Updated for TOC.

experience debating national circuit policy and public forum.

arguments are not arguments without warrants.

if all debaters in the round express a reasonable preference they would like me to adopt prior to judging the debate, let me know and I will adopt it; judge adaptation can go both ways.

speaker points are entirely subjective and arbitrary, and are likely mostly based on what side of the bed I woke up on (anybody who says otherwise is likely kidding themselves, or taking their jobs a little too seriously).

flowing:

Debate is a communicative activity and if you cannot adequately communicate to me why you win a round i'm not going to mine through the flow to justify voting for you. you have to win the round, not rely on me to win it for you in my RFD.

in terms of rate of delivery (spreading), I will yell "clear" once if I do not understand you. If you do not become clear after that, I stop flowing your speech (if I don't flow your speech this typically means you lose).

progressive argumentation:

the only rule I have for debate is speech times, and that's just because I don't want to be here longer than I have to.

i'd characterize myself as a progressive judge. I was pretty deep into postmodern Ks when I debated and have grown to become highly appreciative of good theory debates. Doesn't matter how big your school is or how much resources your program has, you should be prepared to defend the rules if you want to enforce them in round. If you think a rule is good and is something we should stick to, you should be prepared to defend it. You should also be prepared to defend your representations and ideology that underlies your arguments.

literate enough about most K-literature to know when you are bastardizing your evidence, but non-interventionist enough to not care. also can we please read links with our Ks from here on out?

i find the insularity with regards to particular jargon in theory debates to be pretty exhausting, just because a team does not say the magic words "counter-interpretation" does not mean they do not have one. I judge the arguments by how they are argued, not how they are labeled.

evidence:

put simply: i don't care.

I judge based on the what I hear. This means: I won't call for evidence, I don't care if your evidence is in "card" form, I don't want to be on the email chain, and generally care more about what your argument is than what your evidence says. Debate (especially PF) is about communication, and if your communicative strategy is dependent on me flowing your speech doc, strike me.

I don't care about evidence ethics, but am willing to begrudgingly vote on a well-explained argument as to why I should care.

miscellaneous:

no i would not like to be on the email chain

no i do not care where you sit.

no i do not care if you stand or sit to speak.

If you are clearly just reading pre-written blocks the whole debate, your speaker-point ceiling is a 27.

postround me, idc. i like it when the coaches join in on the fun too.

Hi! My name is Philip Bonanno and I debated for six years at the Hackley School in Tarrytown, NY, doing PF for the last four of them.

How I Evaluate a Round:

- So first I look to the weighing. Personally, if no meta-weighing (i.e if your impact is bigger and your opponents argument is more probable, which one is more important) occurs then I am more likely to look towards what I perceive to be the biggest impact. But usually there is some clear winner of weighing before I have to intervene.

- Once I look at the weighing, I look at the arguments under the weighing, and if that happens for one team I have an easy job.

- If both teams have arguments under the weighing then I look at link weighing and then I'll pull the trigger there if it occurs

- If you don't win the weighing anywhere I have to intervene and you may not like the decision. Even if you like the decision, you won't like the speaks.

Preferences:

- Crossfire please be nice and try and alternate lines of questioning.

- 2nd rebuttal should at the very least cover the turns coming out of first rebuttal, and should try and cover the entire thing.

- First summary should now extend terminal defense with the added time. Turns and all things you want me to vote on have to be in BOTH summary and FF.

- Please give me the warranting behind your evidence. Anyone can publish anything on the internet and then you can cite it in round. If you cannot tell me why it's true then I will not care that much, and thus not give it weight.

Theory:

- I dislike frivolous theory because I think it gives theory a bad name. Theory can be a very good tool to check back abuse and/or discrimination in round if used correctly, but the bar is high. I will evaluate if used correctly.

Misc.

- I will call for evidence if you ask me to do so, if you indict it and extend that indict throughout the round, or if both of you extend fact-based claims with no warranting and that would have to decide the round.

- Concessions in cross are binding, but you have to bring it up in a speech for me to count it.

- I can flow anything a PFer can throw at me, so sure go fast, but know yourself. If you go fast and sacrifice clarity, I will not be pleased.

- Please do not read like 6 turns or disads in second rebuttal and then tell me to vote on the ONE turn they do not respond to in summary. This is very abusive, and honestly just not a very educational approach to the round.

- If you exhibit any sort of discrimination in round (racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, etc.) then I will drop you. I think y'all ignore low speaks, so just don't be exclusionary :)

I'm a mix between Bob Dolan and Christian Vasquez.

Hi! My name is Marybeth and I debated in high school and coached/independently drilled with some students in college!

Contact info: mehlbec@emory.edu

Read this, if anything:

Please just have as comfortable of a round as you want, let's all treat each other with respect, empathy, and camaraderie.

Stolen from Malcolm Davis's paradigm: As I get old and grumpy, I am increasingly frustrated with PF's bells and whistles. We are all regular people. You don't need to 'strongly urge an affirmation' or proudly declare what the 'thesis of your case' is or anything, you just need to debate the round and explain what's going on clearly. There needn't be pomp and circumstance in a room where we're talking about ideas for fun on the weekend.

Main Preferences

1. I will vote for an argument (hopefully under a framework [one that is warranted and fairly won] ) if it is warranted, impacted, and weighed against the other args in the around under a default of comparative worlds unless instructed otherwise. Blippy and unwarranted offense will likely produce an audible sigh from me. Exceptions to this rule: the arg is offensive/exclusionary, not in both summary/FF, card is misconstrued/grossly paraphrased.

2. MY HEARING IS NOT THE BEST. please be VERY CLEAR with signposting, extending author names etc.

3. Weighing has to be explicitly comparative and contextualized to your opponent's offense.

4. No off time roadmaps unless you are reading an off.

5. The extension of defense into first summary is not required. It is required if the defense has been frontlined.

Random things due to the cultural decline of public forum:

1. read cards in front of me please, I don't care to hear paraphrased evidence but I will evaluate it when push comes to shove

2.i think disclosure theory in PF is pretty unconvincing/bad strat, although it is a good norm.

3. i would much rather you read theory in paragraph form rather than shell if that's what you're comfortable with and wont look down upon such when I'm evaluating it.

Good luck and have fun!

My Background:

I debated PF for three years on local and national circuit.

I also did LD and Parli a couple times, am a novice in APDA, and can greatly appreciate big picture/philosophical arguments.

PFers- I don’t flow cross ex (so if it’s important mention it in your speech)

I look for a few things in a successful round:

1. Clear speaking: I believe one of the most important aspects to strong debating is developing oratorical skills. That being said, I want to see clear, concise argumentation. Additionally, although I flow all rounds, I am not a “tech judge”. I do not buy arguments said while spreading and I certainly will not extend things on the flow just because you say “extend this.”
2. Narrative building: By this I mean paralleling summary and final focus to enhance consistency and establish cohesive links around the issue you choose to crystallize. I need to know what the ramifications of what you are talking about mean in the big world AKA I want to see all your Impacts extended and clearly contextualized in the final speeches.
3. Weighing on impacts AND links: While weighing on impacts is the most intuitive portion, I really want to know why your link into the impact is more significant than your opponents link into theirs. Especially if you are impacting to the same thing, this is probably going to be the most crucial portion to my decision.

All of this said: I will not stand for sexist/racist/intolerant views in round. Please be respectful, be rational, be clear, be assertive, and enjoy yourself!

https://gph.is/2HThgly

I am an assistant coach at The Potomac School, and previously was the Director of Forensics at Des Moines Roosevelt. If you have any questions about Public Forum, Extemp, Congress, or Interp events, come chat! Otherwise you can feel free to email me at: quentinmaxwellh@gmail.com for any questions about events, the activity, or rounds I've judged.

I'm a flow judge that wants to be told how to feel. Ultimately, Public Forum is supposed to be persuasive--a 'winning' flow is not inherently persuasive. My speaker points are generally reflective of how easy I think you make my decisions.

Things to Remember…

0. The Debate Space: R E L A X. Have some fun. Breathe a little. Sit where you want, talk in the direction you want, live your BEST lives in my rounds. I'm not here to tell you what that looks like!

1. Framework: Cost/benefit unless otherwise determined.

2. Extensions: Links and impacts NEED to be in summary to be evaluated in final focus. Please don't just extend through ink--make an attempt to tell me why your arguments are comparatively more important than whatever they're saying.

3. Evidence: If you're bad at paraphrasing and do it anyway, that's a reasonable voter. See section on theory. Tell me what your evidence says and then explain its role in the round. I also prefer authors AND dates. I will not call for evidence unless suggested to in round.

4. Cross: If it's not in a speech it's not on my flow. HOWEVER: I want to pay attention to cross. Give me something to pay attention to. Just because I'm not flowing cross doesn't make it irrelevant--it's up to you to do something with the time.

5. Narrative: Narrow the 2nd half of the round down with how your case presents a cohesive story and 1-2 key answers on your opponents’ case. I like comparative analysis.

6. Theory: If an abuse happens, theory shells are an effective check. I think my role as an educator is to listen to the arguments as presented and make an evaluation based on what is argued.

Disclosure is good for debate. I think paraphrasing is good for public forum, but my opinion doesn't determine how I evaluate the paraphrasing shell. This is just to suggest that no one should feel intimidated by a paraphrasing shell in a round I am judging--make substantive responses in the line-by-line and it's ultimately just another argument I evaluate tabula rasa.

7. Critical positions: I'll evaluate Ks, but if you are speaking for someone else I need a good reason not to cap your speaks at 28.5.

8. Tech >< Truth: Make the arguments you want to make. If they aren't supported with SOME evidence my threshold for evaluating answers to them is, however, low.

9. Sign Post/Road Maps: Please.

**Do NOT give me blippy/underdeveloped extensions/arguments. I don’t know authors of evidence so go beyond that when talking about your evidence/arguments in round. I am not a calculator. Your win is still determined by your ability to persuade me on the importance of the arguments you are winning not just the sheer number of arguments you are winning. This is a communication event so do that with some humor and panache.**

copied & pasted this from Asher Spector's paradigm - I agree with everything below. please also content warn arguments if necessary (and have a backup argument ready just in case)! if you're not sure how to content warn something, ask!!

--

As a judge, I will adapt to you too. Do what you do best!

That said, I am a pretty standard PF tech judge, with a couple of specific preferences, outlined below:

(1) I will do my best to only vote off offense that is in both summary and final focus – if it’s in one but not the other, I probably won’t consider it in my decision. If you’re the first speaking team, defensive responses to your opponent’s case do not need to be in summary – I’ll still evaluate them if they’re in final focus. Turns that you want to win off of must be in 1st summary. If you’re the second speaking team, defensive responses need to be in both summary/final focus for me to evaluate them. If you have questions on this, please feel free to ask me!

(2) If I have the choice between voting for an impact that’s weighed as the biggest in the round but is muddled versus a less important but clean impact, I will resolve the muddled impact every time. I hope this encourages y’all to collapse, develop, and weigh arguments instead of going for like 4 different voters (unless you weigh all four of them :) ).

(3) I care very little about what your cards say. I care a lot more about the warranting behind them. I will never vote on the idea that something is just "empirically true," although empirics do help when you're doing warrant comparisons/maybe a probability weighing analysis.

(4) I rarely receptive to progressive arguments (Ks/theory) unless there's a real instance of abuse in the round. I strongly dislike disclosure theory. If you don't know what that means, don't worry about it.

- and don't forget to have fun!

TOC 23 update: Senior at michigan, competed and coached PF on the nat circuit but haven't done much since 2021. Also have a policy background so I'll try to keep up with the technical stuff, just know I'm rusty.

-standard flow judge: frontline, extend, and weigh

-any speed is fine but ask opponents if you plan to go fast

-1st summary only needs defense if 2nd rebuttal frontlines

-the later an argument is made, the less i'll believe it

-theory/kritikal arguments are fine if made in accessible ways

-dont be a bad person and have fun

Feel free to ask any more specific questions before the round, if you wanna read more I judge similar to this guy.

I debated four years of public forum debate in high school for The Altamont School and now do APDA at Brown U.

I consider myself to be a really normal judge and don't have any really interesting demands, but here are some things that can help guide how you take on the round!

1) PRE-FLOW: please preflow before round! I will not let yall do it in the room if the round should have started already.

2) EXPLANATION: contextualize cards; explain why they are important and how they support your point/ interact with your opponents case. not doing this makes it really difficult as a judge to understand how you want the round to play out and usually leads to forced intervention

3) 2ND SPEAKING TEAM: you gotta cover turns in 2nd rebuttal. if you don't cover turns then it is offense for the first speaking team.

4) 1ST SPEAKING TEAM: you can extend defense from first rebuttal to final focus but pls try to have some in first summary. I expect at least some defense in 1st summary, especially since there are 3 minutes for the summary now.

5) WEIGHING: even if something is "clean-dropped" you still need to weigh it. I will have a hard time voting on any argument (no matter how cleanly extended) if I am not sure why it's important.

6) ARGUMENTS

A)if you are making an argument about harms to countries that are viewed as "developing" by a western hierarchical perspective, or discussing in your case or in weighing, please be respectful and don't make your own uncarded analysis about the struggles these countries have. I would also prefer not to hear weighing analyses about these countries that mention anything about "these countries have so little" etc.

B) if you are running an implementation/process of getting the bill to the public argument, do so at your own risk. I generally do not find these arguments persuasive or topical, and chances are that if your opponent says I should not evaluate those kind of arguments in a debate round I will drop it from my flow. An example of this is "the united states should not pass ____ because it would be torn up in the courts/loaded with riders."

C) if you are running an econ argument, please be sure to explain it really well in extensions in ff and summary. in my experience, econ rounds are the most difficult to judge because of clarity problems in link extensions and warranting, so make sure you spend time explaining it!

7) EXTENSIONS: don't extend through ink. interact with the argument you are responding to and dont just say "my opponents dropped ___" when they really did not. Frequent issues with extensions through ink lead to lower speaker points and a worse round :(

8) EVIDENCE: I will call for cards you tell me to call for if they are highly important to the debate round. I will also call for any card that seems too good to be true. Evidence ethics is very important and I will intervene if I catch faulty evidence

I agree with everything here: https://www.tabroom.com/index/paradigm.mhtml?judge_person_id=61812

For Blake 2020: Absolutely zero prior knowledge. Please explain everything to me.

However you want to debate in front of me is fine.

I won't require defense in first summary, unless second rebuttal frontlines.

Don't forget to have fun!

TL;DR: warrant, collapse, implicate, weigh, extend consistently and don't be offensive/rude. Add me to the email chain: Alina.shivji1@gmail.com

SPEED

Go as fast as you want, and I’ll flow it. If you’re unclear, I’ll say clear twice and then put my pen down. After that, what I can follow is entirely based on your clarity.

PROGRESSIVE ARGUMENTS

Feel free to read them. That said, these arguments don’t typically function well in PF due to time constraints. So, I do prefer substance in PF. If you do debate progressively, note that crossfire and flex prep serves as accountability on your advocacy. My default is reasonability. If you want me to approach these args from a different standpoint, tell me.

Feel free to read arguments about any of the -isms. But, make sure in the process, you’re not otherizing. For example, if you are not a Muslim woman who identifies with the LGBT+ community, don’t read arguments about it. Also, if you are reading any arguments concerning sexual harassment/assault/suicide/etc., I expect a trigger warning BEFORE the round.

EXTENSIONS

I have a high threshold for extensions. I expect you to extend the internal links to the argument as well as the impact. In other words, just tell me how you get from point A to C before you extend the impact. If you don’t, I’ll still evaluate the arg but I’ll be less inclined to vote for it.

Defense is sticky until it’s frontlined

FRONTLINING

respond to offensive responses ie turns and terminal defense before you access weighing in the second rebuttal

WEIGHING

Tell me WHY the extended argument matters more than your opponents. If your opponents give me a different mechanism than you to prefer their argument, explain why your mechanism should be evaluated first (metaweighing).

Don’t introduce new weighing in second FF unless your opponents made a critical weighing concession in GCX. The only other exception to that rule is when neither team has weighed up until the second FF.

INTERVENTION

I try not to intervene as much as possible. If there’s no offense in the round and its a policy-oriented topic, I’ll default neg aka the status quo. If it's not a policy-oriented topic, I'll default towards what's most probable.

I won’t call for evidence unless you tell me to. If the evidence is miscut, I won’t evaluate it and I will penalize your speaks for it.

TECH > TRUTH

If you didn't say it in the round, don't expect me to evaluate it regardless of how "true" the argument may be. That said, use common sense and have good judgement. If you say something incorrect, it won't influence my decision, but I will call you out after the round.

IMPLICATE!

The link to an argument matters but if you don't tell me HOW it fits in the round, I won't know what to do with it. So, tell me what argument serves as turns/terminal defense, why, and what that means for you/your opponents in the round.

I've been debating and coaching teams across the country for a while. Currently coaching Dreyfoos AL (Palm Beach Independent) and Poly Prep.

MAIN STUFF

I will make whichever decision requires the least amount of intervention. I don't like to do work for debaters but in 90% of rounds you leave me no other choice.

Here's how I make decisions

1) Weighing/Framework (Prereqs, then link-ins/short-circuits, then impact comparison i.e. magnitude etc.)

2) Cleanly extended argument across both speeches (summ+FF) that links to FW

3) No unanswered terminal defense extended in other team's second half speeches

I have a very high threshold for extensions, saying the phrase "extend our 1st contention/our impacts" will get you lower speaks and a scowl. You need to re-explain your argument from uniqueness to fiat to impact in order to properly "extend" something in my eyes. I need warrants. This also goes for turns too, don't extend turns without an impact.

Presumption flows neg. If you want me to default to the first speaking team you'll need to make an argument. In that case though you should probably just try to win some offense.

SPEAKING PREFS

I like analytical arguments, not everything needs to be carded to be of value in a round. (Warrants )

Signpost pls. Roadmaps are a waste of time 98% of the time, I only need to know where you're starting.

I love me some good framework. Highly organized speeches are the key to high speaks in front of me. Voter summaries are fresh.

I love T and creative topicality interps. Messing around with definitions and grammar is one of my favorite things to do as a coach.

Try to get on the same page as your opponents as often as possible, agreements make my decision easier and make me respect you more as a debater (earning you higher speaks). Strategic concessions make me happy. The single best way to get good speaks in front of me is to implicate your opponent's rebuttal response(s) or crossfire answers against them in a speech.

Frontlining in second rebuttal is smart but not required. It’s probably a good idea if they read turns.

Reading tons of different weighing mechanisms is a waste of time because 10 seconds of meta-weighing or a link-in OHKOs. When teams fail to meta-weigh or interact arguments I have to intervene, and that makes me sad.

Don’t extend every single thing you read in case.

PROCEDURAL LOGISTICS

My email is devon@victorybriefs.com

I'm not gonna call for cards unless they're contested in the round and I believe that they're necessary for my RFD. I think that everyone else that does this is best case an interventionist judge, and worst case a blatant prep thief.

Skipping grand is cringe. Stop trying to act like you're above the time structure.

Don't say "x was over time, can we strike it?" right after your opponent's speech. I'll only evaluate/disregard ink if you say it was over time during your own speech time. Super annoying to have a mini argument about speech time in between speeches. Track each other’s prep.

Don't say TKO in front of me, no round is ever unwinnable.

PROG STUFF

Theory's fine, usually frivolous in PF. Love RVIs Genuinely believe disclosure is bad for the event and paraphrasing is good, but I certainly won't intervene against any shell you're winning.

I will vote for kritikal args :-)

Just because you're saying the words structural violence in case doesn't mean you're reading a K

Shoutouts to my boo thang, Shamshad Ali #thepartnership