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OOC and IC: Friday Ethics Debate - Tara, Shep, Beka, Cameron, and Rory

For convenience, I'm creating this post for us to OOC and IC hash out the debate stuff.

I'll place a link to either the Ethics classroom or Study Hall or the Perk or something for the IC stuff once we get going, to provide an IC chrono context for the discussions.

Tara-mun, you're included, in case we have OOC questions, but more until we get the sitch with Shep's ankle and his replacement, if any, straightened out.

I'll be AFK for an hour or so. Otherwise, jump on in. And whomever gets assigned in Shep's place - jump on in. I'll change the subject line to include you as soon as I know who you are. :D

As a reminder, this is the assignment:

First speaker, Affirmative - defines the key words, outlines the arguments his or her team will be making, and begins to address them.
First speaker, Opposition - briefly rebuts (disagrees with) the points 1A made, outlines their own team's arguments, begins to address them.
Second speaker, Affirmative - briefly rebuts 1O, gives the body of the team's argument.
Second speaker, Opposition - briefly rebuts 2A, gives the body of the team's argument.
Third speaker, Affirmative - rebuts all the arguments of the Opposition, in detail. May add one new argument if appropriate.
Third speaker, Opposition - rebuts all the arguments of the Affirmative, in detail. May not add any new points.

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OOC discussion here.

Sorry, what's happening with Shep's ankle? Do we actually need a replacement?

OK. IC - Shep's at the clinic needing maybe, to be hospitalized. But he'll be contacting you about that.

OOC - Shep's mun is going to be mostly AFK this weekend. She'll be contacting you about it too.

In sum, Cam-mun, Shep-mun, and I have talked and we're concerned NPCing Shep for the debate may not be the best way to handle it. I just threw this up here early so I could go eat.

I'm sure Shep-mun will fill you in IC and OOC.

Okay. I'll go back over the class discussion and pick someone else out to 'volunteer', pending Shep-mun's decision.

IC Hash out here, continued from Beka and Cameron's conversation in Study Hall:

Beka tentatively approaches Cameron. "Hey. Sorry about the phone message. Bad night."

"Hey," Cameron smiles at Beka. "Sorry to hear. You okay?"

Beka smiles back wearily. "Me? Fine. Just don't ask about... my roommates, my new emodemon pal, the Student Council President, or any teachers who might regularly have sex." When she pauses for breath, she notices Cam seems cheerful. "You look happy."

"Oh ouch. I won't then." Cameron grimaces, but smiles again at her last remark. "That's because I am. Do you want to wait until Sheppard shows up or do you want to start already?"

"Thanks." She smiles, and it's clear she means it. "I'm glad. Let's just get started. He's been scarce since the jogging accident."

Cameron blinked. "Jogging accident? He said he was fine."

"Last I saw him, which was...yesterday, I think...no, the day before, his ankle looked like a tree trunk."

"Oh man, I knew we should have taken him to the clinic," Cameron sighs as he takes out a notepad.

"He's stubborn like that. Not your fault." Beka rolls her head on her shoulders and pulls out her Flexis, which holds the assignment, and a notepad. "How'd you want to start?"

"I'm not surprised." Cameron sighs and looks over his notes. "Divide rolls and make sure we have some clear arguments that we all agree upon. The rest will be improvisation depending on what the other team says."

"Right. Well, if we don't know what Shep's going to be capable of, let's give him the smallest role and the one that can be prepared most in advance. No?" She taps a pen against her lips. "Seems like the critical thing is controlling the terms of the debate. They're going to want 'murder' defined broadly. It helps our argument if we keep it narrow."

Cameron nods in agreement. "We definitely need to set apart the difference between murder and killing that happens in self defence or accidental to begin with. That leaves us with planned murder and passion crime and I don't think it's too hard to say those should never be allowed."

Beka considers this. "I think we should be even more narrow, if we can. Maybe we should require premeditation for it to be murder? Passion crimes are never 'right' but there are justifications in some legal systems. Mine, for example."

"There are justifications, but it's still wrong to have an impulse to kill. It's poor judgement if you let your anger get away like that." Cameron frowned. "I don't think you can simply wipe this sort of crime out of the definition because it's harder to defend."

"Maybe we should ask Ta-- Professor Maclay about the rules for that? I'm not sure what we can do. A juridical definition of murder is probably a good place to start. We can always rule stuff out later if she says it's OK." Beka chews her lip. "Which piece of this do you want to take?"

"I think we should just do what the instructions say. I'm sure she expects us to be able to handle this ourselves. I like your idea of starting with the juridical definition. Second or third speaker is fine by me."

Beka nods. "OK. If I had to guess the other side's line up, Angelus will want to go last. Parker will want to go ... first, probably, to attack our definitions. And Phoebe in the middle. I'm good either second or third. Maybe we'll get a natural sense of flow as we're working."

Cameron nods. "Sounds good to me."

Shep limps in very slowly. "Sorry I'm running late. I'm uh... not moving so well. Where are we?"

Cameron frowns as he sees Shep limping. "Yo. You alright? I thought you said it was fine."

"Hey, you. You got worse. You should...get that taken care of." Beka looks concerned.

Have we heard from her?

I haven't, no.

Hm. She told us both she'd talk to you. Must've gotten hung up with packing and such.

Two options: if Shep goes first speaker affirmative, the speech can be entirely written beforehand, and Shep-mun doesn't actually need to be there. Second option: I beg another student to take up the position (and there's really nothing around here that doesn't sound smutty, is there?) at the last moment.

Tomorrow's Thursday. We planned for Shep-mun to do the first part, so let's see what comes up then? Maybe line someone up just in case? (and yes, so yes, with the smuttiness)

While we're at it, do you have a definition of murder you want us to use or are we free to define at will?

You define it however you want - it's your debate. The only rule about definitions is that you can't define the other team out of the debate. You have to give them something to argue, so no truisms.

*nods* Got it. Thanks!

Now that's tricky.

"Okay, I looked up the definition in just an ordinary dictionary (http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=murder) and even that is already enough to back us up:

murder : the crime of unlawfully killing a person especially with malice aforethought

Do we want a more tightly sealed definition or one that leaves more room for the other team to debate?"

Yeah. I'm going to have to rely on you and whomever to pick the definition IC, because I'm having a very hard time separating out my legal mind here and figuring out what Beka would maybe know because of her criminal record. I'll have Beka make a suggestion and ask a question or two that seem logical from her personal worldview.

"Unlawful. That's going to need a little bit of framing. Because the laws where I'm from are different than here. And Angelus will take a broad view - with all those centuries to draw from. We're going to want to specify what system of laws." Beka pursed her lips thoughtfully.

"And..." Here she winced painfully thinking of her recent stint in detention. "Do we want to go with a definition that basically says it's only murder if you get caught? Might be good to decide what incidents we think are murder and adjust the definition?"

"I don't know why you think it's only when you get caught. Unlawful applies whether you get caught or not. I thin specifying a law is a bad idea as it gives you a lot of cultures where it doesn't apply to. Leaving it exactly like this you specify that you respect every culture's law."

"Maybe I'm reading that different. I thought a crime meant you actually got caught? If not, OK. Seems like we don't want to give them too many openings." She shrugged. "I don't know a lot about the laws now. A lot of stuff that passes as self-defense or justifiable killing where I'm from would probably be considered murder here.

"Say we go with this definition, for now. Why is murder wrong?"

"No, crime is a general action that you do that is wrong. It doesn't matter if you get caught or not." He frowns. "Taking another life is taboo in pretty much every culture. It's even considered a sin."

And I'm starting to realise that I might be frelled over this whole thing. As good as I can bullshit my way through some issues, a thought through debate that is going to nail you on definitions is going to screw me over as I don't have the finesse to pick up on smaller nuances that can be important in debates.

How 'bout I take the third slot and do clean up. Beka's been arguing with Angelus a lot, so she's got some experience at nuance.

Cam's the perfect foil for Beka's desire to narrow it down as much as possible (so she doesn't feel like a murderer).

We *need* to know who is going to take that other slot. I'll see if I can find Shep mun's e-mail and get permission, and I'll poke Tara-mun when Tara and Beka have 'breakfast Friday morning' (later today).

"Some groups consider it a sin where I'm from. The Nietzscheans see it as honorable and probably don't consider their men men until they've claimed a life. Others see it as a necessity of survival..." Beka frowned too. I'm not a murderer.

"In which case neither actions are actually against the law," Cameron rebutted. "Necessity of survival falls under self defence, no?"

I don't know at this point. I feel like I'm in high school and let a school project get away from me and one of the people needed isn't even here. And my brain might possibly be going on a strike soon. *g*

OMG, I so know what you mean. It feels like an all-night cram session. ;) Take your brain on strike if you have to. I have to eat and do some work.

When I come back, I'll write up something OOC and then we can IC figure it out. Cool?

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OOC and IC: Friday Ethics Debate - Tara, Shep, Beka, Cameron, and Rory

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