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1NC Dark Night K

The 1AC is a faade a pseudo-sign image of sociopolitical change


Williams 2k (Christopher R. Williams, PhD, forensic psychology, professor and chairman of
the Department of Criminal Justice Studies at Bradley University, Bruce A. Arrigo, PhD,
administration of justice, professor of criminology, law, and society, Department of Criminal
Justice and Criminology at the University of North Carolina, Faculty Associate in the Center for
Professional and Applied Ethics, The (Im)Possibility of Democratic Justice and the Gift of the
Majority, Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, Vol. 16, No. 3, August 2000, pgs. 321-343)
The impediments to establishing democratic justice in contemporary American society have
caused a national paralysis; one that has recklessly spawned an aporetic1 existence for
minorities. The entrenched ideological complexities afflicting under- and
nonrepresented groups (e.g., poverty, unemployment, illiteracy, crime) at the hands
of political, legal, cultural, and economic power elites have produced counterfeit,
perhaps even fraudulent, efforts at reform: Discrimination and inequality in
opportunity prevail (e.g., Lynch & Patterson, 1996). The misguided and futile initiatives of
the state, in pursuit of transcending this public affairs crisis, have fostered a reification, that is, a
reinforcement of divisiveness. This time, however, minority groups compete with one another for
recognition, affirmation, and identity in the national collective psyche (Rosenfeld, 1993). What
ensues by way of state effort, though, is a contemporaneous sense of equality for all
and a near imperceptible endorsement of inequality; a silent conviction that the
majority still retains power. The gift of equality , procured through state legislative
enactments as an emblem of democratic justice, embodies true (legitimated) power
that remains nervously secure in the hands of the majority. The ostensible
empowerment of minority groups is a facade; it is the ruse of the majority gift. What
exists, in fact, is a simulacrum (Baudrillard, 1981, 1983) of equality (and by extension,
democratic justice): a pseudo-sign image (a hypertext or simulation) of real
sociopolitical progress.

This creates a hegemonical, narcissistic reinforcement of power


which turns the case
Williams 2k (Christopher R. Williams, PhD, forensic psychology, professor and chairman of
the Department of Criminal Justice Studies at Bradley University, Bruce A. Arrigo, PhD,
administration of justice, professor of criminology, law, and society, Department of Criminal
Justice and Criminology at the University of North Carolina, Faculty Associate in the Center for
Professional and Applied Ethics, The (Im)Possibility of Democratic Justice and the Gift of the
Majority, Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, Vol. 16, No. 3, August 2000, pgs. 321-343)
Reciprocation on your part is impossible. Even if one day you are able to return our monetary
favor twofold, we will always know that it was us who first hosted you; extended to and entrusted
in you an opportunity given your time of need. As the initiators of such a charity, we are
always in a position of power, and you are always indebted to us. This is where the
notion of egoism or conceit assumes a hegemonic role. By giving to you, a supposed act of
generosity in the name of furthering your cause, we have not empowered you. Rather,
we have empowered ourselves. We have less than subtlely let you know that we have
more than you. We have so much more, in fact, that we can afford to give you some.
Our giving becomes, not an act of beneficence, but a show of power, that is,
narcissistic hegemony! Thus, we see that the majority gift is a ruse: a simulacrum of
movement toward aporetic equality and a simulation of democratic justice. By relying
on the legislature (representing the majority) when economic and social opportunities are availed
to minority or underrepresented collectives, the process takes on exactly the form of Derridas

gift. The majority controls the political, economic, legal, and social arenas ; that is, it is
(and always has been) in control of such communities as the employment sector and
the educational system. The mandated opportunities that under- or nonrepresented citizens
receive as a result of this falsely eudemonic endeavor are gifts and, thus, ultimately constitute
an effort to make minority populations feel better. There is a sense of movement toward
equality in the name of democratic justice, albeit falsely manufactured. 18 In return
for this effort, the majority shows off its long-standing authority (this provides a stark
realization to minority groups that power elites are the forces that critically form
society as a community), forever indebts under- and nonrepresented classes to the
generosity of the majority (after all, minorities groups now have, presumably, a real
chance to attain happiness), and, in a more general sense, furthers the narcissism of
the majority (its representatives have displayed power and have been generous).
Thus, the ruse of the majority gift assumes the form and has the hegemonical effect
of empowering the empowered, relegitimating the privileged , and fueling the
voracious conceit of the advantaged.

Their demand for the ballot is trapped in a web of scheming the ethic
of calculation turns the case
McGowan 09 (Todd McGowan, Associate Professor, film theory, University of
Vermont, PhD, Ohio State University, studies the intersection of Hegel,
psychoanalysis, and existentialism and cinema, The Exceptional Darkness of The
Dark Knight, Jump Cut, No. 51, Spring 2009,
http://www.ejumpcut.org/archive/jc51.2009/darkKnightKant/text.html)
According to Kant, when we emerge as subjects, we do so as beings of radical evil,

that is, beings who do good for evil reasons . We help our neighbor for the recognition
we gain; we volunteer to help with the school dance in order to spend time with a
potential romantic interest; we give money for disaster relief in order to feel
comfortable about our level of material comfort; and so on. For Kant, this is the
fundamental problem that morality confronts and the most difficult type of evil to
extirpate. He explains, The human being (even the best) is evil only because he
reverses the moral order of his incentives in incorporating them into his maxims . He

indeed incorporates the moral law into those maxims, together with the law of
self-love; since, however, he realizes that the two cannot stand on an equal footing,
but one must be subordinated to the other as its supreme condition , he makes the
incentives of self-love and their inclinations the condition of compliance with the
moral law whereas it is this latter that, as the supreme condition of the

satisfaction of the former, should have been incorporated into the universal
maxim of the power of choice as the sole incentive.[12] Though Kant believes that
we have the capacity to turn from beings of radical evil to moral beings, we cannot
escape a certain originary radical evil that leads us to place our incentives of self-love
above the law and that prevents us from adhering to the law for its own sake.[13] Our
first inclination always involves the thought of what we will gain from not lying rather
than the importance of telling the truth. Even when we do tell the truth, we do so out
of prudence or convenience rather than out of duty. This is why Kant contends that
most obedience to the moral law is in fact radical evil obedience for the wrong
reasons. The presence of radical evil at the heart of obedience to the law taints this
obedience and gives criminality the upper hand over the law. There is always a

fundamental imbalance between law and criminality. Criminality is inscribed into


the law itself in the form of misdirected obedience, and no law can free itself from
its reliance on the evil of such obedience. A consequentialist ethics develops as a
compromise with this radical evil at the heart of the law. Consequentialism is an

ethics that sees value only in the end obedience and it disregards whatever evil
means that the subject uses to arrive at that obedience . If people obey the law, the
consequentialist thinks, it doesnt matter why they do so. Those who take up this or

some other compromise with radical evil predominate within society, and they
constitute the behavioral norm. They obey the law when necessary, but they do so in
order to satisfy some incentive of self-love. Theirs is a morality of calculation in which
acts have value in terms of the ultimate good that they produce or the interest that
they serve. Anyone who obeys the law for its own sake becomes exceptional. Both
Batman and the Joker exist outside the calculating morality that predominates among
the police, the law-abiding citizens, and the criminal underworld in Gotham. Both

have the status of an exception because they adhere to a code that cuts against
their incentives for self-love and violates any consequentialist morality or morality
concerned solely with results. Though Batman tries to save Gotham and the Joker
tries to destroy it, though Batman commits himself to justice and the Joker
commits himself to injustice, they share a position that transcends the inadequate
and calculated ethics authorized by the law itself. Their differences mask a similar
relationship to Kantian morality. Through the parallel between them, Christopher
Nolan makes clear the role that evil must play in authentic heroism. It is the Joker, not
Batman, who gives the most eloquent account of the ethical position that they occupy
together. He sets himself up against the consequentialist and utilitarian ethic that

rules Gotham, and he tries to analyze this ethic in order to understand what
motivates it. As the Joker sees it, despite their apparent differences, all of the
different groups in Gotham indulge in an ethics of what he calls scheming. That is to
say, they act not on the basis of the rightness or wrongness of the act itself but in
order to achieve some ultimate object. In doing so, they inherently degrade their acts
and deprive them of their basis in freedom. Scheming enslaves one to the object of
ones scheme.

The alternative is to vote negative because the 1ACs ethics are


right - to be the Dark Knight is the only way to create true heroism
and substantive change.
McGowan 09 (Todd McGowan, Associate Professor, film theory, University of Vermont, PhD,
Ohio State University, studies the intersection of Hegel, psychoanalysis, and existentialism and
cinema, The Exceptional Darkness of The Dark Knight, Jump Cut, No. 51, Spring 2009,
http://www.ejumpcut.org/archive/jc51.2009/darkKnightKant/text.html)
Just as The Dark Knight illustrates the inextricable relation between heroism and evil,
it also undermines the idea of the hero who can appear as heroic. From early in the film,
Batman proclaims his desire to step aside in order to cede his position to someone who can be
heroic without wearing a mask. He sees this possibility in the figure of Harvey Dent. But the
film shows that there is no hero without a mask and, more specifically, without a
mask of evil. As Slavoj iek puts it, The properly human good, the good elevated
above the natural good, the infinite spiritual good, is ultimately the mask of evil.[20]
nWithout the mask of evil, good cannot emerge and remains stuck the calculation of
interest; without the mask of evil, good remains scheming. This is precisely what Harvey Dent evinces, despite the promise
that Batman sees in him for the perfect form of heroism. Throughout the beginning part of the film, Harvey Dent seems like a figure of pure good. The purity of his goodness allows him to never be nonplused. Even
when a mobster tries to shoot him in open court, he calmly grabs the gun from the mobsters hand and punches the mobster in the face. After the punch, we see Dents expression of total equanimity, even in the
midst of an attempted assassination. This coolness stems from his absolute certainty that events will ultimately follow according to his plans. The rapidity with which Nolan edits together the threat from the
mobster and Dents response minimizes the spectators sense of danger. The threat against Dents life disappears almost before we can experience it as such, which suggests that it lacks a quality of realness, both
for Dent and for the spectator. The court scene establishes him as a hero whom one cannot harm. Ironically, the superhero in the film, Batman, shows himself to be vulnerable when he first appears in the film, as

to Batman, Dents
heroism does not involve the experience of loss and is based on a repudiation of the
very possibility of losing. Bruce Wayne adopted the identity of Batman after the
trauma of being dropped in a cave full of bats and the loss of his parents, but no such tra umatic loss
dogs bite him through his protective armor. This distinction between Dent and Batmans vulnerability explains why the former cannot be an authentic hero. In contrast

animates the heroism of Dent. He is heroic through an immediate identification with the good, which enables him to have a purity that Batman doesnt have. No rupture and subsequent return animates his
commitment to justice. He can publicly avow his heroic actions because he performs them in a pure way, without resorting to the guise of evil. But the falsity of this immediate identification with the good becomes

apparent in Dents disavowal of loss, which Nolan locates in the tic that marks Dents character his proclivity for flipping a coin to resolve dilemmas. On several occasions, he flips the coin that his father had
given him in order to introduce the possibility of loss into his activities. By flipping a coin, one admits that events might not go according to plan, that the other might win, and that loss is an ever-present possibility.
Though the coin flip represents an attempt to master loss by rendering it random rather than necessary or constitutive, it nonetheless ipso facto accedes to the fact that one might lose. Dent first flips the coin when
he is late to examine a key witness in court, and the coin flip will determine whether he or his assistant Rachel will do the questioning. When Rachel wonders how he could leave something so important to chance,
Dent replies, I make my own luck. It is just after this that the mobster tries and fails to shoot Dent, further suggesting his invulnerability. Dent wins this and subsequent coin flips in the first part of the film because
he uses a loaded coin, a coin with two heads. When it comes to the coin flip, Dent does make his own luck by eliminating the element of chance. The coin that he uses ensures that he will avoid the possibility of

.
Once loss is introduced into Dents world, his heroism disappears, and he becomes a
figure of criminality. The transformation of Harvey Dent after his disfigurement is so precipitous that it strains credulity. One day he is the pure defender of absolute justice, and the
losing. The coin with two heads is certainly a clever device, but it also stands as the objective correlative for Dents lack of authentic heroism. The immediacy of his heroism cannot survive any mediation

next he is on a homicidal warpath willing to shoot innocent children. One could chalk up this rapid change to sloppy filmmaking on Christopher Nolans part, to an eagerness to move too quickly to the films
concluding moments of tension. But the rapidity of the transformation signifies all the more because it seems so forced and jarring. It allows us to retroactively examine Harvey Dents relationship to the law earlier
in the film. Dent becomes Two-Face after his injury, but in doing so he merely takes up the identity that police department had adopted for him when he was working for the Internal Affairs division. As an
investigator of other officers, Dent earned this nickname by insisting on absolute purity and by targeting any sign of police corruption. Even Gordon, an officer who is not corrupt, complains to Dent of the paralyzing
effects on the department of these tactics. On the one hand, an insistence on purity seems to be a consistently noncalculating ethical position. One can imagine this insistence obstructing the longterm goal of

. The pure hero quickly


becomes the criminal when an experience of loss disrupts this purity. This first occurs when Gordon is
better law enforcement (which is why Gordon objects to it). On the other hand, however, the demand for purity always anticipates its own failure

apparently killed at the police commissioners funeral. In response to this blatant display of public criminality, Dent abuses a suspect from the shooting and even threatens to kill him, using his trick coin as a device
for mental torture. Even though Dent has no intention of actually shooting the suspect, Batman nonetheless scolds Dent for his methods when he interrupts the private interrogation. This scene offers the first

Dent resorts to torture because his form


of heroism has no ontological space for loss. When it occurs, his heroism becomes completely derailed. Rachel's death and his own disfigurement
insight into what Dent will become later in the film, but it also shows the implications of his form of heroism.

introduce traumatic loss into Dents existence. Nolan shows the ramifications of this change through the transformation that his coin undergoes during the explosion that kills Rachel. The explosion chars one side of
Dents two-headed coin (which he had earlier flipped to Rachel as he was taken away to jail), so that it becomes, through being submitted to a traumatic force, a coin with two different sides. The film indicates here
how trauma introduces loss into the world and how this introduction of loss removes all subjective certainty. When Dent as Two-Face flips the newly marked coin, the act takes on an entirely new significance. Unlike
earlier, he is no longer certain about the result of the flip. He flips to decide whether he will kill the Joker in the hospital room, whether he will kill Detective Wuertz (Ron Dean) in a bar, or whether he will kill
Detective Ramirez (Monique Curnen) in an alley. Of the three, only Wuertz ends up dead, but Dent also kills another officer and the criminal boss Maroni, along with some of his men. This rampage ends with Dent
holding Gordons family hostage and threatening to kill the one whom Gordon holds most dear. Dent becomes a killer in order to inflict his own experience of loss on others: he tells Gordon that he wants to kill what
is most precious to him so that Gordon will feel what he felt. Dent can so quickly take up this attitude because his heroism has no place for loss. When it occurs, the heroism becomes completely undone. After
Dents death, the film ends with Batman accepting responsibility for the killings performed by Dent in order to salvage Dents public reputation and thereby sustain the image of the public hero. Gordon and Batman
believe that this gesture is necessary for saving the city and keeping its hope for justice alive. When Gordon says, Gotham needs its true hero, we see a shot of him turning Dents face over, obscuring the burned
side and exposing the human side. In death, Dent will begin to wear the mask that he would never wear in life. A mask of heroism will cover his criminality. As the film conceives it, this lie that purity is possible
represents the sine qua non of social being. Without it, without the idea that one can sustain an ethical position, calculation of interest would have nothing to offset it, and the city would become identified with

It is as if Batman takes
responsibility for Dents act not to save Dents face but to stain his own image
irrevocably with evil. He remains the heroic exception, but his status changes
radically. In order to guarantee that Dent dies as a hero, Batman must take
responsibility for the murders that Dent committed. With this gesture, he truly adopts
the mask of evil. In the closing montage sequence, we see the police hunting him down, Gordon smashing the Bat Signal, and finally Batman driving away into the night on his motorcycle.
As this sequence concludes, we hear Gordons voiceover say, Hes the hero Gotham deserves, but not the one it needs
right now. And so well hunt him, because he can take it. Because hes not a hero.
Hes a silent guardian, a watchful protector ... a dark knight. As Gordon pronounces the final word, the film cuts to black
criminality. But the real interest of the films conclusion lies with Batman and the form of appearance that his heroism takes.

from the image of Batman on his motorcycle. The melodrama of this voiceover elevates Batman's heroism, but it does so precisely because he agrees to appear as evil. This gesture, even more than any of his

physical acts of courage, is the gesture of the true hero because it leaves him without
any recognition for his heroism. For the hero who appears in the form of evil, heroic
exceptionality must be an end in itself without any hope for a greater reward . When
the exception takes this form, it loses the danger that adheres to the typical hero.
The mask of evil allows the exception to persist without multiplying itself. By
adopting this position at the end of the film, Batman reveals that he has taken up the
lesson of the Joker and grasped the importance of the break from calculation. Dent,
the hero who wants to appear heroic, descends into murderous evil. But Batman, the
hero who accepts evil as his form of appearance, sustains the only possible path for
heroic exceptionality. In an epoch when the law's inadequacy is evident, the need for the heroic exception becomes ever more pronounced, but the danger of the exception has also
never been more apparent. Declarations of exceptionality abound in the contemporary world, and they allow us to see the negative ramifications that follow from the exception, no matter how heroic its intent.
Audiences flock to superhero movies in search of a heroic exception that they can embrace, an exception that would work toward justice without simultaneously adding to injustice in the manner of todays real

its form of appearance must be its


opposite if it to avoid implicating itself in the injustice that it fights . The lesson for
our real world exceptions is thus a difficult one. Rather than being celebrated as the
liberator of Iraq and the savoir of U.S. freedom, George W. Bush would have to act
behind the scenes to encourage charges being brought against him as a war criminal
at the World Court, and then he would have to flee to the streets of The Hague as the
authorities pursue him there. In the eyes of the public, true heroes must identify
themselves with the evil that we fight.
world exceptions. In The Dark Knight, Christopher Nolan offers a viable image of heroic exceptionality. As he sees,

2NC Overview

OV

Much like the Batman, the affirmative presents us with a choice --- the choice to
succumb to their mandate of the ballot --- to reward them with a win for presenting
an ethical advocacy --- but does this create space for true change? Is this true
heroism?
Does voting affirmative change anything? Or will they simply be negative next round
and potentially debate this very same affirmative and go for the Politics DA and a
couple of util cards as theyve done in the past
Does stepping into a debate room in the middle of _____ help these peoples lives?
Does handing people some money from the federal government for a few more buses
and trains actually break down the system? Does it stop ____ or ____ from causing their
oppression or does it stop ____? Yet the 1AC says they stop it all and voting affirmative
ends it --- making that decision is not only a flawed way at producing change but is
also dangerous
Yet through all of this, its not even enough for the affirmative to simply present an
ethical advocacy --- rather, they demand the ballot which is a morality of calculation
--- it uses ethical challenge they pretend to advocate as a means to win the ballot --this reduces us to mere pawns on their chessboard and controls the root cause of the
1ACs harms and destroys the value to life
Dillon 99 (Michael Dillon, University of Lancaster, Another Justice, Political Theory,
1999, http://ptx.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/27/2/155)
Economies of evaluation necessarily require calculability. 35 Thus no valuation without mensuration and no
mensuration without indexation. Once rendered calculable, however, units of account are necessarily submissible not
only to valuation but also, of course, to devaluation. Devaluation, logically, can extend to the point of counting as
nothing. Hence, no mensuration without demensuration either. There is nothing abstract about this: the declension of
economies of value leads to the zero point of holocaust. However liberating and emancipating
systems of valuerightsmay claim to be, for example, they run the risk of counting out the
invaluable. Counted out, the invaluable may then lose its purchase on life. Herewith, then, the necessity of
championing the invaluable itself. For we must never forget that, we are dealing always with whatever exceeds measure.36 But
how does that necessity present itself? Another Justice answers: as the surplus of the duty to answer to the claim of Justice over
rights. That duty, as with the advent of another Justice, is integral to the lack constitutive of the humanway of being.

Only the alternative solves --- by taking the role of the Dark Knight, voting negative
rejects the ethics that we all agree should come first --- but by not taking the credit,
the alternative allow the objects of the 1AC to be helped without visibly handing them
a gift and without scheming --- only that is truly ethical and means that the heroism
of the alternative is a prior question

Power Distribution
Extend that the 1AC is a political faade. They put on the mask of
heroism, and constantly produce fraudulent reform, which is
doomed by the ethic of caclulation. The inherent gift of the 1AC,
the gift that they screeched 8 minutes about only seeks to give
more power to the powerful elites that was Williams 2k
And extend that the fact that we can give the gift of the 1AC, only serves to re-entrench
the ideology that we have something to spare so much that we can spare extras the the
periphery, those marginalized. The link is the apparent, obvious gift of the 1AC. This
only serves to perpetuate who is really in charge the 1A and the 2A that was the
second piece of Williams 2k

This redistribution of power turns the case and leads to loss of


value to life, dehumanization, and mass self-inflicted violence
Khan 94
(Ali Khan, Law Professor 3at Washburn University school of Law, Lessons from Malcolm X: Freedom by Any Means Necessary, 38, Howard Law Journal 81, http://heinonline.org/HOL/Page?

handle=hein.journals/howlj38&id=89&type=text&collection=journals)

The second aspect of oppression is a systematic assault on the inherent human dignity of the
oppressed.46 Dehumanization of the oppressed and lack of control over basic decisions
in life work in tandem and are inseverable attributes of oppression. The oppressors
create, defend, and reinforce social assumptions which portray the oppressed as
inferior human beings lacking intelligence, virtue, and social skills .47 This attack on
the human dignity of the oppressed is made to defend an uneven and unfair
distribution of social goods, economic benefits, political power, and constitutional
values.' By alleging the inherent inferiority of the oppressed,49 the oppressors can claim,
without guilt, a superior position in the social hierarchy.50 Such an assault on human dignity
has a devastating effect on the oppressed. According to Malcolm, the oppressors
begin to control the minds of the oppressed,5" and the oppressed begin to think
about themselves just as the oppressors characterize them.52 Consequently, the
oppressed internalize self-hatred manifested by hating their skin, hating their caste, hating their
language, hating their religion, and indeed hating who they are and what they are.53 This
hatred leads the oppressed to turn upon themselves blaming their own kind, and
killing their own children, brothers, and sisters,54 as if it is their own race, their own
caste, their own religion, and their own community had trapped them and brought
them down.55 Thus, deep and enduring marks of inferiority and degradation
eliminate the dignity of the entire group.56

And- A loss of value to life outweighs all other impacts death is


preferable to valueless existence
Mitchell '05
[Andrew J. Mitchell, Post-Doctoral Fellow in the Humanities at Stanford University, "Heidegger and Terrorism," Research in
Phenomenology, Volume 35, Number 1, 2005 , pp. 171-217]

Devastation (Verwistung) is the process by which the world becomes a desert Wfiste), a sandy expanse that seemingly
extends without end, without landmarks or direction, and is devoid of all life.20 If we follow the dialogue in thinking an ancient
Greek notion of "life" as another name for "being," then the lifeless desert is the being-less desert. The world that becomes a
lifeless desert is consequently an un-world from which being has withdrawn . The older prisoner makes this connection explicit,
"The being of an age of devastation would then consist in the abandonment of being" (GA 77: 213). As we have seen, this is a process
that befalls the world, slowly dissolving it of worldliness and rendering it an "unworld" (cf. GA 7: 88, 92f./EP, 104, 107f., etc.). Yet this
unworld is not simply the opposite of world; it remains a world, but a world made desert. The desert is not the complete absence of
world. Such an absence would not be reached by devastation (Verwisiung), but rather by annihilation (Vernichtung); and for
Heidegger, annihilation is far less of a concern than devastation : "Devastation is more uncanny than mere annihilation [blofle

Mere annihilation sweeps aside all things including even nothingness, while devastation on the contrary
orders and spreads everything that blocks and prevents" (WHD, 11/29-30; tin). Annihilation as a thought of total absence is a
Vernichtung].

thought from metaphysics. It is one with a thinking of pure presence: pure presence, pure absence, and. purely no contact between
them. During another lecture course on H6lderlin, this time in 1942 on the hymn "The Ister," Heidegger claims that annihilation is
precisely the agenda of America in regards to the "homeland," which is here equated with Europe: "We know today that the AngloSaxon world of Americanism has resolved to annihilate [zu vernichten] Europe, that is, the homeland, and that means: the inception
of the Western world. The inceptual is indestructible [unzersto'rbar]" (GA 53: 68/54; tm). America is the agent of technological
devastation, and it operates under the assumptions of presence and absence that it itself is so expert at dissembling. America
resolves to annihilate and condemns itself to fdilure in so doing, for the origin is "indestructible." We could take this a step further and
claim that only because the origin cannot be annihilated is it possible to destroy it. This possibility of destruction is its indestructible
character. It can always be further destroyed, but you will never annihilate it. Americanism names the endeavor or resolution to drive
the destruction of the world ever further into the unworld. America is the agent of a malevolent being. This same reasoning explains
why the older man's original conception of evil had to be rethought. Evil is the "devastation of the earth and the annihilation of
the human essence that goes along with it" (GA 77: 207), he said, but this annihilation is simply too easy, too much of an
"Americanism." The human essence is not annihilated in evil-who could care about that? Instead it is destroyed and devastated by
evil. Devastation does not annihilate, but brings about something worse, the un-world. Without limit, the desert of the un-

world spreads, ever worsening and incessantly urging itself to new expressions of malevolence. Annihilation would bring
respite and, in a perverse sense, relief. There would be nothing left to protect and guard, nothing left to concern ourselves withnothing left to terrorize. Devastation is also irreparable; no salvation can arrive for it . The younger man is able to voice the
monstrous conclusion of this thinking of devastation: "Then malevolence, as which devastation occurs [sich ereignet], would indeed
remain a -basic characteristic of being itself" (GA 77: 213, 215; em). The older man agrees, "being would be in the ground of its
essence malevolent" (GA 77: 215). Being is not evil; it is something much worse; being is malevolent.

And- Dehumanization is the root cause of and outweighs all


calculable impacts
Berube 97
[David M., Professor of Communication Studies at University of South Carolina.,
NANOTECHNOLOGICAL PROLONGEVITY: The Down Side,
http://www.cas.sc.edu/engl/faculty/berube/prolong.htm]
This means-ends dispute is at the core of Montagu

and Matson's treatise on the dehumanization of humanity. They warn[s]:


"its destructive toll is already greater than that of any war, plague, famine, or natural calamity on record -- and its
potential danger to the quality of life and the fabric of civilized society is beyond calculation . For that reason this
sickness of the soul might well be called the Fifth Horseman of the Apocalypse.... Behind the genocide of the
holocaust lay a dehumanized thought; beneath the menticide of deviants and dissidents... in the cuckoo's next of
America, lies a dehumanized image of man... (Montagu & Matson, 1983, p. xi-xii). While it may never be possible to
quantify the impact dehumanizing ethics may have had on humanity, it is safe to conclude the foundations of
humanness offer great opportunities which would be foregone. When we calculate the actual losses and the virtual
benefits, we approach a nearly inestimable value greater than any tools which we can currently use to measure it.
Dehumanization is nuclear war, environmental apocalypse, and international genocide. When people become things,
they become dispensable. When people are dispensable, any and every atrocity can be justified. Once justified, they
seem to be inevitable for every epoch has evil and dehumanization is evil's most powerful weapon.

Ethic of Caculation
And extend that when the ballot is on the line, people will always put their need for
winning this round before this social movement. This is a disingenious engangement
with the 1AC that fails to create real change. The moral calculation is always
subordinated the supereme maxim of the ethic of calculation which fails to address the
problems of the 1AC. This demand for personal benefits before what is morally right is
the ethic of calculation, and that turns the case.

The ethic of calculation always outweighs


Frazer 06

(Michael L. Frazer, PhD, The Compassion of Zarathustra: Nietzsche on Sympathy and Strength, http://www.gov.harvard.edu/files/The%20Compassion%20of%20Zarathustra.pdf)

Perhaps we should turn our attention from the subject of compassion to its object. Nietzsche
does ask whether such an emotion is good, not only for those who feel it, but also for those who
suffer [den Leidenen] (FW IV:338, p. 269). His answer here, too, is that compassion is of
no value; if one does good merely out of compassion [Mitleid], it is oneself one really
does good to, and not the other (WM 368, p. 199). To be sure, ones painful
sympathy may be soothed, but the object of this sympathy has been shamed by the
condescension charity implies, and, even more importantly, been deprived of the
opportunity to build real strength from his own efforts to overcome his suffering.
Indeed, the potential value of suffering as a challenge to be met head-on, a spur to greatness,
and a test of ones mettle is a central theme in Nietzsches ethics. It almost determines the
order of rank, he repeatedly insists, how profoundly human beings can suffer (JGB IX:270, p.
410). To those of my disciples who have any concern for me, Nietzsche therefore
reasons, I wish suffering, desolation, sickness, ill-treatment, indignities . . . I have no
compassion [Mitleid] for them, because I wish them the only thing that can prove
today whether one is worth anything or not (WM 910, p. 481).

This ethic of calculation kills value to life, perpetuates


dehumanization, and creates endless genocide this turns the case
only the alternative can access the harms of the 1AC
Dillon 99
(Michael Dillon, University of Lancaster, Another Justice, Political Theory, 1999, http://ptx.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/27/2/155)

Economies of evaluation necessarily require calculability.35 Thus no valuation without


mensuration and no mensuration without indexation. Once rendered calculable,
however, units of account are necessarily submissible not only to evaluation but also ,
of course, to devaluation. Devaluation, logically, can extend to the point of counting
as nothing. Hence, no mensuration without demensuration either. There is nothing abstract
about this: the declension of economies of value leads to the zero point of holocaust.
However liberating and emancipating systems of valuerightsmay claim to be, for
example, they run the risk of counting out the invaluable. Counted out, the invaluable
may then lose its purchase on life. Herewith, then, the necessity of championing the
invaluable itself. For we must never forget that, we are dealing always with whatever exceeds
measure.36 But how does that necessity present itself? Another Justice answers: as the surplus
of the duty to answer to the claim of Justice over rights. That duty, as with the advent of
another Justice, is integral to the lack constitutive of the humanway of being.

Cross apply Mitchell 7 and Berube 97. Dehumanization and value to


life outweigh.
This mix of the competition for wins and losses via the ballot with
emancipatory strategies destroys productive dialogue and risks

breaking down coalitions necessary to create community-wide


change. Also, the demand for the ballot always demands the ethic
of calculation which destroys your movement
Martin Osborn (Former Missouri Debater, NDT and CEDA top speaker and semifinalist, and
darling of the debate community) August 2008 towson
http://www.ndtceda.com/pipermail/edebate/2008-August/075583.html
nobody wants to lose.

The idea that debate isn't at some point competitive is pretty strange to me. A large part of why debate rounds become intense, awkward, and loud is because
I have always taken solace in the competitive aspects of this activity and honestly find it intriguing that aside from a select few, I consider myself on good terms with almost everybody I ever debated. Greenstein
and somebody else posted that they like the idea of having a throwdown and then drinking afterwards with their opponent. I like that idea, too, and I don't even drink. After round 7 at the NDT I was angrier than I
had probably ever been about a debate round. I felt genuinely betrayed by Towson and seriously questioned my decision to apologize to them. I figured out long before CEDA semis that

debaters

like to win and did things that helped them to win

and suddenly my attempt to mend fences seemed almost inappropriate given the
competitive environment (despite being advised to do so by the team's coach, some onlookers, and maybe a tiny bit by my conscience although I did feel that what I said at CEDA was 100% misinterpreted by
anybody who I'd need to apologize to). A public statement would have been SO much better in preempting the "ozzy is racist" argument in the event we debated again but that wasn't even a part of my
motivation (although it was my initial plan, Russell convinced me that the political appearance of such a post would probably overwhelm any meaningful content or goal). On the other hand, my private conversation
was unverifiable and largely secret because I didn't care if other people knew about it. Did Towson read that extra part of the 1AC to preempt my deployment of "BTW judges I said I'm sorry so I'm not racist" or
were they trying to convince the judges that what I had "said" at CEDA was so egregious I should lose this debate, too? Was it planned to include the person in the audience in cx or was he just watching his team?
I can think of a lot of competitive reasons why Towson would have waited until we debated to reveal their opinion of my apology. The likelihood that this was just a public service announcement seemed and seems

, listening to a passionate diatribe about how


much of a white supremacist I am would have been a lot different after the CEDA
debate, after the CEDA tournament, before the NDT, or after my apology. I feel that I
would have had more of an opportunity to have a true conversation unconstrained by
time limits and my desire to not kiss my NDT and debate career goodbye so I could rectify a situation I
pretty low but I can't claim to know exactly why they'd choose to start the debate there. For me

consider incidental. Instead I found out during the 1AC when I was pre-flowing, and thinking about the 2NR, and wondering which aff I'd break if I lost, and whether Julian would vote for T, and Above and beyond
the commitment to their goals that I'm sure Towson always displays in round, there was something else at work during that debate round and to pretend there aren't strategic elements to Towson's decision to wait
would require a level of naivety I am not comfortable granting to anybody whose intelligence I respect. The reason depersonalization was introduced in debate (as I understand) was so people would be forced to
debate the merits of U.S. engagement with communist China back before even Ben Warner was born. I don't know if total depersonalization is the best model for debate but it certainly removes the option of turning
your opponent into a true, real-life enemy based on something they said (including all those somethings you think they said). Discussing deeply personal beliefs and tendencies as a means to tackle difficult
While there may be some shock value to forcing
people into this conversation during a debate round, it certainly doesn't seem to
generate much positive social change in the way of creating relationships between
people who misunderstand each other. I can't speak for anybody else but my single
attempt to make peace with one of the many debaters who looked at me like I sold
out my ethnicity by going for topicality worked out about as poorly as I can
reasonably envision (but maybe only because I have never seen my own ass). From
this experience springs my conclusion that if somebody genuinely wants to address
racism and other systemic problems within and with the debate community, a debate
round might not be the best place. The conversation cannot and will not revolve
solely around the non-competitive goal of one or both teams. Far more likely is that
the team who loses feels like they have been swindled and an honest discussion never
actually takes place. I've come pretty close to making this post a lot of times, although it almost never is written out with this amount of restraint. It angers me that Adam Jacksonstructural issues is one thing legitimizing ad hominem attacks as a means of keeping hostility-based arguments afloat is quite another.

5, Deven, and others behave as if Towson (and their supporters) have been "face to face" on the issue instead of relying on "rumors" regarding racism in debate when I feel like I attempted the former in response to
the latter and basically got burned. If transparency is important to this conversation, it seemed pretty irresponsible of me to not make this post at some point..

Their plea for change through winning the ballot not only fails to
inculcate communal response but also re-entrenches the very evil
they criticize - rejecting the notion that one creates change
through the ballot is our only hope
Atchison and Panetta 09 (Jarrod Atchison, Director of Debate @ Trinity University, and
Edward Panetta, Director of Debate @ the University of Georgia, Intercollegiate Debate and
Speech Communication: Issues for the Future, p. 317-34)
The larger problem with locating the debate as activism perspective within the competitive
framework is that it overlooks the communal nature of the community problem. If each
individual debate is a decision about how the debate community should approach a
problem, then the losing debaters become collateral damage in the activist strategy
dedicated toward creating community change. One frustrating example of this type of
argument might include a judge voting for an activist team in an effort to help them
reach elimination rounds to generate a community discussion about the problem.
Under this scenario, the losing team serves as a sacrificial lamb on the altar of community
change. Downplaying the important role of competition and treating opponents as
scapegoats for the failures of the community may increase the profile of the winning
team and the community problem, but it does little to generate the critical coalitions

necessary to address the community problem, because the competitive focus


encourages teams to concentrate on how to beat the strategy with little regard for
addressing the community problem. There is no role for competition when a judge decides
that it is important to accentuate the publicity of a community problem. An extreme example
might include a team arguing that their opponents academic institution had a legacy
of civil rights abuses and that the judge should not vote for them because that would
be a community endorsement of a problematic institution. This scenario is a bit more
outlandish but not unreasonable if one assumes that each debate should be about what is best
for promoting solutions to diversity problems in the debate community. If the debate
community is serious about generating community change, then it is more likely to
occur outside a traditional competitive debate. When a team loses a debate because
the judge decides that it is better for the community for the other team to win, then
they have sacrificed two potential advocates for change within the community.
Creating change through wins generates backlash through losses. Some proponents are
comfortable with generating backlash and argue that the reaction is evidence that the issue is
being discussed. From our perspective, the discussion that results from these hostile situations is
not a productive one where participants seek to work together for a common goal. Instead of
giving up on hope for change and agitating for wins regardless of who is left behind, it seems
more reasonable that the debate community should try the method of public argument that we
teach in an effort to generate a discussion of necessary community changes. Simply put,
debate competitions do not represent the best environment for community change
because it is a competition for a win and only one team can win any given debate,
whereas addressing systemic century-long community problems requires a
tremendous effort by a great number of people.

Alternative
The Alternative is to vote negative to be the dark night adopting
the face of negation as a faade. This is the only way to create
change and give Derridas gift the gift of invisibility. At the end of
the beautiful production of the dark night, Bruce Wayne adopts the
faade of a villain in order to adopt the true rule of heroism. Zizek
speaks, The properly human good, the good elevated above the
natural good, the infinite spiritual good, is ultimately the mask of
evil.[20] Without the mask of evil, good cannot emerge and
remains stuck the calculation of interest; without the mask of evil,
good remains scheming. This speaks to the ability of the mask of
evil to be able to resist the calculation of calculation. In the film,
Batman was looking for a new face for the hero of Gotham. His first
pick was Harvey Dent. Harvey Dent adopted the methodology of
pure heroism. Inevitably, when pure heroism experiences loss, they
cant cope, because the ideology of the pure hero leaves no
ontological space for loss. This inevitably dooms their project. Vote
negative to give the Affirmative the faade of evil, this is the only
way they can cope with loss, give the gift of the 1AC while
remaining incognito through the negative ballot, and be the dark
night. This solves all our offense.
The alternative is invisible the apparent lack of the appearance
of the gift solves all our offense
Williams 2k

(Christopher R. Williams, PhD, forensic psychology, professor and chairman of the Department of Criminal Justice Studies at Bradley University, Bruce A. Arrigo, PhD, administration of justice, professor of criminology, law,

North Carolina, Faculty Associate in the Center for Professional and Applied Ethics, The
(Im)Possibility of Democratic Justice and the Gift of the Majority, Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, Vol. 16, No. 3, August
2000, pgs. 321-343)
and society, Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at the University of

Much of the distinction between law and justice has implications for the gift (of equality) and the
(im)possibility of justice as equality: The gift is precisely, and this is what it has in
common with justice, something which cannot be reappropriated (Derrida, 1997, p.
18). 11 Once a gift is given, if any gratitude is extended in return, the gift becomes
circumscribed in a moment of reappropriation (Derrida, 1997, p. 18). Ultimately, as
soon as the giver knows that he or she has given something, the gift is nullified. The
giver congratulates him- or herself, and the economy of gratitude, of reappropriation,
commences. Once the offering has been acknowledged as a gift by the giver or
receiver it is destroyed. Thus, for a gift to truly be a gift, it must not even appear as
such. Although it is inherently paradoxical, this is the only condition under which a
gift can be given (Derrida, 1991).

To embrace the position of the dark night is a better methodology


for generating community wide awareness and avoids the road to
fascism turning their ethics.
McGowan 09 (Todd McGowan, Associate Professor, film theory, University of Vermont, PhD, Ohio
State University, studies the intersection of Hegel, psychoanalysis, and existentialism and
cinema, The Exceptional Darkness of The Dark Knight, Jump Cut, No. 51, Spring 2009,
http://www.ejumpcut.org/archive/jc51.2009/darkKnightKant/text.html)

The film begins with Batmans grasp of the problem, as it depicts his attempt to relinquish
his exceptional status and to allow the legal order to operate on its own. In order to
do this, a different form of heroism is required, and the quest that constitutes The
Dark Knight is Batmans attempt to find the proper public face for heroism. He is
drawn to Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) because Dent seems to embody the possibility
of a heroism that would be consistent with public law and that could consequently
function without the need for disguise. After the death of Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal)
and Dents own serious facial burn transforms him from a defender of the law into the criminal
figure Two-Face, Batman sees the impossibility of doing away with the heros mask. Dent, the
would-be hero without a mask, quickly becomes a criminal himself when he
experiences traumatic loss. This turn of events reveals that the hero must remain an
exception, but it also shows that the heroism of the hero must pass itself off as its
opposite. Just as the truth that Leonard (Guy Pearce) discovers at the end of Nolans Memento
(2000) is a constitutive lie, the conclusion of The Dark Knight illustrates that the true form
of appearance of heroism is evil. The film concludes with Batman voluntarily taking
responsibility for the murders that Dent/Two-Face committed. By doing so, Batman
allows Dent to die as a hero in the public mind, but he also and more importantly
changes the public perception of his own exceptional status. When he agrees to
appear as a criminal at the end of the film, Batman avows simultaneously the need for
the heroic exception and the need for this exception to appear as criminality. If the
heroic exception is not to multiply itself in a way that threatens any possibility for justice, then its
appearance must become indistinguishable from criminality. The heroic gesture, as The Dark
Knight conceives it, does not consist in any of the particular crime-fighting or lifesaving activities that Batman performs throughout the film. It lies rather in his embrace
of the appearance of criminality that concludes the film. Gordons voiceover panegyric to Batman
that punctuates the film affirms that this is the truly heroic act. This act privileges and
necessitates its own misrecognition: it is only through misrecognition that one sees it
correctly. If the people of Gotham were to see through Batmans form of appearance
and recognition his real heroism, the heroism would be instantly lost. As the film
portrays it, the form of appearance of authentic heroism must be that of evil. Only in
this way does the heroic exceptionality that the superhero embodies avoid placing us
on the road to fascist rule.

2NC Exceptionalism K
The mandate to vote affirmative as an endorsement of their call for
change creates an exception in your decision, positioning an
affirmative ballot as the epistomological heroic choice this
ideological infinite obligation to vote affirmative is limitless
exceptionality that justifies mass genocide and endless warfare
McGowan 09
(Todd McGowan, Associate Professor, film theory, University of Vermont, PhD, Ohio State University, studies the intersection of Hegel, psychoanalysis, and existentialism and cinema, The Exceptional Darkness of The

Dark Knight, Jump Cut, No. 51, Spring 2009, http://www.ejumpcut.org/archive/jc51.2009/darkKnightKant/text.html)

the exception. It leads not just to abuses of civil rights but to


Holocaust, which functions as a major point of reference for Agambens
thought. Exceptionality, for Agamben, launches a legal civil war and thereby plays the
key role in the transition from democracy to fascist authoritarianism. The declaration
of the state of exception attempts to produce a situation in which the emergency
becomes the rule, and the very distinction between peace and war (and between
foreign and civil war) becomes impossible.[10] The problem is that the exceptional
time never comes to an end, and the disappearance of the distinction between an
emergency and everyday life pushes the society toward a state of civil war that the
very exception itself was supposed to quell. Rather than acting as a temporary
stopgap for a society on the brink of self-annihilation, the state of exception actually
pushes the society further down the path to this annihilation by undermining the
distinction between law and criminality and thereby helping to foster a Hobbesian war of all against all, in which every act of sovereign power becomes
Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben sees the great danger inherent in
large-scale horrors like the

justified in the name of order. The Dark Knight begins with a focus on the problem engendered by the state of exception embodied by Batman. He is a figure outside the law on whom the law relies to respond to the
most recalcitrant criminal elements in Gotham. But Batmans very success at fighting crime outside the law has, when the film opens, spawned numerous imitators vigilantes who dress like Batman and spend
their nights fighting crime. The result is an increased degree of lawlessness and insecurity in the city. Through these copycat vigilantes, the film begins by making clear the danger of the sanctioned exception that
exists outside the law. Once one embraces the exception, the need for exceptionality will constantly expand insofar as the exception augments the very problem that it is created to fight against. The fake Batmen
question Batman directly on the monopoly he attempts to hold on exceptionality. After Batman rescues them from their botched effort to interrupt a drug deal, he warns them against this type of activity: One says,
What gives you the right? Whats the difference between you and me? Batman responds, Im not wearing hockey pads. While amusing, this quip is actually wholly inadequate as an argument. Batman has no

self-multiplying exceptionality
portends the destruction of the social order. The state of exception justifies any type
of action any encroachment on civil liberties in order to realize the justice that ordinary law is incapable of realizing. The Dark Knight
inherent right to guard exceptionality for himself, and as long as he occupies this position, others will be drawn to it. And a

explicitly links the heroic exception embodied by Batman with the violation of civil liberties associated with the official declaration of a state of emergency (in the current War on Terror, for instance). Batman acts
exceptionally not just by wearing a mask and breaking a few traffic laws but by creating a system of surveillance that completely erases the idea of private space within Gotham. When Batman commissions his
technical designer Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman) to create a device that will allow him to map the location of everyone within the entire city of Gotham, Fox balks at the violation of civil liberties that this entails. He
agrees to help to catch the Joker (Heath Ledger) but promises to resign immediately afterward. As Fox changes from fully supporting Batman and his exceptionality, his outrage signifies that Batman has crossed a
line beyond heroic exceptionality where one can no longer differentiate the heroic masked man from the criminals that he pursues. But in order to apprehend the Joker and disrupt his criminal plans, the film makes

. The logic of the War on


Terror waged by President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney derives
entirely from the idea that they rule in a state of emergency where the normal rule of
law will be insufficient for safeguarding the U.S. populace. One must thus carve out
an exceptional position outside the law. One of the ramifications of this idea is the
legitimization of torture as a normal practice during the interrogation of anyone suspected of having a link with a terrorist organization. But the other ramification touches
clear that Batman must cross this line. It places him fully on the terrain of contemporary politics and in the company of conservative political figures

directly on the actions of Batman in The Dark Knight. The War on Terror, as conceived by Bush and Cheney, is being fought with increased surveillance more than with additional weapons. The nature of the
emergency calls for exceptional measures of surveillance, including eavesdropping on telephone calls, spying on emails, and using satellites to track movements, all without court authorization. When Batman uses
the device that Fox builds for him, the film's hero elevates himself to an exception in the Bush and Cheney sense of the term. This is one of the points of resonance that led conservative writer Andrew Klavan to link
Batman and Bush. But there is nonetheless a fundamental distinction between the two figures and between Batmans relation to exceptionality and that displayed by Bush. One might assume that the difference lies
in Batmans readiness to abandon the system of total surveillance after he catches the Joker and the emergency ends. Batman arranges for the system to self-destruct after Lucius Fox has finished using it, and as
he walks away from the exploding system, Fox smiles to himself, cheered by Batmans ethical commitment to abandoning the power Batman had amassed for himself. This image does certainly seem to contrast
with the image of the system of surveillance established during the War on Terror, which increases rather than self-destructs as the September 11th attacks move further and further into history. Neither President
Bush nor his successor will call an end to the War on Terror or revoke all of the aspects of the Patriot Act. But Klavan can nonetheless see a parallel between Batmans restoration of full civil rights and Bushs
intention to do so after the emergency ends. The difference between Bushs version of the state of exception and Batmans between the conservative and the leftist does not ultimately reside in the fact that it
is temporary for Batman and permanent for Bush. Both figures view it as temporary, but what separates Batman is the attitude that he takes toward this violation of the law: he accepts that his willingness to
embrace this type of exceptionality constitutes him as a criminal. Because he views it as a criminal act, Batman is quick to eliminate it. But this is precisely what Bush would be loath to accept and why he views the
War on Terror as a quasi-eternal struggle.

2NC Link
New Impact - The result of the plan is scapegoating and
transference of violence
Delgado 03
(Richard Delgado, Professor of Law at Pitt, Texas Law Review, November 2003)

By the same token, Brown v. Board of Education n109 ended official school segregation
for African-American children at precisely the time when Congress was ordering
Operation Wetback, under which 1.3 million Mexicans and Mexican Americans, many
of them lawful U.S. citizens, were deported. n110 In 1913, California's Alien Land Law
made it illegal for aliens ineligible for citizenship to lease land for more than three
years, a measure that proved devastating for Japanese farmers. n111 A few years
later, Congress eased immigration quotas for Mexican farmworkers. n112 Today,
Indian tribes have been winning a series of breakthroughs , establishing the right to
sponsor casino gambling and proving mismanagement in federal trust accounts, all at the very
time California has been enacting a series of anti-Latino ballot measures . n113 The
checkerboard of racial history, with progress for one group coupled with
retrenchment for another, features innumerable similar examples. What does the
author make of all this? It is a product, he says, of the psychological phenomena of
transference and displacement, which occur when feelings toward one person are
refocused on another, who is defenseless or more exploitable .n114 He also invokes
the idea of scapegoating, n115 in which members of powerful groups discharge frustration on
nonmembers who are not the cause of that frustration but who are safer to attack.

**No personal connection** Their reductionist focus on


transportation fails
Arrigo 2k

(Bruce A. Arrigo, PhD, administration of justice, professor of criminology, law, and society, Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at the University of North Carolina, Faculty Associate in the Center for Professional and

Criminal Justice Studies at Bradley University, The


Philosophy of the Gift and the Psychology of Advocacy: Critical Reflections on Forensic Mental
Health Intervention, International Journal for the Semiotics of Law, Vol. 13, No. 2, 2000, pgs.
215-242)
There is one last feature of Nietzsches theoretical speculations on giftgiving
warranting some attention. This point, raised by Gary Shapiro,35 invites a consideration of
Nietzsches philosophy of masks. As Shapiro describes, gift-giving risks undermining the masks . .
. that are necessary for our protection. In giving a gift one undertakes the hermeneutical
project of discovering what is appropriate to the true character of the recipient. If I
fail to interpret him properly, he will feel that some violence or degradation has been
done. . . . 36 Nietzsches philosophy of masks is of considerable importance, particularly when
comparing the congruence between what the intervener gives and what the recipient wants or
needs. Indeed, if I fail to recognize, connect with, and respond to the individual on this
most fundamental of levels, the receiver of the assistance is certain to feel that an
injustice has occurred. This is significant in the context of advocacy where the assigners gift
must be entirely congruent with the recipients desire. A failure to understand this dynamic
only furthers the (purported) injustice against which the giver assumes his/her unique
role as (mental health) advocate.
Applied Ethics, Christopher R. Williams, PhD, forensic psychology, professor and chairman of the Department of

**No personal connection** Re-appropriates hegemonic domination


Arrigo 2k
(Bruce A. Arrigo, PhD, administration of justice, professor of criminology, law, and society, Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at the University of North Carolina, Faculty Associate in the Center for Professional and

Criminal Justice Studies at Bradley University,


The Philosophy of the Gift and the Psychology of Advocacy: Critical Reflections on
Applied Ethics, Christopher R. Williams, PhD, forensic psychology, professor and chairman of the Department of

Forensic Mental Health Intervention, International Journal for the Semiotics of


Law, Vol. 13, No. 2, 2000, pgs. 215-242)

Proponents of mental health treatment regard the treater as helping the person who
is sick or in need. Ones ailment is relieved or, ideally, cured. Intervening in the lives
of persons with psychiatric disorders is understood as the gift of reparation ; of
repairing, remedying, or correcting illness or disease. In such cases as these, the
gift of treatment promises the elimination of the patients sufferin g. Thus, the first
assumption is that treatment is a gift. A second, and more problematic, assumption is
that the giver knows what the recipient desires to receive. In other words, the
intervener understands what unique treatment is in the best interest of the receiver .
This assumption is similarly untenable within the context of advocacy. Indeed,
does the advocate fully know, beyond any self-interest or personal experience, what
the patient wants, needs, or desires? A third assumption is that the recipient of
treatment, receiving the gift of reparation, wants the award or, more startling, would
want it, if the individual truly knew what was in her or his best interest.

The object of the sympathy of the 1AC has been forever weakened
by the condescension charity of the gift of the advocacy.
Frazer 06
(Michael L. Frazer, PhD, The Compassion of Zarathustra: Nietzsche on Sympathy and Strength, http://www.gov.harvard.edu/files/The%20Compassion%20of%20Zarathustra.pdf)

Perhaps we should turn our attention from the subject of compassion to its object. Nietzsche
does ask whether such an emotion is good, not only for those who feel it, but also for those who
suffer [den Leidenen] (FW IV:338, p. 269). His answer here, too, is that compassion is of
no value; if one does good merely out of compassion [Mitleid], it is oneself one really
does good to, and not the other (WM 368, p. 199). To be sure, ones painful
sympathy may be soothed, but the object of this sympathy has been shamed by the
condescension charity implies, and, even more importantly, been deprived of the
opportunity to build real strength from his own efforts to overcome his suffering.
Indeed, the potential value of suffering as a challenge to be met head-on, a spur to greatness,
and a test of ones mettle is a central theme in Nietzsches ethics. It almost determines the
order of rank, he repeatedly insists, how profoundly human beings can suffer (JGB
IX:270, p. 410). To those of my disciples who have any concern for me, Nietzsche
therefore reasons, I wish suffering, desolation, sickness, ill-treatment,
indignities . . . I have no compassion [Mitleid] for them, because I wish them the only
thing that can prove today whether one is worth anything or not (WM 910, p. 481).

2NC Alternative
Even if they win their offense, that just supercharges why the alt solves
--- rejecting the affirmative is akin to Batmans sacrifice --- its a choice
to not be the hero but to allow the affirmative to lose the debate and die
the hero --- a martyr who gave up the ballot for their ethics --- a true
hero --- thats a better method for generating community wide
awareness and change and avoids the road to fascism turning their
ethics

McGowan 09 (Todd McGowan, Associate Professor, film theory, University of Vermont, PhD, Ohio
State University, studies the intersection of Hegel, psychoanalysis, and existentialism and
cinema, The Exceptional Darkness of The Dark Knight, Jump Cut, No. 51, Spring 2009,
http://www.ejumpcut.org/archive/jc51.2009/darkKnightKant/text.html)
The film begins with Batmans grasp of the problem, as it depicts his attempt to relinquish
his exceptional status and to allow the legal order to operate on its own. In order to
do this, a different form of heroism is required, and the quest that constitutes The
Dark Knight is Batmans attempt to find the proper public face for heroism. He is
drawn to Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) because Dent seems to embody the possibility
of a heroism that would be consistent with public law and that could consequently
function without the need for disguise. After the death of Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal)
and Dents own serious facial burn transforms him from a defender of the law into the criminal
figure Two-Face, Batman sees the impossibility of doing away with the heros mask. Dent, the
would-be hero without a mask, quickly becomes a criminal himself when he
experiences traumatic loss. This turn of events reveals that the hero must remain an
exception, but it also shows that the heroism of the hero must pass itself off as its
opposite. Just as the truth that Leonard (Guy Pearce) discovers at the end of Nolans
Memento (2000) is a constitutive lie, the conclusion of The Dark Knight illustrates
that the true form of appearance of heroism is evil. The film concludes with Batman
voluntarily taking responsibility for the murders that Dent/Two-Face committed. By
doing so, Batman allows Dent to die as a hero in the public mind, but he also and
more importantly changes the public perception of his own exceptional status.
When he agrees to appear as a criminal at the end of the film, Batman avows
simultaneously the need for the heroic exception and the need for this exception to
appear as criminality. If the heroic exception is not to multiply itself in a way that threatens
any possibility for justice, then its appearance must become indistinguishable from criminality.
The heroic gesture, as The Dark Knight conceives it, does not consist in any of the particular
crime-fighting or life-saving activities that Batman performs throughout the film. It lies rather in
his embrace of the appearance of criminality that concludes the film. Gordons voiceover
panegyric to Batman that punctuates the film affirms that this is the truly heroic act. This act
privileges and necessitates its own misrecognition : it is only through misrecognition
that one sees it correctly. If the people of Gotham were to see through Batmans form
of appearance and recognition his real heroism, the heroism would be instantly lost.
As the film portrays it, the form of appearance of authentic heroism must be that of
evil. Only in this way does the heroic exceptionality that the superhero embodies
avoid placing us on the road to fascist rule.

2NC A2 alt links too


The alternative is invisible the apparent lack of the appearance
of the gift solves all our offense
Williams 2k

(Christopher R. Williams, PhD, forensic psychology, professor and chairman of the Department of Criminal Justice Studies at Bradley University, Bruce A. Arrigo, PhD, administration of justice, professor of criminology, law,

North Carolina, Faculty Associate in the Center for Professional and Applied Ethics, The
(Im)Possibility of Democratic Justice and the Gift of the Majority, Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, Vol. 16, No. 3, August
2000, pgs. 321-343)
and society, Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at the University of

Much of the distinction between law and justice has implications for the gift (of equality) and the
(im)possibility of justice as equality: The gift is precisely, and this is what it has in
common with justice, something which cannot be reappropriated (Derrida, 1997, p.
18). 11 Once a gift is given, if any gratitude is extended in return, the gift becomes
circumscribed in a moment of reappropriation (Derrida, 1997, p. 18). Ultimately, as
soon as the giver knows that he or she has given something, the gift is nullified. The
giver congratulates him- or herself, and the economy of gratitude, of reappropriation,
commences. Once the offering has been acknowledged as a gift by the giver or
receiver it is destroyed. Thus, for a gift to truly be a gift, it must not even appear as
such. Although it is inherently paradoxical, this is the only condition under which a
gift can be given (Derrida, 1991).

2NC A2 aff is genuine


This is another faade an ingenuine psuedo-sign meant to mask
the ethic of calculation which always outweighs
Frazer 06
(Michael L. Frazer, PhD, The Compassion of Zarathustra: Nietzsche on Sympathy and Strength, http://www.gov.harvard.edu/files/The%20Compassion%20of%20Zarathustra.pdf)

Perhaps we should turn our attention from the subject of compassion to its object. Nietzsche
does ask whether such an emotion is good, not only for those who feel it, but also for those who
suffer [den Leidenen] (FW IV:338, p. 269). His answer here, too, is that compassion is of
no value; if one does good merely out of compassion [Mitleid], it is oneself one really
does good to, and not the other (WM 368, p. 199). To be sure, ones painful sympathy
may be soothed, but the object of this sympathy has been shamed by the
condescension charity implies, and, even more importantly, been deprived of the
opportunity to build real strength from his own efforts to overcome his suffering.
Indeed, the potential value of suffering as a challenge to be met head-on, a spur to greatness,
and a test of ones mettle is a central theme in Nietzsches ethics. It almost determines the
order of rank, he repeatedly insists, how profoundly human beings can suffer (JGB IX:270, p.
410). To those of my disciples who have any concern for me, Nietzsche therefore
reasons, I wish suffering, desolation, sickness, ill-treatment, indignities . . . I have no
compassion [Mitleid] for them, because I wish them the only thing that can prove
today whether one is worth anything or not (WM 910, p. 481).

Their lack of consciously examining their advocacy doesnt mean


theres no link --- rather, it supercharges our egoism arguments
and means their epistemology is bankrupt
Arrigo 2k (Bruce A. Arrigo, PhD, administration of justice, professor of criminology, law, and
society, Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at the University of North Carolina,
Faculty Associate in the Center for Professional and Applied Ethics, Christopher R. Williams, PhD,
forensic psychology, professor and chairman of the Department of Criminal Justice Studies at
Bradley University, The Philosophy of the Gift and the Psychology of Advocacy: Critical
Reflections on Forensic Mental Health Intervention, International Journal for the Semiotics of
Law, Vol. 13, No. 2, 2000, pgs. 215-242)
The psychological egoist questions the possibility of acting altruistically; that is, of acting purely
with regard for the interests of another. That is to ask, can our actions at times be motivated
purely by a concern for the welfare of others without some manifestation of primary self-interest
in our actions? Though questions of self-interest factored significantly into the classical era of
philosophical speculation, the establishment of egoism as psychologically predetermined and,
consequently, inescapable received its first detailed and philosophically animated treatment in
the work of Thomas Hobbes.10 Hobbess theory rests on one core assumption: human beings,
when acting voluntarily, will be egoistically motivated. In other words, all human actions are
rooted in self-interest, and the very possibility of being motivated otherwise is forbidden by the
structure of our fundamental psychological make-up. Hobbess conceptualizations on the self are
artfully depicted in passages from his work, On Human Nature (1650), in which he defines both
charity and pity. These ideas are particularly important for our purposes. Indeed, they
anticipate future developments in the logic of the gift and the motivational aspects of advocacy.
With regard to the former, Hobbes deconstructs the prevalent sentiment of neighborly love,
finding charity to be a veiled form of egoism. As he describes it: There can be no greater
argument to a man, of his own power, than to find himself able not only to accomplish his own
desires, but also to assist other men in theirs: and this is that conception wherein consisteth
charity.11 Actions motivated by a concern for others are those which Hobbes refers to as
charity. To this, we might also add altruism, assistance, intervention, and, to that effect,

advocacy. For Hobbes, charity is nothing more than one taking some delight in ones own
power. The charitable man is demonstrating to himself, and to the world, that he is more capable
than others. He can not only take care of himself, he has enough left over for others who are not
so able as he. He is really just showing off his own superiority.12 There is another important
aspect of the charitable person, relevant more specifically to the psychological underpinnings of
such selfinterested displays of benevolence. This is the notion of conscious selfinterest versus
self-interest that motivates from behind or, in Freuds topology, underneath the level of conscious
awareness.13 This point will become clearer when we discuss self-interest in the context of a
Lacanian psychoanalytic critique. For now, we note that even Hobbes recognized that persons
motivated by self-interest might not be consciously aware that their seemingly selfless acts were,
in fact, blemished by concerns for the self. What is more characteristic of such behavior in terms
of human psychology is that we consciously regard our actions as altruistic; an interpretation
most beneficial to our psychic life. In other words, we want to believe that our actions are
unselfish and, consequently, we interpret them in such a fashion. In fact, following psychological
egoists, this interpretation obtains only superficially; that is, we delude ourselves absent a
careful investigation of the unconscious dynamics that give rise to the logic of charitable,
altruistic, intervening behavior.

2NC - A2 Ballot Key


1. Voting against them is not a condemnation of their project
Moulton, professor of communication and coach t Redlands, 66 (Eugene, The Dynamics of Debate,
p. 5)

The awarding of a formal decision is an essential part of interscholastic and intercollegiate


debate. The decision represents a judges evaluation of the completed contest and does not
imply condemnation of the losing team. Judges are usually exdebaters, or coaches who have been well trained in

contest debate. In addition to this training, the judge has several guidelines to help him in making a valid decision in the major areas
of debate: analysis, reasoning and evidence, refutatory effectiveness, organization of argument, and delivery. The importance of each
area upon the final decision is decided by the judge. Some critics give major importance to analysis, while others may stress
reasoning and evidence.

2. Losing is not an indictment of their stance- it is an essential part


of argumentative training Moulton, prof of comm. and Redlands coach, 66
(Gender Edited) (Eugene, The Dynamics of Debate, p. 10)
Winning and losing are important in debating, as in any form of advocacy. Unquestionably not all
decisions go the way the individual wishes, but this does not minimize the importance of the
decision. It is essential to learn how to win and how to face defeat without losing confidence and
a sense of purpose. The debater often takes extended trips, sometimes covering several
thousand miles during one academic year. The obligations and pressures of these trips, and the
competition of debate contests, call for tact and consideration. Scarcely any other college
subject or activity affords this kind of training. Moreover, for the debater to have practiced
relentlessly for many weeks only to find the he [or she] is still behind other debaters is a distinct
shock. He [or she] must then swallow his [or her] disappointment and learn to begin again.

3. Insert the 2 alt cards from the 2NC o/v under this under this
4. The ballot links to all our offense i.e. the ethic of calculation, the
visible gift, narcissistic hegemonical power distribution only that
alternative solves
5. Cross apply that only losing this debate round with a neg ballot
and adopting the mask of negation is the only way produce true
heroism and avoid the ethic of calculation.

2nc A2 kritik cant solve aff prereq


The mandate to vote affirmative as an endorsement of their call for change creates an
exception in your decision, positioning an affirmative ballot as the heroic choice --this infinite obligation to vote affirmative is limitless exceptionality that justifies
mass genocide and endless warfare --- only voting neg solves
McGowan 09 (Todd McGowan, Associate Professor, film theory, University of Vermont, PhD, Ohio
State University, studies the intersection of Hegel, psychoanalysis, and existentialism and
cinema, The Exceptional Darkness of The Dark Knight, Jump Cut, No. 51, Spring 2009,
http://www.ejumpcut.org/archive/jc51.2009/darkKnightKant/text.html)
Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben sees the great danger inherent in the exception. It leads not just to
abuses of civil rights but to large-scale horrors like the Holocaust, which functions as a major
point of reference for Agambens thought. Exceptionality, for Agamben, launches a legal civil war and thereby plays the
key role in the transition from democracy to fascist authoritarianism. The declaration of the state of
exception attempts to produce a situation in which the emergency becomes the rule, and the very
distinction between peace and war (and between foreign and civil war) becomes impossible.[10] The problem is that the
exceptional time never comes to an end, and the disappearance of the distinction between an emergency and
everyday life pushes the society toward a state of civil war that the very exception itself was supposed
to quell. Rather than acting as a temporary stopgap for a society on the brink of self-annihilation, the state of exception
actually pushes the society further down the path to this annihilation by undermining the
distinction between law and criminality and thereby helping to foster a Hobbesian war of all
against all, in which every act of sovereign power becomes justified in the name of order. The
Dark Knight begins with a focus on the problem engendered by the state of exception embodied by Batman. He is a figure outside the
law on whom the law relies to respond to the most recalcitrant criminal elements in Gotham. But Batmans very success at fighting
crime outside the law has, when the film opens, spawned numerous imitators vigilantes who dress like Batman and spend their
nights fighting crime. The result is an increased degree of lawlessness and insecurity in the city. Through these copycat vigilantes, the
film begins by making clear the danger of the sanctioned exception that exists outside the law. Once one embraces the exception, the

exceptionality will constantly expand insofar as the exception augments the very problem
that it is created to fight against. The fake Batmen question Batman directly on the monopoly he
attempts to hold on exceptionality. After Batman rescues them from their botched effort to interrupt a drug deal, he
need for

warns them against this type of activity: One says, What gives you the right? Whats the difference between you and me? Batman

Batman has
no inherent right to guard exceptionality for himself, and as long as he occupies this position, others will be drawn
to it. And a self-multiplying exceptionality portends the destruction of the social order. The state of
exception justifies any type of action any encroachment on civil liberties in order to realize the justice that
responds, Im not wearing hockey pads. While amusing, this quip is actually wholly inadequate as an argument.

ordinary law is incapable of realizing. The Dark Knight explicitly links the heroic exception embodied by Batman with the violation of
civil liberties associated with the official declaration of a state of emergency (in the current War on Terror, for instance). Batman acts
exceptionally not just by wearing a mask and breaking a few traffic laws but by creating a system of surveillance that completely
erases the idea of private space within Gotham. When Batman commissions his technical designer Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman) to
create a device that will allow him to map the location of everyone within the entire city of Gotham, Fox balks at the violation of civil
liberties that this entails. He agrees to help to catch the Joker (Heath Ledger) but promises to resign immediately afterward. As Fox
changes from fully supporting Batman and his exceptionality, his outrage signifies that Batman has crossed a line beyond heroic
exceptionality where one can no longer differentiate the heroic masked man from the criminals that he pursues. But in order to
apprehend the Joker and disrupt his criminal plans, the film makes clear that Batman must cross this line. It places him fully on the
terrain of contemporary politics and in the company of conservative political figures. The logic of the War on Terror waged by
President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney derives entirely from the idea that they rule in a state of emergency where
the normal rule of law will be insufficient for safeguarding the U.S. populace. One must thus carve out an exceptional position outside
the law. One of the ramifications of this idea is the legitimization of torture as a normal practice during the interrogation of anyone
suspected of having a link with a terrorist organization. But the other ramification touches directly on the actions of Batman in The
Dark Knight. The War on Terror, as conceived by Bush and Cheney, is being fought with increased surveillance more than with
additional weapons. The nature of the emergency calls for exceptional measures of surveillance, including eavesdropping on
telephone calls, spying on emails, and using satellites to track movements, all without court authorization. When Batman uses the
device that Fox builds for him, the film's hero elevates himself to an exception in the Bush and Cheney sense of the term. This is one
of the points of resonance that led conservative writer Andrew Klavan to link Batman and Bush. But there is nonetheless a
fundamental distinction between the two figures and between Batmans relation to exceptionality and that displayed by Bush. One
might assume that the difference lies in Batmans readiness to abandon the system of total surveillance after he catches the Joker
and the emergency ends. Batman arranges for the system to self-destruct after Lucius Fox has finished using it, and as he walks away

from the exploding system, Fox smiles to himself, cheered by Batmans ethical commitment to abandoning the power Batman had
amassed for himself. This image does certainly seem to contrast with the image of the system of surveillance established during the
War on Terror, which increases rather than self-destructs as the September 11th attacks move further and further into history. Neither
President Bush nor his successor will call an end to the War on Terror or revoke all of the aspects of the Patriot Act. But Klavan can
nonetheless see a parallel between Batmans restoration of full civil rights and Bushs intention to do so after the emergency ends.

The difference between Bushs version of the state of exception and Batmans between the conservative and
the leftist does not ultimately reside in the fact that it is temporary for Batman and permanent for
Bush. Both figures view it as temporary, but what separates Batman is the attitude that he takes toward this
violation of the law: he accepts that his willingness to embrace this type of exceptionality constitutes
him as a criminal. Because he views it as a criminal act, Batman is quick to eliminate it.
But this is precisely what Bush would be loath to accept and why he views the War on Terror as a quasi-eternal struggle.Overview

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