The debate team at Mountain Spring High School in Rochester, NY, was unable to talk its way out of a severe beating by the MSHS football team during 6th period lunch yesterday. All six male members of the county championship-winning debate team were treated for injuries by the school nurse. The two female members were unharmed.

The confrontation began early in the lunch period when members of the MSHS football team heard the debate teamers congratulating one another on the championship won over the weekend.

According to debate team president Martin Schlitzer, junior linebacker Mark Hutchen came over to the debaters’ lunch table and said: “Hey nerds, think you can debate your way out of a beating?”

Schlitzer responded to the challenge by referencing Martin Luther King Jr.’s example of non-violence as the impetus for progress, which in turn caused Hutchen’s fists to rain down upon him.

Hutchen was then joined by other members of the football team in pummeling Schlitzer and his friends. During the melee, debate team members could be heard – between whimpers and shrieks of pain – alluding to the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi, Jesus Christ and even Hemchandra, an 8th Century Jainist philosopher who espoused the oneness of all peoples and religions.

Despite the reasoned pleas given during the beating, the debate teams’ words only enraged the football team further. “With each nerdy thing those dorks said we just hit them harder,” said Hutchen.

Most of the debate team is expected to be sufficiently healed from their injuries to be back in school tomorrow. Each member of the football team involved in the fracas received one day of detention.