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Illinois Debate Coaches Association Novice JV State Championshi

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Ahmad Abughosh Glenbrook South High School 2 rounds

Vignesh Alla Glenbrook South High School 5 rounds

Last changed on Sat September 26, 2020 at 3:37 AM CDT

Vignesh Alla

-Member of the Glenbrook South Debate Society from 2012-2016 (Policy)

-Qualified for the TOC my Senior Year (Surveillance Topic)

-Was 2N, 2A, and Double 2s at various points during high school

Topic: To be upfront, I do not have an extensive amount of knowledge about this Topic. What this should mean to you (assuming you want to win) is that the team that does a better job of appealing to my lack of topic knowledge will be served well. This means using acronyms and abbreviations that I would only know if I was doing topic research will probably just confuse me. I am willing to answer questions about this before the round if you are concerned and I place this section in my philosophy to be fair to the debaters that I am judging. Nothing would have annoyed me more than to have lost a round if a judge didn't know what "NSA" stood for, but the onus is on you to convey important pieces of information like that to me. I am letting you know in advance so that the round is judged based on who debated better and not based on what I did and did not know.

Topicality: Explain your interpretation and what would and would not be allowed under that model of the topic. T debates are good when both teams have a nuanced and thought out reason for why each aff should and should not be allowed in the topic and are horrible when both teams assert "limits" and "ground" without explaining what that means in the context of the topic. Tell me what arguments you lose links to or competition for or why your "limit" on the topic is good. I don't know what affs are considered to be "core of the topic" so don't just assume I'll believe you when you say "X aff is core of the topic". It is probably best to explain what the topic should be and why rather than relying on what the topic has become. Reasonability only makes sense if you have a counter-interpretation, Aff's are not "reasonably topical", but interpretations of the topic can be "good enough".

Disadvantages: Never liked the politics DA, and probably hold the record for least 2NRs on the Politics DA as a GBS debater. Other than that, most are fine. It is possible to win zero risk of a link and I won't buy "any risk" arguments unless there is a CP that solves the aff. Impact calculus is important but I am much more persuaded by the validity of internal links. I will not make this argument for you, but if you argue that the probability of a set of internal link chains is low, then the impact is a function of the risk of those internal link chains. All of this applies for 1AC advantages as well.

Counterplans: My favorite arguments. Well written and thought out Counterplans are the bane of any 2As existence and for good reason. I am looking for good solves case, avoids net-benefit, and sufficiency framing. I ran advantage CPs, Agent CPs, Process CPs, Consult CPs, and more. I am probably neg leaning on theory unless you can prove the CP is a probable way the aff can be implemented. The stronger your reasons for a CP being theoretically illegitimate are probably reasons why Perm: Do the CP is a good argument. Even if in my mind they are pretty similar, I'd rather vote on Perm: Do the CP than on "this Counterplan is cheating". 2NC CPs are fair game if they amend a 1NC text, but a wholly new 2NC CP will probably need some 1NR theory justification or I'd buy that making the 1AR answer a new advocacy is not fair/a good model for debate.

Kritik: I liked reading and going for Ks against K affs or affs I didn't have a great case neg to. If you have another solid viable option, it is probably best to go for that than a K in the 2NR. I probably know what K you are reading, but you should still act as if I don't. Bad Kritik debates happen when using big words takes precedence over making arguments. The Best K debaters explain how the assumptions that the K highlights turn the aff and should be a reason to question or throw out an affirmative method/ontology/epistemology etc. I never went for Framework on a K as a reason to ignore the aff but it can easily be won that I should look at other things besides just the results of 1AC implementation. Likewise, I will most likely not buy the "FW means Ks unfair/shouldn't be allowed" argument. Alts are usually explained pretty poorly and a solid line of C-X can highlight some pretty big flaws in them. Perms of a K are a function of how much and how strong of a link you are winning. Strong Link=Weak Perm and I think the Perm is a pretty large threat against the K so winning a solid link is your #1 priority when extending a K. A link of omission will lose 100 out of 100 times to perm do both. The less and less a K argument seemingly interacts with an affirmative the more and more likely it will lose on no link or perm.

Framework: I really didn't think Framework was much different than topicality. I went for it most of the times I was deabating a Kritikal or planless Affs. FW isn't genocide etc. Regardless of if you are aff or neg explain to me why your model of the topic is better. For planless K affs, explain how the aff is predictable or how your interp is reasonable. Winning that planless affs are ok for debate is an uphill battle if I am judging. I've voted for K affs before, but I find the reasons for why they should not be allowed to be more persuasive. "Do it on the Neg" and "Wrong Forum/Round not Key" are underrated.

Theory: Competition and FW were covered above, so this is section is about conditionality. 2 Condo is fine. 3 is pushing it. You probably won't win 1 condo bad unless they drop it. Ask what dispo is cause after 4 years of debate I still don't know and I won't even default to it being anything. Each plank of a CP you can kick is another conditional world.

Speaker Points: I reward CLARITY. I repeat, I reward CLARITY. I don't care if you are the best debater in a generation, if I cannot understand what words come out of your mouth I will think you are bad. Speed is not an issue if you are clear when reading and I never believed that "going 80% as fast as your max" does anything because you can be CLEAR at any speed as long as you are focusing on it. I reward good arguments with a Win but I reward how you sound with points. Debate is both a research and communication activity and debate does not exist without both. I will not follow along with a speech doc so you have to be clear enough so that I get down arguments you want me to. My points range is pretty large and I usually give points from anywhere from 26 to a 29.5. If you get lower than 26, then something besides your argumentation and clarity is the issue. Above a 29.5 and you did exceptionally well.

General Thoughts: C-X=Speech, Tech over Truth, there is not an argument that I will throw out because of "stupidity" if an argument is that stupid it should be easy enough to defeat.

People who have influenced how I view debate: Tara Tate, Jon Voss, Neil Patel, Chris Callahan, Chris Coleman, Ben Wolch, Bill Batterman, Dylan Quigley, Tyler Thur

If you have any questions feel free to ask them before the round.

Bryant Bahena Solorio Academy High School 5 rounds

Sohan Bellam Glenbrook North 3 rounds

Ana Bojinov Niles North High School 3 rounds

Eemaan Butt Lane Tech College Prep H.S. 5 rounds

Ana Carpenter Walter Payton College Prep 5 rounds

Kyujin Derradji Northside College Preparatory 5 rounds

Last changed on Tue February 13, 2024 at 11:21 AM CDT

STANFORD & BERKELEY 24: Very thin working knowledge of the topic. Proceed assuming I know almost nothing, ESPECIALLY in heavy econ debates

my name is kyujin (pronounced Q-jin) – he/him, toc elim debater & il state champion @ northside from 2017-21, coaching @ interlake since 2021. email chain: kyujinderradji@gmail.com and interlakescouting@googlegroups.com.

trying to update this once or twice a year every year that I’m active; debaters spend thousands of hours researching and preparing for tournaments, and the least i can do to maximize the benefits that come from that is to let you know how i will approach evaluating the things you prepared to say.

TLDR: no hard and fast rules except that I will not evaluate death good, and i am heavily biased against strategies that eschew line-by-line debating. if you read a planless aff i would put me lower than “k-friendly” judges but not at the bottom of your pref sheet.

LONGER:

top level –

· i have substantive preferences (of course, everyone does even if they don’t say so) BUT those should not change the way you debate. debates are best when debaters are not just Saying The Words They Were Told To Say, but rather when all the debaters have evidently been thinking about their position and making refined and clear arguments that are not intended to confuse but instead to persuade. while, of course, you will not persuade me that we should kill social security to prevent the Hat Man from haunting your dreams, my role is to evaluate the effectiveness of your communication in attempting to prove that such is true.

· additionally, i will exclude arguments prefaced off events that happened outside of what i have witnessed in the debate, ad homs, or otherwise accusatory statements. i will err towards facilitating the continuation of the debate unless it becomes clear that is no longer possible, in which case i will follow tabroom procedure and maximize opportunities to ensure the well-being of the debaters directly affected by malicious and/or harmful behavior.

· do not attempt to pander to me!! there’s obviously a level of comfortability and camaraderie that i think is good and appropriate in the setting of a debate, but ultimately i am almost out of college. many older people in debate lack boundaries when engaging with high schoolers that honestly makes me very uncomfortable. i appreciate being friendly/relaxed etc, and i encourage that, but please do not act like we are old buddies or make comments that you wouldn’t make to a teacher.

· people who have shaped the way i think about debate: john turner, shree awsare, dml, holland bald, luther snagel, addison kane, wayne tang, all of northside c/o '19

pet peeves –

· clarity. i will not clear you. it's up to you to be as clear as possible even if that means sacrificing speed. having to give an rfd where i tell you that i couldn't understand a third of what you were saying is frustrating annoying for me and embarrassing for you.

· kicking stuff. not kicking out of stuff correctly, even if it doesn’t do you any strategic harm, is a very bad look and your speaks will suffer.

· cx. barring the aff is new or you are mav, you must either do cross ex for all 3 minutes or end early. you cannot use cross ex for prep.

speaker points –

· speaker points will be rewarded by knowing what you are talking about, doing research, clarity, strategic vision, and being funny. speaker points will be docked by rudeness/undue assertiveness, lack of clarity, and lack of strategic vision.

· doing my best to accommodate new trends in speaker points even if i might disagree with them. i understand how frustrating it is to have stingy judges give low speaks and jeopardize seeding/breaking.

decision calc –

· tech over truth. BUT! that requires you extend a claim, warrant, and impact. a 2nr should extend an impact and do impact comparison, not something like “they dropped impact #3 in the 1nr, extinction, don’t make me reinvent the wheel” – bad bad bad. setting yourself up for failure at the hands of a smart 2a.

· i need your arguments to make sense – that’s really really crucial. seems like a truism but unfortunately it is not.

evidence –

· i care a lot about evidence quality – i'd say more than the average judge. research is the largest/most valuable portable skill from debate and i will look for ways to reward teams who have clearly conducted original, innovative, and/or high-quality research and can demonstrate the knowledge that research has imparted them with.

· i do read evidence (not every time, but if I feel so compelled) but i will not include that into my decision unless evidence is a subject of disagreement.

· I will read more than the highlighting, but I will only evaluate the un-highlighted portion if I think that you have misrepresented it in a way that makes the evidence read better than it is i.e. you selectively highlight words or ignore paragraphs to make your evidence look more conclusive. I will not include warrants from ev in my decision that you have not read obviously.

· rehighlightings are obvi great, you can insert them, as long as it’s not egregious. You can’t insert cards from other articles that an author has written in order to indict them – you have to read that. the point of inserting recuttings is just to point to the other team’s own evidence and provide direction as to what specifically is at issue with it. introducing other articles obviously requires you read them, because that is not evidence read by the other team.

· caveat to the above – please! make sure you are not mis-recutting evidence. It will look like you didn’t actually read the evidence and assumed it was miscut. Your speaks will suffer.

the rest of this paradigm are my opinions on various positions, but matter much less than what was just said above.

planless affs/framework –

· 70-30 neg. one of the two hardest things for the aff in these debates are when the aff does not have a meaningful reason why debates over the resolution are bad, as opposed to the resolution itself. this usually requires some kind of exclusionary critique of the idea of debating the topic entirely, which is a pretty high bar to clear imo. the other barrier to an aff ballot in my mind is the role of debate. what is the ballot’s function? what does it mean if i vote aff or neg? why is debating the 1ac valuable fro the neg? all of these are questions I think the aff must be able to answer, and often they cannot to a satisfactory degree. given the aff is choosing to forego a traditional defense of the resolution, i think the burden of proof is set significantly higher because the aff must then establish a new set of criteria by which to evaluate the debate – which also often lends to the neg’s predictability offense on framework.

· i heavily prefer impacts pertinent to the process of debate rather than its substance (paraphrased from holland <3). topic education and the like tend to ignore the way that competition/resolutional wording distorts how we approach the topic – and lend themselves to internal link turns absent substantive defense to the 1ac’s thesis claims.

· all good for a da/pic against a planless aff – my favorite debates v k affs senior year were going for tech good against a “zoom bad” aff and heg good against a mao aff.

· NOT good for k v k debates. i will likely be confused and you will likely be unhappy with my decision.

counterplans –

· :thumbs-up:

· fine for intricate competition debates BUT i will need arguments to be warranted – saying “their interp justifies x” is sometimes not immediately intuitive for me, so just err on the side of explaining things more.

· agree with like everyone else that counterplans can’t simply identify an aff internal link and write a plank to the effect of “solve x impact”. it’s like making an alt cause argument that explains no alt causes.

· i won’t automatically judge kick a counterplan.

· i am neg leaning on basically all theory. most theory is better articulated as a competition argument. i am not a good judge for teams who shotgun 1ar extensions of conditionality and make it 5 minutes of the 2ar – obviously can be a legitimate strategy but it feels like it has recently become a safety net for teams who are afraid of debating substance. also, please slow down in heavy theory debates.

disads –

· :thumbs-up:

· comparison and narrative-telling are the most important. telling me why I should care about your thing and using examples/common threads from evidence is very helpful and demonstrates a lot of skill.

t v plans –

· :thumbs-up:

· there should only really be two kinds of t debates to me: one that gets to the core of a topic disagreement (i.e. t-enact on CJR or t-AOS on immigration) and one that points out an egregious instance of a violation. outside of these two instances, i’ll tend to err aff.

· i prefer t debates with lots of evidence, warrants, and little repetition. limits is the best neg impact and (usually) precision or aff ground are the best aff impacts.

k’s vs. plans –

· yes for most. i think these are best executed when they function as an impact turn to core ideological assumptions of the plan. the more the k is [insert theory – no perm because footnote DA] or reps k of [one of your 9 impacts], the less I will be a fan.

· ideally, the function of your framework argument should be to ratchet down the importance of having a coherent alternative.

· i generally quite dislike "you link, you lose", and i have a pretty low threshold for voting aff on framework in these debates. giving the aff some kind of access to their consequences (at least as a defense of their epistemology) will make me much more receptive to a research or epistemology k.

Chris Dressler Glenbrook South High School 2 rounds

Nadia Firozabadi Niles West High School 4 rounds

Last changed on Wed October 6, 2021 at 7:24 AM EDT

niles west '19

University of Michigan '24

she/her

put me on email chain - nadia.f427@gmail.com

last update: January 2021

if you have any additional questions please email or ask me

background!

I debated competitively at Niles West for 4 years. I was a 2a/1n for most of my career but was a 2n/1a for a couple of months. I was a policy debater in high school, but my partner and I did go for the k often. I received a bid to the toc and have been in many bid rounds. I don't know the topic at all.

aff!

Explain your aff to me with a clear story. Use your impacts and extend them throughout the debate, I love impact debates. I really like it when teams use their aff to answer off case positions and make cross applications in the 2ac.

neg!

My main thing is to have applicable arguments against the aff, I don't like arbitrary off case that are just 1nc fillers. I am fine with reading as many off as you want, but I hate big a 1nc that is just to spread the 2ac thin. If you have a big 1nc at least have a strategy that goes along with it. I don't like huge neg blocks, but I get it sometimes.

cp!

Love love counterplan debates, but I am picky. Advantage counterplans are my favorite and I will be very happy with a smart one, but giant adv multiplank cp without a real solvency advocate are ehhh. Process cp are good IF competitive, so please have a clear cp competition debate if that is your strat. Please don't forget the net benefit debate though! I think net benefits are a huge part of the cp debate. I lean aff on cp theory.

I am not a good judge for the k. Please extra explain things for me, I do not know all of your k jargon. Keep the debate clean and have a real link/impact.

I love a good T debate. I am not super knowledgeable on the arms sales topic so please explain your interps for me. I lean aff on reasonability. I don't like aspec, sorry. Impacts to your standards are super important to me.

da!

DA and case debates are awesome. I am tech over truth, except when it is too true. Love love turns case and case turns da arguments!

k aff!

I don't love k affs. I am better for k affs with some topic relevance and think those are the more strategic. I am neg leaning on fw, but I will vote for aff cause tech over truth. Please explain your aff to me because the chances of me understanding your aff are very low.

theory!

I love condo debates and think 2-3 condo worlds are ok. I am down to hear any theory debates, but they need to be full arguments and not fake small theory arguments. Either go all-in on theory or not at all.

speaks!

Don't clip and be nice and respectful to not only me but especially to your opponents! If you say anything racist, sexist, or hateful I will vote you down and give minimum speaks. Please have a subject line clarifying the tournament and round on your email chains! Other than that, just be clear & smart and you are good. If you know me then you know what jokes to make to help your speaks.

Hannah Foster Glenbrook North 5 rounds

Lily Gies Walter Payton College Prep 5 rounds

Last changed on Tue April 23, 2024 at 5:57 AM CDT

Lily - she/they - not "judge" :)

Walter Payton ‘22

Michigan ‘26

Please include me on the email chain - lily.g.debate@gmail.com
Please send word docs, not google docs :)

First and foremost, BE NICE TO EACH OTHER, and do not be arrogant. Debate is (supposed to be) fun!

I love debate. It was one of the best parts of my high school career and is something I actively enjoy doing in college. Debate is for the debaters. I will work as hard as possible while judging and will give the same care and commitment to the debate that I would like if I was debating.

I have done both kinds of argumentation: policy and kritikal. I feel comfortable evaluating either. That said, I am unfamiliar with the HS topic, so please be deliberate in explaining key concepts.

I will not vote on things that happened out of round.

If you read an ethics violation, I will ask if you want me to stop the round and go to Tab. If you do not want me to do that, I will ignore said violation.

That being said, I’m good to vote on pretty much any argument that is likely to be introduced, as long as there are warrants to do so. I would vote on wipeout, afropessimism, Russia war good, libertarianism, structural violence is a d-rule that outweighs extinction, spark, the reverse security K, framework is a micro-aggression that outweighs the impacts to their model, T 3-tier, etc. Harassment in round becomes a Tabroom issue, but I am extremely confident that any argument introduced by debaters trying to win will be okay, and the only limiting factor will be my ability to keep up with the flow.

I don't like judges who pretend to be tech over truth but then vote on the perceived quality of an argument. Whether or not a judge "buys" an argument is irrelevant to whether or not a debater won that argument. I read arguments I don't believe and will try to win on them, I expect you all to do the same. I will reward the strategic deployment and technical execution of bad arguments; I will not punish the better debaters for being scrappy.

In person:

- Make sure you're facing me during CX and speeches.

Online:

- Please turn your cameras ON for CX and during speeches, it'll be better for your speaks! Plus looking at an actual person talk is so much more interesting that staring at a black box for 8 minutes.

- My camera will always be on, if it isn't that usually means there is a problem with my wifi/tech so wait until you can see me before you start your speech.

- When sending speech docs PLEASE do not just share one big 2AC/2NC/1NR doc that has every arg your team prepped and then make me scroll through it while you skip the args that were not read in the round. You should send a doc that only has cards you are going to read that are relevant to the round.

Nathan Glancy Niles West High School 4 rounds

Last changed on Fri January 26, 2024 at 8:36 AM CDT

Last Updated: November, 2023. Please put me on the chain: nathanglancy124@gmail.com

***Background***

Debated at:

Niles West High School (2014-2018)

Trinity University (2018-2020)

Michigan State University (2020-2023)

Coached for:

Winston Churchill (2018-19)

Niles West High School (2020-2023)

Niles North HS (2023-now)

University of Wyoming (2023-now)

I debated for 9 years, all the way from Oceans to Personhood. I've been a 2n for longer than I've been a 2a, but at heart I am a 2a. I currently coach at Niles North High School in northwest Chicagoland and do remote coaching for the University of Wyoming. I went for policy-style arguments throughout my debate career and relied on debate to help realize/finance my college education. Debate's done a lot for me and I'd like to think I'm doing what I can for debate. If you already know me, say hi!! If you don't know me yet, don't mind the fact that I have a grumpy resting face! I'm not shy and would love to show you pictures of my dog.

***TL;DR***

I really want to ensure you all have a satisfying judging experience. I think this means it is my role as a judge to try my best to render a decision based on the arguments made in the debate. I care about debate's existence and success. I hope that is reflected in my feedback and my efforts as a judge.

High school debaters will do well in front of me if they keep the round organized and moving, show their motivation to improve/learn/win, and maintain a positive approach to the round despite the competitive nature of debate. They'll do even better if this is coupled with good, SPECIFIC arguments :)

College Debaters should consider me capable of judging whatever you need me to. I don't have any large predispositions and therefore I would consider myself quite impressionable if faced with good judge instruction and application of arguments at the end of the debate.

I have comparatively lower amounts of college topic knowledge - fair word of warning for acronyms

*Non-argument Things*

CLIPPING: I am soooooo done with people getting away with murder clipping everywhere. In that light, I will now start dropping non-novice teams that meet my minimum standard for clipping. Triggering any one of these conditions will result in an immediate loss after the speech, with minimum speaks to the individual who does it...

1. Speaker skips a paragraph of a card in a speech

2. Speaker skips a sentence that is 10 or more words in a speech

3. Speakers skips 3-5 words 5 times within a speech

4. Speaker systematically skips 1-2 words throughout a speech

Speaks: I will reward speaks mostly on the following criteria...

1. How did you impact your team's ability to win?

2. How did you impact my judging? Did something impress me?

3. Mastery of Material - "knowing what's going on" at the highest level

4. Mastery of Tech/Organization - did you cause/fix any unnecessary/avoidable decision time hurdles?

Clarity: I'm starting to care way way more about the clarity of argument communicated earlier for how I assess risk later in the debate. I really feel like rewarding good packaging of arguments, labeling, and organization that guides the judge through what you're saying AND why that matters. I will try and highly prioritize this analysis over reading every card and seeing who did the better research project. However, instructing me to read a portion of a card obviously constitutes a form of argument that I will take into account.

Conduct: The more we have good vibes in the round, the better the experience will be for everyone. Feel free to have competitive spirit, but don't let that turn you into an unlikeable person!! That's not a winning recipe. Also I am a fan of corny humor, often to a fault. I have given one 30 in my lifetime, and it was to someone who's joke made me uncontrollably laugh during the 2ar (they lost). Don't reach for a bad joke though that's never funny.

Online Debate: Before EVERY speech and EVERY CX, please confirm that everyone is here AND that the sound is clear! Feel free to do camera on or off, I understand everyone has their reasons. Please be understanding of the different complications of online debate and let's do everything we can to keep online accessible and effective. Oh and I HATE prep stealing and doing it while online doesn't excuse it.

***Argument Things***

Case:

I should understand a consistent explanation of the 1ac and its advantages throughout the debate. Changing this narrative or being dodgy/vague is easily subject to punishment by a good neg team. AFF teams should punish teams that are light on case using clear 2ac articulations of dropped arguments instead of being equally as vague. 2NRs on case should focus on identifying what AFF impacts your case defense is responding to.

I am starting to get really tired of bad highlighting here and teams that point this out can mitigate offense here.

DAs:

They're cool, but oh my gosh do teams double, triple, quadruple turn themselves with these so often! I don't care about spamming DAs, but I wish more AFF teams would exploit contradictions in "neg flex". Neg teams can best win their DAs by getting impact framing out early and being clear about 1ar concessions to establish a high risk of your offense.

I am starting to get really tired of bad highlighting here and teams that point this out can mitigate offense here.

I think explaining your vision of the topic is one of the most underrated and underutilized ways to win a T debate. Please just explain to me why in your squad room you decided that T made sense? What's the "core thing" that the AFF did that is the controversy being debated?

Things that help a lot: TVA, case-list of good AFFs under your interpretation, case-list of bad AFFs under their interpretation, definition comparison, explanation of neg ground under your interpretation AND the other teams'.

Theory:

I HATE bad theory arguments and don't want to vote on them, but I hate teams that don't flow slightly more so I will vote on that stuff (and if I miss one line ASPEC that's on you, debate's a communication activity!). Bad theory debating is a one way ticket to low speaks, but good theory debating can drastically alter how rounds go down.

I'm pretty good for theory all things considered. I went for states CP theory a lot on the education topic and am a 2a at heart, but as someone who was a 2n I understand the deep, deep love we share for condo. I feel like the best theory debaters are FLOWABLE while doing their theory debating, SPECIFIC in their impact articulation beyond just talking about clashing and doing some fair education, and INSTRUCTIVE to the judge on questions of impact comparison and justifying new arguments.

CPs:

CPs are defense and should be explained in the context of what it is defending against (the 1ac's mandate, evidence, and how the advantages are explained). This is how I often think about deficits and how a CP implicates my ballot. Re-cutting the 1ac/AFF evidence is usually the gold standard for proving a CP sufficiently solves. I feel like fore-fronting how you explain a CP early and not deviating from that is the best way to ensure you don't bring in new explanations so I don't let the AFF get new answers. I lowkey hate process CPs but sometimes it must be done.

Ks:

I'm better for the K than you think, but likely need more judge instruction about how to apply X argument. Better for evidence-heavy OR depth-focused debate. Any amount of generic evidence is best addressed through specific analysis.

"Exceeds expectations"/I've gone for: Cap, Security, Biopolitics/Agamben

"Meeting expectations"/I feel fine judging: Set Col, Anti-blackness (Nihilism, Pessimism, to name a few), Orientalism/Colonialism, Imperialism, Queer pessimism, Trans pessimism, Ableism

"Needs improvement"/err towards over-explaining: Psychoanalysis, Bataille, Heideggerian stuff, Baudrillard, Deleuze

I have not judged a KvK debate yet.

Framework:

I almost exclusively went for t-usfg/framework in HS and college, but that doesn't make me care about dropping a policy team. Impact articulation matters for me but far too often I find teams blending concepts such as fairness and clash in incoherent ways. I don't care about the label, but rather the underling explanation and how it is being applied in the debate. If you have any other questions look at Josh Harrington's philosophy on K AFFs, that'll reflect roughly how I feel.

Nate's sliding scales about debate:

Tech/Truth----------------------------X-Facts are Facts & Dropped args are as true as the warrants conceded

Condo-------X----------------------Respect the Aff Peasant (have and will vote on it, clear args in the 1ar key)

Process CP/Normal Means Competition----------------------------X- 100 plank case-specific advantage CP

Super Big CP-----------------X------------Deep Case Debating

Simply saying "Sufficiency Framing"-----------------------------X-Explain why CP solves sufficiently

Zero Risk Framing----------X-------------------Any Risk Framing

Perm Double Bind--------------X---------------Haha Silly Policy Hacks

Deb8=Karl Rove----------------------------X-That was one dude

Salad K----------------------------X-Single K Thesis

Economic Growth----------------------------X-( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

***Miscellaneous***

Email chain is always preferable to anything else barring tech issues

I don't like cards in the body of the email... but nobody seems to care... oh well...

I am fine with open cx. All people should be.

The Prep Rule: I will increase speaks from what I would have given by .1 for every minute of prep not used - speaks can be earned by specifically telling me the balance of prep your team had remaining before their last rebuttal. Capped at .5 boosted speaks.

Massive pet peeve: if you call a CP a "see-pee" I will think about it so much that it might disrupt my flowing and you might instantly lose (I am being sarcastic).

here's a photo collage about debate that I made in high school:

Image result for T Related image Image result for impact turn Image result for criticism bad

Colin Goldberg Glenbrook South High School 1 rounds

Rachael Gu Whitney M. Young Magnet High School 5 rounds

Dennis Guno Glenbrook North 5 rounds

Cesar Gutierrez Solorio Academy High School 5 rounds

Last changed on Wed April 7, 2021 at 4:47 PM CDT

Solorio ’21

Any pronouns are coolio.

cesargutierrez.email@gmail.com

If CPS: cgutierrez38@cps.edu

General:

Tech>Truth.

I'll usually vote on anything if well-articulated.

Impact calc is good.

Have fun.

Don't be a jerk.

Clarity over speed.

***Specifics***

Case:

Always important. I do think most teams nowadays are doing less of it. A good 2nr/2ar should always give me a story of what is happening and how I should evaluate it. Overviews are good... just don't forget the line by line. Tell me how the advantage interacts with the disad or kritik and what that means.

Disadvantages:

Love these. I always want a good thorough story of the DA [assume I don't know anything about it]. Turns case should always be there, tell me how your DA interacts with the aff [Don't just be like "Extinction turns the aff", tell me how your impact or Link specifically affects the aff. Blocks are good, just don't rely on them too much. I prefer impact analysis on top instead of an overview. Compare your cards to theirs, "Our card is more recent, qualified, etc...". Every part of the DA is important. You do have to win every part of the DA [Same for Advantages] If they drop a DA [or anything] don't just say "they dropped it", give me a reason why I should care, what does it mean that they dropped it, you get the picture. Link turns case is a really good argument.

Counterplans:

CP and DA is always a good move. Adv cp + impact turn = my fave. You do have to win the net benefit. Won’t vote on a Counterplan without it. 100 planks? Of course. Agent Counterplans are amazing, just make sure to establish competition. Love Pics, the aff does have to win the entire Plan is a good idea. Always remember to answer theory on the CP. Explain how you access the aff's internal links and do the work. Competition determines legitimacy for CPs - if a CP is a legitimate opportunity cost to the aff, aff theory arguments are a bit less persuasive to me.

Topicality:

If you do go for it make sure it's a full 5 minutes. None of this T, CP, and Disad nonsense. Impact out both your standards and theirs. Give me reasons to prefer reasonability and competing interps. Probably need examples of in-round abuse. ASPEC is pure banter. Just don't drop it 2as.

Theory:

This is always an important part of the debate. 3 condo is probably the max. Prove to me why rejecting the team is necessary. If you have to think "is this counterplan shady/cheating". It probably is.

Kritiks:

I find them interesting, explain your theory of power, philosophy, etc. Explain the alt very clear, and how it resolves the impact to the K. I am most familiar in the following, Cap/Neolib, Security, Settler Colonialism, Ableism. Links specific to the aff are amazing. [It has to be why the aff links and not the squo]. Long overviews? Sure why not but don’t just read it and be like “Line by line, done above, done above, done above”. Framework is important, don't undercover this in rebuttals. The vague alt argument isn't very convincing unless made iffy in CX. The alt needs to solve case, establish root cause claims. Not my Baudrillard < Yes, its your Baudrillard.

K Affs:

"Good luck to you" - Conor Cameron 2019.

Misc:

Roadmaps [This is copied from Argent Martinez’s paradigm who copied it from John Tao's paradigm—I agree with them both]

Please. There are four things I've been seeing that drive me absolutely insane - and apparently there's enough for me to even write about it.

1) Roadmapping the 1AC. Don't do it. It's not necessary. It's not a thing.

2) Asking if I want a roadmap. The answer is YES. The answer is always YES (with the exception of the 1AC, because, once again, don't do it).

3) 1NC roadmap - just tell me how many off, and then where you plan on going on. Don't tell me what the Off cases are, that's not necessary.

4) Roadmap by being clear and concise: "DA, K, Case in order of solvency then advantage one." Do not roadmap: "I'm going to go a little bit on solvency, and then maybe the K...and if I have time maybe the DA...."

Important:

Don't be a douchebag. If you are ableist, sexist, racist, etc. I will vote you down on the spot.

Margaret Hecht New Trier High School 3 rounds

Colter Heirigs Glenbrook South High School 5 rounds

Last changed on Sat February 10, 2024 at 3:07 AM CDT

email: colter.heirigs@gmail.com

POLICY PARADIGM:

I have been coaching Policy Debate full time since 2014. Arms sales is my 7th year of coaching.

I view my primary objective in evaluating the round to be coming to a decision that requires the least “judge intervention.”

If debaters do not give me instructions on how to evaluate the debate, and/or leave portions of the debate unresolved, they should not expect to get my ballot. My decision will end up being arbitrary, and (while I will likely still try to make my arbitrary decision less arbitrary than not) I will not feel bad.

In the final rebuttals, debaters should be giving me a “big picture” assessment of what’s going on in the debate to give them the best chance to get my ballot. Extending 25 arguments in the rebuttals doesn’t do much for me if you’re not explaining how they interact with the other team’s arguments and/or why they mean you win the round. In my ideal debate round, both 2NR and 2AR have given me at least a 45 second overview explaining why they’ve won the debate where they dictate the first paragraph of my ballot for me.

Important things to note:

-I don’t ever think Topicality is an RVI (*this is distinct from kritiks of the neg’s interp/use of topicality*)

-If you don’t signpost AND slow down for tags, assume that I am missing at least 50% of your tags. This means saying a number or a letter or “AND” or “NEXT” prior to the tag of your card, and preferably telling me which of your opponents arguments I should flow it next to. Speech docs are not substitutes for clarity and signposting.

-I'm probably a 7 on speed, but please see above ^^^^

-High-theory will be an uphill battle.

-I would prefer not to call for cards, I believe it’s the debaters job to clearly communicate their arguments; if you tell me they’re misrepresenting their cards – I will probably call for them. But if I call for it and they’re not misrepresenting their evidence you’ll lose a lot of credibility with me and my cognitive biases will likely run amuck. Don’t let this deter you from calling out bad evidence.

-You can win the line-by-line debate in the 2AR but still lose the debate if you fail to explain what any of it means and especially how it interacts with the 2NR's args.

-Don’t assume I have any familiarity with your Acronyms, Aff, or K literature

-Swearing is probably word inefficient

-You’re in a bad spot if you’re reading new cards in the final rebuttals, very low propensity for me to evaluate them

-CPs that result in the aff are typically going to be a very hard sell, so are most other artificially competitive CPs. Perms are cool, so are time tradeoffs for the aff when this happens. If you really think you've got a sick techy CP make sure to go out of your way to win questions of competition/superior solvency / a specific link to the aff plan alone for your NB

-I think debate is a competition.

-the best “framework” arguments are probably “Topicality” arguments and almost probably don’t rely on cards from debate coaches and definitely don’t rely on me reading them after the round

-Impact everything out... Offense and Defense... I want to hear you telling me why your argument is more pressing and important than the other team's. I hate having to intervene... "Magnitude," "Probability," and "Timeframe" are not obscenities, please use them.

Arguments you shouldn’t waste your time on with me:

-Topicality = RVI (*this is distinct from kritiks of the neg’s interp/use of topicality*)

-Consult CPs

I am going to have the easiest time evaluating rounds where:

-warrant and evidence comparison is made

-weighing mechanisms and impact calculus guiding how I evaluate micro & macro level args are utilized

-the aff advocates a topical plan

-the DA turns and Outweighs the Case, or the CP solves most of the case and there's a clear net benefit that the perm doesn't solve for

-the negative has a well-researched neg strategy

-I am not expected to sort through high-theory

-the 2NR/2AR doesn't go for everything and makes strategic argument selection

Presumptions I bring into the round that probably cannot be changed:

-I’m voting Neg on presumption until the aff reads the 1AC

-Topicality is never an RVI (*this is distinct from kritiks of the neg’s interp/use of topicality*)

-There is no 3NR

-Oppression of humans = bad (note: I do not know how this compares to the end of the planet/human race, debaters are going to have to provide weighing mechanisms for me.)

-Earth existing = good (note: I do not know how this compares to other impacts like oppression of humans, debaters are going to have to provide some weighing mechanisms for me.)

-I will have a very difficult time bringing myself to vote for any sort of Consult CP if the aff even mumbles some type of “PERM”

-Once the 2AC perms, presumption goes to the neg to prove the perm unworkable or undesirable if the CP/Alt is not textually/functionally competitive

Unimportant things to note:

-Plz read your plan before you read solvency – I will be annoyed and lost if you don’t

-I really enjoy author indicts if/when they’re specific – it shows a team has worked hard and done their research

-I really enjoy case specific strategies – I enjoy it when a team can demonstrate that they've worked hard to prepare a case specific strategy

-I enjoy GOOD topicality debates

-I’ve been involved in policy debate in some capacity for 11 years now – Education is my 5th topic coaching.

-I put my heart and soul into policy debate for four years on high school. I worked tirelessly to put out specific strategies for specific affirmatives and I like to see debaters who I can tell have done the same and are having fun. So, show me you know your case better than anyone else if you're affirmative, or on the neg, show me specific links and answers to the affirmative... I tend to reward this in speaker points. ...That being said, generics are fun, fine, and essential for the negative team. Feel free to run them, you will not be penalized in any way.

Specific Arguments

I'm good for just about anything that is well debated: T, Theory, DAs, CPs, Ks... I can even be persuaded to vote solely on inherency if it is well debated - if the plan has literally already happened, for the love of god please punish the aff.

That being said, I enjoy seeing a strategy in argument selection, and appreciate when arguments don't blatantly contradict each other (i.e. the DA linking to the CP, or Cap Bad and an Econ Impact on politics). Especially in the 2NR.

********************************************************

LD Paradigm

I am pretty tab when it comes to LD. My goal is to reach a decision that requires the least amount of judge intervention.

Signpost and slow down on tags. Slow down even more for theory args. Spreading through tags and theory interps is absolutely not the move if you want me to be flowing your speech. I will not be flowing from the doc.

Slow down. No, you don’t have to be slow and you should certainly feel free to read the body of your cards at whatever max speed you are comprehensible at. If you’ve used signposting, slowed down on tags and pre-written analytics, you’re golden. It's inexcusable and unforgivable to not have signposting in the 1ac.

I come into the round presuming:

-the aff should be defending the resolution

-the aff is defending the entirety of the resolution

-my ballot answers the resolutional question

-debate is a game

These presumptions can likely be changed.

Stylistically agnostic, but probably not your best judge for:

-dense phil that you’re spreading through

-undisclosed affs that don’t defend the entirety of the resolution

-process CPs that result in the aff

-more than 2 condo

-friv theory - I ❤️ substance

-Probably not interested in hearing condo if it’s just 2 condo positions

-theory interps that require me to ignore other speeches

I think that I have a low propensity to vote for most arguments regarding things that happen outside of the round or prior to the 1ac. I am not interested in adjudicating arguments that rely on screenshots of chats, wikis, or discord servers.

Questions, or interested in my thoughts on particular subjects not covered in my LD paradigm? Check out my POLICY PARADIGM above!

Public Forum Paradigm:

First speakers get to ask the first question in crossfire. If you ask about the status of this in round, expect to get one less speakerpoint than you would have otherwise.

File Share > e-mail chain.

Depth > Breadth. You only have four minutes to construct your position, would far prefer to hear 2 well-developed contentions rather than 3-4 blippy ones unless they are incredibly straight-forward. Much less interested in adjudicating “argument checkers” than most.

Brooke Hemingway Walter Payton College Prep 4 rounds

Last changed on Fri September 9, 2022 at 12:40 AM CDT

College of William and Mary

Walter Payton College Prep '21

Put bhemingwaydebate@gmail.com and sweetnessdebatedocs@gmail.com on the email chain.

I debated for four years at Payton and am not debating in college. If you are a team that reads k affs, you should not pref me. My only 2NR strategy was framework, and I really don't buy the common arguments about debate space being bad or debaters having the ability to change it through individual rounds.

A compete argument consists of a claim and warrants. Simply saying that an argument was dropped means nothing if it's not contextualized to how that implicates the round.

Case

Case debate is underutilized by many of the teams that I judge. Neg teams should use smart case turns or recut the 1ac evidence instead of just using impact defense.

Bad framing debates are the worst. If you don't use warrants and just parrot taglines at each other, I will just default to util.

Disadvantages

2NRs that are the DA v case are fantastic. I judge disadvantages v case primarily through the quality of warranted rebuttal analysis, quality of evidence, and impact calc. I think 0 risk is possible, but it would require a lot of evidence analysis by the aff.

Explain why uniqueness matters with politics DAs.

Counterplans

Process counterplans need to have a clear solvency advocate and articulated reasons why its better then the plan because I'm not a fan of sneaky CPs.

Kritiks

I am qualified to judge a Security/Biopolitics/Cap K round. Identity and high theory Ks will be very unpersuasive to me. Links must be specific to the 1ac -- reciting generic blocks will not be voted on. I have a high threshold for voting neg on the K-- the neg should win specific links and framework. It's not necessary to win an alternative.

Topicality

I default to competing interpretations. I don't have a lot of preferences other than both teams need to describe what the topic looks like underneath both interpretations. 2NRs and 2ARs should clearly explain what their view of the topic looks like and what their opponents view looks like.

I'll vote on extra-T or effects-T only if there is a clear violation.

Theory

Theory should be 5 minutes of the 2AR if you're going for it.

Octavio Hernandez Northside College Preparatory 5 rounds

Tristan Hernandez Lane Tech College Prep H.S. 5 rounds

Lauren Hollis Northside College Preparatory 5 rounds

Mason Hubbard Lane Tech College Prep H.S. 5 rounds

Griffin Jacobs Glenbrook South High School 2 rounds

Last changed on Sat December 17, 2022 at 1:44 AM CDT

minnesota 25

yes email chain - one.griffin.jacobs@gmail.com

top line//tldr

i will always vote for the team that does the better debating, you do not need to tell me to vote for the team that does the better debating. both teams can argue about what "the better debating" means but i will always vote for the team that does the better debating

i will try to evaluate the debate in the way that the debaters have prioritized arguments - i will look for the easiest way out of deciding a debate and go from there - this makes impact framing and judge instruction very important for me

depth > breath - this is the most important thing on my paradigm. i think that any given team needs a maximum of 3 pieces of offense to win any given round and should explain why they're winning that/those argument(s) and why it means they win the round extensively. more than 6 offcase will make me grumpy, although i will still listen to all of them

tech > truth - having truth on your side is obviously good and will win the round when the flow is close but debate is about your ability to debate, not about your ability to read objectively true arguments

evidence quality > quantity - most arguments don't need cards - if you are reading evidence, make sure it is specific and warranted - if you cannot explain the warrants in your cards, i will give them far less weight - author qualifications mean a lot less to me than warrants

i have a debate level understanding of whatever kind of literature you're planning on reading unless you're being truly innovative

STOP MISUSING ONTOLOGY CLAIMS - ontology is important, but almost zero actual qualified authors will say that ontology means that nothing good can ever happen - aff teams vs the k need to make this point more.

i will assume util is trutil until told otherwise

i really really really really really strongly dislike arguments that require me to make a judgment call on whether or not one team or debater is a good person/good people - if something is so egregious that a team should be disqualified from a round or tournament either i will directly intervene before the round ends or you should take it up with the tournament and the other team's coaches

the case debate

i know it is cliché - but this is very important! - do not assume i know what your aff is/does, this makes the 2ac/2ar overview crucial

i am probably a better judge for presumption than most - most aff teams need to make massive stretches in order to solve the impacts they specify in the 1AC - this is why i generally prefer affs with specific and solvable impacts

i'm super down for impact turns - everything from co2 ag to china war good to wipeout is cool with me as long as it's explained well

disadvantages

disads don't always need uniqueness - if the impact is framed as a sliding scale, the link can definitely overcome uniqueness problems

impact framing matters a lot - most teams in a DA debate will agree to magnitude x probability - if both teams agree to this framing timeframe is the tiebreaker

i love internal link defense - a lot of teams surprisingly don't do this that much - most DA internal link scenarios are ridiculous and some well warranted defenses to them are quite persuasive to me

politics da's - i will usually default to thinking that durable fiat doesn't solve them because you only fiat enough congress members to pass the plan - i am however persuaded by non-normative interpretations of fiat that allow aff teams to avoid politics da's (like should =/= immediate) - i am fine for political capital links as long as you have specific evidence

counterplans

functional > textual competition - i think there are ways to explain textual competition as functional competition (especially with courts counterplans with specific evidence), however i generally find textual competition unpersuasive

sufficiency framing unless the aff team makes arguments that contradict this - i will generally assume that if a risk of the net benefit outweighs the risk of the solvency deficit, i will vote negative on the cp

theory (except for condo) is probably a reason to reject the argument, not the team

topicality/procedurals

precision is generally the gold standard unless community consensus heavily contradicts it and makes debate near impossible

i like it when t blocks are specific to the topic - case lists of what you allow/what they justify and listing off ground lost is good

effects and extra t arguments are under utilized and pretty important - especially because they're the only real way of snuffing out questionably topical affs that destroy debatability and limits

non resolutional procedurals are cringe but obviously if this is your thing still go for it, especially if it's dropped

kritiks

specific links to the mechanism of the aff are always best but if you only have generic cards, application and explanation specific to the aff will be enough to win a pretty big risk of the link

the alt really needs to solve the links - otherwise i will view the k as a mostly non-unique linear da - this is still winnable but makes it unnecessarily harder for the neg

framework is obviously important - i see the framework debate on a k from the neg more similarly to a framework debate against a k aff more than most, it's a debate about models of debate - this is why i'm generally less receptive to "you link, you lose" framework arguments, especially when the neg is making a sweeping ontology claim, it really leaves no role for the aff

2nr framing and link storytelling is crucial

the alt can result in or solve the aff without losing to the perm - but it requires a more nuanced link and alt explanation - usually about sequencing/framing or solving the internal links of the aff, but not resulting in its mechanism

kritik affirmatives

these are by far the worst and best debates

i am a fine judge for framework/t-usfg - however i will say that i would prefer you do literally anything else besides going for a procedural fairness impact - obviously, if you win it, i'll vote for you, but i will be incredibly grumpy about it - clash and education are far better impacts and allow you to have turns case warrants

if you do choose to go for framework/t-usfg - you really need to be going to the case page in the 2nr - otherwise you're just kind of gifting the aff full solvency and their impact turns which makes it infinitely easier for the aff

for aff teams - i think there are really only 2 strategic ways to debate framework - either impact turn everything and ignore the topic or just be a hard left topical aff - i am increasingly confused by k teams that do this "we're half topical" nonsense because it makes it much harder for you to solve your impact turns while still linking you to all of their framework offense

"the state is an assemblage" is not a real argument

1ac cross-x is crucial - i think every 2n should be asking "what is the role of the negative?" and "what is the relationship between the aff and solving 1ac impacts?" and every 1a should have a well prepared answer to these

i think that a lot of kritical affs have inherency issues and that these very often justify a presumption ballot

pics are often very strategic against critical affirmatives - especially ones that affirm something incredibly sweeping and broad

i love kvk debates - links need specificity though - links along the lines of "you didn't mention/analyze *x*" are incredibly unpersuasive to me - i love the cap k but if your link is "you didn't use the state" i will be quite annoyed

"no perms in a method/tactics debate" is a pretty sound argument to me, especially because it's one of the only ways to garner competition against k affs - competition should be established in cx tho

richard jo New Trier High School 3 rounds

Felix Jones Lane Tech College Prep H.S. 5 rounds

Last changed on Fri December 3, 2021 at 8:06 AM CDT

Lane Tech 2021, Duke 2025 (I do BP now ew)

Add me to the email chain - fljones@cps.edu

THIS PARADIGM IS OLD AND I'M TOO LAZY TO UPDATE BUT THIS IS MY FIRST TOURNAMENT ON THE WATER TOPIC SO IF IT'S A T DEBATE BE REALLY CLEAR LOL

Like most judges (ideally), I will vote for any argument as long as it is debated effectively. Please be nice to each other or you will get bad speaks. Cross ex is super important, don't blow it off. I don't care what you run just do it well. Understand whatever you're saying, and if you don't understand it then use smaller words. Make the debate interesting please. Do not be racist, sexist, homophobic, bad, etc. Tech over truth mostly just because it's really funny when teams get away with tech stuff, just don't let it get to your head because the skills you gain from debate should not be sneakiness and talking really fast.

That's pretty much it, just have fun in the round, debate can get stressful just remember it's never that deep! Even if you're getting ripped apart it's gonna be alright, life exists outside debate. But also bonus speaks if the other team cries in cross ex.

Don't run ASPEC. I'll vote on it I guess but don't run it. I'll cry.

Detailed stuff:

T - 2NR should be impacting out why the aff being untopical is bad. If it's just "they're not topical so they should lose!" I'm probably not gonna vote on it. Like all theory, you should be explaining why it's a voter.

DAs - Give me the story. If I can't explain in my RFD how exactly the aff triggers the impact, I don't know why I'd vote on it. But beyond that this is pretty meat & potatoes just don't fumble individual parts of it, & explain why the DA outweighs case/vice versa if you're aff.

Ks - I don't consider myself a huge K debater, but I've read a fair share and I have a decent grasp on a good amount of K lit. That being said, a couple things: 1. Don't run a K that you don't understand the lit of. Everyone can tell and you'll probably lose. 2. Assume that everyone else in the round has never heard the K before. What I mean by this is that your explanations are crucial. Me and your opponents should all be able to understand the link, the alt, and the thesis of the K. Even if they drop like the entire K I'd still like a decent explanation of what all your big-worded, full-paragraph-tagged cards mean lol.

CPs - I like me a good CP. Aff, if they read an abusive CP, put theory on it. I like me some good CP theory. I feel like CPs are a really under-appreciated part of debate. I recommend external net bens rather than just like a solvency net ben or something, but if you can prove the CP solves all of case I guess it doesn't really matter. Get creative with your CPs please, and aff get creative with your perms. Gimme more than just "Perm do both, next" explain what the perm would look like.

Presumption - I love giving a "Neg on presumption" RFD. Nothing is more satisfying than shredding an aff to bits. That being said, you should probably have a DA or something with it so I have to err your way still, but yeah go get 'em. Aff on presumption is a thing too but idk it don't hit the same yknow?

If you have any specific questions just ask me before the round. I like to think I'm pretty chill but I do take debate seriously. I do my best to give a good amount of feedback too, if it feels like I'm ripping on you don't take it personally, I try and give varsity-level feedback so y'all can elevate your debating the most you can.

Margaret Jones New Trier High School 3 rounds

Last changed on Tue January 16, 2024 at 7:20 AM CDT

About me

Mj (she/her). Please do not call me "judge"

I debated for four years at New Trier (NT JW <3)

Please add me to the email chain: mj.debate13@gmail.com

I have led a classic lab at umich for the last two years. I would describe my topic knowledge on Fiscal Redistribution medium.

About my judging

Most of these opinions reflect how I felt about certain arguments when I debated. As a judge, I will try to decide everything as it goes down on the flow, irrespective of any personal biases.

Please read rehighlightings - not reading them seems kind of indefensible to me (you have to point this out!!!)

If you have any questions about my paradigm, just ask. I loved debating, I love judging, and I'm always down to talk about either.

Case

Framing should be line-by-lined

Theory

Condo is a reason to reject the team, everything else is probably a reason to reject an argument

You need to impact theory out in the final rebuttals, and it needs to be very present in previous speeches if you go for it in the 2ar

I default to kicking the CP for the neg if it's never brought up, so please bring it up early (2nc/1ar)

The neg should take advantage of poorly-worded aff theory violations, most people don't think enough about how they word their 2ac theory interp

Topicality

Fwiw, everything else equal, I really enjoy T debates.

I debated on three aff biased topics (Immigration, CJR, and Water) and thus may be a lot more amenable to a limited topic than the average judge. I do not feel one way or another on T-Transfers and Taxes.

I think case lists can be really helpful if the aff is going for an aff-ground push. Also it kind of irks me when people list schools when saying what affs would be topical and not what the affs are -- saying that "topical affs include Westministers', GBN's, and WalPay's affs" is literally meaningless.

Say what your alternative to plan text in a vacuum is.

I think reasonability can be good in specific circumstances but I usually don't find myself persuaded by it unless the aff is already basically winning the flow.

My experience running Ks is pretty limited (security, neolib, settler colonialism, death cult) so I'll need you to spend a little time going over the thesis of your K if it's more complex.

I think both teams should be explicit about what I weigh if they win framework.

K Affs

I'm happy to judge anything, although I only ever read policy affs, so there may be a slightly higher burden of explanation for me compared to the average judge.

Your offense on FW needs to be clear before the 2ar.

I think clash is the best impact to FW, but only because it avoids aff offense best.

CPs

I know a lot of basic perm arguments, and went for limited intrensic perms a lot, but I'm admittedly not great at abjudicating really complex textual/functional competition debates. This just means spending more time explaining them in the 2nr/2ar.

DAs

Zero risk is real.

1ar needs to respond to block "DA turns Case" arguments.

Jacob Kalinovskiy Glenbrook North 3 rounds

Last changed on Sat April 10, 2021 at 2:12 PM CDT

Jake Kalinovskiy

Current debater at GBN

GBN 2022

jakdebate@gmail.com

-- add me don't ask

-- tag team cx is good

-- if I don't say anything/am quiet assume I'm good. I'll lyk if I'm not ready

Be interesting/funny = speaks + more likely to do work for you, I prefer to give higher speaks, don't give me a reason to doc yours.

I reward argumentative creativity, I've debated revisionism 50 times -- what makes you special?

- analytics are real arguments -- a smart analytic > unexplained card

- if you try to out-card them and just don't analyze it I really don't care how many cards you read.

- if you read answers to arguements that were in the doc but they didn't get to I will be disappointed.

- I like debate/K tricks if you understand them.

- a dropped argument is true if warranted/impacted out in the rebuttals

Debates about debate are my favorite, go slow: - this is my bread and butter, just please please please tell me why to prefer your model

T, Theory(all of it, condo especially), Framework = much love - the framework page goes aff or neg, that frames every other flow.

Case debate:

I'm probably going to start evaluating the debate here, probably a good idea to win case.

neg, if you don't have cards use analytics PLEASE

Framing: - also frames the rest of the debate (unless you tell me why it doesn't)

if its not case specific I care very little

debate changes value framing

if the disad is bad you don't need ThEiR lInK cHaIN is lOnG (this means connetta and all of the cards like it, just take it out of your 1ac, I will comment after the round how much of a waste of breath this is and no one needs to hear that lecture)

i LOVE the framing contention, but if you read one it needs to be a massive part of the debate. This has to be the hill you die on or its a waste of 1ac space

love it

fairness is probably an internal link but so is nuclear war

Da:

- is your politics link unique? is it really? okay then go for it

- real disads: I'm down, have fun. Connetta is wrong

- 0 risk is a thing

Cp:

Pcp is a good answer to garbage

- Pcp is a T debate -- what does your model of debate look like?

I love garbage if it can beat Pcp

don't bother with solvency advocate theory

-- if you can finagle their aff away I respect it. they have to defend every aspect of the aff. (if it passes the Perm test its a viable option)

condo/judge kick:

I'm down for the condo debate -- I won't make up excuses to vote neg - I love debates about debate, if you create a spicy condo speech you will be rewarded handily in speaks

judge kick is the most abusive thing this side of the Atlantic, but if you don't answer it I have no choice.

impact turns:

- thebomb.com

- big stick affs don't get 'but killing people is bad' as an answer

neg:

don't read it if you can't explain it in English -- K goop in the final rebuttals that hasn't been clearly defined in by the rebuttals will be ignored

if you're reading a framework K -- don't be weasly, the 2nr should be very clear about what you want me to vote on.

-- the neg has to have reps if you're reading a reps K.

if you fiat the alt -- I can be convinced that the pic is okay

have an alt

if you wanna read security abt an impact that isn't terrorism, I'm not your guy.

aff:

most Ks are incoherent and I'll vote on it without a second thought

neg link uniqueness and alt solvency are usually jokes

Kaff:

you're a novice. please don't

if you decide not to read my paradigm, it probably has pedagogical value but the neg ballot on T is looking delicious right about now.

Speaks:

- FLOW -- if you send a picture of your flow in the doc and I like it I'll boost your speaks

- I want to give you higher speaks

Ben Katz Northside College Preparatory 5 rounds

Last changed on Sat February 10, 2024 at 11:01 AM CDT

bnkatz1@gmail.com

Northside '21

Northwestern '25

0 time TOC qualifier, 4 years of debate for Northside College Prep

He/Him

If I am judging a virtual debate and you send documents with analytics omitted, you will be docked speaker points. Your mic quality is not nearly as good as you think it is, so why would you voluntarily make it harder for the person who's deciding which team wins (me) to understand what you're saying by omitting a useful visual supplement? Act like I'm half-deaf.

Pay attention to where you use jargon and explain or contextualize where you can. This topic has lots of acronyms so it would help to say full phrases and what they actually mean at least once in-round.

If you can't explain an argument you plan to read in front of me at a conversational speed, there are very good odds that you won't win me over when trying to spread it. Debate what you're comfortable with, not what you think I'll like the most.

I avoid reading speech docs where possible. I will read a card if it is referenced during cross-ex, as well as if specific warrants are called to my attention during speeches. However, I will not give the full robustness of a card's argument to you if all you are doing is repeating the author's name and the claim.

Primarily debated soft left affs in high school, but have also read traditional policy. I have read every kind of argument on the neg. Increasingly sympathetic to traditional big stick affs as a judge, just because soft left debaters have a structurally harder time winning the debate.

Thoughts on arguments:

Both aff and neg teams severely underfocus on case. This is almost universal. For the neg, aff evidence is never as good as it's made out to be and should be called out in the 1NC. If you're an aff team and truly believe your case is good, then actually spend time talking about why your warrants respond to the neg's on- and off-case arguments (which it should if it's good) beyond just saying that you are extending X card.
Disads reach zero risk very easily. Although framing debates tend to be ineffective and misfocused, my general perspective is that low probability likely negates high magnitude at the point that a layman would consider your DA contrived. I like politics DAs but they tend to be really bad, and case-specific DAs are often the most interesting but always harder to develop. In general, if you think your DA is good, I'll probably think it's okay; if you think your DA is bad, I'll probably think it's terrible. A good internal link makes everything I said above moot.
Counterplans have been massacred without forgiveness and it makes me sad. I strongly dislike the current norm of going for the most abusive counterplan that can still be voted for, but a won argument is a won argument. Still, I tend to bias aff theory against CPs even if it's not a reason to reject the team. (advantage cps > pics/agent cps > process cps > cps that compete off of a single word). As far as complicated mechanisms go, go nuts, I'll be able to grasp it.
Not sure what this topic holds, but I imagine lots of the research will be focused on security and reps-based kritiks. One characteristic of Ks which somehow appears all the time in K Aff debates but never gets drawn own on the neg side is the role of Ks in shaping how the round is argued. If you treat your K like a counterplan, you're fighting a losing battle. I'm not necessarily pro "framework K," but ultimately the alternative is just a digestible manifestation of the epistemology/pedagogy/whatever that you claim the aff is undermining.
Topicality debates tend to be dependent on a lot of factors external to the resolution - mainly how late into the year it is and how many affs have already been generated on the topic. A small topic tends to lean aff on allowing innovative (to an extent) plans, but large topics justify limiting what affs are acceptable more stringently. In a given round, this is largely irrelevant, but good debaters draw these characteristics in as warrants on the standards debate. These claims provide rhetorical strength and can help the persuasiveness of the line-by-line on interpretations/standards substantially.
K Affs are interesting and I'll happily vote on them, but I am, personally, reasonably persuaded by aff arguments favoring predictability and the benefits of switch-side debate. A good kritikal aff is not one which critiques the resolution, but critiques the way that we debate the resolution. If your aff does the latter, most framework arguments go out the window. I will deduct speaker points for 2ACs that have a massive overview but doesn't include it in the doc.
K v K debates are the debates I have debated and certainly judged the least. I think it's the burden of the aff to prove that perms are allowed in a method debate since the aff has already gone so far as to reject the resolution to justify reading their advocacy, but it is up for discussion. Cap links to just about everything but that doesn't always means it's good. The Parenti and Emanuele card is not nearly good enough for the amount it gets read by neg teams. Most of what I said in my thoughts on Ks extends here too.

Two separate instances of clipping will result in an auto-loss and zero speaker points for both debaters. To be clear, clipping is intentionally skipping highlighted parts of a card while acting as though it was still read. To not clip, explicitly state when you stop reading a card before fully finishing ("cut the card at [x]"), keep track of where you stopped reading that card, and after your speech ask if anyone in the round wants a marked copy of your document where the highlighting you didn't read in the card is omitted.

***FOR NOVICES: HOW TO WIN***

Flowing is the most important (and underutilized) skill in debate. Write down your opponent's arguments. All of them.

Do line-by-line - Read and answer everything you just wrote down. Answer your opponent's arguments. All of them.

Novices that learn how to do both of these semi-competently will win the vast majority of their rounds.

Noah Kern Northside College Preparatory 5 rounds

Humza Khan Glenbrook South High School 2 rounds

Last changed on Wed November 16, 2022 at 10:41 PM CDT

UIUC '26 - industrial engineering

GBS '22

Topics: Immigration, arms sales (my beloved), CJR, and Water

2N for all

T/L

anything goes (yes you can run that impact turn)

- i gripe a lot about stuff later on but i legitimately do mean the above

a dropped argument is a true argument

yes even aspec/no neg fiat but...

...an argument is a claim, warrant, and implication

the troll theory's gotta have all three to count

hkdebait@gmail.com

I do not do college debate but am active in electoral politics and policy stuff so you don't need to explain anything beyond the most crucial/niche acronyms and T definitions

- i have done almost nothing debate related since april 22 so 75% of this is me having hot takes about the activity

send a card doc after the final speech

What you care about (policy v k)

Policy

The last time I went for t-usfg was as a sophomore (every 2nr was an impact turn v k affs)

single digit amount of K 2nrs throughout my career

if i somehow end up judging a clash debate i wouldmuch rather see an impact turn debate

More stuff since people lie in paradigms all the time

I am most familiar with standard DA, case, and CP debates (obviously)

I am relatively familiar with T and standard Ks (you know what I mean)

Least familiar with non-standard Ks and K-affs

senior wiki for reference > https://opencaselist.com/hspolicy21/GlenbrookSouth/KhKi

case debate is underrated (everyone says this but i actually mean it) (seriously)

Mechanics

call me whatever the hell you want

- yes inserting re-highlightings unless it's from a different part of the article

- yes open cx

- average speaks are 28.5

- asking for a doc with the cards removed is prep time - a marked doc is a doc with marks on the cards that were marked

- I will not vote on things that happened out of round

- i try to decide in a reasonable amount of time (>30 min decisions are a crime)

- ptiv is stupid (just win the c-i???)

#teaminfinitecondo

Random thoughts you can read while your partner does pre-round

You don't need to crack jokes or whatever for speaks, but if you do want to min-max speaks here's some thoughts

- i like creative strategies (cliche i know) - if your strategy has me thinking you put hours of research into this one subject (my favorite 2nr senior year was nuclear energy bad and junior year it was adv cp+crypto regs good or transhumanism)

- no such thing as too many adv cp planks

i never paid attention to this when i debated but making it easy to flow is really helpful especially considering I have terrible engineer handwriting

saying 'this is {ideology} propaganda' etc. is not a warrant or an implication

indicts are usually stupid unless its refuting something methodological/scientific

Stuff you can read while waiting for a decision

it seems like people aren't going for NATO bad which is understandable but i feel like the block could go ham but idk its not a great argument

Sid Kuchimanchi Glenbrook South High School 2 rounds

Last changed on Tue February 13, 2024 at 3:39 PM CDT

Glenbrook South 2018-2022 (Immigration, Arms Sales, Criminal Justice, Water Policy); George Washington University 2022-Present (Civic Debate Society: Worker Cooperatives)
Yes Email Chain - debate.squid@gmail.com
Call me Sid. Don't call me "judge". I'm not that much older than y'all.

Pre-Whatever Tournament Note:

I have judged approximately 0 rounds on this topic. I don't really know the main T, DAs, Affs, CPs, or topic-specific Ks. I have not flowed in more than 6 months. I will need more detail than other judges will. My debate background and a general understanding of International Affairs is all that I bring to the debate round. Don't assume I know acronyms, don't assume I know debate arguments, don't assume I know what your blocks are saying. Going slower is more likely to help you than going hyper-speed.

Actual Stuff:

Paradigms are stupid. If you're looking at this in the 15 minutes before the round, you do you and I'll try to keep up. If you are looking at this while doing prefs, here's what you should know. I did debate for four years. I had relative success in the back halves of my Junior and Senior seasons, including a TOC trip as a senior.

Things to know about me as a person:

I'm an International Affairs and Economics major, with a general interest in a variety of topics ranging from Philosophy to Geographical Studies
I love reading about politics and international issues
My favorite serious argument is either the Militarism K/DA or the ICJ Counterplan, both from the Arms Topic
My favorite not-as-serious argument was Wipeout

Things to know about me from a debate standpoint:

I flow on paper - which is another way of saying "GO SLOW THROUGH YOUR TAGS"
I mostly did policy impacts
Fine with funny arguments (Spark, Wipeout) and abusive arguments (certain PICs, CPs, etc.)
Love process CPs on bad topics
T is also fun when it's clean
I think people underestimate the power of a smart analytic
Just do what you do best and we'll all have an ok time

Also just don't be a jerk. That's about it.

Good luck!

Sarah Lerner Whitney M. Young Magnet High School 5 rounds

Last changed on Thu March 10, 2022 at 2:03 PM CDT

Email: srlerner2003@gmail.com

Please put me on the email chain.

IMPORTANT: I haven't debated since my junior year in high school and I am currently a freshman in college, so I don't know this topic well. I do have past policy experience, so policy debate in general is quite familiar to me. Just know that I'm not as familiar with this topic in particular. I will also be judging online from Dublin, Ireland, so please be aware that it is six hours later for me here, so if the round feels late in the day for you, it is even later for me. Therefore, please have everything sent out efficiently so that the round can begin on time.

In general, I will vote on almost anything and I consider myself fairly flex, so I do enjoy a good K debate, but it has to be well reasoned out. However, as should be expected, for more out-there arguments, please flesh out your arguments a lot more for me to consider voting on it.

T always trumps condo and all other arguments automatically unless the argument is explicitly made that something matters more than T.

Please articulate any interaction between different arguments or dropped arguments or anything like that because I will not make those connections for you. My job is only to judge what the team actually says.

I will not tolerate cheating of any kind, so if I catch a team clipping or stealing prep, it will be an automatic loss. I don’t count sending out the document as prep, but any conferring between partners in between the time when they say “stop prep” and the time that someone starts to give their speech does count.

In terms of speaks, any offensive or intolerant language will result in massive dockings of points. On the flip side, I will award extra points to debaters that make jokes or something in their speeches because it makes everyone’s lives a bit less bleak.

We all want this to go as quickly and efficiently as possible, so try to have the 1ac sent out at the time that the round is supposed to start.

Kelly Lin Solorio Academy High School 5 rounds

Alyssa V Lucas-Bolin Glenbrook South High School 1 rounds

Last changed on Sat March 16, 2024 at 10:51 AM CDT

Top shelf:

Pronouns are she/her

Just call me Alyssa or ALB - do not call me judge and dear debate Lord do not call me ma'am.

email chains: gbsdebatelovesdocs@gmail.com

questions etc: alucasbolin@glenbrook225.org. If you are a student from another school emailing me please copy an adult coach on the email (just a good safety norm.)

Director of Debate at GBS since 2019, and assistant coach at GBS for a year before that. Prior to that I had taken a few years off of debate but coached at Notre Dame, University of North Texas, University of Nevada Las Vegas, and USC. I only mention this because I've coached debate in a variety of geographical locations with a variety of different argument perspectives. I hope this information helps avoid you "pigeon-holling" me into a Glenbrooks cyborg or whatever the community perception is. If you do this anyway, you'll find yourself either pleasantly or unpleasantly surprised at the end of the debate.

People always ask about my own debate career - the answer is "meh - not bad, not great." I was one of those debaters who qualified to the TOC (once) and the NDT (three times) but was in no way shape or form going to clear at either of those tournaments. This has made me a much better coach because I spend a ton of time thinking about how I can help my own debaters and the people I judge go from good to great. I try to always make sure it's about you and not about me, but I use my own experience to fuel my passion for the activity. Never in my Wildest Dreams (Lauren Ivey) would I kill it in my own debate career but I think I'm pretty okay at giving you feedback to help you kill it in yours.

Brownie points for having as many T Swift, cat, and/or Heartstopper references as possible. To be clear - the reward here is making me smile. I will not actually bump your speaker points or anything because I don't play that way.

Hot takes:

I love debate more than anything else in the world. If you show that YOU love debate more than anything else in the world that is going to go way way way farther than any preference of mine.

Favorite args in order of favoriteness (not so you make these args - just trying to give you a sense of me as a judge)

Politics DAs - I am still waiting for someone to do a one off strategy where it's just politics and the case. Be that person.
Well-executed case debate that features internal link and solvency presses in addition to impact D
Kritiks with SPECIFICITY TO THE AFF (either in analysis or evidence or - gasp - both)
Wonky debates about competition
Very weird impact turns, straight turns, etc

*I am not a great judge for condo - my teams go for it, I know I know, but it does not come from me. I'll vote on it - I just have a high threshold.

*I am a huge switch-side debate person - I really hate the community trend towards only reading arguments that fit in politically correct norms. If you have an evil argument Bring. It. On. I am personally progressive but that has absolutely nothing to do with how I judge debates. The obvious exception to this is attacking people's identity or safety. But if you're packing an absurd impact turn or read a politics da about a piece of legislation that is objectively terrible that you can prove is good, etc, I will be deeply amused.

*I literally have "2a" tattooed on my foot. 2ar terrorism is one of the most wonderful things in debate - make big bold choices if the foundation is there in the 1ar.

*My teams do everything - some are hard right policy teams and some are ... not that. I tend to think that debaters debate best when they find their own brand of debate and let their personalities shine through.

* No roboting through the round. Think. Make risky moves. Let's get weird.

*Style: Don’t be a jerk for the sake of it, but you shouldn’t feel pressure to be sugary sweet if you’re not - expectations of civility, politeness, etc tend to fall on noncis dudes and BIPOC disproportionately. Therefore a little attitude is fine with me. It’s a competition. I'm a woman who directs a major debate program and co-directs one of the biggest tournaments - I understand the need to be assertive and hold your ground.

*Clarity is very important to me. So is pen time.

*Technical debating, line by line, etc are important to me. If you flow off the doc I am not the judge for you.

*Zero risk is a thing. Love me some smart defensive arguments against silly arguments. GIVE JUDGE DIRECTION - challenge normal conceptions of risk.

*If you're making new args late in the debate you're likely to have to justify them to me. That doesn't mean don't do it, it just means defend your actions. THE 1AR IS NOT A CONSTRUCTIVE.

*You do you, but I find that I am slightly more confident in my judging if you include your analytics in the doc. I solemnly swear I am flowing by ear, but just being able to process information both visually and through listening helps my mental processing a bit.

*The one exception to the above is that if you read a new 1ac on paper I am 100% in favor - I truly enjoy watching people freak out when they have to deal with paper debate since I had the not-so-lovely experience of transitioning to paperless mid college debate career.

*EXPLAIN YOUR ACRONYMS - especially in a t debate.

Other random hot takes:

Wipeout - trash takes itself out every single time (me)

Impact turning Ks old school style - it's a love story, baby just say yes (me)

Baudrillard - I forgot that you existed (me)

No cp solvency advocate- now we've got bad blood (Aayan)

More than 6 or 7 off - You're On Your Own Kid (Aayan)

Things that are sexist/homophobic/racist etc - I Know Places where that is tolerated but I will not let rounds I judge be one of them (Aayan)

You must Speak Now (Lauren Ivey/me) in your own cross ex - like obvi tag teaming is sometimes fine but I hate when one partner does ALL of the cx in any given debate.

Heavy stuff:

*No touching.

*I am not the right judge for call outs of specific debate community members

*I am a mandatory reporter. Keep that in mind if you are reading any type of personal narrative etc in a debate. A mandatory reporter just means that if you tell me something about experiencing violence etc that I have to tell the authorities.

*I care about you and your debate but I am not your debate mommy. I am going to give you direct feedback after the debate. I won't be cruel but I'm also not a sugarcoater. It takes some people off guard because they may be expecting me to coddle them. It's just not my personality - I deeply care about your debate career and want you to do your best. I also am just very passionate about arguments. If you're feeling like I'm being a little intense just Shake It Off (Lauren Ivey.)

*Clipping = zero points and a hot L. Clarity to the point of non-comprehension that causes a clipping challenge constitutes clipping.

*I am more than fine with you post rounding as long as you keep it respectful. I would genuinely prefer you understand my decision than walk out frustrated because that doesn't help you win the next time. Bring it on (within reason). I'm back in the ring baby.

Let's have a throwdown!!! If you're reading this before a round I am excited to see what you have to offer. YAY DEBATE!!!

Argent Martinez Solorio Academy High School 4 rounds None

David McDermott Walter Payton College Prep 5 rounds

Last changed on Wed January 24, 2024 at 2:31 PM EDT

please add to the email chain:

gbsdebatelovesdocs@gmail.com

djmcdermott2@gmail.com

HS Debate: 18-22 (4 years) -- Walter Payton WM

College Debate: 23 (1 year) -- Michigan MS

Top

Judging record is more informative than judging opinions.

How I Decide Rounds

I go through parts of the debate in this order, and stop at one if it is sufficient for me to not need to go further.

1. The flow.

This aspect is all tech, no truth. As far as I can tell, I am easily among the most tech-oriented debaters/judges in debate right now. I imagine I'd pull the trigger on a small technical concession much more readily than many other judges. Similarly, I think there are probably far more low point wins than are actually given out. The flow is where my analysis will end for almost all crushes and many debates that are semi-close but not that that close. I have switched to flowing on computer because back-to-back analytics were unflowable for me on paper. I still have no qualms voting you down on an argument I didn't flow in a speech because you were spreading through blocks even if it truly had been there, but hopefully flowing on computer will make this less of an issue.

2. Evidence

Mixture of tech and truth (truer args have better ev, but better card cutters/researchers will put out better ev). I get to this level of analysis in two circumstances: either a) I'm told to read cards or evidence quality is centered in the debate or b) despite not being told to read ev, the flow is too close to vote on alone. This is where most good, close debates will end.

3. Minor Intervention

Tech guided by truth. If I still can't comfortably decide a round based on ev and flow, I'll do things like give more weight to evidence quality despite not being told to by the debaters, look for potential cross-apps, or try to find something like that to decide a round without having to fully insert my opinion. This is where most bad debates without enough judge instruction will end.

4. Major Intervention

All truth. This is where bad debates with no clash and no judge instruction will end.

Biases

I hope to use the above steps consistently irregardless of what args are in front of me, and I think judges who are ideologically predisposed for or against a certain argument or style are annoying. I hope these biases won't affect my decisions, but the way someone has debated/coached will inevitably affect their judging in some way, so following is a list of biases based on how I've debated:

1. Policy bias. I'm almost certainly better for the K than you think (especially Ks on the NEG), and certainly better for it than my debating record would suggest; cross-apply all the tech first stuff here -- more than happy to vote on some small conceded disad to a NEG framework model if competently extended. This bias is mainly limited to thinking about these debates differently from how primarily K debaters would since I've almost always been on the policy side of policy v K debates.

2. 2N bias. This is small and to be honest could help the AFF more than it helps the NEG because I'm somewhat lenient for 1ARs in terms of if I count an extension to be an argument. I think structural AFF side bias (first and last speech) is probably true in theory but tech determines if I think that's true when judging. Overall I don't expect this to affect my judging very much. Probably one of the most 50/50 judges on condo. Default to judge kick.

3. "Small School" bias. For the most part I think people complaining about being from a "small school" would be better off spending the time they spend talking about it cutting cards, and if you do that you'll be just as competitive as your peer from a big school. However, the one area where I think there is truly a difference in schools is that I think a sizeable majority of judges are likely to (obviously subconsciously) factor school's/team's rep into their decision in close debates. I hate this and have a bit of a chip on my shoulder because of it. If debate rounds could be judged blindly I'd be all for it. I obviously won't hack for "small schools" or against "big schools," but when I was doing prefs late in my career I frequently wondered if a judge who would be good for me in most debates might be bad for me in those few key debates where I was hitting a team with more rep. I am not one of those judges.

4. Good argument bias. This is maybe too obvious to warrant saying. I'll vote on tricks and dropped ASPEC or whatever (all the flow first stuff applies for annoying args as well) but obviously in a close debate find it easier to vote for an argument with good ev, deep defenses, well-explained warrants, etc., and will likely award higher speaks in those kinds of debates.

Stuff I Frequently Wondered About Judges

-- What framework impact? --

I almost always went for fairness and consider it the most strategic, however I know I was considerably worse going for non-fairness impacts when I tried to adapt to judges, so I would just do whatever you like best.

-- Can I go for the K/K AFF? --

Yes.

-- How many condo? --

Don't care. If you lose condo you'll lose and if you win condo you'll win, the amount you read probably won't end up mattering past a good 2A contextualizing their interp to the round.

-- Do advantage counterplans need solvency advocates? --

Don't care.

-- 1NC construction/do they care about a ton of off? --

Don't care. Do whatever.

-- Insert rehighlightings? --

Fine.

-- Plan text in a vacuum? --

Fine.

-- Is going for theory hopeless? --

No.

-- If they drop condo or aspec or it's a crush etc do I have to fill the whole 2NR/2AR? --

No.

Speaks

Mean speaks is 28.5, standard deviation is .4, so two-thirds of debaters will be from 28.1-28.9, 95% will be from 27.7 to 29.3, and essentially all will be from 27.3 to 29.7.

Carmine Miklovis Glenbrook North 5 rounds

Last changed on Sun September 18, 2022 at 10:12 AM EDT

Carmine Miklovis (he/him)

American University '26

cmiklovisdebate@gmail.com

Who Are You?

I did policy debate for Glenbrook North for 3 years, and stopped debating at the start of my senior year. I had a little success, but am probably unsuited to judge in the late elimination rounds of the larger tournaments of the year.

Top Level (Non-Negotiables)

Any behavior that is actively violent or otherwise harmful to anyone in the debate will not be tolerated. Default to gender-neutral pronouns (they/them) if you don't know your opponent's specific pronouns.

My ballot will not (and cannot) be a referendum on out-of-round behavior.

Debate is a game.

Tech > Truth, but the original argument has to be complete and not incoherent.

Cross-applications are never new.

Evidence should be highlighted to make actual arguments and shouldn't look like haikus. Teams should call out other teams for extending warrants that weren't originally highlighted in their cards.

If I'm unable to draw a line between an argument made in a final rebuttal and an earlier speech, I won't evaluate it.

Pen time is important. Don't expect me to flow 4 perms in a row. If you're spreading analytics at full speed, don't be mad if I miss the 11th 10-word subpoint you made about why weighing the aff is bad.

Clarity > Speed (you should spread, so long as you're clear)

Clipping is an auto-loss. Accusations of it must stake the debate on it and would benefit from audio proof.

If your primary strategy relies on attempting to win the debate by confusing your opponents, you should strike me. I'll probably end up being confused too.

The age of your blocks is inversely proportional to your chances of winning.

The more judge instruction you do, the less I will have to intervene.

What follows is a list of predispositions that I have about certain arguments. All of the following can be overcome by good debating, but are important to note when preffing me or debating in front of me. Given equal, or unclear, debating, the following predispositions will guide how I resolve the debate.

Topicality

--T v Policy Affs

I have no predispositions about which standards are good, and which ones are bad, or whether to prefer competing interps or reasonability. Don't assume I know the "community consensus" about which affs are and aren't topical, or about what "egregiously untopical" aff MBA reads.

I dislike plan text in a vacuum, but will still vote on it.

--T v K AFFs

I'm not the best for K affs, but if you have me in the back, there are a few things to note.

Your 2ar should have a lot of judge instruction. Given that I ran almost exclusively policy arguments, in the absence of robust judge-instruction from the aff team, I might resolve the debate in a way that favors the team whose arguments make more sense to me.

Aff teams should impact turn the neg's standards on T (and definitely shouldn't read a counter-interp that links just as much to their own offense).

Don't expect me to vote on buzzwords unless you actually explain them.

Additionally, I think any K aff that is not explicitly critiquing debate should always lose to a combination of switch-side debate and a topical version of the aff. K affs that aren't explicitly critiquing debate tend to instead have a reason why defending the USFG is bad, in conjunction with a reason why advocating for their scholarship is key. However, the reasons why the USFG is bad can easily be read on the neg, as a K, and the "advocacy key" warrant is not an "affirmation key" warrant, so the neg only needs to win a small risk of any of their offense on T in order for me to vote neg. That being said, this predisposition can be easily overcome by good debating, and will not substitute for insufficient negative topicality debating.

Kritiks

I'm not terrible for these, but I'm not amazing. You should err on the side of over-explaining your arguments, especially if they're more complicated. I'm good for certain Ks, such as cap, security, settler colonialism, and kritiks of IR, and you shouldn't substantially alter your level of explanation or strategy if you have me in the back for those, but anything else will require a lot of judge instruction.

A simple way to know whether or not you've met the threshold for explanation that will allow me to vote for your argument is to not only explain the concept, but explain the implication of it for the debate, and try to do so using as few buzzwords as possible. For example, "Dropping that antiblackness is ontological zeros all of their state good offense because it proves the state will never actually change, which means engagement is futile and means any risk of a link is sufficient to vote neg."

If you really think an argument is so important that winning it means you should win the debate, it should be more than a one-liner. Otherwise, don't expect me to vote on it, and don't post-round.

Links should be more specific than "any action by the United States federal government is bad."

If you have a new style of K, with completely never-before-seen elements, that you think will revolutionize debate, I'm probably not the best judge for it.

Perm: double bind should just be a way of explaining perm: do both, not a separate argument.

Counterplans

Counterplans that compete off of words that are always in the resolution (resolved, "United States federal government," "should," "substantial" or "substantially," et cetera) are unpersuasive to me, and should lose to theory or the intrinsic perm.

Counterplans that compete off of normal means (also known as "process counterplans") shouldn't be prolific on the NATO/emerging tech topic. Instead, I think plan-inclusive counterplans and advantage counterplans should fill that deficit in the negative's strategic arsenal.

Intuitive solvency claims don't need advocates, but you should have an advocate for why, for example, building a space elevator would prevent the collapse of U.S. hegemony.

Disads

Not much to say, they're great, especially specific disads. While I would prefer specific links, I'm fine with generic links if you can contextualize the link story to the aff.

Aff teams should take advantage of dropped straight turns, and neg teams should stop dropping straight turns (usually in the 1nr).

Evidence should tell a coherent story. If the uniqueness evidence says the bill passes because of bipartisanship, the link shouldn't be about political capital.

Theory

Like most other theory arguments, whether conditionality is good or not is a debate to be had.

"No neg fiat" is a joke.

Most theory arguments against kritiks are nothing more than a time skew for the 2nc, as opposed to a viable 2ar option.

Case

Impact defense is fine. I'm persuaded by the aff explaining why the specificity of their internal links means the impact defense isn't responsive.

Aff internal link chains and solvency mechanisms are suspicious, and should be poked at in cross-ex and in neg speeches.

Comparative impact calculus goes a long way in helping me resolve the debate, and, in conjunction with turns case arguments, can make close debates significantly easier to resolve.

Turns case arguments would benefit from (but don't necessarily need) cards. The level of explanation of your turns case argument is proportional to the likelihood I will vote on it if it is dropped and properly extended.

Closing Thoughts

Email me if you have any questions/would like additional feedback. I will listen to any redos you send me and give you feedback.

Otherwise, good luck and have fun.

Trevon Muhammad Jones College Prep 5 rounds

Subbi namakula Niles West High School 4 rounds

Last changed on Sat February 4, 2023 at 4:33 AM CDT

If you are a novice, none of these things apply to you. please just do your best. Your speaks are solely dependent on you being kind and nice to everyone in the room.- I don't need to be on the email chain! You all amaze me every day!

(Policy, Public Forum, then LD)

POLICY

I'm Subbi and I do Policy debate at the University of Iowa. GO HAWKS I debated for 3 years at Niles West.

First things first, make arguments you are comfortable and happy with. This is an activity that is inherently for the students participating in it. Read what you want to read and tell me why it matters and why I should vote on it. That being said please don't say racist/sexist/ableist language during a round. I'm just not gonna vote on racism good.

@Both Aff and Neg- Making fewer arguments that are extremely warranted is better than making more arguments that are not as warranted. I love common sense arguments and analytics. I don't think you need a card for every argument you make. If you make a persuasive analytic I'm all for that. I think debaters should be able and be encouraged to make arguments outside of cards. I prefer structural impacts over extinction-level impacts if you do make an extinction impact, have a really good internal link chain analysis.

@Policy Aff- Policy affs are really precise and garner GOOD SKILLS and I love them. I LOVE theory and I have a very low threshold for voting on it. I don't like really long case overviews. I will always weigh the affirmative unless told otherwise by the Neg. Winning against a one-off K in front of me requires you to at least win the Perm and a no link argument. I am very biased towards structural and ontological impacts like I don't think extinction outweighs everyday mundane violence, that being said have impact defense.

@Non-Traditional Affirmatives- Non-traditional affirmatives are really fun and give good EDUCATION and I love them. Non-Traditional Affs don't have to win that the Ballot is key in front of me, I will hold them to the same standard I hold the policy affs to, which is "you have to prove that the aff is a good idea. I need the aff to at least be reasonably within the bounds of the resolution.

@Policy Neg- Please don't read spark, death good, or PIC/KS.

@K Neg- If you're a one-off K team, please have a good explanation of your Links. You don't need to win an Alt in front of me to win the K, but you have to win impacts and framing, and why your theory means the aff can not solve or turns the case. Please have great answers to the permutation because I think most times the permutation is probably good, and I admit that I lean aff when it comes to permutations In one-off rounds.

@Negs Vs Non-Traditional Affs- If your ammo against non-traditional affs is two off cap and FW, lose the cap in front of me and just read external impacts that the aff can't solve but can be solved by core policy education. Case debates are really good against Non-traditional affs, Utilitarian framing is good, survival strategies are bad, No root cause. All of these are valid and good arguments to read. Don't drop the case ever. Don't let the aff weigh the entire aff against FW because they will almost always win. I like framework debates where the impact isn't fairness but education and skills. If you go for a Kritik against these Kinds of Affirmatives, I will have a high threshold for the aff being able to get a permutation, especially if they don't have an advocacy statement, but you must make this argument. Also, contextualize your Links to their theory/aff.

@cross ex- Look at me and don't laugh at your opponent's answer. Many people have done this with me in the back and it really hurts your ethos. Please be nice to each other, I have hella feelings and I don't wanna vote up a mean team.

Miscellaneous

- Please show up to rounds on time, ESP NOVICE, I will vote on disclosure theory so fast.

-Email subbi45hope@gmail.com

-Cx is a speech- Brian Rubaie 2k16

-I will never judge kick, ever.

-Don't steal prep.

-Have Fun :)

-I'm here to protect the 2NR.

-Will vote you down if you own Air Pods!!

-fam the wilder your alt, the higher the speaks lol.

- I have a low threshold for presumption if you are running a policy aff, I am not voting for presumption against a K aff.

Hey, I actually love and prefer judging PF. People in PF are a lot more polite and they always acknowledge me in the round and I like that.

PRO- Strongly prefer if pro always goes first in speeches and in the crossfire. I think to me a good pro is very persuasive and organized. I would prefer if you have two well-written and well-explained advantages rather than a bunch of shallow ones. I don't need you to extend everything in every speech but you should definitely have your points in the last two speeches if you want me to consider them.

CON- I think I am CON-leaning but that doesn't mean this is an easy ballot. You should offer good counterexamples, and directly answer their points in the last 3 speeches. I prefer that you have less defensive arguments and are more focused on proving the pro harmful.

Crossfire- You get a question, they get a question, then you get a follow-up. I hate hate hate when someone dominates the crossfire and doesn't allow for the other person to question, very rude. Will drop your speaks.

NOTES- I am fine with speed, I will reward politeness. Thank you for debating for me!

Hi so I have only judged a few rounds of LD, I think I have a good enough grasp on what is going on. I give a lot of leeway for the pro because they have a very short speech when answering a very long one. I prefer if this wasn't a debate about super old philosophers. That's right, I am NOT here for a Kant vs Locke debate. Most of these philosophers were super racist and if you want to talk philosophy there are philosophers today that you can reference.

Cam Nofsinger Lane Tech College Prep H.S. 5 rounds

Last changed on Sat March 11, 2023 at 3:44 AM CDT

cam, they/she, camnofdebate@gmail.com

last time large substance changes were done : nov 2022

if you are a contemporary reading this and i have stolen things from your paradigm, it's because they are good and i will not rehash something already well-written.

bio

- 8 years of cx debate experience and counting

- happily in college debate limbo (transfer student blues)

- lane tech debate captain ('21)

- lane tech debate co-coach (‘22-now)

- went to the toc in hs if that sort of thing has significance to you

- people who have had a significant effect on my debate style and experience: lila lavender, george lee, geo liriano, sam price, uiowa CE, and the entire university west georgia with an emphasis on CL

top level

online debate: please turn your camera on, I hate listening to 4 black boxes - this excludes tech problems, my laptop is also prone to very dramatic tantrums.

don't call me judge, my name will do just fine.

very little offends me. it should be simple for you to prevail if it's so wrong and you're so right.

in my personal career i primarily went for policy aff's and k's or t on the neg. i generally think that good things are good and bad things are bad. i have few stipulations (probably even less than most) on how the "rules" of debate ought to work, if you win the thing that you are running then i will vote on it.

1) an argument is a claim and a reason (at least).

2) evidence supports your argument, evidence is NOT your argument

3) i won't kick arguments for you

4) line by line debating is non-optional

5) tech > truth (this has nuances, you won't read them if i write them...)

5) if you cannot collapse, you are a bad debater

the most significant thing to remember is that i am a human (by most definitions) that does make mistakes (despite my best attempts). i'm generally proficient at flowing, and i will flow the entire round-barring something catastrophic. i've had excellent and extensive conversations with many other college-age judges about this, during which i have concluded the following. my job as a judge is to do my best to fairly adjudicate the round to the best of my ability, which i can assure you that i will do. if you feel the need to hammer me in the post-round, by all means, go for it, but make note that i will respect you as much as you respect me. there are right and wrong decisions in varsity debates, and judges can & do fail to deliver the right ones, which is a regrettable, yet inevitable part of the game; i do my absolute best to avoid this, and i can assure you i have interpreted every argument on the flow to the best of my working ability.

now, much like keryk kuiper outlines, i am a fairly expressive judge. i laugh when things are funny, i do make faces at things, and i have been known to throw flow paper about in a rather dramatic way. you are under no obligation to change strategies based on the way i react to it, and you will win something that i don't "like" as long as you are winning it on the flow. you may, however, choose to alter it. that is your right and your decision. you are also a human with "free will". do as you please - but note that reacting to those things is a crucial part of becoming a better debater - and if your argument is so bad that i look like i’m about to throw up, good luck getting me to hack for you in the rfd.

i believe it goes without saying i would much rather judge a well-executed policy v policy round than a poorly executed k v k round. just because i have a better substantive grasp on a larger body of k lit than an average clash judge does not mean that i think you should pref me higher as a k team. my ideal debate is something you have the best grasp of, and that you are the most excited about. if that happens to be the k, then wonderful, but if it is also a CP you have labored over then i am equally as enthusiastic. all good debate teams do their best to exert themselves on arguments that they think have the most merit - that is what i want to hear.

below are, as the intro would suggest, my many conflicting opinions on debate. do not confuse this with rules for a round. these are just my personal thoughts, and i take pride in my ability to objectively adjudicate whatever presents itself to me.

k things

K's proper: LT PN was explicitly a set col team for many moons, so i am personally most familiar with that set of lit in the context of my own competitive practice. in my time as a coach, i've also worked on plenty of semio-cap/po-mo/ "high theory" based k's. external to debate, i'm fairly well-versed in anti-capitalist and queer theory literature. this is not an excuse to not judge instruct. i have a strong distaste for k teams whose strategy is to confuse the opponent out of ballots with large, and often unnecessary words. i find this practice incredibly disingenuous and i have (unhappily) noticed its presence increase over time. if you rely on obfuscation, the argument is probably quite poor, and you should not be reading it. on a personal note, in working with the lovely lila lavender for quite some time, i have found myself more drawn to k v k debate over time, as i firmly believe it is the most interesting and innovative form that debate can take.

additionally, i do wholeheartedly agree with her analysis of non-colonized and non-black people reading afro-pessimism as a strategy, for more information I have included the same blog link here

https://thedrinkinggourd.home.blog/2019/12/29/on-non-black-afropessimism/

K on the aff: you must be willing to commit. it is far too often that i judge k aff teams that are determined to make their aff more middle-of-the-road/palatable. clever k teams should be able to achieve equilibrium with effective policy teams with the amount of tools at their disposal and yet they seem unwilling to use them. i am far more willing to hear that debate is better with no competition models, debate should be thrown off a cliff, or that debating the resolution has no intrinsic value than your average clash judge. that being said, i have a stronger preference for k affs that defend something material (specific political project) than the average k judge. too many k affs shy away from fiating the alt, but i digress. as far as content goes, the material that i have the most personal familiarity is outlined above. i think lila says it best when they say "If you are going to reject the res, which is totally cool with me, you should make sure to have justifications as to why the res is bad, and why rejecting it on the affirmative is key."

if you are going to perform, and it is significant to you that the performance is flowed a certain way, indicate that.

i will probably not flow your overview if it is longer than 30 seconds.

i will definitely not flow your overview if it requires a separate sheet.

K on the neg: should deal with the case in some way (either moot it entirely on the FW flow/ fiat the alt/ what have you). generating philosophical or research practice based competition is most likely to be persuasive to me - i am of the many that believe beyond game theory, debate is a research practice. one team will win their FW interpretation, as most other standards are arbitrary. same content familiarity applies here. generally, the neg shouldn't be lazy with their links, and the aff should be smarter debating fiat arguments. i prioritize specificity and spin above all else. i also think affs should be smarter (and earlier) on the FW flow.

my favorite part of nick rosenbaum's theory of debate is that "you do not need an alternative if you are winning framework OR if your links are material DA's to the aff's implementation where the squo would be preferable OR if your theory of power overdetermines the aff's potential to be desirable OR if you can think of another reason you don't need an alt." same material praxis alternative preference as k aff's (internal or external to debate). fiating mindset shifts/epistemic reorientations (i have yet to hear a sound description of what that is) is probably abusive and generally not a good argument. i will (and have - dont ask) vote on death good - if you win it.

FW: i generally believe that framework is probably true to some extent, and net good for clash v k affs because reciprocity is good and so on and so forth. as my judging record would indicate, i am neg leaning in K v FW debates, mostly for the reasons outlined in the k aff section of this paradigm. i find tournament and season preparation disparity arguments fairly silly. for the negative, use smart defensive tactics like switch-side debating and TVA's, explain the flaws in the counter-interpretation (unlimited topic, links to aff offense), and produce smart arguments about limits, mechanism education, or clash.

making sure there is fairness in a competition between two teams is one of the judge's main responsibilities. judges are fundamentally expected to evaluate the discussion honestly; forcing them to disregard fairness in that appraisal removes the prerequisite for debate. on the aff, you should impact turn the process of policy debates on the topic - this is distinct from the affs on the topic. if you win that the process of debating the topic is bad, then preserving fairness is futile to the game.

policy things

T: probably makes its way into 75% of my own 1NR’s, competing interps/quality of evidence comes first. do not hinge your strat on some vague cross ex answer, clear and concise arguments only. additionally, both or either team reading blocks through the rebuttals without refuting the other team's arguments in depth is very boring and not something I want to watch.

Theory: See T. I err aff on condo generally and for the sake of transparency thing, most consult/agent counterplans are probably abusive, but don't let that sway you, i will still vote on the flow work (yes i am a strong believer in the debate truth that neg fiat is bad). i'm predisposed to believe exactly what YOU think debate ought to be.

Da's: make sure you do plenty of impact work, and PLEASE articulate why the impact of your DA overwhelms the harms of the aff. Links exist on a spectrum; the "chance of a link" has to be qualified and then incorporated into the risk assessment component of impact calculus. Expert turns case analysis is invaluable. “Any risk” is inane. Below some level of probability, signal should be overwhelmed by noise, or perhaps the opposite effect might occur. Pretending that one can calculate risk precisely is stupid. Are you really sure that the risk of a disad is fifteen percent? Are you sure it’s not, say, twenty? Or maybe ten? Or, God forbid, twenty-five? If you are able to calculate risk with such precision, please quit debate and join the DIA. Your country needs you, citizen. If not, recognize that risks can be roughly calculated in a relative way, but that the application of mathematical models to debate is a (sometimes) useful heuristic, not an independently viable tool for evaluation. - mollison stolen from matheson which has now trickled down to here.

CP's: win the net ben and how you access it, otherwise i will vote on a nice Aff perm. That being said, If a perm is present in the 1ar, I will NOT automatically judge kick the CP if the squo is preferable. In this scenario, the 2nr would need to instruct me as to why I should do this, however I think judge kick goes aff easily in the presence of a perm.I think lots of counterplans that steal much of the aff (interpret that as you wish) are illegitimate and the aff should hammer them. the aff still needs has to win theory regardless of my personal disdain for certain CP's. i do like a well executed tricky PIC though on a NATO topic, i find them widely entertaining. not sure of their legitimacy, but at least i'll be in a good mood.

final notes

have fun, debate should be something you enjoy doing. be nice and cordial to your opponents, that being said don't be afraid to be assertive. don't clip cards. i follow the nsda handbook re: evidence violation, so any of those issues must be resolved through tab. if the tournament is not NSDA sanctioned and i am instructed to make the decision, i will default to my best interpretation of what "good practice" looks like on the current college circuit/"general accepted community norms". all that good stuff

bonus speaks section

+0.1 for open sourcing (let me know, i won't look)

+0.1 for any good joke in a speech (this is at my discretion, good luck)

+0.1 for novices that show me their flows after the round has ended

Jorge Ortiz Lane Tech College Prep H.S. 5 rounds None

Pauline Paranikas Walter Payton College Prep 5 rounds

Jace Phelan Lane Tech College Prep H.S. 5 rounds

Lizzie Prete Niles West High School 4 rounds

Last changed on Sat February 12, 2022 at 6:41 AM CDT

Niles West '14

UIUC '18

I coach for Niles West debate and have for the past 6 years. I have coached and judged in every level from novice to elimination rounds in varsity divisions. I have also coached and judged on local, regional, and national circuits.

Yes, I would like to be sent speech docs but I will not be flowing off of them --- elipre@d219.org

I debated for three years for Niles West and one year at Michigan State University on the legalization topic. My experience in debate is 50/50 policy and K.

I would like to emphasize that I am totally down for the K as much as I am totally down for a policy debate.

First and foremost: I do not allow my preconceived notions about certain types of arguments affect my decision-making. I view debate as an activity that develops critical thinking and advocacy skills, so do that in whatever way you think is best suited for your situation (granted that it is respectful and not offensive).

Certain arguments:

FYI: dropped arguments are not true arguments --- whoever makes the argument has the burden of proof.

T – love a good T debate. compare interpretations and evidence adequately. the impact level is the most important to me in T debates, and you should be comparing standards/impacts. don't forget the internal link debate. fairness is an impact in and of itself.

DAs – are essential to a good debate I think. impact calc and overviews are important. think we can all agree on that.

Ks and Framework – I love the K, I went for it a lot in high school. they are good for debate *if they answer the affirmative*. Please engage the affirmative. This entails making specific link arguments as well as thorough turns case analysis. I am probably familiar with your literature, however, I will not weigh your buzzwords more than logical aff arguments against your K. If you want my ballot, you need to first and foremost TALK ABOUT THE AFF. Read specific links to the aff’s representations and impacts, not just to the topic in general.

The link debate is crucial – and the aff should recognize if the neg is not doing an adequately specific job explaining their link story. Additionally, you need to make turns case arguments. I will not be compelled by a mere floating pik in the 2NR – that’s cheating. Give me analysis about why the aff reifies its own impacts. Absent this, I usually default to weighing the 1AC heavily against the K.

Relating to framework, I have a high threshold for interpretations that limit out critiques entirely. I would rather see debaters interact with the substance of the criticism than talk shallowly about fairness and predictability (especially if it is a common argument). A lot of the times, framework debates are lazy.

Planless affs: Totally down for them, especially on the criminal justice system reform topic. Perhaps they could be read on the neg, but that does not mean that they should not be read on the aff. This is good news if you are negative going for framework because switch side debate probably solves a lot of aff offense if there is a topical version of the aff. This is also good news for the aff because I can just as likely be persuaded that the reading of your aff in the debate space creates something unique (i.e., whatever you are solving for). A policy action, whether or not it's done by the federal government, should be a priority for the aff to defend. Please just do something that gives the negative a role in the debate. SLOW DOWN on taglines if they are paragraphs.

***

Meta things:

1. Clarity (important for online debate) - I've changed my stance on this since online debate became a thing. Still definitely say words. Sending analytics in speech doc and/or slowing down on analytics 1) helps me which is, in turn, good for you and 2) (at worst) facilitates clash because your opponents can also hear and know what you are saying, which is also good for everyone educationally!

Ideally I would not have to work too hard to hear what you are saying. I am bad at multitasking, so if I’m working too hard I’ll probably miss an argument or two. Please enunciate tag lines especially. If I can’t decipher your answer to an argument, I will consider it dropped.

2. Be respectful – yes, debate is a competitive activity, but it is also an academic thought exercise. I encourage assertiveness and confidence in round, but if you are rude, I will reduce your speaker points. Rudeness includes excessively cutting your opponent off or talking over them in cross-ex, excessively interrupting your partner's speech to prompt them, being unnecessarily snarky towards your opponents, etc. Please just be nice :)

3. Logic - a lot of times, debaters get wrapped up in the technicality of their debates. While tech is important, it shouldn’t come at the expense of doing things like explaining your arguments, pointing out logical flaws in your opponents’ arguments, and telling me how I should evaluate a particular flow in the context of the whole debate. I tend to reward teams that provide consistent, clear, and smart meta-level framing issues – it makes my job 100 times easier, and it minimizes the extent to which I have to intervene to decide the debate. I will not do work for you on an argument even if I am familiar with it – I judge off of my flow exclusively.

4. DO NOT assume that I am following along on the speech doc as you are giving a speech, because I am probably not.

5. Trolly arguments will probably get you low speaks and some eyerolls. Debate is an educational activity. By my standards, "trolly" includes timecube, xenos paradox, turing tests, etc. Y'all are smart people. I think you catch my drift here.

Sam Price Lane Tech College Prep H.S. 2 rounds

Samir Rahaman Northside College Preparatory 5 rounds

Kevin Ramirez Solorio Academy High School 5 rounds

Daniel Roytburg New Trier High School 3 rounds

Last changed on Tue January 23, 2024 at 12:50 PM CDT

This paradigm is sorted in descending order in terms of the importance of each component as I perceive them.

djroytburg@gmail.com

I debated at New Trier and currently study Computer Science and Statistics at Emory. I am immensely grateful for the communities I found debating with these two institutions, and I aspire for my view on debate to replicate many of the values of the coaches and debaters that have supported me.

I try not to let my beliefs influence me.

I won’t entertain arguments that are facially unethical, including death good. I’ll stop flowing.

I am a big believer in decorum and procedure. Please time yourselves. Please take a shower if needed. Please send everything in one doc before you stop prep. Please do not come to the debate in your pajamas. The mass migration to the bathroom post-2NC needs to stop, or at least diffuse a little bit. Please treat your opponents and I with respect, at least until you leave the room. Your content is formed by your form.

I am an expressive judge. My face betrays my emotions, no matter how hard I try.

I believe the status quo to be a somewhat stabilized form of debate for both K and policy teams. I do not consider topicality to be unreasonable or dangerous. I do not consider K AFFs to be the reason debate is dying. I am difficult to persuade that ballots shape personal subjectivities. I believe that K teams are better-equipped to win alternative, equally impactful forms of offense.

Topicality debates against planless AFFs should rely more on delineating boundaries between interpretations. I feel that most K AFFs produce vague, unclear imperatives (“AFFs must trouble the epistemology of the resolution”) as if they are defined parameters on the topic, and everyone assumes that this makes sense. This makes it difficult to understand AFF offense beyond “this AFF is very important.” I think about topicality through models, not AFFs.

Teams defending K AFFs should be very clear about a solvent mechanism or advocacy that redresses harms outlined. The risk that you win offense is, to an extent, predicated on this question.

I have been told by every university-level debater and coach around me that “conditionality bad” is facially nonsensical, but I can’t seem to remember why.

Counterplan theory debates need to devolve to issues that are more enriching than AFF and NEG ground. Unless someone is interested in doing better comparative work to prove some definitive topic bias, I couldn’t help but care less.

Debaters generally need need higher-quality evidence, particularly on topicality. I cannot believe some the things I have read in your card docs pass as evidence.

Debaters need to substantiate their arguments much more. Debaters will spurt out any wild conjecture that comes to mind in order to answer solvency deficits. Many of these are claims that one would need a Ph.D. to prove in any serious context. Spin is for comparing or connecting substantiated arguments, not for constructing them from thin air.

You can substantiate an argument with something other than a card. Good analytics beat bad disads. Mid analytics don’t beat mid disads.

Lastly, please keep the following, little catchphrases to yourselves. I never want to hear them ever again:

“Uniqueness determines the link/the link determines uniqueness”

“No perms in a method debate”

“Sufficiency framing”

“Our impacts are linear”

“Intrinsicness”

Melanie Rudolph Glenbrook South High School 3 rounds

Haaziya Saiyed Maine East High School 5 rounds

Nasim Salehitezangi Niles West High School 4 rounds

Last changed on Sat November 20, 2021 at 4:38 AM CDT

Niles West High School 2014-2018

Trinity University 2018-Now

Last Updated: November 2021

Email: nasim978@gmail.com (please put me on the email chain)

Zoom Update

- Please, please, please, again, PLEASE be clear. Honestly, just go slower even. It is so hard to understand sometimes over zoom because your voice gets distorted.

Top Level

I'm open to all arguments as long as they're not morally reprehensible. I did policy throughout all of high school, but that's only because I wasn't familiar with critique literature. I would have definitely read a k aff if I knew how to. So you can read whatever you want in front of me. I'm going to try my best to evaluate every single debate fairly. There are ways you can help me with this!

- Don't use acronyms! I'm not familiar with the topic and might have no idea what you're talking about.

- Don't spread through analytics. This doesn't mean you shouldn't spread. If you're going for an argument that requires a lot of explanation, I want to make sure I can write everything down on my flow and use it to make a fair decision. It's been a couple of years, and I'm not as good at flowing as I was before.

- Don't assume I always know what you're talking about. I'm familiar with most arguments, but I don't want to vote you down because I misunderstood something.

Important ways I evaluate debates

- I don't vote on cards alone. Explanation of an argument will get you way farther than an extra card. Debate is an argumentative activity. You need to explain why you're winning. I won't reward a team for reading a ton of cards and expecting me to just read them after the debate. If I can't figure out a way to evaluate the debate on my flow, I'll resort to evidence to determine the round.

- I'm 50/50 on tech vs. truth. If you explain why one matters more than the other, then I'll evaluate the debate that way. Tell me how I should evaluate the round, and I'll do that.

- I'll only read cards after the debate that I think are relevant to my decision. If there are cards you want me to read after the debate, you should extend/reference them in your speech.

- I have literally a million facial expressions during a round. If I'm scrambling to write things down, go a little slower. If I look confused, I'm confused.

Explain everything to me. If a team asks you something generic, and you're going for a complex argument, use that time to make sure I understand what's going on. Keep speaking until they ask you to stop. Feel free to ramble on and explain other parts of the debate that you think are important. Also a great time to explain acronyms or things about the topic that I might not know. However, you should use cross ex as an opportunity to make arguments and use them later on in the debate. You'll probably get higher speaks if you use cross ex well and incorporate it into the debate.

Topicality

These debates are great! I'm not familiar with the topic this year, so I probably won't understand your case lists. That being said, there are other ways to paint a picture of the best version of the topic and still win my ballot.

One thing to note -- the aff can win my ballot on we meet alone, so make sure your violation actually applies.

Neg -- make sure to have an actual impact.

Also, I won't vote on ASPEC. 2A's, you can feel free to just ignore this argument. I'm serious.

Disads

Great! I will reward 2A's who can logically beat a disad. I'm a little different on this than most people (I think). An aff team can win my ballot by simply pointing out logical fallacies in a contrived and weak disad. That being said, this shouldn't encourage you to read zero cards against a disad. For the neg -- if you're reading a contrived disad, I'll be more likely to vote for you on dropped arguments.

Counterplans

Also great! Advantage counterplans are definitely underutilized. Sufficiency framing!!! Frame the debate!!! Tell me why the net benefit outweighs the risk of a solvency deficit. You can read really abusive counterplans, but you better be good at answering theory. If the aff doesn't read theory, you're lucky. If the aff goes for theory, you're in trouble. You can go for theory in front of me, but that shouldn't dissuade you from going for good solvency deficits. I won't kick the counterplan unless you tell me to do it. Status quo = a viable option always means judge kick.

Impact Turns

Read them! I haven't experienced many of these debates, but if you win, you win!

Theory

Sure! I'll vote on it. Not on the neg. Never go for just theory on the neg. I won't vote for you.

K (General Thoughts)

In general, k arguments are very convincing to me. Most of the time, you're right on what you're saying, but that doesn't mean I'm going to vote for you because of it (remember 50/50 tech and truth). Also, I just don't think I'm good at evaluating these debates. For the aff, why does framework mean their links aren't true? Why is their theory of how things work wrong? For the neg, why does winning your theory mean you win the debate? These debates become kind of muddy for me, and often times, I'll have to resort to judge intervention to determine who is right - you don't want this. I don't know how to evaluate framework because both sides usually make arguments about either predictability or reputations, and they all have equal weight, but no one tells me what that means for the rest of their arguments. I'm just not good at evaluating this. You might end up being upset at me after the round, but I warned you I don't know. That being said, I want to judge debates as fairly as I can. You can read any k you want in front of me. Remember that I don't know a lot of k literature, so you'll need to explain more than usual. You'll probably need to slow down here. For example, if you say there's "x disad" on the perm, give me time to write it down before moving on. I won't remember what the disad to the perm is if I don't write down what it means. I won't just vote on buzz words if I can't explain why I voted on it to the other team. Again, I won't vote on buzz words - I need to be able to explain it myself after the round and it's up to you to make sure I know how to do that. ESPECIALLY IN YOUR LAST SPEECH. I don't want to vote you down just because I didn't understand what your argument was, so please explain it. I like specific links, but if they dropped it and you're winning on a generic link, then I'll vote for you.

K affs

Do whatever you want! If you usually read a K aff, don't change it in front of me. I'll evaluate it as fairly as I can but consider reading everything I said above on clarity and explanations.

K vs policy aff

You can definitely read these in front of me! I'm familiar with these debates, since I've had a lot of them. These debates are the ones where explanation is crucial. I'm not familiar with a lot of k literature, so you'll probably need to do more explaining than usual. Please don't spread through analytics in these debates. I need to make sure what every disad on framework means, and to reiterate, I haven't flowed in a while.

K vs k affs

Do what you want. I might have no clue what's going on, but somehow I will form a ballot. Warning - this will likely be a coin toss for me. If you are upset at my decision, again, I warned you. On the plus, you can convince me to vote on anything since I'm not sure how these debates work. If you say "X" means you win, then yeah I guess it does.

Framework

Do whatever you want. I know these debates and will vote on any impact! I do find the debate is a game argument convincing tho.

Fun things:

- I like jokes

- References you can use -- Game of Thrones, Rick and Morty, Westworld, The Witcher, Avatar the Last Airbender, something popular

- If you know people I know in debate, make a funny joke

- Be bold and do risky things

- Some debates don't require a full speech. You can end a speech in 1 minute if they dropped something like topicality. If they drop theory, just make your entire speech about theory and finish early if you want.

Don't do these things

- Attack someone's race, ethnicity, nationality, gender, orientation, identity, etc. I will stop flowing and submit my ballot.

- Be super mean to your partner/opponents

- Overpower your partner during cx

- Say morally reprehensible things

- Expect cards to win you debates with zero explanations

- Clip cards

Julia Smith Glenbrook North 5 rounds

Last changed on Tue February 7, 2023 at 3:54 PM EDT

debated policy for glenbrook north high school

put me on the email chain: julia.s.debate@gmail.com

pronouns are she/her - for online debate, please change your name to include your school and preferred pronouns.

(last updated for the CJR topic)

tech > truth

I don't tolerate rudeness/racism/sexist/homophobia/transphobia etc.

don't read death good

clipping/false accusations of clipping will result in a loss

specific arguments:

theory: I will vote on most theory arguments - if impacted out well enough. However I will not vote on aspec or rvi's even if they're dropped. As a 2a, I love 2ars on theory, but I really encourage for them to be given off the flow for the most part. Prewritten blocks aren't always responsive to their arguments, and it's kind of weird to get up and give a big speech about education and argument development when you haven't thought out what your saying well enough to extrapolate it without reading a script.

counterplans/disads: I think that counterplans should compete off of non-artificial net benefits - but i'll still vote on them if you can win that they are theoretically legit (I tend to lean aff on this question, but that doesn't mean I'll kick the cp the second they read their 2ac theory block - articulate why your counterplan specifically is good for debate). Normally not a fan of agent cps, but given the only disads on cjr being politics I am sympathetic to them. disad debates are great, please do impact calc. I won't judge kick unless explicitely instructed to.

impact turns: for the most part i'm fine with them - although I will not vote for trump good, or impact turns to soft left impacts (racism, etc).

ks: k's on the neg are fine - I have some experience running ones like security, set col, cap/neolib, etc. i don't have a great understanding of higher theory ks, but if you can articulate them well enough to me then that's fine. Long overviews at the top are a no for me, please just have a quick explanation and then detailed line by line.

k-affs: novices should read a plan, and it should defend hypothetical government action. otherwise it’s fine.

other:
- fairness is an impact.
- if you are going to k the disad/cp do not put some egregious tag like "doesn't solve" and then get up in your rebuttal and saying "they dropped the k of the disad/cp..." that is ridiculous

Mia Sodini Northside College Preparatory 5 rounds

Matthew Sung Northside College Preparatory 5 rounds None

Sofia Thompson Glenbrook North 5 rounds

Rithika Tudmilla Northside College Preparatory 5 rounds

Last changed on Fri February 10, 2023 at 6:21 AM CDT

Email Chain: artsy2133@gmail.com

She/her

Northside College Prep '22

University of Chicago '26

Experience: 4 years of Policy Debate in high school, now American Parliamentary Debate in UChicago. Yes, Parli. Go ahead, laugh. In high school I had a history of running policy, not a master at critical philosophical arguments but can keep up.

TIPS

I like depth over breadth. If you're going to run 11 off, fine. But having a few, well-explained off-case arguments in the 1NC is better for you and your opponents if you actually want to learn something. This also applies to your second rebuttals for both sides; focus on 2 or 3 key arguments you think you are ahead on, explain your warrants, and compare your warrants to the warrants of your opponents.

Make sure to do line by line! Answer your opponents' arguments by inditing their authors or warrants, and explain how your warrants are better. Contextualize it to the round as a whole and TELL ME how it helps you win in your rebuttals.

If you are going to extend an argument from a constructive, make sure it's been explicitly extended in all of the following constructive and rebuttals for it to have weight in the round final decision. If you hear your opponent extending an argument in their second rebuttal that they didn't in the first rebuttal, make sure to call it out and explain why it's not fair. If you do, it's a good sign you are flowing carefully and I will probably increase your speaker points.

AFF

All affs are cool to read, including K Affs. If you are breaking a new aff, please be explicit in your overview to explain the mechanisms, implications, and solvency. Be careful about topicality. This topic implicates a huge scope of affs, so any limiting standards on Topicality will be convincing.

Running disadvantages is good. I have a higher threshold for extinction-level impacts so make sure you explain how your impact has a better probability, timeframe, and magnitude over your opponent's. If you are going against a soft-left affirmative, framing should be a large part of your argumentation in order to tell me how I should evaluate the debate.

The solvency advocate for counter plans needs to be strong for it to win. Make sure you have both internal and external net benefits to the CP so that you explain how the counterplan avoids the disadvantage and how there is an advantage to it that the Affirmative can't access. Permutations are important and will probably be the round decider if it goes insufficiently answered. Have a clear explanation of why your counterplan cannot happen at the same time as the affirmative.

KRITIK

Kritiks are all valid and appreciated. The links should be strong and a viable alternative should be proposed in order for it to be properly evaluated against the Affirmative. I understand the necessity of criticism but an answer to the "so what" question needs to be provided. Makes sure to do K framing to tell me how I should evaluate the Kritik in the round.

THEORY

I do think theory is a voter as long as it's legitimate, so make sure you have a good defense if you are challenged. I consider three or more conditional advocacies to be convincing for condo, but if you have a good explanation of why one or two is cheating, go for it. If you find yourself going for theory, you should dedicate your entire second rebuttal to it. At that point, nothing else will matter. Make sure to isolate points of real in-round abuse or a good argument for why potential abuse is harmful.

Random note: if you are looking for a good pen to use for debate flowing, I recommend Pilot G-2. I like using 0.7mm but 0.38mm is also out there if you prefer Ultra Fine.

Cameron Unwin Niles North High School 3 rounds

Eva Vasilopoulos Niles North High School 4 rounds

Last changed on Sat March 11, 2023 at 6:38 AM CDT

Hey y'all my name is Eva Vasilopoulos and I'm a second year political science, public relations, and economics majors at Iowa State University. I just recently got back into the debate realm this year so I am not fully in the loop on the topic. I did policy debate in high school for Niles North.

Top-level

evavasdebate@gmail.com

Also please make jokes, debate gets boring really fast

I don't know this topic that well so keep that in mind

Just call me Eva, not judge

line by line is important

I don't care what speed you read but just be clear

(For CX)

Case

Impact calc key for affs to do if y'all want an aff ballot. All of my debate career I have only read soft left affs, but I do understand the literature from all aff types. If you have an aff and it has a structural violence impact with some framing, and another impact of war, disease, Econ collapse, etc. Go for one, not both if the 2ar extends their genocide and war impacts, a big no-no. (this happens a lot too)

K-Affs

I like these affs, breath of fresh air from the basic policy affs from the topic resolution. I would prefer teams to read a plan text and defend some action. (doesn't have to be USFG as an actor) I have judged and voted on identity affs a good amount during the arms sales topic and cjr topic.

DA's

have a clear internal link and link story, how does point A lead to point B. Don't use generic evidence for the link, there has to be a clear point that the AFF. I lean slightly aff on this so the neg needs to do some work to prove the DA. If you run a da PLEASE RUN A CP, with it cause yeah there is a risk but I don't have another way to solve that's on my flow. If you are running a relations da, Econ da, or other one make sure you have recent evidence so the impact is concrete.

t has been very over-limiting on a lot of topics I have debate on, majority of T arguments only make certain big affs topical. breath>depth. I'm pretty neutral on judging this, it comes down to the extensions in the 2nr and the response in the 2ar on how I should write my ballot. ASPEC I'm not a big fan of, if you go for it the 2nr should be just aspec and explain the voter in the round and why fairness and ed are key. CJR specific I have voted on t on this topic and I have voted against it.

Love a good perm/theory debate. Both sides need to do work to prove whether if the cp is competitive/noncompetitive and that it does/doesn't solve the aff w/o linking to the net benefit. impact calc of the nb is key for my ballot.

A good amount of 1st-year rounds I judged were more critical. I'm in the loop on K literature, so you really don't have to explain terms just the world of the alt looks like and why I should pick the neg's fw over the affirmative. these rounds are either really good or really bad. Known to be very messy Only run it if you really understand it.No no generic link cards, have to be specific to the aff. By the 2nr the neg should have a clear story of what the world of the alt is, and why the k matters in this round.

Samantha Walsh Northside College Preparatory 5 rounds

Annie Wang Northside College Preparatory 5 rounds

Ned Wawrzyn Glenbrook South High School 2 rounds

Last changed on Sun November 13, 2022 at 6:49 AM CDT

uiuc '25 economics and political science

Glenbrook South '21

Nedwdebate@gmail.com

Top level:

-I did debate for three years and primarily ran policy arguments

-I don't care what arguments you run as long as it isn't racist/sexist/homophobic/harmful towards your opponents

-Like everyone, I think carded evidence and the quality of evidence is really important. However, bad evidence or analytical assertions still need be answered. If unanswered, I will presume the analytical assertion or bad evidence to be true.

-I know nothing about the topic this year

-I won't vote on stuff that happened outside of round.

-below are a few biases that I hold that I doubt will ever factor into a decision unless the debate is super close

I find myself more persuaded by limits internal links as opposed to ground ones. I think I am probably a better judge for reasonability than most if impacted out correctly.

DAs/CPs

nothing to say here

Theory

I am open to voting for pretty much any theory argument if argued well. However some theory args (condo bad, object fiat bad, international fiat bad, multiactor, etc.) are better than others (new affs bad, Ks bad, no negative fiat, etc.) You are also probably better off arguing for theory as a reason to reject the argument but do whatever you think gives you the best chance at winning. I default to judge kicking the CP, if no arguments are raised about it.

K things

I probably lean aff on questions of weighing the aff, but I am pretty easily convinced of the other side. I am also pretty middle of the road on Framework v K affs.

Impact framing

It is very odd to me that some judges put in their paradigms that util and consequentialism are not up for debate. Consequentialism versus deontology is a massive debate in ethics. It is still a bit of an uphill battle for soft left affs because policy analysis lends itself to consequentialist framing and because most of the arguments the aff chooses to make in these debate are not persuasive to me. However, this is all to say that I am more open to non-consequentialist impact assessment after not doing policy debate for nearly two years.

Maryanne Xu New Trier High School 3 rounds

Alan Zhukovsky Glenbrook South High School 3 rounds

Last changed on Sat November 19, 2022 at 2:58 PM CDT

TOP LEVEL -

I'm a first year out. I don't debate in college. Glenbrooks is my first(and maybe only) tournament of this year, so I don't really know much about the topic specifically, but I still remember a decent amount from my years of highschool debate and will probably be able to piece the round together(just don't assume I know anything since I'm a bit rusty). I haven't updated my paradigm in a while, so a decent amount is in the context of novice debate.

This is my inspiration, everything he says applies. He probably does a better job explaining everything so...

https://www.tabroom.com/index/paradigm.mhtml?search_first=connor&search_last=kiefer

TL/DR:

I'll vote for anything

do impact calc and judge instruction

Tech required is proportional to how true the argument is

explain stuff (I'm not smart)

I'm ok with open CX

I like funny debaters, but not mean debaters.

I debated for 4 years debating for Glenbrook South (North of Chicago). I do not debate in college. I was a kritial policy debater(just so you know). I am absolutely not big brain, and will probably be the dumbest one in the room.

General Stuff

I am tech over truth most of the time if warrants are provided. Although I used to prefer evidence over analytics, recently I have started to think of well warranted and contextualized analytics as being the same if not better than cards. If you are extending evidence tell me why I should prefer your evidence (and don't just say "well it's more recent" or something like that, tell me why recency matters). MAKE SURE TO DO IMPACT CALC; as a 2a, I rarely do enough of this (don't be like me). I also like judge directions(please tell me how to evaluate rounds, I would like to do as little work as possible). Try to be respectful, but I understand if you have light hearted banter or make jokes.

Order of arguments(favorite - least favorite) this isn't an order of how I vote, just my favorites

1.Kritiks

2. CPs(the cheatier the better)

3. Normal Arguments(Case/DA)

4.misc. theory violations

5.Topicality

Theory

In my eyes, there are no clear rules to debate. If someone drops your stuff, and they are winning sandbagging good, I might still weigh it. If you want a 3nr, go up there and spend most of the time on theory(actually, probably not. Tournaments have speech times. If it's the last round, then I might be receptive). With persuasive theory, I will allow almost anything. TECH OVER TRUTH DOES NOT ALWAYS APPLY HERE. Using a previous answer, if you want a 3nr, you better have some damn good theory arguments. but generally I will vote on theory arguments if they drop it. I generally believe that the neg has the most ground, but am willing to be persuaded. Theory debates should not exclusively be blocks, extend your offense and then do line by line on their defense.

Here's the order of voters I find persuasive

1. Education

2. Fairness

3. Strategy

4. aff/neg Ground

5.miscellaneous

Kritiks

Ks are pretty epic ngl. I have the most experience with Moten, Afropess, Cap, Setcol, but I am willing to listen to any K(as long as you explain this well and aren't too buzz word heavy[I am probably the least familiar with PoMo]). Because of this, I would like to believe that I can be a competent K judge, but I still think that a good K team doesn't go off big words, but instead explains their theory like I have never heard of who Deleuz is. I believe that the affirmative should have to defend the impact of the plan and their representations, but can be convinced otherwise. I think that framing out the aff/k tricks are interesting. I have sympathy for the aff wanting to weigh their impact, but I think this becomes more persuasive when you defend your reps are good or read scenario planning cards. I also think that if the K team does not attempt to moot the aff, they should either have in-depth impact framing or case debating. I believe that in debate, utilitarianism is the most predictable impact framing, and will default to this. That being said, I can very easily be convinced another way.

Counter-Plans

I think counterplans are strategic. That being said, I am very willing to vote on perms, and probably will. IF YOU ARE AFF, NEVER DROP PERM DO THE CP(THIS IS YOUR BEST CHANCE OF WINNING). Also, try to attack solvency and the net ben. I find counterplan debates fun, and went for a process CP almost every neg round novice year.

I am Ok with open CX, but if you keep taking questions from your partner, then you will lose speaks. I understand if you think your partner will cost you the round, but in general, have some trust. Same thing for asking questions. I like teams that are dominant in CX, without being overly aggressive.

Racism/Misogyny/Bigotry

I typically have a pretty high bar for what I would consider to be in this category, like if you mess up a util argument, I won't completely flame you. TECH OVER TRUTH DOES NOT APPLY HERE. If you read a racist argument, I will not evaluate it, and I will yell at you in the RFD. Even subtle things, can be racist if it's a clear dog whistle. I will try not to outright vote you down if you are clearly winning, but if it's competitive, you will lose.

Topicality

I personally do not think a lot of T arguments are legitimate(clearly some are). That being said, I will vote for them(even if they aren't completely dropped). The T ASPEC at the bottom of another T violation is a legitimate strategy, just please be very clear if it isn't in the speech doc.

General Decorum

I am fine, with some light hearted bashing, IF the other team is alright with it. pls no bullying.

If I see you not flowing then you are probably going to lose speaks, as it kinda shows me you don't care. That being said I'm ok with you prepping speeches, just please don't look at the ceiling or look at "cringe compilation #154"

I will shout clear. I probably won't do this a bunch, especially if you send speech docs.

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Novice Policy Paradigm List

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