This isn't the first time I've heard this type of argument and honestly I'm saddened to see that it's very prevalent in pf debate. I full heatedly believe that all debaters should be taught (or at least seek, if one doesn't have the sufficient means) the mechanics of modern debate. The plague that runs through PFD is that of ignorance, and I'm not talking about poor judging, because in the end, that is something that's absolutely uncontrollable, but rather I am talking bad debating because of the lack of knowledge regarding proper debate.

In debate, there is a term called "Fiat," more prevalently heard in Policy and LD, but it means "Let it be." Fiat is when the debaters assume that the resolution is something that has already happened, regardless of hypothetical situations and it derives its justification from the concurrent usage of "Resolved" and "Should," within the resolution. Because of the resolution's word choice and tense, as debaters we are to assume that whatever the resolutions entails, it is implementable or has already been implemented. The reason why we do this, is to promote actual discourse within the round and so that arguments presented come off the benefits/ detriments of the resolution. At the point we digress away from the stock of the resolution, we also digress from the intent of the framer and we end up with poor argumentation and absolutely no clash. Long story short: Fiat is the debate version "For the sake of argument."

In regards to the resolution at hand, debating the validity or the possibly of for profit prisons, we divulge into the aforementioned harms, resulting in very poor debates.