Question:
It will encourage fans to support their local clubs

A focus on domestic football and domestic footballers would encourage the public to get around their local sides. Therefore, this plan would be fruitful for club football and its relationship with the local community. Once the local team was a real source of local identity, with many home-grown players proud to wear the shirt of the club they grew up with. Now players have no local feeling and move often in search of higher wages or European experience. Loyalty is an undervalued trait in modern football. How can fans identify with a club full of overseas players who will be gone in a season or two, and who otherwise neglect to support local youth talent?

Local loyalties went out of the game years ago – it isn’t just overseas players who change clubs often in search of higher wages. Everyone agrees that when teams were only full of local boys the standard of play was worse. And strong local loyalties aren’t always good – they used to spill over into hooliganism as the fans from rival clubs fought. More overseas players in football, many with different colour skins, have helped reduce nationalism and racism in society.

Rich athletes from wealthier countries will always have access to the latest, highest quality performance enhancers. On the other side, athletes from poorer countries which do not have the same medical and scientific advances will not be able to keep up. They will always be at a disadvantage regardless of whether performance enhancing drugs are legal or not.

If we were to look at the two possible outcomes we would see that allowing both males and females to compete against each other would actively decrease discrimination. This happens as, in this situation, we perceive the two sexes as being equal, able to compete against each other, both beginning the race from the same starting line, whereas the alternative would be to draw an imaginary barrier between the two sexes claiming that they are so far apart that competition between them would be futile. Those women who come on top on several occasions, such as Danica Patrick who has won NASCAR competitions (1) will show that all those stereotypes are wrong and that they should have been long forgotten. Of course there will be a lot of women who won’t be able to win anything, but the entire spotlight and all the media coverage will be on the ones who will, so they’ll be getting the lion’s share of media attention. As a result, successful stories of women defeating men in their leagues will come as a megaphone for promoting gender equality in society.

(1) Esteban “9 Female Athletes Who Competed Against Men”, Total Pros Sports, October 28, 2011 http://www.totalprosports.com/2011/10/28/9-female-athletes-who-competed-against-men/

Simple analogy: If a person were to kill himself for the sake of entertaining the crowd, this act would still be considered illegal by the government and efforts to hinder and discourage it would be created.

An appropriate example is the one of dangers of alcohol and tobacco, which were not known until after they had become normalized in society. Once the dangers were known, the public were so used to it, that they wouldn’t condone a ban by the State. If alcohol were introduced tomorrow it would be banned, as shown by the attitude towards narcotics and steroid use has shown. Governments have tried to reduce sales by having high levels of tax on tobacco and alcohol anyway. Moreover many states are restricting choice in tobacco and alcohol by introducing limited bans, such as on smoking in public places. The proposition cannot use the fact that tobacco and alcohol are legal as a defense of the use of drugs. This should be seen as an equally detrimental act and thus illegal.

Sport is dangerous. Today’s athletes decide to endanger their lives by participating in sports all the time. They decide to participate in sports with the informed decision that they might get hurt as it is part of the sport. Performance enhancing drugs are no different.

In the USA every year there are nearly 300,000 sports-related traumatic brain injuries (TBIs). Athletes involved in sports such as football, hockey and boxing are at significant risk of TBI due to the high level of contact inherent in these sports. Head injuries are also extremely common in sports such as cycling, baseball, basketball and skateboarding. Many head injuries acquired, playing these sports, lead to permanent brain damage or worse. Yet we do not impose a law to ban athletes from participating in those sports. We trust their assessment of risk (1).

All about Traumatic Brain Injuries: http://www.allabouttbi.com/sports-related-traumatic-brain-injury/ , accessed 05/15/2011

The media can and often is used as a tool for public policy. Examples of this include the broadcasting of public information campaigns against drink-driving or smoking or else bans on certain advertising such as smoking advertisements or sponsorship appearing on TV.[1] What’s more the government has a huge influence in what it deems to be worthwhile news or television programs and documentaries. This is because of the existence of state controlled media organisations, like the BBC, and on a more subtle level, with the imposition on restrictions as to what can and cannot be published or broadcast.

The media coverage inequality between women and men’s sport is a different issue to that made out by the opposition. Floods in Queensland Australia are more relevant to Australians than Europeans because they are more likely to have been affected by them. Women’s sports, however, are potentially as relevant to people’s lives as men’s sports. The increased participation in women’s sport indicates that media coverage is likely to be relevant to more and more people. Even if this was not the case women’s sport should still get air time; with the internet and digital TV it is wrong to suggest that more coverage of women’s sport will come at the expense of men’s sports as there is enough airspace.

[1] ‘Law ends UK tobacco sponsorship’, BBC News, 31 July 2005.

The government can to a degree cover for any potential drop in funding from private sector sources. Focus can remain on developing grass-roots and sports at schools in order to incentivise new generations of athletes, so the harms mentioned by the opposition will by and large not occur. In time, popularity of women’s sport will increase such that it will once again attract large lucrative TV rights deals and large investments from sponsors.

It must also be mentioned that the opposition to an extent present a false dichotomy with their argument. Increased coverage of women’s sport need not take valuable air time away from more popular men’s sport in the way the opposition claims. Matches can be scheduled so that they do not clash with each other, and more TV channels can be created (such as the BBC’s red button service). Additionally, air-time is often packed trivial stories and programs other than popular men’s sporting events. Examples from American TV include reports ‘on supremely unhealthy hamburgers on sale at a minor league baseball parks or basketball star Shaquille O’Neal’s contest with a 93-year-old woman’ [1]. Such programs could easily and painlessly be replaced with women’s sporting news or live broadcasting.

[1] Deggans, Eric: “Continued apathy by sports media toward women’s sport a bigger problem than first meets the eye”, National Sports Journalism Centre, June 8 2010.

It is true that it is difficult to decide where to draw the line between legitimate and illegitimate performance enhancement. However we should continue to draw a line nonetheless. This line should be drawn at protecting athletes from harmful drugs and preserving the spirit of fair play and unaided competition between human beings in their peak of natural fitness.

The special diet and sport training equipment, which may seem very hard and exeptional, have been designed based on serious scientific research proved and tested to fit with long-term training of athletes. Hard practice to achieve the best performance with help of these professional methods is completely a different from taking steroids and growth hormones for immediate result.

Football has operated successfully for over 100 years without GLT. Two assistant referees were introduced in 1891, 28 years after the rules of association football were coined; a fourth official was introduced in 1991; and FIFA recently introduced two additional assistant referees in Europa League games. Football has demonstrated that it is willing and capable to adjust to the demands of wider exposure without having to resort to GLT.

Bullfighting is not about torturing for enjoyment; clean and quick kills are what is prized most by the bullfighting community. If a matador fails to deliver such a kill, and the bull suffers needlessly, then he will be jeered and shamed. This dynamic demonstrates a clear sense of decency within the bullfighting community.(8)

It is naïve to pretend that the alternative for bulls and cows is a long, happy life in the meadows and then a natural death. Rather, bulls and cows are kept and bred for their meat and eventual slaughter, a process which can be made to seem just as horrific as bullfighting if the same descriptive language is used. There is no significant moral difference between watching a bull die in a bullfight for enjoyment and having a cow killed to make meat so people can enjoy eating it. Must not it be so, according to Bentham's logic, that eating meat for enjoyment displays as much 'want of humanity' as bullfighting? Indeed, in many ways bullfighting is at least more honest: the violence is clear and there for all to see, whereas the death of the cow is hidden from the consumer of a hamburger. Bullfighting is in no way uniquely cruel or even more cruel than eating meat, and so to ban it would be unjustified.

If a play is part of a longer sequence of events, then don’t use video review for that play. Only permit it for when the ball is dead or play stops immediately upon the conclusion of the play. Continuation plays can easily be placed outside the scope of instant replay.

Also, there’s no such thing as “normative” calls on a play. If an umpire deems a “phantom tag” sufficient for an out, he is making an incorrect call. The rules do not allow for phantom tags. If instant replay puts an end to this practice, so much the better.

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
It is good for the development of home-grown players and therefore, the quality of domestic leagues

Limiting the number of overseas players will be good for home-grown sportsmen. At present only a tiny handful of the best native players will get a chance to play for top clubs due to their profit and success motives. This means that talented young players see no reason to work hard and develop their game, because it is so unlikely they will get a chance to play at the top level. And clubs don’t have a reason to seek out local youngsters and train them, as it is easier to buy a fully trained player from abroad. Limiting the number of foreign players would create incentives for both players and clubs to make the most of their talents. As a result, domestic crowds would rise as quality would improve proportionally with the development of local talent.

Limiting the number of foreign players will weaken the quality of domestic football. Seeing many of the best footballers from around the world competing against each other every week raises the standard of the whole game. Fans want to see their team playing exciting football and winning games – they don’t care whether the players are local boys or not. Youngsters are inspired by foreign heroes and work hard in order to follow in their footsteps, no matter where they were born.

Rich athletes from wealthier countries will always have access to the latest, highest quality performance enhancers. On the other side, athletes from poorer countries which do not have the same medical and scientific advances will not be able to keep up. They will always be at a disadvantage regardless of whether performance enhancing drugs are legal or not.

If we were to look at the two possible outcomes we would see that allowing both males and females to compete against each other would actively decrease discrimination. This happens as, in this situation, we perceive the two sexes as being equal, able to compete against each other, both beginning the race from the same starting line, whereas the alternative would be to draw an imaginary barrier between the two sexes claiming that they are so far apart that competition between them would be futile. Those women who come on top on several occasions, such as Danica Patrick who has won NASCAR competitions (1) will show that all those stereotypes are wrong and that they should have been long forgotten. Of course there will be a lot of women who won’t be able to win anything, but the entire spotlight and all the media coverage will be on the ones who will, so they’ll be getting the lion’s share of media attention. As a result, successful stories of women defeating men in their leagues will come as a megaphone for promoting gender equality in society.

(1) Esteban “9 Female Athletes Who Competed Against Men”, Total Pros Sports, October 28, 2011 http://www.totalprosports.com/2011/10/28/9-female-athletes-who-competed-against-men/

Simple analogy: If a person were to kill himself for the sake of entertaining the crowd, this act would still be considered illegal by the government and efforts to hinder and discourage it would be created.

An appropriate example is the one of dangers of alcohol and tobacco, which were not known until after they had become normalized in society. Once the dangers were known, the public were so used to it, that they wouldn’t condone a ban by the State. If alcohol were introduced tomorrow it would be banned, as shown by the attitude towards narcotics and steroid use has shown. Governments have tried to reduce sales by having high levels of tax on tobacco and alcohol anyway. Moreover many states are restricting choice in tobacco and alcohol by introducing limited bans, such as on smoking in public places. The proposition cannot use the fact that tobacco and alcohol are legal as a defense of the use of drugs. This should be seen as an equally detrimental act and thus illegal.

Sport is dangerous. Today’s athletes decide to endanger their lives by participating in sports all the time. They decide to participate in sports with the informed decision that they might get hurt as it is part of the sport. Performance enhancing drugs are no different.

In the USA every year there are nearly 300,000 sports-related traumatic brain injuries (TBIs). Athletes involved in sports such as football, hockey and boxing are at significant risk of TBI due to the high level of contact inherent in these sports. Head injuries are also extremely common in sports such as cycling, baseball, basketball and skateboarding. Many head injuries acquired, playing these sports, lead to permanent brain damage or worse. Yet we do not impose a law to ban athletes from participating in those sports. We trust their assessment of risk (1).

All about Traumatic Brain Injuries: http://www.allabouttbi.com/sports-related-traumatic-brain-injury/ , accessed 05/15/2011

The media can and often is used as a tool for public policy. Examples of this include the broadcasting of public information campaigns against drink-driving or smoking or else bans on certain advertising such as smoking advertisements or sponsorship appearing on TV.[1] What’s more the government has a huge influence in what it deems to be worthwhile news or television programs and documentaries. This is because of the existence of state controlled media organisations, like the BBC, and on a more subtle level, with the imposition on restrictions as to what can and cannot be published or broadcast.

The media coverage inequality between women and men’s sport is a different issue to that made out by the opposition. Floods in Queensland Australia are more relevant to Australians than Europeans because they are more likely to have been affected by them. Women’s sports, however, are potentially as relevant to people’s lives as men’s sports. The increased participation in women’s sport indicates that media coverage is likely to be relevant to more and more people. Even if this was not the case women’s sport should still get air time; with the internet and digital TV it is wrong to suggest that more coverage of women’s sport will come at the expense of men’s sports as there is enough airspace.

[1] ‘Law ends UK tobacco sponsorship’, BBC News, 31 July 2005.

The government can to a degree cover for any potential drop in funding from private sector sources. Focus can remain on developing grass-roots and sports at schools in order to incentivise new generations of athletes, so the harms mentioned by the opposition will by and large not occur. In time, popularity of women’s sport will increase such that it will once again attract large lucrative TV rights deals and large investments from sponsors.

It must also be mentioned that the opposition to an extent present a false dichotomy with their argument. Increased coverage of women’s sport need not take valuable air time away from more popular men’s sport in the way the opposition claims. Matches can be scheduled so that they do not clash with each other, and more TV channels can be created (such as the BBC’s red button service). Additionally, air-time is often packed trivial stories and programs other than popular men’s sporting events. Examples from American TV include reports ‘on supremely unhealthy hamburgers on sale at a minor league baseball parks or basketball star Shaquille O’Neal’s contest with a 93-year-old woman’ [1]. Such programs could easily and painlessly be replaced with women’s sporting news or live broadcasting.

[1] Deggans, Eric: “Continued apathy by sports media toward women’s sport a bigger problem than first meets the eye”, National Sports Journalism Centre, June 8 2010.

It is true that it is difficult to decide where to draw the line between legitimate and illegitimate performance enhancement. However we should continue to draw a line nonetheless. This line should be drawn at protecting athletes from harmful drugs and preserving the spirit of fair play and unaided competition between human beings in their peak of natural fitness.

The special diet and sport training equipment, which may seem very hard and exeptional, have been designed based on serious scientific research proved and tested to fit with long-term training of athletes. Hard practice to achieve the best performance with help of these professional methods is completely a different from taking steroids and growth hormones for immediate result.

Football has operated successfully for over 100 years without GLT. Two assistant referees were introduced in 1891, 28 years after the rules of association football were coined; a fourth official was introduced in 1991; and FIFA recently introduced two additional assistant referees in Europa League games. Football has demonstrated that it is willing and capable to adjust to the demands of wider exposure without having to resort to GLT.

Bullfighting is not about torturing for enjoyment; clean and quick kills are what is prized most by the bullfighting community. If a matador fails to deliver such a kill, and the bull suffers needlessly, then he will be jeered and shamed. This dynamic demonstrates a clear sense of decency within the bullfighting community.(8)

It is naïve to pretend that the alternative for bulls and cows is a long, happy life in the meadows and then a natural death. Rather, bulls and cows are kept and bred for their meat and eventual slaughter, a process which can be made to seem just as horrific as bullfighting if the same descriptive language is used. There is no significant moral difference between watching a bull die in a bullfight for enjoyment and having a cow killed to make meat so people can enjoy eating it. Must not it be so, according to Bentham's logic, that eating meat for enjoyment displays as much 'want of humanity' as bullfighting? Indeed, in many ways bullfighting is at least more honest: the violence is clear and there for all to see, whereas the death of the cow is hidden from the consumer of a hamburger. Bullfighting is in no way uniquely cruel or even more cruel than eating meat, and so to ban it would be unjustified.

If a play is part of a longer sequence of events, then don’t use video review for that play. Only permit it for when the ball is dead or play stops immediately upon the conclusion of the play. Continuation plays can easily be placed outside the scope of instant replay.

Also, there’s no such thing as “normative” calls on a play. If an umpire deems a “phantom tag” sufficient for an out, he is making an incorrect call. The rules do not allow for phantom tags. If instant replay puts an end to this practice, so much the better.

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
Restrictions would prevent the poaching of the best youngsters from poor nations

This plan would be good for world football. At present poorer nations (e.g. in Africa or South America), or those where football isn’t as well developed (e.g. Australia, the USA), lose all their best players at an early age to the rich European leagues. This weakens their own leagues and can lead to the public losing interest in football. Poor quality games and loss of public support for domestic clubs also means little money comes into the game from ticket sales, television or sponsorship, so nothing goes into grounds, training or youth systems. It is also hard to put a good national side together when the best players hardly ever spend any time in their own country.

The youngsters from poor nations who excel in Europe do so because of their move, not irrespective of it. It is a fallacy to suggest that all players develop in a vacuum, that their ability is irrespective of their development opportunities. For the best youngers in poor and under-developed nations, being poached by the rich European clubs is a way out, a means to realising their obvious talent. Taking away that source risks wasting not only a precocious young talent but also denying him the opportunity to escape the cycle of poverty. Furthermore, it can be expected that the poached youngsters will give back to their host countries, in the form of national team appearances and domestic league endorsements, later in their careers.

Rich athletes from wealthier countries will always have access to the latest, highest quality performance enhancers. On the other side, athletes from poorer countries which do not have the same medical and scientific advances will not be able to keep up. They will always be at a disadvantage regardless of whether performance enhancing drugs are legal or not.

If we were to look at the two possible outcomes we would see that allowing both males and females to compete against each other would actively decrease discrimination. This happens as, in this situation, we perceive the two sexes as being equal, able to compete against each other, both beginning the race from the same starting line, whereas the alternative would be to draw an imaginary barrier between the two sexes claiming that they are so far apart that competition between them would be futile. Those women who come on top on several occasions, such as Danica Patrick who has won NASCAR competitions (1) will show that all those stereotypes are wrong and that they should have been long forgotten. Of course there will be a lot of women who won’t be able to win anything, but the entire spotlight and all the media coverage will be on the ones who will, so they’ll be getting the lion’s share of media attention. As a result, successful stories of women defeating men in their leagues will come as a megaphone for promoting gender equality in society.

(1) Esteban “9 Female Athletes Who Competed Against Men”, Total Pros Sports, October 28, 2011 http://www.totalprosports.com/2011/10/28/9-female-athletes-who-competed-against-men/

Simple analogy: If a person were to kill himself for the sake of entertaining the crowd, this act would still be considered illegal by the government and efforts to hinder and discourage it would be created.

An appropriate example is the one of dangers of alcohol and tobacco, which were not known until after they had become normalized in society. Once the dangers were known, the public were so used to it, that they wouldn’t condone a ban by the State. If alcohol were introduced tomorrow it would be banned, as shown by the attitude towards narcotics and steroid use has shown. Governments have tried to reduce sales by having high levels of tax on tobacco and alcohol anyway. Moreover many states are restricting choice in tobacco and alcohol by introducing limited bans, such as on smoking in public places. The proposition cannot use the fact that tobacco and alcohol are legal as a defense of the use of drugs. This should be seen as an equally detrimental act and thus illegal.

Sport is dangerous. Today’s athletes decide to endanger their lives by participating in sports all the time. They decide to participate in sports with the informed decision that they might get hurt as it is part of the sport. Performance enhancing drugs are no different.

In the USA every year there are nearly 300,000 sports-related traumatic brain injuries (TBIs). Athletes involved in sports such as football, hockey and boxing are at significant risk of TBI due to the high level of contact inherent in these sports. Head injuries are also extremely common in sports such as cycling, baseball, basketball and skateboarding. Many head injuries acquired, playing these sports, lead to permanent brain damage or worse. Yet we do not impose a law to ban athletes from participating in those sports. We trust their assessment of risk (1).

All about Traumatic Brain Injuries: http://www.allabouttbi.com/sports-related-traumatic-brain-injury/ , accessed 05/15/2011

The media can and often is used as a tool for public policy. Examples of this include the broadcasting of public information campaigns against drink-driving or smoking or else bans on certain advertising such as smoking advertisements or sponsorship appearing on TV.[1] What’s more the government has a huge influence in what it deems to be worthwhile news or television programs and documentaries. This is because of the existence of state controlled media organisations, like the BBC, and on a more subtle level, with the imposition on restrictions as to what can and cannot be published or broadcast.

The media coverage inequality between women and men’s sport is a different issue to that made out by the opposition. Floods in Queensland Australia are more relevant to Australians than Europeans because they are more likely to have been affected by them. Women’s sports, however, are potentially as relevant to people’s lives as men’s sports. The increased participation in women’s sport indicates that media coverage is likely to be relevant to more and more people. Even if this was not the case women’s sport should still get air time; with the internet and digital TV it is wrong to suggest that more coverage of women’s sport will come at the expense of men’s sports as there is enough airspace.

[1] ‘Law ends UK tobacco sponsorship’, BBC News, 31 July 2005.

The government can to a degree cover for any potential drop in funding from private sector sources. Focus can remain on developing grass-roots and sports at schools in order to incentivise new generations of athletes, so the harms mentioned by the opposition will by and large not occur. In time, popularity of women’s sport will increase such that it will once again attract large lucrative TV rights deals and large investments from sponsors.

It must also be mentioned that the opposition to an extent present a false dichotomy with their argument. Increased coverage of women’s sport need not take valuable air time away from more popular men’s sport in the way the opposition claims. Matches can be scheduled so that they do not clash with each other, and more TV channels can be created (such as the BBC’s red button service). Additionally, air-time is often packed trivial stories and programs other than popular men’s sporting events. Examples from American TV include reports ‘on supremely unhealthy hamburgers on sale at a minor league baseball parks or basketball star Shaquille O’Neal’s contest with a 93-year-old woman’ [1]. Such programs could easily and painlessly be replaced with women’s sporting news or live broadcasting.

[1] Deggans, Eric: “Continued apathy by sports media toward women’s sport a bigger problem than first meets the eye”, National Sports Journalism Centre, June 8 2010.

It is true that it is difficult to decide where to draw the line between legitimate and illegitimate performance enhancement. However we should continue to draw a line nonetheless. This line should be drawn at protecting athletes from harmful drugs and preserving the spirit of fair play and unaided competition between human beings in their peak of natural fitness.

The special diet and sport training equipment, which may seem very hard and exeptional, have been designed based on serious scientific research proved and tested to fit with long-term training of athletes. Hard practice to achieve the best performance with help of these professional methods is completely a different from taking steroids and growth hormones for immediate result.

Football has operated successfully for over 100 years without GLT. Two assistant referees were introduced in 1891, 28 years after the rules of association football were coined; a fourth official was introduced in 1991; and FIFA recently introduced two additional assistant referees in Europa League games. Football has demonstrated that it is willing and capable to adjust to the demands of wider exposure without having to resort to GLT.

Bullfighting is not about torturing for enjoyment; clean and quick kills are what is prized most by the bullfighting community. If a matador fails to deliver such a kill, and the bull suffers needlessly, then he will be jeered and shamed. This dynamic demonstrates a clear sense of decency within the bullfighting community.(8)

It is naïve to pretend that the alternative for bulls and cows is a long, happy life in the meadows and then a natural death. Rather, bulls and cows are kept and bred for their meat and eventual slaughter, a process which can be made to seem just as horrific as bullfighting if the same descriptive language is used. There is no significant moral difference between watching a bull die in a bullfight for enjoyment and having a cow killed to make meat so people can enjoy eating it. Must not it be so, according to Bentham's logic, that eating meat for enjoyment displays as much 'want of humanity' as bullfighting? Indeed, in many ways bullfighting is at least more honest: the violence is clear and there for all to see, whereas the death of the cow is hidden from the consumer of a hamburger. Bullfighting is in no way uniquely cruel or even more cruel than eating meat, and so to ban it would be unjustified.

If a play is part of a longer sequence of events, then don’t use video review for that play. Only permit it for when the ball is dead or play stops immediately upon the conclusion of the play. Continuation plays can easily be placed outside the scope of instant replay.

Also, there’s no such thing as “normative” calls on a play. If an umpire deems a “phantom tag” sufficient for an out, he is making an incorrect call. The rules do not allow for phantom tags. If instant replay puts an end to this practice, so much the better.

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
Restrictions are unnecessary

This plan is unnecessary – Manchester United is one of the most successful club sides and often fields more locally-born players than its rivals. Most big clubs are working hard to build strong football academies to bring talented youngsters through. The logic is simple, home-grown youngsters can be developed much more cheaply and easily than foreigners. In any case, money will still remain vital to success – this plan would mean that the richest clubs will simply pay silly sums of money to buy up all the best local players. Therefore, competition within domestic leagues would not even up, it would simply lead to a re-shuffling of the best home-grown talent. Really the FIFA proposal is just an attack on English football clubs as they have been so successful recently. The issue wasn’t raised previously when Italian and Spanish club sides dominated European competitions.

Competition would actually improve if foreign players were less common. At the moment the richest clubs can buy up all the best global players and so dominate domestic competitions – often no more than two or three teams have a real chance of winning the big European leagues. This makes tournaments predictable and boring, while clubs become the playthings of billionaire owners. Even international club competitions like the European Champions League are now dominated by just a few teams – in 2008 three of the four semi-finalists and both finalists were English. Forcing clubs to develop home-grown talent would level the playing field, make money less vital, and give more teams a chance to compete for top honours. This would inadvertently drive players to get better, because there would be fewer short-term fixes available to a team’s poor form.

Rich athletes from wealthier countries will always have access to the latest, highest quality performance enhancers. On the other side, athletes from poorer countries which do not have the same medical and scientific advances will not be able to keep up. They will always be at a disadvantage regardless of whether performance enhancing drugs are legal or not.

If we were to look at the two possible outcomes we would see that allowing both males and females to compete against each other would actively decrease discrimination. This happens as, in this situation, we perceive the two sexes as being equal, able to compete against each other, both beginning the race from the same starting line, whereas the alternative would be to draw an imaginary barrier between the two sexes claiming that they are so far apart that competition between them would be futile. Those women who come on top on several occasions, such as Danica Patrick who has won NASCAR competitions (1) will show that all those stereotypes are wrong and that they should have been long forgotten. Of course there will be a lot of women who won’t be able to win anything, but the entire spotlight and all the media coverage will be on the ones who will, so they’ll be getting the lion’s share of media attention. As a result, successful stories of women defeating men in their leagues will come as a megaphone for promoting gender equality in society.

(1) Esteban “9 Female Athletes Who Competed Against Men”, Total Pros Sports, October 28, 2011 http://www.totalprosports.com/2011/10/28/9-female-athletes-who-competed-against-men/

Simple analogy: If a person were to kill himself for the sake of entertaining the crowd, this act would still be considered illegal by the government and efforts to hinder and discourage it would be created.

An appropriate example is the one of dangers of alcohol and tobacco, which were not known until after they had become normalized in society. Once the dangers were known, the public were so used to it, that they wouldn’t condone a ban by the State. If alcohol were introduced tomorrow it would be banned, as shown by the attitude towards narcotics and steroid use has shown. Governments have tried to reduce sales by having high levels of tax on tobacco and alcohol anyway. Moreover many states are restricting choice in tobacco and alcohol by introducing limited bans, such as on smoking in public places. The proposition cannot use the fact that tobacco and alcohol are legal as a defense of the use of drugs. This should be seen as an equally detrimental act and thus illegal.

Sport is dangerous. Today’s athletes decide to endanger their lives by participating in sports all the time. They decide to participate in sports with the informed decision that they might get hurt as it is part of the sport. Performance enhancing drugs are no different.

In the USA every year there are nearly 300,000 sports-related traumatic brain injuries (TBIs). Athletes involved in sports such as football, hockey and boxing are at significant risk of TBI due to the high level of contact inherent in these sports. Head injuries are also extremely common in sports such as cycling, baseball, basketball and skateboarding. Many head injuries acquired, playing these sports, lead to permanent brain damage or worse. Yet we do not impose a law to ban athletes from participating in those sports. We trust their assessment of risk (1).

All about Traumatic Brain Injuries: http://www.allabouttbi.com/sports-related-traumatic-brain-injury/ , accessed 05/15/2011

The media can and often is used as a tool for public policy. Examples of this include the broadcasting of public information campaigns against drink-driving or smoking or else bans on certain advertising such as smoking advertisements or sponsorship appearing on TV.[1] What’s more the government has a huge influence in what it deems to be worthwhile news or television programs and documentaries. This is because of the existence of state controlled media organisations, like the BBC, and on a more subtle level, with the imposition on restrictions as to what can and cannot be published or broadcast.

The media coverage inequality between women and men’s sport is a different issue to that made out by the opposition. Floods in Queensland Australia are more relevant to Australians than Europeans because they are more likely to have been affected by them. Women’s sports, however, are potentially as relevant to people’s lives as men’s sports. The increased participation in women’s sport indicates that media coverage is likely to be relevant to more and more people. Even if this was not the case women’s sport should still get air time; with the internet and digital TV it is wrong to suggest that more coverage of women’s sport will come at the expense of men’s sports as there is enough airspace.

[1] ‘Law ends UK tobacco sponsorship’, BBC News, 31 July 2005.

The government can to a degree cover for any potential drop in funding from private sector sources. Focus can remain on developing grass-roots and sports at schools in order to incentivise new generations of athletes, so the harms mentioned by the opposition will by and large not occur. In time, popularity of women’s sport will increase such that it will once again attract large lucrative TV rights deals and large investments from sponsors.

It must also be mentioned that the opposition to an extent present a false dichotomy with their argument. Increased coverage of women’s sport need not take valuable air time away from more popular men’s sport in the way the opposition claims. Matches can be scheduled so that they do not clash with each other, and more TV channels can be created (such as the BBC’s red button service). Additionally, air-time is often packed trivial stories and programs other than popular men’s sporting events. Examples from American TV include reports ‘on supremely unhealthy hamburgers on sale at a minor league baseball parks or basketball star Shaquille O’Neal’s contest with a 93-year-old woman’ [1]. Such programs could easily and painlessly be replaced with women’s sporting news or live broadcasting.

[1] Deggans, Eric: “Continued apathy by sports media toward women’s sport a bigger problem than first meets the eye”, National Sports Journalism Centre, June 8 2010.

It is true that it is difficult to decide where to draw the line between legitimate and illegitimate performance enhancement. However we should continue to draw a line nonetheless. This line should be drawn at protecting athletes from harmful drugs and preserving the spirit of fair play and unaided competition between human beings in their peak of natural fitness.

The special diet and sport training equipment, which may seem very hard and exeptional, have been designed based on serious scientific research proved and tested to fit with long-term training of athletes. Hard practice to achieve the best performance with help of these professional methods is completely a different from taking steroids and growth hormones for immediate result.

Football has operated successfully for over 100 years without GLT. Two assistant referees were introduced in 1891, 28 years after the rules of association football were coined; a fourth official was introduced in 1991; and FIFA recently introduced two additional assistant referees in Europa League games. Football has demonstrated that it is willing and capable to adjust to the demands of wider exposure without having to resort to GLT.

Bullfighting is not about torturing for enjoyment; clean and quick kills are what is prized most by the bullfighting community. If a matador fails to deliver such a kill, and the bull suffers needlessly, then he will be jeered and shamed. This dynamic demonstrates a clear sense of decency within the bullfighting community.(8)

It is naïve to pretend that the alternative for bulls and cows is a long, happy life in the meadows and then a natural death. Rather, bulls and cows are kept and bred for their meat and eventual slaughter, a process which can be made to seem just as horrific as bullfighting if the same descriptive language is used. There is no significant moral difference between watching a bull die in a bullfight for enjoyment and having a cow killed to make meat so people can enjoy eating it. Must not it be so, according to Bentham's logic, that eating meat for enjoyment displays as much 'want of humanity' as bullfighting? Indeed, in many ways bullfighting is at least more honest: the violence is clear and there for all to see, whereas the death of the cow is hidden from the consumer of a hamburger. Bullfighting is in no way uniquely cruel or even more cruel than eating meat, and so to ban it would be unjustified.

If a play is part of a longer sequence of events, then don’t use video review for that play. Only permit it for when the ball is dead or play stops immediately upon the conclusion of the play. Continuation plays can easily be placed outside the scope of instant replay.

Also, there’s no such thing as “normative” calls on a play. If an umpire deems a “phantom tag” sufficient for an out, he is making an incorrect call. The rules do not allow for phantom tags. If instant replay puts an end to this practice, so much the better.

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
It is illegal under European Union law.

FIFA’s plan is illegal under European Union rules: ‘The implementation by FIFA of this proposal in the European Union would violate EU law. The Commission is not considering any change to allow FIFA to push forward this idea. FIFA is aware of this fact.’ [1] . The rules say that you can’t discriminate against people from other EU countries on the grounds of their nationality - exactly what the six-plus-five plan would do. And the EU has agreements in place allowing people from non-EU European countries like Switzerland and Norway to work freely in EU states, plus a lot of countries in Africa and the Caribbean as well. This means most of the overseas players currently with European clubs would be able to take FIFA to court if it tried to put its plan into practice. And if six-plus-five won’t work in Europe, there is no point applying it elsewhere.

[1] BBC Sport. (2008, May 30). FIFA backs Blatter on quota plan. Retrieved May 10, 2011, from BBC Sport: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/europe/7421348.stm

The six-plus-five plan is not banned under EU law. Although it would be illegal to stop clubs in Europe from employing as many overseas players as they wish, this is not what the plan proposes. It simply puts a limit of five on how many foreign players can start a game – so clubs can employ as many foreigners as they want, they just can’t play more than five of them at the same time. Given the tactical use of reserves and the squad rotation common in modern football, clubs are likely to keep signing overseas players. But under FIFA’s plan domestic players will still be given more of a chance than they are now. As the head of the Institute of European Affairs states: "The key aim of the six-plus-five rule in the view of the experts is the creation and assurance of sporting competition. The six-plus-five rule does not impinge on the core area of the right to freedom of movement. The rule is merely a rule of the game declared in the general interest of sport in order to improve the sporting balance between clubs and associations" [1]

[1] Times Online. (2009, February 26). Fifa's six-plus-five rule is not illegal, claims report. Retrieved May 10, 2011, from Times Online: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/premier_league/article58...

Rich athletes from wealthier countries will always have access to the latest, highest quality performance enhancers. On the other side, athletes from poorer countries which do not have the same medical and scientific advances will not be able to keep up. They will always be at a disadvantage regardless of whether performance enhancing drugs are legal or not.

If we were to look at the two possible outcomes we would see that allowing both males and females to compete against each other would actively decrease discrimination. This happens as, in this situation, we perceive the two sexes as being equal, able to compete against each other, both beginning the race from the same starting line, whereas the alternative would be to draw an imaginary barrier between the two sexes claiming that they are so far apart that competition between them would be futile. Those women who come on top on several occasions, such as Danica Patrick who has won NASCAR competitions (1) will show that all those stereotypes are wrong and that they should have been long forgotten. Of course there will be a lot of women who won’t be able to win anything, but the entire spotlight and all the media coverage will be on the ones who will, so they’ll be getting the lion’s share of media attention. As a result, successful stories of women defeating men in their leagues will come as a megaphone for promoting gender equality in society.

(1) Esteban “9 Female Athletes Who Competed Against Men”, Total Pros Sports, October 28, 2011 http://www.totalprosports.com/2011/10/28/9-female-athletes-who-competed-against-men/

Simple analogy: If a person were to kill himself for the sake of entertaining the crowd, this act would still be considered illegal by the government and efforts to hinder and discourage it would be created.

An appropriate example is the one of dangers of alcohol and tobacco, which were not known until after they had become normalized in society. Once the dangers were known, the public were so used to it, that they wouldn’t condone a ban by the State. If alcohol were introduced tomorrow it would be banned, as shown by the attitude towards narcotics and steroid use has shown. Governments have tried to reduce sales by having high levels of tax on tobacco and alcohol anyway. Moreover many states are restricting choice in tobacco and alcohol by introducing limited bans, such as on smoking in public places. The proposition cannot use the fact that tobacco and alcohol are legal as a defense of the use of drugs. This should be seen as an equally detrimental act and thus illegal.

Sport is dangerous. Today’s athletes decide to endanger their lives by participating in sports all the time. They decide to participate in sports with the informed decision that they might get hurt as it is part of the sport. Performance enhancing drugs are no different.

In the USA every year there are nearly 300,000 sports-related traumatic brain injuries (TBIs). Athletes involved in sports such as football, hockey and boxing are at significant risk of TBI due to the high level of contact inherent in these sports. Head injuries are also extremely common in sports such as cycling, baseball, basketball and skateboarding. Many head injuries acquired, playing these sports, lead to permanent brain damage or worse. Yet we do not impose a law to ban athletes from participating in those sports. We trust their assessment of risk (1).

All about Traumatic Brain Injuries: http://www.allabouttbi.com/sports-related-traumatic-brain-injury/ , accessed 05/15/2011

The media can and often is used as a tool for public policy. Examples of this include the broadcasting of public information campaigns against drink-driving or smoking or else bans on certain advertising such as smoking advertisements or sponsorship appearing on TV.[1] What’s more the government has a huge influence in what it deems to be worthwhile news or television programs and documentaries. This is because of the existence of state controlled media organisations, like the BBC, and on a more subtle level, with the imposition on restrictions as to what can and cannot be published or broadcast.

The media coverage inequality between women and men’s sport is a different issue to that made out by the opposition. Floods in Queensland Australia are more relevant to Australians than Europeans because they are more likely to have been affected by them. Women’s sports, however, are potentially as relevant to people’s lives as men’s sports. The increased participation in women’s sport indicates that media coverage is likely to be relevant to more and more people. Even if this was not the case women’s sport should still get air time; with the internet and digital TV it is wrong to suggest that more coverage of women’s sport will come at the expense of men’s sports as there is enough airspace.

[1] ‘Law ends UK tobacco sponsorship’, BBC News, 31 July 2005.

The government can to a degree cover for any potential drop in funding from private sector sources. Focus can remain on developing grass-roots and sports at schools in order to incentivise new generations of athletes, so the harms mentioned by the opposition will by and large not occur. In time, popularity of women’s sport will increase such that it will once again attract large lucrative TV rights deals and large investments from sponsors.

It must also be mentioned that the opposition to an extent present a false dichotomy with their argument. Increased coverage of women’s sport need not take valuable air time away from more popular men’s sport in the way the opposition claims. Matches can be scheduled so that they do not clash with each other, and more TV channels can be created (such as the BBC’s red button service). Additionally, air-time is often packed trivial stories and programs other than popular men’s sporting events. Examples from American TV include reports ‘on supremely unhealthy hamburgers on sale at a minor league baseball parks or basketball star Shaquille O’Neal’s contest with a 93-year-old woman’ [1]. Such programs could easily and painlessly be replaced with women’s sporting news or live broadcasting.

[1] Deggans, Eric: “Continued apathy by sports media toward women’s sport a bigger problem than first meets the eye”, National Sports Journalism Centre, June 8 2010.

It is true that it is difficult to decide where to draw the line between legitimate and illegitimate performance enhancement. However we should continue to draw a line nonetheless. This line should be drawn at protecting athletes from harmful drugs and preserving the spirit of fair play and unaided competition between human beings in their peak of natural fitness.

The special diet and sport training equipment, which may seem very hard and exeptional, have been designed based on serious scientific research proved and tested to fit with long-term training of athletes. Hard practice to achieve the best performance with help of these professional methods is completely a different from taking steroids and growth hormones for immediate result.

Football has operated successfully for over 100 years without GLT. Two assistant referees were introduced in 1891, 28 years after the rules of association football were coined; a fourth official was introduced in 1991; and FIFA recently introduced two additional assistant referees in Europa League games. Football has demonstrated that it is willing and capable to adjust to the demands of wider exposure without having to resort to GLT.

Bullfighting is not about torturing for enjoyment; clean and quick kills are what is prized most by the bullfighting community. If a matador fails to deliver such a kill, and the bull suffers needlessly, then he will be jeered and shamed. This dynamic demonstrates a clear sense of decency within the bullfighting community.(8)

It is naïve to pretend that the alternative for bulls and cows is a long, happy life in the meadows and then a natural death. Rather, bulls and cows are kept and bred for their meat and eventual slaughter, a process which can be made to seem just as horrific as bullfighting if the same descriptive language is used. There is no significant moral difference between watching a bull die in a bullfight for enjoyment and having a cow killed to make meat so people can enjoy eating it. Must not it be so, according to Bentham's logic, that eating meat for enjoyment displays as much 'want of humanity' as bullfighting? Indeed, in many ways bullfighting is at least more honest: the violence is clear and there for all to see, whereas the death of the cow is hidden from the consumer of a hamburger. Bullfighting is in no way uniquely cruel or even more cruel than eating meat, and so to ban it would be unjustified.

If a play is part of a longer sequence of events, then don’t use video review for that play. Only permit it for when the ball is dead or play stops immediately upon the conclusion of the play. Continuation plays can easily be placed outside the scope of instant replay.

Also, there’s no such thing as “normative” calls on a play. If an umpire deems a “phantom tag” sufficient for an out, he is making an incorrect call. The rules do not allow for phantom tags. If instant replay puts an end to this practice, so much the better.

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
It doesn’t solve the problem of protecting countries outside of Europe from losing players

In practice this plan will do nothing for football in countries outside Europe. Already many overseas players have dual nationality (which is especially easy to obtain for South American players wanting to play in Spain or Portugal). Other players are from countries (e.g. South Africa, Caribbean states) with labour agreements with the EU and can work freely in European countries. Both groups would be able to claim that they didn’t count as overseas players under the FIFA plan, so little would change. One danger is that many good players will completely switch nationality in order to play overseas, and so not be qualified for their original country at all in future. And what FIFA plans to do about the many Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish footballers playing for English teams is very unclear. Would they be banned from playing in their own country?

There is already a problem with talented teenagers from Africa and other poorer countries being recruited by rich European clubs to train at their academies. This takes them far away from family and friends and ties them into long contracts they don’t understand – some have called it a form of slavery. And if they get injured or turn out to be not quite good enough, then they can be thrown out without proper support. At the same time, poorer footballing countries are deprived of many of their most promising players, without even getting the transfer money paid when adult players move to a new club overseas. The FIFA plan is a step towards preventing such exploitation, the fact it doesn’t solve the problem completely does not prevent it from being a good first step.

Rich athletes from wealthier countries will always have access to the latest, highest quality performance enhancers. On the other side, athletes from poorer countries which do not have the same medical and scientific advances will not be able to keep up. They will always be at a disadvantage regardless of whether performance enhancing drugs are legal or not.

If we were to look at the two possible outcomes we would see that allowing both males and females to compete against each other would actively decrease discrimination. This happens as, in this situation, we perceive the two sexes as being equal, able to compete against each other, both beginning the race from the same starting line, whereas the alternative would be to draw an imaginary barrier between the two sexes claiming that they are so far apart that competition between them would be futile. Those women who come on top on several occasions, such as Danica Patrick who has won NASCAR competitions (1) will show that all those stereotypes are wrong and that they should have been long forgotten. Of course there will be a lot of women who won’t be able to win anything, but the entire spotlight and all the media coverage will be on the ones who will, so they’ll be getting the lion’s share of media attention. As a result, successful stories of women defeating men in their leagues will come as a megaphone for promoting gender equality in society.

(1) Esteban “9 Female Athletes Who Competed Against Men”, Total Pros Sports, October 28, 2011 http://www.totalprosports.com/2011/10/28/9-female-athletes-who-competed-against-men/

Simple analogy: If a person were to kill himself for the sake of entertaining the crowd, this act would still be considered illegal by the government and efforts to hinder and discourage it would be created.

An appropriate example is the one of dangers of alcohol and tobacco, which were not known until after they had become normalized in society. Once the dangers were known, the public were so used to it, that they wouldn’t condone a ban by the State. If alcohol were introduced tomorrow it would be banned, as shown by the attitude towards narcotics and steroid use has shown. Governments have tried to reduce sales by having high levels of tax on tobacco and alcohol anyway. Moreover many states are restricting choice in tobacco and alcohol by introducing limited bans, such as on smoking in public places. The proposition cannot use the fact that tobacco and alcohol are legal as a defense of the use of drugs. This should be seen as an equally detrimental act and thus illegal.

Sport is dangerous. Today’s athletes decide to endanger their lives by participating in sports all the time. They decide to participate in sports with the informed decision that they might get hurt as it is part of the sport. Performance enhancing drugs are no different.

In the USA every year there are nearly 300,000 sports-related traumatic brain injuries (TBIs). Athletes involved in sports such as football, hockey and boxing are at significant risk of TBI due to the high level of contact inherent in these sports. Head injuries are also extremely common in sports such as cycling, baseball, basketball and skateboarding. Many head injuries acquired, playing these sports, lead to permanent brain damage or worse. Yet we do not impose a law to ban athletes from participating in those sports. We trust their assessment of risk (1).

All about Traumatic Brain Injuries: http://www.allabouttbi.com/sports-related-traumatic-brain-injury/ , accessed 05/15/2011

The media can and often is used as a tool for public policy. Examples of this include the broadcasting of public information campaigns against drink-driving or smoking or else bans on certain advertising such as smoking advertisements or sponsorship appearing on TV.[1] What’s more the government has a huge influence in what it deems to be worthwhile news or television programs and documentaries. This is because of the existence of state controlled media organisations, like the BBC, and on a more subtle level, with the imposition on restrictions as to what can and cannot be published or broadcast.

The media coverage inequality between women and men’s sport is a different issue to that made out by the opposition. Floods in Queensland Australia are more relevant to Australians than Europeans because they are more likely to have been affected by them. Women’s sports, however, are potentially as relevant to people’s lives as men’s sports. The increased participation in women’s sport indicates that media coverage is likely to be relevant to more and more people. Even if this was not the case women’s sport should still get air time; with the internet and digital TV it is wrong to suggest that more coverage of women’s sport will come at the expense of men’s sports as there is enough airspace.

[1] ‘Law ends UK tobacco sponsorship’, BBC News, 31 July 2005.

The government can to a degree cover for any potential drop in funding from private sector sources. Focus can remain on developing grass-roots and sports at schools in order to incentivise new generations of athletes, so the harms mentioned by the opposition will by and large not occur. In time, popularity of women’s sport will increase such that it will once again attract large lucrative TV rights deals and large investments from sponsors.

It must also be mentioned that the opposition to an extent present a false dichotomy with their argument. Increased coverage of women’s sport need not take valuable air time away from more popular men’s sport in the way the opposition claims. Matches can be scheduled so that they do not clash with each other, and more TV channels can be created (such as the BBC’s red button service). Additionally, air-time is often packed trivial stories and programs other than popular men’s sporting events. Examples from American TV include reports ‘on supremely unhealthy hamburgers on sale at a minor league baseball parks or basketball star Shaquille O’Neal’s contest with a 93-year-old woman’ [1]. Such programs could easily and painlessly be replaced with women’s sporting news or live broadcasting.

[1] Deggans, Eric: “Continued apathy by sports media toward women’s sport a bigger problem than first meets the eye”, National Sports Journalism Centre, June 8 2010.

It is true that it is difficult to decide where to draw the line between legitimate and illegitimate performance enhancement. However we should continue to draw a line nonetheless. This line should be drawn at protecting athletes from harmful drugs and preserving the spirit of fair play and unaided competition between human beings in their peak of natural fitness.

The special diet and sport training equipment, which may seem very hard and exeptional, have been designed based on serious scientific research proved and tested to fit with long-term training of athletes. Hard practice to achieve the best performance with help of these professional methods is completely a different from taking steroids and growth hormones for immediate result.

Football has operated successfully for over 100 years without GLT. Two assistant referees were introduced in 1891, 28 years after the rules of association football were coined; a fourth official was introduced in 1991; and FIFA recently introduced two additional assistant referees in Europa League games. Football has demonstrated that it is willing and capable to adjust to the demands of wider exposure without having to resort to GLT.

Bullfighting is not about torturing for enjoyment; clean and quick kills are what is prized most by the bullfighting community. If a matador fails to deliver such a kill, and the bull suffers needlessly, then he will be jeered and shamed. This dynamic demonstrates a clear sense of decency within the bullfighting community.(8)

It is naïve to pretend that the alternative for bulls and cows is a long, happy life in the meadows and then a natural death. Rather, bulls and cows are kept and bred for their meat and eventual slaughter, a process which can be made to seem just as horrific as bullfighting if the same descriptive language is used. There is no significant moral difference between watching a bull die in a bullfight for enjoyment and having a cow killed to make meat so people can enjoy eating it. Must not it be so, according to Bentham's logic, that eating meat for enjoyment displays as much 'want of humanity' as bullfighting? Indeed, in many ways bullfighting is at least more honest: the violence is clear and there for all to see, whereas the death of the cow is hidden from the consumer of a hamburger. Bullfighting is in no way uniquely cruel or even more cruel than eating meat, and so to ban it would be unjustified.

If a play is part of a longer sequence of events, then don’t use video review for that play. Only permit it for when the ball is dead or play stops immediately upon the conclusion of the play. Continuation plays can easily be placed outside the scope of instant replay.

Also, there’s no such thing as “normative” calls on a play. If an umpire deems a “phantom tag” sufficient for an out, he is making an incorrect call. The rules do not allow for phantom tags. If instant replay puts an end to this practice, so much the better.

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
Spending on youth is best for the economy

Spending on young people is an investment. While there may be other objectives too, such as taking young people off the street to prevent trouble, when there is spending on young people this is almost always to ensure they have either a broader, or more focused skill base. This is done through education, training, and apprenticeships. Having a better skilled workforce has a beneficial effect on economic growth. This means that there are several economic benefits to spending on youth; there is the initial fiscal benefit from the spending on youth followed over years and decades by a return on the investment from having higher skilled workers. This higher skilled workforce will then over time pay back the initial investment through paying more tax as a result of being more productive (so earning more). There is then a change from the unemployed youth being a burden on the state and the economy to a contributor.

A study in the US suggests that a 25 year old with little education past 16 and no job will cost the taxpayer $258,000 over their lifetime. [1] If trained and given a job this can clearly be turned into a gain for the taxpayer and society. This is similar to why it is more beneficial to the economy to spend on infrastructure than simply handing cash out. Both will give a fiscal boost from the money being spent but handing money out won’t bring a return decades later.

[1] Belfield, Clive R., ‘The Economic Value of Opportunity Youth’, Kellogg Foundation, January 2012, http://www.serve.gov/new-images/council/pdf/econ_value_opportunity_youth.pdf , p.2

What is best for the economy is making sure that government money is spent as efficiently as possible. This may mean taking some money away from spending on youth as well as providing more in some areas. Education for example can be changed to focus more specifically on skills needed for the workplace rather than learning for learning’s sake or could be made more efficient by transferring some learning online. This need not involve more spending on youth but better spending on youth.

The women’s quota is a vital start to tackle underlying inequalities. Quotas of multiple identities such as race, class, age, sexuality, class and ethnicity will need to be included following the implementation of a women’s quota.

Programmes implemented have taken action to reduce costs. The recent government program in Ethiopia has been government-sponsored and used a participatory model to ensure affordability across a large-scale.

The benefits of a free labour market are merely based on an idealistic reality. The CMP has only existed for three years so it is impossible to draw any conclusions. When looking at whether migration enhances productivity questions need to be raised. First, what jobs are provided in the new destination? Are the jobs safe and secure, or within informal employment? Second, where is productivity actually encouraged? Is the distribution occurring across an even geography; and assisting the poor? As yet there are no answers.

It is in the nature of international treaties that they represent a compromise, if it was not a compromise receiving nations were willing to make they should have made changes during the negotiations. However the convention does not impose a heavy burden on states wishing to deport migrants, it simply ensures that their human rights are upheld. Suggestions such as “Migrant workers… who are subjected to any form of detention or imprisonment… shall enjoy the same rights as nationals of those States who are in the same situation.” (Article 17) is simply asking for equality for all rather than allowing the current inequality to continue.

The premise that states that second generation immigrants lack incentive to learn the local language is flawed. Although they might choose to learn in their mother tongue, they will still have a big incentive to learn the local language. Learning the language of the country in which they live will provide to them more opportunities and better integration. Those who find they don’t know the language will take courses to learn the language of the country in which they reside. Most certainly, their friends will not only be from their own community so they will feel obliged to talk German, or English or French. The example of Papua simply shows this is the case; promoting a national language is not incompatible with learning in another language.

Are slums really a key challenge? Estimations on the problem of slums may vary depending on which definition is used. Second, the language of the ‘slum’ matters when analysing and applying solutions (Gilbert, 2007; Jones, 2011). The emotions and stigmatic connotations attached to ‘slum’ enables dangerous aesthetic intervention.

Working towards a ‘city without slums’ neglects how and why slums have occurred and suggests governments can apply quick solutions to rid the problem. National aims to remove ‘slums’ has forced governments to focus on the physical problem - infrastructure and housing deficits - rather than understanding who lives in slums and solutions are needed for the dwellers. There remains a need to understand slums as a space of African urbanism. Slums will be cyclically reinforced unless aspects of power, poverty, and politics, are considered.

The image of the European Union, even on human rights, does not result from how they treat the foreign citizens of some distant country but more on how they treat their own citizens. As with any nation or union of countries the EU’s primary responsibility is to fulfill its duties towards its own citizens. More than that, the social balance and economic stability are much more important factors in the European Union’s image abroad than how the union is treating women in faraway countries. So if we decide to talk about image, granting asylum will not improve nor damage the unions. On the other hand, its duty is to protect the European citizens and many things can still be done in this direction. There is no reason in wanting to help people abroad when you can do so much for your own.

Opponents of the feminist movement have always sought to stereotype feminists in order to reduce their support. That this enterprise is often successful is not an argument against feminism; in any case, many of the women who dislike the label ‘feminist’ turn out to hold what would until recently have been seen as extreme feminist views, such as the belief that women are perfectly capable of competing with men on equal terms. Feminists have always argued that women are just as capable of men; they have campaigned against legal, cultural and social barriers which have worked against women, preventing them from achieving equality.

Actively promoting mother-tongue education for immigrants that are part of a large group will create a segregated society in which people are not able to communicate and relate one to another. Integration will be harder to achieve in these conditions - the state may gain some goodwill from the concession but it is unlikely to last. The difficulty in communicating with the state, even for everyday tasks such a doctor’s appointment, will surely sour relations more. Different languages create a segregated society in which foreigners are not able to integrate.

Secondly, diplomacy and trade matters have no connection with the way immigrants are treated on a minor issue like this. Those immigrants who want to trade and promote links between their old home and their new one will continue to do so regardless.

If we use ‘gender-blind’ recruitment and training, some women will be able to meet the required standards, but most will not. The small number of suitable female candidates set against the additional logistical, regulatory and disciplinary costs associated with integrating them, mean that integration is not worthwhile.

For example, one test of American army officer candidates showed that "only one woman out of 100 could meet a physical standard achieved by 60 out of 100 men” [1]

Some roles such as those of sniper and combat aviator clearly require less physical strength than most active combat roles. Many tasks that combat soldiers must accomplish require high muscle density, which women do not naturally possess. [2] Examples would include carrying a wounded soldier, throwing grenades or digging a trench in hard terrain.

Older and more senior soldiers make up for their reduced physical strength with an increased amount of experience. The same cannot be said for new female recruits.

[1] Gerber, Bradley, ‘Women in the Military and Combat’, Family Problems and Social Change, 1998, Accessed on June 2nd, 2011

[2] ‘Israeli women won’t see combat’, WND, 20 October 2003.

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
The youth are getting a raw deal

In most western countries the ‘baby boomers’ (those who were born between the end of the second world war and the mid-1960s) could be considered to have led a charmed life. They were the beneficiaries of free schooling and university education, then of an expanding economy that provided enough jobs, and finally high pensions. David Willetts, the UK Minister for Universities and Science, estimates that the boomers are set to take out about 118% of what they put in to the welfare state. [1] The current generation on the other hand in some countries are having to pay more for their education and then find there is no job available. To make matters worse they are likely to be paying more for their elders’ pensions (which come out of current workers national insurance not that which was paid in by the boomers themselves) and healthcare and then will have to work longer for a smaller pension themselves. This means that if spending remains on its current trajectory most spending will remain directed at the baby boomers for decades to come.

[1] Reeves, Richard, ‘The Pinch: How the Baby Boomers Stole Their Children’s Future by David Willetts’, The Observer, 7 February 2010, http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/feb/07/the-pinch-david-willetts

It seems a little unfair to blame baby boomers for their fortune in terms of demographics. They were simply lucky to be born when they were. Most countries are already considering the impact of aging; the pension age for example is being raised almost everywhere. And of course it is wrong to suggest that the youth are getting a raw deal in every possible area; for example they have much more technology to play with, and average incomes are much higher than they were when the boomers were young. While the government may not pay for as much for the youth parents and grandparents step in, in the UK £470million is contributed to child trust funds each year by grandparents and they provide an estimated £4billion worth of childcare each year. [1]

[1] Mitchell, Michelle, ‘Debate: Is the baby-boomer generation selfish?’, totalpolitics, http://www.totalpolitics.com/print/5278/debate-is-the-babyboomer-generation-selfish.thtml

The women’s quota is a vital start to tackle underlying inequalities. Quotas of multiple identities such as race, class, age, sexuality, class and ethnicity will need to be included following the implementation of a women’s quota.

Programmes implemented have taken action to reduce costs. The recent government program in Ethiopia has been government-sponsored and used a participatory model to ensure affordability across a large-scale.

The benefits of a free labour market are merely based on an idealistic reality. The CMP has only existed for three years so it is impossible to draw any conclusions. When looking at whether migration enhances productivity questions need to be raised. First, what jobs are provided in the new destination? Are the jobs safe and secure, or within informal employment? Second, where is productivity actually encouraged? Is the distribution occurring across an even geography; and assisting the poor? As yet there are no answers.

It is in the nature of international treaties that they represent a compromise, if it was not a compromise receiving nations were willing to make they should have made changes during the negotiations. However the convention does not impose a heavy burden on states wishing to deport migrants, it simply ensures that their human rights are upheld. Suggestions such as “Migrant workers… who are subjected to any form of detention or imprisonment… shall enjoy the same rights as nationals of those States who are in the same situation.” (Article 17) is simply asking for equality for all rather than allowing the current inequality to continue.

The premise that states that second generation immigrants lack incentive to learn the local language is flawed. Although they might choose to learn in their mother tongue, they will still have a big incentive to learn the local language. Learning the language of the country in which they live will provide to them more opportunities and better integration. Those who find they don’t know the language will take courses to learn the language of the country in which they reside. Most certainly, their friends will not only be from their own community so they will feel obliged to talk German, or English or French. The example of Papua simply shows this is the case; promoting a national language is not incompatible with learning in another language.

Are slums really a key challenge? Estimations on the problem of slums may vary depending on which definition is used. Second, the language of the ‘slum’ matters when analysing and applying solutions (Gilbert, 2007; Jones, 2011). The emotions and stigmatic connotations attached to ‘slum’ enables dangerous aesthetic intervention.

Working towards a ‘city without slums’ neglects how and why slums have occurred and suggests governments can apply quick solutions to rid the problem. National aims to remove ‘slums’ has forced governments to focus on the physical problem - infrastructure and housing deficits - rather than understanding who lives in slums and solutions are needed for the dwellers. There remains a need to understand slums as a space of African urbanism. Slums will be cyclically reinforced unless aspects of power, poverty, and politics, are considered.

The image of the European Union, even on human rights, does not result from how they treat the foreign citizens of some distant country but more on how they treat their own citizens. As with any nation or union of countries the EU’s primary responsibility is to fulfill its duties towards its own citizens. More than that, the social balance and economic stability are much more important factors in the European Union’s image abroad than how the union is treating women in faraway countries. So if we decide to talk about image, granting asylum will not improve nor damage the unions. On the other hand, its duty is to protect the European citizens and many things can still be done in this direction. There is no reason in wanting to help people abroad when you can do so much for your own.

Opponents of the feminist movement have always sought to stereotype feminists in order to reduce their support. That this enterprise is often successful is not an argument against feminism; in any case, many of the women who dislike the label ‘feminist’ turn out to hold what would until recently have been seen as extreme feminist views, such as the belief that women are perfectly capable of competing with men on equal terms. Feminists have always argued that women are just as capable of men; they have campaigned against legal, cultural and social barriers which have worked against women, preventing them from achieving equality.

Actively promoting mother-tongue education for immigrants that are part of a large group will create a segregated society in which people are not able to communicate and relate one to another. Integration will be harder to achieve in these conditions - the state may gain some goodwill from the concession but it is unlikely to last. The difficulty in communicating with the state, even for everyday tasks such a doctor’s appointment, will surely sour relations more. Different languages create a segregated society in which foreigners are not able to integrate.

Secondly, diplomacy and trade matters have no connection with the way immigrants are treated on a minor issue like this. Those immigrants who want to trade and promote links between their old home and their new one will continue to do so regardless.

If we use ‘gender-blind’ recruitment and training, some women will be able to meet the required standards, but most will not. The small number of suitable female candidates set against the additional logistical, regulatory and disciplinary costs associated with integrating them, mean that integration is not worthwhile.

For example, one test of American army officer candidates showed that "only one woman out of 100 could meet a physical standard achieved by 60 out of 100 men” [1]

Some roles such as those of sniper and combat aviator clearly require less physical strength than most active combat roles. Many tasks that combat soldiers must accomplish require high muscle density, which women do not naturally possess. [2] Examples would include carrying a wounded soldier, throwing grenades or digging a trench in hard terrain.

Older and more senior soldiers make up for their reduced physical strength with an increased amount of experience. The same cannot be said for new female recruits.

[1] Gerber, Bradley, ‘Women in the Military and Combat’, Family Problems and Social Change, 1998, Accessed on June 2nd, 2011

[2] ‘Israeli women won’t see combat’, WND, 20 October 2003.

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
The government must do what is in the long term interest of the county

Typically businesses, and most people, think about the short term; how they are going to live or produce a profit over the next few years. This leaves the role of thinking across broader horizons to the government. Governments need to plan to ensure the prosperity of the nation in twenty or even fifty years’ time because many of their current citizens will still be alive. This planning is also necessary because of the length of time that large scale construction projects or social changes take. For example “In the energy sector, investments are made for a period between 20 and 60 years.” [1] Decisions on what kind of power to support, coal, gas, nuclear, or renewables, will still be making an impact in half a century. Clearly when thinking longer term it simply makes sense to focus on younger people as they are going to have an impact for longer. Just the same as in energy policy if a nation makes mistakes with its treatment of its youth it will be feeling the consequences for half a century. It is clearly in the long term interest of the state to invest in its youth.

[1] ‘The Commission's Energy Roadmap 2050’, Europa, 15 December 2011, MEMO/11/914, http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_MEMO-11-914_en.htm

It is unclear that the long term interest of the country really means investing in youth. Instead it should mean anticipating the changes that are necessary to ensure future security, health, and prosperity for every citizen. This is what happens with investing in energy; we anticipate that if we don’t invest in it for the future the lights will go out. But we also need to change along with changing circumstances so taking the comparison with energy further that means not just investing in power generation but in renewable power generation. Considering current demographics this should mean spending more to ensure that health services are ready for an older population and ensuring that pensions are on a stable long term footing rather than more on youth.

The women’s quota is a vital start to tackle underlying inequalities. Quotas of multiple identities such as race, class, age, sexuality, class and ethnicity will need to be included following the implementation of a women’s quota.

Programmes implemented have taken action to reduce costs. The recent government program in Ethiopia has been government-sponsored and used a participatory model to ensure affordability across a large-scale.

The benefits of a free labour market are merely based on an idealistic reality. The CMP has only existed for three years so it is impossible to draw any conclusions. When looking at whether migration enhances productivity questions need to be raised. First, what jobs are provided in the new destination? Are the jobs safe and secure, or within informal employment? Second, where is productivity actually encouraged? Is the distribution occurring across an even geography; and assisting the poor? As yet there are no answers.

It is in the nature of international treaties that they represent a compromise, if it was not a compromise receiving nations were willing to make they should have made changes during the negotiations. However the convention does not impose a heavy burden on states wishing to deport migrants, it simply ensures that their human rights are upheld. Suggestions such as “Migrant workers… who are subjected to any form of detention or imprisonment… shall enjoy the same rights as nationals of those States who are in the same situation.” (Article 17) is simply asking for equality for all rather than allowing the current inequality to continue.

The premise that states that second generation immigrants lack incentive to learn the local language is flawed. Although they might choose to learn in their mother tongue, they will still have a big incentive to learn the local language. Learning the language of the country in which they live will provide to them more opportunities and better integration. Those who find they don’t know the language will take courses to learn the language of the country in which they reside. Most certainly, their friends will not only be from their own community so they will feel obliged to talk German, or English or French. The example of Papua simply shows this is the case; promoting a national language is not incompatible with learning in another language.

Are slums really a key challenge? Estimations on the problem of slums may vary depending on which definition is used. Second, the language of the ‘slum’ matters when analysing and applying solutions (Gilbert, 2007; Jones, 2011). The emotions and stigmatic connotations attached to ‘slum’ enables dangerous aesthetic intervention.

Working towards a ‘city without slums’ neglects how and why slums have occurred and suggests governments can apply quick solutions to rid the problem. National aims to remove ‘slums’ has forced governments to focus on the physical problem - infrastructure and housing deficits - rather than understanding who lives in slums and solutions are needed for the dwellers. There remains a need to understand slums as a space of African urbanism. Slums will be cyclically reinforced unless aspects of power, poverty, and politics, are considered.

The image of the European Union, even on human rights, does not result from how they treat the foreign citizens of some distant country but more on how they treat their own citizens. As with any nation or union of countries the EU’s primary responsibility is to fulfill its duties towards its own citizens. More than that, the social balance and economic stability are much more important factors in the European Union’s image abroad than how the union is treating women in faraway countries. So if we decide to talk about image, granting asylum will not improve nor damage the unions. On the other hand, its duty is to protect the European citizens and many things can still be done in this direction. There is no reason in wanting to help people abroad when you can do so much for your own.

Opponents of the feminist movement have always sought to stereotype feminists in order to reduce their support. That this enterprise is often successful is not an argument against feminism; in any case, many of the women who dislike the label ‘feminist’ turn out to hold what would until recently have been seen as extreme feminist views, such as the belief that women are perfectly capable of competing with men on equal terms. Feminists have always argued that women are just as capable of men; they have campaigned against legal, cultural and social barriers which have worked against women, preventing them from achieving equality.

Actively promoting mother-tongue education for immigrants that are part of a large group will create a segregated society in which people are not able to communicate and relate one to another. Integration will be harder to achieve in these conditions - the state may gain some goodwill from the concession but it is unlikely to last. The difficulty in communicating with the state, even for everyday tasks such a doctor’s appointment, will surely sour relations more. Different languages create a segregated society in which foreigners are not able to integrate.

Secondly, diplomacy and trade matters have no connection with the way immigrants are treated on a minor issue like this. Those immigrants who want to trade and promote links between their old home and their new one will continue to do so regardless.

If we use ‘gender-blind’ recruitment and training, some women will be able to meet the required standards, but most will not. The small number of suitable female candidates set against the additional logistical, regulatory and disciplinary costs associated with integrating them, mean that integration is not worthwhile.

For example, one test of American army officer candidates showed that "only one woman out of 100 could meet a physical standard achieved by 60 out of 100 men” [1]

Some roles such as those of sniper and combat aviator clearly require less physical strength than most active combat roles. Many tasks that combat soldiers must accomplish require high muscle density, which women do not naturally possess. [2] Examples would include carrying a wounded soldier, throwing grenades or digging a trench in hard terrain.

Older and more senior soldiers make up for their reduced physical strength with an increased amount of experience. The same cannot be said for new female recruits.

[1] Gerber, Bradley, ‘Women in the Military and Combat’, Family Problems and Social Change, 1998, Accessed on June 2nd, 2011

[2] ‘Israeli women won’t see combat’, WND, 20 October 2003.

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim