EDEB8 - Ultimate Online Debating
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"This House would ban the publication of software which is specifically designed to enable access to the darknet."

(PRO)
WINNER!
4 points
(CON)
0 points
ZaradiZaradi (PRO)

An Explanation of The DarkNet:


In case anyone was wondering, the answer is no: you are not currently using the darknet.


Before any discussion of Darknet begins in earnest, we must first identify and clarify on what the darknet actually is. And in order to explain what the darknet is, it's necessary to understand what programs like TOR are.


Before I explain what Tor is, though, I want to give an example. Take Facebook, for example. Popular social media site, used by millions, if not billions, of people every day. It also automatically records your IP address the second you enter the web address into your search bar. Didn't know that? There are ways around it, though, and one of those ways is Tor.


Tor, also known as The Onion Router, is a free program you can download onto your comuter in minutes that acts as a proxy server on steroids, essentially. It takes your IP address and bounces it around the globe to different places and locations to mask where you're originally typing from. With Tor installed, for all facebook knows you can be typing from Palm Springs, California and they get an IP address located in Siberia. That's why it's called the "Onion" router; each little jump in location is a peel of an onion.


What's good about Tor is that it provides vast amounts of privacy and anonymity, far more than your typical incognito search bar. To compare the two, Tor is an invisibility cloak that makes you nearly impossible to sense and perceive. Incognito is hiding behind a plant at your grandmother's 85th birthday party.


There's another perk to Tor, though, and one that isn't discussed very widely. There are actually certain websites and marketplaces for goods and product that you can't actually view without something like Tor installed. This is what's known as the "darknet"[1], as opposed to what's refered to as the "clearnet", which is site's like this one.


The Harms of the Darknet:


So what's wrong with the darknet? Pretty simple, actually. As Al Jazeera writer Claire Gordon summarized it up nicely, "Honestly, it's not a particularly nice place."[1]


Crime is rampant on the darknet. Drugs, weapons, forgeries, child pornography -- and that's just the tip of the iceberg. Credit card fraud conducted on a international scale. Weapons rings organized online. Thieves and assassins openly posting their resumes and contact information through the anonymity of the darknet.


In order to stop this crime, we have a few options: track and prosecute the individuals who are perpretrating the crimes, shut down the individual sites in the darknet in which the crime originates, or shut down the darknet entirely. I'll explain why the first two are flawed, and how the third one is the only possible option.



Hunting down the individual members of the site's that are doing the criminal activity seems like a decent idea, but the inherent problem with it is that with Tor, they're virtually untraceable. Normally to find someone over the internet you just trace their IP back to a physical location, and then you're right at their doorstep. Tor physically prevents that by bouncing the IP address all over the globe, making it virtually untraceable.


To make matters worse, it’s impossible to trace the money trail to individual members because, well, thereisno money trail. All transactions occur through Bitcoin[3], an electronic cryptocurrency. These cryptocurrencies allow for entirely anonymous transactions to occur en mass[4].


Shutting down the sites on which the crime occurs is another decent thought, but that's simply naive at best. This has actually already been tried before. The Silk Road was the name of a very popular darknet hub for drugs and other illegal wares before it was shut down. The members fled to other sites, leading to a 70% growth in membership for BMR (a similar site), and a nearly 400% increase to the Sheep Marketplace (another similar site). Simply put, there's always going to be another site for the criminals to flee to, making shutting down individual sites a flawed method of solving the problem.[2]


The final method, shutting down the darknet entirely, is a rather simple process to do and one that is guaranteed to not fail in theory. The darknet is a part of the internet that is only visible with certain software and programs installed onto the computer. Banning this software removes the ability to access the darknet entirely, forcing the criminals out into the open, where they can be prosecuted and the crime can be prevented.


Why should we shut down the darknet? Because the harms from the crime that’s allowed to occur through it’s privacy is inexcusable and entirely unjustifiable. To start with, drug use is the cause of a quarter of a million deaths per year worldwide[5]. In 2012, $11.3 billion -- yes that billions with a “b” -- was lost due to credit card fraud globally, which was up 15% from the previous year[6]. Contract murder is, well, contract murder. And these are just the calculable things, things we can put numbers to and bring up some kind of raw “bodycount” for. The harms of child pornography on the child are incalculable; not just physically (everything from genital pains to headaches, loss of appetite and sleeplessness), but psychologically as well (feelings of isolation, anxiety, and fear)[7]. With all of these harms being rampantly created and encouraged over the darknet, we must do everything within our power to shut the darknet down and stop this crime. The only way left to do it that hasn’t failed is to prevent people from using the darknet entirely.


Sources:


[1]http://america.aljazeera.com...

[2]https://media.gractions.com…

[3]http://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2015/06/03/411476653/infiltrating-the-dark-net-where-criminals-trolls-and-extremists-reign

[4]http://www.janes.com/article/47455/law-enforcement-struggles-to-control-darknet

[5]http://www.livescience.com/36068-worldwide-illegal-drug-deaths.html

[6]http://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21596547-why-america-has-such-high-rate-payment-card-fraud-skimming-top

[7]http://www.popcenter.org/problems/child_pornography/2
Return To Top | Posted:
2015-06-06 17:33:17
| Speak Round
BlackflagBlackflag (CON)
Thanks Zaradi for being such a staunch and challenging competitor for the 2015 World Online Debate Championships. 

The darknet refers to any internet service or destination in which one can only browse anonymously through certain software. Practical uses for the darknet can include, but are not exclusive to...
  • anonymous storage of information
  • anonymous communication
  • anonymous purchase of goods 
  • anonymous file sharing and transfer of information 

The darknet isn't one specific place, but rather an umbrella term for any hidden internet location which is meant to be restricted for certain people, almost always in the interest of security. A common misconception is that the darknet got its name because many people have purchased drugs and contraband off of a couple smaller darknet locations, but this has been disputed by employees of Tor, an anonymous browsing company, and other proxy services.

The common argument in reprisal to this misconception is that the vast majority of the darknet is estimated to be utilized for legitimate purposes, such as corporate security and privacy. While it is true that you can find niche places who utilize the anonymity of the darknet to commit illegal acts,  we must remember that the  problem isn't nearly as inflated as many critics would lead you to believe. Of course we can find illegal items on the internet. We can also find illegal items and real life. 

Think of it as a backalley. Some people may run legitimate businesses in backalleys, while others could be managing a drug or prostitution ring in another backalley. The isolation of the backalley draws in criminals, but the space also produces the opportunity for legitimate use and possible economic maximization. Not every alley in the world has a drug dealer or pimp assigned to it. We must view the darknet in the same light. Not every location one can go to on the darknet is malicious or designed for criminal mischief, therefore we shouldn't make the raw accusation that the darknet is inherently bad in retrospect. It is a service which one can use for good or bad. Isn't that the basis of Western democracy and Ideology, the right to make good and bad choices independently? 

The affirming position was very vague in his explanation on why illegal goods being sold over the internet is a bad thing. Some of the goods I am personally aware of include foods, pornography, or entertainment devices such as movies and video games which are banned in a person's home country. Many would even argue that it is okay to buy prostitutes and drugs over the darknet, because they too don't feel these things should be illegal as they are personal choices that affect the individual alone. 

Obviously we cannot rework the law, and encouraging people to break it on purpose can't be good for our society, but nothing is stopping us from enforcing the law regardless of how difficult it may be. The reason drug dealers tend to hang out in backalleys is because it is harder for them to get caught by the police. Yet many criminals have been caught in backalleys for over the course of a century. We can apply the same principles to the darknet. It might be harder to catch bad guys on the internet, but it isn't impossible. We just need to try harder ourselves.

In 2011, the FBI seized billions of bitcoins on a famous darknet site known as Silk Road which had been used for illegal transactions. 3 years later, notorious Silk Road mob boss, Dread Pirate Roberts, was arrested and put in prison for a very long time. Enforcement on the darknet is realistic.  I would much rather give law enforcement some extra support than tarnish the legitimate services and liberties companies like Tor provide us daily.

Therefore I must conclude by stating that banning software like Tor is not in our best interests as a society.

Return To Top | Posted:
2015-06-08 16:21:31
| Speak Round
ZaradiZaradi (PRO)
This round for me is going to be relatively short because, to put it plainly and bluntly, Con doesn't really respond to a whole lot of anything, nor advance really anything with his last round. I'll go over the few things he did touch on before re-advancing my own arguments. 

Con starts off by talking about how a misconception about the darknet is that it's used for illegal things and that it's only a small portion of what the darknet is used for. There's just a few problems with this claim though:

First, he does nothing to back this up with any sort of proof. This is literally just his assertion.

Second, this ignores the evidence I provided in the previous round that shows that the darknet is rampant with crime.

Third, if what I provided last round was not sufficient for the voter's tastes, then here's Evolution, the largest and most currently active marketplace on the darknet[8], where 54% of the site is JUST illegal drugs[8]. This doesn't count for the 23% of the site dedicated to popular guides like "how to hack ATMs" and "A Complete MDMA Synthesis For The First Time Chemist"[8], 19% used on fraud-related purchases, like credit cards and identity theft[8], and 15% for pornography, weapons, drug paraphenalia and illegal services like hacking[8]. The claim that only a small portion of the darknet is used for criminal things is just naive. 

And while I'm sure there's at least one non-illegal place on the darknet, this isn't Sodom. If we're preventing more harm from occurring than we make things harder on people trying to operate in the sketchiest areas of the internet, then shutting down the darknet is what we ought to do.

On an unrelated note, who tries to advertise a legitimate business on the darknet? Only people with specific software on their computer can see your site anyway, so you're intentionally making it harder to get your business out there. Common sense, guys...

The claim that I was vague in my explanation of why we ought not allow crime to occur on the darknet is laughably inaccurate. Recall the statistics I gave in the previous round as to the harms of drug use, credit card fraud and the physical and psychological harms to things like child pornography. The harms I'm extending off from my case are the exact opposite of vague. And whether or not things like child pornography and prositution ought to be legal or illegal is entirely irrelevant not only to this debate, but to my case in general: I'm extending off physical harms to things that are currently illegal as why we ought to be disallowing their existence, not "just because they're illegal".

And Con's desire to prosecute and catch criminals on the darknet is noble, but foolish and naive. While it's a decent start that the FBI shut down the Silk Road, my opponent misses or ignores the statistics I provided in my case showing that after the Silk Road was shut down, the use of two other sides massively spiked, by as much as 400% increase in usage. Simply shutting down sites doesn't actually prevent the crime from occurring because, as my opponent missed from my last round, there's always going to be more sites for them to move their illegal wares and services to. And the nature of providers of darknet software, such as Tor, excludes tracking down individual people who are committing the crimes. This means the only possible recourse that we have to actually stopping the crime from occurring is by shutting down the darknet entirely.

And, go back to the statistics I provided last round to the things that the darknet offers and the harms it brings onto the world. All of the people who's lives we'd be saving and the money we'd be preventing from being stolen makes it worthwhile to shut down the darknet, even if it means shutting down a few "legitimate" businesses...

...but for real. What legitimate business would operate on the darknet in the first place?

Sources:

[8] http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/11/22/a-complete-tally-of-the-weird-disturbing-and-hilarious-things-for-sale-on-the-internets-largest-black-market/



Return To Top | Posted:
2015-06-10 14:33:34
| Speak Round
BlackflagBlackflag (CON)
Welcome to round 2 of this already exciting debate.

It is important to clarify to the audience that the darknet is indeed used for illegal purposes, but it is also used for legitimate purposes as well. Other things which are used for legal and illegal purposes include the regular internet, capitalism, and even democracy. We cannot ban the regular internet due to the high levels of hate content and illegal material it hosts. We can not ban capitalism simply because some people choose to  abuse the system intent on greed, knowing that the alternatives would be worst 100 fold. We can not ban democracy due to the corrupt and power hungry individuals who lie to the people and deface their countries constitutions, simply out of the fact that the alternative to democracy is authority. 

I believe my opponent understands this concept, and would readily accept the legalization of software that allow access to the darknet if I were to prove the darknet has even the slightest amount of legitimate and positive value. At the request of the affirming position, here is a list of groups  which use the darknet for legitimate business and purposes.
  • Almost every major company in the West (Competitive corporations are afraid of espionage, therefore certain internet activities are restricted unless you are anonymously routed)
  • Security Services (including the secret service and several high level security firms)
  • Private messaging services (Includes the once popular Bluedog, I2P, and WASTE) 
  • Pornography and other Legal Inconspicuous Item Vendors (A lot of people buy pornography using the darknet who don't want their financial transaction traced back to them)
  • Just a general place for secure vending (As a dedicated roamer of the darknet using Tor, I can confirm along with Tor employees that the majority of darknet markets are used for legalized products, with the added bonus that the vendors can trade securely)
  • The Estonian General Election (Which was the first in history to allow voting over the internet. Much of the security was done using darknet software) 

Can we enforce the Darknet?
The affirming position claims that the Darknet is impossible to enforce, as illegal activity according to his unsourced claim has went up 400% on the darknet within the last couple of years. It is true that enforcement on the darknet is low, but it is not true that the darknet cannot be enforced. In fact, we've never even tried. The US Federal Bereau of Investigation dedicates less than 1% of their budget towards stopping internal cyber crime. That is low, especially when the US government funnels so much of its money into bottomless pits with little practical value. Even with such a low budget, the FBI was able to make dozens of high profile seizures over the darknet. Even catching the greatest internet criminal in history, Dread Pirates Roberts, was done with the meager 1% cyber security budget.

The darknet can be enforced. We have hardly began to scratch the surface of what we can do in terms of cyber security, and the affirming position is already advocating that we give up before even trying. There are so many reforms we could make to ease the flow of legitimate business on the darknet. Here are just a few examples of what we could be doing instead of outright banning services like Tor
  • Require services like Tor to collect data from their users on why each person is downloading their router
  • Collect a small tax for every user of services like Tor, which can then be used for an increase in national cyber security agencies 
  • Tighten national policies on internet crime, discouraging criminals

There are a lot of things we could do but have never tried. The darknet provides too much economic and security value to attempt to destroy. A vain attempt that would be as well, because the real criminals on the darknet, they don't use software that we know about. I refuse to implicate the legitimate vendor and private firm in unjust activity, and therefore advocate that we keep services like Tor legalized. 






Return To Top | Posted:
2015-06-12 03:27:47
| Speak Round
ZaradiZaradi (PRO)
So there's a few things that need to be noted that make this debate break down really, really simply.

First, he hasn't provided a single source to back up anything that he's been arguing. A lot of his arguments are making statements of fact that he provides no sort of proof other than his own word to warrant them. Even when he cites statistics in his last round, we still get no source to verify what he's saying. You're going to be preferring my arguments over his simply because I'm actually providing you with proof of what I'm saying is actually a thing.

This has a number of implications on the debate. 

First, you prefer my arguments as to how the darknet is rampant with crime over his word that it isn't.
Second, you prefer the impacts of drug-related deaths, money lost due to credit card fraud, and the physical and psychological harms of child pornography as reasons to want to be rid of the darknet over his "It's wrong!" statement that lacks any kind of justification whatsoever. 
Third, you prefer my statistics as to how, after "enforcement" in the darknet, other spikes that were not enforced substantially spiked in activity, suggesting that the idea of enforcing the darknet is foolish and naive over his "we can do it!" rhetoric that lacks any kind of warrant behind it. 

And with that, that's literally 90% of his case gone. Don't let him come in the very last round of the debate and try to provide all these sources because he's had loads of time to do so before this point. He hasn't, so hold it against him. The only thing that's left is this idea that there's legitimate businesses on the darknet and it would be wrong to shut them down while we shut down the darknet. But there's a number of reasons why this doesn't matter and you affirm anyway:

First, like I said before, this isn't Sodom where if there's one good, God-fearing individual, then the entire city is saved. We're talking about what's best for society as a whole, meaning that if I'm preventing more harm by getting rid of the darknet than I am harming others via doing so (hint hint, I'm winning in this weighing game) then I'm winning this debate. 
Secondly, if there actually are legitimate businesses out there on the darknet, then, as I hinted last round and will blatantly say this round, they're being freaking idiotic. They're intentionally making their business suffer by reducing their visibility by running their business in a place where only a small portion of society will ever see. By shutting down the darknet and forcibly relocating those businesses to the normal internet, we would actually be increasing their visibility, thus increasing their chance of actually earning business. His argument here flows in my favor. 
Thirdly, ignore his massive capitalism/democracy rant because it's a massive appeal to emotion. He gives you no impacts to this at all other than saying "it's not what it was meant for so we can't shut it down", and gives no analysis at all as for why this is more important than saving the lives that would be lost to drug-related causes, the money stolen through fraud, and all the physical and psychological harm inflicted onto children from the child pornography that's rampant in the darknet. 

But just in case he tries to extend off this idea that the USFG could enforce the darknet and prevent this kind of crime from occurring in the first place, there's a few things that need to be said beforehand. 

First, he provided absolutely nothing in the way of warrants to show that the USFG can actually enforce the darknet other than "Yeah guys! They totally can! We aren't even trying yet!" rhetoric.
Second, he doesn't actually respond to the reasons I'm providing for why the darknet is actually unenforceable. Money doesn't solve the fact that Tor makes users untraceable and there's an infinite number of potential sites for shutting down individual sites to actually be a feasible solution. And even if it could, he gives no reason to believe that it can or will. 
Third, his argument here that we're not pouring as much money as we can is the No True Scotsman fallacy. By Con's logic, so long as we're not "successfully" enforcing the darknet, it's just because we're not pouring enough money into things. He'll be able to write off any failure as "just throw more money at it! You weren't throwing enough!" and ignore the actual problem of the unenforceability of the darknet. 
Fourth, this argument of "lets just throw money at this" doesn't even negate. I can say the same thing and just say "Let's throw a little bit more money on this and just shut the entire thing down." and affirm the resolution. 
Fifth, this whole "we aren't even trying" argument is in direct contradiction with his whole "it can work, look at The Silk Road and that bad guy we arrested!" argument. He can't have both. Either a) he buys into the we aren't trying and doesn't have any reason to show that it could work in the first place, or b) he buys into the "we did something!" argument and bites into the argument I make showing how it increases the stats of other sites, meaning it doesn't actually do anything. Either way, he still loses. 

And that should be the entire debate in a nutshell. So to tl;dr the debate for you guys:

1. The darknet is a secret part of the internet only viewable to people who download specific software that bounces people's IP address across a bunch of different places, effectively making them anonymous on the internet. 
2. The darknet is a place that's rampant with crime. Illegal drugs, weapons, fraud, contract killings, and child pornography are all common place. These cause massive harms to the world outside the darknet. 
3. The only feasible way to prevent this crime from occurring is to shut down the darknet entirely. This is done by banning the software that is required to view the darknet in the first place. Only by affirming can we solve the harms of the darknet. 


Return To Top | Posted:
2015-06-13 16:14:22
| Speak Round
BlackflagBlackflag (CON)
I think sources are secondary in a debate, considering how most real life debates don't involve website links. If the affirming position was truly skeptical of my facts, he would of disputed them earlier into the debate. The people should believe what I am saying, and if they do not believe in what I am saying, google search is only a click away.

Now back to actual debating...

The Darknet is a secure and protected area of the internet that is used for the purposes of legitimate business, security, and private messaging. Crime exists, but is is astoundingly minimal, and you would have to actually go out of your way to find it. Kind of like how we have to go out of our way to find crime in the real world, at least in any relatively safe city, and coming from Detroit, I can safely claim that you will be a lot better off on the darknet than metro Lincoln Park. 

That actually brings up a good point though. There is a lot of crime in certain places throughout the world. Why do we not just evacuate everyone in those areas and drop  tactical nuclear bombs? The reason we do not do that is because it isn't practical and it isn't humane.  Regular people, not criminals, have invested heavily in the Darknet. They are fed up with crime too. Crime threatens their business, especially when it results in untrue rumors that the only people on the Darknet are criminals. We shouldn't be giving into the criminals. We should be fighting them back. I'm not French. I do not want to give in before the fight even begins. You shouldn't want to give in either.

The more important issue here is the fantasy the affirming position keeps advocating for on how we can "shut down" the darknet by "shutting down" software. Here's the problem with that. The reason criminals do not get caught on the darknet, is because they do not use Tor or other programs like it. They use black market software or even homemade routers. Launching an attack on software programs that allow access to the darknet would not bring down a single criminal. It would bring down a lot of legitimate small business owners though. What happens to those legitimate small business owners after we shut down the software they use to make their livelihood? I'll tell you what, they will get blackmarket software and become criminals too. Has it occurred to anyone that some acts of enforcement can actually cause more criminal activity? 

Softwares that allow access to the darknet should not be banned. It would not bring down criminal activity on the darknet and it would disadvantage hard working small businesses and our own global economy. I do not believe the affirming position has fulfilled any sort of burden here, and you should take that into account before you make a judgement that is supporting a great injustice towards your fellow members of society. 




Return To Top | Posted:
2015-06-15 15:03:03
| Speak Round


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BlackflagBlackflag
Cheers
Posted 2015-06-16 16:43:08
whiteflamewhiteflame
I will abstain from voting on this debate, as I don't wish to produce more claims of bias.
Posted 2015-06-16 07:18:25
BlackflagBlackflag
It was set up with 12 days left before the round was over
Posted 2015-06-15 03:17:24
adminadmin
Maybe it wasn't setup at the exact moment the timer started then. :)
Posted 2015-06-15 02:36:01
BlackflagBlackflag
Really? Zaradi specified the debate so it would go only for 12 days max
Posted 2015-06-15 02:34:47
adminadmin
Technically this debate should have ended already, but I'll give you two a pass 'cause I'm nice.
Posted 2015-06-15 02:25:41
RomaniiRomanii
Jifpop vs Zaradi 2.0
Posted 2015-06-11 12:52:41
ZaradiZaradi
9 hours till you miss the round from this comment.
Posted 2015-06-08 08:22:39
BlackflagBlackflag
How much time is left on this debate?
Posted 2015-06-08 07:03:36
The judging period on this debate is over

Previous Judgments

2015-06-18 04:07:00
adminJudge: admin    TOP JUDGE
Win awarded to: Zaradi
Reasoning:
This was a fairly high quality debate.

What we saw in this debate was a reasonably standard but awesome debate model. Zaradi opened by explaining what the darknet was broadly, what the harm was (easier to commit crime), and why his solution best solves the problem. His opening speech was just about everything a first affirmative should be.

Stag argued from three perspectives, a good number of arguments, and did well to integrate rebuttal. First he argued that the darknet is mostly legitimate, and "shutting it down" because of a few abusers was unfair to everyone else. I felt like it was fair for Zaradi to provide statistical evidence to the contrary, and he did ultimately convince in this way that the majority of darknet activity is bad - and failing that, I also liked his analysis of "they're being idiotic" (late though it came). From this claim of mostly legitimate, Stag's standards slipped noticably in the following round to the "slightest amount of legitimate and positive value". Honestly, I felt Stag did win that. I was convinced there were legitimate users of the darknet who used it in a positive way. I was not convinced that it was the majority, and ultimately pro's "this isn't sodom" narrative won me over on the principle of "majority rules". Stag proposed a variant on this in the final round about bombing real-life cities filled with crime - although I didn't really count it much as Zaradi could not respond, I felt ultimately it wasn't helpful, as it cemented the idea that the darknet was as criminal as the most criminal places on Earth. Zaradi further convinced that alternative mediums were available for legitimate users, and Stag wasn't clear enough about what sort of investment legit users had in the darknet that they couldn't easily transfer to the internet.

Stag's second approach was arguing that crime was ok (illegal goods being sold isn't a bad thing). This was a difficult burden to meet. What Stag argued in principled terms was great (personal choice stuff) but at that point, Zaradi had already evidenced a number of negative externalities. This argument was dropped by Stag in the second round and effectively rebutted by Zaradi, so points to him on that one. Zaradi also carried the point through making it extra effective.

Third Stag argued that enforcement is realistic on the darknet already. There were two threads to this. First, Stag argued that the government has already had great success. I felt like con had a reasonably good response to this from the outset: it hasn't worked. Zaradi put forward a compelling case that criminals could easily find new darknet channels to coordinate their evil deeds or whatever. Second, Stag pointed out the government could do more, and gave some great examples. This was ultimately a much stronger approach, and Zaradi's response (throw a bit more money at this) was probably the poorest way of explaining WHY it doesn't even negate that I could think of. Zaradi did note the two were in contradiction to each other, which Stag had no response to, so I was happy to discount the weaker of Stag's points. As a side point, Stag argued the "real criminals" were elsewhere, but that was almost approaching a counter-model in the final round so I didn't weigh it. I had this point as roughly tied. I wasn't convinced overall that either side had done enough to prove that the ban would or would not be effective. I felt pro did a great job of establishing that the darknet causes the harm, but as the debate wore on, con's narrative was strong enough to give me pause.

Both sides had exceptional structure and were easy enough to follow throughout. I liked Stag's little rants and was bemused by both sides claiming the other hasn't done anything (though against other opponents, this would certainly be the opposite of endearing).

So I judge the debate like this: crime's bad, and the darknet has enough crime to warrant making it nigh impossible to use. I wasn't sure if criminals are already being caught effectively on the darknet, but on the strength of the first two points, I felt the evidence was that it might as well be shut down for good.

Good job to both competitors and I look forward to your performances in the rest of the WODC!

Feedback:
Zaradi - what I liked about your case the most was the setup. You had a clear problem, solution, and means to solve it. It all made sense.

Where you weren't so strong was in your rebuttal, for two reasons:
1. Limited narrative. You seemed more preoccupied with Stag's lack of direct engagement with your model than you were with attacking the points he did raise. While it's ok to point out logical flaws in Stag's evidence, such as a lack of sources, that doesn't need to be a paragraph, along with a paragraph on contradiction etc. It can be 1 sentence, or even less. The bulk of any rebuttal should be what Stag did, providing stories that support your evidence. Heck, I still remember Stag's story about the legitimate business owners in Detroit more strongly than anything in your case. Not just do judges remember that kind of thing more easily, but it's also significantly harder to rebut. Nowhere was this more apparent than with your response to "throw more money at it" - pure logical responses don't make so much of an impact as Stag's list of different things that could be done. It made Stag sound authoritative even though, as you said, no sources. I could still trust his material because of narratives. Powerful things.
2. Second, and this is gonna sound weird, but arrogance is off-putting. Don't tell me what to think, but rather frame it as though it were fact. Instead of "You prefer my point because", "My point is stronger because". In a similar way, going on about the quality of your opponent's arguments is not helpful for a judge. They will assess quality themselves without you needing to prompt them. Instead, frame it in a more neutral way, such as pointing out (again, keep this kind of thing sort) "The argument was unsourced". That basically helps judges the most, particularly if you run a fairly logical case like you did.
This being said, I liked that you didn't lose focus on your own case during the rebuttal. Keep that up.

Stag I'll do you shortly.
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5 comments on this judgement
BlackflagBlackflag
To be honest this judgement isn't up to par with your other judgements, and it's missing feedback.

The reason I did not give the judgement an exceptional rating is because I didn't understand where you were coming from in some areas, and I believe those areas needed more fleshing out. The other reason is because a lot of points in the debate were not assigned any impacts, on both the affirmative and negative side, and even though I participated in the debate, I do believe there are some impacts that were overlooked.

Not a bad judgement, but also not an exceptional or constructive judgement. It is still high quality coming from you though.
Posted 2015-11-03 14:14:56
BlackflagBlackflag
At any rate, I am thankful you took the time to give this debate a quality judgement
Posted 2015-11-03 14:14:56
adminadmin
@Stag - in all honesty, I had little time to write it, but I wanted to write enough to ensure that both of you understood I did read the debate and think about it a lot. I'll probably come back and fill in the gaps a little later today.
Posted 2015-06-18 12:10:57
BlackflagBlackflag
Okay, cool. It did seem odd that you didn't include feedback, but the fact that you were short on time makes enough sense.
Posted 2015-11-03 14:14:56
adminadmin
In the process of writing feedback... need to go off real quick but I'll be back in a few hours.
Posted 2015-06-19 12:51:30

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