This house would embrace a life of mindless consumerism - opening speeches

First proposing speech

Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to this exciting debate about mindless consumerism! My name is Vanilla, and I am an ice cream. Right now, I am shivering into a -20 degrees C freezer. Two men are staring at me and my little sister, Chocolate. Man n°1 has been there for almost 10min, glancing at me but giving no obvious signs he will let my heart melt in this presumably hot evening. Man n°2 has just arrived. He took a look at our little family but when he saw Chocolate, it was obviously love at first sight. A moment later, he gave her the sweetest kiss I ever saw. Meanwhile, Man n°1 had finally decided to choose me. However I could feel that he was still bothered and was definitely not as happy as Man n°1.  (Continues below the break …)

by GG

First opposing speech

Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to tackle an important topic affecting each person of our society. It is concerning an unbeatable devastating curse but captivating, a demon having Santa Claus’s appearance, beating down the multitude and scoffing at the wise. It is a phenomenon that has changed our lifestyles and has manipulated our minds. CAPITALISM & MONEY are the major offenders. They led to the “mindless consumerism”.  I am sure that each reader now felt himself concerned but wondered:”A curse?! A demon?! Is she talking about swine Flu?” Do you know the difference between a disease and consumerism? You can recover from the first thanks to drugs, but from the second when your bank account get in the red. (Continues below the break…)

by HBS

First proposing speech

Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to this exciting debate about mindless consumerism! My name is Vanilla, and I am an ice cream. Right now, I am shivering into a -20 degrees C freezer. Two men are staring at me and my little sister, Chocolate. Man n°1 has been there for almost 10min, glancing at me but giving no obvious signs he will let my heart melt in this presumably hot evening. Man n°2 has just arrived. He took a look at our little family but when he saw Chocolate, it was obviously love at first sight. A moment later, he gave her the sweetest kiss I ever saw. Meanwhile, Man n°1 had finally decided to choose me. However I could feel that he was still bothered and was definitely not as happy as Man n°1

Dear readers, you are obviously trying to see the connection between mindless consumerism and my Ice cream story. Be sure that this story does have a purpose.  First, I chose Ice-cream because it is a food category, but not the one our body needs to survive. In that way, it is unneeded. Buying this ice cream is undoubtedly a consumerist act. But who never bought an ice Cream? Nobody! The first purpose of the story was to highlight that we live in a consumer society. However I want to warn the reader and the opposing team that the motion doesn’t want us to discuss this fact and putting it into question would be a mistake.  The second reason explaining why I pick up this ice cream story is the difference of behaviors between Man n°1 and Man n°2. This difference is a non-subtle metaphor to help you distinguish between two of the various consumerist attitudes existing on earth.  Indeed, we are going to discuss, in this debate, which type of consumerism fits the best our society and why. We, the proposer team, are persuaded that mindless consumerism (ie Man n°2) is the best fit. We will show you that promoting another type of consumerism is totally nonsensical and don’t help people to being happy.

As consumerism is often disparaged in our society, the word tends to have a negative connotation. I thus beg you to get rid of all prejudices you could have.  Dear readers, you are the only judge of this debate! If you want to make, in all honesty, the right decision, you should have a neutral vision on consumerism. I thus propose that, for the time of the debate, you put into brackets every biased memory or personal experience or even former debate linked to consumerism. We should only stick to one definition: consumerism means consuming materials in excess of their basic needs. Buying an unnecessary food, such as ice-cream, or another pair of shoes, are both considered as consumerist attitudes.   Consumerism is part of our everyday life, however, we can distinguish 2 types of attitudes toward consumerism. The first one includes people who think hard during 10minutes in front of ice creams, worrying about the amount of calories and having a hard time converting it into minutes of running. Their intense cerebral activity prevents them from feeling the happiness that comes along with spontaneity of a purchase. The second category of people is composed of those who want ice cream and buy one without procrastinating at all, because they know that buying this ice cream makes them happy! To bring this debate a step further and not stick to a low level argumentation about ice creams, my colleagues will resuscitate philosophers. They will demonstrate that mindless consumerism helps people finding happiness by satisfying some of their desires. And they will also show you that consumerism should definitively be mindless because it frees your brain from meaningless concerns and give you more time to think about important things. But beware! There again, the trap would be to misunderstand the meaning of the word mindless. Mindless means that something is done without justification or concern for the consequences (Encyclopedia Britannica) and thus is marked by no use of the powers of the intellect.

Last but not least, advocating another type of consumerism is endangering us. Indeed, if consumerism is not mindless, it means that you want people to refrain from buying all what they would like to (in accordance with their budget). It leaves the door open to bring back the long-forgotten sumptuary laws consisting of regulating habits of consumption. The consequence of these laws was to widen inequalities by reinforcing social hierarchies. Ladies and Gentlemen, such threats to democratic values of liberty and above all equality make it impossible to agree with the opponents. I thus beg you to vote for the motion!

GG

First opposing speech

Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to tackle an important topic affecting each person of our society. It is concerning an unbeatable devastating curse but captivating, a demon having Santa Claus’s appearance, beating down the multitude and scoffing at the wise. It is a phenomenon that has changed our lifestyles and has manipulated our minds. CAPITALISM & MONEY are the major offenders. They led to the “mindless consumerism”.  I am sure that each reader now felt himself concerned but wondered:”A curse?! A demon?! Is she talking about swine Flu?” Do you know the difference between a disease and consumerism? You can recover from the first thanks to drugs, but from the second when your bank account get in the red.

But before going into the details, let me define to you the “mindless consumerism”. First of all, mindless means “lacking intelligence or good sense”. Then consumerism is equivalent to “the ever-increasing consumption of goods and services”. To summarize, we are more and more buying things we don’t need. Now you will ask:”Where is the problem with such a behavior? It’s entertaining and a source of happiness as well as it supports the economy of our country”. I think it’s time for you to stop being foolish and have a more responsible attitude towards this problem.

Capitalism founded a system of economy driven by consumer spending, thanks to spreading the wealth. But that led to materialism, or the mentality for the need for excess. You are charmed of the advertisement, and stars lifestyle, that are influencing you to buy things you do not need, and most of cases, you cannot afford. But as a matter of fact instead of feeling delighted, you will have a feeling of unfulfillment, due to spending a lot of money yet having nothing of personal value and that’s going to be most of the time quickly outdated. What make things even worse is that the identity of a human today is no longer defined by what one does, but by what one owns. Therefore, we waste a lot of our intellect in jobs that do not challenge us and for the most part do little to make a difference or contribute to society in order to have the most, to have a lot of money to satisfy our unreasonable wants and desires. We are becoming just irresponsible materialist humans.

Let’s take for example “the sales season”. Less foolish persons wait for the sales to shop in order to save money and to be able to buy things that were very expensive. Very nice strategy! And of course, since something that may cost fifty Euros is now only thirty Euros, they will buy it without further consideration if they actually need it or not, because they imagine that they made a good deal. They think that by consuming, they will have a sense of status, as they acquire various items and upgrades throughout their life. But in the reality they are having credits to get to an illusionary and faked status of happiness. They are complicating their life and exhausting themselves through this never-ending race to get the latest, the newest and stay up-to-date.

We have to wake up and to refuse to buy needlessly. Let’s simplify our lives. Many people overspend on luxuries, and then are unable to maintain the things they really need, such as their houses. Companies are creating in humans new desires, new dreams, so they strive to get them by impoverishing themselves. People are just companies and banks slaves! Consumerism is concerned with the individual needs, choices, and satisfaction and in turn promotes overwork, personal stress, debts, and most importantly, an increase in economic disparity. So dear readers, oppose the motion, condemn mindless consumerism and vote for us.

HBS