Add me to the email chain: katherineguo8@gmail.com

she/her/hers

Mission San Jose 2019, Wellesley College 2023. I study economics, with a focus on international political economy and health economics, and history, with a focus on imperial China. 

Lay/JV LD my freshman year and then circuit LD from sophomore year on. I broke at HW and Stanford my junior year, and while I did not debate extensively senior year, I broke at Stanford my senior year. I also did extemp and impromptu. I don't debate in college and haven't judged circuit LD since December 2019.  

Order of paradigms: LD, PF, CX

Conflicts: Mission San Jose High School, Golden State Academy, Dana Hall School

Update for CPS 2019: I haven't legitimately touched circuit LD since the middle of senior year, so please, please, please 1) don't hit me with 100% speed all at once 2) err on the side of overexplaining for anything not LARP-y 3) I'm not a morning person, so 8am rounds need to be super clear

LD Paradigm:

Shortcut:

LARP: 1

LARP-y K's :2

Phil/T/Theory: 2-3

High Theory and Performance K's: 4

Tricks: 5

Speed is kind of fine, start off slower so that I can get a sense of your tone. I haven't heard spreading since 2019. I will yell clear until I can understand you. I do not care if you sit or stand. I flow on paper.

I primarily debated LARP, theory, and phil. Was not a huge K debater, but being out of debate has given me a new appreciation for K lit so do what you will with that information.

LARP:

CP's must be competitive (either textually or functionally). Please have carded CP's. You don't have to have a solvency advocate, but I'd highly prefer if you have one; it's also probably better for you.

I'm ambivalent on one condo bad, but decidedly aff on 2+ condo bad. I lean neg on PIC's.

Unpopular opinion, but I love politics DA's, especially if you can make nuanced arguments about the current state of affairs.

K's:

I never read high theory K's in round but I generally enjoy learning about them and the lit. You'll have to explain these very well for me to vote for you. I'm also not your best judge for a performance v. performance debate, but I'll do my best.

It's a safe bet to assume I understand your standard LARP-y K's (cap, biopower, setcol, fem, etc).

If you have a shifty alt, such as a mindset shift alt, I will marginally lean aff on theory.

You need to be able to link to the aff in some way, shape, or form. The stronger the link, the more convinced I'll be.

Please make more perms than just the "perm double-bind" arg and be able to explain your perms.

For theory purposes, perms are tests of competition, not new ground.

T/Theory/Tricks:

I default competing interps, RVI's, drop the debater, and education, but I can definitely be persuaded the other way.

I think I Meets, especially semantic I Meets, are very under-used.

If you are the neg and you read T, please do not just skip the standards and go straight to the voters in the 2NR unless you are 100% convinced that you are winning the standards.

I have since forgotten the difference between a CI and an OCI. 

Not the best judge for tricks, but my team had some random things on the dropbox.

Do not make me flow theory blipstorms unless you're incredibly clear or have them in the text of the speech doc.

I find friv theory amusing, go for it if it's your thing, but that means you're going to have to go for a CI and I'm much more likely to grant your opp the RVI.

Philosophy:

I read this consistently through my junior year and senior year. My go to NC/NR strat was NC, CP or DA, DA, and I normally went for the NC in the 2NR. I definitely favored sentimentalism and contractualism but I read a decent portion of the lit. Kantian-derivatives and social contract theories are probably my preferred fields. Most of my cases were analytic heavy, so I'm fine with those.

You should be able to actually explain the normative ethic you're defending.

I default to epistemic modesty (bc that's the norm), but I regularly went for EC.

I read more ideal phil than non-ideal but I don't have a preference.

If you group arguments well when responding, I'll be much happier.

FWK (K vs. Theory vs. T vs. phil):

More ambivalent on K vs Theory, but will default to theory/T before K

Phil > K

T > theory

Misc.:

Don't be rude in CX; sass and snark is fine. Read a content warning at the beginning of your case if it's warranted -- if you feel uncomfortable in round because of what is being read, let me know in any way you feel comfortable. If you use Chicago citations, complete with proper footnotes, I'll give you an extra .2 speaks for kicks. Have proper citations regardless (MLA, etc) Please don't post-round me because I might cry -- RFDs already stress me out.

PF Paradigm:

I attend a school with a large PF presence, and I scouted outrounds for the PF team through sophomore year, so I have a pretty good sense of how it works. That being said, I am by no means well-versed in the nuances of PF. Speed is perfectly fine, but I will yell clear if I cannot understand what you are saying.

I am fine with theory in PF -- my high school PF teams read theory back in 2018.

If you want me to evaluate something in FF, you have to have at least brought it up in summary. Extensions need to have warrants; I don't need the full card explained again, but I need to know which card, what the card says, and why the card matters in the context of the full round. Please make your weighing very clear, especially as I'm less familiar with the way PF rounds tend to be evaluated in the end.

Please do not be overly aggressive in cross.

CX Paradigm:

All my defaults are the same as my LD paradigm. If there's something that specific to policy, you're going to have to explain it a little bit more. You're going to have to tell me if your opponent has dropped arguments/introduced new args when not allowed because I'm not as familiar with CX evidence rules. I don't think RVIs exist in policy.

My Background

I coached for about 10 years at Diablo Valley College, where I coached Paliamentary debate (NPDA), IPDA, and NFA-LD. I've coached High School Public Forum, Lincoln Douglas, and Congress for about 6 years now. I co-run a Youtube channel called Proteus Debate Academy, where I talk about debate.

I try to write as much feedback on ballots as I can, both in terms of advice and explaining how and why I made the decision I made.

Let's have a fun round with good vibes and great arguments.

What I Like Most to See in Rounds

Good link refutation and good weighing. In most rounds (that don't involve theory and so on) I'm left believing that some of the aff's arguments flow through and some of the neg's arguments flow through. Your impact weighing will guide how I make my decision at that point.

What I don't mind seeing

I'm comfortable with theory debate. I don't live and die for it, but sure, go for those arguments if they're called for.

If you're not familiar with the exact structure and jargon of a theory argument, all you need to know is that if you think your opponent did something unfair are bad for education, I would need to know (a) what you think debaters ought to do in those situations, (b) what your opponent did wrong that violates that expectation, (c) why your model for how debate should be is better than theirs, and (d) why you think that's a serious enough issue that your opponent should lose the whole round for it.

What You Should be Somewhat Wary of Running

I understand Kritiks. I've voted on many Ks, I'll probably vote on many more. But with that said, it's worth mentioning that I have a high propensity to doubt the solvency of most kritiks' alternatives. If you're running the Kritik, it might be really important to really clearly explain: who does the alt? What does doing the alt actually entail in literal terms? How does doing the alternative solve the harms outlined in the K?

If your K claims to have an impact on the real world, I should have a say in whether I want to cause that real world effect. I'm not gonna make decisions in the "real world" based on someone happening to drop an argument and now I have to murder the state or something.

How am I on speed?

I can keep up with speed. If you're going too fast, I'll call slow. With that said, it's important to me that your debating be inclusive: both of your opponent and your other judges. I encourage you to please call verbally say "slow" if your opponent is speaking too quicklyfor you to understand.Please slow down if that happens.If your opponent does not accommodate your request to slow down, please tell me in your next speech if you feel their use of speed harmed your ability to engage with the debate enough that they should be voted down for it. It's very likely that I'll be receptive to that argument.

Other Debate Pet Peaves

Evidence sharing in evidenciary debate formats. Have your evidence ready to share. If someone calls for a card, it's not acceptable for you to not have it or for it to take a lifetime to track the card down.

Please feel free to ask me more in-person about anything I've written here or about anything I didn't cover!

Updated: September 2023

In debate, the most important thing to me by far is fairness. Fairness gets a lot of lip service in debate and is frequently treated like any other piece on the game board, which is to say that it is wielded as a tool to win rounds, but that isn’t what I mean. I don’t think fairness is an impact in the same way nuclear war or even education are. Fairness is a legitimate, ethical consideration that exists on the gameboard and above it, and as such, weighs heavily in how I make decisions.

In the context of the game itself, all arguments and strategies exist upon a continuum from a mythical “completely fair” to an equally mythical “completely unfair”. I am willing to vote on the vast majority of arguments regardless of where they fall on this continuum, but it is certainly an uphill battle to win those that I perceive as falling closer to “completely unfair.” Arguments that I would say are meaningfully unfair include:

- Conditional Strategies (Especially multiple conditional advocacies)

- Untopical Affirmatives

- Vacuous Theory (think Sand paradox or anything a high school LD student would find funny)

- Arguing Fairness is bad (obvi)

- Obfuscating

In the context of things that occur above the board, I similarly observe this fairness continuum but am even less likely to vote for these unfair tactics because I view them as a conscious decision to exclude people from this space. I view the following as falling closer to the unfair part of the continuum:

- Refusing to slow down when spreading

- Using highly technical debate strategies against new debaters

- Being bigoted in any way

I tend to find myself most frequently voting for arguments that I perceive as more fair and that I understand and feel comfortable explaining in my RFD. With all of this said, I have voted on Aff Ks, theory I didn’t especially like, and conditional strategies, I just want to be upfront that those ballots are certainly more the exception than the norm.

Background: I am the director of debate at Diablo Valley College, I competed in LD and NPDA at the University of the Pacific for 3 years and then was an assistant coach for the team during grad school. I can hang, I just hate sophistry and vacuous debate.

I did Policy in HS and College. I coached Middle/HS LD for six years, and am now coaching Policy for UWyo.

I am collecting anonymous feedback and data about my judging. If I've judged you and you'd like to contribute, please fill out the form!

Above any ideological loyalty or stylistic preference is my appreciation and need for clean, organized, structured debates.

natalieforensics@gmail.com

Mechanics of Evaluation

I try my hardest to be tabula rasa, but I'm also a person. I vote on dropped arguments more than most people.

Major things that make me different from other judges:

I'm somewhat hard of hearing - try to talk way louder than you would. This is usually only a problem during physical (not online) tournaments and in rooms with much echo. If you are unclear, I'll yell clear twice before I stop flowing. Don't slur your words together. Use complete sentences while avoiding filler words. If you've never recorded yourself giving a speech and tried to flow yourself, chances are you think you are far clearer than you really are.

Tech and Truth - it's not hard for me to see the connections between arguments. I vote on many conceded args with impacts, and heavily undercovered args. I guess that makes me more of a tech judge, but I also will be very grumpy about arguments that don't make sense, so I'll vote on them but I'll complain about having voted on them.

1ar/2nr/2ar dynamics - I like to protect the 2nr. If the arg wasn't in the 1ar or the 2ar pivot is outlandish, it can be a problem for me. That being said if the 2nr spin on the block strat is heavy, 2ars should be pointing that out as a reason to justify new 2ar args.

Speech docs- I hate having to follow along on the doc. I think debaters' flowing skills have rapidly deteriorated since judges were added to speech docs. But now, with mixed modalities, it's very much necessary. That being said, I'm not gonna base much of my decisions on your evidence unless there's a disagreement about what it says - the parts that are most relevant should be paraphrased and cited by author name and the speech they were introduced in the rebuttals.

It's also silly how often people spread through their analytics (especially on theory) as though they're highlighting within a card and expect the judge to follow along on the speech doc.

Try to be pleasant - It's not gonna swing my ballot unless it's turned into an argument, which usually has to do with critiques of how people talk.

Events that happened out of round -This is a gray area for me. I guess on some level I think you should be held accountable for things that happened that can be proven to have happened. On the other hand, how many times does someone have to lose on something for them to be free of their past? I guess that's for y'all to debate about and me to find out.

-

Ideologies and their Juxtapositions

K v K Debate

This is the format that the algorithm has determined I'm destined to judge the most...

Be organized. Distinguish between claim warrant and implications. Writing the story of the ballot can be crucial. Detailed perm theory about what the aff does or does not get to permute is essential for me.

Framework/T-Usfg

When I vote on Framework, there's usually an offensive answer to "you don't address the aff impacts" via a conversation about how affs that have no tie to the topic or completely foreclose upon state engagement to trade off with opportunities to learn about the values of state engagement or ways in which the topic hurts the people the aff is talking about. I do think that soft framework with interps such as "aff must defend a tangible strategy," "aff must have a connection to the resolution," "aff must be in the direction of the resolution," etc. with most of the same justifications as regular framework can be solid round winners in front of me. My neg ballots on this usually start with "the topical version of the affirmative resolves most of the aff's offense and has better inroads into dialogue/clash and advocacy/policymaking skills for the following reasons:" or because the aff undercovered switch-side debate.

Plan v K Debate

Aff: Don't over-rely on framework, perms and theory. Read these arguments when they really make sense, not out of fear of engaging the substance of the K. Make sure that the K actually violates the rules you want to set up before spending time setting up those rules.

Neg: Don't be lazy! Read specific, offensive links with well-explained alts that are both paradigmatic and can be translated into action that helps people. You can advocate for specific solutions (that may or may not be state policies) as examples of a broader and more general alternative. Find a good balance between examples, explanations, and warrants/proof.

Discourse/rhetoric links: this is my jam. Neg teams answering these - perm and framework go a long way, but honestly people should sometimes just defend their rhetoric. You're not gonna have a defense of every word you use so offensive args about why the 1ac performance is net good even if it's messy or not ideologically pure. The defense of the performance of the 1ac is the key here, and what impacts it addresses. Labeling it as "the value of the performance of the 1ac outweighs the negative harms of their links" really goes a long way with me because it's a clearer contextualization of what "policymaking good" and "research on this topic is good" are actually doing for you besides getting you out of "roleplaying bad" debates. This isn't a theory arg either - you're just weighing the costs vs benefits of the 1ac speech act, in addition to a robust strategy about why my ballot should prioritize the outcomes of the plan over the performance of the speech.

Critiques based on consequences: winning the impact/root cause debate is key? Idk what else to say here.

Traditional

I did this style in High School, and while I coach a team that predominantly does traditional debate, I don't spend much time thinking about this side of the topic. My favorite traditional debates have been more technical than most. Since I'm more unfamiliar I tend to be a lot more tech over truth, given as I'm not exactly doing regular work on your politics disad or specific uniqueness claims. I am also not very knowledgeable about what many acronyms on the topic mean.