Preston's Negative Constructive

Hello my name is Preston Rodeniser and it is my pleasure to be taking the negative side in today’s debate. My value for today’s debate round is quality of life.

I stand firmly resolved that we ought to negate the resolution which states: When in conflict, Idealism ought to be valued above Pragmatism. I believe we should negate the resolution because Pragmatism allows us to have a higher quality of life.
To begin, I will give definitions for some of the main terms. All of my definitions come from the Encarta World English Dictionary.

My first definition is Pragmatism: A straightforward practical way of thinking about things or dealing with problems, concerned with the results rather than with the theories and principles.
Idealism is defined as: A striving to achieve one’s ideals.
Finally, I will define my value which is quality of life, quality is defined as: the general standard or grade of something and the definition of life is: The entire period during which somebody is. . . alive
In other words having the best quality of life would mean, having the highest standard of living.

If you have a set of ideals through which all your decisions are made, then you will not be able to create the best quality of life that is possible for you. Whereas, through pragmatism we can attain a higher quality of life, because, depending on the circumstances, different choices can be made in order to help others and ourselves achieve that higher quality of life.

My first contention states that, If you are an idealist and killing to you is wrong then your ideals do not support war. But without war, many innocent people’s lives would be snuffed out without any cause.
As you probably know currently we are fighting a war against terrorists who have caused the deaths of many people. The warfare that we are experiencing today needs to occur in order to save lives. As a pragmatist, although you may still think that killing is wrong, you are able to say “yes to war” because in that situation it is the right thing to do. Without fighting wars, such as the war on terror, many people could lose the quality of life that they currently have.

My second contention states that: Idealists, who believe families should stay together, take away from themselves the power to help children who are born into bad homes. They lose the power to give these children a life in which their new parents will love, take care of them and help them to have better lives in the future.

Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin are remembered as two of the most evil men in all history. Albert Marrin said, “People aren’t born good or evil. They are born, period. They become good or evil according to how the world and their life experiences shape them.” This quote is taken from Albert Marrin’s book entitled Hitler. Hitler and Stalin were both beaten and abused by their father’s during their childhoods. Their father’s never cared or paid any attention to them and because of this both Hitler and Stalin became Dictator’s who abused their power and other human beings.

This shows that if someone is left in a home where they are abused they are likely to become an abuser themselves.
The Encyclopedia of Violence, written by Margaret Dicanio (2004), shows that on average, 1/3 of the people who are abused as children will later in life become abusers. As an idealist, who believes a family should stay together, you are unable to help those children who are being abused. Whereas a pragmatist is able to save those abused children from their bad homes. The pragmatist by helping these children escape their homes, helps them attain a better quality of life.

(Conclusion) Through pragmatism we are able to achieve a higher standard of living. For instance, in my first contention I stated that, when we are being attacked by terrorist organizations a pragmatist is able to protect our quality of living by making war, while an idealist is not able to go against his or her ideal of not killing people. Secondly, while an Idealist must say no to family separation, a pragmatist can decide according to the situation whether it is okay to separate a family.

Other Definitions:
The word Ideal is defined as: a standard or principle to which people aspire.

Conflict can be defined as: warfare between opposing forces.

Extra Facts:
In 2006 the Department of Health and Human Services, took a survey that showed, nearly 50 children out of every thousand have been abused.



Please comment on my case. I can use the help!!!

Preston I love the examples you use to make your points. One thing I want to work on is developing TAG lines for your contentions that serve to summarize the main point of your arguments. Let me give you an example:

Quote :

My first contention states that, If you are an idealist and killing to you is wrong then your ideals do not support war.

I totally understand the point you are making here but I want your statement to stand alone without a need to explain.

TAG: Idealism doesn't allow a person to adjust their actions to protect their quality of life.
If you believe that killing people is wrong under all circumstances, then how would you adjust your stance to accommodate self defense or a just war?

Quote :

My second contention states that: Idealists, who believe families should stay together, take away from themselves the power to help children who are born into bad homes.

TAG: Inflexible idealism doesn't always lead to positive results. For example if you hold the idealistic belief that families should always stay together, you would not be able to intervene and assist children who are being abused or mistreated.

One more brief note:

Quote :

Through pragmatism we are able to achieve a higher standard of living.

Since this is your conclusion I want to be careful that we don't bring any NEW terms into the debate. Since your value is quality of life, I think you need to say quality of life here instead of standard of living.
Picky but important just the same.

Let me know if you have questions about this.
Sue

I really like your examples, Preston! I have a few questions for you.

Would you say that quality of life is the most valuable value?

What if my ideal doesn't prevent me from killing or seperating families?

Just a heads up, I think the premise of your case is really strong, but your examples are too specific. Not everyone is going to have a case with a value that forbids killing. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I think your case could go from good to great if you made everything a little bit more general.

If you look at Mrs. Gray's suggested taglines, they're all more general in nature. Your examples are good, I just think you may need to cover a little more ground.

Hey that's a good point.

Do you think I should modify my case and add in more examples or, have more examples, that are not in my case, handy in case they attack my reasoning.

I don't think that quality of life is most important but I think that with the highest quality of life comes most other values (of course Life is not included in this ).

God Bless
Swimmer Dude

I agree with James and Mrs. Gray on this one Pres. You have a lot of great thinking, but you should definately consider changing your tags to be more general and less easy to debate, it just seems to me that your contentions are more like examples/evidence for a more general statement that you could possibly back up with othere examples and also combat your opponent with. however, I do think that if you put in to many examples your case will end up being harder to use, but if you want a few more in the back pocket to whip out if needed, it is always good to feel prepared. I guess it is better to be simple so that you don't end up confusing rather than clarifying this already confusing resolution.
kelsey

This is my rebuttal for my home work. I am not finished yet.

I would first like to address the negative speaker case. First of all his value quality of life needs my value justice to keep his. In order to keep quality of life we need something to punish those who try to get rid of quality of life. Justice does that. Also justice also to help keep people safe and secure. Therefor Justice is a higher value than quality of life. Since Lincoln Douglas debate is a value debate I should be granted the win because I have shown my value is higher than my opponents value.

My opponent in his first contention if we value life

Hey I don't know if I'm supposed to argue back but I will for practice.

I would like to start my rebuttal off by adressing what my opponent said about my case. I would like to remind the judges of my definition for quality of life which is, having the highest standard of living. My opponent said without Justice we cannot have the best quality of life. Let me remind you, though, that once the best quality of life is attained so is Justice. Quality of life contains many values such as Justice, Security, Human Rights and many others. Therefore when my value, quality of life is acheived at it's best all of these values are included therefore making my value preeminent over Justice. Once again I would like to bring to the judges attention that LD debate is value debate and therefore, since my value is preeminent I should be granted the win.

Swimmer Dude

Yes believe it or not.. that's what this forum is for. The more we argue and articulate our points in this venue the more we'll be prepared to do this on the spot.... Have fun chewing on each other's heels!

Respectfully of course!

Mrs. Gray