important -

i wrote this when i was mostly judging pf, but i'm open to any types of arguments in policy. i pretty much exclusively read Ks when i debated, but i've voted on t-fw, politics disads, and all kinds of other boring arguments in the past too. more policy stuff is at the bottom, but ask questions before the round starts if you have any.

email me docs: griffinamos2@gmail.com

i debated for 4 years at cosby high school from 2016-2020 and did policy, ld, and pf. i also did apda a bit at william & mary. i've judged everything from local pf to NFA LD nats.

let me know if you want to see my flow of your round after it's over - i'm uncomfortable sending flows to debaters that weren't in the round though because i think that unfairly helps debaters w more clout

feel free to postround me respectfully, i recognize that i'm capable of making wrong decisions or understanding arguments incorrectly - i'm here to learn too

don't misgender someone, your speaks will get tanked and you'll pretty much auto lose if they make an argument about it

**ESPECIALLY IMPORTANT FOR LOCALS - I'm only going to vote on the arguments in your last speech. Don't expect to win on a contention from your constructive if you just say "Oh and extend contention 1" - tell me the whole story and do comparative weighing.

how do i decide who i vote for?

first - i go through every piece of offense in each final focus and determine if every important piece of the argument is extended (all too many rounds i vote based off a team failing to extend a link, warrant, or impact)

next - i look at the defense on each of these - if no weighing is done, i default to whichever argument is the path of least resistance - if both teams have no offense left, i presume the first speaking team - this is also when i call any cards i'm told to or that i think are sus

then - assuming there is weighing, i vote based on whichever weighing mechanism is best justified - if none are justified, i default magnitude first, probability second, and timeframe third - i think lots of other mechanisms used in pf fall into one of these (for example, severity is a type of magnitude, strength of link is probability)

what types of arguments do i like?

i will vote on anything that isn't problematic and i don't hack for any particular type of argument - i'm comfortable evaluating theory, kritiks, or any type of progressive argument because that is what my background is in.

the substance based debates i find myself enjoying the most generally incorporate some form of structural violence framing, i won't hack for or against it, that's just what the most interesting rounds to me look like. i find myself enjoying rounds where teams collapse on turns in the latter half too, this seems to happen pretty rarely in pf

the kritikal arguments i'm most familiar with are queer-pess, baudrillard, psychoanalysis, and afro-pess but i think you should always explain every kritikal argument as if i'm a lay judge because i think kritiks in pf are too often run against teams that don't understand the arguments.

the theory arguments i find myself agreeing with the most are disclosure, any type of gendered language bad, paraphrasing bad, and trigger warning theory - again i won't hack for or against any of these, i'm just as willing to vote on disclosure bad as i am disclosure good - the exception for this is trigger warning theory, if you trigger someone and they make it clear they don't feel safe, i will drop you, end the round early, and give you the lowest speaks i can w/o having to justify it to tab.

i'll also begrudgingly vote on frivolous theory or trix if they're won - i'm super open to impact turns based on this type of argumentation though and feel like most of them tend to be true

technical stuff?

defense is sticky - i've been asked to include that turns are not defense

frontline in second rebuttal

don't read offensive overviews or disads in second rebuttal

i won't vote on a piece of offense unless it is in summary, and final focus - that includes the warranting for it, not just a blippy extension

theory?

read disclosure theory its just a true argument

i don't care if you read theory in shell format or more simply - all that's important is that all the crucial parts of the argument are there in some capacity - that means i want some interpretation on how you think debate should look, how the other team violates this, the reasons that debate should look this way, and why i should drop the other team for it

if you're going to read theory that is just like i should drop someone because they break x rule (maybe like "this tournament says u can't read counterplans so drop them for reading one"), you need to justify why the rule is good or following rules in general is good. just the fact that it is a rule is not persuasive to me, i don't care

defaults:

no rvis

competing interps

drop the arg

policy

mostly read Ks on aff and my 1ncs tended to be like a K, some dumb argument like the sorites paradox, some form of theory, and just dumping impact and link turns on case

open cross is chill, flex prep and using cross as prep are cool too

i hate the trend of just reading a string of cards on case in 1ncs. i love uncarded, but warranted arguments on case. solid warranting that comes from you is just as persuasive, if not more so, than warranting from some random card you stole from the wiki or camp files.

please stop going for every argument in your 2NR. respond to offense on arguments you're going to kick and then just give me a really persuasive story for why whatever you're collapsing on wins.

Hi! I'm Mac Hays (he/him pronouns)! I did 4 years of PF at Durham Academy. I have spent 4 years coaching PF on the local and national circuit. I now debate APDA at Brown. Debate however is most fun for you without being exclusive.

Disclaimers:

* TLDR tabula rasa, warrant, signpost, extend, weigh, ballot directive language makes me happy, metaweighing ok, framing ok (I default "pure" util otherwise), theory ok, speed ok (don't be excessive), K ok, no tricks, be nice and reasonable and have fun, ask me questions about how I judge before round if you want more clarity on any specifics. Ideally you shouldn't run theory unless you're certain your opponents can engage.

* Nats probably isn’t the place for theory/Ks unless the violation is egregious and your opponents can clearly engage. Don’t run whack stuff for a free win

* Please send all evidence you read in the email chain (ideally before speeches)

* Every speech post constructive must answer all content in the speech before it. Implications: No new frontlines past 2nd rebuttal/1st summary (defense isn't sticky, but that doesn't mean that 1st summary must extend defense on contentions that 2nd rebuttal just didn't frontline), any new indicts must be read in the speech immediately after the evidence is introduced, etc. New responses to new implications = ok. New responses to old weighing = not ok.

* How I vote: I look for the strongest impact and then determine which team has the strongest link into it as a default. See my weighing section for more details. If you don't want me to do this, tell me why with warranting.

* Add me to the chain: colin_hays@brown.edu.

* The entirety of my paradigm can be considered "how I default in the absence of theoretical warrants" - that is, if you see debate differently than I do, then make arguments as to why that's how I should judge, and, if you win them, I'll go with it. (exceptions are -isms, safety violations, speech times and the like, reasonability specifics are in the doc below).

Have fun!

My paradigm got unreasonably long so I put it in a doc, read it if you want more clarity on specifics:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1lFX0Wja9W_h1xC1YBrUl8XZZzRenxOGOx7LCKd9liRU/edit