Samford University Bishop Guild Tournament
2021 — NSDA Campus, AL/US
Lincoln-Douglas Paradigm List
All Paradigms: Show HidePlease speak clearly, concisely, and slow enough that I can understand. Supporting your claims with factual evidence is a must. Be prepared on the topic, it is apparent when you are not. Have passion which will sway my vote. Attack the other competitor's claims with reason and evidence. Tell me what arguments you have refuted and why you win the argument. Christina.Cazzola@cobbk12.org
This paradigm does not apply to New Haven UDL students.
I was a parliamentary debater in the New Haven Urban Debate League for four years, and I've debated on the YDA for the past two years.
For Policy, I have no experience, and I'm not used to fast debate. I also strongly value clarity, both in terms of speaking and in argumentation. Respect your opponents, especially during CX.
For LD, I can handle a reasonable amount of speed, but please do not spread. I value framework pretty highly. You can certainly still win even if I accept the other team's framework, but you'll have an uphill battle. Please provide explicit voters for the round, and be sure to weigh these voters in your rebuttals. I'll be flowing regardless, but this makes my job much easier. Do not use theory.
Good luck and have fun!
I’m a parent judge with 2 years of judging experience with LD (traditional debate). I have a few preferences that need to be followed in order to persuade me:
· Speak clearly so that I can comprehend everything you are saying.
· Please keep your pace to a conversational speed so I can flow. If I miss something on the flow, I can’t vote based on it.
· Be civil and respectful within the round. There will be no racism, sexism, misogyny, belittling of your opponent, or personal criticism of your opponent. If you display any of these characteristics I will stop listening to you and drop you with low speaks.
· Framework is very important. You should have a clear value and value criterion that is well-warranted and explained clearly. You should apply it to all of your arguments made in the round and uphold it at the end. I should be able to tell what contention you’re speaking about and all of your separate points.
· The debate will be weighed on whose arguments and framework were the most clear, consistent, and carried throughout the round.
· Evidence should be extended, if your opponent doesn’t negate your evidence, make that clear to me and carry it throughout.
· Spell it out why I should vote for you, especially in your last speech.
· Having confidence is a huge key to winning. If you sound confident, you’re more than likely to convince me.
Add me to the chain: nrastogi5@yahoo.com
TLDR
1- K
2- Phil/Theory
3- Policy
Email: osayre@macalester.edu
Pronouns: He/him
General stuff:
I did LD in high school with varying degrees of success. I have been out of debate for a while so please don’t spread at 100% speed. Be clear and slow down on what is most important to your argument. Tech > truth (usually). Don’t be racist/sexist/transphobic. Specifically, I will not vote for arguments premised on racism, sexism, transphobia, etc, and speaks will be dropped if you say exclusionary and hurtful things in the round. As long as everything is clear, I will judge your arguments and will not take into account style, level of experience, manners, etc.
Ks:
This is what I did the most in high school. I read a lot of Baudrillard and lefty stuff, so that’s what I know the best. However, I am willing to accept any sort of K and am familiar with most of the literature. I appreciate clear structure in Ks and if you use the same argument for different parts of the debate that needs to be clear. Because I know this the best, I might have some biases toward it. However, I will not default to K over other args like theory or policy and will be annoyed if you don’t understand your own arguments/don’t know how to run a K. K affs and nontopical affs are fine but I will be annoyed if you aren’t prepared against T.
Phil:
I know a lot about phil and read a lot of it in lower level debate. If you are mixing this with theory you can try to be tricky, but sacrifice clarity at your own risk. If I don’t know exactly how phil and theory intersect and what their effect is on the round by the NR/2AR then that is on you. Otherwise, do what you want.
Theory:
Fine with tricky stuff I just need you to tell me the implications of theory directly by the end of the round. I am a bit biased against disclosure theory, but will vote on it if you win the argument. Theory and Ks can interact on the same level and I don’t presume theory > K. Meta theory > theory. I prefer competing interps and drop the arg. Text > spirit of the interp.
Policy:
Fine with this as well but I have less experience running it. I will probably be the harshest on truth>tech for policy. If you say something that is categorically false and I have to decide the debate on it, I will be annoyed. Please weigh impacts. If you don’t you will probably lose.
EMAIL CHAIN: jsydnor@altamontschool.org -- all rounds should set up email chains before designated start time. I would like to be included.
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-Former college and HS policy debater (2004-2012). Experience with all kinds of policy styles, but my endpoint was K. Open to most arguments and styles.
-Speed: 7.5/10. Speed is fine but debate is still a communication-based activity and I'm a poorly aging millennial. Sending speech docs is not a substitute for clarity.
-I have a hard time voting for something I cannot confidently verbalize in an RFD and explain why it impacts my ballot, even if it "feels" like that side is winning the issue. I do not feel bad saying "I didn't understand this, so I didn't vote on it."
-I don't buy into the argument division between "circuit" and "local" debate and that I should intervene to secure the boundary. Argument/method exclusion needs to be theoretically justified.
-CP: I default sufficiency framing and will judge kick unless told otherwise. Would rather hear args about solvency deficit, perm, and issues with NB than rely on theory to answer.
-K: I think all forms of debate are great, but K's and K Affs offer something unique to the activity that enhances its pedagogical value. However, that doesn't mean I know your specific literature or that I am going to immediately buy what you're selling. I like close readings of the 1AC to generate links as quality critical work.
-K Affs: Like them. I believe the Aff has to advance some contestable methodology beyond "res is bad, reject the res." I usually believe offense on method is the most interesting site for clash. T-USFG/FW isn't off the table as a true guaranteed generic response and can be a really strong option given the way some K teams write their 1AC.
-Theory: Sure. Go a little slower in a T/theory debate if you want me to get follow the intricacies of the line-by-line. I have some hesitation with the direction disclosure and wiki theory arguments are going, but I still vote on it.
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LINCOLN-DOUGLAS:
-I come into LD from policy, and I love seeing where LD and policy are in communication with one another. While I'm familiar with K's, CP's, PICs, plan-focus debates, K Affs that don't defend the res/a plan, T, Theory... I'm less familiar with some of the other arguments like high phil, a prioris, NIBs, etc. that are more well known in LD. The burden remains with the debater to make it into a lucid argument I can grasp and understand as offense.
-T vs Plan Affs -- I've noticed a trend of LD plan Affs relying on analytic counter-interps (like mainstream theory debates) and reasonability. I believe plans have the burden to be topical, and topicality is determined by interpreting words in the resolution. Has the Neg read a definition that excludes your plan? If yes, you have a baseline burden to counter-define in a way that is inclusive of your Aff. I am very persuaded that, absent a "we meet," if the Aff cannot counter-define a word in the resolution that is inclusive of the plan then I should consider them unreasonable and with no competing interpretation. (K Affs can be an exception to most of this because the offense to T and method of establishing limits is different.)
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PUBLIC FORUM
-I reward specificity and nuance of arguments/scenarios (ex: specific democracies backsliding vs general democratic backsliding; specific country proliferation vs generic prolif bad)
-I am not part of the cult of numbers, and you can win a round with high magnitude impacts that do not have numbers in front of me. Numbers help contextualize impacts and risk pathways, but it is not game over because a team has expert analysis that doesn't have explicit quantification.
NOTES ON EVIDENCE - PF
Evidence practices in public forum (and some sections of LD) are atrocious. The fault lies somewhere between debaters and judges refusing to be more aggressive in correction. I default to tournament rules first, and then enforce the NSDA established protocols in the official Unified Manual (specifically pages 29-33) for what’s required in debates in terms of having cards ready for opponents and judges with proper citation. This is not a “personal choice,” even if other judges choose not to enforce it. Here is how I go into the round thinking about evidence norms:
Evidence Theory: I will vote on it. Good theory debating will have a clear interpretation (the NSDA unified manual makes this easy), the violation, and the reason why your interpretation is preferable ("it's in the rules, judge" is sufficient, but higher speaker points for identifying educational standards for why we need your interp's evidence practices). But if you're going to do it you need to be ready to stop the round and stake the ballot on it.
Evidence Sharing/E-mail Chains: The other team is entitled to any and all evidence you claim to read in a speech immediately. Yes, all and immediately. This has nothing to do with if you spread or go slow. Debate is at its best when there is evidence engagement... so why are you so invested in hiding the thing your argument depends on to win legitimacy? I will vote on a well articulated "we called for all ev and they couldn't give it in a reasonable time" theory if they don't provide evidence before a speech AND can't give you ALL evidence when requested after the speech. If you can stake a debate on any piece of evidence you just read it is unreasonable to say that you don't have to send everything cited, especially since they can't predict what you might blow up yet. Don't hold up the round searching. Honestly y'all should be sending it before the speech like policy started doing in 2007 with the dawn of Verbatim - and it's worked great!
Paraphrasing: It is difficult for me to vote on paraphrasing bad theory. The NSDA stance is clear and codified in the Unified Manual and explained in Pilot Rules 2019-20. Paraphrasing is acceptable, but you still have to have evidence paraphrased available in card format for in-round engagement and judge decision making. Do I think paraphrasing is probably bad for debate? Yes - absolutely. But ballot-level debates on whether it's fair or educational seem moot given the NSDA has greenlit it in the same rules that dictate speech times, orders, and other key rules I don't have in-round jurisdiction to contest. Still: hold their feet to the fire on providing the evidence they are paraphrasing!