Help! Debate AGAINST Legalization

I used to do NFL Extemporaneous speaking. Here you go. Notice to my fellow city folk: I do not agree with any of these reasons and know how to refute them and know most if not all are bullshit.

1. There is no cost effective way to prohibit people from smoking and driving. (bullshit, check if the eyelids flutter)
2. It has a tendency to make you lazy, although banned for racist reasons in 1937 ("the mexicans smoke it and dont do any work"), if you really think about it, you can spin that to conform with today's political correctness.
3. make up some bullshit that you can get a "psychological" addiction. thats the latest the dea claims.
4. read up on all the reasons NIDA, DEA, ETC keep it illegal. theyre all bullshit but the judges want to hear it.

youre gonna lose unless the judges are nazis. just do your best.

 

you'll have to resort to what the ONDCP and DEA do, such as:

a). Avoid discussing it altogether. This is an extremely effective ploy as reformists are simply left without a forum in which to voice their opinions, and to the audience (the general public) it appears that there's not much interest in the issue.

b). Speak of vague fears that are impossible to prove either way. The ONDCP's current favorite are "it's not your father's marijuana", "legalization will send the wrong message" and "it's a gateway drug".

c). Focus on the importance of pursuing some abstract ideological principal that the prohibition's supposed to protect, regardless of whether it can be proved if the goal even has any benefit to society, or taking into account the consequential social harms that those actions cause.

d). Remember this is a debate not a scientific research project. You don't need to prove your case scientifically in order to win, you can use flippant remarks to ridicule his scientific arguments without even attempting to prove scientifically that he was wrong. Here's a few from a master at the art with whom I was arguing with a while back:

Notice how he appears to have all the answers but in reality he's not presenting a shred of evidence to support his position. It's a very effective ploy if your audience can be swayed by emotion (most of them can).


Oh, and the whole "citizens make the law, the DEA just enforces it" and "the law's the law people should follow it" is pretty effective. It totally ignores the fact that the DEA also MAKES the law. They are the sole decision maker on the scheduling of marijuana and so they use this role to ensure that marijuana will always be kept in Schedule I, thus protecting their jobs as enforcers of the law. And the DEA and police vigorously lobby legislators to never abandon the prohibition, and since they're "experts" on the subject their (bs) opinions are taken seriously.

e). Totally ignore the murders committed by the Cartels in order to protect their cash flows from selling marijuana into the U.S.
The violence committed by the gangsters in the 1930's was the reason why people demanded the alcohol prohibition be repealed. With marijuana however, the violence is conducted in a foreign country and this alone is enough to make people completely ignore it altogether.

That's why there's no public outcry to end the prohibition and why the entire issue appears to be of no real value and is in fact quite boring to most people. The Cartels murdered more than 5,700 people last year, often beheading, dismembering and soaking them in baths of acid as well. Many of these were innocent fathers, mothers and children, killed in order to warn the government to leave the Cartels alone.

Nobody else cares that these murders were a direct consequence of OUR prohibition, and you shouldn't either. If they occurred in this country there'd be public uprising, but because they occurred in Mexico they are of no consequence. And don't mention that there will be an even greater number of people killed this year either, or that this violence is currently threatening to flood over the border and into our country.

GL man. Just remember that you're representing the Government's position on this, and the Government is always right.

 

I really like this one, in that I especially hate this belief. You're right, the DEA and government says, "We cannot accept drugs. We must keep them (specifically cannabis) illegal to send a message and protect justice." What the fuck are they protecting? Cannabis has been proven time and time again to be a completely harmless drug. Not only that, it is the cure for cancer and an industrial powerhouse. When smoking cannabis, there are very few negative effects, even when smoked over a lifetime.

I simply could not argue against legalization. I don't have it in me to argue for the deaths of millions of people and to perpetuate a cycle of pain that won't end and just keeps getting worse. Anyone who knows a lot about cannabis knows that it is the most important issue we face, as it could fix the economy, reform healthcare, help eliminate global poverty, reduce global warming, eliminate our dependence on oil, and more (and exactly how to do this is outlined in Jack Herer's book The Emperor Wears no Clothes. There's proof behind all of this!)

 

One other thing I forgot to mention is you could follow John Walters' lead and automatically classify everyone who supports marijuana as being "on the fringe".


It's a neat ploy and creates the image of the government as being moral and logical while everyone who disagrees with them is either mentally unstable or acting out of self-interests harmful to the rest of society.

If your opponent quotes the research of a respected doctor just say something like "it certainly wouldn't be in the best interests of the public to put the lives of our children in the hands of fringe doctors".

 

I agree, but in any dispute it's important to "know your enemy". Know where he's coming from (science, ideology, etc), know why you disagree, and know where his logic is weak. When you know that you'll know how to beat him.

 

I often see this one floating around:

"There are more children in drug abuse programs for marijuana than all the other illicit drugs combined."

Sounds like a scary fact if you are ignorant. I think something like 98-99% of those kids are in those drug abuse programs because they are either forced or given the choice between drug classes and jail time. It is a totally bullshit fact that makes it seem like cannabis is this demonic weed that has a higher chance of addiction than heroin or meth. Use that little phrase, if your teacher is anti-cannabis he will probably cream his pants.