I am a traditional judge who coached the Marriott's Ridge High School debate team for four years and I now also coach middle school debate. I have judged over 50 tournaments and I have extensive college debating experience. I judge both on value criterions and contention level arguments. I am willing to hear and consider progressive arguments but I do not prefer them. I do not like excessive speed. I prefer quality over quantity.

Debated Policy for: the University of Kansas (KU) (1979-83), Strake Jesuit - Houston, TX (1975-79)

Coached LD for: The Heights School, MD (2011-2014); Stone Ridge School of the Sacred Heart, MD (2016-Present)

Philosophy: Largely traditional. I like evidence, good arguments, respect for opponents, and clarity. Debaters who spread almost can never manage clarity. Sign-posting is valued.

I will try to listen to anything (but would rather not hear K's) and approach the debate as a blank slate. That said, I do view LD Debate as being different than Policy Debate -- slower and more of an emphasis on clarity, values, etc. Evidence is still important, however.

Debaters should remember that success comes as much from listening to their opponent as from what they say; clash is highly desired. Cross-X may not necessarily get flowed, but is part of the debate and important.

LD is supposed to be debate before a lay audience and presume I am a lay person. Construct a cohesive presentation and deliver at a speed and choice of words a lay person will comprehend. My eyes and ears tend to glaze when I hear too much debate jargon. Contextualize and rank your contentions clearly articulating the value. Your contentions should be credible and pass a smell test and I tend to discount projections that have a quantum probability. I have a physics/math background and tend to look at questions for a lens of 'Is this a useful question to ask'. Treat your opponents with respect.

Email for speech docs: alyssastokes19@gmail.com

I am a 6th-year lay judge, former parent from a very traditional circuit. I do have some experience on the national circuit, almost exclusively in lay rounds. I prefer a topical debate on the substance of the resolution. I like a value and criterion, but I don’t make my decision based solely on framework. I expect empirical evidence but don’t want a policy debate. If you are a progressive debater and aren’t willing/able to adapt, you’ll want to use a strike. While I wouldn’t drop you just for being progressive, I probably wouldn’t comprehend enough of your case to make a good decision.

I am comfortable with a lively conversational speed; do not spread. I am a flow judge, and if I can’t understand you due to excessive speed, I will put down my pen. (And you definitely don’t want me to rely on memory.)

Give me voters. If you can integrate them into your final speech, even better.

I suffer from social anxiety and therefore generally do not not disclose in-round unless the tournament requires it, but I will publish the results after I make my decision; my RFD and feedback will be on your ballot. I appreciate your understanding.

Be nice and have fun!

Contact
Email is andrew.torrez@gmail.com for the email chain.

NEW for TOCs (4/19/2022)

I did not judge much during 2021-22; I have 10 rounds on the Jan/Feb topic and three are from outrounds. In those rounds, I voted Aff 5 times (50%), and in out-rounds I voted Aff once (33%). I sat once (Octos @ Golden Desert). I've been through this paradigm recently and it reflects my current judging preferences.

2020-2021 Summary

I judged 60 rounds at last year at 13 different TOC bid-distributing tournaments. In prelims, I voted Aff 24 of 53 rounds (45.2%). In out-rounds I voted Aff 1/7 (14%) (Oof.) I did not sit out on a panel last year (Stanford, Emory, Big Lex, College Prep, Glenbrooks, Grapevine outrounds).

How To Pref Me:

LARP 1 - I'm a LARP hack. I want good, specific topic lit. Longer cards >>>>> more cards.

Ks - 2/3 - treat me like a college policy judge on these; I want a thorough explanation of what the world of the neg looks like in the 1N. You're solid running Cap, Fem, Set Col, Securitization, most post-fiat stuff. Specific links to the 1AC are key. Update: If you want me to vote pre-fiat, the K needs an alt; I will buy a floating PIK as essentially a DA but I'm highly likely to allow new 2AR weighing.

Theory - 2/3 - My threshold for voting is genuine abuse, and I'd prefer to see that in terms of models of debate. I will listen to even frivolous theory arguments but my threshold for answers is very, very low. I vote on RVIs more than most judges. I will vote on Nebel T.

Phil - 2/3 - Happy to evaluate your NCs. The status of most LD phil debate right now is not great - it tends to be a lot of blippy spikes, and I'm definitely on team "give me new 2AR responses on anything extended into the 2N," see tricks below.

Performance/Non-T Affs: 3 - I'm open, and I've enjoyed some of these cases but you probably don't want to pref me high if this is your jam. If you run T/Framework on the neg, I'm likely a very good judge for you.

Lay - 4 - I really love lay debate and can appreciate when it's done well, but I'm tab enough that you're almost certainly better off taking some random parent judge. Note: if you're a circuit debater hitting a lay debater and you adapt to them (i.e., no spreading, no theory args, just run your larp case) and win, I will reward you with a 30. Note: if you're an insecure circuit debater worried you're going to lose to a lay debater and you don't adapt to them, I'll just judge the round normally. If you're the lay debater, be smart in the round.

Tricks - 5 - The most I can say is that I will listen. I voted for Nate Krueger all the time, but he was kind of amazing at trix. My threshold for answers here is very, very low.

Stuff I don't like

Tricks and blippy one-line extensions that foreclose on your opponent's offense.

I'm sticking with 2020's "don't be squirrelly." That means: don't pretend you don't know what an a priori is in CX, don't hide spikes, don't lie about stuff you didn't extend, don't "explain" your crazy-ass Baudrilliard K with 3 minutes of nonsense in CX and then all of a sudden tell a straightforward story in the 2N, don't lie about your super-vague "I'm whole rez!" methods to exclude all clash in the 1AR, etc. Don't be squirrelly!

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Longer stuff if you've got time:

Speed

UPDATED - Particularly online, I can no longer handle your top, top speed; it just becomes a kind of hazy whine in my headphones. Call me a 6 or 7 out of 10. Slow WAY down for tags and analyticals, particularly in rebuttals and especially if it's not on your speech doc. If you're spreading prewritten analyticals, send those with your speech doc to me and to your opponent. I'll clear you if I have to.

Evidence

Like I said, long cards >>>> more cards. Don't power-tag. I love love love when debaters re-cut their opponent's evidence in the next speech to show that it was power/mistagged - that has to be read, not inserted.

Nebel T

I think Nebel is correct, but this winds up being a lot more nuanced in the context of an LD round. Yes, semantics outweigh pragmatics on interpretation, but pragmatics control when we're talking voters/remedy. Here's a real-world example of how that played out. So, I agree with Nebel in the abstract that it's kind of silly that on a topic like "RT: States ought to ban their nuclear arsenals," the most common 1AC was Indo-Pak because that's literally not at all what the topic committee wanted you to debate. That being said, I don't think I ever voted for T on the nukes topic against spec affs because the 1AR answer of "come on, there are only 7 nuclear nations, if you're not prepared for Indo-Pak, you haven't done enough research" was probably sufficient. On the other hand, if your plan was to ban landmines in Myanmar as a spec for "states ought to ban lethal autonomous weapons," then yes I voted for Nebel T every time. The Niemi "indict" is crap and we all know it.

On Embedded Clash

I find that I'm evaluating a lot of embedded clash, especially in late outrounds. Here are my thoughts on that: (a) the best thing you can do is give me a real OV that explains the layers; (b) in the absence of strong ink on the flow, I'm open to applying arguments from one sheet to another, even if the overall sheet is a kick; (c) I'm not likely to credit a single-line blip extension as decisive when there are 130 lines on my flow; (d) you can weigh new in the 2N, but don't make new substantive arguments; and (e) I'm strongly disinclined against 1AR theory that basically forces new 2N/2AR responses unless you have a very strong abuse story.

1AR Theory

I'm open, but from a practical perspective, I think you really need to be winning your abuse story since 1AR theory pretty much requires judge intervention since the 2N CIs will be new and the 2AR will be asking me subjectively to evaluate whether they're "good enough." IOW, my threshold for 2N answers is pretty low.

Ks

In terms of my familiarity and preferences: give me post-fiat, topic-specific Ks like cap and set col over incomprehensible generics like Weheliye, Baudrilliard, D&G, etc.. That being said, you do you -- for example, I think the fem killjoy K is 100% true.

Also: chances are virtually 100% that I'm not at all familiar with your literature, and it seems (to me, anyway) that a lot of judges are giving K debaters waaaaaay too much credit for warrants in the underlying lit that are not read/explained in round. I'm not going to do that. This means that if you're exclusively a K-debater, you probably want to pref me lower, to be honest. Be explicit about whether your K is pre- or post-fiat. K vs. K rounds need to be clear about uplayering and internal links if on the same layer.

Disclosure Theory

Update - particularly at TOCs, I think it is important to have good disclosure practices; you all are the debaters that the rest of the community is trying to emulate. Open-sourcing with highlighted cards is the minimum of what I consider "good." I am not a fan of running friv disclo theory against a debater whose practices are, at minimum, "good." I will happily pull the trigger on an RVI on disclo if you've run something appallingly stupid like "must disclose the precise tournament name" against a debater with "good" disclosure practices.

"Don't be shady" applies here, too - don't misdisclose, don't waste your opponent's time before the round and then drop a doc 4 minutes before the round begins, etc.

I will listen to "new 1ACs bad" theory.

Defaults

I will never use a default if an argument is made on the issue, but in the absence of argumentation:

• T > K
• T and Theory are on the same layer; Metatheory uplayers
• Reasonability over competing interps if not specified
• No RVIs (my threshold for warranting this is low, 'I get RVIs' suffices)
• Drop the arg on theory, drop the debater on topicality
• Presume NEG
• Affirming is harder because duh, 1AR
• Neg gets 1 Condo advocacy
• PICs must be uncondo
• Weigh case against K

Speaks

I default to a 28.7-ish. I give 30s whenever the debater a) doesn't make any obvious technical or analytical mistakes and b) does at least one really cool/clever analytical thing, so, you know, reasonably often. Oh, I also give 30s when a tech-heavy debater adapts out of courtesy to a lay opponent. The only thing that will get me to tank your speaks is if you're bullying/obnoxious/abusive in the round.

IF YOU STILL DON'T KNOW, ASK! I'm happy to answer any questions about my paradigm before the round. I love LD, and I try to make it so that debaters enjoy debating in front of me.