This house hails the end of the world - closing speeches

Closing proposition speech

Dear Ladies and Gentlemen, here we are. The end of the world. Welcome. I hope you will be able to read my speech before the end. While I am writing these words I do not yet know why this end happens: the Mayan prediction about the end of a cycle or the divine punishment for the poverty of the opposing speeches ? If it is indeed the latter, I will do my best to heighten the debate. (Speech continues below the fold.)

PB

Closing opposition speech

Dear ladies and gentlemen, this is the greatest honor to conclude the last debate that will ever take place in this world. Unfortunately the proposition’s common sense seems to have got carried away by the ferocity of the upcoming events. Indeed the proposers believed we would be fool enough to not see that they used many various understandings of “end of the world” in order to hide their logical mistakes. They believed we would be fool enough to forget the obvious difference between evolution and revolution. They believed we would be fool enough to let them change the subject of the debate into “will the world end?”, and moreover into “will the world change?”. Guess what? They were wrong. (Speech continues below the fold.)

IB

Closing proposition speech

Dear Ladies and Gentlemen, here we are. The end of the world. Welcome. I hope you will be able to read my speech before the end. While I am writing these words I do not yet know why this end happens: the Mayan prediction about the end of a cycle or the divine punishment for the poverty of the opposing speeches ? If it is indeed the latter, I will do my best to heighten the debate.

First of all, it is clear, since my colleague defined it, that in this motion, it is not the point to take the « end of the world » figurately. The belief of a massive disaster or an armaggedon only certifies the fact that people need to hope and believe in something transcendent. In a world in lack of spirituality, society turns itself towards horoscopes, predictions and paranormal activities because it tries to exclude religions. In a sense, a global catastrophy would break a kind of routine and promote solidarity for the only survivors. Here is the real quest of mankind. One can see, as an example, the global awe for Japan solidarity after the Fukushima disaster. But, as we define it, we say that the world will not stop today in a sudden moment, but by a progressive process will reach the point of no return. Here is our sense of « the end of the world ». Now, let us come back on the definition of the word « hail » that was apparently a clash point, or let us say an miscomprehension by the opposition team. Yes we hail the end of the world in the sense that we do not flee behind the possibility of it but we try to face and tackle this ordeal. We strongly refuse to blind ourselves with an irrational candor helped by a stick of fake optimism. We will stand up against the passivism that has flooded our society and promoted a blind confidence in what we call progress. Let us think about what we really want for tomorrow and not just saying that the end of the world will not happen because we have more and more free time. Let us ask, like Thomas Moore, in his prayer : « Give me a healthy mind, good Lord, to keep the good and pure in sight;
Which, seeing, sin, is not appalled, but finds a way to set it right. »

Unfortunately, if I had wanted to sum up the main clash points, it would have been very hard : indeed, there were none. My colleague first gave historical examples of « end of the world » and finished her speech dwelling on the fragility of our world, and the first opposer answered with the argument which would become the core of the opposing idea : « our living condition have never been better than today ». The debate was not about your vision of the world but on the possible end of it. The wealth of our society is not a rampart against the loss of our humanity nor a reassurance of being redeemable. In the first chapter of « the War of Gaules », Julius Ceasar compared Romans, who, because of their wealth and their living condition,  became lazy and weak, with Helvetes who were less comfortably implanted but were stronger. Three centuries later, the Roman Empire fell under the barbarian invasions. In this case, the end of the Roman world was precisely due to the fact that their living condition had never been better. So, even if true, this argument is not receivable to justify anything. What we have to focus on is whether these radical changes to the way we live are irredeemable for society and mankind or not.

Moreover, an other clash point was about the vision of the world : as we gave example of clues that imply that the end of the world might happen, the other team only answered that actually, it was ok, there was no need to be scared of the future. Why ? Because Kondratiev said that the History was cyclical and it will be good. If we base our prediction on cyclical history, why not trust the Mayas ? The second proposer gave salient examples of economic and political crisis that are frightening the stability of our system. The opposer dwelled on the price of peace. Yes, peace is not a gift and our European generation forget too often and quickly that some brillant people have thought and fought fot it. So, we have to keep it in mind and to follow their example :by hailing a possible end we try to prepare mankind for a war : « qui vis pacem, para bellum ». On the other hand, wars are ravaging some parts of the world, even if the opposing team seemed to neglect it.

I would like to conclude by adding a last argument after the ones that we have already seen : first of all the historical ends, then the fragility of our economic and political societies and the exacerbated candor of optimist simple-minded. I would like, for this, to come back to the book the most read in the world and that has inspired great thinkers for ages : the Bible. The temptation is great, when it comes to the end of times, to quote Noah’s Arch history. But I would like to focus on another point. Our world has become a great city which wants to grow and gain unity. The progress has made us arrogant and selfish. Some people are trying to play God by creating life chemically, others want to impose their belief by violence and overall, humans have become slaves to technology. There is no more debater that can argue without searching arguments on wikipedia. Social life has become cybernetic, and by breaking the real society, networks undermine the basis of our humanity. Our world is a huge Babel’s tower which everyone is building by itself without plan and without consulting others. If no one tries to stop building this tower, stop considering that his living condition or his free time is the goal of his life, if no one tries to look up to this tower and think about how it can fall and what to do to prevent it, then it is sure mankind is irredeemable. So, hail the end of the world and vote for us.

PB

Closing opposition speech

Dear ladies and gentlemen, this is the greatest honor to conclude the last debate that will ever take place in this world. Unfortunately the proposition’s common sense seems to have got carried away by the ferocity of the upcoming events. Indeed the proposers believed we would be fool enough to not see that they used many various understandings of “end of the world” in order to hide their logical mistakes. They believed we would be fool enough to forget the obvious difference between evolution and revolution. They believed we would be fool enough to let them change the subject of the debate into “will the world end?”, and moreover into “will the world change?”. Guess what? They were wrong.

The proposition team pointed out some dark sizes of our current world (victims of the subprime crisis, exploited children, unsustainable financial situation of Greece) to make us believe that the situation could not be worse (“How can it be more fragile? ” for the quote). There is no need to be a history expert to be convinced that the current situation is far away from being the worst that ever was, especially when compared to the whole mankind’s history. Slavery has been abolished; equality of rights has never been so close;  the majority of the planet does not even fear war. New challenges like climate change, overpopulation, the necessity to sanitize our financial system, the urge to fight against the hunger all around the world gather the mankind behind the same goal and with time I’m positive that those challenges will be succeed. The notion of individual is now a reality, people tend to stop defining themselves as parts of religious, racial or local groups (which is the main reason for conflicts). They actually begin to care for each other. Globalization has introduced many political and financial institutions where the interests of the whole world are defended rather than personal ones. It would definitively be a shame to reject all these improvements.

The proposers also used political and financial changes as an argument to show that the world has already begun to end whereas I see it as the proof that our current world has all keys in hand to continue to improve.

You're telling us that the change has already started. I can't agree more with that (and more than starting, I would say rather that change still goes on) and yet I don't feel like it's the end of the world at all. Do you ? On the contrary, all those changes are the signs that the mankind is not to be declared irredeemable. They are the signs that the mankind, even if not perfect, can learn from its earlier mistakes and continue to improve. Rather than wishing the end of the world, you should join the optimistic side and help : we need you !

Moreover, if the world, as it was intended by the proposition, constantly ends and still remains fragile, wouldn't that be the proof that it's vain to end it once again ?

History has shown us many times that revolution does not necessarily match with improvement, why exactly should we believe that a new world can only be a better place to live ?

On the contrary I find it hard to imagine (well it’s easy if you try) a world without any violence nor pain. Let us focus quickly on how the mechanics of evolution work. Bacteria of the same nature first regrouped themselves into membranes to protect themselves from other aggressive bacteria, making it possible for cells to exist. Then cells of the same nature build organs to protect themselves and bodies appeared. Many scientific approaches, based on genes analogies, such as the one of Howard Bloom, show us that we can continue this reasoning until the creation of families and societies : pain and violence are not the inventions  of a perverted mankind, they are actually an inevitable component of the nature that will unfortunately resist all ends of the world.

Thank you for reading us and make sure to vote for us.

IB