I have coached LD for three years and judged at various tournaments for that time. I did not compete in LD in high school or college.

I am fine with using speed, and it does not affect my decision.

The criterion is a major factor in my evaluation. I look for some evidence. I keep notes of the major arguments and rebuttals in a round. I decide who the winner is based on who won the key arguments of the round.

Final rebuttals should include voting issues.

Technical terms during rebuttals are fine.

I am a progressive judge and I value evidence. An invalid argument will not be considered in my decision for a winner. I will decide based on the flow. Spewing is A-okay as long as I can catch your tag line. 

Judging Philosophy

High School debate experience: 2 year of policy debate

Colligate experience: 1^st year at Weber State

My name is Benjamin Moss any further questions contact email benmoss54@gmail.com

 Generals:

I give the debaters the luxury of running the debate round unless you specifically ask, I don’t like to see people abuse there prep time so as soon as the speech is ready and time stops prep is over. If you continue prepping you speaker points will drop. When It comes to general arguments I’m not picky being newer to the game, I like to have you as a debater explain your arguments to me versus being block or card heavy. First when you’re reading if you are unclear I will tell you to clear up, If you don’t clear up I will disregard that evidence because I won’t do your work for you.

I Flow on paper in columns

Voting:

There are specific arguments that I like more I do tend to understand straight up arguments more, though if you have a kritik it’s not like I won’t vote on it. Again once you present your kritik I expect you to explain it not just specifically for me but I enjoy debates that are more even where both side understand the argument and can debate it well. I will vote on theory arguments but you do have to explain why they out way the affirmative or the negative strategy.

Argument versus Argument:

Straight up debates: I like to see all arguments on a flow but especially straight up impact debates, if you can show me how the debate applies or cross applies to specific arguments. I also love to see the impact level of the debate, tell me why things out ways and why they do. I’m not the type of judge that won’t buy into an argument, but again if you don’t explain why the impact matters in the round I’m going to have a hard time voting on it.

Kritik versus Straight up: Being young in a debate nature I prefer policy debate, but this is where It comes down to weighing the kritik versus the policy plan and why it’s important to way this argument in the round. I do tend to like kritiks that have links to the affirmatives discourse on an argument. Though I’m totally open to debaters running any arguments. I like the ability for debaters to show tons of creativity and style in rounds, I feel like no debate truly is all that good if you don’t truly buy into some of the arguments that you run.

Kritik versus Kritik: Again not as familiar with critical affirmatives but I tend to love creativity in these strategies going around the debate world today. I tend to lean more on the negative side on these arguments because I tend not to know why to vote on the affirmative. But when it comes down to who wins the round it’s truly all about execution the team that executes the debate the best on the critical side wins, fair and simple tell me why and how you want me to vote and do it better than the other team and you’ll likely win. 

 Conflicts: Park City

PF Debate

I vote off the flow 10/10 times

Good evidence is awesome

Be bold and take risks

Defense is overvalued

Weighing and offense are undervalued

Things that make me happy:

-       Great signposting

-       Empirics and quantifiable impacts.

-       Lots of evidence

-       Using Cross well - make it constructive. Be sassy. Being funny never hurts, either.

-       Flashing evidence or being able to hand over evidence speedily.

-       Jokes

-       Off-time roadmaps 100% of the time.

Things that make me sad:

-       Improperly citing evidence

-       Miscutting/manipulating evidence

-       Drawn-out discussions in Cross that go nowhere. 

What I vote on - IMPACTS 1st!! If you don't provide impact calculations then I will base it off of what I think is most important. Framework (this means Value and Criterion) just because it's second doesn't mean I don't care about it. If you drop framework, I will drop you. 

Extending Args - If you extend an arg, you have a very good possibility of winning the round, that said if you extend an arg and don't give me impact based on that idea, or a card, it's meaningless to me. When people say he/she didn't attack my card, it's not impactful and you don't win based on that.

CPs/’Advocacies’?

Big Fan - If you have a CP make sure you explain it correctly and always give impacts and solvency for your CP. If your CP doesn't have solvency I won't vote on it. Advocacies are a necessity in LD. If you don't advocate for anything then I think you are only trying to get out of the negative impacts of the case.

Observations/ Burdens - If the AFF or NEG uses an observation or burden, you must answer it or you will fall under that. This means if your case doesn't follow the observation I will vote you down. You must answer them, or risk losing the round.

The K?

I have never had a good reason to learn about Kritical debate, so I have no understanding of how quality K’s should function and work, or how to judge a K. That said, I’m not going to specifically penalize you for running a K, I just probably won’t know what’s going on.

Speed?

Okay - I like to speed up to 300 wpm-ish. If you go really, really slowly I will get bored and may miss an argument. Second, if I can't understand you then I will set my pen down. If you don't see the pen down I will say clear. After the second time, and if nothing changes, I will stop flowing completely.

Slow down on tags and authors if you’re a speed demon.  

Other technical things: 

-       I’ll only evaluate things that are in both in 1AR and 2AR. Same for the NEG 1NR and 2NR

-       If you bring up a new attack in the 2AR or 2NR, you may still win but your speaker points will make you sad

-       I’m chill with any new evidence/args in the first summary, but no new evidence in the second summary please

-       I don’t flow cross-ex (this is my me-time during the round)

Speaker Points:

Short version - good at debate = high speaks

                     - pretty speaker = entirely meaningless

Long version - I give speaks based on the competitiveness of a tournament:

30 – you should go to finals

29.5 – you’re probably in mid-to-late breaks

29 - you should clear

28 – you might clear

27.5 - average. 3-3, probably.

26 - below average

25 and below - means that you were abusive and mean to your opponent

Updated (06/29/2022)

Currently an IP lawyer. If i am judging, it is because i owe someone a favor.

Overview:

Ill say "what" if i didnt hear/understand what you said

PF:

a decade worth of national circuit experience. former national competitor. former top 10 PF coach. Ill disclosed if you want. time yourselves. 

CX/LD:

Love a good theory debate but i love a good debate on the merits (blame the pfer in me) i wont blame you for striking me lmao

Lincoln Douglas

I did LD my last two years of high school, and had a LOT of fun with it!

I am personally a fan of traditional LD, but that doesn't mean I'm not okay with a progressive case. Please don't expect me to understand every kritik, explain it to me. I want to understand your case as well as you do, so make sure you help me understand.

I am okay with spreading, just make sure to slow down on Contentions and Contention Points so I can flow with you. Possibly even slow down on important pieces of evidence if you think it will be important later.

I think that Value and Value Criterion is very important, and you need to make sure all your contentions connect back, but don't overdo the criterion debate. If you and your opponent have similar criterions, move on to why your case fits it better.

I think the last speech is the most important. This is where you tell your judge exactly why you won the round instead of your opponent. Don't waste that time. I don't flow cross-x so if you think something is important, bring it up in your speech.

I have done LD before, but do it as you want to do it! I have my preferences, but it's only to help me understand. If you can do it in a different way, that's not gonna be a problem. I'm not going to make you lose the round if you don't follow my entire paradigm. I'm going to make the decision on how you debate in round, and if you prove to me that you are the better debater, specifically that you have the better case.

This is one of my favorite resolutions, I studied this a lot hoping it would be one of my resolutions, and I'm excited to see what you guys come up with! Have fun!

I am of the position that it is your debate, and you should do with it what you want. I do not automatically reject arguments based on the type of argument. There are a couple of things that are important to me as a critic that you should know...

DON'T use speed to exclude your opponent. No one (including me) should have to ask you to slow or clear multiple times. In general, I'm not a fan of speeches that spread the entire time. Just talk to me and make arguments... it's better for both of us.

DON'T be rude.

DON'T assume that I will fill in holes for you. It is your job to give me complete arguments with reasons why they win the round.

DO provide impacts and weigh them.

DO be clear on how you would like me to evaluate the round.

DO give me proven abuse on T. I like T, but not if it is incomplete.

DO affirm the topic in ***some*** way. If you are rejecting, I need you to be EXTREMELY clear on why that is fair to your opponent (it probably isn't, especially in LD). There are many ways to affirm, and I am interested in all ways.

Yes to the email chain: hannah.wilson@harker.org

It's important to me that judges act like educators (and by that I mean that I understand it's about the debaters and not me + professional boundaries are important). Debate is hard and we're all learning. My goal is to help make the experience as educationally valuable and fun as possible.

My debate experience: I did one year of PF in high school, one year of policy in high school, and three years of policy in college (2 at Weber and 1 at Concordia). I was an assistant coach at Copper Hills High School for 2 years, and a speech/congress coach at The Harker School for 4 years. I am now the head of the middle school program at The Harker School, coaching all the speech and debate events.

Policy & LD:

-I'm a competent person, but don't assume I have deep topic knowledge (especially with LD topics changing so often!). Don't assume I know what an acronym means. Don't assume I already know the link chain for the generic topic args. Don't assume I know about your aff. Even if I already do know about all of the things already, I think good debate requires painting the picture every time instead of just jumping to the end.

-Speed: Slow down and be clear on your analytics!!!!!! It seems like judges are just flowing off of docs, which is incentivizing people to spread theory/t/framework to get through more, but I am not that judge. I haven't judged a debate yet where I felt someone went too fast in the cards for me to keep up and follow. It's the keeping that same speed throughout all your analytics + lack of clarity and emphasis on the things you think are important that becomes the problem.

-I think signposting is so important! I'd much prefer a speech that says things like "on the circumvention debate" "on the link debate" "they say x we say y" than speeches that read as one big essay/overview. I'll still flow it, but the chances I miss a little thing that you decide to blow up later go up when your signposting is poor.

-While I've coached and judged LD, I never did it so some of the quirks are still foreign. I've heard the word tricks, but don't know what that is. The brief explanations I've received have me skeptical, but I'll listen to any arg with warrants and an impact.

-Theory: I have a high threshold for theory. I'm fine with debates about debate, but I don't know if I've ever seen a theory speech that goes in depth enough to do that well. If your theory shell was a full and cohesive argument in the constructive (i.e. the violation was specific and clear + the impact was specific and clear) and it's conceded entirely I'll vote for it. If it's like a one sentence just incase thing in the constructive, I probably don't think it was a full argument so even if they conceded it I might not buy it. Condo will be hard to win. If they are really reading *that* many off case, those arguments are probably very underdeveloped and some could even be answered by a few reasonable analytics. Do not read disclosure theory in front of me if it's the first debate on a new topic. The theory I'm most likely to be persuaded by is perf con.

-Framework: I'll happily vote for framework. Be specific about what ground you've lost and why it matters. Education > Fairness impacts. Affs need to prove their reps are desirable before weighing extinction against Ks.

-Ks: Make sure your link is specific to the aff. Be specific about how and what your alt solves. If it's an epistemology alt that's fine, but I need you to do thorough explanation of why that's the preferable way to debate and a sufficient enough reason to get my ballot. Don't assume I have a background in your specific K.

-Disads: Got a soft spot for a good politics disad. I'd prefer to watch a debate with core topic disads and a strong link than a new disad that might have a weaker link. Will still vote on it if they don't have answers, but I prefer watching a debate with clash. Don't assume I have background on your disads. Explain the story clearly.

Public Forum:

-Y'all should just start sending all of your evidence. It's a waste of my time and yours to wait for evidence to be called to slowly send over things card by card. It will also hold everyone to higher evidence standards if the community starts evidence sharing and debates will get better.

-I know there is some division on this, but I do think the first rebuttal speech should still talk about their case. It's good to start filtering the debate through your impacts right away.

Congress:

Honestly, y'all don't need paradigms. This is a speech event and if you're thinking of it as a debate event you should reorient your strategy. That said, I know people want to read paradigms anyways so... I really value rebuttals. Constructives can do well in front of me, but if you give more than one speech in a round and both are constructives I'll feel like that's because you don't know how to be off script. Remember you are in a room with a bunch of other students... it's hard for your judges to remember all of you. Be an active participant in questioning and the house to help yourself stand out. Cheesy, but I think of the round in terms of who I would want to be my representative. Not necessarily because they agree with all the things I already think, but because they are actively engaged in questioning, are good at responding to opposing arguments, and have a nice balance between pathos and logos. Greatest speeches might not get my 1 if they are disengaged from every other part of the round.