of changes and transformations. We need also to rethink the knowing subject in terms of affectivity, inter-relationality, territories, eco- philosophical resources, locations and forces. In so doing, we shall take our final leave from the spatio-temporal continuum of classical humanism, though not necessarily from its ideals. The nomadic ethico-political project focuses on becomings as a pragmatic philosophy that stresses the need to act, to experiment with different modes of constituting subjectivity and different ways of inhabiting our corporeality. Accordingly, nomadic ethics is not about a master theory, but rather about multiple micro-political modes of daily activism. As we shall see, it is essential to put the ‘active’ back into activism.
Turns case- focus on the abstract instead of policy further subjugates those the kritik seeks to help.  The kritik is simply a “feel good” excuse for inaction
Jill Taft-Kaufman 95 , Speech prof @ CMU, 1995, Southern Comm. Journal, Spring, v. 60, Iss. 3, “Other Ways”
The postmodern passwords of "polyvocality," "Otherness," and "difference," unsupported by substantial analysis of the concrete contexts of subjects, creates a solipsistic quagmire. The political sympathies of the new cultural critics, with their ostensible concern for the lack of power experienced by marginalized people, aligns them with the political left. Yet, despite their adversarial posture and talk of opposition, their discourses on intertextuality and inter-referentiality isolate them from and ignore the conditions that have produced leftist politics--conflict, racism, poverty, and injustice. In short, as Clarke (1991) asserts, postmodern emphasis on new subjects conceals the old subjects, those who have limited access to good jobs, food, housing, health care, and transportation, as well as to the media that depict them. Merod (1987) decries this situation as one which leaves no vision, will, or commitment to activism. He notes that academic lip service to the oppositional is underscored by the absence of focused collective or politically active intellectual communities. Provoked by the academic manifestations of this problem Di Leonardo (1990) echoes Merod and laments:  Has there ever been a historical era characterized by as little radical analysis or activism and as much radical-chic writing as ours? Maundering on about Otherness: phallocentrism or Eurocentric tropes has become a lazy academic substitute for actual engagement with the detailed histories and contemporary realities of Western racial minorities, white women, or any Third World population. (p. 530) Clarke's assessment of the postmodern elevation of language to the "sine qua non" of critical discussion is an even stronger indictment against the trend. Clarke examines Lyotard's (1984) The Postmodern Condition in which Lyotard maintains that virtually all social relations are linguistic, and, therefore, it is through the coercion that threatens speech that we enter the "realm of terror" and society falls apart. To this assertion, Clarke replies:  I can think of few more striking indicators of the political and intellectual impoverishment of a view of society that can only recognize the discursive. If the worst terror we can envisage is the threat not to be allowed to speak, we are appallingly ignorant of terror in its elaborate contemporary forms. It may be the intellectual's conception of terror (what else do we do but speak?), but its projection onto the rest of the world would be calamitous....(pp. 2-27) The realm of the discursive is derived from the requisites for human life, which are in the physical world, rather than in a world of ideas or symbols.(4) Nutrition, shelter, and protection are basic human needs that require collective activity for their fulfillment. Postmodern emphasis on the discursive without an accompanying analysis of how the discursive emerges from material circumstances hides the complex task of envisioning and working towards concrete social goals (Merod, 1987). Although the material conditions that create the situation of marginality escape the purview of the postmodernist, the situation and its consequences are not overlooked by scholars from marginalized groups. Robinson (1990) for example, argues that "the justice that working people deserve is economic, not just textual" (p. 571). Lopez (1992) states that "the starting point for organizing the program content of education or political action must be the present existential, concrete situation" (p. 299). West (1988) asserts that borrowing French post-structuralist discourses about "Otherness" blinds us to realities of American difference going on in front of us (p. 170). Unlike postmodern "textual radicals" who Rabinow (1986) acknowledges are "fuzzy about power and the realities of socioeconomic constraints" (p. 255), most writers from marginalized groups are clear about how discourse interweaves with the concrete circumstances that create lived experience. People whose lives form the material for postmodern counter-hegemonic discourse do not share the optimism over the new recognition of their discursive subjectivities, because such an acknowledgment does not address sufficiently their collective historical and current struggles against racism, sexism, homophobia, and economic injustice. They do not appreciate being told they are living in a world in which there are no more real subjects. Ideas have consequences. Emphasizing the discursive self when a person is hungry and homeless represents both a cultural and humane failure. The need to look beyond texts to the perception and attainment of concrete social goals keeps writers from marginalized groups ever-mindful of the specifics of how power works through political agendas, institutions, agencies, and the budgets that fuel them.

Tournament: TFA | Round: Doubles | Opponent: Clear Brook GR | Judge: VIncent, Andrews, Davies
Discourse affects our ability to effect change meaning the CP is logically prior
 Haste writes:

Helen Haste, PhD of Psychology at the University of Bath, “Communitarianism and the Social Construction of Morality”, 1998. NC

Communitarian thinkers start from a very different psychological tradition. They emphasise the primacy of language and social interaction in the generation of meaning is important. Taylor argues that human life is ‘fundamentally dialogic …. We become full human agents, capable of understanding ourselves, and hence defining an identity, through our acquisition of rich human languages of expression.’ (1991 p 32). This aligns the communitarian ontological position with social constructionists like John Shotter (1993) and Rom HarrZ (HarrZ and Gillett, 1994) who argue that the primary human reality is face-to-face conversation. If social interaction is the crucible of meaning, then the child learns about morality through discourse and through social practices, both explicit and implicit. The ‘meaning’ of something – including the meaning of our own identity and our morality – depends on what is comprehensible and recognized within our social community. Social beings create their identity through shared discourse and language (Shotter, 1993). Communities are multiple; we are members of many communities which each offer us identity, and personal meaning, and within each different elements and skills are salient. Cultural narratives, stories and traditions feed directly into our identity, signaling valued attributes and behaviours, and giving an explanation for our past and present. Crucially, we also recognize that these are shared by those whom we thus define as members of our community. A moral obligation can only have meaning within a social context. Richard Shweder describes taboos and practices found amongst rural Hindus in India which are quite morally meaningless to Americans, because they are associated with beliefs about pollution which are not shared (Shweder et al, 1987). However practices may be widely condemned, but for different reasons – believing that rape is wrong because it defiles the victim’s purity, is very different from seeing it as wrong because treats her as an object rather than a person.
 

the term DV excludes LGBT victims- California empirically proves
Fountain 2: 

Kim Fountain et al PH.D, Deputy Director New York City Anti-Violence Project, "Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer Domestic violence in the united states in 2008" The National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs www.avp.org/documents/2008NCAVPLGBTQDVReportFINAL.pdf FD

―Intimate Partner Violence‖ and ―Domestic Violence‖ - Distinctions Between the Terms Use of the term “domestic violence” to describe violence in LGBTQ intimate relationships has been disfavored by some feminist researchers. They contend that the language of “domesticity” reflects the patriarchy and hetero-normative tendencies of the law from which it springs, obscuring the dimensions of gender and power at play. These tendencies have various expressions in state law, but even those with provisions around LGBTQ intimate partnerships tend exhibit some form of sanctioned discrimination in either text or practice. For example, in order to access a legal remedy under in California‟s Domestic Violence Protection Act (“DVPA”), one must fall into one of the Act‟s categories of “protected persons,” as well as demonstrate, to the Court‟s satisfaction, “reasonable proof of a past act or acts of abuse.” Categories of “protected persons” under the Act include being the Spouse, Cohabitant, Co-parent, Child, or Blood relative to the alleged perpetrator, or sharing a Dating or Engagement Relationship with the alleged perpetrator. Thus, there is no conduct which alone is sufficient to satisfy the extension of domestic civil protection orders; whatever proofs the alleged victim provides of a past act (or acts) of abuse by the alleged perpetrator, no protection order will be granted without establishing also that the relationship between the alleged victim and the alleged perpetrator is one which the Act anticipated in crafting the law.

That turns case because LGBTQ intimate partnerships are excluded from the law, so they aren’t protected, increasing discriminatory abuse.

the term “domestic” justifies continued violence against the victim because it makes people think it is a private matter that is not our business
 Rivera:
Jenny Rivera Professor of Law at the City University of New York Violence Against Women Act and the Construction of Multiple Consciousness in the Civil Rights and Feminist Movement,”, 1995. FD
Violence against women by intimate partners is commonly referred to as “domestic violence.” In previous articles, I have voiced my opposition to the use of the word “domestic” as a qualifier for this category of violence because it characterizes violence against women by current and former spouces and lovers as sufficiently distinct from all other forms of violence so as to justify wholly different, sometimes, inadequate, sanctionings of such violence. See Jenny Rivera, Domestic Violence Against Latinas by Latino Males: An Analysis of Race, National Origin, and Gender Differentials, 14 B.C. Third World L.J.231, 232 n.5 (1994) hereinafter domestic Violene against Latinas; Jenny Rivera, Puerto Rico’s Domestic Violence Prevention and Intervention Law and the United States Violence Against Women Act of 1994: The Limitations of Legislative Responses, 5 Colum. J. Gender and L. 78, 79 n.8 (1995) hereinafter Puerto Rico’s Domestic Violence Law. Undeniably, violence against women by these categories of perpretrators is different from other violence crimes commited by strangers or nonintimate acquantances and relatives. However, the use of “domestic” as a qualifying term does more than simply categorize based on the status of the abuser. This terminology has, in effect, “domesticized” the very act of violence and facilitated the insulation of this violence from public scrutiny and criminalized. See Elizabeth M. Schneider, The Violence of Privacy, 24 CONN. L. Rev. 973, 977 (1991) (“thus, in the so-called private sphere of “domestic” and family life, which is purportedly immune from law, there is always the selective application of law. Signifincantly, the selective application of law invokes ‘privacy’ a a rationalte for immunity in order to protect male domination.”)
This empirically causes us to ignore “domestic violence” and greater harms
Angela Battery explains:
Angela j. hattery “intimate partner violenc”
On april 16, 2007 the worst school shooting in the history of the united states – to date – took place when a gunman shot thirty-two members of the Virginia tech university campus community before turning the gun on himself and becoming the third third “victim”. Early speculation about the motive focused on a possible domestic dispute. Perhaps the most troubling aspect of this situation is the fact that many accounts of the morning of april 16, 2007, indicate that Virginia Tech’s the campus police did not immediately recognize the risk that the shooter presented to the entire Virginia tech campus because the first homicide committed that morning was believed to be a “domestic violence” homicide. Virginia tech president Charles steger said authorities believed that the shooting at the dorm was a “domestic dispute” and mistakenly thought the gunman had fled the campus. We they had no reason to suspect any other incident was going to occur he said. The events surrounding the Virginia tech shooting are troubling for many reasons, first and foremost because the decision by the Virginia tech president implies that “domestic violence” homicide is nothing to take too seriously, and certainly it does not constitute a threat to public safety in the larger community. And yet in many cases of domestic violence homicide, other victims are maimed and or murdered. Even more troubling is the fact that in examining other school shootings, a clear and disturbing pattern emerges. Beginning with the texas tower shootings at the university of texas, Austin, in 1966, many school shootings either began with or involved domestic violence homicide. In the texas tower shootings, the shooter, Charles Whitman, murdered his wife and his mother the night before the terrible rampage in Austin. Luke woodham, the school shooter in pearl, missipppiip, also began his rampge by shooting his girlfriend and mother. And, of course, the most recent tragedy at Virginia tech as believed to begin with a domestic violence homicide. In all of these cases, had law enforcement and meergecny responders taken the initla domestic violence homicide as a matter obf public safety, perhaps the greater targedies would have been avoided.

Tournament: Apple Valley | Round: 3 | Opponent: Lake Highland MC | Judge: Lily Hock
A. “Critical forms of education” force the judge into the role of coercer and defeats the purpose of critical pedagogy- outweighs their impact because its masked violence. Rickert 01
Rickert (Thomas, “"Hands Up, You're Free": Composition in a Post-Oedipal World”, JacOnline Journal,)
“An example of the connection between violence and pedagogy is implicit in the notion of being "schooled" as it has been conceptualized by Giroux and Peter Mcl.aren. They explain, "Fundamental to the principles that inform critical pedagogy is the conviction that here schooling for self- and social empowerment is ethically prior to questions of epistemology or to a mastery of technical or social skills that are primarily tied to the logic of the marketplace" (153-54). A presumption here is that it is the teacher who knows best, and this orientation gives the concept of schooling a particular bite: though it presents itself as oppositional to the state and the dominant forms of pedagogy that serve the state and its capitalist interests, it nevertheless reinscribes an authoritarian model that is congruent with any number of oedipalizing pedagogies that "school" the student in proper behavior. As Diane Davis notes, radical, feminist, and liberatory pedagogies "often it camouflage pedagogical violence in their move from one mode of 'normalization' to another" and "function within a disciplinary matrix of power, a covert carceral system, that with aims to of creatinge useful subjects for particular political agendas" (212). Such oedipalizing pedagogies are less effective in practice than what the claims for them assert; indeed, the attempt to "school" students in the manner called for by Giroux and McLaren is complicitous with the malaise of postmodern cynicism. Students will dutifully go through their liberatory motions, producing the proper assignments, but it remains an open question whether they carry an oppositional politics with them. The "critical distance" supposedly created with liberatory pedagogy also opens up a cynical distance toward the writing produced in class.”
B. They cause more social injustice by creating a cookie cutter model for every debate student. Their logic is infinitely regressive- they say X is bad because X is X. My alternative is opening curriculum to rhetoric of power AND rhetoric of contestation- rhetoric where questioning the very validity of morality is accepted - controls the internal link into an equal pedagogy. Rickert 2
(Thomas, “"Hands Up, You're Free": Composition in a Post-Oedipal World”, JacOnline Journal,)
“This essay will employ Deleuze's and Zizek's theories to illustrate the limitations of writing pedagogies that rely on modernist strategies of critical distance or political agency. Implicit in such pedagogies is the faith that teaching writing can resist dominant social practices and empower students; however, the notion that we can actually foster resistance through teaching is questionable. As Paul Mann states, "all the forms of opposition have long since revealed themselves as means of advancing it. ... The mere fact that something feels like resistance and still manages to offend a few people (usually not even the right people) hardly makes it effective" (138). In light of Mann's statement, I urge us to take the following position: teaching writing is fully complicitous with dominant social practices, and inducing students to write in accordance with institutional precepts can be as disabling as it is enabling. By disabling, I do not mean that learning certain skills-typically those most associated with current-traditional rhetorics, such as superficial forms of grammatical correctness, basic organization, syntactic clarity, and such-are not useful. Such skills are useful, and they are often those most necessary for tapping the power that writing can wield. In learning such skills, however, we should also ask what students aren’t are not learning. What other forms of writing and thinking are being foreclosed or distorted, forms of writing that have their own, different powers? If one of our goals as teachers of writing is to initiate students into rhetorics of power and resistance, we should also be equally attuned to rhetorics of contestation. Specifically, we must take on the responsibility that comes with the impossibility of knowing the areas of contention and struggle that will be the most important in our students' lives. Pedagogy could reflect this concern in its practices by attending to the idea that each student's life is its own telos, meaning that the individual struggles of each student cannot and should not necessarily mirror our own. Or, to put it another way, students must sooner or later overcome us, even though we may legitimate our sense of service with the idea that we have their best interests in mind. However, we should be suspicious of this presumptive ethic, for, as Mann astutely observes, "nothing is more aggressive than the desire to serve the other" (48)
Representations come first- you cannot weigh your policy against the kritik- we are a structural pre-requisite. Crawford 02
PhD MA MIT, BA Brown, Prof. of poli sci at boston univ.   Argument and Change in World Politics, 2002 p. 19-21
Coherent arguments are unlikely to take place unless and until actors, at least on some level, agree on what they are arguing about. The at least temporary resolution of meta-arguments- regarding the nature of the good (the content of prescriptive norms); what is out there, the way we know the world, how we decide between competing beliefs (ontology and epistemology); and the nature of the situation at hand( the proper frame or representation)- must occur before specific arguments that could lead to decision and action may take place. Meta-arguments over epistemology and ontology, relatively rare, occur in instances where there is a fundamental clash between belief systems and not simply a debate within a belief system. Such arguments over the nature of the world and how we come to know it are particularly rare in politics though they are more frequent in religion and science. Meta-arguments over the “good” are contests over what it is good and right to do, and even how we know the good and the right. They are about the nature of the good, specifically, defining the qualities of “good” so that we know good when we see it and do it. Ethical arguments are about how to do good in a particular situation. More common are meta-arguments over representations or frames- about how we out to understand a particular situation. Sometimes actors agree on how they see a situation. More often there are different possible interpretations. Thomas Homer-Dixon and Roger karapin suggest, “Argument and debate occur when people try to gain acceptance for their interpretation of the world”. For example, “is the war defensive or aggressive?”. Defining and controlling representations and images, or the frame, affects whether one thinks there is an issue at stake and whether a particular argument applies to the case. An actor fighting a defensive war is within international law; an aggressor may legitimately be subject to sanctions. Framing and reframing involve mimesis or putting forward representations of what is going on. In mimetic meta-arguments, actors who are struggling to characterize or frame the situation accomplish their ends by drawing vivid pictures of the “reality” through exaggeration, analogy, or differentiation. Representations of a situation do not re-produce accurately so much as they creatively re-present situations in a way that makes sense. “mimesis is a metaphoric or ‘iconic argumentation of the real.’ Imitating not the effectivity of events but their logical structure and meaning.” Certain features are emphasized and others de-emphasized or completely ignored as their situation is recharacterized or reframed. Representation thus becomes a “constraint on reasoning in that it limits understanding to a specific organization of conceptual knowledge.” The dominant representation delimits which arguments will be considered legitimate, framing how actors see possibities. As Roxanne Doty argues, “the possibility of practices presupposes the ability of an agent to imagine certain courses of action. Certain background meanings, kinds of social actors and relationships, must already be in place.” If, as Donald Sylvan and Stuart Thorson argue, “politics involves the selective privileging of representations, “it may not matter whether one representation or another is true or not. Emphasizing whether frames articulate accurate or inaccurate perceptions misses the rhetorical import of representation- how frames affect what is seen or not seen, and subsequent choices. Meta-arguments over representation are thus crucial elements of political argument because an actor’s arguments about what to do will be more persuasive if their characterization or framing of the situation holds sway. But, as Rodger Payne suggests, “No frame is an omnipotent persuasive tool that can be decisively wielded by norm entrepreneurs without serious political wrangling.” Hence framing is a meta-argument.

Tournament: UT | Round: Triples | Opponent: Southlake Carroll RP | Judge: Drew Burd
The negatives method to engaging in combating pre-fiat oppression is for the judge to vote on topical offense that links to a substantively justified framework. My method argues that consistency with the best liberation strategy for the oppressed requires a debate where we explain what this oppression is, how we react to it, and why it’s the only relevant impact. Each net benefit is a disad to their performance under their ROB and a reason to vote them down as they are unable to actually resolve any of their impacts.

First, their use of educational spaces as a sites of empowerment places the judge into the role of the authoritarian adjudicator who molds students in accordance to a particular political end. This kills any conception of critical citizenship and turns their performance. RICKERT:
Rickert, Thomas. ""Hands Up, You're Free": Composition in a Post-Oedipal World." JacOnline Journal
“An example of the connection between violence and pedagogy is implicit in the notion of being "schooled" as it has been conceptualized by Giroux and Peter Mclaren. They explain, "Fundamental to the principles that inform critical pedagogy is the conviction that schooling for self- and social empowerment is ethically prior to questions of epistemology or to a mastery of technical or social skills that are primarily tied to the logic of the marketplace" (153-54). A presumption here is that it is the teacher who knows (best), and this orientation gives the concept of schooling a particular bite: though it presents itself as oppositional to the state and the dominant forms of pedagogy that serve the state and its capitalist interests, it nevertheless reinscribes an authoritarian model that is congruent with any number of oedipalizing pedagogies that "school" the student in proper behavior. As Diane Davis notes, radical, feminist, and liberatory pedagogies "often camouflage pedagogical violence in their move from one mode of 'normalization' to another" and "function within a disciplinary matrix of power, a covert carceral system, that aims to create useful subjects for particular political agendas" (212). Such oedipalizing pedagogies are less effective in practice than what the claims for them assert; indeed, the attempt to "school" students in the manner called for by Giroux and McLaren is complicitous with the malaise of postmodern cynicism. Students will dutifully go through their liberatory motions, producing the proper assignments, but it remains an open question whether they carry an oppositional politics with them. The "critical distance" supposedly created with liberatory pedagogy also opens up a cynical distance toward the writing produced in class.” (299-300)

Second, their unquestionable model to oppression that justifies itself through self-reference ensures a rigid vision of resistance where the judge prescribes the student an imperialist model of education – turns their performance. RICKERT 2:  
Rickert, Thomas. ""Hands Up, You're Free": Composition in a Post-Oedipal World." JacOnline Journal
“This essay will employ Deleuze's and Zizek's theories to illustrate the limitations of writing pedagogies that rely on modernist strategies of critical distance or political agency. Implicit in such pedagogies is the faith that teaching writing can resist dominant social practices and empower students; however, the notion that we can actually foster resistance through teaching is questionable. As Paul Mann states, "all the forms of opposition have long since revealed themselves as means of advancing it. ... The mere fact that something feels like resistance and still manages to offend a few people (usually not even the right people) hardly makes it effective" (138). In light of Mann's statement, I urge us to take the following position: teaching writing is fully complicitous with dominant social practices, and inducing students to write in accordance with institutional precepts can be as disabling as it is enabling. By disabling, I do not mean that learning certain skills-typically those most associated with current-traditional rhetorics, such as superficial forms of grammatical correctness, basic organization, syntactic clarity, and such-are not useful. Such skills are useful, and they are often those most necessary for tapping the power that writing can wield. In learning such skills, however, we should also ask what students aren’t are not learning. What other forms of writing and thinking are being foreclosed or distorted, forms of writing that have their own, different powers? If one of our goals as teachers of writing is to initiate students into rhetorics of power and resistance, we should also be equally attuned to rhetorics of contestation. Specifically, we must take on the responsibility that comes with the impossibility of knowing the areas of contention and struggle that will be the most important in our students' lives. Pedagogy could reflect this concern in its practices by attending to the idea that each student's life is its own telos, meaning that the individual struggles of each student cannot and should not necessarily mirror our own. Or, to put it another way, students must sooner or later overcome us, even though we may legitimate our sense of service with the idea that we have their best interests in mind. However, we should be suspicious of this presumptive ethic, for, as Mann astutely observes, "nothing is more aggressive than the desire to serve the other” (48)

Third, saying oppression is bad without normatively justifying it is insufficient. Connecting theory to the real world is key to produce social change. A non-reflective theory only reinforces stereotypes, turns their performance. SMITH and EATON:
“Role of reflection and praxis in community-based learning and social justice work” by Toby Smith and Marie Eaton  http://cielearn.org/wp-content/themes/ciel/docs/Praxis_Social20Justice202-10.pdf
“If reflection is an interpretation of the unknown through the lens of the known, students will reflect in the only way they know, which often means applying stereotypes, repeating cliches, and describing their emotions. The emotions are often the most intense aspect of an unfamiliar situation and so students frequently focus on them. We can develop all the writing and discussion exercises we like in our attempts to encourage students to achieve a deeper level of knowledge, but if we do nothing to disrupt familiar narratives, we merely reinforce existing patterns of thought. To achieve a complex understanding of the unfamiliar, it is necessary to break with these comfortable frameworks of interpretation. Well, for me it was like I think I came into the class naively looking for answers to questions I had and then I just came up with more questions which gave me more answers to ask more questions and it just kept going and going and going. (Mary-Jayne – interview) If we are to encourage students to challenge comfortable old orthodoxies, they must be prepared before they engage with the community and learn new conceptual tools and receive relevant substantive information continually. As Jack Mezirow notes, “We have a strong tendency to reject ideas that fail to fit our preconceptions....” These are powerful and tenacious truths that come from “cultural assimilation” and “primary caregivers” (Mezirow 1997) ”. It is very difficult to challenge the apparently coherent and unquestionable authority of home, church, and state. Reflection per se does not necessarily require that we critically evaluate our assumptions. Moreover, in our consumerist, often anti-intellectual culture, pragmatism trumps philosophy. “Just do it.” All this social change work I had done prior to the social change series had really been ...just ... getting in these organizations that...told me what to do and I went out and did it. (Mary-Jayne – interview) The greatest part of this class for me was the praxis work, and having a space, both oral and written to reflect, analyze, and evaluate the actual, real life work that I was doing. Without the built in opportunities to reflect I don’t feel like I would have done that for many of my activities, and when you don’t reflect on your work, you miss a great many chances to learn from your mistakes and your successes...I have the tools to look at any situation and analyze it, which I was not very capable of doing before. (Ashley SE 310c) Nor is it a question of simply giving alternative information to students. Information is not knowledge; it is merely data. Knowledge, in all its epistemological clarity, is a synthesis of thought. Thus the goal of the social change series was not to politically reorient students but to facilitate a self-learning  puzzlement. Rethinking assumptions on which initial understandings of a problem were based. (Van Manen, M. (1987) Human science and the study of pedagogy. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Canadian Society for the Study of Education. Hamilton, Ontario)
 Kolb, D. Learning Styles and Disciplinary Differences. in A.W. Chickering and Associates. (1981) The Modern American College. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. At the end of the third term, Toby Smith and Marie Eaton conducted a group feedback session with the students. A transcription of his session provided many of the student quotes used to illustrate the ideas in this paper.  Students at Fairhaven College are required to write a Self-Evaluation for every course. This quote, and others designated SE were taken from those narratives. situation where students themselves evolve an ethical thoughtfulness and evaluative intelligence which transcends allegiance to authoritative voices and through which they achieve their own knowledge of the world. When I started out the first day and we were building this analytical framework, I thought oh my god I didn’t realize that this is what it’s all about....I’ve never thought about half these things and so I’d have to go through some major...sorting out...just to apply it to the case study. And by the time I got out into the community I felt like I was almost asking so many questions that I was afraid to talk and ask, you know I just started analyzing the group dynamics and...different aspects...it was good because then I could apply it...for the rest of my Fairhaven career... One thing is developing a language with which to talk about it – I had no language and I had no support network, and the class sort of offered me, gave me a language to talk about it and gave me people to talk about it with and so its influence has sort of transformed me – so I would say I’m a totally different person on that level. (Mary-Jayne – interview) Everything I have studied and learned from being a part of this class has expanded who I am, by challenging some old patterns of behavior, beliefs, expectations and judgments, while simultaneously, validating what has brought me to this point. (Regina SE 310c p5) The kind of reflective practice aimed at in this social change series was the kind of transformation of consciousness in the tradition of Paulo Freire and John Dewey and explored by educators such as Jack Mezirow, Ira Shor, and Max Van Manen. It required the integration of, not the application of, analytical and evaluative thought and engaged a dialogue between theories and the stories of personal experience to build deeper understanding. In this type of reflective practice we reframe, recast, and reconstruct our past understandings as we move back and forth between what we know and what we do, between text and our lives. ”

Fourth, advocating an alternative mode of debate to accommodate minorities replicates racist logic and harms efforts towards liberation. BRUCKNER:
But in being proud of what one is, isn’t there a risk of once again transforming skin color into a barrier separating Good from Evil? Melanin vs. vitiligo: all the perjurers, all the traitors will then be called Bounty Bars, Oreos, Uncle Toms – black on the outside, white on the inside. Disagreements are once again racialized: if a black person thinks differently from others, he thinks like a European, that is, he is necessarily “white,” a valet who is a ventriloquist, a traitor to his brothers. Then he will be treated like “a scab in an ethnic labor union” devoted to defending the sectarian interests of a specific community. How then should we categorize mixed-race people, mulattos, quadroons, octaroons, swarthy people, all those who feel neither black nor white and whose indeterminateness throws fanatical classifiers into a panic? If one wants to knock down the old prejudice that associated, among Muslims and Christians, black skin with a black soul, the “Curse of Ham” is capital. But must we for all that make negritude or Africanness a mode of thought and action, see a fundamental connection between an individual’s genetic background and his intellectual or moral qualities, or otherwise redistribute the attributes of inferiority and superiority? Is there a black reason, a white reason, a war of epidermises? Since when does biology determine a person, unless we go back to twentieth-century postulates of colonial thought and “scientific” racism? Progressive thought is blind when it suggests that there can be no antiwhite racism or an anti-Semitism among the formerly oppressed or the young people in the projects because they themselves have suffered from this evil. They are the victims; they are exempt from the prejudices that affect the majority of the population. But the reverse is true: racism is multiplying at exponential rates among groups and communities, taboos are collapsing, and everything is explained in terms of physical characteristics, identity, purity, and difference. And this is a racism that is all the more certain that it is right because it is regarded as the legitimate reaction on the part of the persecuted. Now we see the obsession with the pedigree and the old distinctions derived from slavery being revived, and the prejudices accumulating in the name of racism. This is the end of the concept of humanity as union in diversity and the triumph of human species incompatible with each other.

Tournament: Strake RR | Round: 5 | Opponent: North Crowley LR | Judge: Evnen, Wright
Interpretation: Debaters should read substantively justified frameworks grounded in a normative starting point to combat and understand pre-fiat oppression. Consistency with the best liberation strategy for the oppressed requires a debate where we explain what this oppression is, how we react to it, and why it’s the only relevant impact. To clarify, my argument is not oppression is ok but that debating the justifications is inescapable from solving oppression.
Violation: You literally say you shouldn’t waste time justifying why oppression is bad.
Net Benefits:
First, saying oppression is bad without normatively justifying it is insufficient. Connecting theory to the real world is key to produce social change. A non-reflective theory only reinforces stereotypes, turns their performance.
Smith and Eaton“Role of reflection and praxis in community-based learning and social justice work” by Toby Smith and Marie Eaton  http://cielearn.org/wp-content/themes/ciel/docs/Praxis_Social20Justice202-10.pdf
“If reflection is an interpretation of the unknown through the lens of the known, students will reflect in the only way they know, which often means applying stereotypes, repeating cliches, and describing their emotions. The emotions are often the most intense aspect of an unfamiliar situation and so students frequently focus on them. We can develop all the writing and discussion exercises we like in our attempts to encourage students to achieve a deeper level of knowledge, but if we do nothing to disrupt familiar narratives, we merely reinforce existing patterns of thought. To achieve a complex understanding of the unfamiliar, it is necessary to break with these comfortable frameworks of interpretation. Well, for me it was like I think I came into the class naively looking for answers to questions I had and then I just came up with more questions which gave me more answers to ask more questions and it just kept going and going and going. (Mary-Jayne – interview) If we are to encourage students to challenge comfortable old orthodoxies, they must be prepared before they engage with the community and learn new conceptual tools and receive relevant substantive information continually. As Jack Mezirow notes, “We have a strong tendency to reject ideas that fail to fit our preconceptions....” These are powerful and tenacious truths that come from “cultural assimilation” and “primary caregivers” (Mezirow 1997) ”. It is very difficult to challenge the apparently coherent and unquestionable authority of home, church, and state. Reflection per se does not necessarily require that we critically evaluate our assumptions. Moreover, in our consumerist, often anti-intellectual culture, pragmatism trumps philosophy. “Just do it.” All this social change work I had done prior to the social change series had really been ...just ... getting in these organizations that...told me what to do and I went out and did it. (Mary-Jayne – interview) The greatest part of this class for me was the praxis work, and having a space, both oral and written to reflect, analyze, and evaluate the actual, real life work that I was doing. Without the built in opportunities to reflect I don’t feel like I would have done that for many of my activities, and when you don’t reflect on your work, you miss a great many chances to learn from your mistakes and your successes...I have the tools to look at any situation and analyze it, which I was not very capable of doing before. (Ashley SE 310c) Nor is it a question of simply giving alternative information to students. Information is not knowledge; it is merely data. Knowledge, in all its epistemological clarity, is a synthesis of thought. Thus the goal of the social change series was not to politically reorient students but to facilitate a self-learning  puzzlement. Rethinking assumptions on which initial understandings of a problem were based. (Van Manen, M. (1987) Human science and the study of pedagogy. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Canadian Society for the Study of Education. Hamilton, Ontario) Kolb, D. Learning Styles and Disciplinary Differences. in A.W. Chickering and Associates. (1981) The Modern American College. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. At the end of the third term, Toby Smith and Marie Eaton conducted a group feedback session with the students. A transcription of his session provided many of the student quotes used to illustrate the ideas in this paper.  Students at Fairhaven College are required to write a Self-Evaluation for every course. This quote, and others designated SE were taken from those narratives. situation where students themselves evolve an ethical thoughtfulness and evaluative intelligence which transcends allegiance to authoritative voices and through which they achieve their own knowledge of the world. When I started out the first day and we were building this analytical framework, I thought oh my god I didn’t realize that this is what it’s all about....I’ve never thought about half these things and so I’d have to go through some major...sorting out...just to apply it to the case study. And by the time I got out into the community I felt like I was almost asking so many questions that I was afraid to talk and ask, you know I just started analyzing the group dynamics and...different aspects...it was good because then I could apply it...for the rest of my Fairhaven career... One thing is developing a language with which to talk about it – I had no language and I had no support network, and the class sort of offered me, gave me a language to talk about it and gave me people to talk about it with and so its influence has sort of transformed me – so I would say I’m a totally different person on that level. (Mary-Jayne – interview) Everything I have studied and learned from being a part of this class has expanded who I am, by challenging some old patterns of behavior, beliefs, expectations and judgments, while simultaneously, validating what has brought me to this point. (Regina SE 310c p5) The kind of reflective practice aimed at in this social change series was the kind of transformation of consciousness in the tradition of Paulo Freire and John Dewey and explored by educators such as Jack Mezirow, Ira Shor, and Max Van Manen. required the integration of, not the application of, analytical and evaluative thought and engaged a dialogue between theories and the stories of personal experience to build deeper understanding. In this type of reflective practice we reframe, recast, and reconstruct our past understandings as we move back and forth between what we know and what we do, between text and our lives. ”

Second, their use of educational spaces as a sites of empowerment places the judge into the role of the authoritarian adjudicator who molds students in accordance to a particular political end. This kills any conception of critical citizenship and turns their performance.
Rickert Rickert, Thomas. ""Hands Up, You're Free": Composition in a Post-Oedipal World." JacOnline Journal
“An example of the connection between violence and pedagogy is implicit in the notion of being "schooled" as it has been conceptualized by Giroux and Peter Mclaren. They explain, "Fundamental to the principles that inform critical pedagogy is the conviction that schooling for self- and social empowerment is ethically prior to questions of epistemology or to a mastery of technical or social skills that are primarily tied to the logic of the marketplace" (153-54). A presumption here is that it is the teacher who knows (best), and this orientation gives the concept of schooling a particular bite: though it presents itself as oppositional to the state and the dominant forms of pedagogy that serve the state and its capitalist interests, it nevertheless reinscribes an authoritarian model that is congruent with any number of oedipalizing pedagogies that "school" the student in proper behavior. As Diane Davis notes, radical, feminist, and liberatory pedagogies "often camouflage pedagogical violence in their move from one mode of 'normalization' to another" and "function within a disciplinary matrix of power, a covert carceral system, that aims to create useful subjects for particular political agendas" (212). Such oedipalizing pedagogies are less effective in practice than what the claims for them assert; indeed, the attempt to "school" students in the manner called for by Giroux and McLaren is complicitous with the malaise of postmodern cynicism. Students will dutifully go through their liberatory motions, producing the proper assignments, but it remains an open question whether they carry an oppositional politics with them. The "critical distance" supposedly created with liberatory pedagogy also opens up a cynical distance toward the writing produced in class.” (299-300)
Third, their unquestionable model to oppression that justifies itself through self-reference ensures a rigid vision of resistance where the judge prescribes the student an imperialist model of education – turns their performance.
Rickert 2 Rickert, Thomas. ""Hands Up, You're Free": Composition in a Post-Oedipal World." JacOnline Journal
 “This essay will employ Deleuze's and Zizek's theories to illustrate the limitations of writing pedagogies that rely on modernist strategies of critical distance or political agency. Implicit in such pedagogies is the faith that teaching writing can resist dominant social practices and empower students; however, the notion that we can actually foster resistance through teaching is questionable. As Paul Mann states, "all the forms of opposition have long since revealed themselves as means of advancing it. ... The mere fact that something feels like resistance and still manages to offend a few people (usually not even the right people) hardly makes it effective" (138). In light of Mann's statement, I urge us to take the following position: teaching writing is fully complicitous with dominant social practices, and inducing students to write in accordance with institutional precepts can be as disabling as it is enabling. By disabling, I do not mean that learning certain skills-typically those most associated with current-traditional rhetorics, such as superficial forms of grammatical correctness, basic organization, syntactic clarity, and such-are not useful. Such skills are useful, and they are often those most necessary for tapping the power that writing can wield. In learning such skills, however, we should also ask what students aren’t are not learning. What other forms of writing and thinking are being foreclosed or distorted, forms of writing that have their own, different powers? If one of our goals as teachers of writing is to initiate students into rhetorics of power and resistance, we should also be equally attuned to rhetorics of contestation. Specifically, we must take on the responsibility that comes with the impossibility of knowing the areas of contention and struggle that will be the most important in our students' lives. Pedagogy could reflect this concern in its practices by attending to the idea that each student's life is its own telos, meaning that the individual struggles of each student cannot and should not necessarily mirror our own. Or, to put it another way, students must sooner or later overcome us, even though we may legitimate our sense of service with the idea that we have their best interests in mind. However, we should be suspicious of this presumptive ethic, for, as Mann astutely observes, "nothing is more aggressive than the desire to serve the other” (48)
Rickert 1 and 2 Outweigh:
A.
B.
Fourth, it destroys critical discussion if assumptions like those about oppression being bad are not justified. Foucault 84
Foucault, Michel. "Polemics, Politics and Problematizations." In Essential Works of Foucault, edited by Paul Rabinow. Vol. 1 "Ethics". The New Press, 1998.
In the serious play of questions and answers, in the work of reciprocal elucidation, the rights of each person are in some sense immanent in the discussion. They depend only on the dialogue situation. The person asking the questions is merely exercising the right that has been given him: to remain unconvinced, to perceive a contradiction, to require more information, to emphasize different postulates, to point out faulty reasoning, and so on. As for the person answering the ques­ tions, he too exercises a right that does not go beyond the discussion itself; by the logic of his own discourse, he is tied to what he has said earlier, and by the acceptance of dialogue he is tied to the questioning of the other. Questions and answers depend on a game-a game that is at once pleasant and difficult-in which each of the two partners takes pains to use only the rights given him by the other and by the accepted form of the dialogue. The polemicist, on the other hand, proceeds encased in privileges that he possesses in advance and will never agree to question. On prin­ ciple, he possesses rights authorizing him to wage war and making that struggle a just undertaking; the person he confronts is not a partner in the search for the truth but an adversary, an enemy who is wrong, who is harmful, and whose very existence constitutes a threat. For him, then, the game consists not of recognizing this person as a subject having the right to speak but of abolishing him, as interlocutor, from any possible dialogue; and his final objective will be not to come as close as possible to a difficult truth but to bring about the triumph of the just cause he has been manifestly upholding from the beginning. The polem­ icist relies on a legitimacy that his adversary is by definition denied.
Analytic Impact
Fifth, philosophy is ABOUT social realities and teaches us how to address them. My framework claims are about to real world, not playing some academic game. This is a pre-fiat turn because she’s trying to suppress philosophical discussion while I say we should argue about the best framework. Traber  13:
And, here is where I’m about to sound sappy: philosophy in a very real way can teach you what it means to be a better person. I am always stunned when theory shells casually debaters drop statements that “deontology is useless in day to day life.” Kant is talking about day to day life. While this is not true of all philosophy as studied in the academy, the vast majority of the authors that we use in debate and are critiqued for being ivory tower are speaking seriously about choices we face on a day to day basis. I know personally that my time in debate has made me a better person, if only because it has exposed me to ideas that caused me to question my basic assumptions about the world and about ethics. There is a persistent assumption that those of us who teach debaters about authors like Hobbes, Schmitt, or Derrida are doing so because we think they are strategic, not because we think it will help them be a better person. I can only speak for myself, but I think the ability to grapple with complicated and problematic arguments, understand their warrants and defend their claims, is a key step in growing up to a critical, engaged, moral human being. We are rarely going to be in a position to make decisions about nuclear policy or due process claims, but we will make decisions about what is the right thing to do every hour. Morality, despite the fact that we often think of it instrumentally, is not about debate rounds and I can only see good results from having high school students think about it.

This all impacts back to their ROB of resisting oppression. These arguments all justify why you don’t do that and your speech act is one that re-inforces it on a pre-fiat level. Drop the debater for those reasons- they made the debate about stopping oppression, and this shell proves they just perpetuate it. Competing interps- reasonability makes no sense on this shell since it’s a methods question, which means it’s offense-defense, not a fairness concern.

Tournament: UT | Round: Triples | Opponent: Southlake Carroll RP | Judge: Drew Burd
1: The Kantian subject is the opposite of abstract and embraces an embodied subject—universalizability is essential to mutual recognition of others. FARR:
Arnold Farr (prof of phil @ UKentucky, focusing on German idealism, philosophy of race, postmodernism, psychoanalysis, and liberation philosophy). “Can a Philosophy of Race Afford to Abandon the Kantian Categorical Imperative?” JOURNAL of SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY, Vol. 33 No. 1, Spring 2002, 17–32.
“One of the most popular criticisms of Kant’s moral philosophy is that it is too formalistic.13 That is, the universal nature of the categorical imperative leaves it devoid of content. Such a principle is useless since moral decisions are made by concrete individuals in a concrete, historical, and social situation. This type of criticism lies behind Lewis Gordon’s rejection of any attempt to ground an antiracist position on Kantian principles. The rejection of universal principles for the sake of emphasizing the historical embeddedness of the human agent is widespread in recent philosophy and social theory. I will argue here on Kantian grounds that although a distinction between the universal and the concrete is a valid distinction, the unity of the two is required for an understanding of human agency. The attack on Kantian formalism began with Hegel’s criticism of the Kantian philosophy.14 The list of contemporary theorists who follow Hegel’s line of criticism is far too long to deal with in the scope of this paper. Although these theorists may approach the problem of Kantian formalism from a variety of angles, the spirit of their criticism is basically the same: The universality of the categorical imperative is an abstraction from one’s empirical conditions. Kant is often accused of making the moral agent an abstract, empty, noumenal subject. Nothing could be further from the truth. The Kantian subject is an embodied, empirical, concrete subject. However, this concrete subject has a dual nature. Kant claims in the Critique of Pure Reason as well as in the Grounding that human beings have an intelligible and empirical character.15 It is impossible to understand and do justice to Kant’s moral theory without taking seriously the relation between these two characters. The very concept of morality is impossible without the tension between the two. By “empirical character” Kant simply means that we have a sensual nature. We are physical creatures with physical drives or desires. The very fact that I cannot simply satisfy my desires without considering the rightness or wrongness of my actions suggests that my empirical character must be held in check by something, or else I behave like a Freudian id. My empiri- cal character must be held in check by my intelligible character, which is the legislative activity of practical reason. It is through our intelligible character that we formulate principles that keep our empirical impulses in check. The categorical imperative is the supreme principle of morality that is constructed by the moral agent in his/her moment of self-transcendence. What I have called self-transcendence may be best explained in the following passage by Onora O’Neill: In restricting our maxims to those that meet the test of the categorical imperative we refuse to base our lives on maxims that necessarily make our own case an exception. The reason why a universilizability criterion is morally significant is that it makes our own case no special exception (G, IV, 404). In accepting the Categorical Imperative we accept the moral reality of other selves, and hence the possibility (not, note, the reality) of a moral community. The Formula of Universal Law enjoins no more than that we act only on maxims that are open to others also.16 O’Neill’s description of the universalizability criterion includes the notion of self-transcendence that I am working to explicate here to the extent that like self-transcendence, universalizable moral principles require that the individ- ual think beyond his or her own particular desires. The individual is not allowed to exclude others as rational moral agents who have the right to act as he acts in a given situation. For example, if I decide to use another person merely as a means for my own end I must recognize the other person’s right to do the same to me. I cannot consistently will that I use another as a means only and will that I not be used in the same manner by another. Hence, the universalizability criterion is a principle of consistency and a principle of inclusion. That is, in choosing my maxims I attempt to include the perspective of other moral agents.
2. Non-Unique: They have to use some level of abstraction because if everything was concrete we would have to deal with each case without trying to apply some general concept beforehand but that obviously doesn’t happen because liberating the oppressed is used generically as a strategy.
3. There is nothing good or bad about endorsing certain ideas. All ideas have been misused or applied to do horrible things. Ideas are not bad; people are bad. WOOD:  
“Kantian Ethics” By Allen W. Wood.
“Often, criticisms of Kant (or any other historical philosopher) on such grounds are really an indirect way of arguing against the contemporary use of a philosopher’s ideas by others who obviously do not share Kant’s errors about race or gender. It is a cheap way of resisting an important philosopher’s influence. Often enough this is nothing but a strategy of “guilt by association,” practiced by those who are evidently incapable of challenging the philosopher’s ideas on their genuine merits. There is no plausibility at all, for example, in the suggestion that such Kantian principles as human equality, rationalism, universalism, and cosmopolitanism are in their content favorable to racism, sexism, or other forms of oppression, and such a thesis needs only to be stated explicitly to discredit itself. But this highly implausible thesis may be put forward by implication if it can be associated with the quite distinct but correct point that even a cosmopolitan and universalistic ethical theory, such as Kant’s, can be combined with racist or male-supremacist views in its application. It is also true that egalitarianism, rationalism, universalism, and cosmopolitanism are especially is liable to rhetorical abuse by those who advocate policies in direct violation of them, because subscribing to the correct principles at an abstract level is often enough a shabby ploy used to protect contrary policies from criticism. The thought that this point has any philosophical significance, however, rests on an error of abysmal proportions about philosophy and its relation to human practices. If someone thinks there is a philosophical theory of morality whose uncritical adoption and mechanical application would suffice to protect us from evil, then that person is looking for something that could never exist. The correct standard for an ethical theory is whether it gets things right at the level of basic principles and values, not whether it contains some magical property that protects us, in the application of the theory, from every perversion or abuse through the influence of tradition and prejudice or the infinite human ingenuity of rationalization. All theories are about equally subject to such abuse, and no theory is immune to it. In fact, If we think that the adoption of a certain philosophical theory, or a certain set of religious dogmas, will protect us from all moral error, that way of thinking itself is extremely dangerous, quite irrespective of the content of the theory or dogma with which we associate it. That thought itself is actually responsible for a lot of the evil that people do.”
4. The NC framework controls the internal link to their impact, which is oppression but there is no conception of oppression in their framing. Only the NC can make these claims i.e violating freedom is oppressive.
5. Action theory is not abstract because it deals with the empirical reality of how agents act.
6. 2. Respecting the rationality of every person is key to rectify historical sources of racism and oppression against African Americans. Wright and Rogers
3. Slavery ended with the Civil War almost a century and a half ago, but of course its impact did not disappear simply because this form of racialized class relations had been destroyed. Slavery contributed to a particularly pernicious and durable form of racist beliefs that continues to influence American culture today. Slavery posed a deep cultural problem for the United States after the American Revolution: How could a country founded on the principles of “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” accommodate slavery? How was it possible to reconcile the devotion to liberty and democracy with the treatment of some people as the property of others? The solution to this deeply contradictory reality was the elaboration of racial ideologies of degradation and dehumanization of blacks as intellectually and morally inferior and thus not worthy of treatment as full persons. The attribution of intellectual inferiority meant that blacks were seen as lacking intellectual capacities for rational action, and thus, as in the case of children, choices should be made on their behalf by responsible adults. The attribution of moral inferiority supported the view of blacks as inherently dangerous, ruled by passions, both aggressive and sexual, and thus incapable of exercising liberty. These beliefs constituted the core of the racist culture forged under slavery and although such beliefs were increasingly challenged in the last decades of the twentieth century and are no longer seen as respectable, they continue to influence race relations to the present.

Tournament: UT | Round: 3 | Opponent: WB Ray JG | Judge: Victor Fu
The standard is maximizing expected well-being.
Government legitimacy necessitate tradeoffs—that means util. Woller 97
Gary Woller BYU Prof., “An Overview by Gary Woller”, A Forum on the Role of Environmental Ethics, June 1997, pg. 10
“Moreover, virtually all public policies entail some redistribution of economic or political resources, such that one group's gains must come at another group's ex- pense. Consequently, public policies in a democracy must be justified to the public, and especially to those who pay the costs of those policies. Such but justification cannot simply be assumed a priori by invoking some higher-order moral principle. Appeals to a priori moral principles, such as environmental preservation, also often fail to acknowledge that public policies inevitably entail trade-offs among competing values. Thus since policymakers cannot justify inherent value conflicts to the public in any philosophical sense, and since public policies inherently imply winners and losers, the policymakers' duty is to the public interest requires them to demonstrate that the redistributive effects and value trade-offs implied by their polices are somehow to the overall advantage of society. At the same time, deontologically based ethical systems have severe practical limitations as a basis for public policy. At best, Also, a priori moral principles provide only general guidance to ethical dilemmas in public affairs and do not themselves suggest appropriate public policies, and at worst, they create a regimen of regulatory unreasonableness while failing to adequately address the problem or actually making it worse.”
No act/omission for governments—constraint based theories collapse to util.
Sunstein and Vermule 05 (Cass Sunstein and Adrian Vermuele, “Is Capital Punishment Morally Required? The Relevance of Life-Life Tradeoffs,” Chicago Public Law and Legal Theory Working Paper No. 85 (March 2005), p. 17.) In our view, both the argument from causation and the argument from intention go wrong by overlooking the distinctive features of government as a moral agent. Whatever the general status of the act-omission distinction as a matter of moral philosophy,38 the distinction is least impressive when applied to government.39 The most fundamental point is that unlike individuals, governments always and necessarily face a choice between or among possible policies for regulating third parties. The distinction between acts and omissions may not be intelligible in this context, and even if it is, the distinction does not make a morally relevant difference. Most generally, government is in the business of creating permissions and prohibitions. When it explicitly or implicitly authorizes private action, it is not omitting to do anything, or refusing to act.40 Moreover, the distinction between authorized and unauthorized private action—for example, private killing—becomes obscure when the government formally forbids private action, but chooses a set of policy instruments that do not adequately or fully discourage it.

Tournament: Kandi King RR | Round: 5 | Opponent: Newark BA | Judge: Arun Sharma, Jenn Melin
Counterplan text: Public colleges and universities ought not limit any constitutionally protected speech, except restriction policies that restrict the denial of the 1915 Armenian Genocide.
Kyrou 15 Kyrou, Alexandros. “Erasing Memory, Erasing People: Armenian Genocide Remembrance and Denial at Harvard.” November 2015. American Historical Association.
In the case of students who engage in organized genocide-denial efforts, administrations should make it absolutely clear that while they support free speech, the commitment to free speech must be accompanied by a commitment to respect for procedure and organized events. Universities should reiterate that supporting free speech does not endorse a policy of genocide denial. Conversely, by ignoring and not applying any consequences to such actions, universities are emboldening apologists of genocide. The centennial of the Armenian Genocide affords an opportunity for university administrations to develop such policies where none currently exist for dealing with this issue.
Competes- the aff says they defend all conpro speech, genocide denial is conpro and the aff can’t restrict it.

Armenian genocide denial feeds a violent culture of oppression that keeps knowledge subjugated, which turns the aff.
Walrath 15 Walrath, Dana. “Denial Keeps the Genocide Alive”. Armenians can’t put the genocide behind them while Turks deny their responsibility – and the United States turns a blind eye. April 30th 2015.
The new Turkish Republic’s propaganda strove, as it still does, to let memories of genocide rest in oblivion. Turkish scholar Taner Akçam has shown how Turkish grade school texts overlook the Armenian genocide, casting the Armenian as a historical cancer and an existential threat from within. Having been raised on this diet for three generations, today’s genocide deniers in Turkey have little reason to doubt their position. I’m reminded of the success of such propaganda when, as an Armenian-American, fellow citizens ask me: “This genocide happened so long ago, why can’t Armenians let it go?” I think they know the answer — namely, that moving towards a just future requires sincerity about the past. We do better to honor than to bury our mistakes, however colossal they may be. Pope Francis recognized this earlier this month, when he described the mass killing of Armenians by the Ottoman Turks as genocide. In response, Turkey recalled its ambassador to the Vatican. Meanwhile, the United States, United Kingdom, and Australia tacitly endorse Turkey’s policy of genocide denial, fearing reprisal by this strategically important state. Scholars recognize that genocide takes place in a series of stages, of which extermination is only one; the last stage is denial. Genocide does not end until denial ends. This year Armenians are not just commemorating a genocide that took place 100 years ago; they are asking to end the denial that keeps this genocide alive. The persistence of denial by a vibrant culture such as Turkey’s speaks to the destructive, coercive power of shame. But let’s not forget that there is also such a thing as healthy shame. Honest reflection on the past can bring people who were once friendly neighbors back together again. Such reconciliation was a goal of Hrant Dink, the Turkish-Armenian journalist who was assassinated outside his Istanbul office for his efforts at a truthful accounting of history. A growing cadre of Turkish scholars, journalists, artists and writers, including Taner Akçam, Uğur Ümit Üngör, Orhan Pamuk, Elif Shafak, and others, have managed to journey out of a contrived historical landscape, recognizing that the health of their beloved country is at stake. Meanwhile, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan offers the familiar “war is hell” incantation: “Millions of people of all religions and ethnicities lost their lives in the First World War … and experienced events which had inhumane consequences – such as relocation – during the First World War.” What if the tables were turned: can you imagine if we in the United States did not own our history of slavery? Can you imagine our children’s history books overlooking American Indians’ presence in North America before Europeans arrived? While historical breaches of human rights in our country are far from healed, at least our history books, in large measure, own up to them. Americans know something of the healing power of justified shame to reestablish productive connections between cultures, to reopen physically closed borders. By forsaking such opportunities, denial of the Armenian genocide poses a moral question that is asked again and again in issues ranging from the question of reparations for slavery in the United States to the atrocities of ISIS in Syria and Iraq: Is it ever appropriate to put political exigencies or financial interests ahead of historical accuracy? A decade ago, Samantha Power, who today serves as Washington’s ambassador to the U.N., pointed out that the United States’ handling of the Armenian genocide in the decade after the event set up pernicious patterns that still disrupt the world today. It sent a tacit message that genocide is permissible, that we, as a nation, and will put short term military, political, and financial interests ahead of justice and truth.

Tournament: UH | Round: Quarters | Opponent: Kinkaid JY | Judge: Gelfer, Si, Terrace
Counterplan Text: Public colleges in the United States should enact restrictions on hate speech.
Jared Taylor summarizes Waldron, 12, Why We Should Ban “Hate Speech”, American Renaissance, summarizing Jeremy Waldron, The Harm in Hate Speech, Harvard University Press, 2012, 292 pp., 26.95. 8/24/12, http://www.amren.com/features/2012/08/why-we-should-ban-hate-speech/ Note – Taylor does not agree with but is summarizing Waldron’s position LADI
First-Amendment guarantees of free speech are a cherished part of the American tradition and set us apart from virtually every other country. They are not without critics, however, and the free speech guarantees under sharpest attack are those that protect so-called “hate speech.” Jeremy Waldron, an academic originally from New Zealand, has written a whole book explaining why “hate speech” does not deserve protection—and Harvard University Press has published it. Prof. Waldron teaches law and philosophy at New York University Law School, is a professor of social and political theory at Oxford, and is an adjunct professor at Victoria University in New Zealand. Perhaps his foreign origins influence his view of the First Amendment.  In this book, Professor Waldron makes just one argument for banning “hate speech.” It is not a good argument, and if this is the best the opponents of free speech can do, the First Amendment should be secure. However, in the current atmosphere of “anti-racism,” any argument against “hate speech” could influence policy, so let us understand his argument as best we can.  First, Professor Waldron declares that “we are diverse in our ethnicity, our race, our appearance, and our religions, and we are embarked on a grand experiment of living and working together despite these sorts of differences.” Western societies are determined to let in every sort of person imaginable and make them feel respected and equal in every way. “Inclusiveness” is something “that our society sponsors and that it is committed to.” Therefore, what would we make of a “hate speech” billboard that said: “Muslims and 9/11! Don’t serve them, don’t speak to them, and don’t let them in”? Or one with a picture of Muslim children that said “They are all called Osama”? Or posters that say such things as “Muslims out,” “No blacks allowed,” or “All blacks should be sent back to Africa”? Professor Waldron writes that it is all very well for law professors and white people to say that this is the price we pay for free expression, but we must imagine what it must be like for the Muslim or black who must explain these messages to his children. “Can their lives be led, can their children be brought up, can their hopes be maintained and their worst fears dispelled, in a social environment polluted by these materials?” Professor Waldron insists that a “sense of security in the space we all inhabit is a public good,” like pretty beaches or clean air, and is so precious that the law should require everyone to maintain it: Hate speech undermines this public good . . . . It does this not only by intimating discrimination and violence, but by reawakening living nightmares of what this society was like . . . . It creates something like an environmental threat to social peace, a sort of slow-acting poison, accumulating here and there, word by word, so that eventually it becomes harder and less natural for even the good-hearted members of the society to play their part in maintaining this public good. Professor Waldron tells us that the purpose of “hate speech” is to try to set up a “rival public good” in which it is considered fine to beat up and drive out minorities.

On campus hate speech and crimes is decreasing in the squo—that means current restrictions are working and the aff is unnecessary at best
Sutton 16 Halley Sutton, Report shows crime on campus down across the country, Campus Security Report 13.4 (2016), 9/9/16
A recent report released by the National Center for Education Statistics found an overall decrease in crimes at educational institutions across the country since 2001. The overall number of crimes reported by postsecondary institutions has dropped by 34 percent, from 41,600 per year in 2001 to 27,600 per year in 2013. The report, titled Indicators of School Crime and Safety: 2015, covers higher education campuses as well as K–12 schools and includes such topics as victimization, teacher injury, bullying and cyberbullying, use of drugs and alcohol, and criminal incidents at postsecondary institutions. The report found significant decreases in instances of bullying, harassment due to sexual orientation, and violent crime at all levels of education. The number of on-campus crimes reported at postsecondary institutions in 2013 was lower than in 2001 for every category except forcible sex offenses and murder.
Hate speech is permissible under the first amendment despite the exceptions
Volokh 15 Eugene Volokh, Law Professor at UCLA, “No, there’s no “hate speech” exception to the First Amendment,” The Washington Post, May 7, 2015, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/05/07/no-theres-no-hate-speech-exception-to-the-first-amendment/?utm_term=.9e1ed85e9262  
I keep hearing about a supposed “hate speech” exception to the First Amendment, or statements such as, “This isn’t free speech, it’s hate speech,” or “When does free speech stop and hate speech begin?” But there is no hate speech exception to the First Amendment. Hateful ideas (whatever exactly that might mean) are just as protected under the First Amendment as other ideas. One is as free to condemn Islam — or Muslims, or Jews, or blacks, or whites, or illegal aliens, or native-born citizens — as one is to condemn capitalism or Socialism or Democrats or Republicans. To be sure, there are some kinds of speech that are unprotected by the First Amendment. But those narrow exceptions have nothing to do with “hate speech” in any conventionally used sense of the term. For instance, there is an exception for “fighting words” — face-to-face personal insults addressed to a specific person, of the sort that are likely to start an immediate fight. But this exception isn’t limited to racial or religious insults, nor does it cover all racially or religiously offensive statements. Indeed, when the City of St. Paul tried to specifically punish bigoted fighting words, the Supreme Court held that this selective prohibition was unconstitutional (R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul (1992)), even though a broad ban on all fighting words would indeed be permissible.
Hate speech leads to a genocidal increase in crimes against marginalized groups.  
Greenblatt 15 Jonathan Greenblatt, When Hateful Speech Leads to Hate Crimes: Taking Bigotry Out of the Immigration Debate, Huffington Post, 8/21/15, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonathan-greenblatt/when-hateful-speech-leads_b_8022966.html
When police arrived at the scene in Boston, they found a Latino man shaking on the ground, his face apparently soaked in urine, with a broken nose. His arms and chest had been beaten. One of the two brothers arrested and charged with the hate crime reportedly told police, “Donald Trump was right — all these illegals need to be deported.” The victim, a homeless man, was apparently sleeping outside of a subway station in Dorchester when the perpetrators attacked. His only offense was being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The brothers reportedly attacked him for who he was — simply because he was Latino. In recent weeks anti-immigrant — and by extension anti-Latino — rhetoric has reached a fever pitch. Immigrants have been smeared as “killers” and “rapists.” They have been accused of bringing drugs and crime. A radio talk show host in Iowa has called for enslavement of undocumented immigrants if they do not leave within 60 days. There have been calls to repeal the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of citizenship to people born in the United States, with allegations that people come here to have so-called “anchor babies.” And the terms “illegal aliens” and “illegals” — which many mainstream news sources wisely rejected years ago because they dehumanize and stigmatize people — have resurged. The words used on the campaign trail, on the floors of Congress, in the news, and in all our living rooms have consequences. They directly impact our ability to sustain a society that ensures dignity and equality for all. Bigoted rhetoric and words laced with prejudice are building blocks for the pyramid of hate. Biased behaviors build on one another, becoming ever more threatening and dangerous towards the top. At the base is bias, which includes stereotyping and insensitive remarks. It sets the foundation for a second, more complex and more damaging layer: individual acts of prejudice, including bullying, slurs and dehumanization. Next is discrimination, which in turn supports bias-motivated violence, including apparent hate crimes like the tragic one in Boston. And in the most extreme cases if left unchecked, the top of the pyramid of hate is genocide. Just like a pyramid, the lower levels support the upper levels. Bias, prejudice and discrimination — particularly touted by those with a loud megaphone and cheering crowd — all contribute to an atmosphere that enables hate crimes and other hate-fueled violence. The most recent hate crime in Boston is just one of too many. In fact, there is a hate crime roughly every 90 minutes in the United States today. That is why last week ADL announced a new initiative, #50StatesAgainstHate, to strengthen hate crimes laws around the country and safeguard communities vulnerable to hate-fueled attacks. We are working with a broad coalition of partners to get the ball rolling.A

Tournament: Harvard Westlake RR | Round: 1 | Opponent: Harvard Westlake EE | Judge: Wheeler, Shan
Counterplan Text – Colleges and Universities ought to restrict student hate speech in instances of journalism. Competes- you have to defend all journalistic speech.
Publications are a source of hate on campus – it’s been used to promote platforms for things like Holocaust Denial.
Foxman 10 (Abraham H. Foxman National Director Anti-Defamation League, Fighting Holocaust Denial in Campus Newspaper Advertisements A Manual for Action Revised: May 2010)
Holocaust denial is an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory which claims that the well-documented destruction of six million Jews during World War II is actually a myth created by Jews to serve their own self-interested purposes. On college campuses, Holocaust denial is most often encountered in the form of advertisements submitted to student newspapers ads by Bradley Smith and his Committee for Open Debate on the Holocaust (CODOH). These ads are an affront to truth and an insult to tmemory of those who were murdered by the Nazis. They create a divisive atmosphere for Jews on campus and foster conflict among students, faculty, administrators and the local community. Hillel: The Foundation for Jewish Campus Life, and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) have worked together for years to counteract these ads and to restore civility to the campus community when they have been published. Students, campus professionals and local community leaders necessarily play the major role in this effort. The Holocaust is a central tragedy in the sweep of Jewish and human history and a trauma that continues to inform Jewish life today. It is also a cautionary tale about human character that deserves retelling in every generation, to Jews and non-Jews alike. By fighting Holocaust denial on campuses we honor the memory of the victims, confront the forces of hatred, and help shape a responsible new generation of Americans. We urge you to join us in this effort.
Banning hate speech in journalism is good– they make underground movements less effective and destructive, deter people from joining and allow for coalitions of targeted groups to fight back.
Parekh 12, Bhikhu (2012) ‘Is There a Case for Banning Hate Speech?’, in Herz, M. and Molnar, P. (eds.) The Content and Context of Hate Speech: Rethinking Regulation and Responses. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 37–56. 

This is an important argument and its force should not be underestimated. However, it has its limits. A ban on hate speech might drive extremist groups underground, but it also persuades their moderate and law-abiding members to dissociate them-selves from these groups When extremist groups go underground, they are denied the oxygen of publicity and the aura of public respectability. This makes their operations more difficult and denies them the opportunity to link up with other similar groups and recruit their members. While the ban might alienate extremist groups, it has the compensating advantage of securing the enthusiastic commitment and support of their target groups. Besides, beyond a certain point, alienation need not he a source of worry. Some religious groups are alienated from their secular orientation of the liberal state, just as the communists and polyamourously inclined persons bitterly resent its commitment (respectively) to market economy and monogamy. We accept such forms of alienation as inherent in collective life and do not seek to redress them by abandoming the liberal state. The ban might harden the determination of some, bur it is also likely to weaken that of those who seek respectability and do not want to be associated with ideas and groups considered so disreputable as to be banned, or who are deterred by the cost involved in supporting them. There is the lure of the prohibited, but there is also the attraction of the respectable.
Hate speech leads to a genocidal increase in crimes against marginalized groups.  
Greenblatt 15 Jonathan Greenblatt, When Hateful Speech Leads to Hate Crimes: Taking Bigotry Out of the Immigration Debate, Huffington Post, 8/21/15, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonathan-greenblatt/when-hateful-speech-leads_b_8022966.html
When police arrived at the scene in Boston, they found a Latino man shaking on the ground, his face apparently soaked in urine, with a broken nose. His arms and chest had been beaten. One of the two brothers arrested and charged with the hate crime reportedly told police, “Donald Trump was right — all these illegals need to be deported.” The victim, a homeless man, was apparently sleeping outside of a subway station in Dorchester when the perpetrators attacked. His only offense was being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The brothers reportedly attacked him for who he was — simply because he was Latino. In recent weeks anti-immigrant — and by extension anti-Latino — rhetoric has reached a fever pitch. Immigrants have been smeared as “killers” and “rapists.” They have been accused of bringing drugs and crime. A radio talk show host in Iowa has called for enslavement of undocumented immigrants if they do not leave within 60 days. There have been calls to repeal the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of citizenship to people born in the United States, with allegations that people come here to have so-called “anchor babies.” And the terms “illegal aliens” and “illegals” — which many mainstream news sources wisely rejected years ago because they dehumanize and stigmatize people — have resurged. The words used on the campaign trail, on the floors of Congress, in the news, and in all our living rooms have consequences. They directly impact our ability to sustain a society that ensures dignity and equality for all. Bigoted rhetoric and words laced with prejudice are building blocks for the pyramid of hate. Biased behaviors build on one another, becoming ever more threatening and dangerous towards the top. At the base is bias, which includes stereotyping and insensitive remarks. It sets the foundation for a second, more complex and more damaging layer: individual acts of prejudice, including bullying, slurs and dehumanization. Next is discrimination, which in turn supports bias-motivated violence, including apparent hate crimes like the tragic one in Boston. And in the most extreme cases if left unchecked, the top of the pyramid of hate is genocide. Just like a pyramid, the lower levels support the upper levels. Bias, prejudice and discrimination — particularly touted by those with a loud megaphone and cheering crowd — all contribute to an atmosphere that enables hate crimes and other hate-fueled violence. The most recent hate crime in Boston is just one of too many. In fact, there is a hate crime roughly every 90 minutes in the United States today. That is why last week ADL announced a new initiative, #50StatesAgainstHate, to strengthen hate crimes laws around the country and safeguard communities vulnerable to hate-fueled attacks. We are working with a broad coalition of partners to get the ball rolling.

Tournament: UH | Round: Quarters | Opponent: Kinkaid JY | Judge: Gelfer, Si, Terrace
Counterplan Text: Colleges in the United States should prohibit the distribution of revenge porn.
Rennison and Addington 14 Callie Rennison (associate professor in the School of Public Affairs at the University of Colorado Denver) and Lynn Addington (associate professor in the Department of Justice, Law and Criminology, School of Public Affairs at American University in Washington, DC), "Violence Against College Women: A Review to Identify Limitations in Defining the Problem and Inform Future Research" Trauma, Violence, and Abuse. July 2014. Vol. 15, no. 3. Pgs. 159-169. http://tva.sagepub.com/content/15/3/159.full
The current violence against college women literature has expanded knowledge about the prevalence and characteristics of sexual violence occurring on campus. These findings, in turn, have been translated into policies designed to reduce this form of violence and assist victims. Additional work has considered the prevalence and characteristics of dating violence and stalking against college women and also has informed specific programmatic development on campuses. Despite these advances, our review of the literature identifies three important gaps that limit defining violence against college women and arguably inhibit future development in this area. The most critical gap or limitation is the lack of any assessment of the literature to consider the current approaches of how violence is defined and operationalized. This assessment would help identify whether behaviors are missing that should be included as well as promote a current and comprehensive understanding violence against college women. The two other limitations are not as directly related to defining violence but would assist in conducting such a reassessment. The second limitation concerns the need to provide a context for the victimization experiences of college women, especially the importance of comparing these experiences with those of young adult women who are not students. A third, and related, limitation concerns a need to consider how “college student” is defined and measured. The first limitation concerns the failure to explicitly define violence as it is used in the area of violence against college women. As a result, researchers tend to implicitly define violence against college women as synonymous with sexual violence and to a lesser extent dating violence and stalking. No effort has been made to take stock of the scope of this definition and reassess how well the construct has been operationalized. In addition, no explicit discussion has occurred with regard to whether using a criminal justice perspective or a public health perspective would assist in defining violence in this area. As a result, the violence against college women area has evolved to incorporate aspects of both perspectives but also has failed to fully embrace aspects of either. For example, if a criminal justice perspective was accepted, this view would encourage inclusion of other forms of violent crime such as robbery and nonsexual assaults that are currently absent from the literature. Similarly, if a public health perspective were utilized, this focus would expand the study to emerging forms of violence that may or may not be criminalized such as so-called revenge porn (or the posting of intimate and explicit photographs online) and other forms of online reputational harm as well as forms of criminal behavior that are committed by intimates such as cyberstalking or identity theft (which can generate significant emotional harm).
Competition:
The distribution of revenge pornography is constitutionally protected speech – aff allows it on college campuses.
Goldberg 16 Erica Goldberg Columbia Law Review Volume 116, No. 3 April 2016 "FREE SPEECH CONSEQUENTIALISM"
The regulation of revenge porn presents thorny First Amendment issues, even though the speech is considered both highly injurious and of low value.300 Some argue that revenge porn can be regulated as obscenity,301 but, like much pornography, sexually explicit speech that does not rise to the level of obscenity is still protected speech.302 Criminal statutes and torts based on the invasion of privacy and emotional distress caused by revenge porn compromise the freedom to distribute protected speech lawfully obtained. Indeed, the Supreme Court has recognized a right for the media to publish even unlawfully obtained content, so long as the publisher was not involved in the illegal so long as the publisher was not involved in the illegal conduct that produced the content.303 And in United States v. Stevens , the Supreme Court held that individuals cannot be held criminally liable for distributing speech depicting illegal acts, so long as the individuals did not perpetrate the underlying act.304 Revenge porn, as defined here, is both legally obtained and depicts a legal act. In the ultimate articulation of free speech consequentialism, Mary Anne Franks argues for criminalization of revenge porn because "some expressions of free speech are just considered so socially harmful and don't contribute any benefits to society."305 Yet this does not separate revenge porn from any number of categories of protected speech that may cause others emotional distress and are considered by some to pos- sess little value; this is nothing more than a call for judges to make whole- sale and retail judgments about the value and harms that flow from particular forms of speech. If revenge porn can be regulated, legislators should not target the victim's emotional distress or the invasion of pri- vacy, as these focal points threaten to undermine strong free speech pro- tections exceptional to America's free speech regime.

Solvency:
Restrictions work- they are key to forming a cultural shift in society.
Citron 14 Danielle Keats Citron, Mary Anne Franks"CRIMINALIZING REVENGE PORN" 4/21/2014 https://www.law.yale.edu/system/files/area/center/isp/documents/danielle_citron_-_criminalizing_revenge_porn_-_fesc.pdf
A criminal law solution is essential to deter judgment-proof perpetrators. As attorney and revenge porn expert Erica Johnstone puts it, “even if people aren’t afraid of being sued because they have nothing to lose, they are afraid of being convicted of a crime because that shows up on their record forever.”68 Nonconsensual pornography’s rise is surely related to the fact that malicious actors have little incentive to refrain from such behavior. While some critics believe that existing criminal law adequately addresses nonconsensual pornography, this Part highlights how existing criminal law fails to address most cases of revenge porn. A. The Importance of Criminal Law Criminal law has long prohibited privacy invasions and certain violations of autonomy. Criminal law is essential to send the clear message to potential perpetrators that nonconsensual pornography inflicts grave privacy and autonomy harms that have real consequences and penalties.69 While we share general concerns about over-incarceration, rejecting the criminalization of serious harms is not the way to address those concerns. We are also sensitive to objections that criminalizing revenge porn might reinforce the harmful and erroneous perception that women should be ashamed of their bodies or their sexual activities, but maintain that recognizing and protecting sexual autonomy does exactly the opposite.70 A criminal law solution would send the message that individuals’ bodies (mostly female bodies) are their own and that society recognizes the grave harms that flow from turning individuals into objects of pornography without their consent. In this way, a criminal law approach will help us conceptualize the involuntary publication of someone’s sexually explicit images as a form of sexual assault. When sexual abuse is inflicted on an individual’s physical body, it is considered rape or sexual assault. The fact that nonconsensual pornography does not involve physical contact does not change the fact that it is a form of sexual abuse. Federal and state criminal laws regarding voyeurism demonstrate that physical contact is not necessary to cause great harm and suffering. Video voyeurism laws punish the nonconsensual recording of a person in a state of undress in places where individuals enjoy a reasonable expectation of privacy. 71 Criminal laws prohibiting voyeurism rest on the commonly accepted assumption that observing a person in a state of undress or engaged in sexual activity without that person’s consent not only inflicts dignitary harms upon the individual observed, but also inflicts a social harm serious enough to warrant criminal prohibition and punishment. International criminal law provides precedent and perspective on this issue. Both the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (“ICTR”) and the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (“ICTY”) have employed a definition of sexual violence that does not require physical contact. In both tribunals, forced nudity was found to be a form of sexual violence.72 In the Akayesu case, the ICTR found that “sexual violence is not limited to physical invasion of the human body and may include acts which do not involve penetration or even physical contact.” 73 In the Furundzija case, the ICTY similarly found that international criminal law punishes not only rape, but also “all serious abuses of a sexual nature inflicted upon the physical and moral integrity of a person by means of coercion, threat of force or intimidation in a way that is degrading and humiliating for the victim’s dignity.”74  The legal and social condemnation of child pornography exemplifies our collective understanding that the production, viewing, and distribution of certain kinds of sexual images are harmful. 

Don't let them say free speech good; discursive objectification of women on college campuses takes away their speech. Turns case.
Pinar 12 William F. Pinar (American educator, curriculum theorist and international studies scholar; has taught at LSU, Colgate, Columbia, and Ohio State), "The Gender of Violence on Campus" Published in Gendered Futures in Higher Education: Critical Perspectives for Change. Edited by Becky Ropers-Huilman. Feb 1, 2012. SUNY Press
Fraternities demand conformity and solidarity. Conformity which is created by men bonding together against women (Hirsch, 1990). And against gay men. The sexual objectification of women remains a primary element of fraternity life; it is sometimes evident in fraternity serenades. In 1992, the UCLA-based feminist magazine Together (now called FEM) received an anonymous copy of the Phi Kappa Psi songbook in which one song— “SandM Man”—contained lyrics depicting female genital mutilation. At Cornell University, four male undergraduates posted on the Internet the “Top 75 reasons why women (bitches) should not have freedom of speech.” Reason #20: “This is my dick. I’m gonna fuck you. No more stupid questions”

Tournament: Harvard Westlake RR | Round: 3 | Opponent: Holy Cross RS | Judge: Agarwala, Smith
Minority enrollment in colleges is mostly increasing in the status quo, but inclusion on campus is the key internal link
McGill 15 McGill, Andrew Contributor, The Atlantic “The Missing Black Students at Elite American Universities.” The Atlantic. November 2015.
 Over the past 20 years, black enrollment in colleges and universities has skyrocketed. It’s a huge success story, one that’s due to the hard work of black families, college admissions officers, and education advocates. But at top-tier universities in the United States, it’s a different story. There, the share of students who are black has actually dropped since 1994. Among the 100-odd “very high research activity” institutions scored by Indiana University’s Center for Postsecondary Research, most saw their percentage of black undergraduates shrink between 1994 and 2013, the product of modest growth in black enrollment amid a much more rapid expansion of students on campus, according to data collected by the U.S. Department of Education. This list includes not only Ivy League schools and selective private colleges, but also many large public universities, including UCLA, Florida State, and the University of Michigan. Meanwhile, other institutions of higher education—including speciality schools, baccalaureate programs, and colleges that primarily offer associate degrees—have seen black representation increase, sometimes dramatically. This statistic put the recent campus discussions on race in a different light: less a spontaneous uprising of discontent, and more an inevitability. “When you already have an issue around inclusion ... these incidents of late heighten that perception and confirm that perception,” said Tyrone Howard, an associate dean for equity and inclusion at UCLA and director of the university’s Black Male Institute. “It gives some students of color some pause—do I really want to go to a place that, at least from the optics, suggests they’re not inclusive?” While black post-secondary enrollment grew dramatically during the past 20 years, black representation in elite universities barely budged. Since 1994, black enrollment has doubled at institutions that primarily grant associate degrees, including community colleges. In 2013, black students accounted for 16 percent of the student body there, versus 11 percent in 1994. Universities focusing on bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees also broadly saw gains, with blacks making up 14 percent of the population, compared to 11 percent in 1994. But at top-tier universities, black undergraduate populations average 6 percent, a statistic that has remained largely flat for 20 years. (It’s less than half of what their share of the population might suggest; the Census reports that 15 percent of Americans between the ages of 20 and 24 are black.) While some schools have had success—the University of Missouri’s main campus has actually increased its black share by 3 percentage points since 1994—the median school barely budged. (At Harvard, for example, 6.5 percent of undergraduates were black in 2013, down from 7.4 percent in 1994.) Researchers say top-tier schools have left black students behind in their push for ever-more-selective admission rates. Many rely heavily on measures that disadvantage minority students, including standardized test scores. The greater emphasis on such criteria has left high school counselors in predominantly black schools underprepared to respond. And tighter admissions may have prompted high school counselors to steer black students toward less selective schools. “Those schools don’t have as much support around college prep as they should. As a result, those students are woefully in the dark about their college options,” Howard said. “If a student shows he or she has a profile that would be considered at UCLA or Berkeley, if no one at the school or a counselor or an administrator helps the student to recognize it, that student shoots for a less-selective state school instead.” But simply admitting more black students isn’t enough. Persistently lower graduation rates among black students show that promising enrollment numbers alone won’t build an inclusive campus. The curriculum matters, academics say, as does support. So does the diversity of the faculty. “Even at places that are impressively diverse, students still feel very much on the fringes,” said Shaun Harper, a professor in the Graduate School of Education at the University of Pennsylvania and executive director of the Center for the Study of Race and Equity in Education. “Simply having more students of color on a college campus does not ensure that they are going to feel included and respected.” There’s no question that top-tier schools are becoming more diverse. White students made up 58 percent of the student body in 2013, down from 72 percent in 1994. Universities have also recruited more Hispanics, the United States’ largest minority group.
A perception of openness to hate speech causes Black people to drop out of college
Wilkerson 88 Wilkerson, Isabel Contributor, The New York Times “Campus Blacks Feel Racism’s Nuances.” The New York Times. 1988.
.'Some students were a bit fearful,'' Mrs. McLaughlin said. ''Whether it's right or wrong, these things will sway people if they perceive a danger. If you hear that someone had a horrible experience at a school, you're not likely to go. That's how decisions are made.'' But the choices seem to be getting narrower for blacks looking for predominantly white schools not touched by racial turmoil. In the last five years, incidents of racial harassment or violence have been reported at more than 300 colleges and universities across the country, according to the National Institute Against Prejudice and Violence, an independent, nonprofit policy research group based in Baltimore that tracks racial violence on college campuses. All types of campuses are involved, a including the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, The Citadel, Smith College, Brown University, Wesleyan University, the University of Michigan, the University of Wisconsin and the University of Florida. The incidents range from racist graffiti and hate notes to the formation of white supremacy groups and allegations of racially motivated brutality by campus police. And at hundreds of other campuses where there may be no reports of overt acts of bigotry, black students describe a general sense of polarization and hostility. Last week, more than 1,000 students, most of them black, halted traffic with a sit-in on Broad Street in the middle of Temple University's Philadelphia campus, after members of a white fraternity, armed with baseball bats and sticks, chased three blacks they believed had broken windows of their fraternity house. Eleven students were injured in the melee, eight of them black, and students said the campus police had used excessive force and handcuffed only black students. At Emory University in Atlanta last March, a black woman found racist epithets scrawled in her dormitory room and her stuffed animals ripped apart. The case is being investigated by the police and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. On Sunday at Trinity College in Hartford, billiard balls were thrown through a window at a black cultural center, setting off a protest march by black students the next day. Because of such incidents, racial harassment has become a standard question facing college representatives trying to recruit black students to predominantly white campuses, and with each racial incident comes a battery of calls from concerned black parents of current or prospective students, college officials say. The officials are less inclined to say whether black applications to their schools have risen or decreased, and without access to such data at all campuses where incidents have occurred, it is impossible to quantify cause and effect. Despite the recent incidents, a big majority of the nation's one million black college students - about 80 percent - remain enrolled at the nation's predominantly white colleges, as against about 20 percent at historically black colleges, said Dr. Reginald Wilson, a senior scholar at the American Council on Education. ''There's no question in my mind that black kids are leaving white schools or not going to them in the first place because of the chilly climate,'' he said. ''But it's not the parting of the Red Sea. There is not a flood of people leaving white schools.''
Free speech will only be used by the white majority – blacks fear hate speech and will stay home
Fang 16 Fang, Marina Contributor, The Huffington Post “Most College Students Want Free Speech on Campuses – But Not When It’s Hate Speech.” Huffington Post. April 2016.
But students understand the limitations of free speech policies, especially with regard to discriminatory and offensive rhetoric. In recent months, many students of color have called on their college administrators to more fully address racism on campuses, arguing that their campuses do not promote openness and diversity. “Students do appear to distinguish controversial views from what they see as hate speech — and they believe colleges should be allowed to establish policies restricting language and certain behavior that are intentionally offensive to certain groups,” the survey’s organizers wrote. Yet about 54 percent of students said that “the climate on campus prevents some people from saying what they believe because others might find it offensive.” Gallup, in collaboration with the Knight Foundation and the Newseum Institute, surveyed 3,000 students between the ages of 18 and 24 attending four-year colleges and universities in the United States. Amid a wave of incidents involving free speech and protests on college campuses, the survey’s organizers sought to gather students’ opinions about the First Amendment. The survey noted that race plays a particular role in college students’ perceptions of First Amendment freedoms. For example, only 39 percent of the black students in the survey reported feeling less confident in the right to peacefully assemble, compared to 70 percent of white students.
Turns and outweighs the case-

1. We access the internal link to your solvency- dropouts prevents the possibility of the voices from ever speaking out to develop tolerance or counter-speak.
   2. Campus diversity is key to a litany of impacts – racial progress, economic growth, decreased poverty, national security, and more.
   Kerby 12 Kerby, Sophia Researcher, Center for American Progress “10 Reasons Why We Need Diversity on College Campuses.” Center for American Progress. October 2012.
   . Here are 10 reasons why diversity on college campuses is crucial for all students. 1. Our nation is changing, and our higher education institutions need to reflect this diversity. More than half of all U.S. babies today are people of color, and by 2050 our nation will have no clear racial or ethnic majority. Communities of color are tomorrow’s leaders, and we need to better prepare our future workforce. 2. While communities of color have made great strides in closing the education gap, disparities in higher education remain prevalent. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2009 about 28 percent of Americans older than 25 years of age had a four-year college degree. That same year only 17 percent of African Americans and 13 percent for Hispanics had a four-year degree. 3. It’s in our national interest to invest in our future workforce. People of color today make up about 36 percent of the workforce. According to Census Bureau projections, by 2050 one in two workers will be a person of color. As our nation becomes more diverse, so too does our workforce. 4. Diversity in the workforce fosters innovation and competitiveness in business. Studies consistently show that diversity drives innovation and fosters creativity. In a Forbes survey, 85 percent of respondents said diversity is crucial for their businesses, and approximately 75 percent indicated that their companies will put more focus during the next three years to leverage diversity to achieve their business goals. 5. Fortune 500 companies agree that diversity is good for the bottom line. More than 60 leading 500 Fortune companies—including Coca-Cola, General Electric, Hewlett-Packard, Intel, Johnson and Johnson, and many others—came out in support of race-based admission policies in an amicus brief to the Supreme Court in the Grutter v. Bollinger ruling. 6. Diversity is a national security issue. In the past, our U.S. armed forces have argued that a highly qualified and racially diverse officer corps is essential to the military’s ability to provide national security. A top Army personnel official states that, “Diversity adds to the strength of the military as a force.” In Grutter v.Bollinger a number of high-ranking officers and civilian leaders of the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps urged the Court to uphold the limited consideration of race. 7. Diversity on campus benefits all students. Diversity on college campuses isn’t just a benefit for the brown and black students. Learning with people from a variety of backgrounds encourages collaboration and fosters innovation, thereby benefitting all students.

Tournament: UH | Round: Quarters | Opponent: Kinkaid JY | Judge: Gelfer, Si, Terrace
Promoting free speech on colleges would entail rejecting endowments from partisan donors
Kurtz 15 Stanley Kurtz, senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and a former adjunct fellow with Hudson Institute,“A Plan to Restore Free Speech on Campus,” The National Review, December 7, 2015, http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/428122/plan-restore-free-speech-campus-stanley-kurtz
Fifth: Colleges and universities ought to adopt policies on institutional political neutrality based on the University of Chicago’s Kalven Committee Report of 1967. The Kalven Report explains that the ability of a university to foster political dissent and criticism by faculty and students actually depends upon the political neutrality of the institution itself. The principles of academic freedom and institutional neutrality embodied in the Kalven Report are the surest antidote to demands that universities divest themselves of stock in fossil-fuel providers, Israeli companies, and other political targets. Advocates who attempt to inject universities into the political process by means of their endowments substantially inhibit the intellectual freedom of faculty and students who wish to explore contrary points of view. The National Association of Scholars’ recent reports on campus sustainability and fossil-fuel divestment detail the illiberal implications of these movements. The American Council of Trustees and Alumni includes the text of the Kalven Report and an excellent commentary by civil libertarian attorney Harvey Silverglate in its guide to academic freedom. Trustees should take note.
Schools with large endowments are able to recruit more low-income students which creates more material equalities on campus.
Freedman 13 Josh Freedman, policy analyst in the Economic Growth Program at the New America Foundation, “Why American Colleges Are Becoming a Force for Inequality,” The Atlantic, May 16, 2013, http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/05/why-american-colleges-are-becoming-a-force-for-inequality/275923/
Not all colleges, however, would need to raise tuition drastically to pay for a larger number of low-income students. Schools with large endowments can cover the shortfall in tuition by drawing money from these reserves. But keeping tuition constant and paying more from the endowment is only an option for schools with monstrous endowments. Many writers cite Amherst College as a success story, which has "aggressively recruited poor and middle-class students in recent years" and has increased its share of low-income students. But Amherst has a very large endowment for the size of its student body.
Outweighs the case massively- we access the internal link to your solvency- a loss of endowments prevents the possibility of thse voices from ever speaking out to develop tolerance or counter-speak.

Tournament: UH | Round: 2 | Opponent: Kinkaid JG | Judge: Neel Yerneni
International law banned hate speech
Matsuda 89 Mari J. Matsuda (Associate Professor of Law, University of Hawaii, the William S. Richardson School of Law), "Public Response to Racist Speech: Considering the Victim's Story," Michigan Law Review, 1989
The international community has chosen to outlaw racist hate propaganda. Article 4 of the International Convention on the Elimi- nation of All Forms of Racial Discrimination states: Article 4 States Parties condemn all propaganda and all organizations which are based on ideas or theories of superiority of one race or group of per- sons of one colour or ethnic origin, or which attempt to justify or pro- mote racial hatred and discrimination in any form, and undertake to adopt immediate and positive measures designed to eradicate all incite- ment to, or acts of, such discrimination and, to this end, with due regard to the principles embodied in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the rights expressly set forth in article 5 of this Convention, inter alia: (a) Shall declare as an offence punishable by law all dissemination of ideas based on racial superiority or hatred, incitement to racial discrimi- nation, as well as all acts of violence or incitement to such acts against any race or group of persons of another colour or ethnic origin, and also the provision of any assistance to racist activities, including the financing thereof; (b) Shall declare illegal and prohibit organizations, and also organ- ized and all other propaganda activities, which promote and incite racial discrimination, and shall recognize participation in such organization or activities as an offence punishable by law; and (c) Shall not permit public authorities or public institutions, national or local, to promote or incite racial discrimination.105 Under this treaty, states are required to criminalize racial hate messages. Prohibiting dissemination of ideas of racial superiority or hatred is not easily reconciled with American concepts of free speech. The Convention recognizes this conflict. Article 4 acknowledges the need for "due regard" for rights protected by the Universal Declara- tion of Human Rights and by article 5 of the Convention - including the rights of freedom of speech, association, and conscience. Recognizing these conflicting values, and nonetheless concluding that the right to freedom from racist hate propaganda deserves affirm- ative recognition, represents the evolving international view. An American lawyer, trained in a tradition of liberal thought, would read article 4 and conclude immediately that it is unworkable. Acts of vio- lence, and perhaps imminent incitement to violence are properly pro- hibited, but the control of ideas is doomed to failure. This position was voiced continually in the debates'06 preceding adoption of the Convention, leading to the view that article 4 is both controversial and troublesome. 107 To those who struggled through early international attempts'08 to deal with racist propaganda, the competing values had a sense of ur- gency. 09 The imagery of both book burnings and swastikas was clear in their minds. 10 Hitler had banned ideas. He had also murdered six million Jews in the culmination of a campaign that had as a major theme the idea of racial superiority. While the causes of fascism are complex,11 the knowledge that anti-Semitic hate propaganda and the rise of Nazism were clearly connected guided development of the emerging international law on incitement to racial hatred. In 1959 and 1960, the United Nations faced an "outburst of anti- Semitic incidents in several parts of the world.""'2 The movement to implement the human rights goals of the United Nations Charter and of the Universal Declaration gained momentum as member states sought effective means of eliminating discrimination.

US adherence to international law concerning hate speech is key to credibility in international human rights.
Cohen 15 Tanya Cohen, "It’s Time To Bring The Hammer Down On Hate Speech In The U.S." Thought Catalog, 5/1/2015
Recent scandals involving right-wing hatemongers like Phil Robertson, Donald Sterling, Bill Maher, and the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity have brought to light one of America’s biggest embarrassments: the fact that America remains the only country in the world without any legal protections against hate speech. In any other country, people like Phil Robertson and Donald Sterling would have been taken before a Human Rights Commission and subsequently fined and/or imprisoned and/or stripped of their right to public comment for making comments that incite hatred and violence against vulnerable minorities. But, in the US, such people are allowed to freely incite hatred and violence against vulnerable minorities with impunity, as the US lacks any legal protections against any forms of hate speech – even the most vile and extreme forms of hate speech remain completely legal in the so-called “land of the free”. Not only is this a violation of the most basic and fundamental human rights principles, but it’s also an explicit violation of legally-binding international human rights conventions. For many decades, human rights groups around the world – from Amnesty International to Human Rights First to the United Nations Human Rights Council – have told the United States that it needs to pass and enforce strong legal protections against hate speech in accordance with its international human rights obligations. As of 2015, the US is the only country in the world where hate speech remains completely legal. This is, in fact, a flagrant violation of international human rights law. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD) both mandate that all countries outlaw hate speech, including “propaganda for war” and the dissemination of any “ideas based on racial superiority or hatred”. The ICCPR and ICERD are both legally-binding international human rights conventions, and all nations are required to uphold them in the fullest. By failing to prosecute hate speech, the US is explicitly and flippantly violating international human rights law. No other country would be allowed to get away with this, so why would the US? The United Nations has stated many times that international law has absolute authority. This is quite simply not optional. The US is required to outlaw hate speech. No other country would be able to get away with blatantly ignoring international human rights standards, so why should the US be able to? The US is every bit as required to follow international human rights law as the rest of the world is.

ILaw solves multiple scenarios for extinction—US compliance with ILaw shapes global ILaw compliance
IEER 02 Institute for Energy and Environmental Research and the Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy. Rule of Power or Rule of Law? An Assessment of U.S. Policies and Actions Regarding Security-Related Treaties. May 2002. http://www.ieer.org/reports/treaties/execsumm.pdf
The evolution of international law since World War II is largely a response to the demands of states and individuals living within a global society with a deeply integrated world economy. In this global society, the repercussions of the actions of states, non-state actors, and individuals are not confined within borders, whether we look to greenhouse gas accumulations, nuclear testing, the danger of accidental nuclear war, or the vast massacres of civilians that have taken place over the course of the last hundred years and still continue. Multilateral agreements increasingly have been a primary instrument employed by states to meet extremely serious challenges of this kind, for several reasons. They clearly and publicly embody a set of universally applicable expectations, including prohibited and required practices and policies. In other words, they articulate global norms, such as the protection of human rights and the prohibitions of genocide and use of weapons of mass destruction. They establish predictability and accountability in addressing a given issue. States are able to accumulate expertise and confidence by participating in the structured system offered by a treaty. However, influential U.S. policymakers are resistant to the idea of a treaty-based international legal system because they fear infringement on U.S. sovereignty and they claim to lack confidence in compliance and enforcement mechanisms. This approach has dangerous practical implications for international cooperation and compliance with norms. U.S. treaty partners do not enter into treaties expecting that they are only political commitments by the United States that can be overridden based on U.S. interests. When a powerful and influential state like the United States is seen to treat its legal obligations as a matter of convenience or of national interest alone, other states will see this as a justification to relax or withdraw from their own commitments. If the United States wants to require another state to live up to its treaty obligations, it may find that the state has followed the U.S. example and opted out of compliance.

The only alternative to I-Law is genocide and nuclear war.
Shaw, Martin Professor of International Relations and Politics at the University of Sussex. “The unfinished global revolution: intellectuals and the new politics of international relations.” October 3, 2001. http://www.martinshaw.org/unfinished.pdf
The new politics of international relations require us, therefore, to go beyond the anti-imperialism of the intellectual left as well as of the semi-anarchist traditions of the academic discipline. We need to recognize three fundamental truths. First, in the twenty-first century people struggling for democratic liberties across the non-Western world are likely to make constant demands on our solidarity. Courageous academics, students and other intellectuals will be in the forefront of these movements. They deserve the unstinting support of intellectuals in the West. Second, the old international thinking in which democratic movements are seen as purely internal to states no longer carries conviction—despite the lingering nostalgia for it on both the American right and the anti-American left. The idea that global principles can and should be enforced worldwide is firmly established in the minds of hundreds of millions of people. This consciousness will become a powerful force in the coming decades. Third, global state-formation is a fact. International institutions are being extended, and (like it or not) they have a symbiotic relation with the major centre of state power, the increasingly internationalized Western conglomerate. The success of the global-democratic revolutionary wave depends first on how well it is consolidated in each national context—but second, on how thoroughly it is embedded in international networks of power, at the centre of which, inescapably, is the West.  From these political fundamentals, strategic propositions can be derived. First, democratic movements cannot regard non-governmental organizations and civil society as ends in themselves. They must aim to civilize local states, rendering them open, accountable and pluralistic, and curtail the arbitrary and violent exercise of power. Second, democratizing local states is not a separate task from integrating them into global and often Western-centred networks. Reproducing isolated local centres of power carries with it classic dangers of states as centres of war. Embedding global norms and integrating new state centres with global institutional frameworks are essential to the control of violence. (To put this another way: the proliferation of purely national democracies is not a recipe for peace.)  Third, while the global revolution cannot do without the West and the UN, neither can it rely on them unconditionally. We need these power networks, but we need to tame them too, to make their messy bureaucracies enormously more accountable and sensitive to the needs of society worldwide. This will involve the kind of ‘cosmopolitan democracy’ argued for by David Held. It will also require us to advance a global social-democratic agenda, to address the literally catastrophic scale of world social inequalities. This is not a separate problem: social and economic reform is an essential ingredient of alternatives to warlike and genocidal power; these feed off and reinforce corrupt and criminal political economies. Fourth, if we need the global-Western state, if we want to democratize it and make its institutions friendlier to global peace and justice, we cannot be indifferent to its strategic debates. It matters to develop international political interventions, legal institutions and robust peacekeeping as strategic alternatives to bombing our way through zones of crisis. It matters that international intervention supports pluralist structures, rather than ratifying Bosnia-style apartheid. As political intellectuals in the West, we need to have our eyes on the ball at our feet, but we also need to raise them to the horizon. We need to grasp the historic drama that is transforming worldwide relationships between people and state, as well as between state and state. We need to think about how the turbulence of the global revolution can be consolidated in democratic, pluralist, international networks of both social relations and state authority. We cannot be simply optimistic about this prospect. Sadly, it will require repeated violent political crises to push Western and other governments towards the required restructuring of world institutions. What I have outlined is a huge challenge; but the alternative is to see the global revolution splutter into partial defeat, or degenerate into new genocidal wars—perhaps even nuclear conflicts. The practical challenge for all concerned citizens, and the theoretical and analytical challenges for students of international relations and politics, are intertwined.

Tournament: UH | Round: 2 | Opponent: Kinkaid JG | Judge: Neel Yerneni
The distribution of revenge pornography is constitutionally protected speech – aff allows it on college campuses.
Goldberg 16 Erica Goldberg Columbia Law Review Volume 116, No. 3 April 2016 "FREE SPEECH CONSEQUENTIALISM"
The regulation of revenge porn presents thorny First Amendment issues, even though the speech is considered both highly injurious and of low value.300 Some argue that revenge porn can be regulated as obscenity,301 but, like much pornography, sexually explicit speech that does not rise to the level of obscenity is still protected speech.302 Criminal statutes and torts based on the invasion of privacy and emotional distress caused by revenge porn compromise the freedom to distribute protected speech lawfully obtained. Indeed, the Supreme Court has recognized a right for the media to publish even unlawfully obtained content, so long as the publisher was not involved in the illegal so long as the publisher was not involved in the illegal conduct that produced the content.303 And in United States v. Stevens , the Supreme Court held that individuals cannot be held criminally liable for distributing speech depicting illegal acts, so long as the individuals did not perpetrate the underlying act.304 Revenge porn, as defined here, is both legally obtained and depicts a legal act. In the ultimate articulation of free speech consequentialism, Mary Anne Franks argues for criminalization of revenge porn because "some expressions of free speech are just considered so socially harmful and don't contribute any benefits to society."305 Yet this does not separate revenge porn from any number of categories of protected speech that may cause others emotional distress and are considered by some to pos- sess little value; this is nothing more than a call for judges to make whole- sale and retail judgments about the value and harms that flow from particular forms of speech. If revenge porn can be regulated, legislators should not target the victim's emotional distress or the invasion of pri- vacy, as these focal points threaten to undermine strong free speech pro- tections exceptional to America's free speech regime.
Restrictions work- they are key to forming a cultural shift in society.
Citron 14 Danielle Keats Citron, Mary Anne Franks"CRIMINALIZING REVENGE PORN" 4/21/2014 https://www.law.yale.edu/system/files/area/center/isp/documents/danielle_citron_-_criminalizing_revenge_porn_-_fesc.pdf
A criminal law solution is essential to deter judgment-proof perpetrators. As attorney and revenge porn expert Erica Johnstone puts it, “even if people aren’t afraid of being sued because they have nothing to lose, they are afraid of being convicted of a crime because that shows up on their record forever.”68 Nonconsensual pornography’s rise is surely related to the fact that malicious actors have little incentive to refrain from such behavior. While some critics believe that existing criminal law adequately addresses nonconsensual pornography, this Part highlights how existing criminal law fails to address most cases of revenge porn. A. The Importance of Criminal Law Criminal law has long prohibited privacy invasions and certain violations of autonomy. Criminal law is essential to send the clear message to potential perpetrators that nonconsensual pornography inflicts grave privacy and autonomy harms that have real consequences and penalties.69 While we share general concerns about over-incarceration, rejecting the criminalization of serious harms is not the way to address those concerns. We are also sensitive to objections that criminalizing revenge porn might reinforce the harmful and erroneous perception that women should be ashamed of their bodies or their sexual activities, but maintain that recognizing and protecting sexual autonomy does exactly the opposite.70 A criminal law solution would send the message that individuals’ bodies (mostly female bodies) are their own and that society recognizes the grave harms that flow from turning individuals into objects of pornography without their consent. In this way, a criminal law approach will help us conceptualize the involuntary publication of someone’s sexually explicit images as a form of sexual assault. When sexual abuse is inflicted on an individual’s physical body, it is considered rape or sexual assault. The fact that nonconsensual pornography does not involve physical contact does not change the fact that it is a form of sexual abuse. Federal and state criminal laws regarding voyeurism demonstrate that physical contact is not necessary to cause great harm and suffering. Video voyeurism laws punish the nonconsensual recording of a person in a state of undress in places where individuals enjoy a reasonable expectation of privacy. 71 Criminal laws prohibiting voyeurism rest on the commonly accepted assumption that observing a person in a state of undress or engaged in sexual activity without that person’s consent not only inflicts dignitary harms upon the individual observed, but also inflicts a social harm serious enough to warrant criminal prohibition and punishment. International criminal law provides precedent and perspective on this issue. Both the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (“ICTR”) and the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (“ICTY”) have employed a definition of sexual violence that does not require physical contact. In both tribunals, forced nudity was found to be a form of sexual violence.72 In the Akayesu case, the ICTR found that “sexual violence is not limited to physical invasion of the human body and may include acts which do not involve penetration or even physical contact.” 73 In the Furundzija case, the ICTY similarly found that international criminal law punishes not only rape, but also “all serious abuses of a sexual nature inflicted upon the physical and moral integrity of a person by means of coercion, threat of force or intimidation in a way that is degrading and humiliating for the victim’s dignity.”74  The legal and social condemnation of child pornography exemplifies our collective understanding that the production, viewing, and distribution of certain kinds of sexual images are harmful.
Revenge porn causes chilling effect for victims who are afraid to speak out and are silenced. Causes psychological and irreversible violence to victims.  
Citron 14 Danielle Keats Citron Mary Anne Franks 2014 "CRIMINALIZING REVENGE PORN" Wake Forest Law Review digitalcommons.law.umaryland.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2424andcontext=fac_pubs
Victims struggle especially with anxiety, and some suffer panic attacks. Anorexia nervosa and depression are common ailments for individuals who are harassed online.33 Researchers have found that cyber harassment victims’ anxiety grows more severe over time.34 Victims have difficulty thinking positive thoughts and doing their work. According to a study conducted by the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative, over 80 of revenge porn victims experience severe emotional distress and anxiety.35 Revenge porn is often a form of domestic violence. Frequently, the intimate images are themselves the result of an abuser’s coercion of a reluctant partner.36 In numerous cases, abusers have threatened to disclose intimate images of their partners when victims attempt to leave the relationship.37 Abusers use the threat of disclosure to keep their partners under their control, making good on the threat once their partners find the courage to leave. The professional costs of revenge porn are steep. Because Internet searches of victims’ names prominently display their naked images or videos, many lose their jobs. Schools have terminated teachers whose naked pictures appeared online. A government agency ended a woman’s employment after a coworker circulated her nude photograph to colleagues.38 Victims may be unable to find work at all. Most employers rely on candidates’ online reputations as an employment screen. According to a 2009 study commissioned by Microsoft, nearly 80 of employers consult search engines to collect intelligence on job applicants, and, about 70 of the time, they reject applicants due to their findings.39 Common reasons for not interviewing and hiring applicants include concerns about their “lifestyle,” “inappropriate” online comments, and “unsuitable” photographs, videos, and information about them.40 Recruiters do not contact victims to see if they posted the nude photos of themselves or if someone else did in violation of their trust. The “simple but regrettable truth is that after consulting search results, employers don’t call revenge porn victims to schedule” interviews or to extend offers. 41 Employers do not want to hire individuals whose search results might reflect poorly on the employer. 42 To avoid further abuse, targeted individuals withdraw from online activities, which can be costly in many respects. Closing down one’s blog can mean a loss of income and other career opportunities.43 In some fields, blogging is key to getting a job. According to technology blogger Robert Scoble, people who do not blog are “never going to be included in the technology industry.” 44 When victims shut down their profiles on social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter, they are saddled with low social media influence scores that can impair their ability to obtain employment.45 Companies like Klout measure people’s online influence by looking at their number of social media followers, updates, likes, retweets, and shares. Not uncommonly, employers refuse to hire individuals with low social media influence scores. 46 Aside from these traditional harms, revenge porn can also amount to a degrading form of sexual harassment. It exposes victims’ sexuality in humiliating ways. Victims’ naked photos appear on slut-shaming47 sites, such as Cheaterville.com and MyEx.com. Once their naked images are exposed, anonymous strangers can send e-mail messages that threaten rape. Some have said: “First I will rape you, then I’ll kill you.” 48 Victims internalize these frightening and demeaning messages.49 Women would more likely suffer harm as a result of the posting of their naked images than their male counterparts.
Revenge porn is the manifestation of a violent feminist patriarchy
Dermody 14 Meagan Dermody, Managing Editor at CT, “Jennifer Lawrence, privacy and the patriarchy,” The independent student press at Virginia Commonwealth University, September 7, 2014, http://www.commonwealthtimes.org/2014/09/07/jennifer-lawrence-privacy-and-the-patriarchy/
The leak falls somewhere between degradation and physical violence; though the violation those involved have experienced was not physical in nature, losing control over sexual images can mean losing control of a piece of your personhood. Woman becomes passive body, cut to discrete and consumable pieces without consent — the photo no longer represents a person sharing an intimate part of a complex and valuable self, but an object to be fantasized about, criticized, and consumed. It doesn’t stop there. Users of the website 4chan attempted to manipulate female users into sharing nude photographs of themselves — in solidarity, they claimed. By painting it as a movement for solidarity, they belied (however ineffectively) their true intentions. The attempt to access sexually explicit images of other women is in fact a manifestation of the will to objectify, an act of patriarchal punishment with a beguiling false attitude. It follows that the leak of these photographs and the demand for more represent a greater initiative to consume the female body as passive sex object — a large-scale manifestation of patriarchal violence, meant to reify women on a grand scale and degrade their consent by stripping them of their control over their image and intimate selves.

Tournament: Harvard Westlake RR | Round: 3 | Opponent: Holy Cross RS | Judge: Agarwala, Smith
A. Uniqueness: Federal funding for colleges and universities is growing now and has been increasing for several years
Camera 16 Lauren Camera, education reporter at US News, “Federal Education Funding: Where Does the Money Go?” US News, Jan. 14, 2016, http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/data-mine/2016/01/14/federal-education-funding-where-does-the-money-go JW
Government spending on education has surged over the last decade and a half, with money being funneled to federal programs for low-income students, students with disabilities and a slate of competitions that the Obama administration launched through the economic stimulus package. Since 2002, federal funding for education has increased by 36 percent, from $50 billion to $68 billion, according to an analysis by the Committee for Education Funding, a District of Columbia-based advocacy organization. It peaked in 2009 at $97 million, thanks to an injection of dollars from the economic stimulus, most of which went to staving off teacher layoffs. By far, the biggest amount of federal education dollars goes toward funding the Pell Grant program, a tuition assistance initiative for low-income students. In fiscal 2016, the government is spending $22 billion to fund Pell Grants, twice what was spent in 2002, when the program garnered a little more than $11 billion. The explosion in the tuition assistance program was a result of more people qualifying for the grant, in part because of the Great Recession and in part because the Obama administration lowered the income threshold to qualify. The next-largest slice of overall education spending is going toward a grant program for school districts with large numbers of low-income students, known as Title I. Funding for the program also saw a big increase since 2002, going from $10.4 billion to $14.9 billion this year, an increase of 43 percent.
B. Title IX requires colleges to restrict constitutionally protected speech or lose federal funding.
Fire 16, Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, Department of Justice: Title IX Requires Violating First Amendment, 2016, https://www.thefire.org/department-of-justice-title-ix-requires-violating-first-amendment/
WASHINGTON, April 25, 2016—The Department of Justice now interprets Title IX to require colleges and universities to violate the First Amendment. In an April 22 findings letter concluding its investigation into the University of New Mexico’s policies and practices regarding sex discrimination, the Department of Justice (DOJ) found the university improperly defined sexual harassment. DOJ flatly declared that “unwelcome conduct of a sexual nature”—including “verbal conduct”—is sexual harassment “regardless of whether it causes a hostile environment or is quid pro quo.” To comply with Title IX, DOJ states that a college or university “carries the responsibility to investigate” all speech of a sexual nature that someone subjectively finds unwelcome, even if that speech is protected by the First Amendment or an institution’s promises of free speech. “The Department of Justice has put universities in an impossible position: violate the Constitution or risk losing federal funding,” said Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) President and CEO Greg Lukianoff. “The federal government’s push for a national speech code is at odds with decades of legal precedent. University presidents must find the courage to stand up to this federal overreach.”
Federal funding is critical for college operations, especially financial aid
Pew 15 (The Pew Charitable Trusts – compiles evidence and non-partisan analysis to inform the public and create better public policy, “Federal and State Funding of Higher Education: A Changing Landscape”, http://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/issue-briefs/2015/06/federal-and-state-funding-of-higher-education)
States and the federal government have long provided substantial funding for higher education, but changes in recent years have resulted in their contributions being more equal than at any time in at least the previous two decades. Historically, states have provided a far greater amount of assistance to postsecondary institutions and students; 65 percent more than the federal government on average from 1987 to 2012. But this difference narrowed dramatically in recent years, particularly since the Great Recession, as state spending declined and federal investments grew sharply, largely driven by increases in the Pell Grant program, a need-based financial aid program that is the biggest component of federal higher education spending. Although their funding streams for higher education are now comparable in size and have some overlapping policy goals, such as increasing access for students and supporting research, federal and state governments channel resources into the system in different ways. The federal government mainly provides financial assistance to individual students and specific research projects, while state funds primarily pay for the general operations of public institutions.
C. Benefactors will quit funding colleges if all speech is protected
MacDonald 05, G. Jeffrey MacDonald Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor. Donors: too much say on campus speech? ; Colleges feel more pressure from givers who want to help determine who'll be speaking on campus. The Christian Science Monitor Boston, Mass 10 Feb 2005: 11. Premier
According to Hamilton President Joan Hinde Stewart, angry benefactors threatened to quit giving if the Clinton, N.Y., college were to give a podium to the University of Colorado professor who had likened World Trade Center workers to Nazis in a 2001 essay. In doing so, they employed an increasingly popular tactic used at colleges in Utah, Nevada and Virginia with mixed degrees of success last fall in attempts to derail scheduled appearances by "Fahrenheit 9-11" filmmaker Michael Moore. Although demanding givers are nothing new, observers of higher education see in recent events signs of mounting clout for private interests to determine which ideas get a prominent platform on campus and which ones don't. Faced with such pressures, administrators say they're trying to resist manipulation. Mr. Hamilton canceled Mr. Churchill's speech, Stewart said, only after a series of death threats pushed the situation "beyond our capacity to ensure the safety of our students and visitors." Yet in an age when financiers increasingly want to set the terms for how their gifts are to be used, those responsible for the presentation of ideas and speakers seem to be approaching them much like other commodities on campus. "People are wanting their values portrayed and wanting institutions to do exactly what they want them to do," said Dr. Wes Willmer, vice president of university advancement at Biola University in La Miranda, Calif., and a frequent writer on the topic of university fundraising. "They're not giving for the common good. They're giving because they want to accomplish something, and that plays out in the speaker realm as well." Pressure to reshape the landscape of ideas is coming from various corners. At the University of Nevada, Reno, seven-figure donor Rick Reviglio threatened this fall to stop giving altogether unless the university, which had invited Mr. Moore, would instead arrange for the filmmaker to debate a prominent conservative. The university declined his $100,000 offer to stage the event. In California and Virginia, state lawmakers helped persuade presidents at California State University San Marcos and George Mason University, respectively, that upwards of $30,000 for Moore's appearance would constitute an "inappropriate" use of state funds on the eve of an election. The San Marcos campus hosted the event anyway, however, after a student group raised its own money to sponsor it. In the case of Mr. Churchill, the controversy rages on. Since Hamilton's decision, administrators have nixed Mr. Churchill's scheduled appearances at Wheaton College (Mass.), Eastern Washington University and even his own institution, the University of Colorado at Boulder. Security concerns were officially to blame in each case, although activists who opposed Churchill's message have offered another explanation. "Everything comes back down to money, and they were worried about funding at Hamilton College," says Bill Doyle, outreach director for the World Trade Center United Families Group. He said survivors who lost loved ones in the 9/11 attacks had lobbied Hamilton's four largest corporate donors to withhold future gifts if Churchill were allowed to speak. "You have all these rich corporations throughout the world and the country. Perhaps they'll take a look at what they're funding," says Doyle, especially in terms of paid speakers who "promote hate."

D. Impact
Cuts to funding for higher ed and financial aid hampers college access, especially for students from low-income or minority backgrounds. This is a huge economic blow because college degrees reduce poverty, crime and a laundry list of impacts.
Mitchell et al 16 (Report published by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities; authors were Michael Mitchell (State Budget and Tax), Michael Leachman (State Budget and Tax), and Kathleen Masterson, “Funding Down, Tuition Up: State Cuts to Higher Education Threaten Quality and Affordability at Public Colleges”, http://www.cbpp.org/research/state-budget-and-tax/funding-down-tuition-up,
Years of cuts in state funding for public colleges and universities have driven up tuition and harmed students’ educational experiences by forcing faculty reductions, fewer course offerings, and campus closings. These choices have made college less affordable and less accessible for students who need degrees to succeed in today’s economy. Though some states have begun to restore some of the deep cuts in financial support for public two-and four-year colleges since the recession hit, their support remains far below previous levels. In total, after adjusting for inflation, funding for public two-and four-year colleges is nearly $10 billion below what it was just prior to the recession. As states have slashed higher education funding, the price of attending public colleges has risen significantly faster than the growth in median income. For the average student, increases in federal student aid and the availability of tax credits have not kept up, jeopardizing the ability of many to afford the college education that is key to their long-term financial success. States that renew their commitment to a high-quality, affordable system of public higher education by increasing the revenue these schools receive will help build a stronger middle class and develop the entrepreneurs and skilled workers that are needed in the new century. Of the states that have finalized their higher education budgets for the current school year, after adjusting for inflation: Forty-six states – all except Montana, North Dakota, Wisconsin, and Wyoming – are spending less per student in the 2015-2016 yeah than they did before the recession. States cut funding deeply after the recession hit. The average state is spending $1,598, or 18 percent, less per student than before the recession. Per-student funding in nine states – Alabama, Arizona, Idaho, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and South Carolina – is down by more than 30 percent since the start of the recession. In 12 states, per-student funding fell over the last year. Of these four states – Arkansas, Illinois, Kentucky, and Vermont – have cut per-student higher education funding for the last two consecutive years. In the last year, 38 states increased funding per student. Per-student funding rose $199, or 2.8 percent, nationally. Deep state funding cuts have had major consequences for public colleges and universities. States (and to a lesser extend localities) provide roughly 54 percent of the costs of teaching and instruction at these schools. Schools have made up the difference with tuition increases, cuts to educational or other services, or both. Since the recession took hold, higher education institutions have: Increased tuition. Public colleges and universities across the country have increased tuition to compensate for declining state funding and rising costs. Annual published tuition at four-year public colleges has risen by $2,333, or 33 percent, since the 2007-08 school year. In Arizona, published tuition at four-year schools is up nearly 90 percent, while in six other states – Alabama, California, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, and Louisiana – published tuition is up more than 60 percent. These sharp tuition increases have accelerated longer-term trends of college becoming less affordable and costs shifting from states to students. Over the last 20 years, the price of attending a four-year public college or university has grown significantly faster than the median income. Although federal student aid and tax credits have risen, on average they have fallen short of covering the tuition increases. Diminished academic opportunities and student services. Tuition increases have compensated for only part of the revenue loss resulting from state funding cuts. Over the past several years, public colleges and universities have cut faculty positions, eliminated course offerings, closed campuses, and reduced student services, among other cuts. A large and growing share of future jobs will require college-educated workers. Sufficient public investment in higher education to keep quality high and tuition affordable, and to provide financial aid to students who need it most, would help states develop the skilled and diverse workforce they will need to compete for these jobs. Sufficient public investment can only occur, however, if policymakers make sound tax and budget decisions. State revenues have improved significantly since the depths of the recession but are still only modestly above pre-recession levels. To make college more affordable and increase access to higher education, many states need to supplement that revenue growth with new revenue to fully make up for years of severe cuts. But just as the opportunity to invest is emerging, lawmakers in a number of states are jeopardizing it by entertaining tax cuts that in many cases would give the biggest breaks to the wealthiest taxpayers. In recent years, states such as Wisconsin, Louisiana, and Arizona have enacted large-scale tax cuts that limit resources available for higher education. And in Illinois and Pennsylvania ongoing attempts to find necessary resources after large tax cuts threaten current and future higher education funding. State and local tax revenue is a major source of support for public colleges and universities. Unlike private institutions, which rely more heavily on charitable donations and large endowments to help fund instruction, public two-and four-year colleges typically rely heavily on state and local appropriations. In 2015, state and local dollars constituted 54 percent of the funds these institutions used directly for teaching and instruction. While states have begun to restore funding, resources are well below what they were in 2008 – 18 percent per student lower – even as state revenues have returned to pre-recession levels. (See Figures 1 and 2.) In the states that have finalized their higher education budgets for the current 2015-16 school year compared with the 2007-08 school year, when the recession hit, adjusted for inflation: States spending on higher education nationwide is down an average $1,598 per student, or 18 percent. In only four states – Montana, North Dakota, Wisconsin, and Wyoming – is per-student funding now above its 2008 pre-recession levels. 26 states have cut funding per student by more than 20 percent. Nine states have cut funding per student by more than 30 percent. Arizona and Illinois have cut funding by more than half. Over the past year, most states increased per-student funding for their public higher education systems. (See Figures 3 and 4.) Thirty-eight states are investing more per student in the 2015-16 school year than they did in 2014-15. Nationally, spending is up an average of $199 per student, or 2.8 percent. The funding increases vary from $13 per student in Missouri to $1,730 in Wyoming. 15 states increased per-student funding by more than 5 percent. Five states – Colorado, Nevada, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming – increased funding by more than 10 percent. But this trend is far from universal. In 12 states, per-student funding fell over the last year – declining, on average, 8.8 percent or by more than $516 per student. Funding cuts vary from $20 per student in New Jersey to $1,746 in Illinois. Six states – Alaska, Arizona, Illinois, Oklahoma, West Virginia and Wisconsin – cut funding by more than $250 per student over the past year. Four states – Arkansas, Illinois, Kentucky, and Vermont – have cut per-student higher education funding for the last two years. Reductions in support for public colleges reflect in part the strategy that many states chose during the deep national recession and slow recovery. State tax revenues fell sharply during the Great Recession. The recession of 2007-09 led to record-breaking declines in state revenues, and the slow recovery continues to affect them. High unemployment and a slow recovery in housing values left people with less income and less purchasing power. As a result, states took in less from income tax and sales tax, their main sources of revenue for funding education and other services. By the fourth quarter of 2015, eight years after the recession hit, total state tax revenues were just 6.4 percent greater than they were at the start of the recession after adjusting for inflation. Many states chose to close their budget deficits through sizeable budget cuts rather than a more balanced mix of spending reductions and revenue increases. States relied disproportionately on damaging cuts to deal with declining revenue over the course of the recession Between fiscal years 2008 and 2012, states made up 45 percent of the loss in revenue through reducing support for public services – and only 16 percent through increases in taxes and fees. (They closed the remainder of their shortfalls with federal aid, reserves, and various other measures.) States would have lessened the deep cuts to higher education if they had been more willing to raise additional revenue. Meanwhile, college enrollment has risen. Public higher education institutions must educate more students, raising costs. Enrollment in public higher education was up by nearly 900,000 full-time-equivalent students, or 8.6 percent, between the beginning of the recession and the 2013-14 academic year (the latest year for which there are actual data). The recession played a large role in swelling enrollment numbers, particularly at community colleges, as many high school graduates chose college over dim employment prospects and older workers returned to retool and gain new skills. Other areas of state budgets also are under pressure. For example, an estimated 803,000 more K-12 students are enrolled in the current school year than in 2008. Long-term growth in state prison populations – with state facilities now housing nearly 1.56 million inmates – also continues to put pressure on state spending. In recent years states have modestly increased investment in two-and four-year colleges from their recession lows. As such, tuition hikes have been much smaller than they wee in the worst years of the recession. Published tuition – the “sticker price” – at public four-year institutions increased in 34 states over the past year, but only modestly. Average tuition increased $254, or 2.8 percent. Between last year and this year: Louisiana increased average tuition across its four-year institutions more than any other state, hiking it by more than 7 percent, or roughly $540. Nine states raised average tuition by more than 5 percent. In Washington State, tuition actually fell by nearly 4 percent. Nevertheless, tuition remains much higher than it was before the recession in most states. Since the 2007-08 school year, average annual published tuition has risen by $2,333 nationally, or 33 percent. (See Figures 5 and 6.) Steep tuition increases have been widespread, and average tuition at public four-year institutions, has increased by: more than 60 percent in seven states; more than 40 percent in 14 states; and more than 20 percent in 39 states. In Arizona, the state with the greatest tuition increases since the recession hit, tuition has risen 87.8 percent, or $4,978 per student. Average tuition at a four-year Arizona public university is now $10,646 a year. Tuition increases, while substantial in most states, have fallen far short nationally of fully replacing the per-student support that public colleges and universities have lost due to state funding cuts. In nearly half of the states, tuition increases between 2008 and 2015 have not fully offset cuts to state higher education funding. Because tuition increases have not fully compensated for the loss of state funding, and because most public schools do not have significant endowments of other sources of funding, many public colleges and universities have simultaneously reduced course offerings, student services, and other campus amenities. Data on spending at public institutions of higher learning in recent years are incomplete, but considerable evidence suggest that these actions by many public colleges and universities likely reduced the quality and availability of their academic offerings. For example, since the start of the recession, colleges and university systems in some states have eliminated administrative and faculty positions (in some instances replacing them with non-tenure-track staff), cut courses or increased class sizes, and in some cases, consolidated or eliminated whole programs, departments, or schools. Public colleges and universities continue to make these types of cuts, even as states have begun to reinvest in higher education. For example: The University of Alaska Fairbanks eliminated six degree offerings – including engineering management, science management, and philosophy. The University of Arizona cut 320 positions from its budget including layoffs, firings, and resignations, and increased class seizes for core undergraduate courses. In addition to laying off over 200 employees the University of Akron in Ohio eliminated its school baseball team. Facing large state funding cuts, the University of Wisconsin-Madison laid off or reduced staff and faculty vacancies by 400 slots and held faculty salaries level. Nationwide, employment at public colleges and universities has grown modestly since the start of the recession, but proportionally less than the growth in the number of students. Between 2008 and 2014, the number of full-time-equivalent instructional staff at public colleges and universities grew by about 7 percent, while the number of students at these institutions grew by 8.6 percent. In other words, the number of students per faculty member rose nationwide. Over time, students have assumed much greater responsibility for paying for public higher education. That’s because during and immediately following recessions, state and local funding for higher education has tended to fall, while tuition has tended to grow more quickly. During periods of economic growth, funding has tended to recover  somewhat while tuition has stabilized at a higher level as a share of total higher educational funding. (See Figure 7.). In 1988, public colleges and universities received 3.2 times as much revenue from state and local governments as they did from students. They now receive about 1.2 times as much from states and localities as from students. Nearly every state has shifted costs to students over the last 25 years – with the most drastic shift occurring since the onset of the Great Recession. In 1988, average tuition amounts were larger than per-student state expenditures in only two states, New Hampshire and Vermont. By 2008, that number had grown to ten states. By 2008, that number had grown to ten states. In 2015 (the latest year for which there is data), tuition revenue was greater than state and local government funding for higher education in 22 states, with six – Colorado, Delaware, Michigan, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Vermont – requiring students and families to shoulder higher education costs by a ration of at least 2- to -1. The cost shift from states to students has happened over a period when absorbing additional expenses has been difficult for many families because their incomes have been stagnant or declining. In the 1970s and early-to mid-1980s, tuition and incomes both grew modestly faster than inflation; by the late 1980s, tuition began to rise much faster than incomes. (See Figure 8.) Since 1973, average inflation-adjusted public college tuition has increased by 274 percent while median household income has grown by only 7 percent. Over the past 40 years, the incomes of the top 1 percent of families have grown by almost 170 percent. This means that public college tuition has outpaced income growth for even the highest earners. The sharp tuition increases states have imposed since the recession have exacerbated the longer-term trend. Tuition jumped nearly 30 percent between the 2007-08 and 2014-15 school years, while real median income fell roughly 6.5 percent over the same time period. Rapidly rising tuition at a time of weak or declining income growth has damaging consequences for families, students, and the national economy. Tuition costs deter some students from enrolling in college. While the recession encouraged many students to enroll in higher education, the large tuition increases of the past few years may have prevented further enrollment gains. Rapidly rising tuition makes it less likely that students will attend college. Research has consistently found that college price increases result in declining enrollment. While many universities and the federal government provide financial aid to help students bear the price, research suggests that a high sticker price can dissuade students from enrolling even if the net price, including aid, doesn’t rise. Rising tuition may be harming students of color and reducing campus diversity. New research finds that rising tuition and fees jeopardize campus diversity at public four-year colleges as students of color are less likely to enroll as the cost of tuition goes up. “All else equal, a $1000 tuition increase for full-time undergraduate students is associated with a drop in campus diversity of almost 6 percent,” New York University researchers found in a 2015 study. Another study, which examined tuition policy changes in Texas in the early 2000s, concluded that rising tuition rates limited enrollment gains for Hispanic students in the state. The share of students coming from communities of color at public two-and four-year colleges had risen significantly in the years leading up to these tuition increases. State cuts to higher education, made up for with higher tuition rates, jeopardize this trend. Tuition increases likely deter low-income students, in particular, from enrolling. College cost increases have the biggest impact on students from low-income families, research further shows. For example, a 1995 study by Harvard University researcher Thomas Kane concluded that states with the larges tuition increases during the 1980s and early 1990s “saw the greatest widening of the gaps in enrollment between high-and low-income youth.” The relative lack of knowledge among low-income families about the admissions and financial aid process may exacerbate these damaging effects. Students from families that struggle to get by – including those who live in communities with lower shares of college-educated adults and attend high schools that have higher student-to-counselor ratios tend to overestimate the true cost of higher education more than students from wealthier households in part because they are less aware of the financial aid for which they are eligible. These effects are particularly concerning because gaps in college enrollment between higher-and lower-income youth are already pronounced. In 2012, just over half of recent high school graduates from families with income in the lowest 20 percent enrolled in some form of postsecondary education, as opposed to 82 percent of students from the top 20 percent. Significant enrollment gaps based on income exist even among prospective students with similar academic records and test scores. Rapidly rising costs at public colleges and universities may widen these gaps further. Tuition increase may be pushing lower-income students toward less-selective public institutions, reducing their future earnings. Perhaps just as important as a student’s decision to enroll in higher education is the choice of which college to attend. A large share of high-achieving students from struggling families fail to apply to any selective colleges or universities, a 2013 Brookings Institution study found. Even here, research indicates that financial constraints and concerns about cost push lower-income students to narrow their list of potential schools and ultimately enroll in less-selective institutions. Another 2013 study found evidence that some high-achieving, low-income students are more likely to “undermatch” in their college choice in part due to financial constraints. Where a student decides to go to college has broad economic implications, especially for economically disadvantaged students and students of color. Students who had parents with less education, as well as African American and Latino students, experienced higher postgraduate earnings by attending more elite colleges relative to similar students who attended less-selective universities, a 2011 study by Stanford University and Mathematica Policy Research found. As tuition soared after the recession, federal financial aid also increased.  The Federal Pell Grant Program ― the nation’s primary source of student grant aid ― increased the amount of aid it distributed by just over 80 percent between the 2007-08 and 2014-15 school years.  This substantial boost has enabled the program not only to reach more students ― 2.7 million more students received Pell support last year than in 2008 ― but also to provide the average recipient with more support.  The average grant rose by 21 percent — to $3,673 from $3,028.44 The increase in federal financial aid has helped many students and families cover recent tuition hikes.  The College Board calculates that the annual value of grant aid and higher education tax benefits for students at four-year public colleges nationally has risen by an average of $1,410 in real terms since the 2007-08 school year, offsetting about 61 percent of the average $2,320 tuition increase.  For community colleges, increases in student aid have more than made up the difference, leading to a drop in net tuition for the average student.45  Since the sticker-price increases have varied so much from state to state while federal grant and tax-credit amounts are uniform across the country, students in states with large tuition increases ¾ such as Arizona, Georgia, and Louisiana ¾ likely still experienced substantial increases in their net tuition and fees, while the net cost for students in states with smaller tuition increases may have fallen. Financial aid provided bystates, however — which was far less than federal aid even before the recession — hasfallen on average.  In the 2007-2008 school year, state grant dollars equaled $740 per student.  By 2014, the latest year for which full data is available, that number had fallen to $710, a drop of roughly 4 percent.46 Federal financial aid has certainly lessened the impact of tuition and fee increases on students from families with low incomes.  However, the overall average cost of attending college has risen for these students, because room and board costs have increased, too.  As a result, the net cost of attendance at four-year public institutions for low-income students increased 12 percent from 2008 to 2012.  For those at public community colleges, the increase over the same time period was 4 percent.47   Because grants and tax credits rarely cover the full cost of college attendance, most students — students of color and low-income students in particular — borrow money.  In 2012, 79 percent of students from families whose incomes are in the lowest 25 percent graduating with a bachelor’s degree had student loans (compared with 55 percent of graduating students from families whose incomes are in the higher 25 percent).48 In the same year, more than four of every five African American students borrowed at public institutions (compared with 64 percent of graduating students overall).49 Further, the overall share of students graduating with debt has risen since the start of the recession.  Between the 2007-08 and 2013-14 school years, the share of students graduating with debt from a public four-year institution increased from 55 percent to 60 percent.  At the same time, the average amount of debt incurred by the average bachelor’s degree recipient with loans at a public four-year institution grew to $25,500 from $21,200 (in 2014 dollars), an increase of $4,300, or 18 percent.  By contrast, the average level of debt incurred had risen only about 1 percent in the six years prior to the recession.50 In short, at public four-year institutions, a greater share of students are taking on larger amounts of debt.  By the fourth quarter of 2015, students held $1.23 trillion in student debt — more than car loans and credit card debt combined.51 Yet, while college loan burdens have increased significantly for students at public four-year institutions, the significant run-up in debt levels has been driven in large part by a growing share of students attending private for-profit institutions — such as Corinthian and the University of Phoenix — and two-year community colleges.  In 2000, borrowers entering repayment on student loans from for-profit and two-year institutions made up roughly 30 percent of all borrowers overall, a study from the U.S. Treasury Department and Stanford University researchers found.  By 2011, these borrowers represented nearly half of all federal student loan borrowers entering repayment.  In fact, for-profit institutions have been such a driving force that in 2014, eight of the top ten and 13 of the top 25 institutions whose students owe (collectively) the most in federal student loan debt were for-profit institutions.  (See Table 1.)  In 2000, only one for-profit made the top 25 (the rest were either four-year public or private non-profit institutions).52 The reduced college access and graduation rates that research finds likely result from decreased state support for college hurt more than just students, because college attainment has grown increasingly important to long-term state and national economic outcomes. A college degree is increasingly a pre-requisite for professional success and for entry into the middle class or beyond. A young college graduate earns $12,000 a year more than someone who did not attend college. The benefits of academic attainment extend beyond those who receive a degree. Entire communities benefit when more residents have college degrees. For instance, higher educational attainment has been connected with lower rates of crime, greater levels of civic participation, and better health. Areas with highly educated residents tend to attract strong employers who pay their employees competitive wages. Those employees, in turn, buy goods and services from others in the community, broadly benefitting the area’s economy. As a result, the wages of workers at all levels of education are higher in metropolitan areas with high concentrations of college-educated residents, economist Enrico Moretti of the university of California at Berkeley finds. This implies that – even though not all good jobs require a college degree – having a highly educated workforce can boost an area’s economic success. The economic importance of higher education will continue to grow. In a 2013 report, researchers from the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce projected that by 2020, nearly two-thirds of all jobs will require at least some college education, up from 59 percent in 2007. The Georgetown Center further projects that, based on current trends – without significant new investment in capacity – the nation’s education system will not keep pace with the rising demand for educated workers. By 2020, the country’s system of higher education will produce 5 million fewer college graduates than the labor market will need. The increase in student debt in recent years also has important implications for the broader economy, most explicitly for students who incur the college debt but do not graduate. While debt is a crucial tool for financing higher education, excessive debt can impose considerable costs on both students and society as a whole. Research finds that higher student debt levels are associated with lower rates of homeownership among young adults; can create stresses that reduce the probability of graduation, particularly for students from lower-income families; and reduce the likelihood that graduates with majors in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics will go on to the further academic study that is often needed to obtain advanced positions in those fields. There is also growing concern that rising debt levels may be preventing some young adults from starting businesses. Many entrepreneurs rely heavily on personal debt to help launch their small businesses, and rising levels of student loan debt may make it more difficult to obtain loans or other lines of credit necessary for launching a startup. Looking at the period from 2000 to 2010, researchers from the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia found that as student loan debt rose, net business formation of the smallest businesses – those employing four or fewer people – fell. These findings mean states should strive to expand college access and increase college graduation rates to help build a strong middle class and develop the entrepreneurs and skilled workers needed to compete in today’s global economy.  They suggest further that the severe higher education funding cuts that states have made since the start of the recession will make it more difficult to achieve those goals

Tournament: UH | Round: 2 | Opponent: Kinkaid JG | Judge: Neel Yerneni
The sufficient negative burden is to show there exists one instance where free speech ought not be constitutionally protected.
Google Dictionary defines “not” as https://www.google.com/search?q=not+definitionandoq=not+definitionandaqs=chrome.0.0l6.2170j0j7andsourceid=chromeandie=UTF-8 “used with an auxiliary verb or “be” to form the negative.”
Google Dictionary defines “any” as https://www.google.com/search?q=not+definitionandoq=not+definitionandaqs=chrome.0.0l6.2170j0j7andsourceid=chromeandie=UTF-8#q=any+definition “whichever of a specified class might be chosen.”
Prefer

1. Semantics
   2. Topic Lit

Tournament: Strake RR | Round: 1 | Opponent: Lake Highland MK | Judge: Sullivan, Graham
The standard is consistency with universal freedom.
First, an agent’s will acts on a law that it gives to itself. If pleasure were a law to you, then you would straightaway do the pleasurable act, but since you’re autonomous, you can reason about taking the action. Thus a condition of action is that the will is self-determined. KORSGAARD:
“Self-Constitution in the Ethics of Plato and Kant” by Christine M. Korsgaard
“Now I’m going to argue that that sort of willing is impossible. The first step is this:  :  to conceive of yourself as the cause of your actions is to identify with the principle of choice on which you act. A rational will is a self-conscious causality, and a self-conscious causality is aware of itself as a cause. To be aware of yourself as a cause is to identify yourself with something in the scenario that gives rise to the action, and this must be the principle of choice. For instance, suppose you experience a conflict of desire: you have a desire to do both A and B, and they are incompatible. You have some principle that favors A over B, so you exercise this principle, and you choose to do A. In this kind of case, you do not regard yourself as a mere passive spectator to the battle between A and B. Yo regard the choice as yours, as the product of your own activity, because you regard the principle of choice as expressive, or representative, of yourself. You must do so, for the only alternative to identifying with the principle of choice is regarding the principle of choice as some third thing in you, another force on a par with the incentives to do A and to do B, which happened to throw in its weight in favor of A, in a battle at which you were, after all, a mere passive spectator. But then you are not the cause of the action. Self-conscious or rational agency, then, requires identification with the principle of choice on which you act.” (123)
And, a rational will must set ends within a system of reciprocal constraints. Anything else justifies that someone could impede your ability to achieve your end in the first place, which also means reason constrains end-based frameworks. SIYAR:
Jamsheed Aiam Siyar: Kant’s Conception of Practical Reason. Tufts University, 1999 LW-DD
“Recall that insofar as I represent a rationally determined end, I represent it having rational and hence objective worth. That is—as noted above—I represent my end as to be done just in virtue of the perfectly general rational grounds that I take to be decisive for its adoption. I will now argue that I must also represent my objectively worthy end as recognizable as such by all other subjects—this is just what my representation of communicability consists in. Now, when I represent my end as to be done, I represent it as binding me to certain courses of actions, precluding other actions, etc. Thus, my ends and function as constraints for me in that they determine what I can or must do (at least if I am to be consistent). I may of course give up an end such as that of eating ice cream at a future point; yet while I have the end, I must see myself as bound to do what is necessary to realize it.35 Thus, I must represent my ends as constraints that I have adopted, constraints that structure the possible space of choice and action for me. Further, given that my end is rationally determined, I take it to be generally recognizable that my end functions as a rationally determined constraint. That is, I take it that others subjects can also recognize my end it as an objective constraint, for I take it that they as well as myself can cognize its determining grounds—the source of its objective worth—through the exercise of reason.  Indeed, in representing an end, I in effect demand recognition for it from others subjects: since the end functions as an objective though self-imposed constraint for me, I must demand that this constraint be recognized as such. The thought here is simply that if I am committed to some end, e.g. my ice cream eating policy, I must act in certain ways to realize it. In this context, I cannot be indifferent to the attitudes and actions of others, for these may either help or hinder my pursuit of my end. Hence, if I am in fact committed to realizing my end, i.e. if I represent an end at all, I must demand that the worth of my end, its status as to be done, be recognized by others. For instance, my ice cream eating policy entails the demand that where practically possible, others not hinder my actions in its service. Further, at least in principle, the actions and attitudes of any other subject could have some bearing on my pursuit of my end. Hence, my demand for recognition must be fully general: it must be directed to rational beings per se. In representing an end, I must demand that this end in effect function as a law for all rational beings. I must demand, in other words, that all other subjects recognize and represent my end as constraining their actions just as I represent it as constraining my actions.” (80-81)

Second, action theory (analytic)

Third, freedom is key to all frameworks (analytic)

Impact Calc: This is means based.

Contention:
Freedom implies an innate right to determine the course of your actions. In the state of nature, might rather than right governs these judgments. Absent of a public authority, rights violations are inevitable. VARDEN:
“A Kantian Conception of Free Speech” by Helga Varden Chapter from: “Freedom of Expression in a Diverse World” edited by Deirdre Golash 2010  LM-DD
“The first important distinction between Kant and much contemporary liberal thought issues from Kant’s argument that it is not in principle possible for individuals to realize right in the state of nature. Kant explicitly rejects the common assumption in liberal theories of his time as well as today that virtuous private individuals can interact in ways reconcilable both with one another’s right to freedom and their corresponding innate and acquired private rights. All the details of this argument are beyond the scope of this paper. It suffices to say that ideal problems of assurance and indeterminacy regarding the specification, application and enforcement of the principles of private right to actual interactions lead Kant to conclude that rightful interaction is in principle impossible in the state of nature.5 Kant argues that only a public authority can solve these problems in a way reconcilable with everyone’s right to freedom. This is why we find Kant starting his discussion of public right with this claim: however well disposed and right-loving men might be, it still lies a priori in the rational idea of such a condition (one that is not rightful) that before a public lawful condition is established individuals human beings... can never be secure against violence from one another, since each has her own right to do what seems right and good to her and not be dependent upon another’s opinion about this (6: 312).6 There are no rightful obligations in the state of nature, since in this condition might (‘violence’, or arbitrary judgments and ‘opinion’ about ‘what seems right and good’) rather than right (freedom under law) ultimately governs interactions. According to Kant, therefore, only the establishment of a public authority can enable interaction in ways reconcilable with each person’s innate right to freedom. Moreover, only a public authority can ensure interaction consistent with what Kant argues are our innate rights (to bodily integrity and honor) and our acquired rights (to private prop- erty, contract and status relations). The reason is that only the public authority can solve the problems of assurance and indeterminacy without violating anyone’s right to freedom. The public authority can solve these problems because it represents the will of all and yet the will of no one in particular. Because the public authority is representative in this way – by being “united a priori ” or by being an “omnilateral” will (6: 263) – it can regulates on behalf of everyone rather than on behalf of anyone in particular. For these reasons, civil society is seen as the only means through which our interactions can become subject to universal laws that restrict everyone’s freedom reciprocally rather than as subject to anyone’s arbitrary choices.” (46-47)
And, according to Cornell Law, the Brandenburg v. Ohio U.S. Supreme Court decision maintains that seditious speech is protected by the First Amendment so long as it does not indicate an “imminent” threat.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/395/444 But, seditious speech is never compatible with an omnilateral will and must be restricted. The intent requires the right to destroy the state, which justifies the annihilation of all rights. VARDEN 2:
“A Kantian Conception of Free Speech” by Helga Varden Chapter from: “Freedom of Expression in a Diverse World” edited by Deirdre Golash 2010  LM-DD
“To understand Kant’s condemnation of seditious speech, remember that Kant, as mentioned above, takes himself to have shown that justice is impossible in the state of nature or that there is no natural executive right. Since Kant considers himself to have successfully refuted any defense of the natural executive right, he takes himself also to have shown that no one has the right to stay in the state of nature. This, in turn, explains why Kant can and does considers seditious speech a public crime. The intention behind seditious speech is not merely to criticize the government or to discuss theories of government critically, say. In order to qualify as seditious, the speaker’s intention must be to encourage and support efforts to subvert the government or to instigate its violent overthrow, namely revolution. To have such a right would be to have the right to destroy the state. Since the state is the means through which right is possible, such a right would involve having the right to annihilate right (6: 320). That is, since right is impossible in the state of nature, to have a right to subversion would be to have the right to replace right with might. Since the state is the only means through which right can replace might, the state outlaws it. And since it is a crime that “endangers the commonwealth” rather than citizens qua private citizens, it is a public crime (6: 331).” (52)

Tournament: Harvard Westlake | Round: 5 | Opponent: Brentwood EL | Judge: Lawrence Zhou
Universal rules fail. Any application of rules can never be verified because rules are indeterminate, as they require prior knowledge to understand them, which can never be the basis for truth.
Kripke “Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language” by Saul A. Kripke Harvard University Press Cambridge, Massachusetts 1982
“Normally, when we consider a mathematical rule such as addition, we think of ourselves as guided in our application of it to each new instance. Just this is the difference between someone who computes new values of a function and someone who calls out numbers at random. Given my past intentions regarding the symbol ‘+’, one and only one answer is dictated as the one appropriate to ‘68+57'. On the other hand, although an intelligence tester may suppose that there is only one possible continuation to the sequence 2, 4, 6, 8,…, mathematical and philosophical sophisticates know that an indefinite number of rules (even rules stated in terms of mathematical functions as conventional as ordinary polynomials) are compatible with any such finite initial segment. So if the tester urges me to respond, after 2, 4, 6, 8, . . ., with the unique appropriate next number, the proper response is that no such unique number exists, nor is there any unique (rule determined) infinite sequence that continues the given one. The problem can then be put this way: Did I myself, in the directions for the future that I gave myself regarding plus ‘+’, really differ from the intelligence tester? True, I may not merely stipulate that plus ‘+’ is to be a function instantiated by a finite number of computations. In addition, I may give myself directions for the further computation of plus ‘+', stated in terms of other functions and rules. In turn, I may give myself directions for the further computation of these functions and rules, and so on. Eventually, however, the process must stop, with ‘ultimate’ functions and rules that I have stipulated for myself only by a finite number of examples, just as in the intelligence test. If so, is not my procedure as arbitrary as that of the man who guesses the continuation of the intelligence test? In what sense is my actual computation procedure, following an algorithm that yields ‘125’, more justified by my past instructions than an alternative procedure that would have resulted in ‘5'? Am I not simply following an unjustifiable impulse?" Of course, these problems apply throughout language and are not confined to mathematical examples, though it is with mathematical examples that they can be most smoothly brought out. I think that I have learned the term 'table' in such a way that it will to apply to indefinitely many future items. So I can apply the term to a new situation, say when I enter the Eiffel Tower for the first time and see a table at the base. Can I answer a sceptic who supposes that by `table' in the past I meant tabair, where a 'tabair' is anything that is a table not found at the base of the Eiffel Tower, or a chair found there?. .” (17-20)
If ethics cannot be based on rules, the ethical project must begin with practices. Unlike rules, practices are followed based on socially accepted procedures, as opposed to an indefinite number of rules.
Mouffe “The Democratic Paradox” by Chantal Mouffe 2000
“This reveals that procedures only exist as complex ensembles of practices. Those practices constitute specific forms of individuality and identity that make possible the allegiance to the procedures. It is because they are inscribed in shared forms of life and agreements in judgements that procedures can be accepted and followed. They cannot be seen as rules that are created on the basis of principles and then applied to specific cases. Rules, for Wittgenstein, are always abridgements of practices, they are inseparable from specific forms of life. The distinction between procedural and substantial cannot therefore be as clear as most liberal theorists would have it. In the case of justice. for instance, it means that one cannot oppose. as so many liberals do, procedural and substantial justice without recognizing that procedural justice already presupposes accep- tance of anain values. It is the liberal conception of justice which posits the priority of the right over the good. but this is already the expression of a specific good. Democracy is not only a mauer of establishing the right procedures independently of the practices that make possible democratic forms of individual- ity. The question of the conditions of existence of democratic forms of individuality and of the practices and language-games in which they are constituted is a central one, even in a liberal- democratic society where procedures playa central role. Procedures always involve substantial ethical commitments. For that reason they cannot work properly if they are not supported by a specific form of ethos.” (68-69)
An ethic based in a practice instead of rules require particularism. The virtuous character does not follow a rule that precedes and guides every context. In a particular context, the virtuous character acts for the right reasons, with the right motives, and at the right time. We agree on the goodness of virtues, and the particular context determines the conditions for virtuous decision making.
Leibowitz PARTICULARISM IN ARISTOTLE’S NICOMACHEAN ETHICS * Uri D. Leibowitz University of Nottingham (Forthcoming in The Journal of Moral Philosophy)
“Following Burnyeat (1980), I understand Aristotle here as engaged in a dialectical inquiry towards first principles 1. This inquiry towards first principles, Aristotle argues, must begin with what is known to us 2. Our starting points, I suggest, are the normative statuses of particular actions. As Burnyeat observes, “the ancient commentators are agreed that Aristotle has in mind knowledge about actions in accordance with the virtues; these actions are the things familiar to us from which we must start, and what we know about them is that they are noble or just” (1980:71- 72). In other words, we must start our moral theorizing from our judgments about particular actions.  However, we need not know why those actions have the normative status we identify them as having 4; one can engage in moral theorizing even if one does not know why right acts are right, as long as one can identify that they are right, or as long as one is willing to accept the judgments of “one who speaks well” as one’s starting points 6. This is one reason why Aristotle insists that a competent student is one who has had a good moral upbringing 3. A person who is brought up well should be able to tell apart noble acts from ignoble ones; he is expected to be able to identify courageous acts, or just acts, and he is expected to be able to tell them apart from those acts that are cowardly or unjust. One of Aristotle’s goals in the NE, I propose, is are to teach his students why those acts they identify as right are right.  But how could one identify particular actions as right if one doesn’t know why these acts are right? A native speaker of a language can often tell whether a sentence is grammatical even if in cases in which she does not know why it is so. Naturally, only native speakers who have been “brought up well” with respect to language are able to do this correctly and reliably. Aristotle thinks that with a proper moral upbringing one can form habits that would enable one to distinguish right actions from wrong ones 5. This is one reason why in I.3 Aristotle insists that young men are not the target audience for his lectures: “for they are inexperienced in the actions that constitute life, and what is said will start from these and will be about these” (1095a3-4, Rowe trans.). Our discussion, Aristotle tells us, concerns with the rightness of actions but it also starts with correct judgments about which particular actions are right. The ability to identify right acts as right is acquired by habituation and they habits we form depend on the kind of moral upbringing we get. Having correct starting points is vital to a successful dialectical inquiry; if our initial judgments about the normative status of actions are incorrect, then the first principles we discover by way of a dialectical inquiry from these judgments are likely to be false.13  In I.7 Aristotle reminds us that the appropriate degree of precision for each investigation depends on the nature of the subject matter being explored (1098a26-28). He then goes on to say this:  7 One should not demand to know the reason why, either, in the same way in all matters: in some cases, it will suffice if that something is so has been well shown, 8 as indeed is true of starting points; some are grasped by induction, some by perception, some by a sort of habituation, and others in other ways: 9 one must try to get hold of each sort in the appropriate way, and take care that they are well marked out, 10 since they have great importance in relation to what comes later. For the start of something seems to be more than half of the whole, and through it many of the things being looked for seem to become evident. (1098a33-1098b7, Rowe trans.)14  In this passage Aristotle tells us that inquiries can differ not only with respect to their appropriate degree of precision 7, but also in the way in which their starting points are obtained 8.15 Moreover, Aristotle insists that it is important to obtain the starting points for each inquiry in the appropriate way 9. Finally, Aristotle stresses again the importance of having the correct starting points 10. Aristotle’s goal, as I have mentioned above, is to help us understand why those acts that we identify as right—our starting points—are, in fact, right. But he warns us that the kind of explanation we ought to seek should be appropriate to the subject matter we are investigating 7. In geometry we can give demonstrative explanation. But we “should not demand to know the reason why in the same way in all matters.” Explanations of the rightness of actions will take a different forms. “Pure science involves demonstration,” Aristotle tells us, “while things whose starting points or first causes can be other than they are do not admit of demonstrations” (VI.5:1140a34).  After reminding us in II.2 that the subject matter of ethics lacks fixity and hence that our account will not be very precise,16 Aristotle goes on to say this: “But though our present account is of this nature we must give what help we can” (1104a10, Ross trans.). What immediately follows, are Aristotle’s observations about the harmful effects of excess and deficiency and the positive effects of the proportionate amount, or  the mean. These observations, Aristotle tells us, hold true for health and strength as well as for characteristics like temperance, courage, and other virtues. To act in accordance with the mean is not only the way to acquire virtuous characteristics, but is also the mark of virtuous actions. Aristotle seems to think that his comments on the mean are helpful. But what kind of help does he think these comments provide? Broadie (1991) proposes the following hypothesis: Aristotle could be deceived into thinking the doctrine of the mean useful in ways in which in fact it is not. This may be what happens in NE II.2, where he bewails the impossibility of giving exact rules for correct particular responses (1104a5-9); then says that he must give what help he can (1104a10- 11); and then goes on to discuss, not responses, but dispositions.” (101-2) If Aristotle had thought that his comments on the mean can help us to identify the right response in various situations, then, like Broadie, I think he was mistaken about their usefulness. However, I doubt that this is what Aristotle had in mind. Indeed, in VI.1 Aristotle explicitly tells us that he does not think that his remarks on the mean can help us to identify what we ought to do:  We stated earlier that we must choose the median, and not excess or deficiency, and that the median is what right reason dictates...but this statement, true though it is, lacks clarity. In all other fields of endeavor in which scientific knowledge is possible, it is indeed true to say that we must exert ourselves or relax neither too much nor too little, but to an intermediate extent and as right reason demands. But if this is the only thing a person knows, he will be none the wiser: he will, for example, not know what kind of medicines to apply to his body, if he is merely told to apply whatever medical science prescribes and in a manner in which a medical expert applies them.” (VI.1:1138b19-35)  So what kind of help are these comments on the mean supposed to provide? I propose that these remarks are meant to help us to explain why those acts that we already know are virtuous are virtuous. If we can tell—as we must be able to in order to obtain starting points for our ethical inquiry—that an particular act is courageous, for instance, we now know that this action it lies in the mean. So we can explain its rightness by pointing out that this act is neither excessive nor deficient. This, of course, is a rudimentary sketch of an explanatory schema but we can now already identify the basic structure of the explanation: if an act is right, then we should be able to identify a scale on which it is neither excessive nor deficient. Aristotle recognizes that what he has given us so far is extremely undeveloped and he goes on to expound on this explanatory model in several phases. First, after presenting the bare bones of his explanatory schema, Aristotle discusses some general features of the virtues: he tells us that a mark of an action performed virtuously is that the agent of the action takes pleasure in performing the action (II.3); he distinguishes between a virtuous action and an action performed virtuously (II.4); and he identifies the genus and differentia of virtue (II.5-6). By the end of II.6 we get Aristotle’s definition of virtue: “We may thus conclude that virtue or excellence is a characteristic involving choice, and that it consists in observing the mean relative to us, a mean which is defined by a rational principle, such as a man of practical wisdom would use to determine it” (1106b35-1107a1). We now know a bit more about the proper explanation of the virtuousness of a particular action. Consider: “Why is this action of standing one’s ground in battle courageous?” The proper answer will take the following form: “This action is courageous because the agent chose to perform it, and it is located in the mean (relative to the agent)17 of some relevant scale.”  What we have so far is a sketch of an explanatory schema and we must now learn how to properly fill in this schema in order to provide satisfactory explanations of the rightness of individual actions. Aristotle turns to this in II.7:  However, this general statement is not enough; we must also show that it fits particular instances. For in a discussion of moral actions, although the general statements have a wider range of application, statements on particular points have more truth in them: actions are concerned with particulars and  our statements must harmonize with them.” (1107a28-33)
We already know that in order to explain why a particular act is virtuous we must locate this action in the mean of some relevant scale—this statement has a wide range of application—but in order to appreciate its truth, we must see how it applies to particular virtuous actions, since we are, most fundamentally, concerned with the rightness of individual actions. Aristotle, then, wants to show us that by applying his schema properly we can generate adequate explanation of the rightness of particular actions.  In the remainder of II.7 Aristotle lists the various scales that are relevant to each virtue. And whenever possible he introduces the relevant vocabulary we should use in our explanation. For example, if we want to explain why an act is courageous, we should locate the agent’s emotional state while performing the action as a mean on a scale (or scales)18 of fear and confidence; the agent might be reckless if he exceeds in confidence, or cowardly if he is deficient in confidence. If we want to explain why an action is generous we should locate the action as a mean on a scale ranging from stinginess to extravagance.  Aristotle goes on to list relevant scales for other virtues. Yet he is well aware that even now we have only been given a sketch—“For our present purposes, we must rest content with an outline and a summary, but we shall later define these qualities more precisely” (II.7:1107b15). By the end of II.7, if we are asked, for example, why Ms. Smith’s act of donating $100,000 to cancer research is generous, we could say that she chose to perform this action, and that given her economic and social situation, donating $100,000 to this cause was neither stingy nor extravagant. Moreover, we know that if she did not take pleasure in her generous donation, then she did not act generously. This explanatory schema does not generate deductive explanations. From the fact that Ms. Smith’s action was neither stingy nor extravagant it does not follow that her action was right or virtuous; there may have been other, more urgent, causes to which to donate, or there could have been good reasons not to donate to the particular organization that she had chosen. So explanations produced by applying Aristotle’s explanatory schema do not guarantee the truth of the explanandum.19 But as we have seen, Aristotle insists that we “should not demand to know the reason why in the same way in all matters,” and that explanations in ethics “do not admit of demonstrations.” This is why it is important for Aristotle that we already know that the action is right before we explain why it is right; that the act is right is part of the data we have at our disposal when we explain its rightness.  The reading of Aristotle I propose helps us to make sense of several features of Aristotle’s work that commentators have found perplexing. First, it helps us to understand the importance of the doctrine of the mean for Aristotle’s project. Some readers of the NE are puzzled by the seriousness with which Aristotle approaches the doctrine of the mean. As Broadie (1991) puts it: Aristotle regards the doctrine of the mean as an important contribution, to judge by the solemnity with which he introduces it and the many pages where he strains over the details of its application. Yet the doctrine often gets a disappointed reception. It seems at first to offer special illumination, but in the end, according to its critics, it only deals with truisms together with a questionable taxonomy of virtues and vices. (95) On my reading the doctrine of the mean plays an important explanatory role which lies at the heart of Aristotle’s project. Although the doctrine of the mean doesn’t identify for us the features that make right actions right, it does tell us what a proper explanation of the rightness of a particular action should look like. We obtain a satisfactory explanation only when we replace the truisms about the harmful effects of excess and deficiency and the positive effects of the proportionate amount with the specific features of the action/situation; i.e., we must identify the relevant scale on which the action lies in the mean, and we have to identify the mean relative to the agent of the action and the situation in which the act is performed. This is why Aristotle methodically lists not only those virtues and vices that have names, but also those that do not have names, and this is why he identifies those qualities that resemble virtues but are not quite virtues. The proper explanation of the rightness of each individual action depends on the specific features of the particular act in question. “What sort of things are to be chosen and in return for what, it is not easy to state; for there are many differences in the particular cases” (III.1:1110b8, Ross trans.). There is no algorithm that we can use to generate adequate explanations, as Aristotle emphasizes again in III.4: “What is good and pleasant differs with different characteristics and conditions, and perhaps the chief distinction of a man of high moral standards is his ability to see the truth in each particular moral question, since he is, as it were, the standard and measure for such questions” (1113a31-34). This is why Aristotle gives us many examples of how to generate explanations by substituting the truisms in the generic explanatory schema with particular features of actions.  In his discussion of courage Aristotle specifies different possible objects of fear (e.g., death, poverty, disease), and various contexts in which one could exemplify courage (e.g., in battle, at sea, in illness). “sHe is courageous,” we are told, who endures and fears the right things, for the right motive, in the right manner, and at the right time, and who displays confidence in similar ways. For a courageous man feels and acts according to the merits of each case and as reason guides him.” (III.7:1115b19-20) When we explain the rightness of a particular courageous action, we must replace the hedges (“the right things,” “in the right manner,” etc.) with specific features of the action in question; for example, his action was courageous because he left his family in order to join the army and he risked his life in order to protect his country when no non-military option was available to resolve the conflict.” (7-14)
Thus, the standard is appealing to virtuous character clarified by the moral complexities of specific situations.
Impact Calc- not consequentialism (analytic)

Offense-
First, universal claims negate. (analytic)
Second, restrictions on the constitution are key to particularism. (analytic)
Third, even if the AC specifies instances where constitutionally protected speech is good, it’s still a universal application of those instances, since there are still scenarios that fall outsides of the practice. Remember, the NC doesn’t appeal to rules, and there is no universal structure to practices. DANCY: “
Ethics Without Principles” by Jonathan Dancy 2004
Deductive reasoning is like this; an inference, once logically valid, remains so no matter what one adds as a premise (even if it be the negation of one of the original premises). Brandom's in the example is non- monotonic, since the cogent inference in (1) is reversed by the addition of the further consideration that the match is in a strong electromagnetic field. If one allows that this sort of thing can happen, is one therefore a holist in my sense? One would be a holist if the fact that I am striking a dry, well-made match is functioning as a reason for believing that it will light in the first case, but not in the second or the fourth. But Brandom is not trying to allude to that sort of possibility by his example. His point is rather the sort of phenomenon we find in chemistry: a feature may have a certain effect when alone, even though its combination with another feature will have the opposite effect. One could call this a ‘holistic’ point perfectly sensibly, but it is not holistic in my sense of that term. Holism in my sense is the claim that a feature which has a certain effect when alone can have the opposite effect in a combination. It is one thing to say, as Brandom does, that though a alone speaks in favour of action, a+b speaks as a whole against it; it is another to say that though a speaks in favour of action when alone, it speaks against action when in combination. The difference lies in what is doing the speaking against in cases where features are combined. In the former case (Brandom's) it is the combination; in the latter case (mine) it is the feature that originally spoke in favour.

Tournament: Harvard Westlake RR | Round: 1 | Opponent: Harvard Westlake EE | Judge: Wheeler, Shan
A. Interpretation: The affirmative must defend not restricting any and all constitutionally protected speech—to clarify, they may not specify a constitutionally protected speech.
Google Dictionary defines “not” as https://www.google.com/search?q=not+definitionandoq=not+definitionandaqs=chrome.0.0l6.2170j0j7andsourceid=chromeandie=UTF-8 “used with an auxiliary verb or “be” to form the negative.”
Google Dictionary defines “any” as
https://www.google.com/search?q=not+definitionandoq=not+definitionandaqs=chrome.0.0l6.2170j0j7andsourceid=chromeandie=UTF-8#q=any+definition
 “whichever of a specified class might be chosen.”
So this means the resolution says we can not choose a case to restrict speech. Whatever case might be chosen should not be restricted. So to prove the resolution true, you should show that there does not exist a case where we restrict constitutionally protected speech, else you negate.
B. ViolatIon: You spec.
C. Standards:

1. Accuracy- my interp is best
   A. Legal Precision- Multiple court rulings agree- any means all
   Elder 91, David, “Any and All": To Use Or Not To Use?,” 1991, http://www.michbar.org/file/generalinfo/plainenglish/pdfs/91_oct.pdf
   The Michigan Supreme Court seemed to approve our dictionary definitions of "any" in Harrington v Interstate Business Men's Accident Ass'n, 210 Mich 327, 330; 178 NW 19 (1920), when it quoted Hopkins v Sanders, 172 Mich 227; 137 NW 709 (1912). The Court defined "any" like this: "In broad language, it covers 'arl'v final decree' in 'any suit at law or in chancery' in 'any circuit court.' Any' means ,every,' 'each one of all."' In a later case, the Michigan Supreme Court again held that the use of "any" in an agency contract meant "all." In Gibson v Agricultural Life Ins Co, 282 Mich 282, 284; 276 NW 450 (1937), the clause in controversy read: "14. The Company shall have, and is hereby given a first lien upon any commissions or renewals as security for any claim due or to become due to the Company from said Agent." (Emphasis added.) The Gibson court was not persuaded by the plaintiff's insistence that the word "any" meant less than "all": "Giving the wording of paragraph 14 oJ the agency contract its plain and unequivocable meaning, upon arriving at the conclusion that the sensible connotation of the word any' implies 'all' and not 'some,' the legal conclusion follows that the defendant is entitled to retain the earned renewal commissions arising from its agency contract with Gibson and cannot be held legally liable for same in this action," Gibson at 287 (quoting the trial court opinion). The Michigan Court of Appeals has similarly interpreted the word "any" as used in a Michigan statute. In McGrath v Clark, 89 Mich App 194; 280 NW2d 480 (1979), the plaintiff accepted defendant's offer of judgment. The offer said nothing about prejudgment interest. The statute the Court examined was MCL 600.6013; MSA 27A.6013: "Interest shall be allowed on any money judgment recovered in a civil action...." The Court held that "the word 'any' is to be considered all-inclusive," so the defendants were entitled to interest. McGrath at 197 Recently, the Court has again held that "alny means 'every,' 'each one of all,' and is unlimited in its scope." Parker v Nationwide Mutual Ins Co, 188 Mich App 354, 356; 470 NW2d 416 (1991) (quoting Harrington v InterState Men's Accident Ass'n, supra)
   B. Your definition of any is of a different phrase, it is the strong form of any which isn’t used in negative sentences so your definition is out of context.
   Cambridge Dictionary Cambridge English Dictionary, “Any,” Cambridge University Press, Accessed 12-4-2016, http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/grammar/british-grammar/quantifiers/any
   Any as a determiner We use any before nouns to refer to indefinite or unknown quantities or an unlimited entity: Did you bring any bread? Mr Jacobson refused to answer any questions. If I were able to travel back to any place and time in history, I would go to ancient China. Any as a determiner has two forms: a strong form and a weak form. The forms have different meanings. Weak form any: indefinite quantities We use any for indefinite quantities in questions and negative sentences. We use some in affirmative sentences: Have you got any eggs? I haven’t got any eggs. I’ve got some eggs. Not: I’ve got any eggs.
   2. Limits-
   Foundation for Individual Rights in Education. "Case Archive". Retrieved 2008-03-25.
   3. Topic Lit-
   VOters;
   Fairness
   Jurisdiction
   Drop debater on T-
   1
   2
   CI-
   1.
   2.
   3.
   No RVI
   1
   2
   3

Tournament: Kandi King RR | Round: 4 | Opponent: Westwood RS | Judge: Jacob Koshak, Travis Fife
Interpretation: The aff must defend that all constitutionally protected speech in all venues ought not be restricted by public colleges or universities. To clarify, they can’t defend removing a specific restriction on speech.
Violation: You spec.
Net Benefits:

1. Semantics decisively negate- almost test and framers intent prove
   Lallas 17, Jackson, A DEFENSE OF T-ANY, 2017, http://www.theladi.org/blog/2017/2/9/a-defense-of-t-any
   Consider these sentences: (1) Did you debate any debaters? (2) Any debater could win that round. In (1) any seems to function as an existential. If you debated at least one debater, you would answer yes to the question. However, (2) operates as a universal – pick any debater and they should be able to win the round. A good rule of thumb for telling the difference between a universal and existential any is the ‘almost test,’ (See Carlson 1981, and Kadmon and Landman 1993). Almost can only modify universal determiners (Kadmon and Landman 1993). Consider: (3) Did you debate almost any debaters? (4) Almost any debater could win that round. We see that (3) is incoherent, but (4) still makes sense. (4) now has a smaller scope than (2), as some debaters would not be able to win the round. Using the almost test, it’s clear that our current topic is an example of the universal any: (5) Public colleges and universities ought not prohibit almost any constitutionally protected speech. Though awkward, this sentence has a clear meaning. It reads: “With a small amount of exceptions, constitutionally protected speech ought not be prohibited by public colleges and universities.” Since the resolution passes the almost test, we know that it uses any as a universal determiner. This demonstrates that the semantics of the resolution favor a generic reading, as we would intuitively expect. I will note that there is debate about the meaning of a universal any. However, I have not encountered an article advocating for a model allows the affirmative position to be the more accurate reading of the resolution. There is a lot of literature on the semantics of any and some of the articles are 300 + pages long, so it’s possible I missed something. Another semantic justification for the negative position comes from the ‘widening effect’ of any (Kadmon and Landman 1993). Consider this example, slightly modified for clarity from Kadmon and Landman: (6) Owls hunt mice. (7) Any owl hunts mice. Although both sentences are generic, they conclude that (7) rules out exceptions more strongly than (6). (7) applies to more cases than (6) so it is a broader statement. From an intuitive perspective, this happens because the determiner any emphasizes a statement’s generality. Now consider the following sentences: (8) Countries ought to prohibit the production of nuclear power. (9) Countries ought to prohibit any production of nuclear power. (10) In the United States, private ownership of handguns ought to be banned. (11) In the United States, all private ownership of handguns ought to be banned. (12) Public colleges and universities in the United States ought not restrict constitutionally protected speech. (13) Public colleges and universities in the United States ought not restrict any constitutionally protected speech. There are two observations to be made here that support the negative side of T - Any. The first is that (12) and (13) are analogous to the construction of (6) and (7), so the widening effect indicates that (13) applies to a larger quantity. The second is that the use of any seems to be very deliberate. Our past resolutions (8) and (10) were general statements that omitted universal determiners.
   2. Limits
   3. Ground
   same voters as all my other shells

Tournament: Kandi King RR | Round: 4 | Opponent: Westwood RS | Judge: Jacob Koshak, Travis Fife
Interpretation: “Not restrict” simply implies negative action in which you don’t put a limit on something: thus, the affirmative can only defend stopping the use of current speech codes. They cannot defend amending some sort of definition.
Google Dictionary defines “not” as https://www.google.com/search?q=not+definitionandoq=not+definitionandaqs=chrome.0.0l6.2170j0j7andsourceid=chromeandie=UTF-8 “used with an auxiliary verb or “be” to form the negative.”
https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instantandrlz=1C5CHFA_enUS730US731andion=1andespv=2andie=UTF-8#q=restrictand*
put a limit on; keep under control.

Violation:

Net Benefits:

1. Limits
   2. Jurisdiction

Tournament: Harvard Westlake RR | Round: 1 | Opponent: Harvard Westlake EE | Judge: Wheeler, Shan
A. Interpretation: Freedom of speech refers specifically to literal speech and expressive action—printed, written, or otherwise published information is freedom of the press.
Volokh 12 Eugene Volokh (Gary T. Schwartz Professor of Law, UCLA School of Law), FREEDOM FOR THE PRESS AS AN INDUSTRY, OR FOR THE PRESS AS A TECHNOLOGY? FROM THE FRAMING TO TODAY, University of Pennsylvania Law Review, 2012
The freedom of the press-as-technology, of course, was not seen as redundant of the freedom of speech.56 St. George Tucker, for instance, discussed the freedom of speech as focusing on the spoken word and the freedom of the press as focusing on the printed: The best speech cannot be heard, by any great number of persons. The best speech may be misunderstood, misrepresented, and imperfectly remembered by those who are present. To all the rest of mankind, it is, as if it had never been. The best speech must also be short for the inves- tigation of any subject of an intricate nature, or even a plain one, if it be of more than ordinary length. The best speech then must be altogether inadequate to the due exercise of the censorial power, by the people. The only adequate supplementary aid for these defects, is the absolute freedom of the press. 57 at the Debates of the Constitutional Convention. Likewise, George Hay, who later became a U.S. Attorney and a federal judge, wrote in 1799 that “freedom of speech means, in the construc- tion of the Constitution, the privilege of speaking any thing without control” and “the words freedom of the press, which form a part of the same sentence, means the privilege of printing any thing without control.”58
B. Violation: They defend journalism- my Volokh evidence explains this is freedom of press, not speech. The aff isn’t topical.
C. Standards:

1. Accuracy -
   B. Legal Context -
   C. Author qualifications –
   A.
   B.
   2. Limits-

Tournament: South Texas NSDA Quals | Round: Finals | Opponent: George Ranch | Judge: Beard, Yu, idk third judge
Increased government involvement in the housing market causes the housing market to collapse.
Salins 98 Peter D. Salins (Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs of the State University of New York) "Comment on Chester Hartman's “The case for a right to housing”: Housing is a right? Wrong!." (1998): 259-266.
If government involvement in the provision of housing were significantly extended, as Hartman proposes, the housing market would become increasingly impaired, mainly to the detriment of housing consumers—including the poor. Even existing housing programs, marginal as they are, distort housing markets in the communities in which they operate. Government agencies, operating in their own right or as conduits for subsidies to private or nonprofit developers, make inefficient housing producers; when they assist tenants they distort the contours of housing demand. Most housing projects developed by public agencies are expensive to build and maintain, and usually designed to inferior construction and amenity specifications. Federally mandated eligibility rules make them islands of extreme poverty and social dysfunction, even by the standards of the poor neighborhoods in which they are set. Publicly developed housing is often so poorly designed that some public housing authorities have resorted—amid widespread public approbation—to tearing them down. Even when government programs underwrite privately owned housing—Section 8, for example—many of the same problems arise, and others are added. Subsidized for-profit landlords often overcharge and undermaintain their units, and nonprofit sponsor-owners often fail as managers or go broke.
Public housing harms can drive out positive community contributors which harms the local economy.
Husock 2003 Howard; Vice President, Research and Publications, Contributing Editor, City Journal, “How Public Housing Harms Cities”, Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, 2003
http://www.city-journal.org/html/how-public-housing-harms-cities-12410.html
To understand more fully how much damage public housing can inflict on neighborhoods like the Near West Side, consider what can happen when it disappears from a troubled area of a city. After northern Philadelphia’s bleak Richard Allen Homes met with the wrecking ball two years ago, developer Lawrence Rust pounced, putting together a detailed development plan for the derelict area near the demolished project. Soon he was gutting and renovating previously vacant buildings, and selling to yuppie gentrifiers. “I took 15 dumpsters filled with trash out of here,” Rust tells some prospective buyers of a three-story loft he is renovating—a 20-something graphic designer and a singer, both from New York. He’s selling the row house he restored next door for $225,000, on a block where a few years ago houses went for $1,500, and property taxes were negligible.
Turns and outweighs case-

1. Root cause of all your impacts is the economy- spending will do nothing to address the root cause, so the disad controls the internal link to the aff.
   LÉVY-VROELANT Lévy-Vroelant, Claire. "Right to Housing in France: Still a Long Way to Go from Intention to Implementation, The." JL and Soc. Pol'y 24 (2015): i. Claire Lévy-Vroelant is a professor of Sociology at the University of Paris 8 Saint-Denis (France) and researcher at Centre de recherche sur l’Habitat (CRHLAVUE of CNRS) where she is part of the Scientific Committee. http://www2.univ-paris8.fr/sociologie/wp-content/uploads/2005/05/cv-english-levy-vroelant.pdf
   In a way, the Paris Opéra hotel tragedy is emblematic of our times: at the time of the fire, those “temporarily accommodated” people were both rights-holders (as families) and also, very often, were without rights in the DALO sense as undocumented migrants. Now, these people are all entitled to a formal right to stay, and they can find a place in the social housing sector without proceeding through the DALO as a consequence of being victims of the drama and also thanks to the commitment of housing rights associations. But the Paris Opéra tragedy continues to highlight legal and policy failures and reveal the real barriers to realizing a right to housing: as long as these individuals and families can’t access the labour market, and consequently pay, at least partly, for their own accommodation, they will continue to suffer the worst forms of social exclusion and exploitation. Because of their numbers, those most in need of housing will also continue to displace the initial use of hotels as first-step shelters for isolated homeless persons. At the same time, the story of the Paris Opéra hotel shows that as soon as families have received a stable legal permit and social housing in a familiar neighbourhood, they can become independent and dedicate themselves to the reconstruction of their lives. The decisive importance of being properly housed, on the basis of which promoters of an enforceable right to housing have legitimated the Law, appears in all its critical dimensions.
   2. Long term duration- if the market goes down there will be nobody to produce more houses or invest in fixing old houses and redeveloping them. This means even if in the short term a right to housing can help a few people, it does more harm than good in the long run.
   3. Strong correlation between a weak economy and poverty- empirics prove.
   OECD http://www.oecd.org/derec/unitedkingdom/40700982.pdf GROWTH BUILDING JOBS AND PROSPERITY IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES
   Research that compares the experiences of a wide range of developing countries finds consistently strong evidence that rapid and sustained growth is the single most important way to reduce poverty. A typical estimate from these cross-country studies is that a 10 per cent increase in a country’s average income will reduce the poverty rate by between 20 and 30 per cent.1 The central role of growth in driving the speed at which poverty declines is confirmed by research on individual countries and groups of countries. For example, a flagship study of 14 countries in the 1990s found that over the course of the decade, poverty fell in the 11 countries that experienced significant growth and rose in the three countries with low or stagnant growth. 

Outweighs the case- Poverty is the worst form of structural violence and kills millions.
Abu-Jamal (Mumia, award winning Pennsylvania journalist, quotes James Gilligan, Professor at Harvard/NYU, “A quiet and deadly violence”, http://www.flashpoints.net/mQuietDeadlyViolence.html)
The deadliest form of violence is poverty.  --Ghandi    It has often been observed that America is a truly violent nation, as shown by the thousands of cases of social and communal violence that occurs daily in the nation.    Every year, some 20,000 people are killed by others, and additional 20,000 folks kill themselves. Add to this the nonlethal violence that Americans daily inflict on each other, and we begin to see the tracings of a nation immersed in a fever of violence.    But, as remarkable, and harrowing as this level and degree of violence is, it is, by far, not the most violent features of living in the midst of the American empire.    We live, equally immersed, and to a deeper degree, in a nation that condones and ignores wide-ranging "structural' violence, of a kind that destroys human life with a breathtaking ruthlessness. Former Massachusetts prison official and writer, Dr. James Gilligan observes;    By "structural violence" I mean the increased rates of death and disability suffered by those who occupy the bottom rungs of society, as contrasted by those who are above them. Those excess deaths (or at least a demonstrably large proportion of them) are a function of the class structure; and that structure is itself a product of society's collective human choices, concerning how to distribute the collective wealth of the society. These are not acts of God. I am contrasting "structural" with "behavioral violence" by which I mean the non-natural deaths and injuries that are caused by specific behavioral actions of individuals against individuals, such as the deaths we attribute to homicide, suicide, soldiers in warfare, capital punishment, and so on. --(Gilligan, J., MD, Violence: Reflections On a National Epidemic (New York: Vintage, 1996), 192.)    This form of violence, not covered by any of the majoritarian, corporate, ruling-class protected media, is invisible to us and because of its invisibility, all the more insidious. How dangerous is it--really? Gilligan notes:  Every fifteen years, on the average, as many people die because of relative poverty as would be killed in a nuclear war that caused 232 million deaths; and every single year, two to three times as many people die from poverty throughout the world as were killed by the Nazi genocide of the Jews over a six-year period. This is, in effect, the equivalent of an ongoing, unending, in fact accelerating, thermonuclear war, or genocide on the weak and poor every year of every decade, throughout the world.

Tournament: TFA | Round: Quarters | Opponent: Kinkaid JY | Judge: Paramo, Powell, Fu
Dems will very narrowly retain filibuster now – key to stop full realization of Trump/GOP agenda
Bayer 1-4-17 (Nick Bayer, “Democrats Look At The 2018 Map And Get Ready To Fight For The Filibuster,” 1-4-17, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/senate-democrats-2018-midterm-elections_us_586d4f81e4b0de3a08fab52f)
The outcome of the 2016 election shocked and worried Democrats across the country. Unfortunately for them, there may be worse to come in the 2018 midterm elections. In less than two years, 33 Senate seats will be up for grabs. Senate Democrats, armed with the filibuster, are the last line of defense against incoming President Donald Trump and the congressional Republican agenda. That means the electoral stakes are high in 2018, and Democrats must fight to keep up their numbers. The picture looks reasonably sunny for Republicans, who have only eight Senate seats on the ballot next year. Six of them (Mississippi, Nebraska, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and Wyoming) are likely safe for the GOP. Democrats, on the other hand, have 23 Senate seats to defend ― 25 if you count the independents who caucus with the Democrats. A dozen of those seats are likely safe in the Democrats’ camp. They’ll probably hold onto seven seats in the Northeast ― Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Maryland and Delaware. Democrats are expected to retain five more seats in California, Hawaii, Washington, New Mexico and Minnesota. The two Senate seats now held by independents ― Angus King (Maine) and Bernie Sanders (Vt.) ― are also likely to stay in the hands of their incumbents or go to Democrats. That leaves 13 seats ― 11 held by Democrats and two held by Republicans ― as potential tossups. Just two of the tossup seats are in states that voted for Hillary Clinton last November: Nevada and Virginia. Others are in states ― like Pennsylvania, Florida and Michigan ― that only went for Donald Trump by small margins. But Trump’s victories can’t be ignored. Midterm elections have tended to favor the opposition ― that is, the party that isn’t led by the sitting president. So history could be working for the Democrats. But the 2018 midterms could be different. Kyle Kondik and Geoffrey Skelley of Sabato’s Crystal Ball argue that today’s extremely polarized political environment means that the GOP has a good chance of picking up seats in a few “very Republican states” now held by Democrats. Here’s an early look at those tossup races: First-term senators like Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) and Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.) may have a harder time defending their seats. In Wisconsin, Gov. Scott Walker, a former GOP presidential candidate, has ruled out a 2018 Senate bid against Baldwin, but Republicans still have time to find another strong candidate to take on the junior senator. The GOP has plenty of time to find a strong candidate to unseat Donnelly in Indiana, too. The first-term senator won office in 2012 after tea party favorite Richard Mourdock took out six-term Sen. Richard Lugar in the Republican primary and then took himself out in the general election with controversial remarks about rape. Now the Republicans have a good chance of winning that Senate seat back. As for Heitkamp, she appeared to top Trump’s list for agriculture secretary at one point. That looked like bad news for Democrats trying to hold onto the North Dakota Senate seat. New reports suggest former Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue is now the best bet for the agriculture post. But even if Heitkamp is running for re-election, she faces a battle in a state that voted for Trump by a 36-point margin. Second-term senators Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) and Jon Tester (D-Mont.) also hail from states that voted for Trump by wide margins (19 points and 21 points, respectively). Both are well-established incumbents ― a boon for re-election. But if they face strong challengers in their heavily Republican states, McCaskill and Tester could still be in trouble. Tester probably stands a better chance of the two. While going for Trump last year, Montana also re-elected its Democratic governor, Steve Bullock, to a second term. The Senate race in Ohio could get interesting. Democratic incumbent Sherrod Brown won his 2006 and 2012 elections by comfortable margins, so the same is possible next year. But the sizable victories of both Trump and fellow Sen. Rob Portman (R) last November could provide momentum for Republicans to oust Brown after roughly four decades of public service in Ohio. Specifically, while Brown could probably beat state Treasurer Josh Mandel again, a bid by Ohio Gov. John Kasich would likely prove tougher competition. The popular Kasich is perfectly positioned for a 2018 Senate bid: He led Trump by 11 points in the state’s 2016 presidential primary, and he can’t run for re-election next year having served two consecutive terms as governor. The Senate seat in Florida has a good chance of staying blue, as long as Sen. Bill Nelson (D) runs for re-election. The three-term incumbent won his previous Senate races by reasonable margins and looks like the favorite in 2018. But there is one key caveat to forecasting Nelson’s victory so soon. Gov. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), who will be forced out of office by term limits at the end of next year, has begun to lay the foundation for a potential 2018 Senate bid. Scott could run with the support of newly re-elected Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), by-then-President Trump and a Republican-controlled Congress. That gives him a solid chance of knocking out Nelson. In Arizona, the Republican Senate primary next year will probably be more interesting than the general election. During the 2016 campaign, one-term Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) repeatedly sparred with Trump, expressing his clear disapproval and refusing to endorse the nominee. Now he’s under fire within his own party. Former state Sen. Kelli Ward has said she’ll challenge Flake in the Republican primary. Although Ward is fresh off a 12-plus point loss to veteran Sen. John McCain in the 2016 primary, she did mount a formidable challenge to him. Whether or not Flake gets past her, however, Democrats will likely have a hard time snatching this one from the Republicans. There are some tossup states on the 2018 map in which Democrats still hold a slight advantage over Republicans ― mostly states with well-established Democratic incumbents. With the water crisis in Flint still tainting his reputation, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R) has become increasingly unpopular. This bodes well for Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow’s bid for re-election. The state did narrowly support Trump in 2016 ― the first time Michigan has gone Republican in a presidential contest since 1988 ― but Stabenow is a strong candidate running for a fourth term. Like Heitkamp in North Dakota, Sen. Joe Manchin in West Virginia is a moderate Democrat willing to work with the Trump administration. Indeed, Trump considered Manchin for the position of energy secretary. While the job ultimately went to former Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R), Manchin’s willingness to work across the aisle plays well in his red state. If he can soar above the anger toward the Democratic Party in West Virginia ― a state Trump won by 43 points ― he may yet hold onto his seat. In Pennsylvania, Sen. Bob Casey Jr. (D) will likely keep his seat despite the huge upset that saw his state back Trump last year and also re-elect Sen. Pat Toomey (R). Still, it will definitely be a race to watch. Similarly, Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), the Democrats’ vice presidential nominee last year, will probably hold onto his seat in 2018. Clinton and Kaine carried Virginia by a comfortable, if still surprisingly close, 5 points in November. With lower turnout in the midterm election, the state may be competitive. But given a solid turnout in Northern Virginia, Kaine should be able to secure his seat for a second term. Finally, there’s Nevada. Last year, the state saw some hard-fought battles but still went blue. Voters supported Clinton and elected Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto to take over retiring Sen. Harry Reid’s seat. Democrats could pick up another seat here in 2018 with the right candidate against one-term Sen. Dean Heller (R). While it won’t be easy to knock off the incumbent, a strong candidate and good campaigning would give Democrats reasonable hope. The bottom line for 2018: Democrats likely won’t take back the Senate majority, but Republicans probably won’t reach the 60 seats they need to block a Democratic filibuster, either. To get that filibuster-proof majority, Republicans will have to flip eight of the 11 competitive seats held by Democrats and win their own two tossup contests.

Plan ignites republican opposition
Flegenheimer 17 (Matt, Yamiche Alcindor, “Ben Carson Urges Ending Reliance on Welfare in Bid to Be Housing Chief,” January 12, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/12/us/politics/ben-carsons-hud-housing-nominee-hearing.html//utd-va
Yet Americans had come to view HUD’s mission as “putting roofs over the heads of poor people,” Mr. Carson said. “It has the ability to be so much more than that.” As with his presidential campaign, Mr. Carson leaned heavily on his own compelling biography, straying frequently from his prepared opening remarks as he spoke of life in an impoverished section of Detroit as the son of a single mother with a third-grade education. He waded through several contentious moments, including some aimed at his prospective boss, President-elect Donald J. Trump, and the specter of conflicts over HUD funding and Trump family business ventures. But Mr. Carson, who was prone to fits of spaciness and occasionally bewildering remarks as a candidate, appeared to avoid any major slips on Thursday. The tone of the proceedings diverged sharply from that of hearings this week for Rex W. Tillerson, Mr. Trump’s choice for secretary of state, and Senator Jeff Sessions, Republican of Alabama and the selection for attorney general. Both men faced aggressive questioning from Democrats — and, in Mr. Tillerson’s case, from a Republican, Senator Marco Rubio of Florida. On Thursday, Mr. Rubio introduced Mr. Carson as a leader with “the values, the compassion and the character and the kind of drive that we need.” Senators from both parties made warm reference to Mr. Carson’s granddaughter in attendance, who wore pink headphones during the testimony. They thanked him for his career in medicine. Even some of the more pointed questioners, like Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio, the ranking Democrat on the Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, were disarmed. “You remind me of Columbo,” Mr. Carson said at one point, to extended laughs. “I’ve actually heard that before,” Mr. Brown said. Still, there were sharp exchanges. Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, sought to pin Mr. Carson down on a simple question: “Can you assure me that not a single taxpayer dollar that you give out will financially benefit the president-elect or his family?” Mr. Carson said he would be driven by morals. Ms. Warren cut him off, saying her specific concern was whether grants and loans could specifically benefit Mr. Trump. “It will not be my intention to do anything to benefit any American,” Mr. Carson said, becoming flustered for a moment before quickly clarifying that he wanted to use the department to help “all Americans.” Ms. Warren called on Mr. Trump to establish a blind trust, accusing him of “hiding” his assets. Mr. Carson would not commit definitively to avoiding Trump businesses if confirmed. “If there happens to be an extraordinarily good program that’s working for millions of people and it turns out that someone that you’re targeting is going to gain $10 from it, am I going to say no?” Mr. Carson said. Later, he agreed to work with Mr. Brown to construct a system to identify properties tied both to the Trump family and the department. He committed to telling senators about the department’s dealings with any businesses owned by Mr. Trump or his relatives. More often, Mr. Carson sat patiently as lawmakers recited some of the most fraught comments of his public life. In one interaction, Senator Bob Menendez, Democrat of New Jersey, asked if Mr. Carson truly believed in HUD’s mission, given his trail of comments railing against government intervention. “I think the rental assistance program is essential,” Mr. Carson said, when pressed twice, “and what I have said if you’ve been reading my writings: It is cruel and unusual punishment to withdraw those programs before you provide an alternative.” When asked about housing protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender citizens, Mr. Carson, a vocal opponent of same-sex marriage, said he would “enforce all the laws of the land” if confirmed. But he expressed his personal opposition to any expression of what he called “extra rights” for certain groups. For Republicans, the hearing supplied an opportunity to pay tribute to a figure revered by the conservative base. Senator Thom Tillis, Republican of North Carolina, asked Mr. Carson what he thought was “the best possible thing we can do for someone on government assistance.” “Get them off it,” Mr. Carson said.

That wrecks red-state Democrats – crushes their re-election strategy – gives the GOP a filibuster-proof majority
Roarty 16 (Alex Roarty, “Senate Democrats’ Challenge in 2018: The White Working Class,” 11-16-16, http://www.rollcall.com/news/politics/senate-democrats-midterms-2018)
The only thing standing between Senate Democrats and an electoral wipeout in 2018? Donald Trump’s base. A party that’s only three seats short of a Senate majority is nonetheless bracing to play defense for the next two years, hoping to hold a daunting 10 seats in states that went red in last week’s presidential race. In some of the states — Indiana, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, West Virginia — Trump’s margin of victory reached nearly 20 points or more. Another five — Michigan*, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Florida — unexpectedly swung in the GOP nominee’s favor, instilling fresh fear in Democrats that seats once presumed safe are anything but. Democrats are nervous not just about the fact that Trump won, but how he did so. The New York real estate mogul won because of his popularity with white working-class voters, whose slow drift from the Democratic Party he accelerated to devastating effect. They abandoned Democrats as few, even seasoned, party operatives suspected they could, leading to victories in places like Michigan and Wisconsin that President Barack Obama won easily just four years ago. A new game plan Now, these re-election-seeking Democrats must come up with a game plan to win those voters back — or risk watching their party lose big when they can least afford to see their ranks thinned further. “The underlying vulnerability Democrats have created for themselves is still very present, and probably uniquely so, with the 2018 class of Senate Democrats — almost every place you can think of where Democrats weren’t able to communicate to working-class voters is on the ballot,” said Josh Holmes, a GOP Senate strategist. How Democrats do that isn’t yet clear. Democratic strategists say they won’t know for at least several months — after they’ve had a chance to analyze data — exactly what happened in last week’s election. The evaluation process is all the more important given the fact that the party’s polling and data operations showed them on track to win the presidency. They know they did poorly with blue-collar white voters, they just aren’t yet entirely sure why. “We’re still in the theorizing mode,” said Matt Canter, a Democratic strategist. “We’ll know a lot more by about the beginning of next year.” The 2018 map for Democrats is so poor in large part because this class of senators faced elections in 2006 and 2012, both strong years for the party. It’s how Sen. Heidi Heitkamp delivered an upset victory four years ago in North Dakota, or how Sen. Jon Tester won in Montana. Two of the Democratic senators expected to seek re-election — Sen. Bill Nelson of Florida and Claire McCaskill of Missouri — won four years ago thanks to weak Republican nominees (McCaskill defeated former Republican Rep. Todd Akin, whose statement about “legitimate rape” became a national controversy that year.) Only one Republican senator up for re-election in two years, Dean Heller of Nevada, represents a state won by Hillary Clinton Democrats don’t dismiss the challenge in front of them but add that they’re confident that many of their incumbents are well prepared to win over white working-class voters. Sens. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania and Sherrod Brown of Ohio, for instance, are traditional blue-collar Democrats who have been popular in coal country.
Filibuster-proof majority facilitates immigration restrictions
Diaz 16 (Kevin Diaz, Houston Chronicle, “Trump's tough talk on the border will be tested in Congress,” 12-26-16, http://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Trump-s-tough-talk-on-the-border-will-be-tested-10819777.php)
WASHINGTON - After a presidential campaign built on hard-line promises to secure the border and end illegal immigration, Donald Trump will traverse more difficult terrain in Congress next year among worried Democrats and skeptical Republicans. Although advocates of strict legal enforcement have been emboldened by hawkish Cabinet picks like Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions for attorney general, Trump will face political and fiscal constraints living up to his vow to build a border wall and deport illegal immigrants on a massive scale, particularly if he widens his dragnet beyond those with criminal records. And despite the bellicose campaign rhetoric, there still is no clear GOP agenda on immigration, with different cliques within the Republican-led Congress favoring different approaches toward visas, deportation and legal status. Democrats, too, have some cards to play. The Republican majorities in the next Congress hardly are filibuster-proof, with 48 Democrats in the Senate. To overcome the 60-vote threshold to stop a filibuster, Republicans will need to peel away at least eight Senate Democrats to pass anything that immigration advocates consider draconian, including a massive border wall. There are some changes Trump could make on his own, particularly in reversing President Barack Obama's executive orders shielding and granting work permits to millions of illegal immigrants who otherwise could face deportation. Funding substantial new border measures - with or without a 2,000-mile wall - or an aggressive new interior enforcement program likely would require money, meaning congressional action. That is where Senate Democrats could be an obstacle. "There's a bunch of stuff that doesn't need Congress, so we have to keep that in mind," said Todd Schulte, president of FWD.us, an immigration reform group founded with the help of tech moguls Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook and Bill Gates of Microsoft. "But, in terms of what needs to move through Congress, I would say that anything that passes the Senate will probably need 60 votes."
Deportation effort spins out of control – causes widespread conflict and genocide
Allen 16 (Danielle Allen and Richard Ashby Wilson, “Mass deportation isn’t just impractical. It’s very, very dangerous,” 9-23-16, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/mass-deportation-isnt-just-impractical-its-very-very-dangerous/2016/09/23/c6d3b4ee-7b77-11e6-ac8e-cf8e0dd91dc7_story.html?utm_term=.e4deabe64545)
We’ve hit the home stretch of the election. The time has come to get serious, really serious, about understanding what’s at stake with Donald Trump’s proposal to deport 5 million to 11 million undocumented immigrants and his promise that 2 million will be deported in “a matter of months” if he is elected. In May, former homeland security secretary Michael Chertoff told the New York Times: “I can’t even begin to picture how we would deport 11 million people in a few years where we don’t have a police state, where the police can’t break down your door at will and take you away without a warrant.” He also said, “Unless you suspend the Constitution and instruct the police to behave as if we live in North Korea, it ain’t happening.” Trump’s specific policy involves adding 5,000 Border Patrol agents, tripling the number of Immigration and Customs Enforcement deportation agents, creating a special deportation force that he has described as a military unit and deporting not merely people who have been convicted of crimes but also immigrants on visa overstays and undocumented immigrants who have been arrested, even if not convicted. He has proposed expedited procedures that would, to ensure speed, presumably require setting aside the due process protections meant to safeguard rights and minimize error. One of the last times the world saw such a major effort at mass deportations in a developed country was in the 1990s in the former Yugoslavia. That experience is instructive. In 1989, after the fall of the Berlin Wall and four decades of peaceful ethnic and religious relations in Yugoslavia, post-communist politicians of all three communities in Bosnia and Herzegovina (Croat, Muslim and Serb) came to power on a surge of ethno-nationalist rhetoric. Starting in 1992, they promulgated official policies such as the “Six Strategic Objectives for the Bosnian Serb People” that included the forcible removal of other groups from towns and villages, using new “crisis staffs” made up of police and civilian paramilitaries. The process spun out of control and, in many communities, neighbors turned against neighbors, driving them out of their homes and seizing their assets. It started with a small number of activists, fewer than a few thousand people who were extreme nationalists and members of fringe parties. But as the propaganda and fear spread, the wider citizenry participated in the campaign of persecution. With the cover of official policy, civilians took it upon themselves to hasten the expulsion of members of other ethnic or religious groups. The fratricidal conflict claimed 100,000 lives. The majority of fatalities were civilians murdered in the context of mass deportations. The Bosnian deportations grew into a systematic policy termed “ethnic cleansing.” The U.N. Security Council declared forcible removal based on ethnicity a crime against humanity in 1994. And eventually there was also accountability for political leaders who enacted deportation policies and incited their followers to hatred and violence. In March 2016, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia found former Bosnian Serb president Radovan Karadzic guilty of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. The tribunal ruled that his speeches and official propaganda made a significant contribution to an overarching joint criminal enterprise to create an ethnically homogenous state of Bosnian Serbs. The United States, of course, has its own history of mass deportations. There is the 19th-century Trail of Tears, when the U.S. government forcibly relocated members of Southeastern Native American tribes to land west of the Mississippi River. And in the 1930s and 1940s, under the pressure of the Great Depression, about 2 million Mexicans and Mexican Americans were deported; many lost their property. This was also the backdrop to the famous Zoot Suit Riots in Los Angeles in 1943, when U.S. sailors and Marines attacked Latino youths. The violence spread to San Diego and Oakland, and developed into broader racial violence that summer in Chicago, Philadelphia, Detroit, New York and Evansville, Ind. In the 1950s, the deportation of millions was attempted again with Operation Wetback; again people lost their property. Some died in the desert heat of Mexicali. The notion that governments have learned how to conduct mass deportations in “humane and efficient” ways is ludicrous. The summary removal of millions of members of a minority ethnic or religious group from a territory has been accompanied, in nearly every historical instance, by assault, murder, crimes against humanity and, occasionally, genocide. It has involved armed roadblocks to check papers, the smashing down of doors in the night to drag people out of their homes. It has also involved unrestrained popular violence against a target population. We might like to think that we’re above all that sort of thing, that with the right kind of training a special deportation force and beefed-up ICE units would carry out an orderly removal. But we do have in our midst the elements that have historically made mass deportations so dangerous: heated rhetoric that slurs whole minority groups (“they’re not sending their best . . . they’re rapists”); an activist minority of white nationalists; an armed minority of militiamen; and the ongoing militarization of our police forces.

Tournament: TFA | Round: 5 | Opponent: McNeil PV | Judge: Aisha Bawany
Rights are means of exclusion and naïve security. Rights are a legal construct that can’t exist outside the state. However, the law controls itself; there is no higher control than the state itself. The state is its own sovereign, withholding the ability to strip anyone of rights to bare life at any time. Rights are just a method for integrating people into the biopolitical sphere in which they depend on the state.
David M. Seymour 13 (legal scholar). “The Purgatory of the Camp: Political Emancipation and the Emancipation of the Political”. Google Books, 2013. RC
The idea of political sovereignty creating order ‘behind the backs’ of formal equality expressed through the praxis of rights, is a familiar trope in much recent thinking.25 However, Agamben’s treatment of this idea appears in a more radical guise. For Agamben, rights are presented as unmediated expressions of the ordering of the biopolitical administrative nature of political sovereignty and, as such, they are no more than the vehicle through which the sovereign decides decision on the exception (who is to be included within and excluded from the body politic) is given form. In this context Agamben treats rights as playing a vital role in sovereignty’s capture of life and the decision made or inscribed upon it. Rights become not challenges or limits to sovereign power (as expressed in liberal political thought), but expressions of the biopolitical decision itself:26 It is almost as if, starting from a certain point, every political event were double-sided: the spaces, the liberties, and the rights won by individuals in their conflicts with central powers, always simultaneously prepared a tacit but an increasing inscription of individuals’ lives within the state order, thus offering a new and more dreadful foundation for the very sovereign power from which they wanted to liberate themselves.27 At the centre of this discussion is the manner in which rights articulate modern sovereignty’s capture of (natural) life: Declarations of rights represent the originary figure of the inscription of natural life in the juridico-political order of the nation-state. The same bare life that in the ancient régime was politically neutral and belonged to God as creaturely life and in the classical world (at least apparently) clearly distinguished as zoé from political life (bios) now fully enters into the structure of the state and even becomes the earthly foundation of the state’s legitimacy and sovereignty.28 Modern declarations of rights, therefore, are said to draw together and express in unmediated biopolitical fashion almost all the revolutionary concepts of modern political emancipation: state, nation, citizen and subject: The fiction implicit here is that birth immediately becomes nation such that there can be no interval of separation between the two terms. Rights are attributed to man (or originate in him) solely to the extent that man is the vanishing ground (who must never come to life as such) of the citizen.29 This depiction of rights, therefore, directly places them within the armoury of administrative biopolitical sovereign ordering. Rights serve only as a means of deciding on inclusion within and exclusion from the political category of political life, the nation, (bios). In capturing (natural) life within an unmediated connection with ‘nature’ through the concept of rights, biopolitical administrative sovereignty captures the (natural) world. Nature, the world, comes under the domination of a sovereignty, an emancipation of the political from within the ascendancy of political emancipation.
Rights are always conditional. The state holds the power to strip rights and give rights to those deemed fit—the aff can literally never happen since the state can’t guarantee a right.
Giorgio Agamben 12 (Italian continental philosopher best known for his work investigating the concepts of the state of exception, form-of-life and homo sacer. The concept of biopolitics informs many of his writings). “Beyond Human Rights”. 2012. http://novact.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/Beyond-Human-Rights-by-Giorgio-Agamben.pdf RC
“The reasons for such impotence lie not only in the selfishness and blindness of bureaucratic apparatuses, but also in the very ambiguity of the fundamental notions regulating the inscription of the native (that is, of life) in the juridical order of the nation-state. Hannah Arendt titled the chapter of her book Imperialism that concerns the refugee problem ‘The Decline of the Nation State and the End of the Rights of Man’. 2 One should try to take seriously this formulation, which indissolubly links the fate of the Rights of Man with the fate of the modern nation-state in such a way that the waning of the latter necessarily implies the obsolescence of the former. Here the paradox is that precisely the figure that should have embodied human rights more than any other – namely, the refugee – marked instead the radical crisis of the concept. The conception of human rights based on the supposed existence of a human being as such, Arendt tells us, proves to be untenable as soon as those who profess it find themselves confronted for the first time with people who have really lost every quality and every specific relation except for the pure fact of being human. 3 In the system of the nation-state, so called sacred and inalienable human rights are revealed to be without any protection precisely when it is no longer possible to conceive of them as rights of the citizens of a state. This is implicit, after all, in the ambiguity of the very title of the 1789 Déclaration des droits de l’homme et du citoyen, in which it is unclear whether the two terms are to name two distinct realities or whether t
hey are to form, instead, a hendiadys in which the first term is actually always already contained in the second. That there is no autonomous space in the political order of the nation-state for something like the pure human in itself is evident at the very least from the fact that, even in the best of cases, the status of refugee has always been considered a temporary condition that ought to lead either to naturalization or to repatriation. A stable statute for the human in itself is inconceivable in the law of the nation-state.”
The alternative is t0 play with the law—when the law asks us to engage, we should “prefer not to”. We take the potentiality of the law and render it inoperative.
Arne De Boever 06 (PhD Columbia, 2009, teaches American Studies in the School of Critical Studies at the California Institute of the Arts). “Overhearing Bartleby: Agamben, Melville, and Inoperative Power”. PARRHESIA. RC
In “Bartleby, or On Contingency,” Agamben reads Bartleby as “the last, exhausted figure” of what Avicenna refers to as “a complete or perfect potentiality that belongs to the scribe who is in full possession of the art of writing in the moment in which he but does not write.”9 Later on in the essay, it becomes clear what Bartleby’s ending or exhaustion consist in: the scrivener’s potentiality is at the same time potentiality for the opposite. The formula “prefer not to” does not consent; but it doesn’t simply refuse either. According to Agamben, it refers to something “whose opposite could have happened in the very moment in which it happened.”10 Bartleby is ultimately not a figure of potentiality, but of a specific mode of potentiality – potentiality that is, at the same time, potentiality for the opposite. Agamben refers to this potentiality as contingency. In the final pages of the essay, he characterizes Bartleby as a messianic figure who has come “to save what was not.” He emphasizes, however, that unlike Jesus, “Bartleby comes not to bring a new table of the Law but … to fulfill the Torah by destroying it from top to bottom.”11 The essay on contingency shows Agamben struggling with ideas that he will express much more clearly later on, in his commentary on Saint Paul’s Letter to the Romans, The Time that Remains 2000.12 In this book, but also for example in his State of Exception 2003,13 it becomes clear that Agamben’s thought is not a thought that aims to destroy the law. What opens up a passage towards justice in these works, is rather the law’s “deactivation and inactivity inoperosità – that is, another use of the law emphasis mine.”14 But what does Agamben mean by this other use of the law? Can this inoperativity (“inoperosità”) fully be understood within the limits of legal thought or political science? I want to address these questions by having a closer look at Agamben’s argument on human rights.
This is not a rejection of the law—it is the inoperability of the law. We remain under to law but at the same render it inoperative. This is the only appropriate use of the law.
Arne De Boever 2 (PhD Columbia, 2009, teaches American Studies in the School of Critical Studies at the California Institute of the Arts). “Overhearing Bartleby: Agamben, Melville, and Inoperative Power”. PARRHESIA. RC
Once again, Bartleby’s subversion of the space of the law office becomes particularly interesting when it is articulated politically. In the end, the problem that Bartleby poses to the narrator is a magnified version of his invitation to go beyond the horizon of communication; he would like to remain within the protective realm of the law-office without giving the office anything in return other than the mere, material fact of his life, his being. Bartleby’s demand, an appeal to an extraordinary generosity on the side of the narrator, is to be allowed to remain unconditionally within the protective space of the law-office. Bartleby interrupts the service economy of the law-office, not in order to destroy the law-office but to invite another use of it. As I’ve pointed out above, Agamben suggests something along similar lines: in his recent discussion of Benjamin’s reading of Franz Kafka, he argues that for Benjamin, “what opens up a passage toward justice is not the annulling of the law, but its deactivation and dereliction – which is to say, another use of the law.”30 Although the narrator may not have learned Bartleby’s lesson as a lawyer, I would argue that he did learn it as a narrator: the prologue and epilogue to the story push the text precisely toward the kind of deactivation and dereliction that Benjamin is talking about. Melville’s story He reveals itself here as another use of the law, as an inoperative use of the law.
Instead the judge should use their ballot as a means of pushing counter-narratives to unveil and demystify the power of the sovereign—it’s the hope that we have for meaningful change that spills over this debate round.
Ayten Gündoğdu 12 (Department of Political Science, Barnard College-Columbia University). “Potentialities of human rights: Agamben and the narrative of fated necessity”. 2012. http://www.palgrave-journals.com/cpt/journal/v11/n1/full/cpt201045a.html RC
“In his analysis of biopolitical sovereignty, Agamben provides us with what might be called a counternarrative of Western politics with the explicitly stated goal of ‘unveiling’ or ‘unmasking’ what has become mystified, hidden, secret or invisible, particularly with the prevalence of contractarian accounts of political power (1998, p. 8; 2005, p. 88). Agamben describes this critical task in terms of ‘disenchantment’, or the ‘patient work’ of unmasking the fiction or myth that covers up and sustains the violence of sovereignty (2005, p. 88). What underlies this urge to demystify and unveil is a particular understanding of myth as a deceptive narrative naturalizing and legitimizing violence in the name of the preservation of life. I use the term ‘counternarrative’ to call attention to what Agamben's account aims to do6: This is a critical analysis, as Agamben himself insists, that does not offer ‘historiographical theses or reconstructions’ but instead treats some historical phenomena as ‘paradigms’ so as to ‘make intelligible a broader historical-problematic context;’ to do this, it proceeds at ‘a historico-philosophical level’ (1998, p. 11; 2009, p. 9). In that sense, it is not an account that claims historical accuracy or factual verifiability. This is a crucial point that is sometimes overlooked by Agamben's critics who call into question his inaccurate treatment of historical phenomena such as the concentration camps.7 In addition, ‘counternarrative’ draws our attention to the inventive dimensions of Agamben's endeavor; as one of his critics aptly (though disapprovingly) puts it, ‘Agamben does not discover a concealed biopolitical paradigm stretching back to fourth-century Athens; rather he invents one’ (Finlayson, 2010, p. 116). The invention of a counternarrative of Western politics involves literary devices (e.g. hyperbole), which aims to provoke the readers and persuade them to abandon any politics centered on modern concepts such as sovereignty, and rights and citizenship (LaCapra, 2007; cf. de la Durantaye, 2009). In analyzing Agamben's account as a ‘counternarrative’, I aim to attend to the goals that it sets for itself. It is these goals – particularly the goal of freeing human potentialities from myths that render the contingent necessary and mask other possibilities – that provide the starting point for my critical engagement with Agamben. Instead of resorting to an ‘outside’ – whether this be an alternative historical account or another theoretical tradition – I aim to read Agamben on his own terms, and suggest that as he tries to free human potentialities from contractarian myths, he might be entrapping them in another myth that ends up casting the contingent as necessary. Agamben's counternarrative of Western politics aims to uncover what has become hidden or invisible with ‘our modern habit of representing the political realm in terms of citizens’ rights, free will, and social contracts’ (1998, p. 106). Its main target is the contractarian accounts of sovereign power. As he identifies the production of bare life as the originary or foundational activity grounding sovereign power (1998, pp. 6, 83), he particularly aims to question the social contractarian ‘myth’ that covers up sovereign violence (1998, p. 109). After unveiling the foundational myths of Western politics, Agamben concludes that we cannot effectively respond to ‘the bloody mystification of a new planetary order’ if we let these myths continue to obstruct our political imagination

 (1998, p. 12). With his counternarrative presenting a catastrophic view of the historical present – a view that emphasizes how exception has become the rule, camp has become the paradigmatic structure organizing political space, and we have all virtually become homines sacri (1998, pp. 38, 176, 111) – Agamben aims to convince his readers of the need to think of a ‘nonstatal and nonjuridical politics and human life’ (2000, p. 112). This new politics requires the renunciation of concepts associated with sovereignty – for example, state, rights, citizenship. The contemporary predicament cannot be remedied by a return to conventional political categories and institutions, Agamben suggests, since these are deeply involved in the creation of this catastrophe in the first place. Almost anticipating his critics who would be puzzled by his renunciation of rights and rule of law at a time when the problem of legal dispossession increasingly threatens populations around the world, he explicitly states that the response to the current permanent state of exception cannot consist in confining it within constitutional boundaries and reaffirming the primacy of legal norms and rights (2005, p. 87).8 As legal norms and rights are ultimately grounded in the originary violence of separating a bare life, legal dispossession is already inscribed in them as an inescapable condition. Neither the liberal remedy of reasserting the rule of law, nor the Derridean strategy of ‘infinite negotiations’ with a law that is in force without any significance, are viable options (2005, p. 87; 1998, p. 54). Both are futile, if not lethally dangerous, endeavors.9 The only politically tenable option, Agamben contends, is to move out of sovereignty with ‘a complicated and patient strategy’ of getting the ‘door of the Law closed forever’ (1998, pp. 54, 55)

Tournament: South Texas NSDA Quals | Round: Finals | Opponent: George Ranch | Judge: Beard, Yu, idk third judge
Historically, state sponsored housing programs have been used to segregate blacks from middle class white neighborhoods and force them into ghettos. Over time processes of discrimination have evolved so that even today white institutions are able to maintain a strict racial order.
Rothstein 15 Richard Rothstein, research associate of the Economic Policy Institute and a fellow of the Thurgood Marshall Institute of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and of the Haas Institute at the University of California (Berkeley). Economic Policy Institute. “From Ferguson to Baltimore: The Fruits of Government-Sponsored Segregation”. April 29, 2015
In Baltimore in 1910, a black Yale law school graduate purchased a home in a previously all-white neighborhood. The Baltimore city government reacted byadopting a residential segregation ordinance, restricting African Americans to designated blocks. Explaining the policy, Baltimore’s mayor proclaimed, “Blacks should be quarantined in isolated slums in order to reduce the incidence of civil disturbance, to prevent the spread of communicable disease into the nearby White neighborhoods, and to protect property values among the White majority.” Thus began a century of federal, state, and local policies to quarantine Baltimore’s black population in isolated slums—policies that continue to the present day, as federal housing subsidy policies still disproportionately direct low-income black families to segregated neighborhoods and away from middle class suburbs. Whenever young black men riot in response to police brutality or murder, as they have done in Baltimore this week, we’re tempted to think we can address the problem by improving police quality—training officers not to use excessive force, implementing community policing, encouraging police to be more sensitive, prohibiting racial profiling, and so on. These are all good, necessary, and important things to do. But such proposals ignore the obvious reality that the protests are not really (or primarily) about policing. In 1968, following hundreds of similar riots nationwide, a commission appointed by President Lyndon Johnson concluded that “our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white—separate and unequal” and that “segregation and poverty have created in the racial ghetto a destructive environment totally unknown to most white Americans.” The Kerner Commission (headed by Illinois Governor Otto Kerner) added that “what white Americans have never fully understood—but what the Negro can never forget—is that white society is deeply implicated in the ghetto. White institutions created it, white institutions maintain it, and white society condones it.” In the last 50 years, the two societies have become even more unequal. Although a relatively small black middle class has been permitted to integrate itself into mainstream America, those left behind are more segregated nowthan they were in 1968. When the Kerner Commission blamed “white society” and “white institutions,” it employed euphemisms to avoid naming the culprits everyone knew at the time. It was not a vague white society that created ghettos but government—federal, state, and local—that employed explicitly racial laws, policies, and regulations to ensure that black Americans would live impoverished, and separately from whites. Baltimore’s ghetto was not created by private discrimination, income differences, personal preferences, or demographic trends, but by purposeful action of government in violation of the Fifth, Thirteenth, and Fourteenth Amendments. These constitutional violations have never been remedied, and we are paying the price in the violence we saw this week. Following the police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, last August, I wrote The Making of Ferguson, a history of the state-sponsored segregation in St. Louis County that set the stage for police-community hostility there. Virtually every one of the racially explicit federal, state, and local policies of segregation pursued in St. Louis has a parallel in policies pursued by government in Baltimore. In 1917, the U.S. Supreme Court found ordinances like Baltimore’s 1910 segregation rule unconstitutional, not because they abridged African Americans’ rights to live where they could afford, but because they restricted the property rights of (white) homeowners to sell to whomever they wished. Baltimore’s mayor responded by instructing city building inspectors and health department investigators to cite for code violations anyone who rented or sold to blacks in predominantly white neighborhoods. Five years later, the next Baltimore mayor formalized this approach by forming an official Committee on Segregation and appointing the City Solicitor to lead it. The committee coordinated the efforts of the building and health departments with those of the real estate industry and white community organizations to apply pressure to any whites tempted to sell or rent to blacks. Members of the city’s real estate board, for example, accompanied building and health inspectors to warn property owners not to violate the city’s color line. In 1925, 18 Baltimore neighborhood associations came together to form the “Allied Civic and Protective Association” for the purpose of urging both new and existing property owners to sign restrictive covenants, which committed owners never to sell to an African American. Where neighbors jointly signed a covenant, any one of them could enforce it by asking a court to evict an African American family who purchased property in violation. Restrictive covenants were not merely private agreements between homeowners; they frequently had government sanction. In Baltimore, the city-sponsored Committee on Segregation organized neighborhood associations throughout the city that could circulate and enforce such covenants. Supplementing the covenants, African Americans were prevented from moving to white neighborhoods by explicit policy of the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), which barred suburban subdivision developers from qualifying for federally subsidized construction loans unless the developers committed to exclude African Americans from the community. The FHA also barred African Americans themselves from obtaining bank mortgages for house purchases even in suburban subdivisions which were privately financed without federal construction loan guarantees. The FHA not only refused to insure mortgages for black families in white neighborhoods, it also refused to insure mortgages in black neighborhoods—a policy that came to be known as “redlining,” because neighborhoods were colored red on government maps to indicate that these neighborhoods should be considered poor credit risks as a consequence of African Americans living in (or even near) them. Unable to get mortgages, and restricted to overcrowded neighborhoods where housing was in short supply, African Americans either rented apartments at rents considerably higher than those for similar dwellings in white neighborhoods, or bought homes on installment plans. These arrangements, known as contract sales, differed from mortgages because monthly payments were not amortized, so a single missed payment meant loss of a home, with no accumulated equity. In the Atlantic last year, Ta-Nehisi Coates described how this system worked in Chicago. In summarizing her book, Family Properties, Rutgers University historian Beryl Satter described it this way: Because black contract buyers knew how easily they could lose their homes, they struggled to make their inflated monthly payments. Husbands and wives both worked double shifts. They neglected basic maintenance. They subdivided their apartments, crammed in extra tenants and, when possible, charged their tenants hefty rents. … White people observed that their new black neighbors overcrowded and neglected their properties. Overcrowded neighborhoods meant overcrowded schools; in Chicago, officials responded by “double-shifting” the students (half attending in the morning, half in the afternoon). Children were deprived of a full day of schooling and left to fend for themselves in the after-school hours. These conditions helped fuel the rise of gangs, which in turn terrorized shop owners and residents alike. In the end, whites fled these neighborhoods, not only because of the influx of black families, but also because they were upset about overcrowding, decaying schools and crime. They also understood that the longer they stayed, the less their property would be worth. But black contract buyers did not have the option of leaving a declining neighborhood before their properties were paid for in full—if they did, they would lose everything they’d invested in that property to date. Whites could leave—blacks had to stay. The contract buying system was commonplace in Baltimore. Its existence was solely due to the federal government’s policy of denying mortgages to African Americans, in either black or white neighborhoods. Nationwide, black family incomes are now about 60 percent of white family incomes, but black household wealth is only about 5 percent of white household wealth. In Baltimore and elsewhere, the distressed condition of African American working- and lower-middle-class families is almost entirely attributable to federal policy that prohibited black families from accumulating housing equity during the suburban boom that moved white families into single-family homes from the mid-1930s to the mid-1960s—and thus from bequeathing that wealth to their children and grandchildren, as white suburbanites have done. As I described in the Making of Ferguson, the federal government maintained a policy of segregation in public housing nationwide for decades. This was as true in northeastern cities like New York as it was in border cities like Baltimore and St. Louis. In 1994, civil rights groups sued the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), alleging that HUD had segregated its public housing in Baltimore and then, after it had concentrated the poorest African American families in projects in the poorest neighborhoods, HUD and the city of Baltimore demolished the projects, and purposely relocated the former residents into other segregated black neighborhoods. An eventual settlement required the government to provide vouchers to former public housing residents for apartments in integrated neighborhoods, and supported this provision with counseling and social services to ensure that families’ moves to integrated neighborhoods would have a high likelihood of success. Although the program is generally considered a model, it affects only a small number of families, and has not substantially dismantled Baltimore’s black ghetto. In 1970, declaring that the federal government had established a “white noose” around ghettos in Baltimore and other cities, HUD Secretary George Romney proposed denying federal funds for sewers, water projects, parkland, or redevelopment to all-white suburbs that resisted integration by maintaining exclusionary zoning ordinances (that prohibited multi-unit construction) or by refusing to accept subsidized moderate-income or public low-income housing. In the case of Baltimore County, he withheld a sewer grant that had previously been committed, because of the county’s policies of residential segregation. It was a very controversial move, but Romney got support from Vice President Spiro Agnew, who had been frustrated by unreasonable suburban resistance to integration and mixed income developments when he had been the Baltimore County Executive and governor of Maryland. In a 1970 speech to the National Alliance of Businessmen, Agnew attacked attempts to solve the country’s racial problems by pouring money into the inner city as had been done in the Johnson administration. Agnew said that he flatly rejected the assumption that “because the primary problems of race and poverty are found in the ghettos of urban America, the solutions to these problems must also be found there… Resources needed to solve the urban poverty problem—land, money, and jobs—exist in substantial supply in suburban areas, but are not being sufficiently utilized in solving inner-city problems.” President Richard Nixon eventually restrained Romney, HUD’s integration programs were abandoned, Romney himself was forced out as HUD Secretary, and little has been done since to solve the urban poverty problem with the substantial resources that exist in the suburbs. Ten years ago, during the subprime lending boom, banks and other financial institutions targeted African Americans for the marketing of subprime loans. The loans had exploding interest rates and prohibitive prepayment penalties, leading to a wave of foreclosures that forced black homeowners back into ghetto apartments and devastated the middle class neighborhoods to which these families had moved. The City of Baltimore sued Wells Fargo Bank, presenting evidence that the bank had established a special unit staffed exclusively by African American bank employees who were instructed to visit black churches to market subprime loans. The bank had no similar practice of marketing such loans through white institutions. These policies were commonplace nationwide, but federal bank examiners responsible for supervising lending practices made no attempt to intervene. When a similar suit was filed in Cleveland, a federal judge observed that because mortgage lending is so heavily regulated by the federal and state governments, “there is no question that the subprime lending that occurred in Cleveland was conduct which ‘the law sanctions’.”

Progress in the housing department is never possible and enforcement fails every single time-  we outlawed redlining but that doesn’t stop secret redlining projects.  
Lane 17 Minnesota's KleinBank accused of discriminatory lending, DOJ accuses bank of redlining minority neighborhoods, Ben Lane. http://www.housingwire.com/articles/38971-minnesotas-kleinbank-accused-of-discriminatory-lending#disqus_thread
Minnesota-based KleinBank excluded minority neighborhoods from its service area for all banking servicers and engaged in discriminatory lending, the Department of Justice claimed in a lawsuit filed late last week.
According to the Department of Justice, none of KleinBank’s branch locations in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro area is located in a minority neighborhood, a practice known as “redlining.”

Residential development projects are founded on concepts of racial exclusion. Freund
David M. P. Freund, associate professor of history at the University of Maryland at College Park, is the author of "Colored Property: State Policy and White Racial Politics in Suburban America" and "The Modern American Metropolis: A Documentary Reader." - https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/04/28/we-cant-forget-how-racist-institutions-shaped-homeownership-in-america/
Nowadays it is increasingly rare to encounter studies of residential segregation and racial inequality in the United States that do not reckon with the history of discrimination. Still in many scholarly settings and popular venues, our debates concerning urban change and opportunity are distorted by a powerful myth about the places that Americans call home: namely, that patterns of residential development have been driven, above all else, by the preferences of individual housing consumers, or even of entire generations of such consumers. This myth has consequences because it obscures the powerful institutions that have shaped metropolitan landscapes and created opportunity for some while systematically denying it to others. Of course preferences matter for understanding U.S. history, but individual preferences alone did not draw our urban and suburban maps. Nor did they alone determine winners and losers in the markets for residence and community resources. I was reminded of this myth’s endurance by a recent piece in Wonkblog discussing new economics research about, in the words of one of the study’s authors, the “emergence of segregation” in northern cities. Allison Shertzer and Randall P. Walsh have done remarkable work compiling and digitally mapping census information to produce “the first systematic analysis” of white households’ “relocation decisions” between 1900 and 1930. The authors seek to gauge the “relative influence” of two variables that contributed to segregation: “white flight” from racially integrated neighborhoods, which they also call “population sorting”; and “institutional barriers constructed by whites” or “collective white action” (such as vigilantism or adoption of race restrictive covenants) to prevent blacks from settling there in the first place. The data shows that whites left integrated neighborhoods during this era at an increasing rate, leading the authors to conclude that “flight” was so statistically significant that institutional racism was probably not, in the final analysis, decisive. “Segregation would likely have arisen even without the presence of discriminatory institutions,” they write, and then suggest the policy implications. “White flight from black neighborhoods is an individual behavior that cannot be limited by local or federal agencies.” Here is the problem: This bold claim is challenged by an enormous body of historical evidence showing that Americans’ decisions about residence have rarely if ever been “individual behaviors” that are separable from a host of social and institutional contexts. Why, then, do arguments about the power of individual housing “preferences” continue to carry such weight? Part of the answer lies in our political culture’s celebration of the free market for homeownership, despite the fact that American property markets have never been wholly “free.”  Of course most people are aware that racial separation and discrimination are longtime features of American life, and they are familiar with notorious (usually Southern) actors in this story, such as George Wallace or Bull Connor. Yet most people are surprised to learn the mundane details of residential exclusion, because it is a history not simply of racist mobs and deed restrictions but also powerful institutions and public policy. Throughout much of the 20th century, discrimination by race was integral to the design, development, marketing and even financing of American cities and suburbs. Discrimination was sanctioned and aggressively promoted by real estate  neighborhood associations , municipal governments, state and federal courts, mortgage lenders, and a host of federal housing and development programs.  Together they helped to draw drew sharp neighborhood boundaries, deny equal access to markets and places, and produced obscene disparities in wealth, opportunity and basic quality of life.  Our contemporary urban and suburban landscapes continue to reflect that history and seldom a day passes when we are not reminded of its legacies.

The alternative is to reject the affirmative's positivist approach to empirics.
You cannot detach theory from its history- ethics must be informed by the injustice of empirical institutions, because the assumptions behind abstraction defy reality and serve to legitimize oppression. Curry 13
Dr. Tommy J. Curry 13, Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy, Texas AandM, "In the Fiat of Dreams: The Delusional Allure of Hope, the Reality of Anti-Black Violence and the Demands of the Anti-Ethical", 2013.
Despite the rhetorical strategies adopted by both Black and white political theorists  which urge Blacks and whites alike to demand Americans to continue their allegiance to the foundational de-racialized ethos of the post-Civil Rights era, the reality of the American racism—its sheer recurring violence against Black people—demands more than symbolic rhetorical allusion. To seriously grasp the reality of racist oppression and the sempiternal machinations of anti-Blackness throughout American society be it in its institutions like the prison industrial complex, its policies like Affirmative action, or its manipulation of Black social degradation and economic disadvantage to support pathological theses about disasters like Katrina or cultural deviance as in the death of Trayvon Martin, Darius Simmons, or Jordan Davis, the study of the matter itself—racism—must be a study of a conceptual disengagement with the myth of racial equality and the “automatic progressivism” of the American liberal project.  This disengagement is not simply the refusal to accept the idealism of civil rights myth held beyond the realm of fact, but the disengagement with the illusions of democracy and equality that continue to ignore the role that violence has played and continues to play in the subjugation, incarceration, and vilification of Black life.  As Dr. A.J. William Myers reveals in his work groundbreaking work entitled Destructive Impulses,  Until at such time white America (and Black America) is openly willing to confront a historical legacy of its own violence (perpetrated against an American people of color), any venture into and/ or expository on race relations becomes an exercise in futility…As a result, therefore, white violence, confined to the subliminal recesses of the American psyche, continues to prevent the transition necessary for the country to move beyond the idea of race. In America, Blackness and the racism that continues to condemn those historical racialized peoples is violence—it is the forceful and coercion enclosing of human beings to an inferior social, political, and economic status of which their own humanity exceeds. This dehumanizing relegation of the raced citizen is not a gradual or incremental debasement, but rather the historically immediate condition of inferiority that presents progress to be attainable by the cyclical degrees of physical violence against the racialized population. For these racially oppressed peoples, violence is the permanent fixture of  existence in America, since it is the vitiation of their humanity that rationalizes the varying techniques of their cultural erasure, birthing the emergent symbolic associations of degradation that replace their invisibility, and empowering the intentional enforcements of their societal exclusions. In fact, it is precisely this triumvirate that gauges what we take to be the negation of the necessity of revolutionary change--since the raced is taken to be present, as a result of a critical redefining of humanity, integrated into society. The potentiality of whiteness—the proleptic call of white anti-racist consciousness— is nothing more than the fiat of an ahistorical dream. A command ushered before thought engages racism, before awareness of the world becomes aware of what is actual. This is forced upon accounts of racism where whiteness is morally obscured from being seen as is. whiteness as is partly determined by what could be, since what is was a past potentiality—a could be. The appeal to the sentimentality, morality, the moral abstraction/distraction of equality—both as a political command and its anthropological requisite—complicate the most obvious consequence of anti-Black racism, namely violence. This moral apriorism urges the Black thinker to conceptualize racism as an activist project rooted in the potential of a world filled with non-racists, a world where the white racist is transformed by Black activity into the white anti-racist. But this project supposes an erroneous view of the white racist which occludes the reality of white supremacy and anti-Black racism. As Robert F. Williams argues in Negroes with Guns, “the racist is a man crazed by hysteria at the idea of coming into equal contact with Negroes. And this mass mental illness called racism is very much a part of the ‘American way of Life.’” The white racist is not seen as the delusional individual ostracized from society as a result of their abhorrent social pathologies of racist hate. Rather the white racist is normal—the extended family, the spouse, the sibling, the friend of the white individual—the very same entities upon which the inter/intrasubjectivity nexus of the white self is founded. The white he experiences no punishment for his longing for Black servitude and his need to exploit and divest the Black worker here and then of his wealth. The white she has no uneasiness about her raping of—the destruction of generations of Black selves—mothers, children, and men—and today usurps the historical imagery of “the nigger,” to politically vacate Blackness and demonize niggers as beyond political consideration. She rewrites history, pens morality, and embodies the post-racial civil rights subject. As such, racism, the milieu of the white racist is not the exposed pathological existence of the white race, but rather valorized in white individuality, the individuality that conceptualizes their racism as a normative aspiration of what the world should look like, and even more damning, an aspiration that can be supported and propagated in the world. The white racist recognizes the deliberateness of the structures, relations, and systems in a white supremacist society and seeks like their colonial foreparents to claim them as their own. Traditionally we have taken ethics to be, as Henry Sidgwick’s claims, "any rational procedure by which we determine what individual human beings 'ought'—or what is right for them—or to seek to realize by voluntary action.”   This rational procedure is however at odds with the empirical reality the ethical deliberation must concern itself with. To argue, as is often done, that the government, its citizens, or white people should act justly, assumes that the possibility of how they could act defines their moral disposition.  If a white person could possibly not be racist, it does not mean that the possibility of not being racist, can be taken to mean that they are not racist. In ethical deliberations dealing with the problem of racism, it is common practice to attribute to historically racist institutions, and individuals universal moral qualities that have yet to be demonstrated.  This abstraction from reality is what frames our ethical norms and allows us to maintain, despite history or evidence, that racist entities will act justly given the choice.  Under such complexities, the only ethical deliberation concerning racism must be anti-ethical, or a judgment refusing to write morality onto immoral entities.
Racism is the foremost impact—it makes all ethical action impossible. Memmi 2K
Professor Emeritus of Sociology @ U of Paris, Naiteire, Racism, Translated by Steve Martinot, p. 163-165 2000
The struggle against racism will be long, difficult, without intermission, without remission, probably never achieved. Yet, for this very reason, it is a struggle to be undertaken without surcease and without concessions. One cannot be indulgent toward racism; one must not even let the monster in the house, especially not in a mask. To give it merely a foothold means to augment the bestial part in us and in other people, which is to diminish what is human. To accept the racist universe to the slightest degree is to endorse fear, injustice, and violence. It is to accept the persistence of the dark history in which we still largely live. it is to agree that the outsider will always be a possible victim (and which man is not himself an outsider relative to someone else?. Racism illustrates, in sum, the inevitable negativity of the condition of the dominated that is, it illuminates in a certain sense the entire human condition. The anti-racist struggle, difficult though it is, and always in question, is nevertheless one of the prologues to the ultimate passage from animosity to humanity. In that sense, we cannot fail to rise to the racist challenge. However, it remains true that one’s moral conduit only emerges from a choice: one has to want it. It is a choice among other choices, and always debatable in its foundations and its consequences. Let us say, broadly speaking, that the choice to conduct oneself morally is the condition for the establishment of a human order, for which racism is the very negation. This is almost a redundancy. One cannot found a moral order, let alone a legislative order, on racism, because racism signifies the exclusion of the other, and his or her subjection to violence and domination. From an ethical point of view, if one can deploy a little religious language, racism is ‘the truly capital sin. It is not an accident that almost all of humanity’s spiritual traditions counsels respect for the weak, for orphans, widows, or strangers. It is not just a question of theoretical morality and disinterested commandments. Such unanimity in the safeguarding of the other suggests the real utility of such sentiments. All things considered, we have an interest in banishing injustice, because injustice engenders violence and death. Of course, this is debatable. There are those who think that if one is strong enough, the assault on and oppression of others is permissible. Bur no one is ever sure of remaining the strongest. One day, perhaps, the roles will be reversed. All unjust society contains within itself the seeds of its own death. It is probably smarter to treat others with respect so that they treat you with respect. “Recall.” says the Bible, “that you were once a stranger in Egypt,” which means both that you ought to respect the stranger because you were a stranger yourself and that you risk becoming one again someday. It is an ethical and a practical appeal—indeed, it is a contract, however implicit it might be. In short, the refusal of racism is the condition for all theoretical and practical morality because, in the end, the ethical choice commands the political choice, a just society must be a society accepted by all. If this contractual principle is not accepted, then only conflict, violence, and destruction will be our lot. If it is accepted, we can hope someday to live in peace. True, it is a wager, but the stakes are irresistible.

Tournament: TFA | Round: Octas | Opponent: Westwood RM | Judge: Sims, Melin, Wright
Deconstructive logic is constitutive of metaphysics. All concepts, identities, and judgements are constructed in opposition to their negative. There can be no conception of good without bad, friendship without betrayal, promises without promise breaking. Ontological violence is foundational to any ethical or political framework.
Hagglund “THE NECESSITY OF DISCRIMINATION DISJOINING DERRIDA AND LEVINAS” MARTIN HÄGGLUND
“Derrida targets precisely this logic of opposition. As he argues in Of Grammatology, metaphysics has always regarded violence as derivative of a primary peace. The possibility of violence can thus be accounted for only in terms of a Fall, that is, in terms of a fatal corruption of a pure origin. By deconstructing this figure of thought, Derrida seeks to elucidate why violence does is not merely an empirical accident that befalls something that precedes it. Rather, violence stems from an essential impropriety that does not allow anything to be sheltered from death and forgetting. Consequently, Derrida takes issue with what he calls the “ethico-theoretical decision” of metaphysics, which postulates the simple to be before the complex, the pure before the impure, the sincere before the deceitful, and so on. All divergences from the positively valued term are thus explained away as symptoms of “alienation,” and the desirable is conceived as the return to what supposedly has been lost or corrupted. In contrast, Derrida argues that what makes it possible for anything to be at the same time makes it impossible for anything to be in itself. The integrity of any “positive” term is necessarily compromised and threatened by its “other.” Such constitutive alterity answers to an essential corruptibility,  which undercuts all ethico-theoretical decisions of how things ought  to be in an ideal world.11 A key term here is what Derrida calls “undecidability.” With this term he  designates the necessary opening toward the coming of the future. The coming of the future is strictly speaking “undecidable,” since it is a relentless displacement that unsettles any defi nitive assurance or given meaning. One can never know what will have happened. Promises may always be turned into threats, friendships into enmities, fidelities into betrayals, and so on. There is no opposition between undecidability and the making of decisions. On the contrary, Derrida emphasizes that one always acts in relation to what cannot be predicted, that one always is forced to make decisions even though the consequences of these decisions cannot be finally established. Any kind of decision (ethical, political, juridical, and so forth) is more or less violent, but it is nevertheless necessary to make decisions. Once again, I want to stress that violent differentiation by no means should be understood as a Fall, where violence supervenes upon a harmony that precedes it. On the contrary, discrimination has to be regarded as a is constitutive condition. Without divisional marks—which is to say: without segregating borders—there would be nothing at all. 

Next, if cultural conflict is inevitable, then the sovereign must be the one defining meaning in the economy of violence to make the final discriminative judgement, otherwise we have absolute violence.
Parrish Derrida`s Economy of Violence in Hobbes` Social Contract, Richard Parrish
All of the foregoing pints to the conclusion that in the commonwealth the sovereign’s first and most fundamental job is to be the ultimate definer. Several other commentators have also reached this conclusion. By way of elaborating upon the importance of the moderation of individuality in Hobbes’ theory of government, Richard Flathman claims that peace “is possible only if the ambiguity and disagreement that pervade general thinking and acting are eliminated by the stipulations of a sovereign.” Pursuant to debunking the perennial misinterpretation of Hobbes’ mention of people as wolves, Paul Johnson argues that “one of the primary functions of the sovereign is to provide the necessary unity of meaning and reference for the‘ primary terms in which people men try to conduct their social lives.” “The whole purpose raison d’entre of sovereign helmsmanship lies squarely in the chronic is to defuseing of interpretive clashes,” without which humans would “fly off in all directions” and fall inevitably into the violence of the natural condition.
Thus, the standard is adhering to the will of the sovereign.

1. The sovereign is impossible to avoid. All persons want to become meaning creators and eventually a sovereign will be formed.
   Parrish 2 Derrida`s Economy of Violence in Hobbes` Social Contract, Richard Parrish
   But even more significantly for his relationship with Derrida, Hobbes argues that in the state of nature persons must not only try to control as many objects as possible -- they must also try to control as many persons as possible. "There is no way for any man to secure himself so reasonable as anticipation, that is, by force or wiles to master the persons of all men he can, so long till he see no other power great enough to endanger him. And this is no more than his own conservation requireth, and is generally allowed."37 While it is often assumed that by this Hobbes means a person will try to control others with physical force alone, when one approaches Hobbesian persons as meaning creators this control takes on a more discursive, arche-violent character. First," says Hobbes, "among persons in the state of nature there is a contestation of honour and preferment,"38 a discursive struggle not over what physical objects each person will possess, but over who or what will be considered valuable. Persons, as rationally self-interested beings who "measure, not only other men, but all other things, by themselves,"39 and value themselves above all others, attempt to force that valuation on others. "The human desire for 'glory', which in today's language translates not simply as the desire for prestige, but also the desire to acquire power over others," is therefore primarily about subsuming others beneath one's own personhood, as direct objects or merely phenomenal substances. As above, the inevitability of this situation is given by the fact that the primarily egoistic nature of all experience renders the other in a "state of empirical alter-ego"41 to oneself. Those who prefer a more directly materialistic reading of Hobbes may attempt to bolster their position by pointing to his comment that "the most frequent reason why men desire to hurt each other, ariseth hence, that many men at the same time have an appetite to the same thing; which yet very often they can neither enjoy in common, nor yet divide it; whence it follows that the strongest must have it, and who is strongest must be decided by the sword."42 This quote also supports my reading of Hobbes, because quite simply the primary thing all persons want but can never have in common is the status of the ultimate creator of meaning, the primary personhood, from which all other goods flow. Everyone, by their natures as creators of meaning whose "desire of power after power . . . ceaseth only in death,"43 tries to subsume others beneath their personhood in order to control these others and glorify themselves. As Piotr Hoffman puts it, "every individual acting under the right of nature views himself as the center of the universe; his aim is, quite simply and quite closely, to become a small "god among men," to use Plato's phrase."Hobbes argues that this discursive struggle rapidly becomes physical by writing that "every man thinking well of himself, and hating to see the same in others, they must needs provoke one another by words, and other signs of contempt and hatred, which are incident to all comparison, till at last they must determine the pre-eminence by strength and force of body."45 The ultimate violence, the surest and most complete way of removing a person's ability to create meaning, is to kill that person, and the escalating contentiousness of the state of nature makes life short in the war of all against all. But this does not render the fundamental reason for this violence any less discursive, any less based on "one's sense of self-importance in comparison with others"46 or human nature as a creator of meaning.
   This outweighs- individuals are always ontologically self-interested, meaning we are key to ethical motivation.
   Mercer 01 In Defence of Weak Psychological Egoism.: Mark Mercer. Erkenntnis (1975-), Vol. 55, No. 2 (2001), pp. 217-23
   To begin: To understand what another has done is both to have a particular sort of true description of the his action he has performed, one that reveals it to be intentional, and to know the agent's his practical reason for performing that action. In turn, to know an agent's reason for performing particular action involves understanding their motivation in doing it. An interpreter cannot, though, really understand an agent's motivation in performing an action unless she sees that motivation as a motivation, unless she is cognizant of its force as a motivation. It is not enough, that is to say, to understand what a person who intentionally sips from a saucer of mud has done to note merely that he had the desire to sip from a saucer of mud, and believed himself both possessed of a saucer of mud and able to sip from it. An interpreter has also to comprehend what in desiring to sip from a saucer of mud was attractive to him.

Contention (Note: did not read this contention in round, instead extemped an analytic reason that hobbes meant revolution was unjustified)
To have a right assumes the ability to make a claim of obligation against someone. So for the resolution to make the claim the US ought to grant a right assumes that we can make a claim against the sovereign.
Curran 02 https://kar.kent.ac.uk/533/1/Hobbes's_theory_of_rights_12NOV07DP.pdf Hobbes’s Theory of Rights – A Modern Interest Theory Eleanor Curran, The Journal of Ethics, 6 (1) pp 63 – 8
A claim right is a right that is correlated with the duties of another or others. These duties consist in either refraining from actions that would impede the rightholder in her exercise of the right or, sometimes, of performing actions that will give the rightholder the thing she has a right to or help her to have or do the thing she has a right to. So, if A has a claim right to X against B, then B has a correlative duty to A to refrain from interfering with A’s having or doing X, or sometimes, a duty to give X to A or to help A to have or do X.
However, individuals don’t have rights against the state, so this claim is never justifiable.
Feinburg 80 Première publication dans The journal of Value Inquiry, Vol.4 (1970), pp.243-57; repris dans Joel Feinberg,
Rights, justice, and the bounds of Liberty, Priceton University Press, Priceton, 1980, pp.159-184. La version
originale de cet article contient des italiques omis par cette version numérique.Surely, one might ask, rights have to come in somewhere, if we are to have even moderately complex forms of social organization. Without rules that confer rights and impose obligations, how can we can have ownership of property, bargains and deals, promises and contracts, appointments and loans, marriages and partnerships? Very well, let us introduce all of these social and economic practices into Nowheresville, but with one big twist. With them I should like to introduce the curious notion of a "sovereign right-monopoly." You will recall that the subjects in Hobbes's Leviathan had no rights whatever against their sovereign. He could do as he liked with them, even gratuitously harm them, but this gave them no valid grievance against him. The sovereign, to be sure, had a certain duty to treat his subjects well, but this duty was owed not to the subjects directly, but to God, just as we might have a duty to a person to treat his property well, but of course no duty to the property itself but only to its owner. Thus, while the sovereign was quite capable of harming his subjects, he could commit no wrong against them that they could complain about, since they had no prior claims against his conduct. The only party wronged by the sovereign’s mistreatment of his subjects was God, the supreme lawmaker. Thus, in repenting cruelty to his subjects, the sovereign might say to God, as David did after killing Uriah, "to Thee only have I sinned."4 Even in the Leviathan, however, ordinary people had ordinary rights against one another. They played roles, occupied offices, made agreements, and signed contracts. In a genuine "sovereign right-monopoly," as I shall be using that phrase. they will do all those things too, and thus incur genuine obligations toward one another; but the obligations (here is the twist) will not be owed directly to promises, creditors, parents, and the like, but rather to God alone, or to the members of some elite, or to a single sovereign under God. Hence, the rights correlative to the obligations that derive from these transactions are all owned by some "outside" authority. As far as I know, no philosopher has ever suggested that even our role and contract obligations (in this, our actual world) are all owed directly to a divine intermediary, but some theologians have approached such extreme moral occasionalism. I have in mind the familiar phrase in certain widely distributed religious tracts that "it takes three to marry." which suggests that marital vows are not made between bride and groom directly but between each spouse and God, so that if one breaks his vow, the other cannot rightly complain of being wronged, since only God could have claimed performance of the marital duties as his own due; and hence God alone had a claimright violated by nonperformance. If John breaks his vow to God, he might then properly repent in the words of David: "To Thee only have I sinned."

Tournament: TFA | Round: 2 | Opponent: Lindale AR | Judge: Nolan Burdett
analytics
And, and a violation of freedom can’t be true since its a contradiction.
Stephen Engstrom (PhD, Professor of Ethics at University of Pittsburg). “Universal Legislation As the Form of Practical Knowledge”. Pg. 19-20 RC
“Given the preceding considerations, it’s a straightforward matter to see how a maxim of action that assaults the freedom of others with a view to furthering one’s own ends results in a contradiction when we attempt to will it as a universal law in accordance with the foregoing account of the formula of universal law. Such a maxim would lie in a practical judgment that deems it good on the whole to act to limit others’ outer freedom, and hence their self-sufficiency, their capacity to realize their ends, where doing so augments, or extends, one’s own outer freedom and so also one’s own self-sufficiency. 19In this passage, Kant mentions assaults on property as well as on freedom. But since property is a specific, socially instituted form of freedom, I have omitted mention of it to focus on the primitive case. Now on the interpretation we’ve been entertaining, applying the formula of universal law involves considering whether it’s possible for every person—every subject capable of practical judgment—to shares the practical judgment asserting the goodness of every person’s acting according to the maxim in question. Thus in the present case the application of the formula involves considering whether it’s possible for every person to deem good every person’s acting to limit others’ freedom, where practicable, with a view to augmenting their own freedom. Since here all persons are on the one hand deeming good both the limitation of others’ freedom and the extension of their own freedom, while on the other hand, insofar as they agree with the similar judgments of others, also deeming good the limitation of their own freedom and the extension of others’ freedom, they are all deeming good both the extension and the limitation of both their own and others’ freedom.”
The standard is respecting freedom.
analytics
Kantianism justifies a system of free markets- we have the right to make inferior choices and businesspeople have a right to choose how they want to distribute their own goods. This also means nobody has to sell you a house either- there should be zero interference, positive or negative
Jones 04 September 2004, Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies;2004, Vol. 16 Issue 1/2, p65, http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/articles/14576363/immanuel-kant-free-market-capitalist
This essay argues that Kant's philosophy provides a justification for free markets. The myths about Kant are that he was a recluse, knew nothing about business, and that his epistemology divorced reason from reality, while his primary interest was metaphysics. Yet Kant's categorical imperative demands obedience even in the face of uncertainty about the external world. Adam Smith described this principle as the inward testimony of an impartial observer. Smith and Kant put individual decisions at the center of morality, but agreed that people have a tendency to make morally inferior chokes. Those who propose to regulate the economy are as troubled by this tendency as those they regulate. The self-sacrifice prescription is economically, psychologically, and morally unstable. In recommending market competition, Smith was unconsciously applying a Kantian formula. Market decisions are individual decisions. Individuals prefer to do business with those they trust: this is an incentive to honesty. A morality that depends upon incentives is imperfect but superior to a morality imposed by force.
A right to housing requires coercion since it uses the property of others to take actions.
Tanner 04 Michael Tanner “Is affordable housing a human right?” The CQ Researcher. June 2004. http://library.cqpress.com/cqresearcher/document.php?id=cqresrre2004061806
Affordable housing for every American is a desirable goal for public policy. But not every good policy can be translated into questions of human rights. When properly defined, rights do not conflict. That is because rights are essentially negative in character. My exercise of my rights in no ways infringes on your exercise of your rights. Your only obligation is negative, to refrain from interfering with my exercise of rights. Thus, my right to speak freely requires no action on your part, takes nothing away from you. My right exists independent of you. Your only obligation is not to stop me from speaking. But the same is not true of a right to affordable housing. It would impose a positive obligation. In order for me to exercise my right, something must be taken away from you. That may be your property, directly through taxes, or indirectly through limits on what you can charge for rent. But in theory, my claim on you could go still further. Suppose there simply was not enough housing being built. If housing is a right, I would have the authority to conscript you to become a carpenter

Tournament: TFA | Round: 4 | Opponent: Clear Brook DW | Judge: Forrest Hebron
Interpretation: The affirmative must defend the resolution as a state of affairs- i.e. that the government has an obligation to guarantee the right in the abstract. 

Violation:

Vote Neg:

1. limits
   2. textuality
   King 03 King, Peter. "Housing as a Freedom Right." Housing Studies 18.5 (2003): 661-72. Web.
   Before proceeding any further there is a need to make a terminological distinction, and in so doing, separate out statutory and philosophical notions of rights. This paper is more properly discussing the ‘right to housing’. This is a moral right that may or may not exist. It is a normative condition that relates to the legitimate interests that individuals have. This is to be distinguished from ‘housing rights’, which relate to conditions granted by statute. The notion of housing rights is, of course, quite commonly referred to. Indeed, there are many texts that aim to explain what rights individuals have to housing and associated benefits, usually produced by professional and lobbying bodies such as the Chartered Institute of Housing and Shelter. Whilst these are obviously useful, they are concerned with what could be called ‘statutory rights’. They seek to elucidate what an individual might be entitled to in law, with the specific aim of acting as guides for practitioners. However, what this practice-based literature does not do is discuss how rights to housing are grounded. These texts cannot tell us why rights themselves are important. This work has already been assumed to have been done, in the sense that it was deemed necessary to enact statutes. Nor can this statutory notion tell us whether rights are, of themselves, a sufficient condition. More practically, they are also unable to inform us of what grounds there might be to extend or to reduce statutory rights, except in the narrow sense of whether particular statutes are effective. Discussions on statutory rights tend to be question-begging, in that they take for granted that rights exist, and that therefore action is necessary by the state to institutionalise them and then to act upon them. But what we need to know is why rights exist and thus why it is that governments have felt the need to legislate for them. This initially necessitates an abstract discussion, which defines rights and how they might be categorised.  

Voters: same as t entitlements

Tournament: TFA | Round: Doubles | Opponent: Clear Brook GR | Judge: VIncent, Andrews, Davies
Interpretation: The affirmative must defend a policy that guarantees a right to housing for all people unconditionally. To clarify, you cannot defend giving housing to specific groups. 

Violation:

Net Benefits:

1. Limits
   2. Field Context
   NESRI https://www.nesri.org/programs/what-is-the-human-right-to-housing What is the Human Right to Housing?
   Everyone has a fundamental human right to housing, which ensures access to a safe, secure, habitable, and affordable home with freedom from forced eviction. It is the government’s obligation to guarantee that everyone can exercise this right to live in security, peace, and dignity. This right must be provided to all persons irrespective of income or access to economic resources. There are seven principles that are fundamental to the right to housing and are of particular relevance to the right to housing in the United States:

T's a voting issue (same voters)

Tournament: TFA | Round: 2 | Opponent: Lindale AR | Judge: Nolan Burdett
Interpretation: Right” is defined as a claim which can be acted on by individuals without government assistance or coercion. That means the aff must defend a negative right, not a positive right.
Yates explains the distinction between rights and entitlements
Yates, Steven (Ass’t Prof of Philosophy, U of South Carolina). “Rights Versus Entitlements.” Foundation for Economic Education. 1 September 1994. https://fee.org/articles/rights-versus-entitlements/
In other words, there is a hard and fast difference between rights and entitlements, a difference which the past seventy years of government policy has blurred to the point of indistinguishability. A free society must recognize the distinction. Otherwise, it has no way of knowing which claims of rights to acknowledge and which to reject as spurious. Legitimate rights are easy to recognize. They can be acted on by individuals without the assistance of government and without forcibly interfering with other individuals. Entitlements, on the other hand, cannot be fulfilled except through specific government actions which require forcible interference with others. Protecting rights is thus compatible with limited government. Granting entitlements requires an ever-expanding and increasingly meddlesome state. The more entitlements the state grants, the more it must extend itself to make good on its promises, and the greater its level of interference with people’s actions. Moreover, by interfering with successful actions, government becomes a drain on the individual’s energies. The individual must expend more and more effort to get the same personal benefits. This translates into a disincentive to produce, and when less is produced, there is less to seize and distribute. Soon, the state can no longer keep its promises.
Section 8 and voucher programs are entitlements, not rights.  
Hartman Hartman, Chester (director of research at the Poverty and Race Research Action Council). “The Case for a Right to Housing.” National Housing Institute. Issue #148, Winter 2006. Web. http://nhi.org/online/issues/148/righttohousing.html
Some specific, although quite limited, rights/ entitlements exist in the housing area. Local housing codes (varying enormously with respect to coverage and standards) provide something of a right to decent physical conditions. But enforcement is a problem and market realities limit the benefits these regulations offer. A warranty of habitability and rent-withholding provisions exist in some jurisdictions. While this levels the playing field somewhat between landlord and tenant, it falls short of guaranteeing decent housing conditions and, as is true of housing codes, does not deal with the key issue of affordability. In those few areas that still have rent control, limits are placed on rent increases. Federal, state and local laws bar discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, disability and other personal characteristics, as well as source of income. But again, enforcement is far less than ideal, and more subtle forms of residential discrimination are hard to detect and prove. Due process must be followed in eviction and foreclosure proceedings. Relatedly, some jurisdictions provide protection to tenants against condominium conversions and demolitions. In a few areas, "just (good) cause" eviction statutes limit eviction to stipulated reasons. Tenants in public and Section 8 housing are required to pay no more than 30 percent of their income as rent. In a few areas, by statute or litigation, homeless persons have a right to shelter (not to be confused with housing), and for the homeless there also exists, again in just a few areas, what might be labeled "a right not to freeze to death": ordinances requiring that public buildings be opened to homeless persons when the temperature dips below a certain level. And, as is constantly pointed out by low-income housing advocates, while there is no entitlement to a Section 8 certificate or a public housing unit, all homeowners are entitled to the most massive, albeit indirect, housing subsidy of all - the ability to deduct every dollar paid in property taxes and virtually all dollars paid in mortgage interest from their taxable income base, providing a huge and highly regressive housing subsidy to those who need it least. (Other provisions of our tax laws as they affect homeowners add to this disparity.) So, our society has lots of rights and entitlements, with some limited kinds of rights in the housing area, but we're way shy of a right to decent, affordable housing for all.

Vote Neg:

1. Precision
   2. Limits
   3. Field Context
   Morais 05 Lochner Marais (PhD, University of the Free State, Bloemfonte Professor) in Social Policy)  and Johannes Wessels, Housing Standards and Housing Rights: The Case of Welkom in the Free State Province, 16 URB. F. 17, 20 (2005)
   In general, it seems as if the right to housing does not mean that governments are supposed to construct houses for the entire population (Leckie, 1990; Kok and Gelderblom, 1994). Rather, it is more concerned with the obligation of the state not to act in a way that will undermine the opportunity of households to gain access to housing. For example, making laws or regulations that undermine access to housing will not be conducive to the furtherance of the right to housing. In terms of established informal settlements, the right to housing would probably have the implication that one may not remove informal settlers without providing alternative accommodation and without meeting all of the legal requirements. Furthermore, it probably also requires the state to develop an implementation plan as to how it will ensure that this right is upheld.
   Voter: Fairness jurisdiction
   Drop debater on t
   competing interps
   t isn't an RVI

Tournament: TFA | Round: Quarters | Opponent: Kinkaid JY | Judge: Paramo, Powell, Fu
A: The aff must only guarantee the right to housing
Violation: There are a litany of extra-topical things involved in complying with this international agreement.

(HIGHLIGHT) Here’s just a couple of examples of extra-T things in the ICESCR – look up the document it’s actually ridiculous
ICESCR 66 (International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, 16 December 1966, http://www.ohchr.org/EN/ProfessionalInterest/Pages/CESCR.aspx//utd-va)
PART I Article 1 1. All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development. 2. All peoples may, for their own ends, freely dispose of their natural wealth and resources without prejudice to any obligations arising out of international economic co-operation, based upon the principle of mutual benefit, and international law. In no case may a people be deprived of its own means of subsistence. 3. The States Parties to the present Covenant, including those having responsibility for the administration of Non-Self-Governing and Trust Territories, shall promote the realization of the right of self-determination, and shall respect that right, in conformity with the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations. PART II Article 2 1. Each State Party to the present Covenant undertakes to take steps, individually and through international assistance and co-operation, especially economic and technical, to the maximum of its available resources, with a view to achieving progressively the full realization of the rights recognized in the present Covenant by all appropriate means, including particularly the adoption of legislative measures. 2. The States Parties to the present Covenant undertake to guarantee that the rights enunciated in the present Covenant will be exercised without discrimination of any kind as to race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. 3. Developing countries, with due regard to human rights and their national economy, may determine to what extent they would guarantee the economic rights recognized in the present Covenant to non-nationals. Article 3 The States Parties to the present Covenant undertake to ensure the equal right of men and women to the enjoyment of all economic, social and cultural rights set forth in the present Covenant. Article 4 The States Parties to the present Covenant recognize that, in the enjoyment of those rights provided by the State in conformity with the present Covenant, the State may subject such rights only to such limitations as are determined by law only in so far as this may be compatible with the nature of these rights and solely for the purpose of promoting the general welfare in a democratic society. Article 5 1. Nothing in the present Covenant may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights or freedoms recognized herein, or at their limitation to a greater extent than is provided for in the present Covenant. 2. No restriction upon or derogation from any of the fundamental human rights recognized or existing in any country in virtue of law, conventions, regulations or custom shall be admitted on the pretext that the present Covenant does not recognize such rights or that it recognizes them to a lesser extent. PART III Article 6 1. The States Parties to the present Covenant recognize the right to work, which includes the right of everyone to the opportunity to gain his living by work which he freely chooses or accepts, and will take appropriate steps to safeguard this right. 2. The steps to be taken by a State Party to the present Covenant to achieve the full realization of this right shall include technical and vocational guidance and training programmes, policies and techniques to achieve steady economic, social and cultural development and full and productive employment under conditions safeguarding fundamental political and economic freedoms to the individual. Article 7 The States Parties to the present Covenant recognize the right of everyone to the enjoyment of just and favourable conditions of work which ensure, in particular: (a) Remuneration which provides all workers, as a minimum, with:  Fair wages and equal remuneration for work of equal value without distinction of any kind, in particular women being guaranteed conditions of work not inferior to those enjoyed by men, with equal pay for equal work; (ii) A decent living for themselves and their families in accordance with the provisions of the present Covenant; (b) Safe and healthy working conditions; (c) Equal opportunity for everyone to be promoted in his employment to an appropriate higher level, subject to no considerations other than those of seniority and competence; (d ) Rest, leisure and reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay, as well as remuneration for public holidays Article 8 1. The States Parties to the present Covenant undertake to ensure: (a) The right of everyone to form trade unions and join the trade union of his choice, subject only to the rules of the organization concerned, for the promotion and protection of his economic and social interests. No restrictions may be placed on the exercise of this right other than those prescribed by law and which are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security or public order or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others; (b) The right of trade unions to establish national federations or confederations and the right of the latter to form or join international trade-union organizations; (c) The right of trade unions to function freely subject to no limitations other than those prescribed by law and which are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security or public order or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others; (d) The right to strike, provided that it is exercised in conformity with the laws of the particular country. 2. This article shall not prevent the imposition of lawful restrictions on the exercise of these rights by members of the armed forces or of the police or of the administration of the State. 3. Nothing in this article shall authorize States Parties to the International Labour Organisation Convention of 1948 concerning Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organize to take legislative measures which would prejudice, or apply the law in such a manner as would prejudice, the guarantees provided for in that Convention. Article 9 The States Parties to the present Covenant recognize the right of everyone to social security, including social insurance. Article 10 The States Parties to the present Covenant recognize that: 1. The widest possible protection and assistance should be accorded to the family, which is the natural and fundamental group unit of society, particularly for its establishment and while it is responsible for the care and education of dependent children. Marriage must be entered into with the free consent of the intending spouses. 2. Special protection should be accorded to mothers during a reasonable period before and after childbirth. During such period working mothers should be accorded paid leave or leave with adequate social security benefits. 3. Special measures of protection and assistance should be taken on behalf of all children and young persons without any discrimination for reasons of parentage or other conditions. Children and young persons should be protected from economic and social exploitation. Their employment in work harmful to their morals or health or dangerous to life or likely to hamper their normal development should be punishable by law. States should also set age limits below which the paid employment of child labour should be prohibited and punishable by law. Article 11 1. The States Parties to the present Covenant recognize the right of everyone to an adequate standard of living for himself and his family, including adequate food, clothing and housing, and to the continuous improvement of living conditions. The States Parties will take appropriate steps to ensure the realization of this right, recognizing to this effect the essential importance of international co-operation based on free consent. 2. The States Parties to the present Covenant, recognizing the fundamental right of everyone to be free from hunger, shall take, individually and through international co-operation, the measures, including specific programmes, which are needed: (a) To improve methods of production, conservation and distribution of food by making full use of technical and scientific knowledge, by disseminating knowledge of the principles of nutrition and by developing or reforming agrarian systems in such a way as to achieve the most efficient development and utilization of natural resources; (b) Taking into account the problems of both food-importing and food-exporting countries, to ensure an equitable distribution of world food supplies in relation to need. Article 12 1. The States Parties to the present Covenant recognize the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health. 2. The steps to be taken by the States Parties to the present Covenant to achieve the full realization of this right shall include those necessary for: (a) The provision for the reduction of the stillbirth-rate and of infant mortality and for the healthy development of the child; (b) The improvement of all aspects of environmental and industrial hygiene; (c) The prevention, treatment and control of epidemic, endemic, occupational and other diseases; (d) The creation of conditions which would assure to all medical service and medical attention in the event of sickness.

Net Benefits- 

1. Limits
   2. Jurisdiction

Same voters

Tournament: TFA | Round: 5 | Opponent: McNeil PV | Judge: Aisha Bawany
Interp: The aff must defend the passage of a post-fiat policy action in which the right to housing is guaranteed.

1. The right to housing requires POLICY action.
   HRRC The Right to Adequate Housing, USING MODULE 13 IN A TRAINING PROGRAM, http://hrlibrary.umn.edu/edumat/IHRIP/circle/modules/module13.htm
   State obligations vis-a-vis the right to adequate housing are frequently misunderstood. They does not mean that the state is required to build housing for the entire population, or that housing should be provided free of charge to the populace, or even that this right will manifest itself in the same manner in all places at all times. Rather, recognition of the right to housing by a state means: The state undertakes to endeavor by all appropriate means to ensure that everyone has access to affordable and acceptable housing. and the state will undertake a series of measures which indicate policy and legislative recognition of each of the constituent aspects of the right to housing. The state will protect and improve houses and neighborhoods rather than damage or destroy them. The essential elements of the state’s obligation to implement all ESC rights (including the right to adequate housing) are encapsulated under article 2(1) of the ICESCR.
   2. And guarantee implies a concrete action or solution.
   Merriam Webster https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/guarantee
    to engage for the existence, permanence, or nature of :  undertake to do or secure 

3. Government-guaranteed right to housing entails implementation, including enacting laws and creating agencies to ensure the right.
Golay and Ozden 07 Christophe Golay and Melik Özden (advisor to the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food; Director of the CETIM's Human Rights Programme and permanent representative of the CETIM to the United Nations). “The Right To Housing.” CETIM. 2007. http://www.cetim.ch/legacy/en/documents/bro7-log-A4-an.pdf
3. The Obligation to Protect the Right to Adequate Housing. The obligation to protect the right to adequate housing requires that governments prohibit third parties from preventing the enjoyment of the right to housing in any way. This applies to individuals, business enterprises and other entities. Governments must, for example, enact laws that protect the population from land and property speculation. They must create competent bodies to investigate violations and must assure the means of effective redress for victims, most notably through access to the courts. Governments must also intervene when powerful individuals or business enterprises evict persons from their land or their housing, by bringing to law those responsible and by guaranteeing restitution and/or compensation for the victims. The Special Rapporteur on the Right to Adequate Housing, in several of his reports, has denounced the negative effects of the privatization of public services.41 He emphasizes that the government has the duty to guarantee, for example, that privatization of water will not have negative effects on access to water and to adequate housing for the population. Such privatization has very often entailed price increases that have made water unaffordable for the poorest. In Manila, for example, the price of water quadrupled between 1997 and 2003 after the privatization carried out by Lyonnaise des Eaux.42 In all cases of privatization of public services, including water or electricity, the government must continue to guarantee the protection of the right to adequate housing, including/especially for the poorest. The government is also responsible for intervening to avoid all discrimination in access to housing. A government that does not, for example, guarantee that no person shall be refused housing because of his/her sex, nationality or origin, nor prevent other forms of discrimination, violates its duty to protect the right to housing.

Violation: You dont

vote neg:
a) ground
b) field context
c) t version of the aff

same voters as anything else

Tournament: Apple Valley | Round: 3 | Opponent: Lake Highland MC | Judge: Lily Hock
CP Text: The Supreme Court should modify Monell claims to operate according to a ‘conscious disregard standard instead of the current ‘Deliberate Indifference’ standard.
Singh 15 clarifies:
Singh, Amit (J.D. Candidate, University of the Pacific, McGeorge School of Law). "Accountability Matters: An Examination of Municipal Liability in Sec. 1983 Actions." The U. of Pac. L. Rev. 47 (2015): 105.
The Court should revisit the standard for municipal liability in § 1983 actions and provide an actual definition to prevent confusion and varying application by lower courts.'7 9 A standard of conscious disregard that combines the California law for imposing punitive damages with the definition from the Nevada Legislature would remedy the failings of the deliberate indifference standard. 80 This comment proposes the courts adopt the following standard for imposing municipal liability in § 1983 actions:
 (a) knowledge of probable harmful consequences of a wrongful act; and'
(b) willful or deliberate failure to avoid those consequences;182
 (c) by a municipal policymaker, or those persons acting on behalf of a municipal policymaker. 8
Mutually exclusive- Limiting qualified immunity means lawsuit fall on police, not the system - you can’t sue both. Gilles 2K
Gilles, Myriam (Assistant Professor, Cardozo Law School) "In defense of making Government pay: the deterrent effect of constitutional tort remedies." Ga. L. Rev. 35 (2000): 845.
Second, the common practice of bifurcation serves to limit the efficacy of municipal liability claims. 7 Many courts reflexively bifurcate the trial of individual and municipal liability claims under Rule 42(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, 8 staying all Monell proceedings, including discovery on Monell issues," until after the resolution of claims against individual officers."' I have a theorem: bifurcation + indemnification = elimination of Monell. Once a case is bifurcated and the plaintiff proceeds against the individual officer, the plaintiff either wins or loses. If plaintiff wins and the officer is indemnified, the plaintiff is made whole. End of case. Plaintiff cannot proceed against the municipality, having been made whole in the first trial against the individual officer. If plaintiff loses against the individual officer, he likely cannot proceed against the municipality. End of case. Having failed to show he suffered any constitutional injury, plaintiff may not then claim that a municipal policy or custom caused him constitutional injury." 1 Either way, the Monell claim never sees the light of day, and the informational and fault-fixing functions of municipal liability lie inert. 10

This modification would lead to more successful lawsuits. Singh 15
Singh, Amit (J.D. Candidate, University of the Pacific, McGeorge School of Law). "Accountability Matters: An Examination of Municipal Liability in Sec. 1983 Actions." The U. of Pac. L. Rev. 47 (2015): 105.
Unlike the deliberate indifference standard, the conscious disregard standard provides an effective remedy for plaintiffs who have suffered constitutional violations at the hands of municipal employees." 9 The current standard often functions as an impossible barrier to relief.'" Although a court may consider a particular municipal "policy" or "custom" as exhibiting an indifference to the rights of a citizen, the court will generally not interpret the policy as amounting to a deliberate indifference.'9 The conscious disregard standard addresses this problem by reducing the burden of proving municipal liability in § 1983 actions.1 92 Instead of the confusing, repetitive language of the deliberate indifference standard, the conscious disregard standard will provide a workable definition for lower courts.' The language is clear and the goal is straightforward: prevent municipalities from engaging in patterns or practices that violate the constitutional rights of citizens.'9
Turns and outweighs the case:
Unlike suits, Monell claims lead to policy reform. Lawsuits on police don’t lead to any change and just deflect blame from the institution.  Gilles 2
Gilles, Myriam (Assistant Professor, Cardozo Law School) "In defense of making Government pay: the deterrent effect of constitutional tort remedies." Ga. L. Rev. 35 (2000): 845.
In addition to serving an informational function, municipal liability claims serve a "fault-fixing" function, localizing culpability in the municipality itself, and forcing municipal policymakers to consider reformative measures. To understand how this fault-fixing function operates, it is important to distinguish between the liability a municipality incurs indirectly, through the indemnification of its officers, and the direct liability it may incur under Monell. Indirect liability does not trigger the fault-fixing function. The municipal indemnification of an individual officer for constitutional damage awards levied against him6" does not necessarily force policy-makers to acknowledge municipal fault and take remedial action, for two reasons. First, indemnification is an ex ante benefit given to individual officers as a form of insurance. The determination to indemnify is made at the front end, as the product of collective bargaining arrangements and political lobbying, and not in response to any constitutional claim.64 The act of indemnifying is largely a ministerial one, and indemnification expenses are easily justified as costs of doing business, along with salaries and other items of overhead.65  Second, where municipalities indemnify officers, they "generally write off the misconduct of an individual officer to the 'bad apple theory,' under which municipal governments or their agencies attribute misconduct to aberrant behavior by a single 'bad apple.'60 This "deflects attention from systemic and institutional factors contributing to recurring constitutional deprivations." 7 As I have argued elsewhere, "the bad apple theory' is essentially an institutionalized belief system ensuring that fault for unconstitutional conduct--even when it results in large damage awards against individual officers or city-approved settlements-will never be localized in the culture of the municipal agency itseltf"' with the result that little or no remedial actions are taken.69  Direct liability, on the other hand, does serve a fault-fixing function. Under the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Monell v. Department of Social Services," municipal liability cannot be based upon principles of vicarious liability; rather, municipal liability will attach only where an identifiable "policy or custom" of the municipality caused plaintiffs constitutional injury." A finding of Monell liability, therefore, fixes the fault of constitutional violations directly on the municipal entity, which "possesses the resources and broad vantage point with which to identify the particular deficiencies, and... take appropriate corrective action,"72 thereby furthering the deterrence goal of § 1983. Holding the municipality itself liable for injuries caused by its own unconstitutional policies and customs makes it more difficult to take refuge in the "bad apple theory" and more likely that the municipality will take steps to remedy the broader problems.
Empirical proof that Monell claims can lead to reform is shown throughout history. Gilles 2K
Gilles, Myriam (Assistant Professor, Cardozo Law School) "In defense of making Government pay: the deterrent effect of constitutional tort remedies." Ga. L. Rev. 35 (2000): 845.
First, as I have argued elsewhere, too many courts and practitioners have failed to apprehend the broad spectrum of policies or customs that may support the imposition of Monell liability under 42 U.S.C. § 1983.9o Specifically, greater focus upon the "custom" language of § 1983 holds promise for reinvigorating modern civil rights litigation.
Originally enacted as the Ku Klux Act of 1871, 42 U.S.C. § 1983 was intended to combat the widespread practices of local officials, including rank-and-file municipal officers, that impeded implementation of the principles enshrined in the Fourteenth Amendment. In passing the statute, the 42nd Congress understood that, while state and local legislatures were swiftly passing laws throughout the South to conform to the mandates of the Reconstruction amendments, unwritten codes guiding the conduct of local officials in Southern strongholds undermined the new constitutional and statutory edicts.93 The architects of the original Ku Klux Act used the term "custom" to refer to the nefarious unwritten codes of conduct pursuant to which local officials terrorized freedmen and Republicans, and failed to enforce Reconstruction era laws against dissenters.94 While the particular "customs" that prevailed amongst deputy sheriffs, local prosecutors and Klansmen in the post-bellum South have largely subsided, other "customs" in the form of unwritten codes of conduct among modern law enforcement officials regularly impair rights guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment today. Indeed, I have argued that institutionalized, unwritten "customs"- most particularly the police code of silence-underlie many of the constitutional deprivations suffered at the hands of contemporary police officers.9" As the true range of actionable customs is recognized by more plaintiffs' lawyers and judges, we will see more clearly the deterrent or behavior-altering effect of constitutional damage suits aimed at municipalities under Monell.96

Tournament: UT | Round: 3 | Opponent: WB Ray JG | Judge: Victor Fu
Body cameras increase violence- studies prove.
Gershman 16 Jacob, analyst and journalist at WSJ, 8/12/16, http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2016/08/12/study-links-police-bodycams-to-increase-in-shooting-deaths/
In the wake of high-profile police shootings, the Obama administration has encouraged local police departments to equip their officers with body-worn cameras. The devices, said Attorney General Loretta Lynch, “hold tremendous promise for enhancing transparency, promoting accountability, and advancing public safety.” A new study by Temple University researchers, however, suggests that the wearable video cameras may not lead to fewer police shootings of civilians, but may actually make officers more likely to use lethal force. Those are findings from a new working paper by Min-Seok Pang and Paul A. Pavlou of Temple University’s Fox School of Business. The scholars, who research the impact of information technology on organizations, drew heavily on the Washington Post’s tally of fatal police shootings in 2015 (986 deaths in total), among other national datasets. They write: Surprisingly, we found that the use of wearable video cameras is associated with a 3.64 increase in shooting-deaths of civilians by the police. We explain that video recordings collected during a violent encounter with a civilian can be used in favor of a police officer as evidence that justifies the shooting. Aware of this evidence, the officer may become less reluctant to engage in the use of deadly force…. This contradicts the expectation of many law enforcement officials and policymakers that video cameras would reduce incidents of use of deadly force. What’s more, they found that body cameras were associated with a larger increase in shooting deaths of African Americans and Hispanics than whites and Asians.
cameras don’t do anything—empirics prove
Ariel 16 Barak, chief analysist at the Cambridge Jerry Lee institute of Criminilogy, 4/5/2016, http://spectrum.ieee.org/consumer-electronics/portable-devices/do-police-body-cameras-really-work
Another common type of video surveillance, the one that has accompanied the proliferation of smartphones, might actually be more important. Video cameras are ubiquitous, and the video recording of engagements between police and public is incredibly influential, especially when misconduct is caught, be it the infamous beating of Rodney King in Los Angeles in 1991 or the killing of Eric Garner in New York City in 2014. These recordings certainly demonstrate the effect of cameras on public reactions to the police, having sparked the Los Angeles riots of 1992 and the Black Lives Matter movement of 2015. Given the notoriety of such videos, a camera at the scene of a police-public encounter ought, logically, to send out an accountability cue, eliminating feelings of anonymity on either side. There is no strong evidence, however, to support the conclusion that mobile-phone cameras deter officers from misconduct. The Garner incident is particularly telling in this regard: As clearly shown in the recording released to the media, officers were well aware of the cameras filming them (some of them looked directly at the cameraman), yet they still used a prohibited choke hold. Why? There are probably two reasons. First, the officers might have been aware of a camera, but it still didn’t really register. Here, as in many other highly charged encounters, people just don’t think much about all the cameras around them before making the decision to throw a punch or otherwise misbehave. Second, even if they are aware of being recorded, the parties involved might not perceive a strong possibility that the footage captured can and will be used to hold them accountable for any type of misconduct. Because it is not official evidence, the video from a civilian’s smartphone camera doesn’t seem to inspire concern that it will surface later.
Current police reforms like body cameras are superficial; without strong financial liability, they will only instill complacency
Hansford 14
Justin Hansford (Human rights activist and law professor at St. Louis University School of Law; graduate of Howard University and Georgetown University Law Center). “Why Police Body Cameras Won't Work.” Hartford Courant. 5 December 2014. http://www.courant.com/opinion/op-ed/bc-body-cameras-wont-work-need-accountability-20141205-story.html
Lax laws prevent us from holding police accountable, not a lack of evidence. But the presence of police body cameras will simply lull the country into believing that we can solve the problems of racial profiling and police violence without holding police accountable for their actions. State excessive-force laws make criminal conviction of police officers for murder almost impossible; a police officer has nothing to lose by killing unarmed black men. Even in civil suits, officers are never personally financially responsible for paying for damages; state and local governments cover it for them. This is the textbook definition of impunity. In addition to their ineffectiveness, the information captured by body cameras raises serious questions about citizen privacy. The Fourth Amendment prohibits unreasonable search and seizure, and many jurisdictions prohibit recording of a person without his or her consent if the surveillance takes place in an area of expected privacy. The big brother state stands in direct contradiction to the freedom from unreasonable searches that the Fourth Amendment guarantees us. President Obama isn't alone in his misguided approach. Across the country, local police departments are considering the use of body cameras and perpetuating the view that this will end police brutality. But if this country wants to get serious about this problem, we should do what government always does when it wants to alter behavior on a systematic level: Impose financial penalties

Police control over camerawork reifies the oppression.
Beyond Body Cameras: Defending a Robust Right to Record the Police JOCELYN SIMONSON* Assistant Professor, Brooklyn Law School. © 2016, Jocelyn Simonson
Similarly, civilian control over access to the footage changes the function of the video in the public sphere. When police departments become their own gatekeepers, deciding what to release, when, and to whom, they remain in control of the narrative surrounding videos—solidifying, rather than dismantling, the traditional monopoly that police departments possess over the evidence of and narratives structuring their behavior on the street.40 In many states, police departments are the sole gatekeepers of the release of body camera footage. Police departments often require complicated discovery requests before the footage is released or refuse to turn over any footage at all.41 State legislatures around the country are moving to restrict access to body camera footage by exempting it from public records laws.42 By maintaining control over their body camera operation and footage, police departments are able to craft official narratives before handing over information to the public or to independent investigators. In August 2015, for example, the Oakland Police Department held an invitation-only screening of a video of a fatal incident, but refused to release that same video to the public or provide a full, unedited version.43 And the Chicago Police Department famously resisted releasing the footage of the police shooting of civilian Laquan McDonald, doing so only after losing a court battle in November 2015 and then carefully orchestrating the release of the video.44 When police departments control access to the footage and the narratives surrounding any release of the footage, they strengthen their own power over the people who interact with the police on those videos.

Police control over camerawork reifies the oppression.
Beyond Body Cameras: Defending a Robust Right to Record the Police JOCELYN SIMONSON* Assistant Professor, Brooklyn Law School. © 2016, Jocelyn Simonson
Similarly, civilian control over access to the footage changes the function of the video in the public sphere. When police departments become their own gatekeepers, deciding what to release, when, and to whom, they remain in control of the narrative surrounding videos—solidifying, rather than dismantling, the traditional monopoly that police departments possess over the evidence of and narratives structuring their behavior on the street.40 In many states, police departments are the sole gatekeepers of the release of body camera footage. Police departments often require complicated discovery requests before the footage is released or refuse to turn over any footage at all.41 State legislatures around the country are moving to restrict access to body camera footage by exempting it from public records laws.42 By maintaining control over their body camera operation and footage, police departments are able to craft official narratives before handing over information to the public or to independent investigators. In August 2015, for example, the Oakland Police Department held an invitation-only screening of a video of a fatal incident, but refused to release that same video to the public or provide a full, unedited version.43 And the Chicago Police Department famously resisted releasing the footage of the police shooting of civilian Laquan McDonald, doing so only after losing a court battle in November 2015 and then carefully orchestrating the release of the video.44 When police departments control access to the footage and the narratives surrounding any release of the footage, they strengthen their own power over the people who interact with the police on those videos.

Tournament: UT | Round: 3 | Opponent: WB Ray JG | Judge: Victor Fu
Litigation slows down effectiveness of police departments
Rosen 05 Rosen, Michael M, "A Qualified Defense: In Suport of the Doctrine of Qualified Immunity in Excessive Force Caess, With Some Suggestions for its Improvement" Golden Gate University Law Review. Volume 35. Issue 2. January 2005. http://digitalcommons.law.ggu.edu/ggulrev .  
It is hard to deny that the more time police officers spend at trial defending their conduct, the less time they spend pa- trolling the streets, the more money their departments expend in their defense, and the more frequently the officers will sec- ond-guess certain behaviors in the heat of the moment. These drawbacks may well be justified for the sake of society's pre- vention of tortious and unreasonable conduct on the part of law enforcement agents. Nevertheless, police agencies, Supreme Court justices, and some scholars highlight the important role that qualified immunity can play in reducing unnecessary costs and in improving deterrence of crime.
Court cases against the police kill city budgets and harm local economy.
Elinson and Frosh 15 Zusha Elinson (Zusha Elinson is a U.S. news reporter based in Northern California) and Dan Frosch (Dan Frosch is a general assignment reporter for The Wall Street Journal's Southwest Bureau.), 7-15-15, "Cost of Police-Misconduct Cases Soars in Big U.S. Cities," WSJ, http://www.wsj.com/articles/cost-of-police-misconduct-cases-soars-in-big-u-s-cities-1437013834
The cost of resolving police-misconduct cases has surged for big U.S. cities in recent years, even before the current wave of scrutiny faced by law-enforcement over tactics. The 10 cities with the largest police departments paid out $248.7 million last year in settlements and court judgments in police-misconduct cases, up 48 from $168.3 million in 2010, according to data gathered by The Wall Street Journal through public-records requests. Those cities collectively paid out $1.02 billion over those five years in such cases, which include alleged beatings, shootings and wrongful imprisonment. When claims related to car collisions, property damage and other police incidents are included, the total rose to more than $1.4 billion. On Monday, New York City agreed to a $5.9 million settlement with the estate of Eric Garner, whose death after being put in a police chokehold last summer sparked widespread protests.
Police budget cuts turns and outweighs the case- multiple warrants
A. Incentivizes more excessive policing, which turns case.
Kopf 16 Dan Kopf, data journalist. The Fining of Black America, Priceonomics, 6-24-2016, Accessible Online at https://priceonomics.com/the-fining-of-black-america/
. He warned that the city would be in financial trouble “unless ticket writing ramps up significantly before the end of the year.” “Given that we are looking at a substantial sales tax shortfall,” he wrote, “it’s not an insignificant issue.”¶ The Finance Director’s request surfaced as part of the U.S. Department of Justice’s investigation of the Ferguson Police Department. The investigation was instigated by the civil unrest that followed the fatal shooting of an 18-year-old African American man named Michael Brown in August 2014. Its goal was to better understand why the citizens of Ferguson felt so at odds with the police department chartered to protect them.¶ The Justice Department concluded that the mistrust between the police and the community primarily resulted from excessive fining. “Ferguson’s law enforcement practices are shaped by the City’s focus on revenue rather than by public safety needs,” the report read. The use of fines to fund the government undermined “law enforcement legitimacy among African Americans in particular.” ¶ Ferguson has a population of just over 20,000 that is 67 African American, and it raised over $2 million from fines and fees in 2012. This accounted for around 13 of all government revenue, and a disproportionate amount of this money came from the African American population.
B. Extinction. City budgets key to the national economy.
Morath 10/26 Eric; covers the economy from The Wall Street Journal's Washington Bureau; 10/26/2016; “Slowdown in State, Local Investment Dents U.S. Economy”; http://www.wsj.com/articles/slowdown-in-state-local-investment-dents-u-s-economy-1477495758;
A sharp pullback in spending by cities and states on infrastructure—from highways to sewage systems to police stations—is weighing on U.S. economic growth.¶ Such government austerity is unusual in the eighth year of an economic expansion, and it is acting as a headwind just as the worst effects of the energy-industry bust, a strong dollar and inventory drawdown are fading.¶ State and local governments spent an annualized $248.47 billion on construction in August—the least since March 2014 and down nearly 11 from its recent peak in mid-2015.¶ The decline depressed gross domestic product growth this spring and was on track to weigh on growth again in the third quarter.¶ “We’re seeing anemic government revenue growth and consistent austerity-oriented budgets,” said Gabe Petek, managing director for state ratings at SandP Global Ratings. States are trimming investments in infrastructure and higher education, “areas of the budget helpful for generating economic growth going forward,” he said.¶ In Kansas, officials this spring delayed 24 road-construction projects to help balance the state budget. The more than $500 million in work had been slated to start between this year and the end of 2018, including expanding U.S. 50 into a four-lane expressway near Dodge City.¶ Instead, the state will spend money to maintain existing roads. “We want to make sure the roadways we currently have are in the best condition as possible,” said Joel Skelley, director of policy at the Kansas Department of Transportation. ​ Total state and local government spending last year accounted for roughly 11 of U.S. economic output, four times as large as federal nondefense spending, and swings in public investment can have outsize effects on the growth rate. The Commerce Department will release its first estimate for third-quarter GDP on Friday.¶ ENLARGE¶ Many state governments have yet to fully recover from the recession and associated steep declines in tax revenue. In late 2015, inflation-adjusted tax revenue was lower in 21 states compared with the peak before or during the recession, according to Pew Charitable Trusts.¶ The situation doesn’t seem to be improving. Preliminary data indicate that state tax revenue fell 2.1 in the second quarter from a year earlier after advancing just 1.6 in the first quarter, according to the Rockefeller Institute of Government. The recent drop reflected mixed stock-market returns and slowing growth in sales-tax collection and paycheck withholding.¶ Revenue declines restrain the ability of state and local governments to borrow money for capital projects. Such a situation prompted Connecticut to cancel or delay selling about $1 billion in bonds earlier this year. By law, the state has a debt limit tied to tax collections, and lawmakers must make cuts when the limit can’t be raised.¶ As a result of the lost funding, the University of Connecticut delayed a $150 million renovation of its Gant Science Complex by several months and postponed plans for a $10 million overhaul of the roof at Gampel Pavilion, home of the national-champion Husky basketball teams. Instead, the university will fix leaks.¶ “We’re trying to balance priorities,” said Scott Jordan, the university’s chief financial officer. The cuts are “forcing us to take a look at what things support our core mission and Connecticut’s economy,” he said.¶ At the same time tax revenue is falling, costs for Medicaid, public-employee health care and pension obligations are rising, leaving many states with little discretion to deploy tax dollars elsewhere.

Economic collapse causes war.
Harris and Burrows 9 Mathew, PhD European History @ Cambridge, counselor in the National Intelligence Council (NIC) and Jennifer is a member of the NIC’s Long Range Analysis Unit “Revisiting the Future: Geopolitical Effects of the Financial Crisis” http://www.ciaonet.org/journals/twq/v32i2/f_0016178_13952.pdf Increased Potential for Global Conflict
Of course, the report encompasses more than economics and indeed believes the future is likely to be the result of a number of intersecting and interlocking forces. With so many possible permutations of outcomes, each with ample Revisiting the Future opportunity for unintended consequences, there is a growing sense of insecurity. Even so, history may be more instructive than ever. While we continue to believe that the Great Depression is not likely to be repeated, the lessons to be drawn from that period include the harmful effects on fledgling democracies and multiethnic societies (think Central Europe in 1920s and 1930s) and on the sustainability of multilateral institutions (think League of Nations in the same period). There is no reason to think that this would not be true in the twenty-first as much as in the twentieth century. For that reason, the ways in which the potential for greater conflict could grow would seem to be even more apt in a constantly volatile economic environment as they would be if change would be steadier. In surveying those risks, the report stressed the likelihood that terrorism and nonproliferation will remain priorities even as resource issues move up on the international agenda. Terrorism’s appeal will decline if economic growth continues in the Middle East and youth unemployment is reduced. For those terrorist groups that remain active in 2025, however, the diffusion of technologies and scientific knowledge will place some of the world’s most dangerous capabilities within their reach. Terrorist groups in 2025 will likely be a combination of descendants of long established groups_inheriting organizational structures, command and control processes, and training procedures necessary to conduct sophisticated attacks_and newly emergent collections of the angry and disenfranchised that become self-radicalized, particularly in the absence of economic outlets that would become narrower in an economic downturn. The most dangerous casualty of any economically-induced drawdown of U.S. military presence would almost certainly be the Middle East. Although Iran’s acquisition of nuclear weapons is not inevitable, worries about a nuclear-armed Iran could lead states in the region to develop new security arrangements with external powers, acquire additional weapons, and consider pursuing their own nuclear ambitions. It is not clear that the type of stable deterrent relationship that existed between the great powers for most of the Cold War would emerge naturally in the Middle East with a nuclear Iran. Episodes of low intensity conflict and terrorism taking place under a nuclear umbrella could lead to an unintended escalation and broader conflict if clear red lines between those states involved are not well established. The close proximity of potential nuclear rivals combined with underdeveloped surveillance capabilities and mobile dual-capable Iranian missile systems also will produce inherent difficulties in achieving reliable indications and warning of an impending nuclear attack. The lack of strategic depth in neighboring states like Israel, short warning and missile flight times, and uncertainty of Iranian intentions may place more focus on preemption rather than defense, potentially leading to escalating crises. 36 Types of conflict that the world continues to experience, such as over resources, could reemerge, particularly if protectionism grows and there is a resort to neo-mercantilist practices. Perceptions of renewed energy scarcity will drive countries to take actions to assure their future access to energy supplies. In the worst case, this could result in interstate conflicts if government leaders deem assured access to energy resources, for example, to be essential for maintaining domestic stability and the survival of their regime. Even actions short of war, however, will have important geopolitical implications. Maritime security concerns are providing a rationale for naval buildups and modernization efforts, such as China’s and India’s development of blue water naval capabilities. If the fiscal stimulus focus for these countries indeed turns inward, one of the most obvious funding targets may be military. Buildup of regional naval capabilities could lead to increased tensions, rivalries, and counterbalancing moves, but it also will create opportunities for multinational cooperation in protecting critical sea lanes. With water also becoming scarcer in Asia and the Middle East, cooperation to manage changing water resources is likely to be increasingly difficult both within and between states in a more dog-eat-dog world.

Tournament: UT | Round: 2 | Opponent: Stony Point FB | Judge: Kim Hsun
Limiting QI clogs the courts – empirically confirmed – best study, Noll 8’
Noll, David L. "Qualified Immunity in Limbo: Rights, Procedure, and the Social Costs of Damages Litigation Against Public Officials." NYUL Rev. 83 (2008): 911
In the context of ordinary civil litigation between two private parties, the total (or “social”) cost of litigation is generally limited to the cost of litigating the claim, the cost to the public of providing a dispute resolution system, and the cost created by an incorrect decision.36 Damages litigation against public officers, however, implicates several additional costs.37 As the case law on qualified immunity suggests, these additional costs should be assessed when deciding how to adjudicate a claim against a government official for damages.38 Damages litigation gives rise to unique negative externalities. Consider a hypothetical, based loosely on Iqbal, in which a mid-level Justice Department lawyer, sued for her personal role in the development of an allegedly unconstitutional policy, is required to comply with discovery requests (depositions, responses to interrogatories, document productions, and so on). Discovery will produce several direct costs: The lawyer will not simultaneously be able to perform her primary responsibilities (a concern that assumes particular importance if she serves a critical public function);39 she will avail herself of government resources, such as legal and informal assistance from other government employees, that are unavailable to private litigants; 40 and, except in cases of clear illegal conduct, the government will most likely indemnify her for any eventual settlement or damages award.41 Beyond these direct costs, the case law recognizes four categories of indirect costs of damages litigation against public officials. In contrast to the opportunity costs of haling a government employee into court and indemnifying her against a judgment, these costs are far more difficult to measure. Moreover, they generally reflect the assumption on the part of the courts that negative systemic effects follow from allowing a “culture” of litigation against government officials to develop.42 The first indirect cost is the risk that the “fear of personal monetary liability and harassing litigation will unduly inhibit officials in the discharge of their duties.”43 A leading statement of the problem was delivered more than a half century ago by Judge Learned Hand.44 He argued that in the abstract, there is no legitimate reason that an official “guilty of using his powers to vent his spleen upon others” should escape liability.45 But Hand noted that denying recovery may nonetheless be in the public interest: The justification for doing so is that it is impossible to know whether the claim is well founded until the case has been tried, and that to submit all officials, the innocent as well as the guilty, to the burden of a trial and to the inevitable danger of its outcome, would dampen the ardor of all but the most resolute, or the most irresponsible, in the unflinching discharge of their duties.46 Characteristically, Hand recognized that for the purposes of determining whether a particular class of claims should be allowed, the aggregate costs and benefits are what matters, not the justice of the individual case. The second indirect cost is the deadweight loss of nonmeritorious litigation, is a problem exacerbated by the disproportionate number of nonmeritorious constitutional tort claims.48 In the most comprehensive study of § 1983 litigation yet conducted, Professors Theodore Eisenberg and Stewart Schwab concluded that “constitutional tort plaintiffs do significantly worse than non-civil rights litigants in every measurable way.”49 One article by a former Justice Department lawyer reported that of the more than 12,000 Bivens actions filed between 1971 and 1986, only thirty had resulted in judgments for plaintiffs, only four of those judgments had been paid, and settlements were rare.50 To be sure, there are meritorious damages claims against public officials, and they may have social benefits surpassing the value of individual claims. Yet the perception that constitutional tort cases “flood the federal courts with questionable claims that belong, if anywhere, in state court”51 is supported at least by anecdotal evidence and has undoubtedly affected the development of the modern qualified immunity doctrine.53
Court clog leads to poor decisions and hurts the minorities the worst- turns case
Brunt 15 Alexa Van Brunt, "Poor people rely on public defenders who are too overworked to defend them" Guardian, http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jun/17/poor-rely-public-defenders-too-overworked, June 17, 2015.
Money can buy you a great defense team, but what if you can’t afford one? More than 80 of those charged with felonies are indigent. As a result, they are unable to hire an attorney and instead rely on representation by a public defender. Public defenders are, as a general matter, the hardest working sect of the legal bar. But our nation’s public defender systems have long been plagued by underfunding and excessive caseloads. In Florida in 2009, the annual felony caseload per attorney was over 500 felonies and 2,225 misdemeanors. According to the US Department of Justice, in 2007, about 73 of county public defender offices exceeded the maximum recommended limit of cases (150 felonies or 400 misdemeanors). Too often, those who are poor receive lower quality defense than those who have the means to pay. The on-going decimation of public defense prevents defense attorneys from conducting “core functions,” including factual investigation into the underlying charges. In a lawsuit brought in Washington State, it emerged that publicly appointed defense attorneys were working less than an hour per case, with caseloads of 1,000 misdemeanors per year. This state of affairs also leads to exorbitant trial delays. Consequently, roughly 500,000 pre-trial detainees sit in jail year after year before being adjudged guilty of any crime. This makes a mockery of the innocent-until-proven-guilty principle so sacred to our system of justice. Just two years ago, then-Attorney General Eric Holder acknowledged that the country’s indigent defense systems were “in a state of crisis.” Overworked and poorly prepared attorneys were unable to provide effective representation to those they counsel, in violation of their ethical obligations to provide competent and diligent representation and their clients’ rights under the Sixth Amendment. Holder’s words came on the 50th anniversary of Gideon v Wainwright, in which the Supreme Court held that states are constitutionally required to provide counsel to defendants unable to afford to hire their own. Four years later, the Supreme Court ensured the same right for juveniles. Gideon prompted the widespread creation of public defender systems on which so many rely. Yet, the conditions underlying Holder’s condemnation of public defense systems persist. Though funding for indigent defense systems vary by state, such systems are unified in being cash-strapped. Louisiana has had ongoing problems with the funding of its public defender systems since at least 1986 (controversially, Louisiana public defense is supported by the court costs and fines paid by public defenders’ own clients). Ten judicial districts in the state are slated to run out of funds to pay their public defenders as early as this month. Other parishes have already implemented “restricted services plans” – meaning public defenders are refusing to take on new cases. Indeed, in recent years public defenders in Missouri, Kentucky and Pennsylvania have also refused to represent new clients due to an overload of cases. The costs of relying on such overburdened attorneys to provide the primary assurance of a fair trial are significant. 95 of criminal cases end in plea bargaining. Excessive caseloads contribute to this trend, and result in a “meet ‘em and plead ‘em” system of justice, in which clients have little more than a brief conversation in the courtroom with a harried public defender before pleading guilty. In Chicago, where I practice as a civil rights litigator, people are spending longer stints in jail (an average of 56 days for those in on drug charges.) Part of the reason is the rampant use of continuances, a sign of an overworked public defender system. Consequently, pre-trial detainees incur a “trial tax” – those who decide to fight their case are forced to stay in jail longer than those who plead guilty. Rikers island survivor Kalief Browder faced this same dilemma. There are also clear racial implications to the poor health of public defender systems. Black people are disproportionately caught up in the criminal justice system. In 2011, black Americans – 12 of the US population – constituted 30 of persons arrested for a property offense and 38 of persons arrested for a violent offense. This group bears the brunt of our public defender systems’ underfunding and overwork.

Tournament: Apple Valley | Round: 2 | Opponent: Harvard Westlake JD | Judge: Connor Riano
The latest poll proves Hillary’s lead over Trump has narrowed after FBI revelations. Kirk and Scott 11/2
The Telegraph, Ashley Kirk and Patrick Scott, US election 2016 polls and odds tracker: Latest forecast Hillary Clinton's lead over Donald Trump narrows after FBI revelations, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/0/us-election-2016-polls-and-odds-tracker-latest-forecast/

The news that the FBI has reopened its investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private server to send, receive and store government emails has handed Donald Trump an unexpected boost ahead of next Tuesday.
The FBI has obtained a warrant to begin searching newly discovered emails belonging to Huma Abedin, a top aide of Hillary Clinton, with Clinton's use of emails also in the spotlight.
There is no sign that this new investigation will be completed by election day and it seems that Clinton will have to fight the final week of her campaign with unspecified allegations hanging over her.
This is ideal for Trump who was shown to be as many as 14 points behind Clinton in some polls before this latest scandal.
Clinton has been ahead almost continuously in the Telegraph's poll of polls, which takes an average of the last five polls published on RealClearPolitics.
She still retains a lead, but this could change in the coming days with some polls now showing a far closer race.

Actions in favor of anti-police sentiments will give Trump that last great surge, recent article concludes – Carl 9/22:
Jeremy Carl, Jeremy Carl is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. 9-22-2016, "Will the Riots in Charlotte Help Elect Donald Trump?," National Review, http://www.nationalreview.com/article/440277/law-and-order-will-riots-charlotte-help-elect-donald-trump Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/440277/law-and-order-will-riots-charlotte-help-elect-donald-trump
With every wave of anti-police violence and rioting, the chance of a backlash from fed-up voters grows. Watching the depressing news of rioting in my beautiful home state of North Carolina, I’m beginning to think that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are secretly conspiring to get Donald Trump elected president. For it would be hard to imagine a narrative playing better into the “law and order” theme Trump launched at the GOP convention than yet another racially motivated riot against the police, fed by persistently false rumors and outright lies from the “community” and irresponsible rhetoric from the federal government and the media. And it would be hard to imagine a better advertisement for how great America isn’t right now than the wave of anti-police violence that we are currently enduring. The aftermath of the police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott, a man with convictions in multiple states including assault with a deadly weapon, and further arrests on numerous charges including assault with intent to kill, has proven sadly predictable. The riots in Charlotte unfolded in the wake of a video live-streamed on Facebook by Scott’s daughter, who was not at the scene, who among other choice bits of eloquence, informed viewers that “they shot my motherf*in daddy four times for being black.” The officer doing the shooting in the case in question, Brentley Vinson, was himself African American, suggesting perhaps that the typical left-wing strategy of equating any police action against an African American as signaling the impending rebirth of the KKK will not be entirely successful in this case. (Of course, alleged witnesses were spreading rumors, reported credulously by the media, that the shooter was white, just as they spread equally false rumors that Mr. Scott was reading a book and was unarmed when shot, and that he had his hands in the air. Eyewitness accounts and video of Scott’s gun emerged subsequently.) Officer Vinson, the son of a Charlotte police officer, was a recent graduate of Liberty University in Virginia, an Evangelical Christian school, where he was a captain of the football team. ”Brent has always been a great guy founded on good morals. I find it very hard to believe that he would gun down an innocent man,” one of his Liberty teammates told CNN. Michael Scurlock, a former NFL player who had befriended Officer Vinson in Bible study, described Vinson as distraught after the shooting, telling CNN, “It’s nothing easy, and I know that he expressed that through the emotions of his voice, over the phone.” Vinson’s high-school football coach told the Charlotte Observer, “We need more Brent Vinsons, that type of person, in our communities. . . . He’s a natural leader and one of those guys who always had the best interest of others before himself.” Sounds very suspicious — he’s probably one of those alt-right types. Charlotte police chief Kerr Putney, also African American, was unsurprisingly tired of having to fight back against misinformation in the media and within the “community.” “It’s time to change the narrative,” he said, “because I can tell you from the facts that the story’s a little bit different as to how it’s been portrayed so far, especially through social media.” Meanwhile, Charlotte descended into anarchy, as rioters looted numerous stores, stopped cars on the interstate and assaulted drivers, looted tractor-trailers, and set fires, forcing a major freeway to close and North Carolina governor Pat McCrory to call out the National Guard. RELATED: Anti-Cop Rioters Are the Vanguard of the ‘No Lives Matter’ Movement Unlike the lawless rioters, I won’t rush to judgment on what exactly transpired in the encounter between Officer Vinson and Mr. Scott. While the most explosive claims, which caused the riots, have almost certainly been proven false, we need to let the process play out to find out whether the shooting was justified, as it appears to have been, or whether Officer Vinson was in error. But even if the shooting were unjustified, it would not excuse even one minute of the lawless rioting we are seeing. Loretta Lynch, Eric Holder, Barack Obama, and Hillary Clinton have inflamed racial tensions for political gain repeatedly over the past eight years. Speaking about the riots in Charlotte, Lynch said,“They have once again highlighted — in the most vivid and painful terms — the real divisions that still persist in this nation between law enforcement and communities of color.” And why do they persist, Attorney General Lynch? In part because you have continued to inflame them, rather than tell African Americans the hard truths they need to hear. Racial incitement by Trump? Even Trump’s most outrageous statements haven’t been the equivalent of having rioters shouting “hands up, don’t shoot” as rioters and looters in Charlotte did, repeating the false narrative of Ferguson’s Michael Brown that was relentlessly pushed by left-wing media and government officials. At a campaign rally yesterday, Hillary Clinton said, “There is still much we don’t know about what happened . . . but we do know that we have two more names to add to a list of African Americans killed by police officers in these encounters,” cleverly imputing, without directly saying so, that all of these deaths were unjustified. “It’s unbearable, and it needs to become intolerable,” Clinton continued, before tossing off a few meaningless pro-police sentiments to give her some plausible deniability. “Intolerable.” That’s an interesting choice of words. Well, when I watch these videos of lawless rioting in my home state, with people shot, more than 20 police officers assaulted and hospitalized, windows smashed, and stores looted, that is intolerable. It’s intolerable, Hillary Clinton, that business owners of all races who have invested in Charlotte had their property destroyed by thugs and rioters. It’s intolerable, Hillary Clinton, that honest journalists who report the truth about these incidents struggle to find work, while left-wing racial arsonists command the front pages of our most prestigious newspapers and the top spots at our TV networks. But most of all, it’s intolerable, Hillary Clinton, that brave law-enforcement officers, particularly African-American law-enforcement officers, such as Charlotte police chief Kerr Putney, Dallas police chief David Brown, and Milwaukee county sheriff David Clarke have seen themselves and their men repeatedly slandered as racists by you and your Democratic cronies, all so that you can whip up enough racial anger among African Americans to bolster your cynical quest for political power. In many ways, Donald Trump, for all of his many flaws, represents a backlash of a silent majority of voters, looking at the endless race-baiting of the Obama years, seeing its continuation in Hillary’s candidacy, and saying, “Enough!” If that group, which grows with each outrageous riot, proves large enough to propel Trump to the White House, he will ironically have Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton to thank for the presidency it.
The next president is make it or break it for warming—a GOP presidency will undermine all possible progress on warming.
Neuhauser 15, energy, environment and STEM reporter for U.S. News and World Report. (Alan, “The Climate Change Election”, August 14, 2015, US News, http://www.usnews.com/news/the-report/articles/2015/08/14/the-2016-election-is-critical-for-stopping-climate-change)
For as long as Americans have voted and pundits have bloviated, each presidential election cycle has seemed The Most Important in All History. Next year, though, may truly – actually, seriously – be different, if climate scientists are right. The next candidate Americans send to the Oval Office, experts say, may also be the very last who can avert catastrophe from climate change. "It is urgent and the timeframe is critical and it has to be right now," says Vicki Arroyo, executive director of the Georgetown Climate Center at Georgetown Law. "We can't lose another four years, much less eight years." This is not an overnight ice age or a rise of the apes. But global warming is already here, parching the American West, flooding coastal cities, strengthening storms, erasing species and inflaming armed conflict, with a rise of just 0.85 degrees Celsius from pre-industrial levels. And it's going to get worse, experts say. Last year, a U.N. panel of scientists predicted the world had until 2050 to slash emissions by as much as 70 percent to keep temperatures from rising another 1.15 degrees by the end of the century. That's the threshold of an unstoppable cycle of Arctic and Antarctic melting, the release of heat-trapping gases that had been caught in the ice, more warming, more melting, more warming, more melting – until the glaciers and ice caps disappear. But some researchers – including the man who first presented the facts on climate change to Congress in 1988 – say that that tipping point may come even sooner, perhaps as early as 2036: Humans, in short, are having an even greater impact than expected. "Sea level projections and upcoming United Nations meetings in Paris are far too sluggish compared with the magnitude and speed of sea level changes," the scientist, Columbia professor James Hansen, wrote Wednesday in a QandA on the web forum Reddit, discussing a study he published in July. The needed changes are monumental: Halting climate change and heading off its worst consequences is going to require a wholesale switch from fossil fuels like coal, oil and gas to renewables like wind and solar – potentially upending utilities, energy producers and construction contractors, the sort of change "of the magnitude of the invention of the steam engine or the electrification of society," says Jules Kortenhorst, CEO of the Rocky Mountain Institute, a nonpartisan energy research group. "How quickly can we transform one of the most complex industrial systems – our energy system – across the globe in order to move toward low carbon?" he asks . "There is absolutely no doubt we have to act now." This presents an election – and a choice – with no historical analogues. "This will be a make-or-break presidency as far as our ability to avert a climate change catastrophe," says Michael Mann, meteorology professor and director of the Earth System Science Center at Penn State University, whose "hockey-stick" shaped graph warned of sharply rising emissions and temperatures. Pick any issue throughout history, he and others argue, none has shared the three qualities that make climate change stand apart: its threat to the entire planet, the short window to respond, and how sharply it has divided the two parties' candidates. "Republicans and Democrats have argued over issues for years, but I can't think of an example where one party didn't even say that the issue exists," says Katharine Hayhoe, a climate scientist at Texas Tech University who has advised Evangelical and conservative climate action groups, and who has urged policymakers to address warming.  Four of the five Democratic candidates has pledged or supported Obama administration efforts to cut the heat-trapping emissions that cause climate change: Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Martin O'Malley and Lincoln Chafee. Former Sen. Jim Webb has said he'd expand the use of fossil fuels and once voted to block the Environmental Protection Agency from regulating certain greenhouse gas emissions. Among the Republicans, eight of the 17 candidates have hedged: Jeb Bush, Carly Fiorina, Lindsey Graham, Jim Gilmore, Bobby Jindal, John Kasich, George Pataki and Rand Paul have acknowledged that humans do contribute to global warming, but have questioned or stopped short of saying how much – a position at odds with the findings of a vast majority of scientists. "The climate is changing; I don't think anybody can argue it's not. Human activity has contributed to it," Bush said in an email interview with Bloomberg BNA in July – a statement that notably did not mention how much humans were at fault. During a campaign stop in New Hampshire in June, he had previously told listeners, "The climate is changing, whether men are doing it or not," one month after calling it "arrogant" to say climate science is settled. The rest of the GOP field – including three senators who rejected a January amendment tying human activity to climate change – has dismissed the issue outright. Paul also voted against the amendment. "As a scientist it's very frustrating to hear politicians basically saying, 'This isn't true,' or, 'They're just making it up to get government money,'" Hayhoe says. "A thermometer is not Democrat or Republican. What observations are telling us is not political – it is what it is." And there are conservative solutions for warming. Some party members, in fact, see it as an inherently Republican issue: Carbon emissions, for example, distort the free market, forcing others to pay the higher and indirect costs of climate change (storm recovery, disaster relief) plus the health costs associated with air pollution.  "We allow the coal industry to socialize its costs, and we conservatives don't like allowing people to socialize anything," says former South Carolina Rep. Bob Inglis, who now explores free-market solutions to climate change as head of the Energy and Enterprise Institute at George Mason University. A revenue-neutral carbon tax, one that does not support other programs and instead goes back to households, could fix that distortion, he and others argue. "The question is not, 'Is there going to be a tax on carbon?' It's, 'Do you want a tax that you have a voice in and control, or do you want to keep writing checks after disasters that you have no control over?'" says retired Rear Admiral David Titley, who has advised some of the GOP presidential candidates and directs the Center for Solutions to Weather and Climate Risk at Penn State University. "That $60 billion relief bill for Hurricane Sandy that passed very quickly through a Republican-led House, did you get a vote on that tax? Because that's a tax." Yet Inglis, himself is a living example of what can happen to conservatives who call for climate action. The recipient of the JFK Profile in Courage Award in April, he was unseated in the Republican primary in 2010 after shifting his position on global warming. "Republicans say, 'Look at what happened to him when he said it was real. Do you want that to happen to you?'" Hayhoe describes. Oil, gas and coal companies, along with billionaire Libertarian industrialists David and Charles Koch, rank among the biggest campaign donors, and often seem as allergic to new taxes as a bubble boy to fresh pollen. But popular sentiment among voters appears to be changing: Most Republican voters say they support climate action, and last week, Shell did not renew its membership in the Koch-backed American Legislative Exchange Council because of the group's opposition to climate action. Even the climate statements by the eight Republicans who have hedged on warming, vague as they were, may signify a kind of progress – especially during the primaries, when candidates play to their parties' more extreme bases. "In the Great Recession in 2010, it was this very atheistic position with regard to climate change: 'We don't believe,'" Inglis says. "Then, in the 2014 cycle, 'I'm not a scientist,' that was an agnostic position. These are data points on a trend line toward a tipping point." Republicans can exploit a distinct advantage on climate action, too, he adds: Voters tend to support the presidents who buck party stereotypes. "Nixon goes to China, Bill Clinton signs welfare reform – the country will trust a conservative to touch climate," Inglis argues. But climate scientists, environmental advocates and Democrats remain deeply skeptical. The most recent Republican president, for one, backpedaled on his 2000 campaign pledge to rein-in carbon emissions. Campaign donations remain hugely influential, and as Republican candidates lambaste the environmental agenda of the Obama administration, stopping climate change will actually require they expand upon Obama initiatives: resist industry pressure to slow the roll-out of tighter fuel standards for cars, push states to reduce emissions from their power sectors and uphold and ratchet-up international commitments to slow carbon emissions. There's also the Supreme Court: with four Supreme Court justices now over the age of 70, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg pushing 80, the next president will likely have the chance to nominate new jurists to the court – a court that will almost certainly decide challenges to various environmental actions aimed at slowing global warming. "If we are going to avoid catastrophic, irreversible climate change impacts, we have to be ramping down our carbon emissions dramatically in the years ahead. The current administration has begun that process, but our next president must not only continue but build on that progress," Mann says. It is on the global stage where perhaps the spotlight – and climate scientists' hopes and expectations – will shine brightest. In December, negotiators from nearly 200 nations will meet in Paris to hammer-out an international climate accord. It is expected to include commitments from China and India, heavy polluters spurred to rein-in their emissions and invest in clean energy by America's own commitment to slash carbon emissions from its power sector. "The rest of the world is going to expect the U.S. to live up to its commitment made at the Paris meeting, no matter who is in the White House," says Henrik Selin, professor of international relations at the Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University. "If you have a president who comes in and starts rolling back the Obama initiatives, you're going to have international leaders being very unhappy about this – and they are not just countries, they are trading partners. This is not just a domestic issue, it's also very much a foreign policy issue." And so far, he and others argue, none of the Republican candidates have offered a clear vision on climate, let alone any plan to slow warming. "If we want to get to that low-carbon future, we have to agree that's where we're going to go, and then we can fight over the speed at which we're going to get there," Kortenhorst, of the Rocky Mountain Institute, says. As David Sandalow, who held senior posts in the State Department and Energy Department under Obama and is an inaugural fellow at the Columbia University Center on Global Energy Policy, describes: "There's a very big difference between electing a candidate who's committed to seriously addressing this problem and one who isn't. The implications of failing to address the problem in the next four years could be very serious."
Warming causes extinction.
Don Flournoy 12, Citing Feng Hsu, PhD NASA Scientist @ the Goddard Space Flight Center and Don is a PhD and MA from UT, former Dean of the University College @ Ohio University, former Associate Dean at SUNY and Case Institute of Technology, Former Manager for University/Industry Experiments for the NASA ACTS Satellite, currently Professor of Telecommunications @ Scripps College of Communications, Ohio University, “Solar Power Satellites,” January 2012, Springer Briefs in Space Development, p. 10-11
In the Online Journal of Space Communication , Dr. Feng Hsu, a  NASA scientist at Goddard Space Flight Center, a research center in the forefront of science of space and Earth, writes, “The evidence of global warming is alarming,” noting the potential for a catastrophic planetary climate change is real and troubling (Hsu 2010 ) . Hsu and his NASA colleagues were was engaged in monitoring and analyzing climate changes on a global scale, through which they received first-hand scientific information and data relating to global warming issues, including the dynamics of polar ice cap melting. After discussing this research with colleagues who were world experts on the subject, he wrote: I now have no doubt global temperatures are rising, and that global warming is a serious problem confronting all of humanity. No matter whether these trends are due to human interference or to the cosmic cycling of our solar system, there are two basic facts that are crystal clear: (a) there is overwhelming scientific evidence showing positive correlations between the level of CO2 concentrations in Earth’s atmosphere with respect to the historical fluctuations of global temperature changes; and (b) the overwhelming majority of the world’s scientific community is in agreement about the risks of a potential catastrophic global climate change. That is, if we humans continue to ignore this problem and do nothing, if we continue dumping huge quantities of greenhouse gases into Earth’s biosphere, humanity will be at dire risk (Hsu 2010 ) . As a technology risk assessment expert, Hsu says he can show with some confidence that the planet will face more risk doing nothing to curb its fossil-based energy addictions than it will in making a fundamental shift in its energy supply. “This,” he writes, “is because the risks of a catastrophic anthropogenic climate change can be potentially the extinction of human species, a risk that is simply too high for us to take any chances” (Hsu 2010 ).

Tournament: UT | Round: 2 | Opponent: Stony Point FB | Judge: Kim Hsun
Limiting QI triggers an increase in indemnification- governments need people entering service
Fallon 11 Fallon, Richard H. Jr. "Asking the Right Questions About Officer Immunity" Ralph S. Tyler Jr, Professor of Law, Harvard Law School. Fordham Law Review. 2011. http://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/flr/vol80/iss2/3  
The difficulty in answering this question arises because it is impossible, as a practical matter, to imagine a world without official immunity in which nothing else changes. Even critics of current immunity doctrine so recognize. When they contemplate a world in which some or all officials lack immunity, they anticipate two changes, both of which they understandably regard as desirable. First, victims of constitutional rights violations who now go uncompensated would receive compensation.36 Second, threats of individual liability would deter a number of constitutional violations that otherwise would have occurred.37 I once imagined a third change that I also thought normatively attractive: the abolition of official immunity would effectively force governments to indemnify their officials.38 Otherwise, I reasoned, too many people would be deterred from entering government service. If so, a de facto regime of strict governmental liability for injuries caused by officials’ constitutional violations would not only ensure compensation to victims, but also create powerful incentives for the government to take greater care to train and supervise its employees.39
Police don’t pay legal fees, are unaware of complains and potential liability doesn’t alter actions.  
De Stefan 16 Lindsey de Stefan, JD Candidate, Seton Hall University School of Law, “No Man is Above the Law and No Man is Below It: How Qualified Immunity Reform Could Create Accountability and Curb Widespread Police Misconduct,” Seton Hall Law Student Scholarship, July 26, 2016 (2017 Academic Year)
The Court specifically fears that financial liability, in the form of paying compensatory damages to victims whose constitutional rights an officer has violated, will be a vehicle of overdeterrence.97 But the widespread practice of indemnification means that individual officers are almost never financially responsible for civil judgments against them, practically eliminating any fiscal motivation for avoiding harmful conduct.98 In fact, in many instances, even the police department that employs the officer suffers no direct financial consequences because police litigation costs and damages awards are often paid from a city or insurer’s general budget.99 The police department is not financially penalized, and thus has no incentive to discipline the officer or attempt to prevent him from repeating the unconstitutional behavior in the future. And because law en- forcement officials are often unaware of the allegations set forth in lawsuits filed against them or their employees, officers’ conduct often goes uninvestigated and undisciplined, and allegations of unconstitutional conduct do not affect performance reviews or opportunities for promotion. 100 Finally, although many law enforcement officers claim that the threat of incurring liability deters them from misconduct, studies contrarily indicate that potential liability does not actually alter most officers’ on-the-job actions.101 

Poor communities have to pay for indemnification, turns the case
Phillip 15 Abby Phillip, The Washington Post “Why the poor often pay for police misconduct with their pocketbooks.” 2015
There is a bitter irony to the situation, but it’s not unusual that the very people who are most beset by police violence are the ones who wind up paying for it with their pocketbooks. When victims or their families are paid out by cities and municipalities in excessive-force cases that are settled or tried, taxpayers pay every time, highlighting the direct relationship between the social and financial costs of police violence. In Chicago: $84 million in one year. Los Angeles: $54 million. Philadelphia: $40 million in cases brought since 2009.  In Inkster, the sum is small and deals with just one case. But for its residents, the reality will be unavoidable: The tax will amount to a $178.67 on a home valued at about $55,400, the Free Press estimates. “The price of this is enormous, and it proba bly is hardest on those who can least afford it and whose communities are most egregiously beset with the misconduct problems,” noted Andy Shaw, president and CEO of the Better Government Association, which has studied the high financial and social costs of police misconduct in Chicago. In Chicago, police-related settlements over the last decade cost the city more than $500 million according to a study published by the group last year.

Tournament: Apple Valley | Round: Doubles | Opponent: Harrison RP | Judge: Panel
Supreme Court unanimously ruled that Qualified Immunity is legal.  
Totenberg 14, Nina, and Rebecca Buckwalter-Poza, Supreme Court Upholds Law Enforcement's Qualified Immunity, 2014, NPR, http://www.npr.org/2014/05/27/316484853/supreme-court-upholds-law-enforcements-qualified-immunity
In two decisions handed down Tuesday, the Supreme Court made it more difficult for citizens to sue law enforcement officers for their conduct. Both decisions were unanimous. The central issue in both was the doctrine of "qualified immunity," which shields public officials from being sued for actions that fall short of violating a clearly established statutory or constitutional right.

Aff destroys judicial review- it obliterates the precedent that the government has to listen to court decisions, allowing congress to pass laws that interfere with judicial review.
Nathanson 86, Edmond, Law clerk for Court of Appeals, Congressional Power to Contradict the Supreme Court's Constitutional Decisions: Accommodation of Rights in Conflict,
http://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2115andcontext=wmlr
In his dissenting opinion in Morgan, Justice Harlan suggested that the Court's recognition of congressional power to interpret the substance of the fourteenth amendment, in a manner inconsistent with the Court's interpretation, compromised the principle of judicial supremacy enunciated in Marbury v. Madison.' Justice Harlan contended that Congress could not revise or contradict a constitutional decision of the Court through ordinary legislation, and he noted that Congress could use the power recognized by the majority to curb fourteenth amendment rights.7 The majority's response to this argument was oblique. In a footnote, Justice Brennan argued that, while Congress could exercise the enforcement power to expand judicially-created rights, it could not "exercise discretion in the other direction . . . to restrict, abrogate, or dilute fourteenth amendment guarantees."' This assertion, which has become known as the one-way "ratchet" theory, has provided a continuing source of controversy. 

Judicial Review is key to check back the legislator from hugely oppressive laws- Brown v. Board proves.
Somin 16, Ilya, The Supreme Court Is a Check on Big Government, Protection for Minorities, 2016, http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2015/07/06/is-the-supreme-court-too-powerful/the-supreme-court-is-a-check-on-big-government-protection-for-minorities

The Supreme Court gets many things wrong. Yet America would be a far worse society without it. If judicial review were seriously curtailed, the executive and legislative branches of government could ignore most constitutional limits on their powers. This is a particularly grave danger in a world where government is as large and powerful as it is today – spending nearly 40 percent of our gross domestic product, and regulating almost every aspect of human activity. Without an independent judiciary to check their vast powers, federal and state governments would often be free to use their full might to censor opposition speech, confiscate property and otherwise persecute those they disapprove of. Avoiding that is well-worth the price of putting up with a good many flawed judicial rulings. Public opinion imposes some constraints on oppressive policies. But with a government as large and complex as ours, many of its abuses are little-known to voters, who generally pay scant attention to public policy. Moreover, some of the worst abuses target groups disliked by mainstream public opinion, such as unpopular ethnic and religious minorities. Absent judicial protection for political rights, political incumbents could even use their powers to insulate themselves against future electoral competition – as has happened in some other countries that lack strong judicial review. The court’s historical record is mixed. But it has had a major beneficial impact in helping protect the rights of racial minorities – not only in iconic cases like Brown v. Board of Education, but in lesser-known decisions, like Buchanan v. Warley, an underappreciated 1917 ruling that struck down laws preventing blacks from moving into majority-white neighborhoods. There is also little doubt that unpopular speech and religious worship has far greater protection than would exist in the court’s absence. The same is true of the rights of criminal defendants, another vulnerable group that tends to get short shrift from the political process. In recent years, the court has done much to curtail uncompensated takings of private property by both federal and state officials. This June, it struck down a program that seized large quantities of raisins from their producers to facilitate a cartel that raises prices for the benefit of politically connected agribusiness interests. Many Americans have reason to be grateful for this little-known aspect of the court’s work. Historically, many of the court’s worst decisions were cases where it chose not to strike down an oppressive unconstitutional policy – cases like Plessy v. Ferguson, which permitted racial segregation, and Korematsu v. United States, which permitted the expulsion of Japanese-Americans from the West Coast during World War II. Weakening the court would increase the incidence of such outrages.

Tournament: Apple Valley | Round: Doubles | Opponent: Harrison RP | Judge: Panel
Analytics

And, the intent determines the action, so foreseen harms are irrelevant.
Christine Korsgaard 14 (Professor at Harvard University) “How to be an Aristotelian Kantian Constitutivist.” 2014
 “First of all, no one thinks a wholly “external performance,” if that just means a bodily movement, has any moral value. Suppose that you are starving, and I am about to eat a sandwich when I learn about this. And suppose that just then I am attacked by a series of involuntary muscle spasms that cause me to make exactly the same physical movements I would make if I were giving you my sandwich. No one would claim that this “external performance” has any moral value. An act must be done with a certain proximate or immediate intention in order to count as an act at all. And that proximate or immediate intention is already part of an action’s motive. So in order to even count as “giving you my sandwich” I have to at least intend to transmit the sandwich from my possession to yours.”
Thus, the standard is maintaining consistency in the rational will.
Also, means act/omission distinction: when you will something, you must test whether or not it coheres with universal law, but if you simply omit an action, you are not willing anything.
Qualified immunity prevents individuals from being held accountable when there is a good will, they don't know they're in violation of the law at the time. Zipursky n.d.:
Zipursky, Benjamin. “Reasonableness in and Out of Negligence Law.” No Date. Pg. 11 and 12.
In certain parts of the criminal law of some jurisdictions and in certainconstitutional torts, whether a defendant’s breach of a legal rule is actionable will turn on whether it would have been reasonable to believe, under those circumstances, that the legal rule was not being breached. 33 An important subset of these are “reasonable mistake of fact” cases. The Model Penal Code and the Supreme Court of California (in People v. Hernandez34),for example, famously declared that a defendant’s reasonable belief that his sexual partner was over the age of consent could exculpate him from charges of statutory rape.35 Certain cases of self-defense involve a defendant who mistakenly believed he was being attacked with deadly force. In those cases, the reasonableness of the mistaken belief is essential to whether the defense truly exculpates, or merely mitigates, the defendant’s use of deadly force.36 “Reasonableness” of belief here has nothing whatsoever to do with deference, but it is epistemic and it does pertain to proper exercises of judgment. This utilization of reasonableness actually presupposes that there is a true answer to the question (e.g., whether the woman eighteen years of age yet), and the defendant missed it. Nonetheless, whether it was or was not due to a faulty exercise of judgment is an important question. Although there was, in an important sense, a legal wrong committed, certain jurisdictions have decided, in these circumstances, not to hold the defendant responsible for having committed it if he or she had the good faith belief and his having the belief was not attributable to a faulty exercise of judgment. Remarkably, the United States Supreme Court expanded its form of qualified immunity in § 1983 claims to be significantly broader than this.37 The torts of fraud and negligent misrepresentation include a qualified reliance requirement sometimes labeled a “reasonable reliance” requirement and sometimes labeled a “justifiable reliance” requirement. As this pairing indicates, reasonableness in this context is much the same as justifiability.38 Where the reliance stems from a poor, defective, or ungrounded decision to rely on another’s statement, the putatively injured party is not entitled to redress the putative injury. It is not quite right to pin the harm done on the party inducing the reliance, where the party who was in fact deceived was unwarranted in having relied on the defendant’s misrepresentation. Reasonableness is used to pick out epistemic defensibility, as in the case of reasonable mistake.

Tournament: UT | Round: Triples | Opponent: Southlake Carroll RP | Judge: Drew Burd
The standard is consistency with universal freedom. 

First, an agent’s will acts on a law that it gives to itself. If pleasure were a law to you, then you would straightaway do the pleasurable act, but since you’re autonomous, you can reason about taking the action. Thus a condition of action is that the will is self-determined. KORSGAARD:
“Self-Constitution in the Ethics of Plato and Kant” by Christine M. Korsgaard LW-DD
“Now I’m going to argue that that sort of willing is impossible. The first step is this:  :  to conceive of yourself as the cause of your actions is to identify with the principle of choice on which you act. A rational will is a self-conscious causality, and a self-conscious causality is aware of itself as a cause. To be aware of yourself as a cause is to identify yourself with something in the scenario that gives rise to the action, and this must be the principle of choice. For instance, suppose you experience a conflict of desire: you have a desire to do both A and B, and they are incompatible. You have some principle that favors A over B, so you exercise this principle, and you choose to do A. In this kind of case, you do not regard yourself as a mere passive spectator to the battle between A and B. You regard the choice as yours, as the product of your own activity, because you regard the principle of choice as expressive, or representative, of yourself. You must do so, for the only alternative to identifying with the principle of choice is regarding the principle of choice as some third thing in you, another force on a par with the incentives to do A and to do B, which happened to throw in its weight in favor of A, in a battle at which you were, after all, a mere passive spectator. But then you are not the cause of the action. Self-conscious or rational agency, then, requires identification with the principle of choice on which you act.” (123)

And, a rational will must set ends within a system of reciprocal constraints. Anything else justifies that someone could impede your ability to achieve your end in the first place, which also means reason constrains end-based frameworks. SIYAR:
Jamsheed Aiam Siyar: Kant’s Conception of Practical Reason. Tufts University, 1999 LW-DD
“Recall that insofar as I represent a rationally determined end, I represent it having rational and hence objective worth. That is—as noted above—I represent my end as to be done just in virtue of the perfectly general rational grounds that I take to be decisive for its adoption. I will now argue that I must also represent my objectively worthy end as recognizable as such by all other subjects—this is just what my representation of communicability consists in. Now, when I represent my end as to be done, I represent it as binding me to certain courses of actions, precluding other actions, etc. Thus, my ends and function as constraints for me in that they determine what I can or must do (at least if I am to be consistent). I may of course give up an end such as that of eating ice cream at a future point; yet while I have the end, I must see myself as bound to do what is necessary to realize it.35 Thus, I must represent my ends as constraints that I have adopted, constraints that structure the possible space of choice and action for me. Further, given that my end is rationally determined, I take it to be generally recognizable that my end functions as a rationally determined constraint. That is, I take it that others subjects can also recognize my end it as an objective constraint, for I take it that they as well as myself can cognize its determining grounds—the source of its objective worth—through the exercise of reason.  Indeed, in representing an end, I in effect demand recognition for it from others subjects: since the end functions as an objective though self-imposed constraint for me, I must demand that this constraint be recognized as such. The thought here is simply that if I am committed to some end, e.g. my ice cream eating policy, I must act in certain ways to realize it. In this context, I cannot be indifferent to the attitudes and actions of others, for these may either help or hinder my pursuit of my end. Hence, if I am in fact committed to realizing my end, i.e. if I represent an end at all, I must demand that the worth of my end, its status as to be done, be recognized by others. For instance, my ice cream eating policy entails the demand that where practically possible, others not hinder my actions in its service. Further, at least in principle, the actions and attitudes of any other subject could have some bearing on my pursuit of my end. Hence, my demand for recognition must be fully general: it must be directed to rational beings per se. In representing an end, I must demand that this end in effect function as a law for all rational beings. I must demand, in other words, that all other subjects recognize and represent my end as constraining their actions just as I represent it as constraining my actions.” (80-81)

Second, analytics
And, and a violation of freedom can’t be true since its a contradiction. Engstrom
Stephen Engstrom (PhD, Professor of Ethics at University of Pittsburg). “Universal Legislation As the Form of Practical Knowledge”. Pg. 19-20 RC
“Given the preceding considerations, it’s a straightforward matter to see how a maxim of action that assaults the freedom of others with a view to furthering one’s own ends results in a contradiction when we attempt to will it as a universal law in accordance with the foregoing account of the formula of universal law. Such a maxim would lie in a practical judgment that deems it good on the whole to act to limit others’ outer freedom, and hence their self-sufficiency, their capacity to realize their ends, where doing so augments, or extends, one’s own outer freedom and so also one’s own self-sufficiency. 19In this passage, Kant mentions assaults on property as well as on freedom. But since property is a specific, socially instituted form of freedom, I have omitted mention of it to focus on the primitive case. Now on the interpretation we’ve been entertaining, applying the formula of universal law involves considering whether it’s possible for every person—every subject capable of practical judgment—to shares the practical judgment asserting the goodness of every person’s acting according to the maxim in question. Thus in the present case the application of the formula involves considering whether it’s possible for every person to deem good every person’s acting to limit others’ freedom, where practicable, with a view to augmenting their own freedom. Since here all persons are on the one hand deeming good both the limitation of others’ freedom and the extension of their own freedom, while on the other hand, insofar as they agree with the similar judgments of others, also deeming good the limitation of their own freedom and the extension of others’ freedom, they are all deeming good both the extension and the limitation of both their own and others’ freedom.”

Third, analytics.

Impact Calc: analytics

Freedom requires an omnilateral will to resolve inherent rights disputes. RIPSTEIN:
“Kant on Law and Justice” by Arthur Ripstein
“Kant’s point about disputes is not just a reiteration of Locke’s familiar claim that people often disagree about the application of principles to particular situations, especially when their interests are at stake. Unilateral judgment is a problem because of the two dimensions of the innate right of humanity. The innate right to freedom demands that people be able to acquire things as their means without the explicit leave of others. Rightful honor requires people to stand up for their rights, and so that no person defer to any other private person’s judgment in cases of dispute about what either is permitted to do. If you think that you have performed an act establishing a right, you are entitled to stand by your claim in the face of all who contest it, but those who contest it are no less entitled to stand by their claims. Rightful honor requires that each party accept no standard other than “what seems right and good” to him.”24 The only reason to defer is because you can’t win. Might makes right, regardless of how "good and law-abiding" you or the person who disputes your claim might be. The solution to disputes about rights is to make the omnilateral will institutional. Disputes can be resolved in a way that is consistent with rightful honor if the parties to it are subject to the authority of an impartial judge, and an enforcer who can carry out the decision. The state is a generalized version of this structure. It is a common authority, charged with making, applying, and enforcing law. It is legitimate because it makes it possible for people to resolve disputes about rights in a way that is consistent with the rightful honour of all. Legitimacy flows from what the state does, and so does not require an explicit act of instituting it.” (13)

And, law enforcement is an extension of an omnilateral will acting on the intent to serve the public interest. RIPSTEIN 2:
“Force and Freedom Kant’s Legal and Political Philosophy” Arthur Ripstein Harvard University Press 2009
“Kant’s solution to these difficulties is not to find some other principle of private ordering, because no principle of private ordering can do the job. Instead, he works through the implications of the idea that “the best constitution is that in which power belongs not to humans beings but to the laws.”11 His basic strategy is to show that a rightful condition can give authority to laws rather than human beings, so that the actions of particular human beings in making, enforcing, and applying laws can be exercises of public rather than private power, and so are instances of an omnilateral will. Institutions can do so because they incorporate a distinction between the offices they create and the officials carrying them out.” (191) 

That negates, analytics

Tournament: Apple Valley | Round: 2 | Opponent: Harvard Westlake JD | Judge: Connor Riano
Curtail means a partial restriction – the aff is a cancelation of a program, not curtailment
San Fellipo, 92 (John, “OREGON'S TELEPHONE INFORMATION DELIVERY SERVICE LAW: A CONSUMER PROTECTION STEP TOO FAR” 28 Willamette L. Rev. 455 1991-1992, Hein Online)

131. The author understands "limit" as used in OR. ADMIN. R. 860-21-505(8) (1991) to mean cancel, as opposed to the word "curtail" used in section (7), meaning only a partial restriction.

Thus the interp: The affirmative must only defend a complete cancelation of Qualified Immunity rather than a partial restriction.  

Violation:

Standards:

1. Ground-
   a)
   b)

2. Limits-
a)
b)

Voter:
fairness, drop debater, CI, no RVI

Tournament: UT | Round: 3 | Opponent: WB Ray JG | Judge: Victor Fu
Interpretation: The affirmative must defend that the United States limit the qualified immunity of police officers by getting rid of immunity from suit.
According to Letric Law, qualified immunity is
http://www.lectlaw.com/def2/q063.htm, Letric Law
The defense of qualified immunity protects "government officials . . . from liability for civil damages insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known." Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818 (1982). The rule of qualified immunity " `provides ample support to all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law.' " Burns v. Reed, 500 U.S. 478, 494-95 (1991) (quoting Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 341 (1986)). "Therefore, regardless of whether the constitutional violation occurred, the officer should prevail if the right asserted by the plaintiff was not `clearly established' or the officer could have reasonably believed that his particular conduct was lawful." Romero v. Kitsap County, 931 F.2d 624, 627 (9th Cir. 1991) (emphasis added). Furthermore, "the entitlement is an immunity from suit rather than a mere defense to liability; .. . it is effectively lost if a case is erroneously permitted to go to trial." Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 526 (1985).
Qualified immunity is only a pre-trial move in civil lawsuits, not criminal charges. Bergstein:
TUESDAY, MARCH 18, 2008 Qualified immunity: injunction but no damages - Bergstein and Ullrich, LLP.
Qualified immunity hovers over any civil rights lawsuit brought under Section 1983, the civil rights statute that allows you to enforce the Constitution against government officials. Qualified immunity is what it sounds like: government officials are immune from suit, but that immunity is qualified as it does not always apply. The general rule is that if the state of the law was not clearly established at the time of the civil rights action, the government official cannot be sued for damages. We know whether the state of the law was clearly established by looking at the case law as decided by the Supreme Court and the local Court of Appeals. Qualified immunity, however, does not stand in the way of an injunction to force the government to comply with the law. You can get an injunction but not recover damages in these esoteric cases.

Violation: The aff is body cams- that's FX t since it's not action that directly limits suit immunity, which is what QI really is about.
Standards:

1. Limits
   2. Text
   Fairness and Jurisdiction are voters.
   Drop the debater.
   Competing Interps.
   No RVI.

Tournament: UT | Round: 2 | Opponent: Stony Point FB | Judge: Kim Hsun
Interpretation: The affirmative must defend that the United States limit the qualified immunity of police officers by getting rid of immunity from suit.
According to Letric Law, qualified immunity is
http://www.lectlaw.com/def2/q063.htm, Letric Law
The defense of qualified immunity protects "government officials . . . from liability for civil damages insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known." Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818 (1982). The rule of qualified immunity " `provides ample support to all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law.' " Burns v. Reed, 500 U.S. 478, 494-95 (1991) (quoting Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 341 (1986)). "Therefore, regardless of whether the constitutional violation occurred, the officer should prevail if the right asserted by the plaintiff was not `clearly established' or the officer could have reasonably believed that his particular conduct was lawful." Romero v. Kitsap County, 931 F.2d 624, 627 (9th Cir. 1991) (emphasis added). Furthermore, "the entitlement is an immunity from suit rather than a mere defense to liability; .. . it is effectively lost if a case is erroneously permitted to go to trial." Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 526 (1985).

Violation: The aff defends getting rid of the right to financial compensation too- extra T at best.
Standards:

1. Limits
   2. Ground
   Voter is fairness.
   Drop debater.
   Competing interps.
   No RVI.

Tournament: Grapevine | Round: 3 | Opponent: Prosper EH | Judge: Lyndie Ho
Text: Indigenous communities should individually decide for themselves whether they want to prohibit the production of nuclear power in their territory commonly known as the United States.
Competition: Mutually exclusive: they decide for themselves, so they don’t actually necessarily ban. The perm is severance. 

Some indigenous people see waste facilities as good. To clarify, my argument is not that all groups should do this, but they need the option- the aff denies that.
Gover et al, Kevin, and Jana L. Walker (Native American Attorneys at Gover, Stetson and Williams). "Escaping Environmental Paternalism: One Tribe's Approach to Developing a Commercial Waste Disposal Project in Indian Country." University of Colorado Law Review 63 (1992): 933.
The second and more controversial issue facing tribes involves the use of reservation lands as sites for commercial solid and hazardous waste disposal facilities. Looking at the waste industry as a form of economic development, in many respects it can be a good match for tribal communities. The industry is usually willing to pay the costs of developing new projects without requiring a tribe to put any cash up front. Since most tribes just do not have the money to independently fund large-scale economic development, this makes the industry attractive to Indian communities desperate for development. The waste industry needs isolation and an abundance of land, and, again, because of the overall lack of tribal economic development, undeveloped land is a resource that many tribes have. The waste industry also provides numerous opportunities for unskilled and semi-skilled workers, including training in the construction and environmental compliance fields. On most reservations, unemployment is extremely high and opportunities for training Indians very limited. Finally, the waste industry is and must be recognized as an indispensable and legitimate part of the services sector of the economy, and as such, can be an extremely profitable form of development for tribes. All of this means that, under certain circumstances, a solid or hazardous waste disposal project may represent a viable and appropriate form of industrial development for some tribes and can provide extraordinary opportunities for economic development on some reservations. It is not appropriate for every community, and we certainly are not urging tribes to site waste facilities on their reservations. Each tribe must decide for itself if it is interested in such development. Our intent is merely to put things in a more honest perspective and to describe one process that, when and if a tribe seriously considers a commercial waste proposal, it can use to evaluate the proposal effectively and, if it's feasible, plan for its development.

Grouping indigenous identities together is much worse- you don’t take into account particularities, which turns case since you just re-ify native violence by not acknowledging this.

Also, it does not matter that you read specific authors who do not want nuclear power on their land- that’s just a reason they should ban individually, which solves the aff. But you shouldn’t impose this on other groups.

Tournament: Greenhill | Round: 5 | Opponent: Marlborough GK | Judge: Chase Hamilton
Counterplan Text: Indigenous communities should individually decide for themselves whether they want to prohibit the production of nuclear power in their area, and the US should step out totally. Mutually exclusive: they decide for themselves, so they don’t actually necessarily ban. The perm is severance.
CP solves best- you cannot make rulings over the needs of the oppressed without reifying their oppression. Friere 68 PEDAGOGY OF THE OPPRESSED Paulo Freire. 1968.  
It is essential for the oppressed to realize that when they accept the struggle for humanization they also accept, from that moment, their total responsibility for the struggle. They must realize that they are fighting not merely for freedom from hunger, but for freedom to create and to construct, to wonder and to ven­ ture. Such freedom requires that the individual be active and responsible, not a slave or a well-fed cog in the machine. . . . It is not enough that men are not slaves; if social conditions further the existence of automatons, the result will not be love of life, but love of death. The oppressed, who have been shaped by the death-affirming cli­ mate of oppression, must find through their struggle the way to life- affirming humanization, which does not lie simply in having more to eat (although it does involve having more to eat and cannot fail to include this aspect). The oppressed have been destroyed precisely because their situation has reduced them to things. In order to regain their humanity they must cease to be things and fight as men and women. This is a radical requirement. They cannot enter the struggle as objects in order later to become human beings. The struggle begins with men's recognition that they have been destroyed. Propaganda, management, manipulation—all arms of domination—cannot be the instruments of their rehumanization. The only effective instrument is a humanizing pedagogy in which the revolutionary leadership establishes a permanent relationship of dialogue with the oppressed. In a humanizing pedagogy the method ceases to be an instrument by which the teachers (in this instance, the revolutionary leadership) can manipulate the students (in this instance, the oppressed), because it expresses the consciousness of the students themselves. The method is, in fact, the external form of consciousness manifest in acts, which takes on the fundamental property of consciousness—its intentionality. The essence of consciousness is being with the world, and this behavior is permanent and unavoidable. Accordingly, consciousness is in essence a way to­ wards something apart from itself, outside itself, which surrounds it and which it apprehends by means of its ideational capacity. Consciousness is thus by definition a method, in the most general sense of the word. A revolutionary leadership must accordingly practice co-inten- tional education. Teachers and students (leadership and people), co- intent on reality, are both Subjects, not only in the task of unveiling that reality, and thereby coming to know it critically, but in the task of re-creating that knowledge. As they attain this knowledge of real­ ity through common reflection and action, they discover themselves as it£ permanent re-creators. In this way, the presence of the op­ pressed in the struggle for their liberation will be what it should be: not pseudo-participation, but committed involvement. 

Making blanket claimes over what Natives want ignores the actual voices of the oppressed- you literally just make assumptions and ignore native groups who actually like nuclear power. This is a form of papering over identities which just reinforces colonialism. Yamamoto 99
Yamamoto, Eric (Professor of Law, University of Hawai'i Law School; Visiting Professor of Law, Boalt Hall School of Law, University of California at Berkeley, 1999.)., and Jen-L. W. Lyman. "Racializing environmental justice." U. Colo. L. Rev. 72 (2001): 311.
The framework, however, at times also undercuts environmental justice struggles by racial and indigenous communities because it tends to foster misassumptions about race, culture, sovereignty, and the importance of distributive justice. Those misassumptions sometimes lead environmental justice scholars and activists to miss what is of central importance to affected communities. The first misassumption is that for all racialized groups in all situations, a hazard-free physical environment is their main, if not only, concern.4 ' Environmental justice advocates foster this notion by placing emphasis on "high quality environments" 4' and the adverse health effects caused by exposure to air pollutants and hazardous waste materials. Not all facility sitings that pose health risks, however, warrant full-scale opposition by host communities. Some communities, on balance, are willing to tolerate these facilities for the economic benefits they confer or in lieu of the cultural or social disruption that might accompany large-scale remedial efforts. Other communities, struggling to deal with joblessness, inadequate education, and housing discrimination, indeed with daily survival, prefer to devote most of their limited time and political capital to those challenges. In these situations, racial and indigenous communities may have pressing needs and long-range goals beyond the re-siting of polluting facilities. For example, as Native communities endeavor to ameliorate conditions of poverty and social dislocation by encouraging the economic development of tribal lands, some increasingly find themselves in conflict with environmentalists, who are sometimes but not always environmental justice advocates. In the mining industry, several Native American tribes are attempting to tap mineral resources on their reservations. ° Urged by the increased emphasis on economic selfdetermination in federal Native American policy in the 1970s, the tribes formed the Council of Energy Resource Tribes to deal with both the siting of new mines on Native American lands and the environmental and the cultural problems that might result.51 Those efforts met stiff opposition from some environmental groups concerned mainly with land degradation and pollution. The environmentalists' seeming lack of understanding of the economic and cultural complexity of the Native American groups' decisions have led some Native Americans to express cynicism about environmentalists who sometimes treat them as mascots for the environmental cause.

This means your movement just harms traditional groups, such as indigenous people- turns case and no solvency.
Yamamoto 01, Eric (Professor of Law, University of Hawai'i Law School; Visiting Professor of Law, Boalt Hall School of Law, University of California at Berkeley, 1999.)., and Jen-L. W. Lyman. "Racializing environmental justice." U. Colo. L. Rev. 72 (2001): 311.
James Huffman also criticizes the traditional environmental justice framework, but from the perspective of Native American economic development. He identifies three assumptions of modern environmental thought that work against Native interests.' First, orthodox environmentalism assumes the existence of a scientifically "correct" natural condition and thus tends toward oppressive command and control methods.'65 The second assumption is that regulations must limit development and growth.166 Finally, in marked contrast to arguments that anthropocentrism in American environmentalism clashes with Native cultural beliefs, Huffman asserts that American environmentalism assumes a "biocentric" approach fundamentally opposed to economic development, even when necessary for Native survival.16 7 He criticizes environmental protection as a "luxury good" enjoyed by wealthier societies1 68 that promotes the idea that "the poverty and economic depression of the reservations is not only inevitable but desired." 69
Huffman's critique is harsh: "Native Americans, more than any other segment of American society, will suffer at the altar of environmentalism worshipped in their name."'7 ° Commentator Conrad Huygen arrives at a similar conclusion: "We have romanticized indigenous cultures in a manner that threatens to stifle development on reservations and perpetuate the poverty that permeates them."'7' In more measured terms, Tsosie agrees with Huffman's view that "national implementation of centralized policies (whatever their origin and content) often disregards tribal sovereignty and the special interests of indigenous peoples."'72
 From these varied visions of Native American scholars emerges a point of commonality: traditional environmentalism and, by extension, the established environmental justice framework, do not necessarily work well for Native Americans or for other racial and indigenous groups.'73 In light of the philosophical and practical limitations of the established environmental justice framework, the writings of Professors Chang, Williams, Shutkin, Tsosie, and Huffman illuminate an indigenous American cultural perspective on the environment, race, and sovereignty. They demonstrate how the dominant environmental justice narrative tends to ignore or even undermine that perspective.

Tournament: Grapevine | Round: Octas | Opponent: Law Magnet MG | Judge: Chris Vincent, Travis Fife, Rodrigo Paramo
COunterplan Text- Individual Communities should make decisions about banning nuclear power and it's uses.
Same offense as Consult CP, just different Text

Tournament: Valley | Round: 1 | Opponent: St Thomas LW | Judge: Cameron McConway
Nuclear power is the only way to generate sufficient energy for large-scale desalination
IAEA 15 -- widely known as the world's "Atoms for Peace" organization within the United Nations family. Set up in 1957 as the world's centre for cooperation in the nuclear field, the Agency works with its Member States and multiple partners worldwide to promote the safe, secure and peaceful use of nuclear technologies, “New Technologies for Seawater Desalination Using Nuclear Energy,” IEAE TecDoc Series, 2015
 It is anticipated that by 2025, 33 of the world population, or more than 1.8 billion people, will live in countries or regions without adequate supplies of water unless new desalination plants become operational. In many areas, the rate of water usage already exceeds the rate of replenishment. Nuclear reactors have already been used for desalination on relatively small-scale projects. In total, more than 150 reactor-years of operating experience with nuclear desalination has been accumulated worldwide. Eight nuclear reactors coupled to desalination projects are currently in operation in Japan. India commissioned the ND demonstration project in the year 2008 and the plant has been in continuous operation supplying demineralised (DM) quality water to the nuclear power plant and potable quality to the reservoir. Pakistan has launched a similar project in 2010. However, the great majority of the more than 7500 desalination plants in operation worldwide today use fossil fuels with the attendant emission of carbon dioxide and other GHG. Increasing the use of fossil fuels for energy-intensive processes such as large-scale desalination plants is not a sustainable long-term option in view of the associated environmental impacts. Thus, the main energy sources for future desalination are nuclear power reactors and renewable energy sources such as solar, hydro, or wind, but only nuclear reactors are capable of delivering the copious quantities of energy required for large-scale desalination projects. Algeria is participating in an IAEA’s CRP in the subject related to “New technologies for seawater desalination using nuclear energy’’ with a project entitled “Optimization of coupling nuclear reactors and desalination systems for an Algerian site Skikda”. This project is a contribution to the IAEA CRP to enrich the economic data corresponding to the choice of technical and economical options for coupling nuclear reactors and desalination systems for specific sites in the Mediterranean region
Desal is the only solution to water shortages IAEA 2 -- widely known as the world's "Atoms for Peace" organization within the United Nations family. Set up in 1957 as the world's centre for cooperation in the nuclear field, the Agency works with its Member States and multiple partners worldwide to promote the safe, secure and peaceful use of nuclear technologies, “New Technologies for Seawater Desalination Using Nuclear Energy,” IEAE TecDoc Series, 2015  
Addressing water shortages is a difficult challenge for many countries due to population growth and the increasing need for water to support industry, agriculture and urban development. Innovative water management strategies are certainly needed to preserve water resources. But they may not be sufficient. Throughout the world, many highly populated regions face frequent and prolonged droughts. In these areas, where, for some reason, the natural hydrologic cycle cannot provide people with water, desalination is used to provide people with potable water. Desalination systems fall into two main design categories, namely thermal and membrane types. Thermal designs –including MSF and MED- use flashing and evaporation to produce potable water while membrane designs use the method of RO. Desalination is the main technology being used to augment fresh water resources in water scarce coastal regions. With almost 64.4 million m3 /day (GWI 2012) of worldwide desalination water production capacity, about two third is produced by thermal distillation, mainly in the Middle East. Outside this region, membrane-based systems predominate. Both processes are energy-intensive (Fig. I-1.). Even if power consumption has been reduced as technological innovations, such as energy recovery systems and variable frequency pumps (reverse RO plants), are introduced, it remains the main cost factor in water desalination. Traditionally, fossil fuels such as oil and gas have been the major energy sources. However, fuel price hikes and volatility as well as concerns about long term supplies and environmental release is prompting consideration of alternative energy sources for seawater desalination, such as nuclear desalination and the use of renewable energy sources. Replacing fossil fuel by renewable (solar, wind, geothermal, biomass) or nuclear energy, could reduce the impacts on air quality and climate. 

Water crises cause escalating global conflict.
Rasmussen 11 (Erik, CEO, Monday Morning; Founder, Green Growth Leaders) “Prepare for the Next Conflict: Water Wars” HuffPo 4/12
For years experts have set out warnings of how the earth will be affected by the water crises, with millions dying and increasing conflicts over dwindling resources. They have proclaimed -- in line with the report from the US Senate -- that the water scarcity is a security issue, and that it will yield political stress with a risk of international water wars. This has been reflected in the oft-repeated observation that water will likely replace oil as a future cause of war between nations. Today the first glimpses of the coming water wars are emerging. Many countries in the Middle East, Africa, Central and South Asia -- e.g. Afghanistan, Pakistan, China, Kenya, Egypt, and India -- are already feeling the direct consequences of the water scarcity -- with the competition for water leading to social unrest, conflict and migration. This month the escalating concerns about the possibility of water wars triggered calls by Zafar Adeel, chair of UN-Water, for the UN to promote "hydro-diplomacy" in the Middle East and North Africa in order to avoid or at least manage emerging tensions over access to water. The gloomy outlook of our global fresh water resources points in the direction that the current conflicts and instability in these countries are only glimpses of the water wars expected to unfold in the future. Thus we need to address the water crisis that can quickly escalate and become a great humanitarian crisis and also a global safety problem. A revolution The current effort is nowhere near what is needed to deal with the water-challenge -- the world community has yet to find the solutions. Even though the 'water issue' is moving further up the agenda all over the globe: the US foreign assistance is investing massively in activities that promote water security, the European Commission is planning to present a "Blueprint for Safeguarding Europe's Water" in 2012 and the Chinese government plans to spend $600 billion over the next 10 years on measures to ensure adequate water supplies for the country. But it is not enough. The situation requires a response that goes far beyond regional and national initiatives -- we need a global water plan. With the current state of affairs, correcting measures still can be taken to avoid the crisis to be worsening. But it demands that we act now. We need a new way of thinking about water. We need to stop depleting our water resources, and urge water conservation on a global scale. This calls for a global awareness that water is a very scarce and valuable natural resource and that we need to initiate fundamental technological and management changes, and combine this with international solidarity and cooperation. In 2009, The International Water Management Institute called for a blue revolution as the only way to move forward: "We will need nothing less than a 'Blue Revolution', if we are to achieve food security and avert a serious water crisis in the future" said Dr. Colin Chartres, Director General of the International Water Management Institute. This meaning that we need ensure "more crop per drop": while many developing countries use precious water to grow 1 ton of rice per hectare, other countries produce 5 tons per hectare under similar social and water conditions, but with better technology and management. Thus, if we behave intelligently, and collaborate between neighbors, between neighboring countries, between North and South, and in the global trading system, we shall not 'run out of water'. If we do not, and "business as usual" prevails, then water wars will accelerate.
That goes nuclear
Zahoor 12 (Musharaf, Researcher at Department of Nuclear Politics – National Defense University, Water Crisis can Trigger Nuclear War in South Asia, http://www.siasat.pk)
Water is an ambient source, which unlike human beings does not respect boundaries. Water has been a permanent source of conflict between the tribes since biblical times and now between the states. The conflicts are much more likely among those states, which are mainly dependent on shared water sources. The likelihood of turning these conflicts into wars is increased when these countries or states are mainly arid or receive low precipitations. In this situation, the upper riparian states (situated on upper parts of a river basin) often try to maximize water utility by neglecting the needs of the lower riparian states (situated on low lying areas of a river basin). However, international law on distribution of trans-boundary river water and mutually agreed treaties by the states have helped to some extent in overcoming these conflicts. In the recent times, the climate change has also affected the water availability. The absence of water management and conservation mechanisms in some regions particularly in the third world countries have exacerbated the water crisis. These states have become prone to wars in future.  South Asia is among one of those regions where water needs are growing disproportionately to its availability. The high increase in population besides large-scale cultivation has turned South Asia into a water scarce region. The two nuclear neighbors Pakistan and India share the waters of Indus Basin. All the major rivers stem from the Himalyan region and pass through Kashmir down to the planes of Punjab and Sindh empty into Arabic ocean. It is pertinent that the strategic importance of Kashmir, a source of all major rivers, for Pakistan and symbolic importance of Kashmir for India are maximum list positions. Both the countries have fought two major wars in 1948, 1965 and a limited war in Kargil specifically on the Kashmir dispute. Among other issues, the newly born states fell into water sharing dispute right after their partition. Initially under an agreed formula, Pakistan paid for the river waters to India, which is an upper riparian state. After a decade long negotiations, both the states signed Indus Water Treaty in 1960. Under the treaty, India was given an exclusive right of three eastern rivers Sutlej, Bias and Ravi while Pakistan was given the right of three Western Rivers, Indus, Chenab and Jhelum. The tributaries of these rivers are also considered their part under the treaty. It was assumed that the treaty had permanently resolved the water issue, which proved a nightmare in the latter course. India by exploiting the provisions of IWT started wanton construction of dams on Pakistani rivers thus scaling down the water availability to Pakistan (a lower riparian state). The treaty only allows run of the river hydropower projects and does not permit to construct such water reservoirs on Pakistani rivers, which may affect the water flow to the low lying areas. According to the statistics of Hydel power Development Corporation of Indian Occupied Kashmir, India has a plan to construct 310 small, medium and large dams in the territory. India has already started work on 62 dams in the first phase. The cumulative dead and live storage of these dams will be so great that India can easily manipulate the water of Pakistani rivers. India has set up a department called the Chenab Valley Power Projects to construct power plants on the Chenab River in occupied Kashmir. India is also constructing three major hydro-power projects on Indus River which include Nimoo Bazgo power project, Dumkhar project and Chutak project. On the other hand, it has started Kishan * hydropower project by diverting the waters of Neelum River, a tributary of the Jhelum, in sheer violation of the IWT. The gratuitous construction of dams by India has created serious water shortages in Pakistan. The construction of Kishan * dam will turn the Neelum valley, which is located in Azad Kashmir into a barren land. The water shortage will not only affect the cultivation but it has serious social, political and economic ramifications for Pakistan. The farmer associations have already started protests in Southern Punjab and Sindh against the non-availability of water. These protests are so far limited and under control. The reports of international organizations suggest that the water availability in Pakistan will reduce further in the coming years. If the situation remains unchanged, the violent mobs of villagers across the country will be a major law and order challenge for the government.    The water shortage has also created mistrust among the federative units, which is evident from the fact that the President and the Prime Minister had to intervene for convincing Sindh and Punjab provinces on water sharing formula. The Indus River System Authority (IRSA) is responsible for distribution of water among the provinces but in the current situation it has also lost its credibility. The provinces often accuse each other of water theft.  In the given circumstances, Pakistan desperately wants to talk on water issue with India. The meetings between Indus Water Commissioners of Pakistan and India have so far yielded no tangible results. The recent meeting in Lahore has also ended without concrete results. India is continuously using delaying tactics to under pressure Pakistan. The Indus Water Commissioners are supposed to resolve the issues bilaterally through talks. The success of their meetings can be measured from the fact that Pakistan has to knock at international court of arbitration for the settlement of Kishan * hydropower project. The recently held foreign minister level talks between both the countries ended inconclusively in Islamabad, which only resulted in heightening the mistrust and suspicions. The water stress in Pakistan is increasing day by day. The construction of dams will not only cause damage to the agriculture sector but India can manipulate the river water to create inundations in Pakistan. The rivers in Pakistan are also vital for defense during wartime. The control over the water will provide an edge to India during war with Pakistan. The failure of diplomacy, manipulation of IWT provisions by India and growing water scarcity in Pakistan and its social, political and economic repercussions for the country can lead both the countries toward a war. The existent asymmetry between the conventional forces of both the countries will compel the weaker side to use nuclear weapons to prevent the opponent from taking any advantage of the situation. Pakistan's nuclear programme is aimed at to create minimum credible deterrence. India has a declared nuclear doctrine which intends to retaliate massively in case of first strike by its' enemy. In 2003, India expanded the operational parameters for its nuclear doctrine. Under the new parameters, it will not only use nuclear weapons against a nuclear strike but will also use nuclear weapons against a nuclear strike on Indian forces anywhere. Pakistan has a draft nuclear doctrine, which consists on the statements of high ups. Describing the nuclear thresh-hold in January 2002, General Khalid Kidwai, the head of Pakistan's Strategic Plans Division, in an interview to Landau Network, said that Pakistan will use nuclear weapons in case India occupies large parts of its territory, economic strangling by India, political disruption and if India destroys Pakistan's forces. The analysis of the ambitious nuclear doctrines of both the countries clearly points out that any military confrontation in the region can result in a nuclear catastrophe. The rivers flowing from Kashmir are Pakistan's lifeline, which are essential for the livelihood of 170 million people of the country and the cohesion of federative units. The failure of dialogue will leave no option but to achieve the ends through military means. The only way to discard the lurking fear of a nuclear cataclysm is to settle all the outstanding disputes amicably through dialogue. The international community has a special role in this regard. It should impress upon India to initiate meaningful talks to resolve the lingering Kashmir dispute with Pakistan and implement the water treaty in its letter and spirit. The Indian leadership should drive out its policy towards Pakistan from terrorism mantra to a solution-oriented dialogue process. Both the countries should adopt a joint mechanism to maximize the utility of river waters by implementing the 1960 treaty, Besides negotiations with India, Pakistan should start massive water conservation and management projects. The modern techniques in agriculture like i.e. drip irrigation, should be adopted. On the other hand, there is a dire need to gradually upgrade the obsolete irrigation system in Pakistan. The politicization of mega hydropower projects/dams is also a problem being faced by Pakistan, which can only be resolved through political will.

Tournament: Grapevine | Round: 1 | Opponent: Northland MP | Judge: Abbey Chapman
U.S. carbon emissions are getting lower and are on track to meet environmental goals
McMahon 6/23 Jeff McMahon, contributor at Forbes, “U.S. On Track To Achieve 2030 Emissions Goals In 2016,” Forbes Magazine, June 23, 2016, http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2016/06/23/u-s-on-track-to-achieve-2030-emissions-goals-in-2016/#fa3d9fa42c8e
A dramatic slump in coal production has pushed U.S. carbon emissions so low that, were the trend to continue, the U.S. would achieve its 2030 emissions goals this year, according to one professor’s analysis of data from the Energy Information Administration. Coal production has plummeted 29 percent in 2016 compared to the same period last year, crushed in part by cheap natural gas, which emits about half as much carbon. Unless coal rebounds, the U.S. could achieve a 32 percent reduction in emissions from 2005 levels, according to Daniel Cohan, an assistant professor of environmental engineering at Rice University. That happens to match the final goal set for the year 2030 in the Clean Power Plan (CPP). “It’s still conceivable to meet CPP this year, depending on the weather and how much further natural gas prices rise,” Cohan told me via email. EIA doesn’t expect that to happen. The agency forecasts a colder winter and rising natural gas prices, which would make coal attractive again to power producers. But the notoriously fossil-friendly agency may be overestimating coal’s prospects, and Cohan notes that EIA repeatedly lowered its carbon emissions estimates as actual data on First Quarter coal use arrived in recent editions of its Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO). “We’re unlikely to sustain the Q1 trend, which benefited from warm weather and cheap gas. But I’m skeptical of EIA’s forecast of a Q4 rebound, given that its STEO’s have been consistently overestimating coal use. A rebound would have to overcome coal plant retirements, coal mining bankruptcies, and the possibility of another warm winter.” In its June Outlook, the EIA noted an unusually large stockpile of coal left on hand at the end of last winter: “Warmer-than-normal temperatures experienced throughout the United States in March 2016 (and the winter as a whole) and coal’s continuing loss of market share to natural gas for electric power generation contributed to the increase in coal stockpiles,” the document says. In addition to warm weather and low natural gas prices, Cohan credits ”a broad array of emerging and cheapening technologies” for transforming power markets, including inexpensive renewables and increasing efficiency. In scrutinizing EIA’s data, Cohan noticed its emissions estimates were increasingly approaching the Clean Power Plan goal. He realized that if the coal rebound fails to materialize, the goal could be attained. “Yes, you read that correctly: The U.S. could achieve the 2030 emission cuts this year,” Cohan wrote in a blog post he penned for Bloomberg Governance. Even if the U.S. doesn’t achieve its 2030 goal this year, the EIA’s more conservative estimates still bring the country most of the distance. Carbon emissions had already fallen 15 percent from 2005 to 2014, the last year for which reliable figures are available. EIA estimates another 4.5 percent drop across 2015 and 2016. Cohan thinks recent emissions will fall more than 4.5 percent, because the EIA tends to overestimate coal use, and overestimate the cost of renewables. Those EIA estimates also cover energy emissions in all sectors of the economy. Focusing just on the power sector covered by the Clean Power Plan, the cuts are more dramatic, according to Cohan: a 12 percent decline in power sector emissions from 2014 to 2016, adding up to a 25 percent decline from 2005 to 2016. “If we end up just a few percent away from the 2030 target this year, it becomes tough to argue that CPP is unattainable or too costly,” Cohan said. It could be argued, however, that the Clean Power Plan is unnecessary, because its long-term goal has come into view while the regulation remains idled in a court-imposed stay of execution. But without the Clean Power Plan, there’s nothing to prevent a protracted coal rebound in the future that could wipe out the emissions gains. “EIA’s longer term Annual Energy Outlook forecasts an ongoing rebound in coal consumption,” Cohan said, ”if the Clean Power Plan is not implemented.” 

Closing nuclear plants forces increased fossil fuel use
Roston 15 Eric Roston, writer for Bloomberg, “Why Nuclear Power Is All but Dead in the U.S.” Bloomberg News, April 15, 2015, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-04-15/soon-it-may-be-easier-to-build-a-nuclear-plant-in-iran-than-in-the-u-s-
*ellipsis from original text
Say what? The U.S. achieved fission before anybody else. It learned before anybody else to control nuclear power, train it to boil water, to spin turbines, to generate electricity. There are 99 nuclear reactors across the U.S., providing about 19 percent of Americans’ electricity. They account for about 30 percent of global nuclear capacity. No new U.S. nuclear plant has opened since Watts Bar 1, in Tennessee, in 1996. And 20 more may close, “which makes no sense at all, from a common sense standpoint, or anything else,” Gregg said. Not because there’s something dramatically wrong with them. They’re victims of the success of natural gas, a shortage of power lines, eternal environmental enmity, and the eternally unresolved issue of where to store nuclear waste. Natural gas has driven power prices lower than nuclear’s operating costs. If bad economic trends persist for nuclear, more and more of the U.S. fleet may retire in coming years, leaving the communities they serve at the tyranny of plants powered by fossil fuels. That’s a huge problem for climate activists who oppose nuclear power. Nuclear plants would likely be replaced by natural gas or (shudder) coal plants, which would drive up carbon dioxide emissions. It’s happening in Germany, where the government decided to abandon nuclear power after the March 2011 catastrophe at Fukushima. In Vermont, where a 600-megawatt plant closed in December, carbon-free nuclear power is being replaced largely by fossil-powered electricity from the grid. That makes nuclear an energy source that could help nations meet the goal of keeping global warming below 2 degrees Celsius. We're already about 0.8 degree there. “I can’t see a scenario where we can stick to the 2 degree warming commitment ... without a substantial contribution from nuclear,” said Michael Liebreich, the founder of Bloomberg New Energy Finance, at its annual conference yesterday. “We have got to figure out nuclear if that envelope is to mean anything to us."

Meeting the 2 degrees Celsius change is key to stopping climate change catastrophe
Mastroianni 15 Brian Mastroianni, “Why 2 degrees are so important to the climate,” CBS News, November 30, 2015, http://www.cbsnews.com/news/paris-un-climate-talks-why-2-degrees-are-so-important/
As the United Nations conference on climate change gets underway Monday in Paris, one temperature that will be on everyone's minds is 2 degrees Celsius (or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit). Although it might not sound like a big number, climatologists predict that if the planet warms a total of 2 degrees more than its average temperature before the Industrial Revolution -- when humans started burning fossil fuels -- the results could be catastrophic. What could happen? Think events like greater sea level rise submerging the coasts, more pervasive droughts and wildfires, and plant and animal extinctions across the board. Scientists say this amount of temperature increase could leave us with a significantly different Earth. And unless something changes, we're heading in that direction: U.N. and U.K. climate analysts recently concluded that the Earth has already warmed by 1 degree Celsius, with 2015 the hottest year ever recorded. Yale economist William Nordhaus first defined the 2-degree benchmark in a 1977 paper, "Economic Growth and Climate: The Carbon Dioxide Problem." Since then, the figure has stood as a rallying cry for those advocating for cutting back on carbon emissions. For others, 2 degrees is still too high -- to allow the Earth to warm even that much would be dire for life on the planet. "Those who study the possible impacts of warming think that there is a threshold before we can start to get much more changed in the world -- like the flooding of low-lying countries, and things like that," said Eric Larson, a senior scientist at Climate Central, a nonprofit news organization that provides analysis and information on climate science. "Science has established for quite a while that we need to respect a threshold of 2 degrees, that being the limit of the temperature increase that we can afford from a human, economic and infrastructure point of view," the top U.N. official on climate change, Christiana Figueres, told CBS News in an interview earlier this fall. Beyond that, "we would be moving into exceedingly dangerous zones of abrupt interruptions to our economy, to our livelihood, to our infrastructure that frankly we wouldn't even know how to deal with." Moreover, she noted, "quite recently the insurance industry has come out to say that a world that goes beyond a 2-degree increase is not insurable." At the Paris summit -- known as COP21 since it is the 21st annual Conference of the Parties (COP) on the U.N. Convention on Climate Change -- delegates from more than 190 countries will seek a legally binding agreement to reduce global carbon emissions enough so that the 2-degree threshold is not crossed.

Tournament: Grapevine | Round: 1 | Opponent: Northland MP | Judge: Abbey Chapman
Permissibility negates- the aff has to prove a moral obligation from ought in the resolution- so if the resolution is merely permissible, not obligatory, then there is no obligation. Also presume neg- statements are more often false than true since if one part of the statement is false, the whole statement is false. 

Only self interest can provide a guide for understanding and motivating action.  MERCER  To begin: To understand what another has done is both to have a particular sort of true description of the his action he has performed, one that reveals it to be intentional, and to know the agent's his practical reason for performing that action. In turn, to know an agent's reason for performing particular action involves understanding their motivation in doing it. An interpreter cannot, though, really understand an agent's motivation in performing an action unless she sees that motivation as a motivation, unless she is cognizant of its force as a motivation. It is not enough, that is to say, to understand what a person who intentionally sips from a saucer of mud has done to note merely that he had the desire to sip from a saucer of mud, and believed himself both possessed of a saucer of mud and able to sip from it. An interpreter has also to comprehend what in desiring to sip from a saucer of mud was attractive to him. Now usually, of course, there is no problem in our comprehending what it is in the desires had by people around us that attracts them as desirable. The people around us are more or less like us in many if not most of their desires, wants and wishes, and few of them desire to sip from a saucer of mud, so in our day to day life we do not often have cause to turn our attention explicitly to the question from whence arrives the motivational force of their desires. Still, it is not exceedingly uncommon for us, even for those of us who are not psychologists, sociologists, or anthropologists, to be stumped by some piece of what we take to be behaviour. How are we to make sense of some such piece of strange behaviour? One way is to connect that piece of behaviour to one or more of the strange agent's self-regarding ends. If we can see in sipping from a saucer of mud a way of maintaining self-respect, or even a way to delight in the taste of mud, we can understand the desire the agent had to sip from the a saucer of mud. We need not connect his self-regarding end to an intention to realize that end in or through his action; we need only, I think, connect it to an expectation of realizing it. But is this the only way we can make sense of desires we ourselves do not share and cannot, at first at least, imagine sharing? I think that it is. Without our perceiving a connection to an intention or an expectation of realizing some self-regarding end, we cannot see in any consideration we attribute to an agent a motivation to act. The motivating force of the consideration that spurred action will remain beyond our ken, the action stemming from it unfathomable and inexplicable.
Self interest entails creation of a sovereign to be the arbiter of ultimate decisions. HOBBES:
Thomas Hobbes, The Leviathan, 1660
Lastly, the agreement of these creatures is natural; that of men is by covenant only, which is artificial: and therefore it is no wonder if there be somewhat else required, besides covenant, to make their agreement constant and lasting; which is a common power to keep them in awe and to direct their actions to the common benefit.The only way to erect such a common power, as may be able to defend them from the invasion of foreigners, and the injuries of one another, and thereby to secure them in such sort as that by their own industry and by the fruits of the earth they may nourish themselves and live contentedly, is to confer all their power and strength upon one man, or upon one assembly of men, that may reduce all their wills, by plural- ity of voices, unto one will: which is as much as to say, to appoint one man, or assembly of men, to bear their person; and every one to own and acknowledge himself to be author of whatsoever he that so beareth their person shall act, or cause to be acted, in those things which concern the common peace and safety; and therein to submit their wills, every one to his will, and their judgements to his judgement. This is more than consent, or concord; it is a real unity of them all in one and the same person, made by covenant of every man with every man, in such manner as if every man should say to every man: I authorise and give up my right of governing myself to this man, or to this assembly of men, on this condition; that thou give up, thy right to him, and authorise all his actions in like manner. This done, the multitude so united in one person is called a Commonwealth; in Latin, Civitas. This is the genera- tion of that great Leviathan, or rather, to speak more reverently, of that mortal god to which we owe, under the immortal God, our peace and defence. For by this authority, given him by every particular man in the Commonwealth, he hath the use of so much power and strength con- ferred on him that, by terror thereof, he is enabled to form the wills of them all, to peace at home, and mutual aid against their enemies abroad. And in him consisteth the essence of the Commonwealth; which, to de- fine it, is: one person, of whose acts a great multitude, by mutual cov- enants one with another, have made themselves every one the author, to the end he they may use the strength and means of them all as he shall think expedient for their peace and common defence.

However, there is no ultimate arbiter for states, meaning the international community is just a collection of sovereigns. Thus, the only cogent theory for states is realism, since they can pursue their own self-interest in a system of anarchy. There is no other way- states are always at odds. Mearsheimer Mearsheimer, John. “The Tragedy of the Great Power Politics.” Google Books.  Great powers fear each other. They regard each other with suspicion, and they worry that war might be in the offing. They anticipate danger. There is little room for trust among states. For sure, the level of fear varies across time and space, but it cannot be reduced to a trivial level. From the perspective of any one great power, all other great powers are potential enemies. This point is illustrated by the reaction of the United Kingdom and France to German reunification at the end of the Cold War. Despite the fact that these three states had been close allies for almost forty-five years, both the United Kingdom and France immediately began worrying about the potential dangers of a united Germany. The basis of this fear is that in a world where great powers have the capability to attack each other and might have the motive to attack each other do so, any state bent on survival must be at least suspicious of other states and reluctant to trust them. Add to this the “911” problem - the absence of a central authority to which a threatened state can turn for help - and states have even greater incentive to fear each other. Moreover, there is no mechanism, other than the possible self-interest of third parties, for punishing an aggressor. Because it is sometimes difficult to deter potential aggressors, states have ample reason not to trust other states and to be prepared for war with them.
Thus, the standard is consistency with international realism.
And my framework is not about the consequences of actions but rather what states perceive to be in their self-interest since that is what guides them. Only intentions are relevant since a) consequences aren’t directly attributable to individual agents, but rather to states of affairs themselves. Thus, the only verifiable way to evaluate standards is through intentions. b) ends-based logic is circular because it assumes that past justifies future consequences. However, the only justification for past action itself is past action, which means ends-based logic is entirely circular. 

I contend that maintaining energy power is an internally motivated state action. Mathai 13 Will the Environment Survive International Relations? 6/28/2013. Manu V. Mathai
“Power politics is also a driver of environmental degradation. The possession of power in international relations, whether “hard”, “soft” or “smart”, is sustained in great measure by the size of a country’s GDP. And despite claims of dematerialization, GDP remains correlated to an economy’s “ecological footprint”. The tendency of countries to unceasingly pursue the accumulation of power and prestige in geopolitics is also a driver of environmental degradation. Within the realist construction of international relations countries constantly challenge or seek to maintain the status quo of the global pecking order. This construction predisposes geopolitics to competitiveness and conflict as the default mode rather than cooperation and coexistence. The latter are wished for and talked about glowingly, but the former weigh more on states’ behaviour, planning and economic investments. This competitiveness leaves states obliged to develop their “power resources to the utmost”, as Jawaharlal Nehru observed in his autobiography. It may be debated whether all countries of the world act similarly (i.e., oriented toward competitiveness and conflict) but among the established and aspiring powers on the world stage or in smaller regional theatres, this remains the norm.”

This also specifically means nuclear power negates, since this is a part of state drive to power and growth against other countries.
Nuclear power is also eternally justified by urgency of governments to act in accordance to ends. Kaur 11 Dr. Raminder Kaur is Senior Lecturer in University of Sussex, London (Anthropology, Centre for Migration Research), A ‘Nuclear Renaissance’, Climate Change and the State of Exception, http://www.dianuke.org/a-E28098nuclear-renaissanceE28099-climate-change-and-the-state-of-exception/ Whilst the ‘carbon lobby’, including the fossil-fuels industries, stand to gain by undermining the validity of global warming, it appears that the ‘nuclear lobby’ benefits enormously from the growing body of evidence for human-based global warming. This situation has led to a significant nuclear renaissance with the promotion of nuclear power as ‘clean and green energy’. John Ritch, Director General of the World Nuclear Association, goes so far as to describe the need to embrace nuclear power as a ‘global and environmental imperative’, for ‘Humankind cannot conceivably achieve a global clean-energy revolution without a huge expansion of nuclear power’ (Ritch nd). To similar ends, India’s Union Minister of State for Environment and Forests, Jairam Ramesh, remarked, ‘It is paradoxical that environmentalists are against nuclear energy’ Deshpande 2009). With a subtle sleight of hand, nuclear industries are able to promote themselves as environmentally beneficial whilst continuing business-as-usual at an expansive rate. Such global and national views on climate change are threatening to monopolise the entire environmentalist terrain where issues to do with uranium and thorium mining, the ecological costs of nuclear power plant construction, maintenance, operation and decommissioning, the release of water coolant, and the transport and storage of radioactive waste are held as subsidiary considerations to the threat of climate change. Basing much of my evidence in India, I note how the conjunction of nuclear power and climate change has lodged itself in the public imagination and is consequently in a powerful position, creating a ‘truth regime’ favoured both by the nuclear lobby and those defenders of climate change who want more energy without restructuration of market-influenced economies or changes in consumerist lifestyle. The urgency of climate change discourses further empower what I call the ‘nuclear state of exception’ which, in turn, lends credence to the veracity of human-centric global warming. Due to the indeterminacy between atoms for peace and atoms for war, the nuclear industries began to play a key part in several nations’ security policies, both externally with reference to other states, and also internally with reference to objectors and suspected anti-national contingents. Jungk notes ‘the important social role of nuclear energy in the decline of the constitutional state into the authoritarian nuclear state’ by focusing on a range of indicators, including a report published by the American National Advisory Committee on Criminal Justice in 1977 which suggested that: in view of the ‘high vulnerability of technical civilization’, emergency legislation should be introduced making it possible temporarily to ignore constitutional safeguards without previous congressional debate or consultation with the Supreme Court. (1979: 135) The bio-techno-political mode of governance encapsulates subjects into its folds such that it becomes a ‘technical civilisation’ – a civilisation that, although promising favourable aspects of modernity to the populace and development for the country, is also to be accompanied by several risks to human and environmental safety that propel states including democracies further towards authoritarianism. ‘Big science’ – that is, science that is centralised or at least circumscribed by the state – and the bureaucracies surrounding it play a critical part in the normalisation of the state of exception, and the exercise of even more power over their citizens. Jungk elaborates on the routinisation of nuclear state violence, epistemological, juridical and physical: Such measures will be justified, not as temporary measures made necessary by an exceptional emergency … but by the necessity of providing permanent protection for a perpetually endangered central source of energy that is regarded as indispensable .A nuclear industry means a permanent state of emergency justified by a permanent threat.

Tournament: Grapevine | Round: Doubles | Opponent: Edgemont | Judge: Panel
Analytic
Violating freedom is contradictory.
Stephen Engstrom (PhD, Professor of Ethics at University of Pittsburg). “Universal Legislation As the Form of Practical Knowledge”. Pg. 19-20 RC
“Given the preceding considerations, it’s a straightforward matter to see how a maxim
AND
both the extension and the limitation of both their own and others’ freedom.”

The standard is respecting freedom.
Analytics
And, nuclear power is defined by The Free Dictionary as
The Free Dictionary. “Nuclear Power”. http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Nuclear+Power RC
A form of energy produced by an atomic reaction, capable of producing an alternative source of electrical power to that supplied by coal, gas, or oil.

Tournament: Grapevine | Round: Octas | Opponent: Law Magnet MG | Judge: Chris Vincent, Travis Fife, Rodrigo Paramo
Ethics must be situational, we must ground moral judgments in the context of the particularities of agents.  
Aristotle and Leibowitz  
PARTICULARISM IN ARISTOTLE’S NICOMACHEAN ETHICS Uri D. Leibowitz (uri.leibowitz@nottingham.ac.uk) University of Nottingham (Forthcoming in The Journal of Moral Philosophy)
1 Nor must we overlook the fact that arguments which proceed from fundamental principles are different from arguments that lead up to them ...2 Now, we must start with the known. But this term has two connotations: “what is known to us” and “what is known” pure and simple. Therefore, we should start perhaps with what is known to us. 3 For that reason, to be a competent student of what is right and just, and of politics generally, one must first have received a proper upbringing in moral conduct. 4 The acceptance of a fact as fact is the starting point, and if this is sufficiently clear, there will be no further need to ask why it is so. 5 A man with this kind of background has or can easily acquire the foundations from which he must start. 6 But if he neither has nor can acquire them, let him lend an ear to Hesiod’s words:  That man is all-best who himself works out every problem...
That man, too, is admirable who follows one who speaks well.
He who cannot see the truth for himself, nor, hearing it from others,
Store it away in his mind, that man is utterly useless. (1095a31-1095b12)12 Following Burnyeat (1980), I understand Aristotle here as engaged in a dialectical inquiry towards first principles 1. This inquiry towards first principles, Aristotle argues, must begin with what is known to us 2. Our starting points, I suggest, are the normative statuses of particular actions. As Burnyeat observes, “the ancient commentators are agreed that Aristotle has in mind knowledge about actions in accordance with the virtues; these actions are the things familiar to us from which we must start, and what we know about them is that they are noble or just” (1980:71- 72). In other words, we must start our moral theorizing from our judgments about particular actions.
Thus, we must make ethical judgments based on our moral upbringing.  Morally correct acts are correct because they are trained in us.  The only way to resolve particularities and the paradoxical nature of rule following is by finding the average of two extremes.  This is also how we tell if an action is virtous.
Leibowitz 2
PARTICULARISM IN ARISTOTLE’S NICOMACHEAN ETHICS Uri D. Leibowitz (uri.leibowitz@nottingham.ac.uk) University of Nottingham (Forthcoming in The Journal of Moral Philosophy)
But how could one identify particular actions as right if one doesn’t know why these acts are right? A native speaker of a language can often tell whether a sentence is grammatical even in cases in which she does not know why it is so. Naturally, only native speakers who have been “brought up well” with respect to language are able to do this correctly and reliably. Aristotle thinks that with a proper moral upbringing one can form habits that would enable one to distinguish right actions from wrong ones 5. This is one reason why in I.3 Aristotle insists that young men are not the target audience for his lectures: “for they are inexperienced in the actions that constitute life, and what is said will start from these and will be about these” (1095a3-4, Rowe trans.). Our discussion, Aristotle tells us, concerns the rightness of actions but it also starts with correct judgments about which particular actions are right. The ability to identify right acts as right is acquired by habituation and the habits we form depend on the kind of moral upbringing we get. Having correct starting points is vital to a successful dialectical inquiry; if our initial judgments about the normative status of actions are incorrect, then the first principles we discover by way of a dialectical inquiry from these judgments are likely to be false.13 In I.7 Aristotle reminds us that the appropriate degree of precision for each investigation depends on the nature of the subject matter being explored (1098a26-28). He then goes on to say this: 7 One should not demand to know the reason why, either, in the same way in all matters: in some cases, it will suffice if that something is so has been well shown, 8 as indeed is true of starting points; some are grasped by induction, some by perception, some by a sort of habituation, and others in other ways: 9 one must try to get hold of each sort in the appropriate way, and take care that they are well marked out, 10 since they have great importance in relation to what comes later. For the start of something seems to be more than half of the whole, and through it many of the things being looked for seem to become evident. (1098a33-1098b7, Rowe trans.)14 In this passage Aristotle tells us that inquiries can differ not only with respect to their appropriate degree of precision 7, but also in the way in which their starting points are obtained 8. Moreover, Aristotle insists that it is important to obtain the starting points for each inquiry in the appropriate way 9. Finally, Aristotle stresses again the importance of having the correct starting points 10.   Aristotle’s goal, as I have mentioned above, is to help us understand why those acts that we identify as right—our starting points—are, in fact, right. But he warns us that the kind of explanation we ought to seek should be appropriate to the subject matter we are investigating 7. In geometry we can give demonstrative explanation. But we “should not demand to know the reason why in the same way in all matters.” Explanations of the rightness of actions will take a different form. “Pure science involves demonstration,” Aristotle tells us, “while things whose starting points or first causes can be other than they are do not admit of demonstrations” (VI.5:1140a34). After reminding us in II.2 that the subject matter of ethics lacks fixity and hence that our account will not be very precise, Aristotle goes on to say this: “But though our present account is of this nature we must give what help we can” (1104a10, Ross trans.). What immediately follows, are Aristotle’s observations about the harmful effects of excess and deficiency, and the positive effects of the proportionate amount, or the mean. These observations, Aristotle tells us, hold true for health and strength as well as for characteristics like temperance, courage, and other virtues. To act in accordance with the mean is not only the way to acquire virtuous characteristics, but is also the mark of virtuous actions. 

Ethics therefore lacks fixity, no two moral upbringings or situations will ever be the same.  This means absent a way to resolve these particularities, any other ethical theory fails to account for differences between competing ethical claims and can never work.

Thus the standard is consistency with contextual decision making

Prefer additionally:

States must promote contextual virtuous decision-making. The alternative cannot guide action in all cases.  SILVIA:
“VIRTUE ETHICS AND COMMUNITARIANISM” by Rui Silva, University of the Azores DD
“The second distinctive trait of virtue ethics is closely connected with the first one: virtue ethics is suspicious of the guiding role of principles and rules. The point was already made by Aristotle, namely in his discussion of the legal virtue of equity. Equity is required because laws and rules are too generic to accommodate all possible cases that judges can face. No legal system can avoid the occurrence of the so-called hard cases: The reason for this is that law is always a general statement, yet there are cases which it is not possible to cover in a general statement. ... The material of conduct is essentially irregular. ... This is the essential nature of the equitable: it is a rectification of law where law is defective because of its generality. (Nichomachean Ethics 1137b) There are, indeed, two basic problems when we try to act solely on principles. Firstly, there is a gap between general principles and the unpredictable diversity of situations that demand moral decisions; as a result it is often very difficult, if not impossible, to determine how to apply a principle to certain, atypical situations. In other words, it is possible to arrive at different conclusions departing from the same principles. Secondly, there can be clashes between equally valuable principles, depriving thereby the agent of action guidance. We may add that virtue ethics, far from endorsing moral universalism, is sensitive to the role of context in ethics. In the words of Julia Annas (2004: 741), virtue ethics is opposed to “one-size-fits-all” accounts of ethics. Virtue ethics invites us to and adopts moral contextualism, but it should be noted that contextualism must not be confused with relativism. After this brief presentation of virtue ethics, I will try to clarify and legitimize the idea of moral reliability, which is crucial for virtue ethics. For that purpose, the humanist idea of Bildung will be integrated in the project of virtue ethics. In a third section, I will analyse the most significant affinities between virtue ethics and communitarianism. Finally, I will claim that we can develop, with the help of the idea of Bildung, a form of virtue ethics that is not committed to strong forms of communitarianism. 2. Because it does not conceive of moral judgements on the basis of deductions from principles or decision procedures, virtue ethics is often considered as vague; instead of focusing on consequences or rules, virtue ethics it is based on the reliability of the moral agent, and this view may sound puzzling for modern moral philosophers. Standard formulations of virtue ethics are, indeed, somewhat vague. Let us consider, for example, the following presentation of the “fundamental premise” of virtue ethics:” (3-4)  

Impact Calc:
Analytic

Contention:
Analytic

Even if the AC specifies a specific factors of the ban, its still a universal application of the ban, since there are still instances that fall outsides of the rule. Dancy
“Ethics Without Principles” by Jonathan Dancy 2004 DD
“But there are forms of holism that do not go so far as particularism. That is, we can accept the context-sensitivity, the variability, of reasons, but still suppose that there are the sorts of general truths about how reasons behave that might be expressed by moral principles. So even if we do reject Ross's position, there remains some distance to go before we get to particularism. Consider the following series of conditionals offered by Robert Brandom (2000: 88): 1. If I strike this dry, well-made match, then it will light. (this is p→q) 
2. If p and the match is in a very strong electromagnetic field, then it will not light. ((p and r)→−q) 
3. If p and r and the match is in a Faraday cage, then it will light. ((1 additions to the premises cannot make a good or cogent inference less good or cogent. Deductive reasoning is like this; an inference, once logically valid, remains so no matter what one adds as a premise (even if it be the negation of one of the original premises). Brandom's in the example is non- monotonic, since the cogent inference in (1) is reversed by the addition of the further consideration that the match is in a strong electromagnetic field. If one allows that this sort of thing can happen, is one therefore a holist in my sense? One would be a holist if the fact that I am striking a dry, well-made match is functioning as a reason for believing that it will light in the first case, but not in the second or the fourth. But Brandom is not trying to allude to that sort of possibility by his example. His point is rather the sort of phenomenon we find in chemistry: a feature may have a certain effect when alone, even though its combination with another feature will have the opposite effect. One could call this a ‘holistic’ point perfectly sensibly, but it is not holistic in my sense of that term. Holism in my sense is the claim that a feature which has a certain effect when alone can have the opposite effect in a combination. It is one thing to say, as Brandom does, that though a alone speaks in favour of action, a+b speaks as a whole against it; it is another to say that though a speaks in favour of action when alone, it speaks against action when in combination. The difference lies in what is doing the speaking against in cases where features are combined. In the former case (Brandom's) it is the combination; in the latter case (mine) it is the feature that originally spoke in favour. For an example of the difference between Brandom and me, consider the relation between the following three ‘principles’: 1. If you are causing someone pain, you are doing something wrong. (p→q) 2. If p and the pain is a statutory punishment for a recognized offence, you are not doing something wrong. 
((p and r)→−q) 
3. If p and r and the punishee was unjustly convicted, you are doing something wrong. ((p and r and s)→q) If we say these things, are we therefore holists? That depends on whether we think that, in the second case, the fact that we are causing someone pain ceases to be a reason not to do what we are doing. Holists in my sense would be open to such a suggestion, even if they decided that it is not how things in fact work in this case. But Brandom's approach doesn't really ask about the role of any particular part of the combination.” (7-9)

Tournament: Greenhill | Round: 2 | Opponent: Kinkaid JG | Judge: Terrence Lonam
Interp: Cannot spec a reactor or type.
Violation: you do
Standards:

1. Limits 2. Textuality 3.Ground
   Drop debater, fairness, jurisdiction, competing interps, no RVI

Tournament: Greenhill | Round: 5 | Opponent: Marlborough GK | Judge: Chase Hamilton
A. interp: The affirmative must defend countries in general and must not defend that only a single country or some combination of countries prohibits the production of nuclear power.

B. You defend only US specific
C. 

1.  Grammar-the word “countries” in the resolution is a bare plural indicating the resolution is generic.
   Debois 16, Danny, VBI Topic Analysis Sept-Oct, p.11, 2016
   Importantly, “countries” in this resolution is a bare plural—i.e. there’s no article or demonstrative in front of adolescents like “the” or “these” indicating which adolescents the resolution is talking about. Bare plurals indicate that the resolution is a generic statement, and consequently, in order to textually affirm, aff advocacies have to be why in general countries have to prohibit nuclear power, not why specific countries should prohibit it.
   2. Framers intent
   3. Limits
   Same voters as the other T shells

Tournament: Grapevine | Round: Doubles | Opponent: Edgemont ML | Judge: Abbey Chapman, Lawrence Zhou, Rory Jacobson
Interpretation: Debaters cannot defend phase out to a ban.
Violation: You do. It's FX T
NB:
Ground
Limits
Fairness. Drop debater. Competing Interps. No RVI