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I negate that Resolved: Individuals have a moral obligation to assist people in need.

Definitions:

1. To assist is defined by Merriam Webster as [giving] support or aid.2. Need is defined by Merriam Webster as a lack of something requisite, desirable, or

useful. This definition is also backed by framers intent, because if they desired that the

debate be about more pressing needs then it would have been specified.

Prefer my definitions because they are the most predictable and accessible because they come from

a popular and commonly used dictionary.

The value is morality because the resolution asks us to deal with moral obligations.

Moral rules must be universally applicable, Moreland and Giesler explain:James Morelandand Norman Geisler, Profs. of Philosophy, Biola Univ. and Liberty Univ., THE LIFE AND DEATH DEBATE, 1990, p. x.Ajudgment is moral only if it is universalizable; that is, if it applies equally to all relevant similar

situations.The main point of this criterion is to express the conviction thatmoral judgments must be impartially applied to moral

situations by taking into account all of the morally relevant features of the situation. If someone

claimed that one act is right and a second act is wrong, but that person was unable to cite a relevant

distinction between the two acts, then the judgment would seem arbitrary and without adequate

foundation. This criterion points to an important aspect of morality:moral judgments are [not] arbitrary expressions

of personal preference. They are rationally justifiable claims which, if true, are binding on all cases

that fit the relevant criteria upon which the claim is based.This has several implications:

1. Keeping this in mind, the resolution provides only one morally relevant criteria to the claimstated in the resolution, the criteria being people in need, therefore, the moral obligation

that the affirmative states exist, must exist under any situation in which a person is in need.

2. If the above condition is not met no moral obligation would exist because it would be anarbitrary law that is only circumstantially true and wouldnt be a universally applicable

maxim.

3. If the affirmative tries to exclude certain situations in which a person is in need, then theywould be excluding topical ground.

4. You cannot weigh between moral rules and obligations. To do so would present acircumstance in which the directives of one moral obligation wouldnt be followed thus

revoking its status as a moral obligation to begin with.

5. Because moral obligations only exist if theyre universally applicable you prefer mycriterion as it is the only method of checking for universal applicability.

The Criterion is Kants Categorical Imperative which states that one should only act on the maxim

which he could will to become a universal law. Additionally, because the Moreland and Giesler

evidence tells you that moral obligations only exist if theyre universally applicable, you prefer my

criterion as it is the only method of checking for universal applicability.

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Principles which allow the limitation of other's freedom cannot be universalized, Engstrom

explains:

Stephen Engstrom

http://www.philosophie.uni-hd.de/md/philsem//engstrom_vortrag.pdf Now on the interpretation weve been entertaining,applying the formula of universal law involves considering

whether its possible for every personevery subject capable of practical judgmentto sharethe practicaljudgment assertingthe goodness of every persons acting according to the maxim in question. Thus inthe present casethe application ofthe formula involves considering whether its possible for every personto deem good every persons acting to limit others freedom, where practicable,with a view to

augmenting their own freedom. Since here all persons are on the one hand deeming good both the

limitation of others freedom and the extension of their own freedom, whileon the other hand, insofaras they [also] agree with the similar judgments of others, also deeming good the limitation of their own freedom and the

extension of others freedom,they are all deeming good both the extension and the limitation of both theirown and others freedom. These judgments are inconsistent insofar as the extension of apersons outer freedom is incompatible with the limitation of that same freedom.

My sole contention is that circumstances exist in which no moral obligation exists to assist a person

in need:

First, individuals cannot be expected to assist another if doing so would come at the sacrifice of

their own lives, to do so would be to compel suicide.

Harris further why individuals cannot be compelled to do harm to themselves:GEORGE W. HARRIS1University of California Press Agent-centered Morality http://gwharr.people.wm.edu/agent.htmTo beanongoing agent is not to be the agent of a principlethat comes into play willy-nilly as dictated by eventsexternalto the agent's reasons for living; rather, it is to be an agent whose actions have theircoherenceand meaning withinthe agent'sway oflifewith its own constitutive good.Being anongoing agent, therefore,essentially involves findinglife worthwhile and having reasons for living.It also involves having reasons for living one way rather than another. No

way of life, then, is morally obligatory that is entirely independent of a[n]human agent's own good.Ifthis is true, thenno individual act that is destructive to the most fundamental goods of that life can bemorally obligatory for an agent.

Second, the resolution makes no distinction between individuals who desire assistance and those

who dont. To assist those individuals who do not desire assistance would be to infringe upon their

rights and their autonomy.

Third, assisting people can come at the detriment of others, thus placing the affirmative in a bind

where an individual has an obligation to help someone but doing so would place another in need of

assistance.