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Post by Carlos Johnston on Sept 21, 2016 18:06:11 GMT -7
Carlos smiled as his car approached the school. It was his to be his first day attending Gardner High, although he had registered when he first arrived in Emerald City. He had found there was other, far more pressing matters that he needed to tend to before he could even think of going to school. Between business meetings and research into the city's predicaments, he simply didn't have the time. Today, however, he finally had some free time on his hands, and he was visibly excited as he emerged from the vehicle, the outline of Tiny Tim visible to those who peered behind the young teen. Gardner High was by far not the most prestigious school Carlos could've chosen to go to. However, he had his reasons for choosing a public high school. For one, he had never experienced public schooling. He saw it as a way for him to see how the rest of the next generation was developing, as well as a chance to improve upon his social expertise. For another, he wasn't willing to pay a school just to keep his name in the registry while he dealt with matters of real consequence. Not to mention that he had little reason to concern himself with typical schooling, as he didn't need to learn the necessities of working hard to become successful. He was born successful, and taught how to maintain that success. No, what he needed to learn was how to share his success, and he knew well that he wouldn't learn that from any textbook. As he strode through the hallways in search of his locker, he took care to attempt to listen any discussions in his vicinity. Most, he found, weren't about him at all. The ones that were simply painted him as "a new kid". He smirked as he walked past. It seemed that most of the students hadn't been paying attention to the news the past few weeks, which he found suited him well. Those that didn't likely weren't the sort of people that he would've been interested in making the first move towards meeting. --------- It was third period and Carl had already decided that he hated school. The layout was confusing and something he hadn't thought to prepare himself for. The lectures were dull and emotionless. The required work already seemed near endless, and even though there was really little of it, he was tempted to hire somebody to do it for him. The student body was largely immature, loud, and overly obnoxious. It was enough to make him reconsider how he acted around Tiny Tim. He had finally found a foe that he doubted he could defeat: soul-crushing boredom. He pondered whether or not the entire thing was worth was worth it. Luckily, his next class was Debate. His hope, battered but not yet broken, was that the class would provide him with enough something that he'd be able to make it through the rest of the day without being driven completely mad. Of the classes listed on his schedule, it promised the highest chances of it, at least. When he finally found the class, he had seconds to spare. He quickly took the first available seat he came across, beside a small girl who didn't seem to be any older than he was. He found that strange as, from what he had been told and by the looks of the other students in the room, it was supposed to be a class normally for older students. He turned and offered her a friendly wave before turning back, intent on seeing if the class was indeed as he hoped it would be. Avaline Ophilia |
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Post by Avaline Ophilia on Sept 24, 2016 11:14:17 GMT -7
Avaline did not like school. She did not like the amount of time it ate up, or the useless lectures and busy work that were used to fill that time. She especially did not care for the social aspect involved with it all. People were best avoided in any and all ways; conversing with her peers, in general, was not worth her time, attention, or brainpower. If these people could even be called her peers. It bothered Avaline, to be lumped in with these lazy and simple humans of about her age category, like she was one of them. They were insignificant. Should one of them, any one of them, die, it would affect only a small number of people and the city, even school, as a whole would continue on as before. She refused to be likewise.
She was wondering this about the boy who came through the door at the last moment and demolished her hopes of having at least one desk beside her that wasn’t occupied by another person to ignore. It seemed to her like she’d never seen his face in this class before, but she hadn’t bothered (and if anything tried to avoid) learning half the faces of people in the class. Avaline regarded the boy who sat beside her with little more than a cursory glance. Absently, wondered if, should she wish to do so, what would happen if she killed him? He was within her range. She could cut his windpipe with no more than a thought, and no one would ever know she had anything to do with it. How much would change? Besides for an extra empty seat in the classroom. It would be one less student for taxpayers to pay for, maybe a story for a newspaper journalist to write in place of anything actually important. Though few liked to think it, most individuals were expendable. The last dragon attack had shown just how true, even on a large scale, that was.
She had been zoning out the teacher in favor of her train of thought that was about as consequential, but was at least hers. But her name was mentioned, snapping her from her disinterested stare out the window to attention.
“Avaline and Carlos.” The teacher had a distinctly evil look in his eye. “Since the two of you have missed the most days so far, how about you two be our guinea pigs for the first debate of the semester?” He held out two slips of folded paper. He had explained earlier in the year that one would say ‘argument’ and the other ‘counter argument’, and that was the side the recipients were supposed to take. He’d then write the topic on the board, and the person so lucky as to get the ‘argument’ slip could present their side.
It was some of the worst logic Avaline had heard in awhile. Normally she would be seething, but she hadn’t bothered much with sleep the last night, and she was too startled to do much more than take the slip of paper and begrudgingly walk up to one of the podiums.
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Post by Carlos Johnston on Sept 28, 2016 16:52:15 GMT -7
Carlos simply smiled when he was called out, even when it was made clear that he was not going to be able to simply sit back and enjoy. He withheld his sigh of irritation and instead simply took the scrap of paper offered to him and made his way to the podium opposite Avaline.
The teacher quickly went to the board and, writing as he spoke, went "What is the best course of action for dealing with the super problem?" Carlos felt his smile falter for a moment as his mood soured considerably, but quickly regained his composure. The thought of dealing with super-phobic teachers was something that made him appreciative of the fact that he wouldn't be there often. Still, he had suffered through worse, and he knew how to maintain a facade.
He looked at what was written on the paper. "Counter-argument". He supposed that was better. He didn't have advanced warning or opportunity to look up exact statistics, so instead he'd be focusing solely on dismantling her stance. He couldn't rely on logos, so instead he'd be dependent on pathos and ethos. What could go wrong?
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Post by Avaline Ophilia on Sept 30, 2016 13:39:47 GMT -7
Avaline glared at the slip of paper. ‘Argument’. She shot a deeper glare at the teacher and what he wrote on the board, but the weathered high school speech teacher seemed decently oblivious and perfectly impervious to all of her attempts. She’d been dragged out of her small haven of comfort, of making up sleep she’d purposely put off in class, and was now being forced to argue something about a question that insinuated there was a problem with supers.
Avaline made no attempts to keep up a facade. Her expression was one of utter contempt and distilled ‘I really don’t want to be here right now’, because she couldn’t care enough about the class to put effort into pretending like she did. The only reason she didn’t now turn half her brain off and spew out the first somewhat-relevant thing that came to mind was the topic itself; of all the issues the teacher could’ve chosen, he’d picked the one that most stepped on her toes. Avaline had a mind to stomp on his back. She glanced at the boy who was supposed to try to knock her down, dare in her eyes. She rested her elbows on the podium and her head lazily on them.
“Nothing needs to be done.” She said matter-of-factly. “The present status-quo is the optimal relation between supers and the general populous; common people keep to their own issues, and supers deal with their own, themselves. Each only intersects rarely and when necessary.” She couldn’t outright argue her true position, that unpowereds should leave supers entirely alone regardless of what they’re doing, but that would raise eyebrows and take more time to explain than she had sleep or care for. “The day-to-day effects of supers is negligible on the population. Existent, yes, but it’s nothing we can’t all deal with. If this were untrue, we would be facing an unpowered uprising. Perhaps it can be argued that the common person would be better off if supers and their dealings were less common, however that decrease in commonality may come, but that is only useful in times of true peace. Namely, when we can be sure that a dragon will not appear. As supers currently are, dragons can be managed by supers the same way supers are; distantly, away from the common people. This is, overall, the optimum for the average person.”
Avaline suppressed a yawn and felt her job completed.
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Post by Carlos Johnston on Oct 3, 2016 17:21:40 GMT -7
Carlos stared with a smirk of amusement as Avaline gave her argument. He had been expecting to deal with somebody who said "supers are bad", more or less. He was preparing to say something about how supers were at least useful for keeping dragons at bay. Having his argument used against him was not a new experience, but it was wholly unexpected given the topic. He wondered if his original stance was different enough to qualify or if he should instead go with the more popularly accepted argument.
"Some of what my opposition said is arguably true," he started out, standing straight with his hands folded on the podium. "What she said about supers being able to deal with dragons away from the general public, for instance. It could even be argued that the conflict between supers allow them to strengthen their abilities so that they can effectively fight against dragons. Unfortunately, that conflict also causes civilian casualties. Instead, if we were to somehow find a way to cooperate with the supers, many problems would be resolved. For instance, many supers are isolated from the rest of humankind. This gives them reason to despise us, which breeds conflict, which breeds more fear and contempt. If we were to accept supers into our society, we would be able to minimize the amount of supers committing crimes due to their treatment. This would, in turn, save unpowered lives. We would also have more supers working towards the betterment of humanity, with unknown potential benefits. With the combined efforts of supers and unpowereds, we could have unprecedented advances in science and medicine, as well as other areas, but I digress. The cooperation and collaboration would, first and foremost, minimize super villainy, which would decrease the kill count from superpowered conflicts. Decreasing conflict amongst supers would also have the added benefit of them working together more effectively as a unit against dragons. This would also, in turn, decrease unpowered casualties caused by them. That is why I believe that the best course of action for dealing with problems caused by supers would be to attempt to establish a mutual, peaceful compromise between supers and unpowereds that allows for cooperation between the two groups."
He looked over at Avaline and waited. If he understood the basic format of debate classes, she was to present a counter to his argument. If he were wrong, the teacher would likely let him know soon. Either way, he was very curious as to the response his argument would elicit.
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Post by Avaline Ophilia on Oct 7, 2016 23:45:07 GMT -7
Avaline had prepared herself for the idiotic ‘but supers are a problem’, the simple go-to she would bet every one of these children would jump to. It was an easy argument and thus easy credit, by means of appealing to popular opinion and allowing for the unending flood of ‘evidence’ to support it to be drawn upon. She would spit out her statements against it, get the points she only sort of wanted, and be on her way without having betrayed herself for such a trivial matter.
Instead, he gave her something much harder to contend with. Inwardly, it was difficult not to retort with ‘why should we settle for equals when we clearly are not’ and ‘I refuse to let unpowereds who think they’re above me tell me I can’t take what I want’, but for obvious reasons she had to let these sit in her stomach. Avaline sunk deeper into her podium.
Her original argument was to maintain the status quo - even if she couldn’t give all of her reasons as to why, she could still defend it.
“You say that as though it is a simple matter. Supers will not be accepted into society, because society will not contend with the power supers would like, and be able to easily take for themselves. Electrical-minded supers will be favored in technical and engineering positions. Healing supers will be favored over doctors. Cognitive supers will make better breakthroughs in the scientific community, which could be detrimental in fields where patents are key. An unpowered politician will never be able to win against a super who can optimise such systems. This appears to go against the very core values of America, and I doubt many of us,” she said the word hesitantly, but necessarily, “would ungrudgingly adopt that.”
She cast a glance at the teacher, who gave an encouraging look back. He was leaning against his desk, arms crossed and looking all too content with this arrangement. Avaline huffed and rested her chin a little more comfortably on her wrist.
“This is ignoring how supers may feel about the situation. Unpowereds will wish to…” she picked her words carefully, “place restrictions on supers’ actions and abilities, under the rationale of safety. It is natural for unpowereds to do so, and it is natural for supers to retaliate in kind. Would this not create resentment on both sides? Again we will have conflict, perhaps conflict more deadly to unpowereds, as it will be focused primarily on them. As it stands, supers have much less reason to target the majority of unpowereds, and thus it is best to leave the present state be.”
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Post by Carlos Johnston on Oct 28, 2016 19:03:58 GMT -7
Carlos occasionally nodded slightly as Avaline presented her counter to his argument. She had some relatively valid points, but he would be pathetic if he were to give up on his stance so easily. He smiled confidently as he thought it over. There was no way he could be taken seriously if he were to outright lose a highschool debate. He'd lose what credibility he had hard earned over the last year, and he couldn't afford that.
"I believe the core values of America are centered around certain inalienable rights, Ms. Avaline. For the sake of this argument, I'll be focusing on the pursuit of happiness.
"The mistreatment of supers is, at its base, no different than the mistreatment of any other minority group. The majority simultaneously believes themselves better while fearing what the minority could accomplish. As such, they oppress, and then use stereotyping and propaganda to establish that the oppression is deserved and for the good of all. Meanwhile, the minority group builds resentment towards the majority, eventually causing a conflict between the two groups if the situation isn't resolved early enough. Even when the situation is technically resolved, it usually takes time for the two groups to work together effectively.
"The best course of action, in my humble opinion, would be to start taking the necessary steps towards a mutually beneficial coexistence as soon as possible. Supers are born human as well, and therefore deserve the same rights as the rest of us." Carlos said the word without hesitation. As far as he was concerned, there was little real difference between the two groups besides individual effect on society, and yet he likely had just as much of an effect as Carlos than as not. "We all deserve a chance to use our potential to benefit the system from within the system, whether we have powers or not. Everyone is born with the right to find a way to use their talents in a way that doesn't interfere with others' rights. There's nothing stopping those born with wealth from utilizing that wealth for their own personal benefit. Why should we treat supers any different?
"Yes, there would be issues, especially at first, but the current balance of power encourages even worse. Eventually one group will decide that the other is only causing problems for them, and action will be taken. Sure, this might be a more difficult option, but it is the ideal solution to the current problem, and the only long term solution."
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Post by Avaline Ophilia on Oct 29, 2016 18:45:40 GMT -7
Carlos’s words actually drew Avaline up out of her arms to stare, as the implications of what he was saying fell into place. She was dumbfounded to hear this from this boy. Her stomach was warm, with the feeling of when someone unexpectedly and unknowingly agrees with you. Perhaps not all of these students (minus Tristan) were entirely naive.
“You argue that supers should be allowed to use their talents to their maximum degree freely within the system, as a wealthy person may their money?As the wealthy have unarguably risin to the top in this country, so too will the supers.” Avaline was grinning from ear to ear, but there was a slyness to it.
However, unlike the wealthy, a super’s powers could not be stolen by a bankruptcy or redistributed among the people. This was one show of proof as to why the power of supers was real, and that of the wealthy was as fragile as their reputation. Such a setup was sure to benefit supers greatly. However, just as the affluent could use their money for personal gain over the public’s well being, so too would supers - and, under his counter, it could be argued doing so was in the super’s pursuit of happyness and thus just. This, she couldn’t say for undermining her own next statement, delivered with a wide grin, and even a single chuckle.
“Carlos, your name was. If that is what you are arguing, than I am forced to concede. Allowing supers to do as they please, as is their right, is indeed the optimal way to deal with the super problem.” Avaline stretched her arms on the podium. Yawning, she again folded them in front of her. “I have just one more point to offer; supers are, at their base, unlike other minority groups. Their power is real, and highly condensed. A single super has the force of hundreds of another group. Because of that, their individual actions can hold considerably more weight.”
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