//shree

I am a social studies & math teacher who is no longer involved in full-time argument coaching. I am judging this tournament because my wife, a mentor, or a former student asked me to.

I previously served as a DOD at the high school level and as a hired gun for college debate programs. During this time, I had the privilege of working with Baker Award recipients, TOC champions in CX, a NFA champion in LD, and multiple NDT First-Round teams; I was very much ‘in the cards.’ Debate used to be everything to me, and I fancied myself as a ‘lifer.’ I held the naïve view that this activity was the pinnacle of critical thinking and unequivocally produced the best and brightest scholars compared to any other curricular or extracurricular pursuit.

My perspective has shifted since I’ve reduced my competitive involvement with the community. Debate has provided me with some incredible mentors, colleagues, and friends that I would trade for nothing. However, several of the practices prevalent in modern debate risk making the activity an academically unserious echo chamber. Many in the community have traded in flowing for rehearsing scripts, critical thinking for virtue signaling, adjudication for idol worship, and research for empty posturing. I can’t pretend that I wasn’t guilty of adopting or teaching some of the trendy practices that are rapidly devolving the activity, but I am no longer willing to keep up the charade that what we do here is pedagogically sound.

This ‘get off my lawn’ ethos colors some of my idiosyncrasies if you have me in the back of the room. Here are guidelines to maximize your speaker points and win percentage:

1 – Flow. Number arguments. Answer arguments in the order that they were presented. Minimize overviews.

2 – Actually research. Most of you don’t, and it shows. Know what you are talking about and be able to use the vocabulary of your opponents. Weave theory with examples. Read a book. Being confidently clueless or dodgy in CX is annoying, not compelling.

3 – Please try. Read cards from this year when possible; be on the cutting edge. Say new and interesting things, even if they’re about old or core concepts. Adapt your arguments to make them more ‘you.’ Reading cards from before 2020 or regurgitating my old blocks will bore me.

4 – Emphasize clarity. This applies to both your thoughts and speaking. When I return, my topic knowledge will be superficial, and I will be out of practice with listening to the fastest speakers. Easy-to-transcribe soundbytes, emphasis in sentences, and pen time is a must. I cannot transcribe bots who shotgun 3-word arguments at 400wpm nor wannabe philosopher-activists who speak in delirious, winding paragraphs.

5 – Beautify your speech docs. Inconsistent, poor formatting is an eyesore. So is word salad highlighting without the semblance of sentence structure.

6 – No dumpster fires. Ad hominem is a logical fallacy. I find unnecessarily escalating CX, heckling opponents, zoom insults, authenticity tests, and screenshot insertions uncompelling. I neither have the resources nor interest in launching an investigation about outside behavior, coach indiscretions, or pref sheets.

7 – Don’t proliferate trivial voting issues. I will evaluate a well-evidenced topicality violation; conditionality can be a VI; in-round harassment and slurs are not trivial. However, I have a higher threshold than most with regards to voting issues surrounding an author’s twitter beef, poorly warranted specification arguments, trigger warnings, and abominations I classify as ‘LD tricks.’ If you are on the fence about whether your procedural or gateway issue is trivial, it probably is; unless it’s been dropped in multiple speeches, my preferred remedy is to reject the argument, not the team. Depending on how deranged it is, I may just ignore it completely. I strongly prefer substantive debates.

8 – Be well rounded. The divide between ‘policy,’ ‘critical,’ and ‘performance’ debate is artificial. Pick options that are strategic and specific to the arguments your opponents are reading.

9 – Not everything is a ‘DA.’ Topicality standards are not ‘DAs.’ Critique links are not ‘DAs’ and the alternative is not a ‘CP.’ A disadvantage requires, at a minimum, uniqueness, a link, and an impact. Describing your arguments as ‘DAs’ when they are not will do you a disservice, both in terms of your strategy and your speaker points.

10 – I’m old. I won’t know who you are, and frankly, I don’t care. Good debaters can give bad speeches, and the reverse can also be true. Rep has no correlation to the speaker points you will receive. 28.5 is average. 29 is solid. 29.5 is exceptional. 30 means you’ve restored my belief in the pedagogical value of policy debate.

I spent thirteen seasons solely working in policy. I have spent the last five seasons working in public forum. In addition to coaching and judging, I served as the Tournament Director for the NYCUDL, the Vice President for Policy Debate for the BQCFL, part of tab staff for NYSFLs, NYSDCAs, the New York City Invitational, and the Westchester Invitational, and in the residence halls for DDI.

What this means for PF debaters is that I am very flow-centric and expect good sign posts. If you give me a road map, I expect you to follow it. While I understand that you will not read evidence in-round, I do expect you to clearly cite your evidence and will listen to (and reward) good analysis of evidence throughout the round.

What this means for policy debaters is that I typically spend more time running tournaments than judging in them. My flowing skills are not what they used to be. You need to SLOW DOWN for your tags and authors or else they will not make my flow. You should also SLOW DOWN for the actual claims on any theory or analytic arguments (Treat them like cards!). My flow is sacred to me, if you want me to vote for you, your flow should look like mine. Lay it out for me like I am a three year-old.

As for arguments, I consider myself a stock-issues judge. Those are what I coach my novices, and I still feel they are the best arguments in policy debate. That said, I have voted on all types of arguments and performance styles in debate. If you want me to vote on something that is not a stock issue, you better explain it to me like I am a three year-old. Even if you want me to vote on a stock issue, you should explain it to me like I am a three year-old.

I do not typically ask for (or want to) examine evidence after the round. It is your job to explain it to me. There is no need to add me to an email chain. That said, if there is some contention about what a piece of evidence actually says, you should make a point of that in your speeches.

As for paperless debate in general, I like my rounds to start on time and end on time. If your technical issues are hindering that, I will start running prep. I will do my best to accommodate debaters, but you need to know your tech at least as well as you know your arguments.

Noah Cramer

Background:
Dartmouth '16 (Debated for 12-13 and 13-14 seasons.)
OPRF '12

General Thoughts:

--I have not yet judged on the criminal justice reform topic. I like to think of myself as decently knowledgeable about current events, the government, and classic debate arguments, but I don't have a strong sense of how the topic has developed.

-- I'm also new to Zoom debate, so bear with me if I have technical difficulties.

--Debate the way that makes you love the activity! The round is about you, not me!
--I ran more kritiks in high school and more policy in college. I am happy to judge either.

--Clarity is good, even at the cost of some speed. I imagine this rule will be especially true in Zoom debates.
--Impact framing is especially important in almost every debate.
--I love smart concessions and cross-apps.
--I won't kick a counterplan/alt for you unless you tell me why I should.
--No one's objective, but I'll strive to not intervene.
--All of my predispositions are flexible. I'm happy to go against nearly any of my predispositions if you can convince me that I should.

Disads
--An aff that points out flaws in the disad well will be very persuasive. That might be especially true for politics. That said, if an aff doesn't do that, I won't do it for them.
--I think the value of "turns case" arguments often hinge on how well you win the parts of your DA that lead up to those turns case arguments. "Econ turns heg" isn't a kill shot if the neg doesn't win a decent risk that the plan collapses the economy.

CP's
--Good perm work/theory against process-type counterplans is awesome.
--I like well-explained CP links to DA arguments a lot.
--Debaters sometimes forget how important it is to explain what the CP does and how it is different from the aff. Investing the time to do that definitely pays off.
--Smart and competitive uniqueness CP's are awesome.

The K
--Both aff and neg teams should remember that the aff exists.
--There is little in debate as entertaining as good link debate, and good link debating makes the other parts of the k easy.
--Both teams: Know what the k is saying. It's just another argument. I won't be mad if you spend cross-x sorting out what your opponent's k is saying if you are not sure.
--I'll like well-explained appeals to empirics by both sides. Stats are cool.

K Tricks
--I tend to see "role of the ballot" as just a glorified way of saying "our impacts outweigh." But by all means, if you can make a role of the ballot argument and explain it well as something else, more power to you.
--I wish most debates would go a level deeper in explaining their k "tricks." Asserting "they dropped root cause" in the 2nr does not get you as far as a nuanced explanation of how the k's impacts are the root cause of the affirmative's impacts.
--Similarly, you should explain what your K trick means for how I evaluate the debate. Saying "they dropped epistemology first" is about a million times more useful if you explain how that framework determines how I should view the aff, the alternative, and the perm.
--I guess the tl;dr of this is that K tricks are fine, but you still need to explain what they mean and why they matter!

Topicality
--Limits is usually a better argument than ground.
--I think reasonability makes a lot of sense, but absent any discussion of how to evaluate T debates, I'll evaluate the debate through competing interpretations.
--If the aff wins reasonability, it's not an auto-win. It's up to both teams to convince me whether or not the aff's interpretation is "reasonable."

No-Plan Text Affirmatives
--I am open to the idea that positions in these debates should have different standards of competition/mutual exclusivity than they would in a more traditional style of debate. Often times, the affirmative's own claims on framework can help you win this argument.
--I can be persuaded either way on framework/T debates. I do not think framework is an inherently better or worse strategy than anything else and won't be disappointed if you decide it is the way you want to respond to an aff. Similarly, I won't be disappointed if your choice is to not read a plan.
--In these debates, ground arguments can be more persuasive than they are in a more conventional T debate.
--I think, for the aff, it's often a good call to present a coherent vision of what the negative's role should be and what the judge is endorsing by voting affirmative. For the negative, point out that if they've failed to do those things.

K-Aff's With a Plan
--I ran these in high school. They seem to have gone the way of the dinosaur, for the most part, but they will always hold a special place in my heart.
--If you are reading one and reading it well, I'll like it a lot!

Theory
--Theory is a great strategy against a lot of counterplans. Don't be afraid to go all in on it if you think you can win it.
--I enjoy condo debates. Your speaks will not suffer at all if you choose to make theory your 2ar strategy.

Overview

Email: jhalldallas@gmail.com 

Debated 4 years at Jesuit College Prep, currently debating as a freshman at Dartmouth

As a 2A I have read affs with and without plans; as a 2N I have read policy and critical strategies. 

I'll probably know something about whatever you read so I guess I'll insert the "read whatever you want" line here. However, I do not have much experience with this high school topic; therefore I will value good explanation. Don't assume I've already heard the topic DAs debated 20 times each. 

Argument Preferences

Judges who say they don't have preferences are lying. However, regardless about how I feel about an argument (unless it's obviously offensive), I will always try to vote for the team that does the better debating. This means that tech (line by line, clash, etc) is important. Truth is always good but if you are getting crushed on the line by line you probably won't win. 

Planless affs: Make sure you explain your stuff, especially how I should be evaluating the round.
T-USFG/Framework: I think T (an argument about limits) is better than framework. The aff should have a counter-interpretation that sets some sort of limit on the size of the topic. From my experience most counter-interpretations aren't very good. I find myself more persuaded by fairness arguments than most people. Please have a terminal impact in the 2NR. If you are at all familiar with John Turner's beliefs about this argument, you will roughly know my views. Thinking back on judging, I have probably voted more for the aff in these debates than the neg. But a good 2NR on T is great (but rare) speech to hear.

Theory:
CP Theory: I'm very persuaded when the CP has a solvency advocate/grounding in the literature because that allows the negative to access topic education/lit checks arguments that I think are super good. Without these arguments the neg is in a tough place when reading CPs the "community" agrees are "sketchy" (consult, process, etc.). Conditionality: I'm cooler with contradictions than most people; the aff should use these strategically more often. Neg flex is a thing. 

Kritiks
Specificity is key - historical examples good.
Good k debate is good case debate.
Prioritize explanation over evidence in the block.
I don't like vagueness very much - make sure 1NC cx/block make it very clear what the alt does.

Things I Like:
Organization, clarity, examples, and using cx well. Making my flow nice, being smart (know what you're talking about), and making me laugh.
Impact calculus. You want to be writing my ballot in your final rebuttals.
Bold strategic decisions. Power moves will be rewarded.
Good case debate.
Limits.
Devasting CX questions.
Being nice.
Jokes about Dartmouth Debate(rs).

Things I don't like:
Long overviews. Everything that can be on the line by line should be.
Stealing prep.
When people don't tell me what they mean by reasonability.
Judge kicking without an argument for why I should.
Lack of clarity.
Underhighlighting.

Assistant Director of Speech and Debate at Presentation High School and Public Admin phd student. I debated policy, traditional ld and pfd in high school (4 years) and in college at KU (5 years). Since 2015 I've been assistant coaching debate at KU. Before and during that time I've also been coaching high school (policy primarily) at local and nationally competitive programs.

Familiar with wide variety of critical literature and philosophy and public policy and political theory. Coached a swath of debaters centering critical argumentation and policy research. Judge a reasonable amount of debates in college/hs and usually worked at some camp/begun research on both topics in the summer. That said please don't assume I know your specific thing. Explain acronyms, nuance and important distinctions for your AFF and NEG arguments.

The flow matters. Tech and Truth matter. I obvi will read cards but your spin is way more important.

I think that affs should be topical. What "TOPICAL" means is determined by the debate. I think it's important for people to innovate and find new and creative ways to interpret the topic. I think that the topic is an important stasis that aff's should engage. I default to competing interpretations - meaning that you are better off reading some kind of counter interpretation (of terms, debate, whatever) than not.

I think Aff's should advocate doing something - like a plan or advocacy text is nice but not necessary - but I am of the mind that affirmative's should depart from the status quo.

Framework is fine. Please impact out your links though and please don't leave me to wade through the offense both teams are winning in that world.

I will vote on theory. I think severance is prolly bad. I typically think conditionality is good for the negative. K's are not cheating (hope noone says that anymore). PICS are good but also maybe not all kinds of PICS so that could be a thing.

I think competition is good. Plan plus debate sucks. I default that comparing two things of which is better depends on an opportunity cost. I am open to teams forwarding an alternative model of competition.

Disads are dope. Link spin can often be more important than the link cards. But
you need a link. I feel like that's agreed upon but you know I'm gone say it anyway.

Just a Kansas girl who loves a good case debate. but seriously, offensive and defensive case args can go a long way with me and generally boosters other parts of the off case strategy.

When extending the K please apply the links to the aff. State links are basic but for some reason really poorly answered a lot of the time so I mean I get it. Links to the mechanism and advantages are spicier. I think that if you're reading a K with an alternative that it should be clear what that alternative does or does not do, solves or turns by the end of the block. I'm sympathetic to predictable 1ar cross applications in a world of a poorly explained alternatives. External offense is nice, please have some.

I acknowledge debate is a public event. I also acknowledge the concerns and material implications of some folks in some spaces as well. I will not be enforcing any recording standards or policing teams to debate "x" way. I want debaters at in all divisions, of all argument proclivities to debate to their best ability, forward their best strategy and answers and do what you do.

Card clipping and cheating is not okay so please don't do it.
NEW YEAR NEW POINT SYSTEM (college) - 28.6-28.9 good, 28.9-29.4 really good, 29.4+ bestest.

This trend of paraphrasing cards in PFD as if you read the whole card = not okay and educationally suspect imo.

Middle/High Schoolers: You smart. You loyal. I appreciate you. And I appreciate you being reasonable to one another in the debate.

I wanna be on the chain: jyleesahampton@gmail.com

email chain: hillweld32@gmail.com
tl;dr - an argument is a claim+warrant+impact, do your thing and I'll evaluate the debate accordingly

I have debated (and listened to) some of the fastest debaters in the country, and I'm pretty comfortable flowing them. But unless you have the ability to be just as clear as they are, don't sacrifice your clarity to read 50 cards in your 1AC at a nice high pitched humming sound that no one understands. I'll give you two warnings if you're not being clear. Keep your speeches organized, line by line and signposting are important.

T - I default to competing interpretations unless told otherwise, and you should impact out why your model for evaluating topicality is good. The same goes for the competing interpretations debate; it's not good enough to say that your interpretation has better/different limits than theirs, I want to know why that's important.

Disads - they're cool. I prefer specific links (specific disads are even better) rather than generic ones, and it will also make your life easier. Impact calculus is very important, but you also have to make sure you win the internal link chain to get you to the impact in the first place. I'll default to utilitarianism (whatever you tell me it means) unless told otherwise but am quite open to other frameworks for evaluating the impact debate.

Counterplans - PICs are cool, case-specific CPs are cool. It's important that you're actually competitive and that you're not placing an unfair burden (whatever that means) on the affirmative.

Theory - Use it strategically, and if one team is clearly making the debate unfair and you can impact out why I should actually care about it, that's when you'll win your theory debate.

Kritiks - Do your thing. Explain the link (ideally it's specific or at least articulated in the context of the aff) and impact it out. Even if your alternative is to reject the team I need to know why I should endorse it as a method to combat whatever impact you present. This is what I've spent the most time thinking about, but I wont be doing any extra work for you.

Framework - I really enjoy K debates but this includes a defense of your framework for the round, whether it's a question of alt solvency or state engagement or whatever, impact it out.

K Affs/Planless Affs - The same way it is with everything else, explain your argument and why I should care about it. I'm open to critiques of engagement practices, the resolution, the debate community, or whatever else you can come up with.

Framework v. K Affs - I'll default to competing interpretations, but the same stuff I said about topicality applies here. These debates will most likely include some question about the pedagogical value of the 1AC and I think that a good explanation of why they create better education (or don't) can be extremely strategic for the aff. Similarly, a role of the ballot is an impact framing argument, the 2NR/2AR isn't going to be able to win on "they dropped the role of the ballot." If you win your impact framing, do your impact calculus.

I will actively listen and work hard to develop my understanding of your arguments as the debate progresses regardless of whether or not I am familiar with your style of debating or type of argument.

Sean Kennedy - Debated at: University of Kansas

Director of Debate at USC

In general I would prefer to judge based upon the perspective presented by the debaters in the debate. Framing issues are very important to me, and I think debaters should make it clear what they believe those issues are through tone, organization, or explicit labeling (ie "this is a framing issue for the debate" or some similar phrase). Embedded clash is fine, but I think that concept carries some limitations - there is only so far that I am willing to stretch my reading of a (negative/affirmative) argument on X page/part of the flow, that does not reference Y (affirmative/negative) argument on another page/part of the flow. Some of my more difficult decisions have revolved around this point, so to avoid any ambiguity debaters should be explicit about how they want arguments to be read within the debate, especially if they intend a particular argument to be direct refutation to a specific opponent argument.

Beyond that I will try to keep as open a mind about arguments as possible - I have enjoyed initiating and responding to a diverse set of arguments during my time as a debater, and I have had both good and bad experiences everywhere across the spectrum, so I think as a judge I am unlikely to decide debates based on my personal feelings about content/style of argument than the quality of execution and in-round performance.

As a caveat to that - I do think that the affirmative has an obligation to respond to the resolution, though I think whether that means/requires a plan, no plan, resolution as a metaphor, etc is up for debate. However, I am generally, although certainly not always, persuaded by arguments that the affirmative should have a plan.

I am also willing to believe that there is zero risk or close enough to zero risk of link/impact arguments to vote on defense, should the debate appear to resolve the issue that strongly.

Whether or not I kick a counterplan/alt for the 2nr (what some people call "judge conditionality" or "judge kick") depends on what happens in the debate. I will always favor an explicit argument made by either team on that score over some presumption on my part. I have similar feelings about presumption when there is a counterplan/alt. The reason for this is that although there may be logical reasons for kicking advocacies or evaluating presumption in a certain light, I think that debate as a pedagogical activity is best when it forces debaters to make their choices explicit, rather than forcing the judge to read into a choice that was NOT made or requiring that both teams and the judge have an unspoken agreement about what the logical terms for the debate were (this is probably more obvious and necessary in some cases, ie not being able to answer your own arguments, than I think it is in the case of advocacies).

Please be kind to your competitors and treat their arguments with respect - you don't know where they come from or what their arguments mean to them, and I think this community can only work if we value basic decency towards others as much as much as we do argumentative prowess. In that vein, jokes are good, but I'm certainly much less amused by personal attacks and derision than I am by dry humor or cheekiness.

About Me:

New Trier ‘16

Dartmouth ‘20

wwardkirby@gmail.com, add me to the email chain

Please keep in mind I am not very actively involved in the high school debate topic, and while I have judged at a couple of tournaments and have been involved in argument discussion with New Trier, I might have a slightly higher threshold for which claims require evidence than other judges.

I am not actively involved in college debate, but study Environmental Science and International Relations in college. For climate-based debates, this means I am going to be incredibly unpersuaded by environment impact defense, as well as extremely skeptical of any internal links that claim to solve the coming environmental catastrophe. For IR debates, I will reward teams that can explain holistic theories of state behavior and how that implicates their position in the debate, instead of taking ad hoc approaches depending on what flow they're on.

Non-Negotiable Beliefs:

The following predispositions I have are basically uncontestable within a round, and if you disagree, feel free to strike me

Death/Sexism/Racism/Heteronormativity are all bad

Disclosure is good, and failure to correctly disclose previously read positions is considered cheating, and is a loss (of course, these debates can be impossible to evaluate as I am unable to evaluate things that occur outside of the round itself)

Line-by-line is good, and if you choose to ignore any sort of organizational structure to your speeches I won’t feel bad if I miss something

I reserve the right to vote down any argument that I don’t understand, and don’t feel obligated to read through all of your evidence to piece together what wasn’t sufficiently explained in the debate—if you rely on replacing explanation with jargon, proceed at your own peril

I have recently realized that I am growing more and more frustrated with hiding deliberately bad arguments with the hope opponents drop them. If you are willing to advance an argument in order to win the debate, it shouldn't be one 15-second undertagged card in the 2NC on the K that suddenly turns into death not real, or a three-second ASPEC shell in the 1NR on the perm, or C/I only our aff hidden in the middle of some other standards on T. I by no means want to disincentivize proper flowing and clash, but this shouldn't come at the expense of making strategic, well-reasoned arguments.

If you seem to not care about your debate, then I will care a lot less about judging you—as long as you are invested in the debate for two hours, I will do my best to match or exceed that level of commitment

Kritiks:

My feelings about judging the K are directly related to the level of responsiveness to the 1AC—as long as your links are explained in terms of the action the 1AC takes/the assumptions that their specific authors make/the language in the 1AC evidence I’m perfectly content—I am much less persuaded by Ks that criticize structures that undergird the 1AC without explaining how the aff furthers the harms of that system. This also applies to being aff against the K, where I would hold the same burden of specificity—teams need to be much better at using the specifics of their case to make nuanced permutations, no link arguments, etc. etc.

If your K is based in any form of postmodernism, ESPECIALLY the aff’s relationship to death, you’re fighting an uphill battle. If you want to make the debate as difficult for yourself to win as possible, go for the fiat double-bind.

K Affs:

I’d prefer you read a plan. Having done a decent amount of work on “soft-left” (an imperfect term) affirmatives, I am very sympathetic to smart impact framing and feel no problem at all assigning zero risk to nonsensical DAs. I am much less sympathetic to affirmatives that don’t read plans, and VERY unsympathetic to affirmatives that don’t defend at least some interpretation of what a topical aff looks like (also, wtf does it mean to be "in the direction of the topic"). I’m not immovable on these questions by any means, as there are large portions of common negative framework arguments that are either nonsensical (looking at you, decision-making impact), or just regularly executed poorly. That being said, when two teams of equal skills execute both sides of the debate with similar quality, I would be surprised to find myself voting affirmative.

CPs:

Overly vague plan texts not only annoy me, but will make me lean negative on almost every theoretical question, especially counterplan competition. I love specific PICs (with solvency advocates) and affirmative attempts to avoid those debates are upsetting, to say the least. I’m somewhat neutral about International or State counterplans, but am more neg-leaning when the topic is large enough to be considered unmanageable. I lean aff on most Process CPs, but find that aff teams rarely execute in these theoretical debates.

As for judge kick, I’ll default to it, but will be very frustrated if the debate comes down to whether or not I had to kick the counterplan for the 2NR with ZERO discussion of whether or not that’s theoretically legitimate in a debate. I don’t think it’s a particularly uphill battle to win that judge kick is bad, but would strongly prefer the argumentation over that question to begin prior to the final rebuttals.

Conditionality:

The word “interpretation” matters to me quite a bit in theory debates, and I am often unconvinced that there is a large strategic difference between dispositionality and conditionality, so 2As need to be careful that their interpretation solves their own offense.

Like many judges, I’d prefer not to have to judge a theory debate, but understand the necessity of it. Aff teams will fare best when the language of the 2AR is clearly rooted in previous aff speeches. I will do my best to protect the 2NR, particularly when the 1AR fails to make an adequate investment in the argument, but am less sympathetic to the 2NR when it is clear the aff team wants to go for conditionality.

Topicality:

I am a good judge for the negative on topicality, provided the negative can win a clear violation (if I have to decide a debate based a we meet claim that neither side has fleshed out at all, I'm going to be upset). For me, we meet is largely a yes/no question, I've never understood how there could be a "risk" that you either do or don't meet. I am not a fan when people reduce limits to “number of affs under both interpretations”, and then arbitrarily argue whether or not their arbitrary number of affs is better or worse. T debates are best when they are specific and discuss specific affirmative and negative grounds and impact those arguments out. Reasonability, when articulated as “good is good enough” makes negative sense to me.

DAs/Case:

Nothing really novel here. Turns case is obviously super important. Uniqueness controls the direction of the link/link controls uniqueness arguments are incoherent at best. Zero risk (or, more accurately, low enough risk so as to be statistically insignificant) is most definitely a thing, and nothing frustrated me more as a debater when judges arbitrarily assigning risk to an advantage or DA when a defensive argument was decisively won. Terrible internal link chains that can be defeated with simple analytics are rarely made, please be the one to change that.

Speaker Points:

My goal is to reward teams that are kind, invested in the activity, clear (I cannot emphasize this enough, please, please, please be clear) and demonstrate specific research and content knowledge. Cross-x is an excellent opportunity to increase your points, and defaulting to your partner on every question is a excellent way to decrease your points.

I've realized I might be a little behind the curve on speaker point inflation and am trying to adjust accordingly.

If you are unnecessarily rude (and trust me, there is a clear difference between being a little bit overzealous in cross-x and genuinely mean—don’t cross that line), then I won’t feel bad at all for hurting your speaks.

I also tend to assign more low-point wins than most judges, simply because I award speaker points immediately after you have given your last speech, because I believe my process for deciding speaker points should be independent and prior to deciding who won the round. I still don’t give low-point wins very often, but I regularly had at least one per tournament.

Judge Philosophy

Conflicts: UGA, Emory University, and North Broward

Email: Brianklarmandebate@gmail.com - Yes, put me on the thread. No, I won't open all of the docs during the round and will likely ask for a doc of cards I find relevant at the end.

2024 Updates:

I am not a fully time debate coach. I am working with the UGA & North Broward debate teams part time.

I am someone who believes tech > truth. However, I do not look at cards during debates, so if your arguments are not clear by explanation/flowable tags/very clearly read card text, they are not "tech" that is on my flow. My favorite debates involve strategy (think: creative "cross applications," argument that are "good because the other teams can't read their best answers," etc). I enjoy a good theory debate (conditionality, solvency advocate, perms, politics theory arguments, etc.) and I would prefer that debates have some depth by the end of the negative block.

College - Assume I know things about the topic, but have not cut cards on it in the past year. I have had conversations with debaters/coaches and am very familiar with nuclear strategy. My knowledge of the college topic extends to knowing: assurance, deterrence, IR Ks, military process CPs*, and anything that would have been read on the past college exec power/military presence/alliance topics. I have written many iterations of both ICBMs and NFU affs & negs.

*If you are going for a T argument or process CP, keep in mind that I could not tell you the wording of the resolution off of the top of my head, so any arguments related to grammatical construction of the resolution might require you explaining with another sentence or going a bit slower. I am under the impression that the topic is pretty small and the negative ground is pretty good, so make sure to impact your limits (or "functional limits")/ground arguments

High School - I have had very little interaction with the current topic. I cut a number of cards on UBI in the past, but I know very little about the other parts of the topic. I did not teach at a debate camp. I have judged a handful of rounds and they were almost all on capitalism or race Ks. I am under the impression that the "core" negative arguments are some combination of States, Politics, "Redistribution" PICs, and Ks about the economy; I assume that the "core" affirmative arguments are all related to the economy and inequality.

2021 Post-NDT Updates:

(1) "X Outweighs Y" - If the 2NR/2AR does not start with some version of this (or include this elsewhere), I will almost certainly vote the other way. I don't super care how you say it, but if you are unwilling to say that the impact you will win is more important than the impact the other team will win, things aren't going well.

(2) T & Theory - I seem to like them more than everyone else I judge with. Go for conditionality bad! I don't necessarily think it is true but never seem to hear 2NC or 2NR blocks that have great offense or impact calc. After judging on a slew of panels, I realize that I am more likely to be into technical theory & T arguments then others. I also tend to expect complete arguments in the 1NC/2AC/2NC (theory needs warrants, T needs the necessary defense and offense).

(3) Tech > Truth - I feel like I have said this a number of times, but I realized that I think this more than others (or at least more than people that I judge with). A "bad" disad has high risk until/unless answers are made. This also has made me amenable to voting on some not great disads vs. planless affs just on the basis of 2ACs lacking necessary defense.

(4) T vs. Planless affs - I have found that I tend to vote affirmative when something is conceded or answered completely incorrectly. I tend to vote negative when the negative goes for a limits/fairness impact and responds to every argument on the line by line. I tend to find myself confused about the relevance of all arguments that the content of the resolution is either good or bad. I feel like I find my voting record to be like 50/50, but I haven't done the math.

(5) Decision making process - I tend to read less cards then others who I judge with. Not because I am against reading cards, but because I only read evidence to resolve questions in a debate. If you want me to read cards (which you likely do), make them relevant.

(6) Points - At the NDT, my points were about .1-.2 below everyone else on every panel. I plan on upping my points by .1-.2. That said, I don't give great points.

2020-2021 Updates - Online Judging: Judging online is difficult - a few implications:

(1) Ask if I am in the room / paying attention before you start speaking. Non-negotiable. "Brian, are you ready?" or "Klarman, are you here?" or anything that requires me to respond. I will give you a thumbs up or say yes (or I am not in the room and you shouldn't start).

(2) Clarity matters more - I don't usually follow along in the doc and I am unlikely to read cards from both teams if one team is significantly clearer. On a related note, organization and numbering can help a lot with clarity because it tells me what arguments to expect.

(3) Technology skills matter - Emails should be sent out on time. If you are taking "no prep" for the 2AC, 1NR, etc. I assume that means the doc is sent and we are ready to go. I get that tech issues happen, but unnecessary tech time hurts decision time and makes concentration harder.

(4) Interesting arguments help keep attention and boosts points - I am really trying to flow and get everything down. I flow CX. I line up arguments. I am more aggressive than most about the flow. That being said, staring at the computer for the 3rd or 4th round of the day is very difficult. I will do my best. I find flowing very important because it lets the debaters do the debating instead of me deciding what I like. That said, online it is taking me a little more energy to focus. I've found when I hear arguments that I either haven't judged before, things I haven't blocked out, or even a new explanation, I tend to think the debate is more interesting which helps points & engagement. I really do love debate, so if you are excited, I will be too. On the other side, if this is the 9th time i am hearing the same school read the same block (and this could be Politics, T, Fairness bad, Deterrence or a K) with no emphasis at the same tournament, its hard to focus.

(5) Internet issues - they happen, I get it. They might happen to you, they might happen to me. I've heard best practice is to have some backup of yourself speaking in case this occurs. If the tournament has rules, follow those. Otherwise I will likely just ask tab what to do if this happens. I'm open to other ideas of how to deal with it. Please please please have one (or all) debaters look to make sure the judge hasn't gotten booted from the room.

2020-2021 Updates - Other:

(1) Points - I think my points average around 28.5. I usually don't go under 28 unless something has gone wrong. If you get a 29.3 or 29.4 that is very good. I'm willing to go above that, but mostly when I hear something and am like "wow, that was memorable. I am going to try to tell people who I coach/teach in lab/judge to do things like this in the future."

(2) I often decide debates by (1) determining what I need to decide (2) looking through my flow for if it is resolved and then (3) reading cards if necessary. I'm unlikely to read a card (for the decision) to figure out something that the debaters never made clear. That said, I am happy to talk about some card or look through your evidence to give advice after the debate if you want - I tend to think debate is collaborative and we should all make each other better.

(3) I miss theory debates - this is the thing I have thought the most about, this is how I debated, and I just think its fun. I don't like "pointless" theory, but if you can convince me that something is the debate in the literature and predictable - from process CPs to T arguments to even spec arguments - I'm happy to hear it. That said, if you make your theory argument intentionally blippy ("ASPEC, they didnt, its a voter") I won't care.

I also left my old paradigm up here, but I think it mostly says: I did more "DA/CP/T" stuff than "K" stuff, I am familiar with "K" literature about race/gender/biopower/cultural studies, I like specific strategies, good case debating always impresses me, and I am very particular about the flow.

Old Stuff:

Preferences: I don't really care about what argument you make. I tend to think bad arguments will lose. The debate things I think about the most are counterplans and topicality arguments. That being said, I cut everything and coach everything. I feel like I mostly judge K debates where no one agrees about anything at this point. In those, I generally am familiar with that set of arguments (I am completing my MA in cultural studies, focusing on questions of race & gender) but not how to fit them into a debate. I tend to be very comfortable with how DAs, CPs, T arguments, and case fit into debate, but I tend to do weird research so I might not know what all the technical stuff of the CP is. That also means that the purpose of a K argument (or answer to the purpose) might require more explanation than the purpose of another argument. The things I think you actually need to know about me are below. I tried to lay out what I do in most debates while they are happening and afterwords and be as honest as possible.

Flowing: I will try to flow every argument in the debate. I expect that debaters will be doing the same thing. I could not possibly care less what the speech doc says or if you are "skipping a card" in the doc (that being said, I would like to be on the chain because I like glancing at cards after debates & trying to learn more about the topic/have informed discussions after the debates; also if you are doing some super annoying thing in the doc just to mess with the other team, I will likely be upset at you when I realize that in the post round/give points). When I flow speeches that set up argument structure (1nc on case, 2ac on off case), I will attempt to number the speech and will give higher speaker points to 1ns and 2as who set up that structure themselves (as well as be able to better understand their arguments; the 1nc that makes 4 analytics in a row without numbering is basically unflowable which means when the 2ac drops something I won't care). In subsequent speeches, I will go by the order of those numbers and will attempt to find what you are answering before I flow what you say. This means that if the 2nc starts on 2ac 4, I will mostly likely miss the first few arguments trying to figure out where to flow it (unless they say "2ac 4 - X - here's our answer" which would just be easily flowable but I might be confused about why the 2nc started on 2ac 4). If the 2nc starts on 2ac 1, I will not have an issue flowing. If the negative block (or 1ar) decides that the order is irrelevant, I am likely to be very grumpy; it is hard to vote on technical concessions or other things if the flow gets ruined and it makes it hard to tell a 1ar "you dropped X" when the block does not answer 2ac arguments. In addition to initial numbering, I will be able to better understand later speeches if you give me some idea (probably by number or argument) where the thing you are extending is on my flow. If you would like to only extend an impact turn or thumper or some no internal link argument in the 1ar that is 2ac 9 on my flow but don't tell me that you are starting at 2ac 9, it is going to take me a minute to find it on my flow. If, however, the 1ar goes to a flow and says "2ac 9 - they dropped X - here's what it is and why it matters" I will be able to immediately find it on my flow (it is easier to find numbers than exact arguments on a flow).

CX: I love CX. It is maybe my favorite "speech." I often try to flow it or take some notes at the least. That means you should pick words carefully in CX. I will especially try to write down anything about the advocacy and frameworks for evaluating debates (meaning metrics for thinking about things, which is not always how debate uses the word). CX can be fun even when teams get heated, but when CX is just people yelling at people and it is clear that people are more upset than enjoying things, I tend to lose interest. I like when people answering questions are honest, explain things, etc. I sometimes have the docs open and if we are having a fight about some card, I will look at it. I am not yet entirely comfortable with this, but if I miss the answer to a question, I may re-ask for the answer after the timer (I will do this with things like status or clarification, I don't think I will with other things yet but I might). I am also not comfortable interrupting CX to say things, but if someone is intentionally saying something that isn't true to answer clarification questions or refusing to answer clarification questions I may do so. If I make any definitive judgement about these things, I will try to update my philosophy again.

Look at me: I do not have a good poker face. I'd recommend looking for expression or other gestures. When I cannot flow people, I tend to look very confused. Same when an argument is bad. When I think an argument has already been explained and/or you are saying things that aren't arguments, I tend to sit there with my pen on my paper waiting for you to say something that needs to be flowed.

How I make a decision: At the end of the debate, I try to figure out what arguments are going to decide the debate (there tend to be 1-3), parse those out, and figure out what happens from there. It is generally better if debaters tell me what those things will be either on the line by line or in an overview (this is the only reason I could really imagine having an overview unless it is to explain some super complicated thing). I tend to think the best speeches are the ones that both identify these key points, explain why they win and then what happens if they win those key things. If there is no discussion of key points (either implicit or explicit), it is highly possible that I will try to find a few points that are key and then explain my decision from there (I determined this argument was probably the most important, here's how I evaluated it, here's why it deals with lots of other stuff). Any decision like that just makes me grumpy, especially because it always ends with the judge CX forever about why I decided this way and my answer tends to be "I didn't know how else to decide"

Speaker points: I'm going to be honest, I don't know if I understand this entire speaker point thing. I think my points might be a bit low. I don't plan on just raising them; if you need higher points I get that I might not be the judge for you. At the moment, I don't think that raising points just to raise them is a great idea because it eliminates a lot of range and variation in points that I think signal improvement for debaters and help communicate about the debate. I might revisit this later on if people want. I don't really know what an "average" speech looks like. If I had to try and articulate some made-up scale, it would probably look something like this: if the speech you gave was the best it could have been and/or basically won you the debate, its in the 29.3+ space. If the speech kept things going and helped a bit but not as much as it could, its in the 28.7+ range. If the speech was fine but didn't have much value value, I tend to think its in the 28.2+ range. If the speech wasn't good and didn't help much, it in the 27.5+ area. If the speech is bad, we are in the like 27 or even 26.8+ range. I don't think I've given many points lower than 27 and if I did, something must have gone very wrong. I tend to find most speeches between that 28-29 range. I think I average in the low 28s but I don't really know or care. Only a few speeches have just crushed the debate for me. I tend to have a lot of issue judging debates when I feel that all the speeches were about 28.2s or something and I have to give people different points. I think my default is to make the thing I think the top end or top middle (so if it was 28.2, maybe i'd give 28.3-28 to everyone). That being said, I think I am more willing to use high range in points based on speeches. I am also happy to add points for well used CX, good numbering, clarity of cards and highlighting (like if I can understand all the warrants in the evidence while you are reading), partners who work well together and make each other look good (I think basically every bold move in debate could be characterized by the 2nr/2ar as a big mistake or a big efficiency gain; if you can convince me that the 1ar under-covering the DA was to trick them to go for it, I will likely think the 1ar choice was smart and hence deserves better points, same with other speeches), etc. If people have a better way of doing speaker points, I am happy to talk about it.

Do not: Clip cards, lie, use something out of context, or do anything else unethical. These will result in loss of speaker points or loss of rounds.

**standard operating procedure: 1) yes, if you are using an e-mail chain for speech docs, I would like to be on it: mikaela.malsin@gmail.com. The degree to which I look at them varies wildly depending on the round; I will often check a couple of cards for my own comprehension (because y'all need to slow down) during prep or sometimes during a heated cross-ex, but equally often I don't look at them at all. 2) After the debate, please compile all evidence that *you believe* to be relevant to the decision and e-mail them to me. I will sort through to decide which ones I need to read. A card is relevant if it was read and extended on an issue that was debated in the final rebuttals.

updated pre-Shirley, 2013 

Background: I debated for four years at Emory, completed my M.A. in Communication and coached at Wake Forest, and am now in my 2nd year of the Ph.D. program at Georgia.

global thoughts: I take judging very seriously and try very hard to evaluate only the arguments in a given debate, in isolation from my own beliefs. I'm not sure that I'm always successful. I'm not sure that the reverse is true either.  In the limited number of "clash" debates that I've judged, my decisions have been based on the arguments and not on predispositions based on my training, how I debated, or how my teams debate. 

speaker points: I will use the following scale, which (while obviously arbitrary to some degree)  I think is pretty consistent with how I've assigned points in the past and what I believe to represent the role of speaker points in debate. I have never assigned points based on whether I think a team "should clear" or "deserves a speaker award" because I don't judge the rest of the field in order to make that determination, I judge this particular debate. EDIT: I think the scale published for the Shirley is very close to what I was thinking here.

Below 27.5: The speaker has demonstrated a lack of  basic communication. 

27.5-27.9: The speaker demonstrates basic debate competency and argumentation skills. Some areas need substantial improvement.

28.0-28.4: The speaker demonstrates basic argumentation skills and a good grasp on the issues of importance in the debate. Usually shows 1-2 moments of strong strategic insight or macro-level debate vision, but not consistently. 

28.5-28.9: Very solid argumentative skills, grasps the important issues in the debate, demonstrates consistent strategic insight.

29-29.5: Remarkable argumentative skills, understands and synthesizes the key issues in the debate, outstanding use of cross-ex and/or humor.

29.6-29.9: The speaker stands out as exceptionally skilled in all of the above areas.

30: Perfection.

Critical arguments: My familiarity is greater than it used to be but by no means exhaustive.  I think  that the "checklist" probably matters on both sides.

Topicality: I believe in "competing interpretations" with the caveat that I think if the aff can win sufficient defense and a fair vision of the topic (whether or not it is couched in an explicit C/I of every word), they can still win. In other words: the neg should win not only a big link, but also a big impact. 

CP’s: Yes. The status quo is always a logical option, which means the CP can still go away after the round. (Edit: I am willing to stick the negative with the CP if the aff articulates, and the neg fails to overcome, a reason why.) Presumption is toward less change from the status quo. 

DA’s: Big fan. At the moment, I probably find myself slightly more in the “link first” camp, but uniqueness is certainly still important. There CAN be zero risk of an argument, but it is rare. More often, the risk is reduced to something negligible that fails to outweigh the other team's offense (edit: this last sentence probably belongs in the all-time "most obvious statements" Judge Philosophy Hall of Fame). 

Theory: RANT is the default. Probably neg-leaning on most issues, but I do think that we as a community may be letting the situation get a little out of control in terms of the numbers and certain types of CP’s. I think literature should guide what we find to be legitimate to the extent that that is both possible and beneficial. 

Good for speaker points: Strategic use of cross-examination, evidence of hard work, jokes about Kirk Gibson (edit: these must be funny) 

Bad for speaker points: Rudeness, lack of clarity, egregious facial hair.

Experience

Dartmouth 20', Lexington 16', debated policy 4 years at each.

Rounds judged on Antitrust: 0, Cards Cut: 0.

duncan.s.mccallum@gmail.com on the chain please.

he/him/his

General

Policy argument background. I try hard to evaluate debates objectively and be content neutral. I consider myself fairly well read and interested in many subjects. Therefore my process of evaluation, rather than my comprehension, of your arguments is more likely to be impacted by my background and biases.

I find myself to be less interventionist than the average judge. I am willing to take the implications of "bad" arguments at face value until disproven.

Strong preference for well researched strategies and evidently knowledgeable debaters. The closer arguments are to the "literature"/academia the happier I am.

Kritiks

Enjoy good versions of these debates, strongly dislike bad ones. The difference between the two is specificity.

Unwarranted overviews and explanation do not get very far with me.

Good K debating is good case debating. Aff inclusive kritiks are underrated.

Planless affs

Struggle the most with comparing impacts. Neg leaning on kritik competition. Generally frustrated with trend towards proliferation of 1ACs which are 6-7 minutes of T preempts. I'm quite receptive to strategies meant to exploit resulting inconsistencies.

T-USFG: I believe that there is too much ground (not too little) under aff interpretations. This means limits and procedural fairness are compelling arguments. Affirmative turns are compelling and should be mitigated by case debating. Strategies premised around interesting counter-interpretations are compelling but rare. Most counter-interpretations provide little defense. Topicality is a better argument than framework. TVAs are rarely necessary as I seldom find the exact content of the 1AC uniquely important. See: Turner, John.

Topicality (v plan)

I enjoy thinking about topicality. A strong interpretation must be a predictable limit. Neg ground standards are not persuasive. Overlimiting interpretations are rare. Arbitrary interpretations are common. 2As do with that as you will. I favor arguments backed by good cards. Lean towards competing interpretations.

Very willing to vote on specification arguments.

Disads

More receptive than most to smart analytics. Zero risk is a unicorn. Low risk strongly mitigates impact comparison and implication. But, that stuff is still very important when done concisely. Most turns case and impact calc arguments require only a couple seconds to defeat.

Average judge for politics DAs.

CPs/Theory

The stronger the grounding of the CP in topic literature the more theoretically legitimate it tends to be.

Very receptive to theory arguments excluding multi-actor fiat, not-a-policy fiat, and uniform-50-state fiat.

'Reject the argument not the team' is persuasive in most instances. Arguments about what is justified rather than what happened in the round are much stronger.

I have the typical 2A's frustration with CPs consisting of 5+ planks. I'm not sure quite what to do with it but I'm annoyed.

Conditionality: probably good. Interpretations that restrict conditionality to a specific number in the 1NC are arbitrary to some degree – I find dispositionality more persuasive. I don't think there is much controversy around defining that term, but still extrapolate your interpretation. Against 2NC planks or amendments. No opinion on judge kick.

Misc

Evidence comparison is quite important. I care a lot about quals. I am inclined to strongly discount unqualified evidence and inclined to strongly prefer extremely qualified evidence. Identifying and communicating the qualifications of a particular author is the responsibility of the debaters.

You cannot insert evidence into a debate. You must read it unless it's an image that can't be read easily (e.g. chart, map).

How to get good speaks -

Hard numbering. This is very near and dear to my heart. Eschewing line by line is a great way to get bad speaks.

I find my favorite debaters are genial, well read, and very confident. The most important thing is to demonstrate preparation with execution.

Bold decision making.

Debating the case.

Jokes. Don't worry too much about content. Recommended subjects: Dartmouth debate, Boston sports, NBA, soccer, Twitter, pop culture, ridiculous metaphors (see Estrada, Joseph; Tambe, Raam).

You will get bad speaker points if you are unclear.

EMAIL lindseyshook@gmail.com

Currently - Director at the University of Oklahoma

Previously – Director at James Madison and Univ. of Central Florida

Way previously – graduate student coach at Univ. of Kansas

Long long ago – debated for the Univ. of Central Oklahoma

BIG PICTURE

My default way of viewing a debate is as follows – I am deciding between hypothetical worlds. In general debates are either about the world at outside of our activity (fiated plans, CPs, and critical advocacies that are about what society at large should do or think or change). Or debates are about debate as an activity (topicality, theory, critical advocacies that are about endorsing or rejecting particular kinds scholarship or argument or forms of presentation).

In either case I assume I am being asked what is the preferrable world? The world where the aff plan is enacted into law? The status quo? The world of debate where everyone meets your version of the topic? The world of debate where no one reads conditional advocacies? Etc.

Arguments that directly challenge this are things like reject the team for reasons of fairness or because they did something problematic. I have and am certainly willing to vote on those reasons but they need to be clear and specific to what has gone wrong in the debate you are in. Ideally not a generic set of reasons (at least by the last rebuttals).

I can certainly be persuaded to understand debate in a different way or to evaluate your arguments from a different perspective but just so you know that is where I start.

OTHER IMPORTANT NOTES

- - A drop matters if you make it matter and if it actually implicates the round

- - I am not offense defense oriented. You can win on defense alone particularly against poorly written advantages and disadvantages.

- - It is hard but not impossible to win you link you lose style debates. You are better off with some version of an alt or a more specific framing argument in front of me.

- - I flow on paper. I can generally keep up with speed but the less you sound like a person reading fast and the more you sound like a robot spitting out random words with no rhythm or cadence the harder it is for my brain to process what you are saying. So if you know you are in the wordwordwordwordwordword spreading habit either slow down a bit or work on getting some normal speech patterns into the reading.

- - I’m old so I try to line arguments up on my flow. This makes me annoyed with overviews and people who don’t do the line by line. I will still flow it but I will try to line things up until I can’t keep up with you and line things up. Then I will flow straight down but it makes my decision take longer at the end so be warned.

SPECIFICS

Case – more case debate is good. Always. In every kind of debate. The more specific and in depth the better. I think that is coldest take in debate at this point.

T – I mostly judge clash debates and I don’t hate judging them or T. If the aff can be used as offense against your topicality argument you would do well to have specific arguments to neutralize that (not all TVAs or do it on the neg etc. are good and having a bad one is a waste of time). You can win fairness comes first. Again it helps to have some specificity about why this round or affs like this one are so bad. I am not convinced affs have to have a counter interpretation to win. Impact turning the neg. interpretation can be enough.

Kritiks – framework against the K from the side of a traditional policy aff is generally meh. You get to weigh your impacts if you win that those mechanisms are good. Util? policy making? Extinction? If those are good things to value when I make a decision win that. Fairness is useless as a standard. They get a K. Stop it. See above for alts are preferable. Floating PICs are generally useless. Most K tricks are tricks for a reason they don’t work in the face of answers. I still have no idea what no perms in a method debate is supposed to mean.

CPs – I love theory and think it is absolutely crucial for most 2As (including critical affs) to help fend off counter advocacies and counter plans. CPs are probably the easiest way to neutralize the aff – I probably care more about how they solve than most judges so more time on solvency deficits in both directions is a good idea.

Disads – great arguments with often terrible evidence and spin. If your ev is bad debate well enough that I don’t have to read it. You are better being honest about your evidence and making up for it with spin and common sense than pretending your cards are amazing only for me to figure out that’s not true.

Hello - I debated for Emory for four years and just graduated.  I have some biases but will try to not let them affect me during the debate.  I also don't read speech docs during the round unless a certain card becomes a huge deal in c/x.  Below is my speaker point scale - I will try to reference this to avoid inconsistent point distribution throughout the year/at any given tournament.

Below 27.5: The speaker has demonstrated a lack of  basic communication. 

27.5-27.9: The speaker demonstrates basic debate competency and argumentation skills. Some areas need substantial improvement.

28.0-28.4: The speaker demonstrates basic argumentation skills and a good grasp on the issues of importance in the debate. Usually shows 1-2 moments of strong strategic insight or macro-level debate vision, but not consistently. 

28.5-28.9: Very solid argumentative skills, grasps the important issues in the debate, demonstrates consistent strategic insight.

29-29.5: Remarkable argumentative skills, understands and synthesizes the key issues in the debate, outstanding use of cross-ex and/or humor.

29.6-29.9: The speaker stands out as exceptionally skilled in all of the above areas. 

I think vagueness is going to be an interesting argument on this topic - I would encourage teams to specify as much as their solvency advocate does to encourage good debates and interesting neg strategies

Counterplans: I think CPs must be both functionally and textually competitive. I think process, consult, and agent counterplans are bad for debate/not competitive

Disadvantages: The link controls the direction of the disadvantage. If the disad turns and outweighs the case, but has no link, I won’t vote for it. Absolute defense is possible.  All of this equally applies for aff advantages

Critiques: Alts are important and not just a K prior question.  Negatives should explain what the alternative does and what it means to vote for the critique.  I can be persuaded to vote for any critique, as long as I understand it

I think that debate is a game that should revolve around a topical plan/action.  I am persuaded more by topicality arguments rather than framework arguments. Topicality is more along the lines of you have to defend the resolution/debating about the resolution is a good thing.  Fairness is an impact in and of itself-but the negative still has to explain why

Seven—Misc:

Presumption goes to less change, not necessarily the negative.

I am very willing to grant absolute defense, especially if I feel an argument is silly.

Smart analytics = good. You don’t need evidence to make an argument.

Evidence v. Debating—if an argument is conceded and explained (or if one team is out-debating another), I won’t look to evidence. If arguments are well contested (at the margins), evidence is very important to me. Better evidence > more evidence. Evidence > spin.

Edits - minor 11/13/14

Director of Speech & Debate - University of Houston

Previously coaching at (Iowa, Miami (Ohio), Wake Forest)

As of the 2014 Shirley - I have judged (according to Debateresults + tabroom):

475 - College Debates

I have voted AFF in 226 of those debates (47.5%)

I have voted NEG in 249 of those debates (52.4%)

First rule of judging - judging is subjective. 
Second rule of judging - get over it. 

Judge philosophies are in fact an attempt to compensate for this inevitably subjective activity. We try to minimize personal opinions, but in the end who you vote for is more than often related to how you feel and the style of the debaters as much as it is about any particular argument. You have to convince the judge (me) to vote for you. This is as subjective as really any other activity. 

T - A paradox - I am a bad judge for T. I love T debates. 

Competing interpretations doesn't make much sense to me because the aff can't win on T. Reasonability is largely good (I am not a good judge for trivial interpretations like "and/or means both") - see above re: subjectivity. Reasonability is also a good answer to most affirmative theory complaints.

Legal topics are ideal for T debates, given that the law is all about definition. I find these questions interesting, but in order to win on T with me as a judge, you typically need to have insightful argument and some decent evidence about the educational harm (and not just to negative ground) of the affirmative's interpretation. These arguments, of course, can take many forms, but be careful.

Avoid specification arguments. Please. While implementation might be 90% of whatever, ASPEC is still not a reason to reject the affirmative. 

I think T is an important check against non-topical affs, you have to read a plan and defend the federal government and your plan, reading the resolutions does not seem to be enough. Switch-side debate is a good thing. 

Framework/Non-plan Topicality arguments - 

Framework debates are not fun. I judge them a lot.I think that these debates have both gotten stale and also very detached from the actual arguments at hand. Both sides would do well to connect their arguments to the actual positions relevant to their debate. My previous statements about reasonability tend to apply in these questions as well. A small advantage to an very limiting interpretation is often not enough for me to justify a ballot. 

The best framework debates don't read the Shively card.

My suggestion is to try to have a good interpretation that takes the middle ground, this will make me much more sympathetic and open to listening to your arguments. A violation is often overlooked by both sides, but is often where the crux of the decision lies - don't neglect this (or the "we meet")

Theory – I think in general most aff theory arguments are reasons to reject the argument not the team. That means theory is rarely rarely a voting issue for me.

Conditionality - I think conditionality is a good and necessary thing. Dispositionality is not a thing. I am open to kicking CPs on my own (without the encouragement of the negative) - I do indeed possess that power.

PICS (or whatever) is not a reason to reject the team, only the position, in these cases if the CP goes away the aff would still win. 

International agent fiat, in some cases, may be a legitimate test of the necessity of USFG action.

50 State Fiat - eh?

Disads – Politics DAs are my favorite.

I won’t vote on 1% risk.

Magnitude and probability are far more important than timeframe.

"DA turns the case" by itself is not a full argument.

Also "DA turns the case" is often wrong, the DA impact must complicate the aff's ability to solve or access the internal link to the impact, not just be the same impact. The aff should point this out. 

Don't read a bunch of new impacts in the block unless you've got a real reason to do so. Most teams won't have a reason beyond, we didn't feel like answering their arguments.

Case debate. I think debate should be more in depth debating of the specifics of an aff, I will reward hard work and understanding on the topic, which is often demonstrated in good case debating. The more specific your strategy is, the better.

Reading impact defense to all of their impacts does not count as a case debate (maybe necessary, but certainly not sufficient).

There are rules for debating the case - http://goo.gl/FliJY The treaties topic was awesome because of case debates. 

CPs – Most are good. I really like a smart advantage CP. Consult CPs and Condition CPs are cheating. How much cheating? It depends. See above on theory. 

Ks - 

Critiques are often times strategic and I also think can be won very easily because the aff doesn’t attack the argument at its weaknesses. Weakness include, the alternative, the links to the aff (and not to the law, society, etc), other stuff. I often end up voting for Ks when the aff fails to contest these issues.

Framework arguments are usually underdeveloped on off-case Ks, this makes me not vote on these arguments.

Like any other argument, it has to be well explained. I also have an inherent distaste for generic backfile Ks (or consult CPs or Framework ....) that you have resurrected year after year because you were too lazy to do any work. I like debating new topics, don’t just cut one new Zizek book and consider your work done. 

As an academic, I think I know a bit about critical theory and so forth -as a rhetorician there are things I like by trade - critiques of rhetoric, language and discourse, well executed understandings of theory, that is to say criticism of actual instances of things that are objectionable. Things that I don't like (or understand very well) include vague psychoanalytic theory (ie Zizek) or rabbit-holes of very complicated post-structuralism - the event of the non-part or something. 

Other things – I don’t like reading a lot of cards after the debate, although I know I will at times, I change my mind on this every couple of months. Right now, I'll probably skim a lot of cards and read some carefully.

I will also probably be open to getting emailed your evidence during the debate, but won't really want to look at it until the end of the debate. Maybe during CX or prep to figure out something I missed. Maybe. I do think it is incumbent on the teams in the debate to communicate to the judge verbally, not via email.

If I have to reconstruct the debate I might not see it like you think it happened. The final speeches MUST do this for me. 

I've taken to answering some questions in CX, particularly informative questions, especially if I think an answer might be confusing. How many perms? I'll answer. If you are just wrong about something, I might say something. 

I'm very emotive during debates, you should look up and see if I'm scowling or nodding, this can be a clue (to what? I don't know, but to something).

Underviews are the worst thing ever. 

I also think the 1NR should not be used to make new arguments. It is a rebuttal not a constructive.

Terms that have lost meaning to me - "Role of the Ballot," "the debate space" (more later)

Speaker Points – I think I give fairly good points, simply because I think most debaters deserve a chance at clearing if they have the wins.

My scale goes something like this;

26.5 and below – bad debating,

26.6 - 27 - Needs a lot of work,

27 -27.5 – average, but has a way to go,

27.5-28 - better than average, some things to work on,

28-28.5 – Good varsity debating.

28.6 - 29 - Very good - should be in contention for a speaker award.

29-29.5 – Excellent debating 

29.6 - 29.9 - Almost Gabe.

30 – Gabe

I will punish your speaker points for lack of clarity, rudeness, or inappropriate language (these issues could also result in a loss). 

I think clipping is bad, though I'm not sure what the threshold is to warrant a ballot. These questions stop the debate. If you are making an accusation of cheating, I will decide the debate on that question. You need to be fairly certain to make this kind of claim, so be ready to explain.

T—I prefer limits over ground arguments. Rather than right to particular ground I would like interpretations argued in terms of the predictability of the research burden/definition. Case lists are important. I consider T an argument that doesn't specify the relationship between the debaters and the resolutional actor (i.e. how the debate is evaluated and what the role of the judge for evaluating the debate is still in question).  To me, framework is a category of arguments that establish a limit that restricts not just the resolution but the role for the judge.  I find most framework arguments unnecessarily restrictive in their interpretation about how we impact/assess a debate whereas a T interpretation can maintain significant freedom for different ways of couching an affirmative while providing predictable limits. For this reason kritiks of T are difficult for me to accept, while criticisms of framework have frequently been successful. 

DAs- I’m unlikely to assess uniqueness/link in absolute terms.  It tends to be easier to get me to consider direction/quality of link & internal link over uniqueness.   Evidence qualifications are important. I probably give analytic and defensive arguments more weight than many judges. 

CPs--I've rarely voted against CPs for theory reasons. This probably has more to do with what affs are willing to do/commit time to more than it demonstrates any real appeal of certainty-based competition arguments. 

K pickiness—I am more open to aff inclusion and textless alternatives than most. I am frustrated by debates where the alternative “vote negative” squares off against permute “do all the parts of the alternative that don’t compete with the plan.” Those are both just abstract descriptions of what any alternative or permutation entails. In depth debate on these issues might be helped by being less tied to a text and more to not being obnoxious in the c/x in describing an alternative. Pay attention to language/phrasing—pull quotes from evidence and speechs instead of debating author names (Yes, pot-kettle, but still). I prefer Ks that aren’t debated like disads—too much big impact/impact turn and not enough about the aff/alt from either side in most debates I judged. Neg link arguments should include reference to 1AC evidence/tags. Historical examples help a lot for either side.
 
Theory—I tend to dislike theory debates focused on narrow comparison of interpretations.  For the most part, people would be better off discussing the logical implications of a practice rather than a potentially arbitrary implementation of that practice (i.e. conditionality rather than "neg gets 1 CP and 1K").   I am biased in favor of conditionality, though not that strongly.  To me, "status quo is always a logical option" or other logic-oriented defenses of conditionality require a judge to evaluate the plan versus the status quo even if the negative goes for their CP.  I say this for clarifying purposes -- this has very rarely changed the outcome of a debate that I have judged.  I often judge debates that do not presume conventional plan-focused models for debate yet still contain theory arguments that presume a plan-focused terminology and its resulting constraints.  I point this out only to suggest that I think debaters should devote some time to thinking about the consequences of strucutral changes in the form of debate that they advocate for the smaller theoretical practices that occur within those debates. 

Evidence comparison. In most debates I’ve judged if I hear about the other side’s evidence it’s only in the 2NR/2AR or it’s about how the opponent’s evidence is “terrible.” Granted, many people read terrible evidence, nevertheless, sophisticated evidence comparison should begin early in the debate. I intensely dislike random unqualified internet evidence.

I prefer cross-ex strategies premised on listening to an opponent's answer and using it in a subsequent speech, not posturing/arguing as though c/x were another speech.

I'm a bit of grump, especially when it comes to my consistent facial expressions in debates.  It's not often that is about you,  the debaters.  I often talk a great deal after debates. 

I desperately wish I were funny so I will probably appreciate your humor even if I rarely laugh out-loud. My sense of humor is definitively geeky. My speaker point scale is lower than our current average.  I've tried to get more in line with current norms so as not to punish people for speaker point inflation.  That said, for high points (28.5+) I still need to be impressed.