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YouDebateIt.com -- Should the US detention facility at Guantanamo Bay be shut down?
Topic: Should the US detention facility at Guantanamo Bay be shut down?

Which do you prefer #1 or #2?
Vote below for the better argument.
Opinion #1
Debater: Tim
Individual Sacrifices are Necessary for a Functional Society
I certainly agree with Staff's assertion that punishment and mistreatment of persons not convicted of any crime is abhorrent - indeed, the practice of tortureought to be permanently abolished by way of constitutional amendment.

However, to shut down Gitmo is short-sighted, I think, in light of the broader goals of the war on terror. While a verb certainly cannot be defeated, it should be the goals of all civilized societies to minimize barbaric behavior; a balance must be found between detaining persons deemed likely to commit attacks on civilization and ensuring appropriate civil liberties for all persons.

Just as occurs in our penal system with each wrongly convicted imprisoned (or executed) person, there will doubtless be instances of innocent persons prosecuted. Each tale will be heart-wrenching and grossly unfair, but, fair or not, the price for the aforementioned balance must be paid by someone. We can only do our best to minimize these tragic and unforgivable mistakes.
Opinion #2
Debater: Stef
If you destroy freedom, then what are you left protecting?
Before talks of humiliation of prisioners, before talks of abuse, before eveidence of the USA torturing prisoners. Guantanamo Bay should have been shut down.
A free society is based on many principles, one of the greatest of these is that one is innocent untill proven guilty. To detain anyone without trail or charge can never be construed as right or unbarabaric, whatever threat or perceived threat the country doing so is under.
US politician's talk of protecting freedom at all costs must ring hollow to the hundreds of men illegally held without trail and ritually abused on a daily basis. It's like protecting the freedom of a budgie with a cage, a shameless piece of propaganda talk which the US administration hopes no one will notice.
The day Guantanamo Bay begun holding prisoners without trail or charge America destroyed a large piece of it's status as a free state to the extent to which many Europeans now consider the US now has no right to refer to it'self as protecting freedom.
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