Question: Are Social Media Platforms Beneficial for Our Community?

Resolved: Social Networking Sites Have a Positive Impact on Society

Thank you for the debate, and good luck to my opponent. To begin, I would like to clarify that the title of the article cited by my opponent is "Social Networking Sites Are Neutral and Simply Mirror Society," which suggests that the impact of social networking sites on society is neither inherently positive nor negative.

To address the points made by my opponent, I would like to acknowledge the potential benefits of social networking sites. According to Mrs. Boyd, social networking sites can be used to bring people together, support learning, and provide an outlet for creative expression. For instance, for rural LGBTQ+ youth, social media can be a tool for self-realization and a means to combat depression. Moreover, social media can provide a platform for building and maintaining intimate communities for those who are unable to see friends and family due to social and physical mobility restrictions.

However, my opponent's claims are not backed up with any statistics, and we must weigh the impact of these points. While I do not doubt the validity of these statements, we need to consider the potential negative effects of social networking sites on society.

For instance, social networking sites can provide an easy venue for devastating actions such as bullying, which can have far-reaching negative ramifications. According to the Crimes Against Children Research Center at the University of New Hampshire, nearly 1 in 5 kids have received unwanted sexual solicitations over the internet. Furthermore, the FBI found that the number of known internet predators on social networking websites has more than tripled in a single year.

Social networking sites can also be a major distraction for students and employees, leading to a loss of productivity and academic performance. According to a study by the National Bureau of Economic Research, social media use can reduce student achievement by up to 20 percent.

Moreover, identity theft is a significant issue on social networking sites, as people place their personal information online, which can be used by identity fraudsters. Research shows that one in six 16 to 25-year-olds publishes information about him or herself on the internet that could be used by an identity fraudster.

In conclusion, while social networking sites have some potential benefits, the negative effects outweigh the positive ones. The potential for bullying, distraction, and identity theft on social networking sites is a significant concern, and we must weigh the benefits against the risks. Therefore, I ask you to consider the potential negative impact of social networking sites on society and vote to negate the resolution. Thank you.

Use of social media is taking big emotional and mental tolls on teens. "Negative," says that American University, the research found a link between negative body image and social media, especially among girls. They are bombarded by edited photos that insist they must be perfect. This evidence helps to prove my claim because social media was found to be linked to negative body image. This is an emotional and mental thing that no kid should go through, but they are more because of social media. Edited photos of "perfect girls" are always being seen around in ads, but now it is spreading more through social media. When a girl comes upon it, it could greatly decrease their self-esteem, taking a big emotional toll. The article "Negative" says "It has been linked to increased anxiety, depression, and decreased relationship skills." This evidence helps to prove my claim because the research from this article states that social media has been linked with many negative traits. Increased anxiety and depression have come from social media before, and both are emotionally and mentally exhausting. Decreased relationship skills is another thing that has come from social media. It is bad for many people and it has started now to come from social media. These types of traits developing when teens use social media more often is not a good sign.

Thanks for the compliment. I will address your issues one at a time, and then I will go through my points. 1) Correlation Does Not Mean/Prove Causation. I agree with the above statement of correlation not necessarily proving or meaning causation. As for you claim about the Internet being more good than bad, I disagree with you. 2) Personal Development As for this I will address them each in letter format not to confuse with the number format I am using. a) We could find jobs before the internet existed. If anything, this causes more problems. Not everyone has the internet, or can afford the internet. Internet causes monthly charges and fees as we all know. Therefore, if anything, finding jobs has become more expensive. People could previously just get a newspaper, which is still plausible, and look for a job. b) Resumes can be submitted without the internet as well in person. Regardless, resumes are needed when going to a job interview. c) The same can be done with books. d) I would really like for you to explain your reasoning for gaining confidence via the internet. In my honest opinion, I would say it does the opposite. e) I agree with this. We also have telephones, mail, etc. There are several ways to connect with people. f) This I disagree with. Maybe some specific courses for College and what not, but not regular school. However, regular schools still exist. My main point above is that all the things the internet is doing that you are stating has already existed. As for the economy, I will agree it has benefited the economy. 3) Our world is working and has eliminated lots of negative aspects of the Internet. 3-1) Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012 is act put in place to reduce the amount of illegal activity on the internet. First thing I'd like to state is how this is only applied to the Philippines. It is not a world-wide thing. Also internet restrictions vary from country to country. a) Cybersquatting happens quite often. That's why many companies warn about only to use the login at such and such webpage. However, this is not a big point of mine, if anything it shows problems that exist within the internet. b) Cybersex is all over the internet. Don't believe me? Just type "live sex web cam" in any search engine and you'll get tons of websites that offer these services. c) Child pornography is being attacked I will agree with you, but what about regular pornography? I'll address it more later in my problems with the internet. d) I didn't know identity theft was a big issue within the internet. I don't have anything to argue about this. e) This is everywhere. Just for an example, . http://thepiratebay.se... 3-2) Both Windows, and Macintosh (including iOS) OS' have security features in place to protect, humans from Harmful and Illegal acts/uses online. Are you sure? Can you prove the limitations or the amount of protection it applies? For example, in Microsoft it has a block list for certain websites. This requires the specific website to be know. The child could easily bypass this like the child who bypassed Microsoft's Xbox password feature (web-link #1). I would like for you to cite the amount of security please. Those are my comments to everything you have stated. Now I am going to go with the problems that exist because of the internet. Resources: [1] . http://techcrunch.com... 1) Exercise There is a lack of exercise in today's society. Years ago when there were few electronic distractions such as video-games, internet, television, etc. , people resorted to other solutions for fun - physical activity. I would like to quote from web-link #1 - "The lack of physical activity due to the rise of new technology, especially the internet has also affected the increase of obesity in today's society. According to the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services, today one third of all adults are obese. 16 percent of children and teens are obese, a number which has tripled since 1980. ". So how does this correlate with the internet? Lets read the quote from web-link #2 - "The origins of the Internet date back to research commissioned by the United States government in the 1960s to build robust, fault-tolerant communication via computer networks. While this work, together with work in the United Kingdom and France, led to important precursor networks, they were not the Internet. There is no consensus on the exact date when the modern Internet came into being, but sometime in the early to mid-1980s is considered reasonable. From that point, the network experienced decades of sustained exponential growth as generations of institutional, personal, and mobile computers were connected to it. The funding of a new U. S. backbone by the National Science Foundation in the 1980s, as well as private funding for other commercial backbones, led to worldwide participation in the development of new networking technologies, and the merger of many networks. Though the Internet has been widely used by academia since the 1980s, the commercialization of what was by the 1990s an international network resulted in its popularization and incorporation into virtually every aspect of modern human life. " There we have a correlation of things such as the internet arriving in the 1980's and much more substantially used in our present time, with the rising number of obesity. It is not solely the internet to blame, video games and other things have causes these numbers to rise. However, the internet does contribute towards this trend as stated. Resources: [1] . http://search.yahoo.com... [2] . http://en.wikipedia.org... 2) Black markets These are illegal and are being taken down over time. I will admit to that. However, the internet has made it extremely easy to set one up. All you have to do is create a web page. There was a very famous one of these websites called the silk road. Check the resources out and you'll see how it was created (resource #1), as well as how it finally got stopped. They had tons of things for sale on their market, such as guns, drugs, etc. A more recent one is Bit coin. To quote from the web-link #2 - "In 2012, it was estimated that 4.5% to 9% of all transactions of all bit coin exchanges in the world were for drugs trades on a single deep web drugs market, Silk Road. [151] The bulk of bit coin purchases during the time were speculative in nature,[151] so drugs must have constituted a greater percentage of the actual goods purchased with bit coins c. 2012. Silk Road was shut by US law enforcement in October 2013 leading to a short-term fall in the value of bit coin. [152] Alternative sites were soon available, and in early 2014 the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported that the closure of the Silk Road had little impact on the number of Australians selling drugs online, which had actually increased. [153] Several news outlets have asserted that the popularity of bit coins hinges on the ability to use them to purchase illegal goods. [154] Non-drug transactions were thought to be far less than the number involved in the purchase of drugs,[155] and roughly one half of all transactions made using bit coin c. 2013 were bets placed at a single online gambling website. [156] One source stated online gun dealers use bit coin to sell arms without background checks. [157] The bit coin community branded one site, Sheep Marketplace, as a scam when it prevented withdrawals and shut down after an alleged bit coins theft. [158] In a separate case, escrow accounts with bit coins belonging to patrons of a different black market were hacked in early 2014. [159]" The interesting thing about that quote is it refers back to the Silk Road which I talked about previously. Resources: [1] . http://en.wikipedia.org...(marketplace) [2] . http://en.wikipedia.org... There are other things I'd like to address, but I don't want your post to go over the Character limit.

Internet is an ADDICTION that is DRAINing the SOULS out of people. Peoples lives are being destroyed by their inthernet addiction and families are being torn apart. No one cares about family values and society is falling apart. All the porn on the internet is turning people into drones... b/c everyone has access to 1000's of pages of porn from the time they are 6 years old. It affects our minds and makes people believe that they should be think porn stars. everyone is the same. The internet is destroying world cultures and languages. Making everyone the same. It is evil and destroying the world. it must be stopped. Facebook is "BIG BROTHER!" the government is taking over with the internet!!!

People under the age of 20 are still immature and have no idea what they are getting into. The world Wide web is both beautiful as it is horrific, social media websites are destroying the brains of a children around the globe. The Internet is being abused by children and predators out there on the web. Adults using hooks to steal kids from there parents who hold there children in high esteem. Still social media is a big hook that predators use to catch a child. Social media distracts them and puts them in a temptation to do mostly bad stuff. Social media is destroying lives and is being used as a tree to hide behind instead of facing a gruesome fact of life, that is called reality. The kids under 20 should not be allowed because reality will be too hard for them to face.

Seeing as my opponent forfeited (and I feel they shall again), I shall not put too much here. 1) Social Networks allow us to connect with all our old friends and family that we lose contact with.2) Social Networks gave way for the innovation of "social gaming". Gaming like Farmville could only come about through social Networks.3) Social Networks allow New social movements (NSMs) to form. NSMs are political movements which put huge pressure on the government in order to act in certain ways, usually reactionary to go against laws. They also work against many corporations as well. For example, the 2009 charts led with "Killing in the Name", which only came about due to facebook campaigns, and the general pro-piracy movements.

Hi there, It's very simple. Society would benefit from the regulation of citizens' speech. That much is plain to see. Only an idealist would suggest that society could flourish in an environment whereby any person could say whatever they wanted to, regardless of the truth, sensitivity, or confidentiality of what is being said. I will be arguing that absolute freedom of speech conflicts overwhelmingly with core Liberal values, and in support of this argument I will refer to the work of John Stuart Mill. I will also draw upon modern-day examples of how regulation of speech has been calculated and introduced, so as to aid social development and safety. I welcome your response.

I do understand your point about how parents getting involved in social media is a good thing, but I only think to a certain extent. If the parent makes a social media page for themselves and is constantly posting or commenting on the child's page they will begin to feel like they are tracking their every move. The parent is not only using it as a form of communication, but to also check up and stalk their child's page. I do not believe that social media should be the main source of communication between the parent and child because that is not a healthy relationship. If the child or parents wanted to share a photo with each other, they could just show it to them in person. That way the child does not feel like the parent is over involved in their social media.

Many people who use social media sites like Facebook, often put themselves in danger by putting too much information on the websites and not protecting it properly. People also accept random people as friends without knowing them personally which predators to access their information.

I will try to prove my point that technology is a really important thing in our lifes. I am not sure if my opponent meant the Internet or technology in general but I will give some arguments. "For example, most of us has iPhones, iPads, smartphones and so on, and everyone (I am not an exception) loses their time on social websites and on different kind of games, which makes everybody think and do things like a zobie. " Actually video games help people. Certain games can help people that have a problem with their brain. Strategic games can improve strategic thinking and brain agility. There are a lot of games that can actually educate you. I am not a huge gamer but I know that those exist. I think "Skyrim" and "Assassin's creed" can educate you but I am not sure. But most of the games can make you smarter. People that use the Internet helps them learn English. There are some people who perfectly know English just from the Internet ( My English sucks but I wouldn't know English that good if I didn't use the Internet ) There are a lot of website ( like this ) that can help you to improve your social skills and educate you. You can shop much easier. I hate social website too but today's society needs those websites to communicate with friends really easy. For an example if you have a friend or a family member in another country he/she can chat with you every day, see the pictures that you posted and connect you both more than if technology didn't exist. Technology, for an example robots help the production of products. Technology helps science ( explore space, experiments etc) If you had a sad day you could watch a comedy or a parody. This can cheer you up. If you are a lonely person you can find Internet friends and have fun with them. The Internet can connect you easily with people that are like you and have no friends. Technology is important for the business and advertising. Also the technology is important for a business to be efficient. You can read books. It is harder for the government to spread propaganda because you can get informed about the events on the Internet. For an example youtube chanels. If people get informed it is harder for countries to get into war because people stand against that. There are a lot of other stuff I could point but I don't think it is needed. The good things that come with technology are much more than the bad things. Sources: . http://www.nbcnews.com... . http://www.theguardian.com... . http://blog.deepbluesky.com... . http://www.ask.com...

Is there really a need to take selfies? Selfies are just not the kind of social activity that we should be using to communicate with each other. It seems like they love posting pictures of themselves for everyone to see. In response to my opponent's question, they may not seem self-conceited, but they are sub-consciously self-conceited. Like I said before, we should just talk to each other on the phone rather than text because it is more personal and unique than any text. Facebook may be an easier way to keep connected, but if we really wanted to keep our friends from our past to our adulthood, then we should take the extra mile to do so.


Question: Do Graphic Video Games Play a Role in Juvenile Aggression?

Violent video games do not necessarily lead to youth violence. No, because some children understand how to manage their behavior and recognize the distinction between games and reality. For instance, playing a game like Grand Theft Auto V does not mean that a child will begin stealing cars. Moreover, video games can also provide opportunities for family bonding, such as playing Black Ops 2 together with a cousin, while still maintaining a healthy balance in real-life interactions.

My objective in this debate is simple, to show that my opponents claims are not based on sound science and that his claims are no more than a conflation between correlation and causation. My claim is the null hypothesis, that porn is not connected to reducing or increasing the social ills Pro claims. But what is most important is even if you believe porn causes harm, are those claimed harms significant at a societal level to prompt action? If porn was erased tomorrow would the society change in a demonstrable way? In regards to his videos, he makes a bizarre appeal to celebrity. He takes the opinion of the faux spiritualist Russell Brand [Con7;8;9] in commenting on porn in which he casually suggests the now debunked ‘damaged goods myth’[Con10] as a reason women get into porn. Like my opponent Brand makes moral judgments and speculation based on the conflation between causation and correlation. Ted Bundy is an even more bizarre case; to save characters I’m going to put this bluntly, it is very stupid to trust the word of a sociopathic serial rapist, especially when interviewed by a described “evangelical psychologist and crusader against pornography” [Con11] Porn and Aggression My opponent claims that experimental data proves causation; I suppose this means he no longer values his own quoted expert Dr. Jenson who says “no lab experiment can replicate the common male practice of masturbating to pornography.” As I noted earlier in this debate there are many reasons to distrust the experimental side of the anti porn debate. Lab work is artificial, and bears little resemblance to actual conditions; participants are often not fully informed of the nature of the study, leaving ethical questions; the model is backwards with no indication if for example, if porn causes loneliness or if loneliness causes porn use (conflation of correlation/causation); the media effects model sees porn in isolation, without greater context of society; definitions such as erotic, violent, porn, obscene, sexually arousing etc are not uniform making replication difficult, furthermore these definitions are used interchangeably to refer to a whole host of sexual activities; in survey studies the ones taking the survey may not agree with the ones conducting the study in regards to definitions; in experiments the subjects do not choose how to express themselves, they are simply subjectively judged by how they perform an arbitrary task; by claiming causation it strips the individual of responsibility; and finally these types of studies are usually male centric [A]. My opponent cites study after study yet they all suffer the same methodological flaws listed above at one point or another. For example [Pro 17], this work was published in 1986 by a member of the Reagan administration (talk about bias). However what I find remarkably contradictory and consistent with my opponent taking thinks out of context, when looking at figures 12 & 13 the reports says: “The investigation by Check has obvious implications for public health. It shows that on the whole, common nonviolent porn has the strongest influences on men’s willingness to force intimate partners into forms of sexuality that are not necessarily to their partners’ liking and on the propensity for forcing sexual access altogether. Violent porn apparently has the same power to increase rape proclivity, but its influence on the coercion of specific sexual acts is limited, if not negligible. (pg 25)” This is a complete contradiction, how can non violent porn be more influential than violent porn? Pro’s entire argument is based on monkey see monkey do. In regards to studies showing porn reduces sex crimes, as I said before I’m not committed to this argument; his dismissal of my evidence is hypocritical. First I did not fully rely on aggregate data, survey data was taken as well. But regardless, the to quoque fallacy does not makes his sources more credible, especially when it comes to the aggregate sources that he himself cites that he now discredits. If my opponent is going to say that my sources over simplify the issue, I say the same of his sources. And in the end I’m happy to accept that the science on both sides is not credible. And as such can we trust Pro’s argument over admitting the truth that the science is not yet in? By its very definition it is impossible to truly know how much rape is unreported. However rates at which women report rape are on the rise [Con12]! If we acknowledge that overall rape rates are going down as Pro shows in round 3, and see that women are less afraid to report assault, Pro can’t logically conclude that porn is responsible, especially given his own source does not even mention porn. This is biased speculation on his part. In regards to sexually aggressive men and porn, this is a non issue. Again it puts the cart before the horse, aggressive men may like porn at higher rates but that does not mean that porn is responsible for their aggressive behavior. To say otherwise oversimplifies the matter. Honestly have you ever seen a wife beater and thought “Yea, it must be the porn that makes him an a$$hole.”? Furthermore when it comes to hardcore porn on the internet violent porn isn’t even the most popular! It’s actually more focused on older ladies, MILFs, step moms etc. [Con 15-16] So on a societal level, how is violent porn prevalent enough to have violent influence? On a final note, other medias have also shown no link between media and real world violence, video games being a perfect example [Con13]. And in regards to BDSM Pro has completely ignored how this group, literally steeped in hardcore sexual activity, is not rampant with psychos and misogynists. Porn & Relationships Continuing with the theme of conflation, wants to say the porn is the cause for plummeting marriage rates. Yet notice the decline on his chart, it begins in the early 70’s, long before internet porn existed. I could easily correlate 2nd wave feminism with the decline in marriage than with porn, but that would be the same fallacy my opponent is making. With divorce, same issue. Pro’s own source says higher rates of divorce are not the fault of the internet, despite its facilitation. My opponent wishes to claim that porn use is the cause of divorce, when it is more likely that it is a symptom of an already failing marriage. As noted in round 3, porn is only a problem if you make it one, instead of a woman succumbing to the patriarchal demand that women abstain from the sexually taboo, women could just as easily join their men and explore their sexuality together! In fact Dr. Malamuth, a man Pro has cited several times against porn found in a study “respondents construed the viewing of hardcore pornography as beneficial to their sex lives, their attitudes towards sex, their perceptions and attitudes towards members of the opposite sex, toward life in general, and over all. The obtained beneficial effects were statistically significant for all but one measure across both sexes. … A positive correlation was obtained between the amount of hardcore pornography that was viewed and the impact of the benefits reaped. [Con18]” Talk about contradictions huh? Porn & Habit Pro underestimates me in this section. Like with violence and porn, the connection between porn and addiction is not conclusive. The DSM rejects porn addiction on this ground, and if they do not accept it why should you? Pro has not bothered to address my concerns about given the ubiquity and constant use of the internet how can we determine what is addictive behavior compared regular use? Furthermore “although people may partake excessively in certain activities and sometimes suffer detrimental life consequences, they rarely develop tolerance or obvious withdrawal symptoms—two hallmarks of addiction. [Con14]” In other words porn, like everything else, is harmful when taken to the extreme (this is not a reflection on porn, but a truism of life). However you will not find 1 source by my opponent that says how wide spread true addiction is among the porn using population. Given this lack of information can we say that habit formation is a significant problem when not only do we not have societal data, but experts disagree that such addiction is even real and is not comparable to substance addiction [Con14; 17]? Warped View & STD’s Few characters must be brief. His truck analogy is a false equivalence. The necessity of sex education is separate from porn. When we see a failure in sex ed as I have demonstrated with the lack of national comprehensive sex ed, we can expect people to be ignorant of sex. Porn will be consumed either way, but due to the societal failure of education porn is made to be the scapegoat for causing misunderstanding when there was little understanding to begin with. Pro says kids start looking at porn by 11, that’s when they hit puberty, so that’s to be expected. Shall we absolve parents of responsibility then? Genital insecurity? Like before, Malamuth says otherwise [con18]. Not to mention other societal factors could be at play, Con oversimplifies. In regards to STD’s porn is again the scapegoat, a spurious leap in logic that says people give each other STD’s on a global level because porn. People are just helpless aren’t they? I bet all the AIDs in Africa has to do with internet porn and not education, just kidding, it’s lack of education [con19]. To say quality of education does not matter is a dangerous joke. Again use the alcohol metaphor, if boose is all you got you're gonna get drunk. Do we blame alcohol for our lack of water? Thanks Mike for the debate. Remember folks before you whack it, Vote Con! http://www.youtube.com... Sources: http://www.debate.org...

I believe my opponent's argument is that those aged over 13 should be allowed to participate in buying video games, that are rated Mature by the ESRB system, for themselves. I strongly doubt that this would not be the case.True to my usual debating methods, I will first rebut before I make my own argument."Studies show that most teenagers will use violent and M-Rated games to vent anger(1)."It is my belief that my opponent intended to cite a source here. Specifically, this source: http://www.theregister.co.uk... One I have also read.I will take all that as true.However, I don't believe buying video games should be the future at all. I believe we would gain much more by submitting to simply buying the license for the game. I do believe playing rated M games would be beneficial to the human race. We even use it to treat PTSD*.However, that's as far as I'm willing to concede. Half of the argument my opponent has presented is agreeable with me. We should "play 'M' rated Games." Buying them? No.By only buying the license of these games, community is more developed and encouraged, a more structured relationship between corporations is established, and cultivation of a game beyond its release is also heavily encouraged. It also means that more independent games are shared and more independent video game groups are able to flourish and prosper.I will allow this argument to manifest more in following rounds.

so who cares if a child plays a violent video game and decides hey you know what ill just go and do that. it is the parents fault

Thank you for accepting. 1. "Based on bad concept that I presume negatively affect our children correct? Look at this [http://abcnews.go.com......] According to this video games actually help. Problem solving being one, which is one thing that can help you in school. Problem solving is really mostly what the schools make you do anyways. Solve this problem and get a good grade, correct? Problem solving isn't limited to school, but also your daily life. By playing games (mobile or console) WITH MODERATION your kids will develop problem solving skills. It also teaches that failure is okay sometimes. Start again and keep practicing and you will get better. This is also perfect for school. When a student gets stuck on a question they might wanna give up. Those who play games are less likely to succumb to failure." ~Are you sure games we play on mobile or console designed for brain-training to solve problems? Children play games for entertainment and problem solving is something different. refer the articles which clearly shown the bad effect of digital games. http://www.ehow.com... http://www.scmp.com... http://edition.cnn.com... Not even children, adults are forgetting their personal hygiene because of full concentration on game what he/she is playing. Some reported restlessness and/or irritability when unable to play, preoccupation with thoughts of previous online activity or anticipation of the next online session and lying to friends or family members regarding the amount of time spent playing. What more information I need to give to explain this? 2. "I did research and guess what. GAMING IS NOT A BIG CULPRIT. That's right games are not the biggest reason why students fail tests. I went to multiple websites and gaming was not on there. Actually when I directly looked up if gaming was a reason why they fail tests no plausible (reasonable) results actually popped up." Failing is the worst case but games are effecting study concentration and later on bad performance in exams. refer the link http://www.parentingscience.com.... In addition to bad results on academics, purchase games and add-ins generate credit card bills. http://venturebeat.com... Children ignore their spending on games that is raising funds for game companies but their parents are paying bills. That is really bad for some families those poor and such bill create problems for them. Here is the link of game industry stats of commercials. http://www.gamesindustry.com... Moreover, addiction of games create a distance in family members because of addiction we don't give time to our family.

I apologize for the delay. I would also like to say I dont mind your cursing or "a**hole" arguing, we are all mature here. "Say what you will, I've heard it before. Quite frankly, I've never heard a case of a f***ing mexican cartel geting in a shootout over the latest copy of Call of Duty or some s*** like that."You haven't argued against my point about addiction so I will assume you acknowledge that. However, you are exactly right, and you know why? Because video games are legal. One basic rule of business is that if there is demand there is a market. And if video games were illegal there would still be demand, therefore there would be an illegal market. Then, I promise you would see shootouts of video game dealers protecting their merchandise."You made a good point about the harmful affects, so I'll give you that one."Thanks"I don't think so. It may seem like an exaterattion to you, but some of my friends are potheads. I can tell you from personal experience of being around someone who's high but not high myself that they ate every bag of lays in my house. Maybe I took it too far, but as I said I'm a bit of a d*** about the way I argue."Once again I ask you how this is so negative an effect that it warrants prohibiting a substance to the point of criminalizing its users? " I doubt you had a such a substantial amount of lays that you were little more than annoyed about what happened. If you were, then you should have made sure they paid you back and if they didn't that's on them not weed. "And as for the gateway drug thing that you wrote an entire f***ing seminar on, if weed becomes legal then how does it stop being a gateway drug? " I understand my response was lengthy but that was so I could accurately convey my logic. Based on what you said, I don't think you really read and undersood what I said because I explained how there is no such thing as a gateway between two acts if there is no connection between them. I also explained how making it legal would reduce that which is mistaken as the gateway effect in users. Please reveiew and try to understand what I said so you can properly respond, else there is no point in this debate. "People take pharmacudicals all the time illegally, so making it legal might make it worse, because teenagers can get in a whole lot more trouble, and now someone who actually needs that weed for cancer or something can't get it because some idiot names Brody needed to get his weed."It is true that people illegally use things that are legal to a degree but it is also true that people (many of which are teens/youth) smoke marijuana illegally now. So what does it matter? A whole lot more trouble? Consider the difference between what happens now when a teen is caught with alcohol and when a teen is caught with weed. You have it backwards. Also, I promise no patient is gonna be without their medicine when it comes to weeds availiability, anybody can grow the plant so legalization's resulting businesses will have ample availability. That's not to say that prohibition does much to help marijuana patients get their medicine anyway." Okay, fair enough. What I was trying to say is that weed, like any other mood changing substance, causes crazy psychadelic affects. These things can cause certain people to do reckless and impulsive things, mainly because they're just so calm about everything. Alchohol does this too, but instead of calmness, drunks get pissed about everything. "What crazy psychadelic effects are you talking about, red eyes, giggling? And how can one act impulsively if they are calm? I touched on why intoxication effects are irrelevant with regards to legalization already but I will post again. If you do not respond to any of my points I can only assume you either acknowledge them or cannot refute them. Under the influence of marijuana, a few general effects are euphoria, mild anxiety, mild paranoia, munchies, calming, giggles, etc. Basically, none of these effects are adverse in and of themselves to the point of making the the substance dangerous. With alcohol, the consumer is severely punished for drunk driving or over aggresiveness not the product. This is because the consumer is stilll responsible for his own actions. If a child eats alot of sugar and is uncontrollable for the rest of the night and hurts themselves, do you ban sugar for all or do you blame the childs parents for allowing them to consume that much? "I'm not trying to say weed's a bad thing, I'm just trying to get people to drop the subject. It's not like it's hard to find or anything. Are you too lazy to visit a nearby park that you'd rather wait in a line to get some more pot?"While I can understand your impatience around the topic, that does not excuse the fact that legalization is whats best for and much needed by the nation as a whole. And no I'm not too lazy, I just dont want the threat of being locked away and deemed criminal for using a perfectly safe and fun drug recreationally (that or getting killed at a deal gone wrong)."Perfectly integrated? Tobacco is seen as the devils drinking buddy by society, and drinking is now known as being desperate. Weed will stop being known as a calming drug, it'll just become a cautionary tale."Although some hold these beleifs, I doubt they are the majority, and they still seem pretty tolerant considering I haven't heard anyone talking about prohibiting tobacco or alcohol as of late. By perfectly integrated, I'm talking about things like employee smoke rooms at jobs, smoking sections in restaurants, happy hours, availiability at your local store, events centered around the substance, etc. All societal integrations tobacco and alcohol have."Since when? Since when has the governments job not been to control us? Oh yeah, let's protect the lives of the US by doing absulutely f***-all about our s*** health care and allow all these terrible massacres to keep happening. Let's protect their liberty by trying to ban the things they love. Let's pursue happiness by going to war with the wrong countries and doing everything wrong in every other countries eyes. As for Canada, well King Prime Minister Stephen Harper banned Count Chocula & Cookie Crisp for being unhealthy, so don't expect us to legalize weed anytime soon."What the government does and what is supposed to do are two completely different things. This however, doesn't change what they SHOULD be doing. I take that you agree with me on this so I wont go any further. But, with regards to the U.S., full legalization is becoming more and more likely everyday. Look it up.

The thing is they're still blaming the video games more than they're blaming the parents. It is the parents job to make sure that any sort of weapon the child could bring to school is out of the child's reach. Yet society blaming the parents for buying the video games is not enough, the parents need to take at least most of the responsibility in this situation. Yes you bring up a very good points when it comes to child curiosity, and as a parent then they should understand this and make sure that they don't let this curiosity allow for the child to do something that shouldn't.

i dont understand what your trying to say but games are never bad for kids it helps them and not destroy them pepole can change though from the games on there own they might change there mind about them but i dont see how the are bad

I am sorry my definition of rap was not up to par. I found it on a website, it was not my own definition. I would also like to say to readers that I do NOT believe that rap music should be limited. I am doing this for a school project and solely that. I also thank my opponent for taking this debate, but I would like to point out that this is also very much so for researching aspects. If I say anything improper or has lack of evidence, I apologize. I am attempting to make this a real case scenario as much as possible for myself. ======= Argument 1 ======= Last time I checked, I am supposed to support my arguments with evidence that supports my side, not yours. So the POSITIVE (yes I can use caps as well) effects would not exactly prove my arguments well. ======= Rebuttal ======= 'Findings thus far are mixed, but overall they suggest that listening to rap music does not cause aggressive or deviant behaviour.' [1] I would like to bring attention to the findings are MIXED, there is grey area in this situation. Therefore, it can still cause aggressive and deviant behaviour. 'Another study found that adolescent females, after watching a rap video depicting women in sexually subordinate roles, were more inclined to express acceptance of violence against women in a dating situation. However, increased acceptance of crime and violence appears to be linked with viewing violent or sexist rap videos rather than listening to rap music on its own.' [1] Yes I agree that it is not only rap music on it's own, but the production of rap music equals the production of rap videos (in most scenarios). ======== '"The thing is: the young people who are very impressionable want to make it big in a similar way. But the danger here is that the young people at the street level…they don't have the same protection [as the commercial rap starts], and they are carrying guns. And young people are losing their lives. And this has been reflected from the role models that these people follow."[2] I believe this involved and aspiration to be part of the rap scene is the exact situation we are trying to avoid for adolescents and young adults everywhere. I agree that most successful rap artists come from impoverished backgrounds, but a lot of people who can familiarize themselves with them tend to follow their prior life style and fall in to the same bad habits, without the fame. Involvement with the rap scene has also put kids on the streets, trying to live their big dreams of becoming the next rap star. ======== '"Music forms an illusion and young people take it on board, because one known fact is that people connect to music lyrics, and these illusions are what young people take on and live with and try to portray in their own lifestyles, and that is such a big danger."[2] Explain how these behavioral problems before rap were not evident until rap was introduced? Frankly, on both parts, these will be biased opinions because there are scenarios for every situation possible. There are situations where people may develop the problem through the music, have had it before, or never occurred one throughout. Once again, it was never stated that rap music 100% did not influence this said behaviour. Limiting would solve the issues of children being able to walk into a store and buying vulgar and violent music. Little pictures on the bottom saying explicit content usually does not stop kids from buying it. It may be the responsibility of the parents and the individual themselves, but perhaps it is needed on a greater scale to be the responsibility of society to protect the future of tomorrow. '"If I had a choice I would say it should be completely be cut off, but the thing is they say forbidden fruit attracts, and I do believe that if there is a market you know then the negative rapping should be censored. And I'm not saying it should be 18 or 21, I do believe it should be censored to 25, because all young people, by the age of about 25, would have become fathers or they would have matured a little bit, and that's when they will be able to actually make up their minds in relation to what should be heard in the house and that shouldn't be" [2] Also, for the infringement upon civil liberties, that could go any way regarding any issue. Such as: drinking age, age of eligibility to vote. etc. ================== In conclusion, there may not be consistent evidence that rap on its own significantly influences behaviour, but there is no consistent evidence that rap doesn't either. 'There are many other rappers who also feed young people the type of lyrics that can influence positive thinking. These artists are usually not in the mainstream but you can find their music online.' [3] Therefore the rap music that is in mainstream, that is violent and negative, should be limited. [1] http://cognitive-psychology.suite101.com... [2] http://static.rnw.nl... [3]http://www.goarticles.com...

TV was invented in the early 1920"s and video games were developed in the early 1970"s but both have now become an invariable source of fun and entertainment for children. There is no denying that children love to watch TV and play video games. Some of these shows and games were for fun and educational, but throughout the years of technological advances, they have evolved to new levels creating controversy among society.The amount of children that stare at a TV screen for several hours a day has grown so profusely that it has been labeled an epidemic. An average child watches a total of 28 hours of television a week. The amount of time spent playing video games or watching TV, and the types of games/shows children watch/play will influence their behavior in a major way. By the time a child finishes high school he/she will have seen 8,000 TV deaths. Video games have the most negative psychological effects including: a decrease in social skills, increased aggressive thoughts, behaviors, and feelings and increased physiological arousal. Studies show that a family that has the TV on all the time usually speak 200 words an hour to their child but a family that does not regularly have the TV on speaks about 1000 words per hour. so not only have video games proven to be a complete waste of time but they also have proven to decrease the growth of a child. oh and thanks for understanding the misunderstanding about the pro and con

I have provided adequate resource to counter that eye strain is not a major concern in those who play video games, watch tv and etc in a responsible way. Con's argument has not established solid links that video games represent a cause and effect relationship with violence behavior or that damage to the eyes is a direct result of gaming. But rather that poor conditions while playing video games may result in damage, this is not sufficient to establish the basic premise that the act of playing video games is unhealthy. In contrast I have provided resources establishing benefits of gaming both mentally in all ages and physically in the elderly and disabled who benefit amazingly from playing games on platforms such as the Wii. It is there for Pro's conclusion that there is a benefit to be gained from the daily consumption of video games. Though I have not touched on it during this debate, additional resources are available regarding educational games and their benefits.


Question: Do Aggressive Video Games Play a Role in Juvenile Delinquency?

Violent video games might fuel youth aggression.

In my neighborhood, there was an incident where two brothers were discussing their fascination with Grand Theft Auto. They were so engrossed in the game that they decided to imitate it in real life. They planned to attack another kid with a pocket knife. Unfortunately, they went through with their plan and assaulted the kid. I intervened to help the victim, and upon closer inspection, I noticed he had a stab wound. This situation raises serious concerns about the potential link between violent video games and youth violence.

I will do a quick argument this round because I am running out of time. This is basically a repeat/ rebuttal. So you said something like if you break your spoon and punch someone, it is your fault the the spoon. But think about it like a source, an item, and an outcome. The spoon powered your anger. Then your anger created a punch. So though the spoon didn't directly cause the punch, it was still one of the causes. The same goes for the video game. Since such a scenario is possible, the videogame created violence, thereby proving my point.

Neither do I, but just for the sake of this argument, I'll accept the opposing position. While there's little to no evidence supporting the claim that video games cause violence, perhaps there is a case to be made that certain types of violence are unacceptable in games. So I'm mainly going to focus on games that go "too far". (I will freely admit that I've moved the goalpost a bit, but I do this because of the lack of evidence on my side of the debate). With the possible exceptions of psychopaths, sociopaths and severe narcisists, everyone has a line they will not cross. Where this line lies is different for each individual, yet there are some subjects that illicit (or would illicit) such outrage from the general public, that banning it might not be such a bad idea. Let's imagine a game that would involve raping children. No matter how much you object to censorship, I doubt that many people would defend a game such as this and would not see banning it as an infringement on free expression. The horror that people will feel when confronted with such a game even existing is enough to override any reservations they might have concerning the banning of a videogame. So, yes, games that overstep certain boundries should be banned if there is a general concensus with the public.

Watch your words. The one you have just "copied" was to contradict your stand. Oh, what was your stand again? Video games are good for you. Now that you have admitted that it depends upon the people it now contrast badly. Why? Video games are not good and saying that it depends upon the people means that it is not good to all people. In fact, the right words to use where "gaming has benefits." And maybe no one would've stood up to conquer you. You have misused words. Gaming is not good. Good is the definition of the results when these benefits implies to a person. Let me teach you some lesson, 1 gaming is not good 2 good is the definition if the benefits have impinged to an individual 3 misuse of words is misleading and may construct an invalid argumentative reason and 4 try not to geneneralize people. As what I've said, people have different ways of thinking. If we had one way of thinking and then the benefits of gaming would imply to us and using the terms "Gaming is good" would be acceptable. I'm not really here to say gaming is bad but I truly object your agenda. Once again, gaming is not good.

Do you think gaming is harmful to our youth. Well if so your WRONG gaming gives us something to do on free time and I also believe it encourages young people to have new ideas to do more than the impossible it makes them want to create a game there self and to do anything they put to there young mind and to study how to create one there self this is my claim I am i 13 year old and not all gaming IS HARMFUL.

I will be making this brief as I am really not feeling well. The original contention of Con was that Playing video games " Every day" was bad for you. In an earlier round I established that this is not the case, peer reviewed studies show it serves to increase stimulation in the brain. Con made a point about bad posture and drew an abstraction, Because many gamers have poor posture Con summarized that games cause bad posture. This is a logical fallacy, Correlation does not equal causation. Bad posture is bad for you regardless of what your doing-while you do it with bad posture. Next he countered again about video games causing violent tendencies but the article he posted only glossed over it and than stated matter of factually. It is true, Certain types of violence in games can promote violence in the real world but this does not extent to all games or all types of violence in video games, not all or even most video games are considered violent.In short, Cons argument at best proves that video games can be abused and over done but so can hamburgers... There is proven benefits that video games can benefit a person who plays games daily.

I argue that the exposure to video game violence does not contribute significantly to school shootings, but rather, the living environment of the individual.

Thanks Pro for the response. In this round we are just going to tie this all up and show why we have won this debate. Now I will begin to say why I have won. 1. Okay, so my opponent brought up Adam Lanza, or the horrible human being who killed 20 children and 6 adults. However, regardless of the evidence that my opponent has brought up, it does not even say that the video game that Adam Lanza was playing even was the MAIN CAUSE of the shooting. The resolution is proposing that video games are CAUSING violence. His evidence bites him back again as the evidence directly states, "The fact remains that while the report's conclusion does not mention video games as any cause for Lanza's murderous rampage (nor does it speculate on any motive), one video game was, at least, part of the buffet of mass shooting news reports, books, and other media Lanza was consuming, according to evidence recovered from the home." Again, voters, my opponent has brought up evidence that directly refutes his statements and his argument falls as mine stands regardless of the rebuttal. There is no, way, shape, or form that my opponent has brought up that a video game caused that mass shooting. Therefore you are just going to have to carry that to my side as a winning argument. 2. My opponent brought up grand theft childhood, and this again contradicts his statements. If you look at the myth category of the website, it says, "The growth in violent video game sales is linked to the growth in youth violence " especially school violence " throughout the country." And the fact is, "Video game popularity and real-world youth violence have been moving in opposite directions. Violent juvenile crime in the United States reached a peak in 1993 and has been declining since. Between 1994 and 2004, arrests for murder, forcible rape, robbery and aggravated assaults fell 49 percent, resulting in the lowest juvenile arrest rate for violent crimes since at least 1980. Murder arrests, which reached a high of 3,790 in 1993, plummeted 71% to 1,110 by 2004. School violence has also gone down." My opponent clearly has lost this point as he is completely contradictory of himself and you are going to keep this flowing to my side as VIDEO GAMES ARE NOT CAUSING VIOLENCE IN CHILDREN. 3. My opponent brought up my argument that parents are influencing the child when they buy the child that game. He brought up a cooking game and how that makes people want to be chefs, however, he would have never wanted to be a chef had it not been for his parents buying the game and letting him play it. In violent video games, it is the same case , therefore voters, you are just going to flow that to my side. 4. Now voters, please keep in mind that my opponent has failed to attack my correlation does not prove causation contention therefore dropping his case even further, and not attacking my third contention leads to an even further drop in his case as the studies are false and are contradictory of his statements. http://www.grandtheftchildhood.com... http://kotaku.com... Please vote con as his case is contradictory and holds no ground in this debate, he is completely contradictory of himself, and has failed to attack my second and third contention. I have deconstructed his case and have proven, WITH HIS OWN EVIDENCE that video games are not causing violence in children. Therefor, I must undoubtedly negate.

Well what about those with physical disabilities that prevent them from being able to participate in physical sports such as chronic fatigue syndrome http://www.cdc.gov... or arthritis http://www.arthritis.org... and there is even a list of conditions on this page http://sped.wikidot.com... do you think it is wise for people with these physical disorders to participate in sports which could potentially worsen their conditions, I think not. The simple fact is not everybody can participate in physical activities due to bodily conditions so would it not be wise to let them play video games in order for them to entertain themselves? And how does sitting around your house playing video games make you a loser, from current trends in culture (well culture of the U.S.A.) people with game consoles (especially the newest ones) are held at a higher esteem and tend to be more popular in many social areas (this is more from a teens standpoint upon the subject) http://www.usatoday.com... http://www.examiner.com... http://www.associatedcontent.com... . I would also like to say this majority of programmers make a $53,964 salary http://www1.salary.com... and employment in this field is expected to continue to rise http://www.bls.gov... http://www.infoworld.com... you can also see some of the "perks" of their jobs (so to speak) and from what can be seen people who are interested in video games tend to be interested in programming http://mvpmodelingsolutions.com... http://www.racialicious.com... http://degreedirectory.org... now what are the odds of getting into any major league sport .00565% chance of that happening http://www.thesportdigest.com... http://forum.bodybuilding.com... , now are those high or low odds I am fairly certain that is considered to be a low probability bu the odds of being a programmer are significantly higher such as nearly 100% if you put your mind to it http://freelanceprogramming.blogspot.com... http://www.articlesbase.com... http://www.educationcenteronline.org... . You see video games interest the young in other fields of expertise other than that of a pro-athlete which you have a low chance of becoming. Although I agree that sports can help you stay physically fit that is not the only way, you can simply go to a gym and use the exercise room or jog it is not necessary to play sports in order to maintain physical fitness http://www.thedigeratilife.com... http://ezinearticles.com... . Playing video games also comes with certain benefits such as improving hand-eye coordination and enhancing creativity http://www.selfgrowth.com... . The idea of who is and who isn't a loser is a subjective matter due to the way you use it hence bearing no weight for I am fairly certain that people with a chance at making higher wages and a low chance of going out of business seem pretty cool to me, just use Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Steve Wozniak as a reference http://dictionary.reference.com... http://www.microsoft.com... http://allaboutstevejobs.com... http://www.woz.org... .

"we are all mature here.""No I am not."lol"You doubt my inventory of lays?"Pardon me. "Okay, that may sound accurate now, but drugs are apsychadelic substance people enjoy smoking, so it explains why people would be willing to go to such lengths to protect it."And video games are electronic forms of entertainment that people enjoy playing. Black market dealers don't fight to protect the product, but the revenue the product generates. Since revenue would still be generated if video games were illegal there would still be disputes. This is because money is still there to be fought over. " But while normal video games are legal, pirated copies of video games aren't legal. And tell me if I'm wrong, but I've never turned on the news to see people dead in a shootout over bootleg Halo copies."That is because the amount of money to be made off of bootlegs is very small, nowhere near enough to attract the violent kingpins that run the underground drug market. How could it be when everyone goes to gamestop or pirates for free online? The same could be said for marijuana because everyone would be going to the headshops/dispensiaries for it, instead of going to the dangerous dealer(who could've spiked your weed, or tried to rob you). "It has both to do with them and the weed. I didn't make them pay me back because they were potheads. They've got better things to do with their money. If they didn't, then they wouldn't have to ask me to bring food when I went to their place." I hope you aren't implying that weed is the reason that they are in such a situation because there are many successful marijuana smokers (i.e. Micheal Phelps). But anyway, do you feel your friends deserve to be imprisoned and criminalized for eating your lay's? If you support prohibition then you do."And there completely are connections between two acts. If say, I'm a kid and I start playing Halo, I'll start playing Call of Duty. I know that there is a VERY large gap between halo - call of duty and weed - cocaine. What I'm trying to say is if I do one thing, I might want to start doing a similar thing."This is the equivalent of what you just said. If say, I'm a human and I start drinking Sprite, I'll start drinking Moutain Dew. All you did was name two things that are within a similar category. You gave no explanation as to why the one act compells a person to the next. Which is exactly what the gateway theory accuses marijuana of doing. The gateway theory in itself is a logical fallacy (please look up if you don't know what that is). Here is a link to a site with all the logical fallacies. The gateway theory is the first fallacy, Faulty Cause. http://commfaculty.fullerton.edu... Thanks and it's been a pleasure debating! I welcome constructive criticism from all. Vote for me everyone!!

I think we should because people don't commit crimes because of video games. If they did then so does movies, news, shows, and everything. that is why i say people should be able to play video games.


Question: Can aggressive video games lead to an increase in young people's violent behavior?

Violent video games may contribute to youth violence. In my opinion, engaging in violent video games can potentially lead to brain damage. Moreover, players may neglect spending quality time with their families. There is also a risk that these games could instigate fights in school settings.

my worthy opponent, if you aren't satisfied with the given arguments, i request you to prove your point, to why have you chosen the side of con for this topic. for your kind information, I am not shifting at all. I am on my topic and the best example goes on to the above rounds, with lots of examples stating that television spreads violence. this is what has to do with violence. yes, its total nonsense, nonsense about television that is continuously spreading violence in youth. give me at least few points that I can agree to you that its not. children spend a lot of time before it, and thus it has got to do with all the violence rampant.for your statement that questions are unanswered, i am in a state of deep flutter when I read these lines. I am unable to find any argument or question from your sides, thus, your point of questions being unanswered has no entity at all.

What is all this nonesense about television? I accepted this debate thinking I was refuting that "Telivision" is the main cause of violence in youth.Why is Pro case-shifting? What is Telivision and what does it have to do with violence? What does television have to do with anything?!These questions are unanswered and I'm starting to question my opponents intentions. He has yet to provide an argument actually addressing the resolution.

Con forfeited, and I extend my argument. There is no reason why kids should not play violent video games, as there is no evidence to show that violent video games engenders violent behavior in kids (pro did not even make this claim - in fact, there was no mention of how "violent" video games contrasts with video games in general from the pro side). Therefore, pro failed to uphold the BOP and con wins by default.

Ok if ur going to say that video games is a sport that is sad because they are clearly not

I must say, I mean no beratement with the argument, I was only trying to stress the importance of using proper spelling and grammar to avoid semantic trolls such as mysef.To answer my opponents question, I did not provide an argument supporting the negative resolution because I did not hold the burden of proof. It was only required of me to refute Pro's argument, and required of him to provide arguments and rebuttals. To avoid such a format, I would suggest my opponent put "BoP is shared" in his opening round to require Con to make an actual construct.Other than that, all I have to say is,Pro's BoP is unfulfilled. Telivision is not the main cause of violence in youth.

I see your point, even though people don't go out and copy what they do in Call of Duty. Online gaming when not played responsibility does damage the player especially if he/she is young. Just like alcohol and other addictive substances, online video gaming when not played RESPONSIBLY sets the player down a dark path. http://healthland.time.com...

Good Luck, I quote: "you are submitting yourself to anything that people may want to say to you or about you during, before, or even after the gameplay. " As I understand it, you are stating that by playing video games, you are subjecting yourself to these rude comments. However, with this statement you are neither proving your position nor disproving mine. Just because you are subjecting yourself to these comments by playing video games does not mean someone is justified in tagging you as a "nerd" or "dork". I quote: "and I do not think that is right to say, but hey! America is a free country. " By saying you do not think it is right to say (correct me if I'm wrong), you proved my point in which these tags and names are wrong. Examples I'm going to list out a few games as examples: · World of Warcraft · Runescape · Dungeons and Dragons These games are usually referred to as the “nerd games”. However, if you look at the generic definition of “nerd”, and the contents of the game itself, the opinion should change dramatically. “Nerd is a term that refers to an intelligent but single-minded person obsessed with a nonsocial hobby or pursuit. ” (. http://en.wikipedia.org...) At this point I’d like to link you a video of someone who spends his time playing the game World of Warcraft: . http://www.youtube.com... I apologize for any inappropriate words said during the video. (Video up top) Referring to the generic definition of a nerd, people usually describe them as non-social. However, if you listen to what the man in the video talks about, he describes a “fantasy world” in which players have fun together and have a social experience. These same concepts also go for a vast majority of video games. “Title” of the game I put the word title in quotation marks because I’m referring to it as the tag the game itself has. This tag is the typical person’s outlook on the game itself: “Someone who plays (tagged video game) is clearly a nerd because they spend so much time playing it”. The example I provided is one of the main comments I hear all the time when talking about these types of games. However, what they fail to realize is that they are being extremely hypocritical by saying so. For example: If I play CoD Black Ops hours on end, and begin talking about how someone who plays Runescape hours on end is a nerd, you are contradicting yourself. The person that play’s CoD Black Ops plays the exact same amount of game time as the person who plays Runescape does, so how does that make the Runescape player a nerd and not the CoD player? It’s because of the “title” the typical person give the game, which is morally wrong. ******* Thank you for taking time to participate in this debate.

I strongly believe that video games are really good for you. Video games are good for you because you get better problem solving skills. In life you must problem solve a lot no matter where you are. You get better Hand-eye coordination when playing video games like call of duty. You also see farther and clearer in some areas because some games involve you to see though a scope and you must see little things to defeat your enemies. In some games like minecraft Hunger games, you must know where to go, when to go to the center or the edge of the map and where to get the good stuff to pvp (person vs person) and defeat the people and win the game. It Improves teamwork and cooperation skills because you can team up and destroy other people. It improves your social life because you can make more friends online and throughout the video games you play. Friends are very important on earth today. They can help you succeed in life and help you with your troubles.

"Gangs, murders, and drug transactions happened before the gangster rap. Gangster rap may make this more popular but the problem is caused by outside influences. I play Halo and don't kill people like many A students in school have Pink Floyd's "Another brick in the wall" on their ipods. The drug revolution happened in the 70s making a sudden increase in drug use. Drugs affect poor people the most. Blacks were mostly poor." By popularizing it, children get in contact with it by their family members and/or older siblings. Getting in contact with it at a young age will of course corrupt the child's developing mind and would make the child incapable of sufficiently telling the good from the bad of things because he would have been hearing about shooting, stabbing, brawling, sex, and crime at such a young age. Yes they do need to know that these realities do very exist in the world, but there are certain ages that they need to hear about these when their minds are capable of comprehending. By banning this more aggressive genre of music, it would be much more easier for a child to not come in contact with it. On the side there will be 2 videos, from top to bottom it begins with Pink Floyd's "Another Brick In The Wall", then 50 Cent's "*%#! You". Unfortunately I was unable to post the lyrics due to 50 Cent's constant use of foul language, so I posted up the videos. Now, which one would a child most understand? I myself would be able to understand the words like "#%*! You" compared to "education" if I was a child, my younger brother would most likely agree..... He just did. But, I still did not understand 50 Cent's song through the lyrics nor through the music video. But I would say this..... I like the background images from 50 Cent's music video from 2:00 - 2:05, what a wonderful image of not promoting guns. As guns, drugs, and violence becomes more popularized by Gangsta Rap, more and more youths become involved in the world of gang violence and I just do not want the record companies and artists to constantly make money off of this. I would like to thank my opponent for putting up a very difficult debate, but I would like to apologize for not posting my argument up sooner for now I do not have enough time to reply to all of your arguments. I sincerely apologize for my very late timing. http://www.youtube.com... http://www.youtube.com...

I have no new studies to present, so this round will consist entirely of rebuttals and defenses of my statements. Statements in quotes which begin a paragraph are taken from Pro’s rebuttals in round 3. “With Kids having a higher chance does not guarantee that they will become more aggressive and for a statement like that where a higher chance is incorporated there must be some sort of ratio. and you do not have to state one I am just stating that there should be one and it would have to incorporate; all children who have been known to play violent video games or television, who have actually became more aggressive, who did not, and which households did the parents explain to their children the differences. and a ratio like that is hard to achieve” This does absolutely nothing to refute my claim that children who play violent video games or watch violent movies are far more likely to act violently. The fact that an exact ratio is virtually impossible to establish does nothing more than testify to the number of variables affecting the situation. I'm sure that you will find that the studies indicate that the ratio is quite high, however. “it also is the parents fault if the child is to imitate what they see on television. the parents have to state to the children that the reaction they are going to get by imitating what they saw or what will happen will be a lot more different then what they had seen.” This, whether true or not, is entirely irrelevant. The fact is that kids ARE imitating what they see on TV, which is what is to be shown in this debate. “you conclude that children should be limited to what they watch. in the past limitations are set so things do not get out of control, but limitations are not needed when met with a compromise or a "win win" situation and all that means is that parents need to take time to talk to their children and their life” 1) Most parents are not psychologists. Given that it is not likely that parents worldwide will suddenly start reasoning with their children on matters of morality, and simply limiting violent media intake is far easier, since violent media doesn’t impart any know great benefit to society, it would be far better to simply limit children’s exposure to it. 2) The problem with assuming that if parents simply talk to their children, the children will have a lessened propensity for violent behavior after watching violent movies is that even among adults, violent media is still positively correlated with violent behavior. Furthermore, you’ve not presented evidence that parents who speak to their children about violence before or after or during a violent movie are going to produce less violent children. Extend all other arguments.


Question: Can aggressive video games lead to increased youth aggression?

Are video games truly detrimental to individuals? This argument is between Zebracakes and myself, discussing whether video games are detrimental to individuals or not. In the previous debate, I held the Con position: for this debate, I will take the Pro stance. Round 1: Presenting our perspectives. Round 2: Supporting our side of the discussion. I am convinced that video games can have a profoundly negative impact on individuals. Consider games like "Hate," for instance. Additionally, video games can consume time that could be better spent on activities like exercise or education.

I'm not sure what you are talking about , my point is short and simple , I have been heavily exposed to violence and death as a kid , yet today I am no more prone to violence than some farmer living up a hill with nobody around for miles. The point is , you are more prone to violence if you choose to be.

I see your point, even though people don't go out and copy what they do in Call of Duty. Online gaming when not played responsibility does damage the player especially if he/she is young. Just like alcohol and other addictive substances, online video gaming when not played RESPONSIBLY sets the player down a dark path. http://healthland.time.com...

Of course, I am here to debate against my opponent, Video games have become a massive part of today's culture , offering jobs, ways to connect, and is just plain fun. I am ecstatic to get this debate on the way and good luck to my opponent.

REBUTTALThe original contention of Con was that Playing video games " Every day" was bad for you. In an earlier round I established that this is not the case, peer reviewed studies show it serves to increase stimulation in the brain. Con made a point about bad posture and drew an abstraction, Because many gamers have poor posture Con summarized that games cause bad posture. This is a logical fallacy, Correlation does not equal causation. Bad posture is bad for you regardless of what your doing-while you do it with bad posture. I did not make an assumption between video gaming and bad posture. The link is here: http://www.healthcentral.com.... And, if playing video games itself is bad enough, playing it EVERY DAY is certainly worse.Next he countered again about video games causing violent tendencies but the article he posted only glossed over it and than stated matter of factually. It is true, Certain types of violence in games can promote violence in the real world but this does not extent to all games or all types of violence in video games, not all or even most video games are considered violent.In short, Cons argument at best proves that video games can be abused and over done but so can hamburgers... There are proven benefits that video games can benefit a person who plays games daily.Even if violent video gaming does not correlate to real violence COMPLETELY, there is still a risk, and that risk increases exponentially as days go by. So, video gaming every day is certainly NOT good for you.CONCLUSION In conclusion video gaming every day is not good because of the eye strain it provides. Since video games hook people in, the effects are multiplied. Video games also sometimes causes real violence and muscle stiffness which is very interfering with life. Overall, video gaming is certainly NOT good for you.I would like to thank my opponent for her time and arguments.Thank you.

We musn't be devoted TOO MUCH to scientific studies. Like when a researcher says that night owls have higher IQs, every night owl has a high IQ. No right? On an angle, it pretty much depends on the person. Because you know, we have different way of thinking and these Pros won't imply on each person. Only a gamer would start this kind of thread. This is one con of being a gamer. You persuade people to believe that that they need gaming and gaming is good.

Hello, I am Korean and you know, I am very young, 13 years old. I did many debating but I am still don't know English well. I will start with video games. I strongly think that all video games should be banned because there are many games that are violent so children or even adults would not realize the real and the game world. Also, video games can harm people's health and children can easily be addicted. Also, I think there are many fun activities to do except video games.

http://www.youtube.com...http://www.youtube.com...I’m not asking the readers to judge if porn is a net negative. All I’m saying is that I must show porn is significantly harmful, and that whether or not porn is net negative is irrelevant and up to the readers.I. Porn and aggression Ted Bundy clearly states that porn caused him to become more aggressive. In porn studies, there are two divisions: those on the individual level and those on the aggregate level (looking at the rape rate over the country as a whole) 1. Individual level studies There are two subcategories here. Experimental and non-experimental. Experimental studies deal with control groups and groups exposed to porn and then use a scientific model to determine attitudes towards women. Non-experimental studies are simply surveys and show correlations within the data. Experimental studies show causation Non-experimental studies show correlation For studies on the individual level, the answer is inevitable. I cite several meta-analyses[1|2|3|6|23] which each examine vast amounts of both experimental and non-experimental studies, and they all come to the conclusion that exposure to hardcore pornography causes increased aggression/negative attitudes towards women, including acceptance of the rape myth (the view that only bad/sexually promiscuous women get raped). I also cite individual studies [4|5|7|8|9|10|11|12|13|14|15|16|24] In an experimental study [17] control groups were compared to those exposed to porn over a period of time, and showed the group exposed to porn developed a more negative view of women, believing that women were naturally more sexually promiscuous, and expected less faithfulness between partners. Rape proclivity was also higher in the porn group: As expected, those with higher levels of psychosis were more influenced by exposure to porn: Also, the group exposed to porn thought the punishment for rape should be significantly less than the control Another study also found that those exposed to porn thought rapists should receive 300-350 less months in prison as compared to the control group [18] Thus, the studies on the individual level show porn increases negative attitudes and sexual aggression towards women, including trivialization of rape.2. Aggregate level studies As my opponent points out, there are several studies which correlate porn availability with decreased sex crimes, however experts have criticized these studies as over simplifying a complex issue [23]. Second, studies at the aggregate level are notorious for misleading mistakes. Dr Robinson illustrates this in a famous example [19] where he used stats at the aggregate level and showed that as the amount of immigrants increased in America, the literacy also increased. This is absurd! We know that immigrants are less literate, since statistics show this on the individual level. This is an example of an ecological fallacy, and it is a huge problem with my opponent’s studies. Dr. Robinson concludes “The relation between ecological and individual correlations…provides a definite answer as to whether ecological correlations can validly be used as substitutes for individual correlations. They cannot”[19] Thus, the very methodology of my opponent’s studies aren’t reliable when applied to interpersonal behaviors, especially since they contradict what the studies on the individual levels show. Thirdly, my opponent’s studies rely upon reported rape values, but only 15% of rapes are reported to authorities [20]. Some of the main reasons why women do not report rape is because they don’t want others to know (63%) and fear shame/mistreatment (44%). But wait…according to the individual research, pornography increases the rape acceptance myth, and thus fosters the social atmosphere in which women would not report rape. Thus, as pornography use increases, women will be less likely to report rape. So an increase in pornography would make it seem as if there is less rape, since less women will be open about their abuse. My opponent’s study takes place in the Czech republic during the middle of a rebellion, a change from communism to capitalism, the national Separation of Slovakia [22] and many other social and political changes. There’s so many factors here, it’s ridiculous to say porn caused the reduced rape rate. In addition to this, immediately after the change from communism to democracy (when pornography became available, the year 1989) the amount of rape actually increased at first [22]. In addition to this, the lesser sex-related crimes and child abuse had already began decreasing before the legalization of porn. Furthermore, they did not continue declining. Also, while the overall crime rate increased, the sexual crime rate remained the same despite women being less likely to report their abuse [26] Furthermore, in the Denmark study, the police admitted that they would sometimes not report rape cases, and in a public survey, it was found that the people were less likely to report physical violence against women [25] after the availability of porn, to such a degree it could significantly alter the rape rate. Historians and sociologists attribute the declining crime rate in the 1990s to various cultural causes including immigration, improved housing for low income, anti-drug campaigns etc[21]. My opponent is using shaky methodology, oversimplifying complicated historical time periods, and contradicting all the evidence on the individual level. Thus, the studies that porn causes lower sex crime rates are inconclusive and do not prove the null hypothesis.II. Porn harms relationships My opponent’s logic simply doesn’t work. Through his logic, we could come to the conclusion that infidelity doesn’t cause divorce, and that it’s just an outlet. While there may be a more fundamental and underlying problem with that relationship, the unfaithfulness of a spouse can obviously contribute to and thus cause a divorce. So why can’t we say that pornography (which is habit forming, and women don’t like when their spouse use it) also causes divorces? Especially considering it contributes to about half of divorces [27]. Also, the marriage rate has been declining dangerously [28]: While the divorce rate has sky-rocketed[29]. This is an important issue. Some recent studies suggest that porn may even be used as a substitute for marriage [30]. There are also many studies that claim the hurt due to porn can be even worse [31|32|33|34]. Therefore, since a significant amount of women (30%) think their partner has failed them by using porn, the effects of porn upon relationships are significant [35]. 23% of them claim their partner lies to them about his porn use. Trust is the basis of every relationship. Furthermore, my opponent accuses this study of methodological problems, but the study clearly does not use experimental exposure to porn.III. Porn is habit forming My opponent doesn’t do much. I’ve provided numerous sources which show that internet addiction and pornography are seriously habit forming (See the big list above). All he does is point out that internet addiction is not listed in the DSM. However, considering how new the internet is, this isn’t surprising. IV. Porn causes warped views of sex Let’s say I go mudding in my truck. I screw up my suspension. But don’t worry, I know how to work on front end suspension pretty well, and I change the ball joints in no time. This means that mudding must not be bad for my truck, right? Obviously not. But this is what my opponent is saying. His entire argument in response to mine is that we should teach more sex ed (fix the ball joints). This implicitly admits that pornography warps views of sex (is bad for my truck’s suspension). If porn isn’t harmful to children, why does Con say parents should set up safety nets to keep their children from finding it? Porn is a poor sex educator and causes people to think that sexual promiscuity is more widespread [17]: Considering porn is now affecting children, it will change the way they perceive sexuality in the world and in themselves. Con has ignored this. The quality of sexual education is irrelevant. Regardless of whether or not I am a good mechanic, mudding is bad for my truck’s suspension. Likewise, porn warps views of sex. Also, considering how porn is discovered at the age of 11 [36], it seems difficult to educate them before damage has already occurred. My opponent still ignores the argument that pornography contributes to genital insecurity. Ask yourself: do you want your impressionable 11 year old wondering “What’s sex?” so he jumps on Google, and his first exposure… double penetration? cool truck btw V. Porn causes STDs My opponent admits that porn-stars get STDs. This is due to the sex they have. Likewise, if porn causes adolescents to engage in the same sort of sex (shown above) it will cause an increase of STDs in the world. Therefore, my opponent has conceded one premise and not refuted the other and the argument stands. The point is simple. Porn causes people to be more acceptant of promiscuity [17]: It also causes them to be more sexually promiscuous (I showed this in earlier rounds). And being sexually promiscuous causes more STDs. So watching porn causes more STDs. Furthermore, considering how every second you spend reading this, there are 30,000 people watching porn [37] and 40,000,000 Americans regularly view porn, I believe the effects will be significant. Conclusion In conclusion, I have upheld every one of my arguments. I’ve shown that porn causes negative attitudes and sexual aggression, that it is habit forming, warps views of sex, harms relationships, and causes an increase in deadly STDs. Therefore the resolution is upheld, and I urge you to vote Pro! I’d like to end this debate with a final quote. “the problem with pornography is not that it shows too much of the person, but that it shows far too little.” [38] Thanks to Bennett for this great debate! Sourceshttp://tinyurl.com...

To begin my argument, I first like to bring up some points my opponent has brought up on why Video Games are not a significant cause of violence. My opponent brought up other types of reasoning's of why video games are not the significant problem towards the violence in children; examples being television and school. But I must ask my opponent one question, dealing with his arguments, being: "Do Video Games cause technically cause violence"? Before continuing into my argument, I would like to define a few key words within the topic. The biggest one being video games, meaning: "A game played by electronically manipulating images produced by a computer program on a television screen or other display screen". Then there is violence, which is defined as: "Behavior involving an action intending to hurt, damage, or kill someone or something". My opponent, in most video games nowadays, isn't the goal resulting in any of the three aspects of violence when playing a video game? So isn't already causing most violence among children, when actually just plying the game? If you reply with "no", then you clearly do not see the point that video games are a significant cause in violence among children; because of its heavy popularity in modern media. Stated in a statistic on ABC News, and the website "Education", the amount of video games played by children in 2014 was around 91%. That is a huge population of children, which practically makes up most of the U.S, and in another statistic; it states that the average amount of time played on a video game was about 13.5 hours. The reasoning of why is typically because of adults having their own responsibilities, and parents needing a way to "distract" kids from bugging them. A video game is the simple solution for the parents task. The games the child plays varies, but most video games either have some element of violence or is within the "cool trend" among children. The most recipient, with the influence of the "cool-trend", typically rely among teenagers. The ages between 13 to 16 years old. The games typically played by this audience involves either "Action", or "Shooters"; like stated in the Sales of Video Game Genres in 2014. The most selling either being Call of Duty or Assassin's Creed, two of the most violent games within the market. My opponent may question why parents do not take these away from their children? It seems so simple, and it is, but most parents do not understand the Rating System in games. In another statistic stated on "PBS", it states that close to 90% of parents do not look at the Rating System within games because of being "too stressed" as an adult. Supporting one of my previous arguments. In my opponents previous argument, he brought up that there are more other influences than just video games. To counter argue his statement, let me please share another statistic. Under an article, titled "Kids stay indoors: What happened to, "Go outside and play"", it states that more children stay inside than outside. The exact percentage, being 72%, states that kids rather stay inside, than outside; disproving my opponents argument of being influenced on the outside. As well as in another article titled "Why do Kids Love Video Games", it states that children were surveyed about whether they like to watch TV or play video games. 87% said that they preferred to play video games, over watching television, because of having an interactive experience within the room; instead of just sitting and watching a screen. As it is seen, my opponents previous arguments that he has brought up are actually false, than true. Video games is the popular media in society nowadays, and is mostly the target audience of many companies. If my opponent claims its because of other reasoning's, why are video games "pushed" away; even though being the most popular trend within the United States? Sources: http://www.pbs.org... http://www.statista.com...- http://abcnews.go.com... http://www.education.com... http://www.pbs.org... https://www.minnpost.com... http://learningworksforkids.com...

This debate is going to be extremely challenging since I am only allowed 1,000 characters, which is not nearly enough to make a substantial and good argument. I will be doing arguments in segments since I need enough room to cite and to post the argument: According to the American Psychological Association (APA): "Many studies have shown that physical punishment-- including spanking, hitting and other means of causing pain-- can lead to increased aggression, antisocial behavior, physical injury and mental health problems for children." [1][1] http://www.apa.org...

This debate is between Zebracakes and I, about whether video games are bad for people or not. The previous debate, I took the position of Con: For this one, I will take the position of Pro. Round 1: stating our Opinions. Round 2: Proving our side of the debate. I believe that video games can be be a very bad influence on people. For example, we have games like "Hate". Games also burn time that can be used for other, better purposes like exercise or schooling.