2018 NPDA National Champion

I can judge pretty much anything. Just be clear and have fun.

For additional speaker points, consult the below recipe.

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***Before you strike me, ask your DoF how many times I beat the teams they coached. Now, rethink your strike and pref me higher.***

Ingredients:

• 1⁄2 cup butter
• 2 tablespoons cream cheese
• 1 pint heavy cream
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• salt
• black pepper
• 2⁄3 cup grated parmesan cheese (preferably fresh)
• 1 lb fettuccine, prepared as directed

Directions:

1. In a medium saucepan, melt butter.
2. When butter is melted, add cream cheese.
3. When the cream cheese is softened, add heavy cream.
4. Season with garlic powder, salt, and pepper.
5. Simmer for 15-20 minutes over low heat, stirring constantly.
6. Remove from heat and stir in parmesan.
7. Serve over hot fettuccine noodles.

Overview:

Old-school policy debater. I.E not that big of a fan of spreading and K AFFS. I support the belief that you should have to debate the topic.

. The majority of the weight from my final decisions will come from how the debate is framed in the end and which the role of the ballot is argued to be more significant.

Topicality:

Definitely would say I respect the T but do not believe it should be the only defining factor in the round. I understand its use and how it is interpreted but would prefer if its coupled with other arguments

Kritik:

Generally not a fan of the K. Please have a solid understanding of what the alternative of your K looks like and what that looks like in the world of the debate. I am fairly open minded about the types of kritik that are run. But once again please make sure they actually link to the case and are thoroughly argued.

I really am open to any form of debate, as long as your arguments are coherent and explained. Please tell me how to weigh your arguments, and why a particular impact is "bad".  I enjoy straight up debates on the topic and Kritiks that are well linked. I love original and compex kritics, just make sure you explain them to someone who is not immersed in whatever theory you're using, and that there is room for an actual debate. Although I have judged a lot of NPDA in the past, I have mostly been judging BP for the past few years. That doesn't mean I have issues with jargon or speed necessarily, but memorized and/or generic positions may be less persuasive to me now. Be nice.

Hi y'all. Hope this is helpful in any way.

ABOUT ME:

My name is Darren, and genderqueer, pronouns are they/them. This is my 6th year involved in debate, 4 years debating, and this will be my 3rd year coaching.

TL;DR:

Route to my ballot: no matter what you are going for, collapse in the rebuttal to specific arguments, not just off-case/advantages. Tell me a comprehensive story thereafter, and resolve other issues. The best debate is one in which arguments are impacted and/or resolved with clear indication to how the argument is supposed to impact my decision.

Kritik - I like Kritiks due to their explanatory power. The aff should have equally powerful justifications and methods to prove the desirability of the 1ac. I don't start from a point that the Aff must be topical in instances where there is substantial evidence that is congruent with the advocacy/position of the K why they shouldn't have to be, and believe that the education K's give outweighs most other framing arguments. That being said - when Framework is ran against a K, I am more persuaded by game-balancing (fairness) arguments.

If you are running the K - 100% you should read framework in 1A/NC. Without it, I am giving credency to the aff on a lot of arguments I should not be.

T/theory - against policy affs I have a low threshold for voting on T/theory. I default competing interps, but do not believe that it is the end-all be-all of theory judging.

Speed - I'm usually comfortable. The clearer you are, the better off you will be.

PARADIGM:

I will not pretend that personal/political bias' will never affect my, or other's decisions in round. That being said, I will do everything in my power to decenter myself, and do no work for either debater. In general, I wish for you debaters to make the round according to your wishes. Specific stances on issues will be listed below. Any question and/or clarification of my paradigm are welcome before the round as long as both debaters are present.

The truest method to my ballot

Collapse and Resolve. Most negatives and affirmatives give me little room to vote on the singular argument that wins you the round, but explain the 9 different scenarios as to why I need to vote for them. The former is MUCH MORE compelling than the latter. As such, you should collapse not just to different positions/advantages, but rather specific arguments on them that give you a compelling story as to why you win. Resolving is the method of showing me the importance or unimportance of certain issues that would win/lose you the ballot. An example of such an argument is: "we are winning our framework contention so the affirmative structural violence advantage should be given prioritization over the disad because the loss of life of structural issues has killed millions silently, much more than any one war."

Speaker points

I give 25-30 speaker points in most rounds. The exception to this rule is when insults are used to devalue the other debater or to groups of people. Usually, this will accompany a loss in the round, and 0-15 speaker points.

Critiques/ On the Aff Criticism.

I like critiques because of their explanatory power. Critiques are acceptable and good for testing the desirability of the affirmative/resolution. If you desire to go for framework type arguments to exclude criticisms, it is an uphill battle for my ballot. This follows for affirmative critiques as well.

I do not believe the negative needs an alternative to win that I should not vote for the affirmative, just that the justifications for the affirmative are bad. An alternative is helpful for justifying my ballot, but it is not necessary.

If you are aff, to win the critique from a standpoint of policy is to situate the aff in conversation with methods of knowledge production and how the affirmative engages with power structures writ large. These explanations need be more nuanced than just "incrementalism good." Research of the 1ac must necessarily include the justifications of how/why the problem exists and how to resolve those issues, and why this method is preferable. This has most successfully been deployed in framing contentions. Otherwise, you will struggle to win my ballot in these rounds

Speed.

Speed is usually a non-issue, however be courteous to your opponent in all instances and allow for engagement of all debaters. I will speed/clear you if necessary.

Evidence.

All evidence used in round should be shared by any means, I prefer Speechdrop so far.

Theory/topicality/framework

Great if done well. I prefer theory/topicality/framework debates that get deep into specific standards and voters. I typically take an offense-defense paradigm to theory which gives me a low threshold when voting on these positions, but I am willing to be convinced otherwise as I believe that its not the end-all of debate judging. Framework against criticisms however is one area that I find the critique's answer more compelling in most cases.

Effects/Extra T function best as a separate position. When ran as a standard, there is a quick "you explode limits" argument along with its own voters, however, I am less convinced that these are sufficient to go for in the NR due to their limited explanation in the NC. If the aff is extra/effects, then make that argument as a separate position.

If you are aff, most T's will omit the affirmative in some fashion. In order to win in these cases you need to prove why your interpretation is better than the negatives. To do so, you must not undercover the standards. As with most debate rounds, T debate is best served when you have a strategy. Make smart concessions that you know you can outweigh later, and have a plan for what internal links to voters you are going for.

Rules

Critical thinking and reasoning are key skills debate develops. Rules arguments are at conflict with such skills as long as why the rules exist goes unstated. Giving reasons why rules matter, or why the rules exist (i.e. education and fairness) will help you access my ballot much easier than any shallow "rules say you should lose" argument.

Alex McVey - Director of Debate at Kansas State University

Yes Email chain - j.alexander.mcvey at gmail

Online things - Strong preference for Camera On during speeches and CX. I'm willing to be understanding about this if it's a tech barrier or there are other reasons for not wanting to display. But it does help me a ton to look at faces when people are speaking.

If I'm physically at a tournament and judging a debate with one online and one in-person team, I'm always going to try to be in the same room as the in-person team, if the tournament permits. Within those parameters, Zoom teams should let me know if there's anything I can do to make myself more present for them in that space. I respect what online debate has done to increase access for some teams, but I value in-person connection with debaters too much to go judge from an empty classroom or hotel room.

I flow on paper. I need pen time. Clarity is really important to me. I'll always say "clear" if I think you're not being clear, at least 1-2 times. If you don't respond accordingly, the debate probably won't end well for you.

I tend to be expressive when I judge debates. Nodding = I'm getting it, into your flow, not necessarily that it's a winner. Frowny/frustrated face = maybe not getting it, could be a better way to say it, maybe don't like what you're doing. I would take some stock in this, but not too much: I vote for plenty things that frustrate me while I'm hearing them executed, and vote down plenty of things that excite me when first executed. All about how it unfolds.

The more I judge debates, the less ev I'm reading,  the more I'm relying on 2nr vs 2ar explanation and impact calculus. If there are cards that you want me to pay attention to, you should call the card out by name in the last rebuttal, and explain some of its internal warrants. Debaters who make lots of "even if" statements, who tell me what matters and why, who condense the debate down to the most important issues, and who do in depth impact calculus seem to be winning my ballots more often than not.

Debating off the flow >>> Debating off of speech docs (ESPECIALLY IN REBUTTALS). I'd say a good 25% of my decisions involve the phrase "You should be more flow dependent and less speech doc dependent." Chances are very little that you've scripted before the debate began is useful for the 2nr/2ar.

My experience and expertise is definitely in kritik debate, but I judge across the spectrum and have been cutting cards on both K and Policy sides of the legal personhood topic. Run what you're good at. Despite my K leaning tendencies, I’m comfortable watching a good straight up debate.

Don't assume I've cut cards in your niche research area though. I often find myself lost in debates where people assume I know what some topical buzzword, agency, or acronym is.

Theoretical issues: Blippy, scatter-shot theory means little, well-developed, well-impacted theory means a lot. Again, pen time good.

I have no hard and set rules about whether affs do or don't have to have plans. Against planless/non-topical affs, I tend to think topicality arguments are generally more persuasive than framework arguments. Or rather, I think a framework argument without a topicality argument probably doesn't have a link. I'm not sure what the link is to most "policy/political action good" type framework arguments if you don't win a T argument that says the focus of the resolution has to be USFG policy. I think all of these debates are ultimately just a question of link, impact, and solvency comparison.

I tend to err on truth over tech, with a few exceptions. Dropping round-winners/game-changers like the permutation, entire theoretical issues, the floating PIC, T version of the aff/do it on the neg, etc... will be much harder (but not impossible) to overcome with embedded clash. That being said, if you DO find yourself having dropped one of these, I'm open to explanations for why you should get new arguments, why something else that was said was actually responsive, etc... It just makes your burden for work on these issues much much more difficult.

Be wary of conflating impacts, especially in K debates. For example, If their impact is antiblackness, and your impact is racism, and you debate as if those impacts are the same and you're just trying to win a better internal link, you're gonna have a bad time.

I intuitively don't agree with "No perms in a method debate" and "No Plan = No Perm" arguments. These arguments are usually enthymematic with framework; there is an unstated premise that the aff did something which skews competition to such a degree that it justifies a change in competitive framework. Just win a framework argument. That being said, I vote for things that don't make intuitive sense to me all the time.

I like debate arguments that involve metaphors, fiction, stories, and thought experiments. What I don't understand is teams on either side pretending as if a metaphor or thought experiment is literal and defending or attacking it as such.

A nested concern with that above - I don't really understand a lot of these "we meets" on Framework that obviously non-topical affs make. I/E - "We're a discursive/affective/symbolic vesting of legal rights and duties" - That... doesn't make any sense. You aren't vesting legal rights and duties, and I'm cool with it, just be honest about what the  performance of the 1ac actually does. I think Neg teams give affs too much leeway on this, and K Affs waste too much time on making these nonsensical (and ultimately defensive) arguments. If you don't have a plan, just impact turn T. You can make other defensive args about why you solve topic education and why you discuss core topic controversies while still being honest about the fact that you aren't topical and impact turn the neg's attempt to require you to be such.

RIP impact calculus. I'd love to see it make a comeback.

RIP performance debates that actually perform. My kingdom for a performance aff that makes me feel something.

Affs are a little shy about going for condo bad in front of me. I generally think Condo is OK but negatives have gotten a bit out of control with it.  I'm happy to vote for flagrant condo proliferation if the neg justifies it. I just don't think affs are making negs work hard enough on these debates.

Negs are a little shy about making fun of 1ac construction in front of me. Ex: K affirmatives that are a random smattering of cards that have little to do with one another. Ex: Policy affs where only 2 cards talk about the actual plan and the rest are just genero impact cards. I feel like negative's rarely ever press on this, and allow affirmatives to get away with ludicrous 2AC explanations that are nearly impossible to trace back to the cards and story presented in the 1ac. More 1nc analytical arguments about why the aff just doesn't make sense would be welcome from this judge.

In a similar vein, many affirmative plans have gotten so vague that they barely say anything. Negatives should talk about this more. Affs should write better plans. Your plan language should match the language of your solvency advocate if you want me to grant you solvency for what is contained in said evidence. I'm going to be trigger happy for "your plan doesn't do anything" until teams start writing better plans.

Debaters should talk more about the lack of quality the other team's evidence and the highlighting of that evidence in particular. If you've highlighted down your evidence such that it no longer includes articles (a/an/the/etc...) in front of nouns, or is in other ways grammatically incoherent due to highlighting, and get called out on it, you're likely to not get much credit for that ev with me.

Be kind to one another. We're all in this together.

Policy Judging Philosophy—David Romanelli Loyola University Chicago

I have been judging for 28yrs (Old CEDA, NDT, CEDA/NDT, NPDA, and for the last 6 years BP). I have not judged a lot of policy in the last 6 years. This will be my first tournament on this topic.

I think the resolution is the focus of debate. If the affirmative team does not support the resolution, I have a very low threshold for voting neg. I like a well-organized flow. I prefer line-by-line debate. I prefer well developed arguments to warrantless tag line debate. I am not a fan of K debates unless the wording of the resolution demands it (the resolution is the focus of the debate). K affirmatives are generally not welcome unless the resolution demands it. That does not mean that the impacts have to be war etc. You can and should make arguments about how impacts should be evaluated. That being said, I also reject the policy maker paradigm. We can and should image a better world through debate.

Speed up to a point is fine (slow down on plan text, theory dumps etc.). Debaters should adhere to the guidelines of their institution and that of the host. Contradictions can cost you the debate if the other team knows why.

Topicality. I have no problem with T. There are a variety of ways you could win it. That being said, most will not. You need to explain how it works and answer their arguments. A well explained definition and violation with clear standards is the key to my ballot on T.

Counterplans C/P status is conditional unless explained or asked about;(I would ask). Net benefits are my default for competition.

It is your job to compare and contrast impacts. If neither team has in the debate and I am now forced to intervene. No one is going to be happy including me. I have no set way to decide these issues. Lots of dead bodies normally = victor

Policy Judging Philosophy—David Romanelli Loyola University Chicago

I have been judging for 28yrs (Old CEDA, NDT, CEDA/NDT, NPDA, and for the last 6 years BP). I have not judged a lot of policy in the last 6 years. This will be my first tournament on this topic.

I think the resolution is the focus of debate. If the affirmative team does not support the resolution, I have a very low threshold for voting neg. I like a well-organized flow. I prefer line-by-line debate. I prefer well developed arguments to warrantless tag line debate. I am not a fan of K debates unless the wording of the resolution demands it (the resolution is the focus of the debate). K affirmatives are generally not welcome unless the resolution demands it. That does not mean that the impacts have to be war etc. You can and should make arguments about how impacts should be evaluated. That being said, I also reject the policy maker paradigm. We can and should image a better world through debate.

Speed up to a point is fine (slow down on plan text, theory dumps etc.). Debaters should adhere to the guidelines of their institution and that of the host. Contradictions can cost you the debate if the other team knows why.

Topicality. I have no problem with T. There are a variety of ways you could win it. That being said, most will not. You need to explain how it works and answer their arguments. A well explained definition and violation with clear standards is the key to my ballot on T.

Counterplans C/P status is conditional unless explained or asked about;(I would ask). Net benefits are my default for competition.

It is your job to compare and contrast impacts. If neither team has in the debate and I am now forced to intervene. No one is going to be happy including me. I have no set way to decide these issues. Lots of dead bodies normally = victor