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Loyola Invitational

2022 — Los Angeles, CA/US

Varsity LD Paradigm List

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Naomi Alan Marlborough School 5 rounds

Joseph Barquin Marlborough School 6 rounds

Last changed on Wed January 3, 2024 at 4:53 PM PDT

Affiliations:

I am currently coaching 3 teams at lamdl (POLAHS, BRAVO, LAKE BALBOA) and have picked up an ld student or 2. I am pretty familiar with the fiscal redistribution and WANA topics.

I do have a hearing problem in my right ear. If I've never heard you b4 or it's the first round of the day. PLEASE go about 80% of your normal spread for about 20 seconds so I can get acclimated to your voice. If you don't, I'm going to miss a good chunk of your first minute or so. I know people pref partly through speaker points. My default starts at 28.5 and goes up from there. If i think you get to an elim round, you'll prob get 29.0+

Evid sharing: use speechdrop or something of that nature. If you prefer to use the email chain and need my email, please ask me before the round.

What will I vote for? I'm mostly down for whatever you all wanna run. That being said no person is perfect and we all have our inherent biases. What are mine?

I think teams should be centered around the resolution. While I'll vote on completely non T aff's it's a much easier time for a neg to go for a middle of the road T/framework argument to get my ballot. I lean slightly neg on t/fw debates and that's it's mostly due to having to judge LD recently and the annoying 1ar time skew that makes it difficult to beat out a good t/fw shell. The more I judge debates the less I am convinced that procedural fairness is anything but people whining about why the way they play the game is okay even if there are effects on the people involved within said activity. I'm more inclined to vote for affs and negs that tell me things that debate fairness and education (including access) does for people in the long term and why it's important. Yes, debate is a game. But who, why, and how said game is played is also an important thing to consider.

As for K's you do you. the main one I have difficulty conceptualizing in round are pomo k vs pomo k. No one unpacks these rounds for me so all I usually have at the end of the round is word gibberish from both sides and me totally and utterly confused. If I can't give a team an rfd centered around a literature base I can process, I will likely not vote for it. update: I'm noticing a lack of plan action centric links to critiques. I'm going to be honest, if I can't find a link to the plan and the link is to the general idea of the resolution, I'm probably going to err on the side of the perm especially if the aff has specific method arguments why doing the aff would be able to challenge notions of whatever it is they want to spill over into.

I lean neg on condo. Counterplans are fun. Disads are fun. Perms are fun. clear net benefit story is great.

If you're in LD, don't worry about 1ar theory and no rvis in your 1ac. That is a given for me. If it's in your 1ac, that tops your speaks at 29.2 because it means you didn't read my paradigm.

Now are there any arguments I won't vote for? Sure. I think saying ethically questionable statements that make the debate space unsafe is grounds for me to end a round. I don't see many of these but it has happened and I want students and their coaches to know that the safety of the individuals in my rounds will always be paramount to anything else that goes on. I also won't vote for spark, trix, wipeout, nebel t, and death good stuff. ^_^ good luck and have fun debating

Hannah Bartels La Reina 1 rounds

Mike Bietz Harvard-Westlake School 2 rounds

Last changed on Tue January 2, 2024 at 6:43 AM PDT

Head Coach: Harvard-Westlake School, Los Angeles CA | mbietz AT hw.com

I am diagnosed (and am on medication) with severe ADD. This means my ability to listen carefully and pick up everything you say will wane during the round. I would strongly suggest you have vocal variety and slow down, especially for what you want to make sure I get.

Jonah Feldman, friend and former coach at UC Berkeley, summed up a lot of what I have to say about how I evaluate arguments

I do not believe that a dropped argument is necessarily a true argument.

I am primarily interested in voting on high-quality arguments that are well explained, persuasively advanced, and supported with qualified evidence and insightful examples. I am not interested in voting on low-quality arguments that are insufficiently explained, poorly evidenced, and don't make sense. Whether or not the argument was dropped is a secondary concern...

How should this affect the way I debate?

1) Choose more, especially in rebuttals. Instead of extending many different answers to an advantage or off-case argument, pick your spots and lock in.

2) If the other team has dropped an argument, don't take it for granted that it's a done deal. Make sure it's a complete argument and that you've fully explained the important components and implications of winning that argument.

His full paradigm: https://www.tabroom.com/index/paradigm.mhtml?judge_person_id=6366

More stuff:

I never thought I'd have to say this, but you have to read aloud what you want me to consider in the round. Paraphrasing doesn't count as "evidence."

The affirmative probably should be topical.

I think that I'm one of the few circuit LD judges who votes affirmative more than I vote negative. I prefer an affirmative that provides a problem and then a solution/alternative to the problem. Negatives must engage. Being independently right isn't enough.

I consider myself a policy-maker with an extremely left bent. Answering oppression with extinction usually doesn't add up for me. I'll take immediate, known harms over the long-term, speculative, multi-link impacts 90 out of 100 times. This isn't paradigmatic, so it is NEGS failing to engage the Affirmative Case.

Given my propensity to vote affirmative and give the affirmative a lot of leeway in defining the scope of the problem/solution, and requiring the negative to engage, I'd suggest you take out the 3 minutes of theory pre-empts and add more substance.

Topicality is probably not an RVI, ever. Same with Ks. Today I saw someone contend that if he puts defense on a Kritik to make debate a safe space, the judge should vote for him because he'll feel attacked.

Cut your presumption spikes. It's bad for debate to instruct judges not to look for winning arguments. It also encourages debaters to make rounds unclear or irreconcilable if they need to catch up on actual issues.

Where an argument can be made "substantively" or without theory, just make it without theory. For example, your opponent not having solvency isn't a theory violation. it just means their risk of solvency is very low. Running theory flips the coin again. So it's both annoying and bad strategy. Other examples might include: Plan flaws, no solvency advocate, and so on. Theory IS the great equalizer in that it gives someone who is otherwise losing an argument a chance to win.

Cross-x cannot be transferred to prep time.

Some annoyances:

- Not letting your opponents answer a question. More specifically, male debaters who have been socialized to think it is ok to interrupt females who have been socialized not to put up a fight. If you ask the question, give them a chance to answer.

- Ignoring or belittling the oppression or marginalization of people in favor of smug libertarian arguments will likely not end up well for you.

- People who don't disclose or they password protect or require their opponents to delete speech documents. I'm not sure why what you read is private or a secret if you've read it out loud. The whole system of "connected" kids and coaches who know each other using backchannel methods to obtain intelligence is one of the most exclusionary aspects of debate. This *is* what happens when people don't disclose. I'll assume if you don't disclose you prefer the exclusionary system.

Some considerations for you:

- if you’re reading such old white male cards that you have to edit for gendered language, maybe consider finding someone who doesn’t use gendered language... and if you notice that ONLY white men are defending it, maybe consider changing your argument.

- if you find yourself having to pre-empt race or gender arguments in your case, maybe you shouldn't run the arguments.

Kaare Bodlovich Peninsula High School 4 rounds

Ian Brown Hire 6 rounds

Last changed on Tue January 17, 2023 at 5:51 AM PDT

Bio:

pls add me to the chain - iandebatestuff@gmail.com

prolly go 85-90% of your speed if you're spreading super quickly-- will call you out in you aren't enunciating clearly. Slow down on analytics in your rebuttal speeches.

clipping is a L25

Currently attend Loyola Marymount University

3 years Varsity LD at Loyola HS.

If you have any questions pls ask me b/f the round.

Top level:

Tech > Truth.

Strategic decision making > Pandering to me. Good tech will override any preferences I have below.

I'll only intervene if there are arguments of equal strength without weighing claims to resolve them. In these situations, I look to evidence first, then truth.

Misc: Sometimes emotive; always flowing (but not off the doc). Not a fan of one-line cheap shots. You have my consent to record, but ask others. I don't keep time. 100% fine with post-rounding (time permitting).

Banned arguments: Racism good and oppression good

Argument history: Affs defended a plan and mostly big impacts. Negs were almost strictly policy: sometimes 6+ off, sometimes 6 minutes of impact turns, but usually something in between. K when policy ground was scarce.

DA: Terminal impact calc >> strength of link barring instruction. Topic disads are good. Politics and riders are fine. Uniqueness puts the straight turn in a much better place. Zero risk on ridiculousness like 2014 midterms. I like it better when turns case is earlier. New 2AR and 2NR weighing always.

Case: Case debate, impact turns, presumption, analytics, and/or re-highlighting are appreciated. Read re-highlight for offense. Insert for defense. No preference between soft left and big stick.

T: Slightly lean against bare plural arguments for clash/predictability reasons. I think Pics is a true arg the Aff should make on Nebel. One aff a topic is a terrible model. Model/vision of the topic is more persuasive than "9 factorial affs" in a vacuum. A staunch believer that the neg needs definitions otherwise we get infinite T debates.

Theory: Save for literal double turns or technical drops from 1AR shells, not good for the condo 2AR. Easier to convince me the abuse is unreasonable rather than to use competing interpretations.

K: Better for teams that utilize K tricks than those that wax poetically about society. Read cap, security, dualism, and anti/post-humanism during my career. Roughly familiar with other meta lit and their answers. Imo neg needs either solves/turns case, framework/methods , unsustainability/inevitability, or a robust external extinction impact to win. I'll probably vote aff on case o/w otherwise.

K affs: Skeptical about framework's ability to cause either genocide or grassroots movements. Affirmatives need a counter interpretation/model of debate. Negatives need to answer case. Affs gets perms. Not the best judge in the world for it.

Phil: Will try to evaluate fairly, but more experienced and think generally util is true. Epistemic modesty makes sense. Also extinction o/w's seems to be a persuasive arg.

Other Things: Tricks should be sent via doc. If you extemp just send a doc after b/f cross.

Speaker points: Will not punish for humor, sarcasm, or minor cursing. 29 for breaking.

Scott Brown Troy Independent 6 rounds

Last changed on Fri April 26, 2024 at 1:24 PM PDT

clarity = speed of delivery. pleaseslow down on tags, texts, interpretations, advocacies, analytical arguments, authors, or any argument you want me to get in detail verbatim on my flow. please keep in mind that your speed will always be faster than my keyboarding skills/flowcabulary. i do not flow off the document and will not backflow arguments from the document

i am a great judge for technical, mechanical line-by-line debate

judge instruction is axiomatic. most judging philosophies say "judge instructions please" because debaters rarely do enough of it and judges are left to decide debates on their own devices which leads to inevitable intervention and at least one unhappy debater. please - judge instructions! yes, go for your arguments, say how they outweigh, sure, magnitude timeframe sure, but tell me what to do with them/everything else at the end of the debate

what you debate is up to you - i do not have a preference for how you stylistically debate or which arguments you choose to read. this is my 20th year in debate and i have been around long enough that i have probably heard, debated, coached, and/or judged almost any/every argument you could say or do within reason. all arguments are fair game within reason - do not be violent, racist, et cetera. i consider myself an incredibly flexible coach that believes debaters get the most out of the activity through a student-centered model of debate where the debater is in the argumentative captain's seat and my job as a debate coach is to coach debaters at what they want to do to the best of my ability

i obviously have preferences - every debate judge does - but i try to keep those out of the decision calculus for deciding who wins the debate. given that, the following might help you out while either filling out your pref sheet or in the pre-round prep:

i am an awesome to great to okay judge for almost all arguments that come from policy debate - disads, counterplans, plans, not plans, performance, kritiks, k affs, theory, topicality, the politics da, conditionality bad, et cetera

i am an okay-ish judge for kant/phil - did a lot of academic research in uni on kant, but often struggle with how ld does kant. if you are going to read a bunch of dense cards about the categorical imperative, you are a-okay. if you are spamming a bunch of paradoxes, i would probably take another judge

i'm getting increasingly better for "tricks". a couple years ago this would have said no tricks, but i find myself increasingly voting on arguments like "role of the ballot spec", random ivis, and such when explained/impacted properly. i will only evaluate the debate after the 2ar

my voting record is historically bad for the neg on "t-usfg/framework/must larp/instrumentally defend the topic" and would advise engaging the affirmative

the aff is 29-0 in front of me over the past 5 years when the nr goes for "t-nebel/whole resolution/cannot specify/no plans"

some judge intricacies:

i will not judge kick unless you explicitly make judge kick an option in your speech

team no risk - there is zero risk that i will win the gold medal in the 100m dash at the 2024 paris olympic games

debaters must speaketh the rehighlighting - you can only re-insert text that has already been read

speaker point floor typically 29.0

i do not have a "poker face" and am unabashedly human

Carlos Carrasco Harvard-Westlake School 6 rounds

Last changed on Thu January 11, 2024 at 8:44 AM PDT

I debate currently at CSUF Until further notice

I debated for around 5.5 years and my background is mostly K args, but dont be afraid to run policy, I’m cool with both

Keep me on the chain por favor – ccarrasco244@gmail.com

If you have any questions for after the round or just need some help feel free to email, I’ll try to get back

general -

- I will distribute speaker points based off the accumulated performance from y’all, I like hearing arguments more if you truly believe in what you’re saying, especially debating Kritiks, be funny tho I’ll probably laugh, try to have fun and be the chill ones, try not to be toxic and even more so do not be violent, no -isms

- I will try to keep up on the flow but do not hyper-spread through theory blocks or any block for that matter, I will most likely not catch it

- be chill with each other but you can be aggressive if thats just your style, try not to trigger anxiety though in other debaters if you’re going too far

———- some more specifics ———-

I run and prefer Kritikal arguments, I am more comfortable listening to Settler Colonialism, Afro-Pessimism and Marxist literature, but that does not mean you can just spew jargon and hope to win, explain what your theories mean and your arguments, it will go a long way for your speaker points as well

Speaking of, i will be in the range of 27.5 - 29.9 for speaker points, I will try to be objective as possible but you do you, if you can do that well the speaker awards will come too

On T/FW, please make sure that your standards are specific to the round and are clearly spoken, I am substantially less convinced if you do not argue how that specific aff loses you ground and/or justifies a bad model of debate, but I will not vote it down for no reason, argue why those skills are good to solve the aff or provide a good model that sustains KvK debate in a better way than the aff justifies. Just don’t try to read your generic 2NC blocks, it gets more obvious the longer the debate goes on, do it well.

On Counterplans, try to have a net benefit, be smart with it, try not to have a million planks, having a solvency advocate is cool too, not much here.

Disads - do your link work as usual, I will vote on who does the better impact framing, just make sure you still got that link :) p.s for affs, just dont leave it at the end of the 2AC with a 2 second “they dont link isn’t it obvious”, please explain your answers and divide up time strategically

on K’s, I love good 2NC/1NR link stories, try not to just extend some evidence and answer 2AC args, evaluate why your links implicate the aff and how their specific aff makes something problematic. I dont mind a 2NC only the K with no cards, just make sure you’re not reading prewritten blocks, please be as specific as possible

Please stick to your arguments and embody them, just tell me what to evaluate at the end of the debate, I will very much appreciate if you can tell me how that happens, be revolutionary if you want to, I would probably enjoy the debate more.

Amy Chakladar Oxford Academy 3 rounds

Cindy Chanay South Eugene Independent 6 rounds

Last changed on Mon April 15, 2024 at 12:53 PM PDT

Hello!

My name is Cindy Chanay and I am a LAMDL (urban debate) alumni. I was a varsity debater at Bravo Medical Magnet High School, and now debate in NPDA and NFA-LD at UC San Diego. I also have acquired experience in speech, mostly in interp events.

Please put me on the chain (if there is one): cindypaolachanay@gmail.com . Speechdrop also works.

Now that I am in the judging position, I will give a few insights into how I view debates.

Some quick notes:

1. Be nice. In other words, be mature, and good people.

2. Have fun! :)

3. I will not allow conflicts that can put at risk the debate environment such as comments/arguments that can hurt other debaters and others in general, this includes and is not limited to racism, sexism, etc.

Note for LD: My views are similar to policy, but specifically for y'all: No trix please, reverse voters might make my head hurt, and good explanations are a must, especially as I probably lack deep topic knowledge- shadow extensions are not the best.

Some of my debate background (if that's important to you): I debated throughout high school, and I was mostly a K-Aff/K debater. If I didn't go for the K, I went for T (either topicality or theory). I have the most experience with settler colonialism, capitalism, and indigenous feminism type arguments. I have heard a bit of pomo arguments, but these will need more explaining to get my ballot. More on some specific sections will be below :).

Case (General)- Unavoidable. If you're aff, don't lose case, it can cost you the ballot. I find that in most cases winning that your aff outweighs can save you from a few defensive neg arguments. Yet, this depends on how your aff interacts with the neg arguments. For the neg, this is where it can get fun if you're losing your off-case positions. Don't underestimate the case to focus on your off-cases. Always look for a way to poke holes in the aff case. It will be quite hard for me to not look at case unless you win another flow.

Policy Affs: I didn't utilize these as often, but they can be fun. I rather you have two solid advantages than five that make no sense, though.

K-Affs: This is where I am most comfortable. I read a K-Aff in my last two years of high school debate and continue to read them in college. For the aff: Be prepared for T-FW and the Cap K, and explain your solvency. If I don't understand your solvency the more I am inclined to vote neg. I do enjoy performance affs, and non-traditional affs as well. While topic affs are easier for me to judge, I will evaluate a "non-topical" aff. Always make the aff o/w argument, because in most cases it does and it gets you out of a lot of negative offense, but you must know how to utilize this argument and where. For the neg: You can win on T-FW- but I think that it's not the only way to win against a K-Aff. I suggest to also make vagueness and presumption arguments on case, I will vote on them. I also like to hear more creative ways of beating a K-Aff (this can include theory, more in-depth K's, counter-performances, etc.)

DA/CP- I don't have much experience here, as I stated before I debated mostly the K on both sides. But, I will say that to win using this strategy, it's best to have the CP + DA so that there is a clear net benefit. For the neg- If you're going just for the DA, focus more on the link and the impact, as that's where I am more likely to vote. Uniqueness questions can be a voter, but it's usually not likely. Win that there is a link and that your impact o/w and you should be good. For the aff: Either straight turn the DA or at best win the link turn. You can also convince me on a no link, but remember that n/l is mostly just defensive, don't rely solely on that argument. For CP's: It's harder to win here if you don't have a DA, I find permutations quite convincing, but you can win. Have some relative advantage to the CP and win that it o/w. I think that winning theory on the permutation is fun. For the aff: Make permutations. Most of the time the CP is not that distinct from the aff/ has no net benefit enough to outweigh the aff. This is why you have to prove your aff is better and not lose case.

T-I usually went for T if I didn't go for the K. We meet arguments I think are mostly defensive, and I prefer counter interpretations. I usually use a competing interpretations lens, but I can be persuaded to use reasonability. Violation I think is a must, and the standards and voters should always be there. While I don't mind a short shell, make sure to explain the standards and voters in the extensions of the T. This is especially true if the T becomes the 2NR, I need to know why the aff violates and what that does to the debate space. For theory specifically: I will listen to aspec in the 1NC shell, but please don't extend it or much less go for it, unless the aff just clean drops it, I just don't find it persuasive. Most other specs I'm fine with and will vote on. I will vote on theory if you explain it well. Please don't pull tricks or rvi's, if you had that on mind, I will not vote on them.

K- Again, I am more comfortable in these debates. I don't think that you need to win all parts of the kritik to win it, but you definitely want to win at least a link to have some relative offense. Yet, I can also be persuaded to just vote on the alternative alone, if you know how to handle that debate, because this type of approach can implode on you if not done correctly. I do think that you have to answer framework though, because I need to know how to weigh the aff and the K. Give me reasons to prefer your interp. Remember to explain your alternative well, and impact framing because that can be a winning ballot paired with a decent link. On that note, I prefer links that are specific to the context of the aff, but some "general" links can be made into specific links if you are smart and pull lines from the aff's evidence. For the aff specifically: Utilize perms to the best of your ability. This is the easiest way to beat the K. Also pair it with at least a link turn and fw. But, I would prefer you have more than that to be able to have a cleaner win against a K. Disclaimer: While I do have some general ideas and am more knowledgeable in the set col and cap K debate, I don't know all of the literature available, so don't fall short on explanations. This is especially true for pomo literature because it can get confusing very quickly.

Speed: I am okay with it (just be clear) unless your opponents are not. Just be respectful of your opponents and you should be okay. I will call CLEAR if necessary.

Speech: do you. I will time and count you down if the event requires it and I'll also give you hand signals.

Don't worry too much if it's your first debate, I am a debater like you, so don't worry, I know what it's like.

If you have any questions before the round you can contact me at cindypaolachanay@gmail.com

You can also use that email to ask questions if you have any after the round as well :).

Madeleine Conrad-Mogin Immaculate Heart High School 6 rounds

Last changed on Sun April 16, 2023 at 4:43 AM PDT

The preferences below are a reflection of the way I debated in high school and the way I coach students, not the way I evaluate debates 100% of the time. Most of them can be changed through persuasive argumentation. I’m just going to vote for whoever wins the round.

Email: mconrad@ihs.immaculateheart.org

General Philosophy

Debate should be fun and I want to see you have fun and excel at what you do best. Please don't adjust your debating too much to me. I regularly vote for arguments and strategies I passionately disagree with and vice versa. No matter what strategy you defend, act as if my prior knowledge of it is close to 0. Even if you're right, I will judge and hold you accountable for warranting your arguments as if my knowledge was in fact 0. I treat judging as a serious obligation and no matter what you do, I'll give you my full attention and effort!

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Non-Negotiables

1) Disclose. Full text is a bare minimum to win in front of me.

2) I will not vote on any argument about events outside the debate (I consider disclosure pertinent to the debate). Death good, arguments about your opponents appearance/clothing, and facially offensive actions end the round. I am not comfortable using my ballot as a moral judgement on students.

3) Fair Play. Miscut evidence, clipping, reading ahead, outside communication, evidence fabrication, etc are cheating. Accusations without proof mean you lose. “Evidence ethics” ends the round.

4) I won't vote on arguments I can't understand in the speech they're first made.

5) Show up to round on time. Prep ends when the doc is sent. Flow clarification is prep/CX. Marked docs should be sent immediately after the speech. If your opponent did not mark any cards in their speech, but did not read certain portions of the speech doc (i.e., skipped certain cards entirely), you must start prep before receiving a marked doc. If, however, your opponent marked cards, you may wait until you receive a marked doc to begin prep. The reason I have different policies for these circumstances is that the former is just flow clarification, whereas the latter actually affects the way you answer arguments.

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Preferences

1) I don't want to judge rounds about heinous tricks. I enjoy judging Phil debates but think they benefit from more explanation and less tricks.

2) In general, I lean neg on CP theory. Creative counterplans are underutilized. Creative perms are too. Judge kick makes sense to me, but is not my default. I'm not opposed to voting on condo, but err heavily neg, and I don't find hail-mary condo 2ARs fun to judge. To make it a viable 2AR, condo should be more than a sentence in the 1AR.

3) "Not defending implementation" doesn't make sense to me.

4) I err neg in K Aff vs. T debates, but my judging record in these debates is fairly even. Thoughts:

Aff: I think affirmatives have a burden of "affirming" something - I’m easily persuaded that pure pessimism is neg ground and presumption is winnable if the aff doesn't do anything (I don't know why this is almost never the 2nr). When answering T, counter-define words and have a debatable counterinterp ("discussion of the topic", "only our aff", etc. don't count - they wouldn't make sense in any other T debate). An effective strategy against framework should explain what your model of debate looks like, not just why your aff is important.

Neg: Listen to the 1AR - when I vote aff, it’s usually because of technical drops. Neg usually under-develop the TVA, but I find having one less important than a lot of judges do.

5) A kritik should disagree with and disprove the aff - you should be able to point out specific lines in the aff the K disagrees with. “Pre-fiat” does not mean anything. Answering the case is important. Weighing is important. The K should turn and outweigh the case, even if it’s an indictment of the representations the aff uses rather than the consequences of the plan. The 2NR should incorporate K tricks - they are smart and underutilized.

6) Independent voters don't exist. All arguments need to be tied to a specific framing argument.

7) Tired of hearing the same topicality debates over and over again. If it's just a dressed up version of plans bad (Nebel/T-a/etc) I'm probably not the best judge for it (although I vote for these arguments all the time). I don't think complex grammar debates are the best way to set the limits of the topic.

8) Random paradigmatic things:

- 1AR doesn't get add ons. 2NR doesn't get new uniqueness, links, etc.

- Insert re-highlighting: sure

- "You didn't read a fairness voter" isn't super compelling to me w.r.t. paragraph theory. It seems obvious to me that both sides should have a roughly equal shot at winning, all things equal.

- I will disregard any argument about my "jurisdiction" as a judge.

Kaya Czyz Westridge School 6 rounds

Last changed on Sun September 18, 2022 at 6:42 AM CDT

Hi I'm Kaya (they/ she)!

Lovejoy 2021/ USC 2025

kayabczyz@gmail.com

TL;DR

I will evaluate any argument you give me so long as they're not homophobic, ableist, racist, sexist, etc. you get the point (meaning you will be dropped L25 if you read problematic arguments). Speed is fine, just ease up to it and be clear. If there is going to be an email chain, please put me on it!!

As far as actual substance goes, I'm fairly tab other than the fact that I'm not great with tricks. If you really want to read tricks, be my guest (theory tricks > substantive tricks), but it will probably be a harder ballot to win if that's the collapse. Tech > Truth unless you tell me otherwise. Warrant your arguments. Buzzwords ≠ ballot.

If you have any other specific questions, feel free to dm or email:)

PREFS SHORTCUT

1- policy/ Ks*/ topical prep

2- Ks*/ phil

3- T/ theory*/ non-T

4- theory*

5- straight up tricks

Note on Ks: I read quite a bit of deleuze, disability studies, bioptx, and semiotics in high school. I am less familiar w idpol Ks but understand them. If you are reading a more niche K lit (ex: Bataille or Glissant), more likely a 2 than a 1 for prefs.
Note on theory: frivolous/ blippy theory is not a smart move in front of me. If theory is your go to/ only strat, probably 4 over 3 considering I pref substance rounds.

Speed

The TL;DR version covers most of this. Please slow down for advocacy/ plan/ interp texts. Also, if you are going full speed online, that's fine, just use something to indicate a differentiation between each card/ analytic. *to improve accessibility, it is probably a good norm to check that everyone competing/ judging in the space are okay with speed.*

Policy/ LARP

General Note- I enjoy a good LARP debate, but blippy DAs/ CPs (i.e. if you're thinking of reading 8 off but the off are not warranted well) and lack of weighing can make these muddled quickly.

DAs- Love them/ go for them, but do the impact calc !! Expand on more than just "X outweighs because magnitude." This doesn't mean you need to go over the entire link chain again, just warrant and weigh and you'll be fine :)

CPs/ PICs- Also great, just be sure they are competitive/ have net benefits. Unless told otherwise, I'll default condo.

Ks- I read high theory and some intersectional identity theory in high school. Overexplaining > jargon. Don't assume I will know all of what you're talking about & also know what you're reading. As far as framing goes, warrant why the ROB/ROJ comes first/ defend your fw. The more specific link, the better, but generic links are okay if explained well. I have found that I am less inclined to vote on links of omission (exceptions exist). Alt solvency is nice but if you tell me fiat solves, I'll roll with that.

PIKs- PIKs are a little more iffy for me because usually there's a lot more flex on what the PIK actually does. Be ready for theory if you read a PIK. That being said, the note on Ks still applies here.

K Affs- I enjoy T K Affs, but if you decide to read a non-T K Aff, you need to 1] win that there is a legitimate reason to be non-T, 2] offer an alternative mechanism to evaluate the round, and 3] have offense to meet the mechanism. Regardless though, creative framework is always a plus. AGAINST K AFFS: While T and K are great strats against K Affs, util/ big stick strats are too.

Trad

Legit you do you. I grew up in Texas doing UIL, so this type of debate is comprehensible to me. If you read trad arguments, go for it. If you do this type of debate though, please don't spend all of the time on which value is better if the values are similar (ex: morality and justice). To me, understanding the evaluative mechanism for offense matters more.

Phil

I'm familiar with the more well-known phils in debate (Kant, Levinas, realism, util, agonism/ Mouffe, Hobbes, Locke, pragmatism, etc.). AC/ NC phil strats are often impressive and I enjoy evaluating these debates. Err on overexplaining the warrants than assuming I/ your opponent just know the content. If your strat includes lengthy analytics, either number the arguments or slow down.

Tricks

I do not feel competent to best adjudicate tricks strategies, BUT if your only strat is tricks, I prefer theory tricks over content tricks. Presumption is your safest bet if anything.

Theory/ T

General Note- I'll evaluate under whichever paradigm you tell me to, just warrant and justify it. Not a huge fan of disclosure theory, but if there is a real violation, justify it and I'll listen (my threshold for a violation is high, esp if the wiki is down or it's not possible to check the violation in the moment).

Theory- This is one of my least favorite rounds to judge, but I will vote for it. Theory is fine, but be sure to actually justify and use the internal links rather than mentioning them and not engaging. I won't vote for theory strats that rely on how someone dresses (ex: shoes theory). You need to do impact calc on why standards matter under your voters rather than just arguing which voter comes first/ even matters. 1AR theory and meta-shells are fair game and sometimes the only strat; justify the violation. This is not an invite to make the 1AR theory just for funsies but rather to say I am not opposed to evaluating it.

T- definitions are always a plus.

Other

Content/ trigger warnings are a must.

Signposting >>

Cameron McConway coached me; a large portion of my views are likely similar (specifically on Ks, LARP ! weighing, and FW/ Phil).

I will boost +.1 speaks for a song rec

Blake Dee Peninsula High School 6 rounds

Norma Delgado Monta Vista High School 6 rounds

Last changed on Tue January 2, 2024 at 7:02 AM PDT

2017-2019 LAMDL/ Bravo

2019- Present CSU Fullerton

Please add me to the email chain, normadelgado1441@gmail.com

General thoughts

-Disclose as soon as possible :)

- Don't be rude. Don't make the round deliberately confusing or inaccessible. Take time to articulate and explain your best arguments. If I can't make sense of the debate because of messy/ incomplete arguments, that's on you.

-Speed is fine but be loud AND clear. If I can’t understand you, I won’t flow your arguments. Don’t let speed trade-off with the quality of your argumentation. Above all, be persuasive.

-Sending evidence isn't prep, but don't take too long or I’ll resume the timer. (I’ll let you know before I do so).

Things to keep in mind

-Avoid using acronyms or topic-specific terminology without elaborating first.

-The quality of your arguments is more important than quantity of arguments. If your strategy relies on shallow, dropped arguments, I’ll be mildly annoyed.

-Extend your arguments, not authors. I will flow authors sometimes, but if you are referencing a specific card by name, I probably don’t remember what they said. Unless this specific author is being referenced a lot, you’re better off briefly reminding me than relying on me to guess what card you’re talking about.

-I don’t vote for dropped arguments because they’re dropped. I vote on dropped arguments when you make the effort to explain why the concession matters.

- I don’t really care what you read as long as you have good reasoning for reading it. (ie, you’re not spewing nonsense, your logic makes sense, and you’re not crossing ethical boundaries).

Specific stuff

[AFFs] Win the likelihood of solvency + framing. You don't have to convince me you solve the entirety of your impact, but explain why the aff matters, how the aff is necessary to resolve an issue, and what impacts I should prioritize.

[Ks/K-affs] I like listening to kritiks. Not because I’ll instantly understand what you’re talking about, but I do like hearing things that are out of the box.

k on the neg: I love seeing teams go 1-off kritiks and go heavy on the substance for the link and framing arguments. I love seeing offense on case. Please impact your links and generate offense throughout the debate.

k on the aff: I like strategic k affs that make creative solvency arguments. Give me reasons to prefer your framing to evaluate your aff's impacts and solvency mechanism. The 2ar needs to be precise on why voting aff is good and overcomes any of the neg's offense.

[FW] Choose the right framework for the right aff. I am more persuaded by education & skills-based impacts. Justify the model of debate your interpretation advocates for and resolve major points of contestation. I really appreciate when teams introduce and go for the TVA. Talk about the external impacts of the model of debate you propose (impacts that happen outside of round).

[T/Theory] I have a higher threshold for voting on minor T/Theory violations when impacts are not contextualized. I could be persuaded to vote on a rebuttal FULLY committed to T/theory.

I am more persuaded by education and skills-based impacts as opposed to claims to procedural fairness. It’s not that I will never vote for procedural fairness, but I want you to contextualize what procedural fairness in debate would look like and why that’s a preferable world.

[CPs] CPs are cool as long as you have good mutual exclusivity evidence; otherwise, I am likely to be persuaded by a perm + net benefit arg. PICS are also cool if you have good answers to theory.

[DAs] I really like DAs. Opt for specific links. Do evidence comparison for me. Weigh your impacts and challenge the internal link story. Give your framing a net benefit.

I am more persuaded by impacts with good internal link evidence vs a long stretch big stick impact. Numbers are particularly persuasive here. Make me skeptical of your opponent’s impacts.

David Dosch Immaculate Heart High School 6 rounds

Last changed on Wed April 17, 2024 at 8:48 AM PDT

I am the Director of Debate at Immaculate Heart High School. I am a conflict for any competitors on this list.

General:

1. I will vote on nearly any argument that is well explained and compared to the arguments your opponent has made.

2. Accusing your opponent of an evidence ethics or clipping violation requires you to stake the debate on said allegation. If such an allegation is made, I will stop the debate, determine who I think is in the wrong, and vote against that person and give them the lowest speaker points allowed by the tournament.

3. I won’t vote on arguments that I don’t understand or that I don’t have flowed. I have been involved in circuit LD for almost ten years now and consider myself very good at flowing, so if I missed an argument it is likely because you were incomprehensible.

4. I am a strong proponent of disclosure, and I consider failing to disclose/incorrect disclosure a voting issue, though I am growing weary of nit-picky disclosure arguments that I don’t think are being read in good faith.

5. For online debate, please keep a local recording of your speech so that you can continue your speech and share it with your opponent and me in the event of a disconnect.

6. Weighing arguments are not new even if introduced in the final rebuttal speech. The Affirmative should not be expected to weigh their advantage against five DAs before the Negative has collapsed.

7. You need to use CX to ask which cards were read and which were skipped.

Some thoughts of mine:

1. I dislike arguments about individual debaters' personal identities. Though I have voted for these arguments plenty of times, I think I would vote against them the majority of the time in an evenly matched debate.

2. I am increasingly disinterested in voting for topicality arguments about bare plurals or theory arguments suggesting that either debater should take a stance on some random thing. No topic is infinitely large and voting for these arguments discourages topic research. I do however enjoy substantive topicality debates about meaningful interpretive disagreements regarding terms of art used in the resolution.

3. “Jurisdiction” and “resolvability” standards for theory arguments make little sense to me. Unless you can point out a debate from 2013 that is still in progress because somebody read a case that lacked an explicit weighing mechanism, I will have a very low threshold for responses to these arguments.

4. I dislike critiques that rely exclusively on framework arguments to make the Aff irrelevant. The critique alternative is one of the debate arguments I'm most skeptical of. I think it is best understood as a “counter-idea” that avoids the problematic assumptions identified by the link arguments, but this also means that “alt solves” the case arguments are misguided because the alternative is not something that the Negative typically claims is fiated. If the Negative does claim that the alternative is fiated, then I think they should lose to perm do both shields the link. With that said, I still vote on critiques plenty and will evaluate these debates as per your instructions.

5. Despite what you may have heard, I enjoy philosophy arguments quite a bit and have grown nostalgic for them as LD increasingly becomes indistinct from policy. What I dislike is when debaters try to fashion non-normative philosophy arguments about epistemology, metaphysics, or aesthetics into NCs that purport to justify a prescriptive standard. I find philosophy heavy strategies that concede the entirety of the opposing side’s contention or advantage to be unpersuasive.

6. “Negate” is not a word that has been used in any resolution to date so frameworks that rely on a definition of this word will have close to no impact on my assessment of the debate.

May Duong Athenian Independent 3 rounds

Tej Gedela Hire 6 rounds

Last changed on Sat April 13, 2024 at 4:52 PM EDT

Final update - April 2024

Docs: speechdrop.net

Directing the DebateDrills Club Team for 2023-25 - here are incident reporting forms, roster, and MPJ/ conflict info.

Enloe HS '20 + UPenn '24. 2x LD TOC qual (cleared junior year/ skipped senior year) + 13 bids. I primarily read policy args + T/theory. I am fairly familiar with but do not particularly care for philosophy, tricks, or the K; however, I will not insert my preferences absent a poorly resolved debate - read what you feel comfortable with.

Debating

Debate is a competitive game that imparts useful life skills, flow clarification is CX, CX isn't prep, speaks are my choice and not yours

Speaks boost for taking less prep and sitting down early if you've clearly won

You should disclose properly, and it doesn't take 30 minutes to "make changes" to the aff

Not voting on:

---Args that deny the badness of racism/ sexism/ homophobia/ etc (potential auto-loss given severity)

---Death/ suffering good (spark/ wipeout type stuff is fine)

---Ad-homs or args based on out of round actions or a debater's appearance/ location/ etc (except disclosure screenshots)

---Arguments that are "vote for me because I’m x" or "I get [to do] y because I'm x"

---Independent voters that are not labeled as such in the speech they are introduced with a reason why they are

Defaults: fairness and education are voters, drop the debater, competing interps, no RVIs, comparative worlds, util, epistemic confidence, policy presumption, OCIs incoherent, perm theory is drop the arg

Tell me to read ev if you want me to

Judge kick requires winning an argument for it

Read rehighlightings if they make a new/ different argument - insert them if they show x thing is in y context, and explain any insertions

1ARs should probably read theory and 2NRs should probably answer it

Consequences probably matter but perhaps you can convince me otherwise

Tricks tend not to have warrants in the speech they're introduced or in the speech they're extended in

Ks need to prove that the aff is a bad idea, affs probably get to weigh case and extinction probably outweighs

I seem to vote for Ks far more vs phil affs than vs policy affs

K affs need to do something but usually do not

I do not want to adjudicate personal survival strategies or callouts

T framework - fairness and clash/ research > skills/ movements

Things I shouldn’t have to say

---All arguments need to be both originally made with and extended with a coherent warrant

---Won’t vote on arguments that I don’t understand the warrant for in the first speech they're introduced

---Delineate and explain arguments and their implications throughout the debate

Cheating

Clipping: Ending the debate if I catch it. If you have a recording, you can stake the round. Skipping 3+ words multiple times probably constitutes clipping.

Ev Ethics: If I catch a violation, speaks will plummet and the card will be ignored. These constitute a violation such that I'd act or you can stake the round/ make a challenge:

---Card starts/ends in the middle of a sentence or paragraph

---Text has been added to or removed from the original text of the cited article within the start/end of the card

---Card has been cut/highlighted/bracketed to make a claim that the article does not warrant

You can read any of these or any other violation you want as theory. If another part of the article contradicts the argument made in the card, I'd prefer to see a recutting of the article read as an argument.

Tori Hoge La Reina 6 rounds

Last changed on Sun January 7, 2024 at 7:59 AM PDT

TLDR;

I like K’s; i believe they have an important place in debate when done right. Don’t be mean. You do you honestly. Read anything and warrant it well, I’ll probably vote for it.

About Me

pronouns: she/her

I am a junior at Stanford.

put me on the email chain: torihoge@stanford.edu

events i have competed in from most frequently to least: policy, ld, parli, pofo, congress, impromptu (at heart, i am a policy kid)

I coach nationally all levels of policy, LD, and public forum. Do with that what you will.

PET PEEVES:

1. is everybody ready. Say is anyone not ready and begin 2. my timer starts now. Just hit start 3. (for online debate) please turn your camera on when you are speaking 4. don't decide your roadmap while you are talking. at least sound certain of what order you are going in

IMPORTANT READ:

If there is anything I can do to accommodate your needs, please do not hesitate to let me know.
Do not read a K just because you saw I like k’s. Do not use other’s oppression for a ballot. This is not okay. You must be well versed in the literature and have a genuine understanding and care for the argument you read, or don’t bother. I don’t like performative activism or reading things just for a ballot. I would rather do a lot of things than watch a bad k debate. If k’s are your thing and you are knowledgeable, then go for it, it’s my favorite kind of debate.
Also include trigger warnings for graphic depictions of racial/settler/ableist/anti-queer/gender-based violence and anything to do with sexual assault or suicide.
My philosophy: if you can explain a very complex topic in simple enough words to explain to a grandparent, then you are a very good debater
If you do anything of the -ists or -ics (think racist, sexist, ableist, homophobic, etc.) you will receive an L-25
email me before or after if you wanna talk about literally anything or if you have any questions about my paradigm or about the round

I’m a great judge for you if:

you like k debate or read mostly critical arguments
you like technical, high speed debate
you have fun, quirky arguments that demonstrate a lot of personality
you are amazing at T
you have a well-researched stock case

K’s

I was a k debater in high school. This is not an invitation to read any k ever. I do not know or understand the premise of every single k that exists. For reference k’s I have debated are neolib/cap, fem ir, queer ir, security, imperialism, setcol, and speaking for others. At least, that is what I can remember off the top of my head. Even if you are reading a k that I have read, explain it and warrant it as if I have no idea what is going on. K’s need some alt or a very good explanation of why defense is enough and why you don’t need one. K’s need a specific link otherwise they don’t work. What you’re talking about may be important, but if it does not link, then it is not part of the conversation.

Nontopical/K-affs

I don’t really care if they are in the direction of the topic or not. I think that it is stupid that some judges are like at least run a K in the direction of the affirmative, like no that’s quite literally not the point of k-affs. Also, I read my fair share of k-affs in high school primarily fem killjoy and open borders. I am ok with k-affs, but again do not just read them for a ballot, and do them right.

Topicality (not theory)

I like (and can even love) topicality debates when they are done right. However, if T is not your forte, DO NOT RUN IT IN FRONT OF ME. I despise bad T debates.

Theory (distinct from topicality)

Sometimes can be justified, but it has never been a voting issue for me. Run it if you want, but it better be warranted.

CPs

I think they’re great for stock debate. I think they help generate offense. However, I need a very clear explanation of why the perm cannot work, or else I am prompted to vote on the perm. I default to the perm if the explanation does not make sense, if I do not follow, or if it is contradictory. Perm work here is very important for me. Also this should be obvious but I’m putting it in because I see it wayyyyy too many times. YOUR DA SHOULD NOT LINK TO THE CP. that’s the point of a cp.

DAs

Also good for stock debate. Warrant well. Connect to a terminal impact. I think that they need some sort of CP or K with them.

CHSSA/Lay debate

I really don’t care what the “rules” are or whatever the handbook says. If your only strategy is to complain that they are cheating or aren’t following the rules, then get better at debate: learn how to debate substance.
Don’t try any mind tricks. I am flowing. I know when your opponent dropped something or when they did not. Do not claim they dropped something when they did not.

I was very heavily influenced by Andrea Chow. Andrea is the goat and was also my partner in high school. Check out her paradigm for more context as I generally agree with all of her philosophies.

Gordon Krauss Peninsula High School 6 rounds

Julian Kuffour Peninsula High School 4 rounds

Timothy Lewis Damien High School 3 rounds

Last changed on Thu February 8, 2024 at 7:32 AM CDT

Affiliations and History:
Please email (damiendebate47@gmail.com and tjlewis1919@gmail.com) me all of the speeches before you begin.
I am the Director of Debate at Damien High School in La Verne, CA.
I was the Director of Debate for Hebron High School in Carrollton, TX from 2020-2021.
I was an Assistant Coach at Damien from 2017-2020.
I debated on the national circuit for Damien from 2009-2013.
I graduated from Occidental College in Los Angeles with a BA in Critical Theory and Social Justice.
I completed my Master's degree in Social Justice in Higher Education Administration at The University of La Verne.
My academic work involves critical university studies, Georges Bataille, poetics, and post-colonialism.
Author of Suburba(in)e Surrealism (2021).

Yearly Round Numbers:
I try to judge a fair bit each year.
Fiscal Redistribution Round Count: About 40 rounds
I judged 75 rounds or more on the NATO Topic.
I judged over 50 rounds on the Water Topic.
I judged around 40 rounds on the CJR topic.
I judged 30 rounds on the Arms topic (2019-2020)
I judged a bit of LD (32 debates) on the Jan-Feb Topic (nuke disarm) in '19/'20.
I judged around 25 debates on the Immigration topic (2018-2019) on the national circuit.
I judged around 50 rounds on the Education topic (2017-2018) on the national circuit.
LD Protocol:I have a 100% record voting against teams that only read Phil args/Phil v. Policy debates. Adapt or lose.
NDT Protocol: I will rarely have any familiarity with the current college topic and will usually only judge 12-15 rounds pre-NDT.
Please make your T and CP acronyms understandable.

Front Matter Elements:
If you need an accommodation of any kind, please email me before the round starts.
I want everyone to feel safe and able to debate- this is my number one priority as a judge.
I don't run prep time while you email the speech doc. Put the whole speech into one speech doc.
I flow 1AC impact framing, inherency, and solvency straight down on the same page nowadays.
Speed is not an issue for me, but I will ask you to slow down (CLEAR) if you are needlessly sacrificing clarity for quantity--especially if you are reading T or theory arguments.

I will not evaluate evidence identifiable as being produced by software, bots, algorithms etc. Human involvement in the card’s production must be evident unique to the team, individual, and card. This means that evidence you directly take from open source must be re-highlighted at a minimum. You should change the tags and underlining anyways to better fit with your argument’s coherency.

Decision-making:
I privilege technical debating and the flow. I try to get as much down as I possibly can and the little that I miss usually is a result of a lack of clarity on the part of the speaker or because the actual causal chain of the idea does not make consistent sense for me (I usually express this on my face). Your technical skill should make me believe/be able to determine that your argument is the truth. That means warrants. Explain them, impact them, and don't make me fish for them in the un-underlined portion of the six paragraph card that your coach cut for you at a camp you weren't attending. I find myself more and more dissatisfied with debating that operates only on the link claim level. I tend to take a formal, academic approach to the evaluation of ideas, so discussions of source, author intentions and 'true' meaning, and citation are both important to me and something that I hope to see in more debates.

The best debates for me to judge are ones where the last few rebuttals focus on giving me instructions on what the core controversies of the round are, how to evaluate them, and what mode of thinking I should apply to the flow as a history of the round. This means that I'm not going to do things unless you tell me to do them on the flow (judge kick, theory 'traps' etc.). When instructions are not provided or articulated, I will tend to use (what I consider to be) basic, causal logic (i.e. judicial notice) to find connections, contradictions, and gaps/absences. Sometimes this happens on my face--you should be paying attention to the physical impact of the content of your speech act.

I believe in the importance of topicality and theory. No affs are topical until proven otherwise.
Non-impacted theory arguments don't go a long way for me; establish a warranted theory argument that when dropped will make me auto-vote for you. This is not an invitation for arbitrary and non-educational theory arguments being read in front of me, but if you are going to read no neg fiat (for example), then you better understand (and be able to explain to me) the history of the argument and why it is important for the debate and the community.

Reading evidence only happens if you do not make the debate legible and winnable at the level of argument (which is the only reason I would have to defer to evidentiary details).

I find framework to be a boring/unhelpful/poorly debated style of argument on both sides. I want to hear about the ballot-- what is it, what is its role, and what are your warrants for it (especially why your warrants matter!). I want to know what kind of individual you think the judge is (academic, analyst, intellectual etc.). I want to hear about the debate community and the round's relationship within it. These are the most salient questions in a framework debate for me. If you are conducting a performance in the round and/or debate space, you need to have specific, solvable, and demonstrable actions, results, and evidences of success. These are the questions we have to be thinking about in substantial and concrete terms if we are really thinking about them with any authenticity/honesty/care (sorge). I do not think the act of reading FW is necessarily constitutive of a violent act. You can try to convince me of this, but I do start from the position that FW is an argument about what the affirmative should do in the 1AC.

If you are going to go for Fairness, then you need a metric. Not just a caselist, not just a hypothetical ground dispensation, but a functional method to measure the idea of fairness in the round/outside the round i.e. why are the internal components (ground, caselist, etc.) a good representation of a team's burden and what do these components do for individuals/why does that matter. I am not sure what that metric/method is, but my job is not to create it for you. A framework debate that talks about competing theories for how fairness/education should be structured and analyzed will make me very happy i.e. engaging the warrants that constitute ideas of procedural/structural fairness and critical education. Subject formation has really come into vogue as a key element for teams and honestly rare is the debate where people engage the questions meaningfully--keep that in mind if you go for subject formation args in front of me.

In-round Performance and Speaker Points:
An easy way to get better speaker points in front of me is by showing me that you actually understand how the debate is going, the arguments involved, and the path to victory. Every debater has their own style of doing this (humor, time allocation, etc.), but I will not compromise detailed, content-based analysis for the ballot.

I believe that there is a case for in-round violence/damage winning the ballot. Folks need to be considerate of their behavior and language. You should be doing this all of the time anyways.

While I believe that high school students should not be held to a standard of intellectual purity with critical literature, I do expect you to know the body of scholarship that your K revolves around: For example, if you are reading a capitalism K, you should know who Marx, Engels, and Gramsci are; if you are reading a feminism k, you should know what school of feminism (second wave, psychoanalytic, WOC, etc.) your author belongs to. If you try and make things up about the historical aspects/philosophical links of your K, I will reflect my unhappiness in your speaker points and probably not give you much leeway on your link/alt analysis. I will often have a more in-depth discussion with you about the K after the round, so please understand that my post-round comments are designed to be educational and informative, instead of determining your quality/capability as a debater.

I am 100% DONE with teams not showing up on time to disclose. A handful of minutes or so late is different than showing up 3-5 min before the round begins. Punish these folks with disclosure theory and my ears will be open.

CX ends when the timer rings. I will put my fingers in my ears if you do not understand this. I deeply dislike the trend of debaters asking questions about 'did you read X card etc.' in cross-x and I believe this contributes to the decline of flowing skills in debate. While I have not established a metric for how many speaker points an individual will lose each time they say that phrase, know that it is something on my mind. I will not allow questions outside of cross-x outside of core procedural things ('can you give the order again?,' 'everyone ready?' etc.). Asking 'did you read X card' or 'theoretical reasons to reject the team' outside of CX are NOT 'core procedural things.'

Do not read these types of arguments in front of me:
Arguments that directly call an individual's humanity into account
Arguments based in directly insulting your opponents
Arguments that you do not understand

Sarah Li Hire 6 rounds

Last changed on Wed March 20, 2024 at 3:12 PM CDT

sarah (she/her) - homestead '22 (cx for 3 years, ld senior year), usc '26 (not actively debating in college)

read whatever you would like - good debating supersedes any arg preferences. i am probably not the best if you read phil/trix. you'll have to do more explaining for what you're talking about.

yes email chain: hhspolicy@gmail.com, speechdrop is also great

please do something different. i've been judging the same debates in a cycle.

-----

I coach on the DebateDrills Club Team - please click here to access incident reporting forms, roster, and info regarding MJP’s and conflicts.

-----

things that make me happy:

comparison: of evidence, of voting issues, of warrants, of literally everything - the more the merrier
clash
warrant extension (please)
pointing out mistagged cards + explaining what it actually says > "this card is mistagged" with no further explanation > letting them get away with murder
ballot painting
clarity

things that make me sad:

doc blotted 2nrs that don't interact with the aff at all
blind extension of arguments without interacting with opponent's args (no clash)
spreading through theory shells/answers like your life depends on it
stealing prep

-----

misc. thoughts below

policy/larp

the cheatier the cp, the lower the threshold i have on aff theory (ie delay cps, should/ought pics). smart cheaty cps are cool. i default to judge kick if neither debater contest it.

impact turns and case turns are fun and underutilized.

specific aff implementation/enforcement > "it just happens"

do impact calc pls.

vs ks: i really enjoy these debates when done well. don’t be afraid of the k mumbo jumbo and defend your reps, extinction ows, etc. use cx to clarify the things you don’t understand. losing the fw debate makes winning the debate really difficult. link defense is good. pls answer ontology.

spark/cap good/heg good: yes.

v. familiar (read it as a debater) - security, cap, set col, harney and moten, beller

familiar (have read some lit, debated against it) - fem, afropess, agamben, baudrillard, bataille

mehhh? - any other pess, ableism, lacan, deleuze, IR

??? - debaters inventing ks by mish mashing authors who don’t agree w/ each other together

specific > generic links. if you go for a generic link, contextualize it in the 2nr.
good explanation > buzzwords that don’t mean anything, don't presume i know what your jargon means - err on the side of a clear explanation.

k affs

k affs are cool. i prefer if i understand what it is they're doing at the end of the round.

kvk debate: very cool.

phil

i’m somewhat familiar with the generic kant fw, but everything else i’m much less familiar with. well-developed phil syllogism > blippy independent reasons to prefer.

theory

if you're not clear, i will not have it on my flow = we are all sad. please don't full send spread through your shells.

3+ new shells in the 1ar and kicking the 1ac - D:

2NR should always overcompensate on theory, a 30sec pre-written block will usually lose to 2AR extrapolation of the 1AR shell.

topicality: cool.

defaults: DTD, C/I, no RVIs, T comes before 1ar theory

tricks

>:(

other

if you’re debating someone significantly less knowledgeable than you, pls be nice. don’t spread against novices.

good cx =/= overly aggressive cx

if it’s an online debate, pls record your speeches when you give them (especially the rebuttals) in case of tech glitches.

------

speaks:

speaks usually hover around 28.5, increases and decreases based on how well you debate

unclear spreading = lower speaks

in a competitive round, if you close your laptop and give your 2nr/2ar off the flow, i'll give you a 29.5+ (do not do this if it's an online tournament for obvious reasons)

Erika Linares Marlborough School 6 rounds

Connor Lindquist Prospect High School 6 rounds

Last changed on Wed June 16, 2021 at 8:43 AM PDT

email: connquisty@gmail.com

Phil: (Yes!)

K's: (Yes again!)

LARP: (reluctant acceptance)

Reading more than 3 theory shells: (please no)

Tricks: (NOOOOO)

I competed in LD in high school for Loyola. If you're wondering whether I value truth or tech more, my answer would be firstly that you should try for both; if a round becomes absolutely irresolvable, I usually try to vote for the argument that makes more intuitive sense. I care a lot about logical coherence, and the single best way to win my ballot (especially in the 2nr or 2ar) is by explicitly telling me what framing is most important and how you're winning under that framing at the top of your speech; if the round is extremely messy, this is doubly true, especially if you have a clever way for me to evaluate the round. I want important, far-reaching arguments to be well-developed, so I don't think that tricks are persuasive (and on balance I'd say that the development required for any given "trick" would devoid its strategic value). That said, I love philosophy, and well-developed philosophical positions (specifically moral/epistemic/linguistic/... skepticisms) will be fairly and gleefully evaluated. I love K's (identity-oriented, postmodern, or otherwise), and K tricks are also super cool and underutilized. LARP is fine, although not my favorite, but you can definitely win it; I'd suggest diversifying your offs if you want to larp against another larper (ie read a 3 card K or some theory). Theory done well is fun, but theory done poorly is hard to evaluate, so if you're not exactly a theory God just yet, try not to read too much of it. The same applies for T. Also, I don't have strong emotions regarding T-framework (positive or negative). I try to be nice with speaks, and if you want higher speaks, ask well-articulated cx questions and make smart strategy decisions throughout the round. Finally, I have no taste for aggressiveness or arrogance of any kind: You can be commanding without being condescending or rude, and if I feel you've crossed that threshold, then your speaks will reflect that. With that said, happy debating! You can ask me further questions about my prefs via my email.

Nethmin Liyanage Monta Vista High School 6 rounds

Last changed on Thu January 4, 2024 at 4:05 AM PDT

tldr do what you do best; i'll only vote for complete arguments that make sense; weighing & judge instruction tip the scales in your favor; disclosure is good; i care about argument engagement and i value flexibility; stay hydrated & be a good person.

About me:

she/her

policy coach @ damien: spring 2022 - present

ld coach @ loyola: fall 2023 - present

My strongest belief about argumentation is that argument engagement is good - I don't have a strong preference as to what styles of arguments teams read in front of me, but I'd prefer if both teams engaged with their opponents' arguments; I don't enjoy teams who avoid clash (regardless of the style of argument they are reading). I value ideological flexibility in judges and actively try not to be someone who will exclusively vote on only "policy" or only "k" arguments.

I am comfortable evaluating arguments that are commonplace in policy (cx) debate; less comfortable evaluating nonsense trick-blip-phil-paradox-skep-word-soup quirks of lincoln douglas. This means that any CX team that debates in a coherent and well-researched manner (whether policy or k) should be fine in front of me. LD teams that read real arguments should be fine in front of me. LD teams that read "eval after 1ar" should strike me before they strike a parent judge.

General note about reading my paradigm - most things are phrased in terms of policy debate structure & norms (2nr/2ar being 5 minutes, "team" instead of "debater," "planless aff" = "non-t k aff," etc). If I'm judging you in LD and you have questions about how something translates to LD, feel free to ask!

email chains:

ld email chains: loyoladebate47@gmail.com and nethmindebate@gmail.com

policy email chains: damiendebate47@gmail.com and nethmindebate@gmail.com

if you need to contact me directly about rfd questions, accessibility requests, or anything else, please email nethmindebate@gmail.com (please don't email the teamail for these types of requests)!

flowing: it is good and teams should do it

stolen from alderete - if you show me a decent flow, you can get up to 1 extra speaker point. this can only help you - i won't deduct points for an atrocious flow. this is to encourage teams to actually flow. i recently witnessed a 2ac that answered a whole k that was not read in the 1nc. it nuked my value to life. this is my attempt at remedying it:)

All of my deal-breakers/hard and fast rules/moments of "I won't vote on this" are dependent on four things:

1 - protecting the safety of the participants in the round (no harrassment, no physical violence, etc).

2 - voting for things that meet the minimum standard to be considered an argument (it needs to have warrants & make some amount of logical sense).

3 - rules set forth by the tournament (speech times, one team wins and one team loses, I have to enter my own ballot, etc).

4 - i will only evaluate the debate after the end of the 2ar. this is 0% negotiable. i did not think i would have to say this, but i guess i do.

My voting record is roughly 50-50 on most major debate controversies (yes, even planless affs vs framework). As long as your argument doesn't violate the above four criteria, go for it!

I think that warrants are hard to come by in many debate rounds these days, even ones with “good” teams. Err on the side of a little too much explanation, because if your arg is warrantless, you will be ballotless. Extensions need to include warrants, not just taglines.

Independent voters need warrants and an articulation of why they should be evaluated before everything else. These debates could generally benefit from more judge instruction and weighing. Simply calling something an independent voter doesn’t mean I vote for you if you extend it.

Disclose or lose. Non-new affs should be on the wiki & should be disclosed to the neg team a minimum of 30 min before round. Neg offcase positions that have been read before should be on the wiki. Past 2nrs should be disclosed to the aff team a minimum of 30 min before round. New affs don't need to be disclosed pre-round. I am 1000000% done with teams that don't disclose. I have zero belief that there is any good reason for non-disclosure. If your opponent engages in any disclosure nonsense, read theory and there's a 95+% chance I vote for you, regardless of how good they are at the theory debate. Don't like disclosing? Pref someone who is willing to tolerate your nonsense (not me).

note: i am far more lenient on disclosure with novices/debaters who haven't debated at national-circuit tournaments before. the grumpiness of the above section is directed at people who know how to disclose and purposefully avoid it. you know who you are:)

Some general notes

Accessibility & content warnings: Email me if there is an accessibility request that I can help facilitate - I always want to do my part to make debates more accessible. I prefer not to judge debates that involve procedurals about accessibility and/or content warnings. I think it is more productive to have a pre-round discussion where both teams request any accommodation(s) necessary for them to engage in an equitable debate. I feel increasingly uncomfortable evaluating debates that come down to accessibility/cw procedurals, especially when the issue could have easily been resolved pre-round.

Speed/clarity – I will say clear up to two times per speech before just doing my best to flow you. I can handle a decent amount of speed. Going slower on analytics is a good idea. You should account for pen time/scroll time.

Online debate -- 1] please record your speeches, if there are tech issues, I'll listen to a recording of the speech, but not a re-do. 2] debate's still about communication - please watch for nonverbals, listen for people saying "clear," etc.

I am not comfortable evaluating out-of-round events. The only exception to this is disclosure. I will vote on reasonable and good faith disclosure theory (yeah you should probably disclose on opencaselist, no you probably shouldn't lose for forgetting one round report). I will not vote on arguments about random out-of-round events, things that happened in another round, things that happened on a team's pref sheet, or any other arguments of this nature.

Speaker points:

Speaker points are dependent on strategy, execution, clarity, and overall engagement in the round and are scaled to adapt to the quality/difficulty/prestige of the tournament.

I try to give points as follows:

30: you're a strong contender to win the tournament & this round was genuinely impressive

29.5+: late elims, many moments of good decisionmaking & argumentative understanding, adapted well to in-round pivots

29+: you'll clear for sure, generally good strat & round vision, a few things could've been more refined

28.5+: likely to clear but not guaranteed, there are some key errors that you should fix

28+: even record, probably losing in the 3-2 round

27.5+: winning less than 50% of your rounds, key technical/strategic errors

27+: winning less than 50% of your rounds, multiple notable technical/strategic errors

26+: errors that indicated a fundamental lack of preparation for the rigor/style of this tournament

25-: you did something really bad/offensive/unsafe.

Extra speaks for flowing, being clear, kindness, adaptation, and good disclosure practices.

Minus speaks for discrimination of any sort, bad-faith disclosure practices, rudeness/unkindness, and attempts to avoid engagement/clash.

Opinions on Specific Positions (ctrl+f section):

Case:

I think that negatives that don't engage with the 1ac are putting themselves in a bad position. This is true for both K debates and policy debates.

Extensions should involve warrants, not just tagline extensions - I'm willing to give some amount of leeway for the 1ar/2ar extrapolating a warrant that wasn't the focal point of the 2ac, but I should be able to tell from your extensions what the scenario is, what the internal links are, and why you solve.

Planless affs:

I've been on both sides of the planless aff debate, and my strongest opinion about planless affs is that you need to be able to explain what your aff does/why it's good.

I tend to dislike planless affs where the strategy is to make the aff seem like a word salad until after 2ac cx and then give the aff a bunch of new (and not super well-warranted) implications in the 1ar. I tend to be better for planless aff teams when they have a meaningful relationship to the topic, they are straight-up about what they do/don't defend, they use their aff strategically, engage with neg arguments, and make smart 1ar & 2ar decisions with good ballot analysis.

T/framework vs planless affs:

I'm roughly 50-50 in these debates. I don't have a strong preference for how framework teams engage in these debates other than that you should be respectful when discussing sensitive material.

I think that TVAs can be more helpful than teams realize. While having a TVA isn't always necessary, winning a TVA provides substantial defense on many of the aff's exclusion arguments.

I don't have a preference on whether your chosen 2nr is skills or fairness (or something else). I think that both options have strategic value based on the round you're in. Framework teams almost always get better points in front of me when they are able to contextualize their arguments to their opponents' strategy.

I also don't have a preference between the aff going for impact turns or going for a counterinterp. The strategic value of this is dependent on how topical/non-topical your aff is, in my opinion.

Theory:

The less frivolous your theory argument, the better I am for it.

Please weigh! It's not nearly as intuitive to make a decision in theory debates - I can fill in the gaps for why extinction is more impactful than localized war more easily than I can fill in the gaps for why neg flex matters more/less than research burdens.

default to no rvis <3 medium uphill to change my mind on this one

Topicality (not framework):

I like T debates that have robust and contextualized definitions of the relevant words/phrases/entities in the resolution. Have a clear explanation of what your interpretation is/isn't; examples/caselists are your friend.

Grammar-based topicality arguments: I don't find most of the grammar arguments being made these days to be very intuitive. You should explain/warrant them more than you would in front of a judge who loves those arguments.

Tricks (this is mostly an LD thing):

I used to say that I would never vote on tricks. I've decided it's bad to exclude a style of argumentation just because I don't enjoy it. Here are some things to know if you're reading tricks in front of me:

1 - I won't flow off the doc (I never flow off the doc, but I won't be checking the doc to see if I missed any of your tricks/spikes)

2 - The argument has to have a warrant in the speech it is presented

3 - The reason I've been so opposed to voting on tricks in the past is that I've never heard a trick that met the minimum threshold to be considered an argument

Kritiks (neg):

I tend to like K teams that engage with the aff and have a clear analysis of what's wrong with the aff's model/framing/epistemology/etc. I tend to be a bit annoyed when judging K teams that read word-salad or author-salad Ks, refuse to engage with arguments, expect me to fill in massive gaps for them, don't do adequate weighing/ballot analysis/judge instruction, or are actively hostile toward their opponents. The more of the aforementioned things you do, the more annoyed I'll be. The inverse is also true - the more you actively work to ensure that you don't do these things, the happier I'll be!

Disads:

Zero risk probably doesn't exist, but very-close-to-zero risk probably does. Teams that answer their opponents' warrants instead of reading generic defense tend to fare better in close rounds. Good evidence tends to matter more in these debates - I'd rather judge a round with 2 great cards + debaters explaining their cards than a round with 10 horrible cards + debaters asking me to interpret their dumpster-quality cards for them.

Counterplans:

I don't have strong ideological biases about how many condo advocacies the neg gets or what kinds of counterplans are/aren't cheating. More egregious abuse = easier to persuade me on theory; the issue I usually see in theory debates is a lack of warranting for why the neg's model was uniquely abusive - specific analysis > generic args + no explanation.

Judge kick - you've gotta tell me to do it. I'm not opposed to it, but I won't assume that you want me to unless the 2nr tells me to. No strong opinions for/against judge kick.

currently no strong opinions on things like normal means or counterplan competition on the fiscal redistribution topic. this means you can probably get away with more in front of me as long as you warrant it/read good evidence.

Arguments I will NEVER vote for:

-arguments that are actively discriminatory or make the round unsafe ("misgendering good," "let's make the debate about a minor's personal life," other stuff of that nature).

-any argument that attempts to police what a debater wears or how they present (this includes shoes theory/formal clothes theory).

-any argument that denies the existence/badness of oppression (i don't mean i won't vote for "extinction outweighs." i mean i won't vote for "genocide good.")

if there's anything i didn't mention or you have any questions, feel free to email me! if there's anything i can do to make debate more accessible for you, let me know! i really love debate and i coach because i want to make debate/the community a better place; please don't hesitate to reach out if there's anything you need.

Samantha McLoughlin Hire 4 rounds

Last changed on Tue April 16, 2024 at 10:33 PM PDT

**Conflicts for TOC 24: Harvard Westlake, Scarsdale, Westridge TW, Memorial DX, Notre Dame San Jose AG, San Mateo YR, Monta Vista KR, Los Altos AK, Amador Valley EM, Brophy TJ, Stanford OHS AY, Horace Greeley SG, Bellevue WL, Concord Carlisle FZ, St Agnes EH

**TOC Specific: if you're a senior and would not like to hear the RFD, just let me know!

Hi! I'm Sam. Harvard Westlake '21, Vanderbilt '25. Email chain please: samanthamcloughlin13@gmail.com. LD TOC qual 4x (octos soph year, skipped etoc junior year, quarters senior year), 20 bids, won some tournaments (Valley, Yale, Stanford, etc). I mostly read policy args, some basic T/theory, and some Ks/topical K affs (settler colonialism, fem IR, etc). I also coached for the past two years/am coaching this year, so I have some topic familiarity.

Everything in this paradigm (minus the hard and fast rules) is just a preference - my strongest belief about debate is that it should be a forum for ideological flexibility, creative thinking, and argumentative experimentation. I realized this paradigm was way too long so I tried to bold stuff for pre-round skimming.

Hard and Fast Rules--

If you are going too fast for me to tell if you are reading all the words in your cards, I will assume you're not. I will call clear and slow, please listen or we will all be sad.

Won't vote on any arg that makes debate unsafe. This includes any arg that denies the badness of racism/sexism/etc, or says death good (args like spark/wipeout = ok, cuz it doesn't deny the value of life, it's just fancy util maths that says extinction better preserves the value of life). If your opponent wins your argument is repugnant (absent any larger framing or judge instruction), I'll drop the argument, unless you presented your argument with the agreement that it was repugnant (ie, if you admit your position is racist, but attempt to say that doesn't matter), in which case I will consider your repugnance purposeful and drop you.

Ev ethics - stake the round on it (ie W30 to the person who is right and an L with the lowest possible speaks to the other) if evidence is misrepresented (an omitted section contradicts or meaningfully alters the meaning of the card). I think a good litmus test for misrepresentation is: does the article agree with the claims presented in the card? If it's missing a sentence or two at the beginning/end of a paragraph but it doesn't change the meaning of the card, you're better off reading it as theory. To make everyone's life easier, just cut ev well (this means full citations, full paragraphs, in alignment with the author's intent).

Clipping = an L with the lowest speaks I can give.

Speaks are my choice, not yours (put away 30 speaks theory).

For online debate, I expect that you record all your speeches in case you, your opponent, or I drops out.

Argument TLDRs--

Defaults: reasonability on theory, competing interps on t, drop the debater on t/theory, no RVIs, T>theory>everything else, comparative worlds, fairness + education are voters, policy presumption, epistemic confidence

^All those can be easily changed with a sentence.

K debate - Line by line >> long overviews. Winning overarching claims about the world is helpful, but you need to apply those claims to the specifics of your opponents arguments or else I will not do those interactions for you. Framework is important (honestly most of the times in K v policy debates, the person who wins fw wins the round). Links to the plan are preferred, but not necessary - the less specific your links, the more fw matters, and the more persuasive the permutation is. I also tend to think debate should be about arguments, not people, which means I'll likely be unpersuaded by personal attacks or "vote for me" arguments. I'm more persuaded by skills impacts on T Framework than fairness, and more persuaded by non topical affs that impact turn things than try to find a middle ground.

Policy - Yay! Zero risk not a thing but arguments still must be complete to be evaluated. Underdeveloping off in the 1nc = they get less weight in the 2nr. Rebuttal ev explanation > initial ev quality, but if your opponent's ev sucks and you point that out, that falls under the first category. Read your best evidence in the 1NC - I'll be persuaded by arguments that the 2NR doesn't get new evidence unless it's directly responsive to the 1AR. Big fan of creative counterplans <3(consult __ is usually not creative).

Theory - PICs and condo are probably good. Other CPs (international fiat, agent, process etc) are a bit more suspicious. All of this is up for debate. Descriptions of side bias are not standards. The more frivolous the shell = the truer reasonability and DTA are, and the lower the bar for answers. On that note, reasonability and DTA are under-utilized.

Philosophy - Not the area i'm the most comfortable in, but I'll try my best. I'd love to see a well explained phil debate, but I will not enjoy a blippy phil round that borders closer to tricks debate. I'd rather you leverage your syllogism to exclude consequences rather than relying on calc indicts. Debaters should take advantage of nonsensical contention args.

Tricks - I don't think a model of debate predicated on the avoidance of clash (ie relying on concessions) is an educational model. My test for whether an argument falls under this model of debate is: ask yourself if you would be willing to go for an argument if it was responded to competently. The same idea also extends to the formatting of your argument (ie you should delineate + thoroughly explain all your arguments with clear implications). I won't purposefully insert my personal beliefs about the value of tricks debates into the round, but it does mean that I'll probably be more receptive to arguments that indict tricks debate as a model. Some arguments are truer than others, and it's easier to win true arguments in front of me than false ones. I also default comparative worlds, and have given more than one RFD that boils down to "X trick was won but there's no truth testing ROB under which it matters." Up-layering tricky affs with Ks or strategic theory is smart, and when leveraged correctly make claims of new 2NR responses more persuasive.

Lay - I have respect for good lay debaters since I know I could never be one. That said, I will definitely evaluate the debate on a technical level regardless of the style. Good lay debaters can beat circuit debaters by strategically isolating key arguments. Circuit debaters vs lay debaters don't need to modify their style of debate, but should do everything they can to be accessible (explain stuff in CX, send docs, etc) (same applies to debates where there is a large skill gap).

Misc - My threshold for independent voters is high. Emphasizing this after a couple rounds where it's been relevant.

Rant Section--

Tech > truth, but separating the two is silly. The more counter-intuitive an argument, the higher the bar for winning it, and the lower the threshold for responses. Saying "nuclear war bad" probably requires less warranting than "nuclear war good" cuz the second one has the burden of proof to overcome the intuitive logical barrier to its truth value.

I'll deal with irresolvability using the "needs test" - the burden of proof falls on the side that "needs" to win the argument (ie the burden of proof is on the neg in the perm debate because the neg needs to beat the perm, but the aff doesn't need to win the perm).

I won't vote on arguments telling me to "evaluate the entire debate after X speech" that are introduced in X speech - it generates a contradiction. Also, the 2AR is after all the speeches before it - interpret this as you choose.

Likes/Dislikes--

Likes: plans bad 2NR on semantics if you understand the grammar behind it and are not reading someone else's blocks, creative and non-offensive policy impact turns, creative process CPs (no this is not the ICJ CP or consult the WTO), plan affs (yes I realize this contradicts with my first like), multiple shells bad, Ks with links to the plan, presumption/case presses vs non T affs, topical K affs, reasonability/DTA on frivolous theory, collapsing, flashing analytics

Dislikes: the grammar DA, RVIs, plans bad 2NR on semantics when you don't understand the grammar behind it, plans bad 2NR that's just reading off someone else's doc with no topic specific analysis, standard spec, buffet 2NRs, hidden args, non T affs that are an FYI not an advocacy, combo shells that don't solve their offense, "strat skew", "this argument is bad" [then doesn't explain why the argument is bad], "that's an independent voting issue" [doesn't explain why it's a voting issue past just the label] (this also applies to 1AR arguments not labelled as voting issues that magically become voting issues in the 2AR), "what's a floating PIK" "what's an a priori", being rude or interrupting your opponent (especially if you're more experienced or in a position of power) (at best it adds nothing at worse it's unkind)

Jonathan Meza Harvard-Westlake School 6 rounds

Last changed on Tue January 2, 2024 at 8:52 AM PDT

Add me to the chain: speechdrop[at]gmail.com

tldr: My name is Jonathan Meza and I believe that at the end of the day the debate space is yours and you should debate however you want this paradigm is just for you to get an insight on how I view debate. One thing is I won't allow any defense of offensive -isms, if you have to ask yourself "is this okay to run in front of them ?" the answer is probably no. I reserve the right to end the debate where I see fit, also don't call me judge I feel weird about it, feel free to call me Meza or Jonathan.

debate style tier list:

S Tier - Policy v k, Policy v Policy, Debates about Debate
A tier - K aff v Policy, K aff v Framework, Performance debate (either side)
B tier - K v K, Theory,
C tier - Phil
D tier - Trix
F tier - Meme/troll

about me: Assistant debate coach for Harvard Westlake (2022-). Debated policy since 2018 that is my main background even tho I almost only judge/coach LD now. Always reppin LAMDL. I don't like calling myself a "K debater" but I stopped reading plan affs since 2019 I still coach them tho and low key (policy v k > K v K). went 7 off with Qi bin my senior year of high school but not gonna lie 1-5 quality off case positions better than 7+ random shells.

inspirations: DSRB, LaToya,Travis, CSUF debate, Jared, Vontrez, Curtis, Diego, lamdl homies, Scott Philips.

theory: Theory page is the highest layer unless explained otherwise. Aff probably gets 1ar theory. Rvis are "real" arguments I guess. Warrant out reasonability. I am a good judge for theory, I am a bad judge for silly theory. Explain norm setting how it happens, why your norms create a net better model of debate. explain impacts, don't just be like "they didn't do XYZ voter for fairness because not doing XYZ is unfair." Why is it unfair, why does fairness matter I view theory a lot like framework, each theory shell is a model of debate you are defending why is not orientating towards your model a bad thing. Oh and if you go for theory, actually go for it do not just be like "they dropped xyz gg lol" and go on substance extend warrants and the story of abuse.

Topicality: The vibes are the same as above in the theory section. I think T is a good strategy, especially if the aff is blatantly not topical. If the aff seems topical, I will probably err aff on reasonability. Both sides should explain and compare interpretations and standards. Standards should be impacted out, basically explain why it's important that they aren't topical. The Aff needs a counter interpretation, without one I vote neg on T (unless it's kicked).

Larp: I appreciate creative internal link chains but prefer solid ones. Default util, I usually don't buy zero risk. For plan affirmative some of you are not reading a different affs against K teams and I think you should, it puts you in a good place to beat the K. as per disads specific disads are better than generics ones but poltics disads are lowkey broken if you can provide a good analysis of the scenario within the context of the affirmative. Uniqueness controls the link but I also believe that uniqueness can overwhelm the link. straight turning disads are a vibe especially when they read multiple offs.

K affirmatives: I appreciate affirmatives that are in the direction of the topic but feel free to do what you want with your 1ac speech, This does mean that their should be defense and/or offense on why you chose to engage in debate the way that you did. I think that at a minimum affirmatives must do something, "move from the status quo" (unless warranted for otherwise). Affirmatives must be written with purpose if you have music, pictures, poem, etc. in your 1ac use them as offense, what do they get you ? why are they there ? if not you are just opening yourself to a bunch of random piks. If you do have an audio performance I would appreciate captions/subtitles/transcript but it is at your discretion (won't frame my ballot unless warranted for otherwise). In Kvk debates I need clear judge instruction and link explanation perm debate I lean aff.

Framework: I lean framework in K aff v framework debates. These debate become about debate and models defend your models accordingly. I think that the aff in these debates always needs to have a role of the negative, because a lot of you K affs out their solve all of these things and its written really well but you say something most times that is non-controversal and that gets you in trouble which means its tough for you to win a fw debate when there is no role for the negative. In terms of like counter interp vs impact turn style of 2AC vs fw I dont really have a preference but i think you at some point need to have a decent counter interp to solve your impact turns to fw. If you go for the like w/m kind of business i think you can def win this but i think fw teams are prepared for this debate more than the impact turn debate. I think fairness is not an impact but you can go for it as one. Fairness is an internal link to bigger impacts to debate.

Kritiks: I am a big fan of one off K especially in a format such as LD that does not give you much time to explain things already reading other off case positions with the kritik is a disservice to yourself. I like seeing reps kritiks but you need to go hard on framing and explain why reps come first or else the match up becomes borderline unwinnable when policy teams can go for extinction outweighs reps in the late game speeches. ~~Generic links are fin~~e ~~but~~ you need to contextualize in the NR/block. Lowkey in LD it is a waste of time to go for State links, the ontology debate is already making state bad claims and the affirmative is already ahead on a reason why their specific use of the state is good. Link contextualization is not just about explaining how the affirmatives use of the state is bad but how the underlining assumptions of the affirmative uniquely make the world worst this paired up with case take outs make for a real good NR Strategy.

speaker points: some judges have really weird standards of giving them out. if I you are clear enough for me to understand and show that you care you will get high speaks from me. I do reward strategic spins tho. I will do my best to be equitable with my speak distribution. at the end of the day im a speaker point fairy.

quotes from GOATs:
- " you miss 100% of the links you dont make" --- Wayne Gretzky -- Michael Scott - Barlos
- "debate is a game" - Vontrez
- "ew Debate" - Isaak
- "voted for heg good" - Jared

Curtis Ortega Marlborough School 6 rounds

Last changed on Sun April 21, 2024 at 9:24 PM PDT

cmeowdebate@gmail.com

HARTS 22'

CSULB 26'

The more I judge and debate, the more I realize how useless these paradigms actually are. Debate is an educational activity. Have fun, flow, make smart arguments, be kind but petty. I eliminate my own biases to fairly adjudicate rounds. Will not check in for any isms or physical violence.

Best tip I can give you in order to get my ballot is to adopt clean and easy decision-making. I hate doing work for you so I would prefer you do the work for me, which means doing the line by line, answering their offense, and extending your own with well explained warrants through every speech.

Debate Shoutouts: Deven Cooper, Dayvon Love, Diego "Jay-Z" Flores, Erika Linares, Rickelle Basillo, Geo Liriano, Jaysyn Green, Destiny Popoca, Lauren Willard, Cameron Ward, Gabriela Gonzalez, Elvis Pineda, J-Beatz, J-Burke, Von, Cameron Ward, Toya, Jorge Aguilar, Ryan Upston, Y'Mahnie Harvey, Max Wiessner, Sofia Gurrola, Jean and Gavie, Clare Bradley, and all of #LAMDLGANG.

"IR topics are cool bc we learn abt the world and stuff" - E.C. Powers, Wyoming Debate 5/22/23.

Song Challenge: I usually start speaks at 28.5 and move up/down depending on performance. On a softer note, I usually will listen to music while I write my RFD. Most times, I already have decided a winner after the 2AR has ended, but I always go over my flow/notes one last time before I write or submit my ballot. I love listening to new music, and I listen to every genre imaginable. That being said, I love to hear the tunes y'all have been jamming to recently. To encourage such behavior, debaters have an opportunity to garner extra speaks based on their music suggestions. Each team is allowed to give me one song to listen to while I write my RFD. It cannot be a song I've heard before. If I like the song, you will receive a +.1 to your speaker points. If I don't like it, you won't receive any extra, but I also won't redact any from your original score.

Here are teams I love debating against:

Wake RL/RT

Kentucky DG

Wyoming LP

Wayne State RM

My list of favorite white people in debate is coming soon.

Asenat Pantoja Oak Ridge Independent 6 rounds

Max Perin Hire 5 rounds

Last changed on Wed March 20, 2024 at 7:19 AM PDT

Hi, I'm Max, I'm a second year out who did LD for 3 years. Won the TOC and a couple of other tournaments, read predominately policy arguments but dabbled a bit in critical international relations theory, settler colonialism, and ethical philosophy.

Paradigm:

Add me to the chain, maxvperin@icloud.com

-- Debate is a game (not sure why this is a controversial take in an activity with rules where we compete to win and have fun) – it’s a really fun game that can teach us lots of cool things, but don’t take it too seriously/please be nice in round/have basic human decency

Big fan of strategies that:

-- Spend most of the NC on impact turns

-- Use advantage counterplans and smart case presses to punish bad affs

-- Use long, good evidence

-- Don’t rely on the other debater dropping/mishandling arguments

Strongly dislike strategies that:

-- Are designed to avoid clash

-- Are recycled across topics

-- Allow you to read off a script during a rebuttal

-- Try to explain all society/history/IR/etc. with a theory from the depths of god knows where in academia

Might vote you down for/won’t vote for strategies that:

-- Ad hom other debaters/force me to evaluate out of round events (exception is disclosure)

-- Say racism/sexism/other isms good (will def vote you down for this one)

Other things to know:

-- I find clash and especially fairness standards in T Framework to be extremely compelling, and if debated equally I lean heavily negative in clash debates. On a truth level, fairness is clearly an impact, though it's often a bit tricky to explain why in a manner that's not tautological, so I'll be impressed by 2nrs that give that explanation persuasively

-- That said, while I'd recommend reading a topical plan, you certainly don't have to read a big stick policy aff - I think that well constructed topical K affs that materially solve for some instance of a structural impact through a plan and leverage a critical theory of power to do impact calculus and attack the internal links of disads and counterplans are extremely cool.

-- When reading a kritik against a policy aff, case defense and predictions Ks are your friend. It's extremely difficult to win a framework argument that excludes the advantage or a reason a high probability extinction impact doesn't outweigh, and "reee ontology and the ROTB means the aff disappears" certainly won't cut it on either of those fronts. Instead, you should attack the parts of the aff that are most vulnerable, i.e. the shitty internal links.

-- Behind nuclear strategy and IR theory, I think formal logic is one of the coolest areas of study/literature that can be used in debate. However, I also hate bastardization of it. Tricks debaters, do with that information as you will.

-- I think that a lot of popular theory and non-topic specific topicality arguments (condo, nebel, etc.) are fairly obviously bad arguments, and gain strategic value almost exclusively from the fact that they exploit the time structure in LD very effectively. Because of that, I'll be very sympathetic towards the debater answering theory in most of these situations.

- On the topic of silly arguments, psychological theories that have been rejected by 99% of psychologists and readings of history that have been rejected by 99% of historians are probably silly – there’s a reason they exist in debate, English departments, and nowhere else

Scott Phillips Harvard-Westlake School 1 rounds

Last changed on Tue January 2, 2024 at 7:42 AM PDT

Scott Phillips- for email chains please use iblamebricker@gmail in policy, and ldemailchain@gmail.com for LD
Coach@ Harvard Westlake/Dartmouth

My general philosophy is tech/line by line focused- I try to intervene as little as possible in terms of rejecting arguments/interpreting evidence. As long as an argument has a claim/warrant I can explain to your opponent in the RFD I will vote for it. If only one side tries to resolve an issue I will defer to that argument even if it seems illogical/wrong to me- i.e. if you drop "warming outweighs-timeframe" and have no competing impact calc its GG even though that arg is terrible. 90% of the time I'm being postrounded it is because a debater wanted me to intervene in some way on their behalf either because that's the trend/what some people do or because they personally thought an argument was bad.

I am a good judge for you if/A bad judge for you if not

You cut good cards and highlight them to make complete arguments in at least B- 7th grade English, which is approximately my level. Read uniqueness. If your disad is non unique, not putting a uniqueness card in the 1NC is not cute, its a waste of time. If your best answers to an IR K are Ravenhall 09 and Reiter 15 you are not meeting this criteria, ditto answering pessimism with "implicit bias is malleable".
You debate evidence quality/qualifications and read evidence from academic sources rather than twitter/forum posts. If you are responding to a zany argument not discussed in academia, blog/forum away. If that is not the case I implore you to ask why these sources are the only ones you can find.
You listen to what the other team is saying and give a speech that demonstrates that you did by answering all of their arguments correctly and in the order in which they were presented . Do not read a collection of non responsive blocks in random order. And then in follow up speeches you compare/resolve those arguments rather than repeating yourself.
You make smart analytics against arguments with obvious weaknesses. Most 1NC disads and 1AC advantages in current debate are incoherent/missing several pieces. You do not have to respond to an incomplete argument, point out it is incomplete and move on. Once completed you get new answers to any part of it.
You rely on knowing what you are talking about more than posturing/grandstanding.
You understand your arguments/can explain things. In CX and speeches you should be able to explain words/concepts from your evidence correctly, and be able to apply them. If your link card says "the aff is not disarm" thats not a link, thats an observation
You can cover/don't drop things. Grouping things is fine. Making a philosophical argument for why line by line debate is bad, and instead making your argument in the form of big picture conceptual analysis is fine. Randomly saying things in the wrong place, dropping 1/2 of what the other team said and then expecting me to figure out how to apply what you said there is not. I will not make "reject argument not team" for you.

I operate on a "3 strikes" rule: each side gets up to 3 nonsense arguments- a CP that is just a text, a bad disad or advantage, an unexplained perm etc. After that your points and credibility plummet precipitously. If I'm reading your card doc I will stop reading your evidence after 3 cards highlighted into nothing. If you include 3 "rehighlightings" of the other teams evidence that are obviously wrong I will ignore all your evidence/default to the other sides.

If debated by two teams of equal skill/preparation, the following arguments are IMO unwinnable but I vote for them more often than not because the above suggestions are ignored.

-please let us weigh our case or we said the word extinction so Ks don't matter

-the framework is: object of research, you link you lose, debate shapes subjectivity, ethics first without explaining what ethics are/mean

-War good, pollution good, renewables bad- it doesn't matter if these are in right wing heritage impact turn form or academic K form

-the neg needs more than 1cp and 1K for debate to be fair. Arguments like "hard debate is good debate... so make it hard for them" are so bad you should be able to figure it out/not say them

-PICS that do/result in the whole plan are legitimate. The negative can actually win without these, especially on a topic where there are 3 affs.

-counterplans that ban the plan as their only form of competition are legitimate, especially on a topic with only...

Rayeed Rahman Peninsula High School 6 rounds

Lukas Rhoades Peninsula High School 6 rounds

Yardley Rosas Marlborough School 6 rounds

Last changed on Tue January 2, 2024 at 7:07 AM PDT

Please add me to the chain, my email is rosasyardley.a@gmail.com

Policy from 2014-2021 for Downtown Magnets High School/LAMDL and Cal State Fullerton.

thoughts

general: I will listen to anything you have to say. I need you to control how I think about what is going on in the round. Framing weighing and comparing impacts is important. Extending and debating warrants as thoroughly as the debate allows is so important to me especially in the rebuttals . Also because I feel like tech and truth determine each other. You should be able to do a lot more with less. I flow on paper so I will miss quick, short, and intricate arguments. Tell me what it is I need to be voting on and why I should vote on that thing. I am very receptive to an rfd that is straight up given to me. My rfds are broad and I don't ever really get into specifics unless asked and rarely vote on a single argument.

specifics: I like k v k and k v policy debates the most. I have the most experience with arguments about the state, racial capitalism, and the intersection of race/gender/queerness/class. I need to feel like you are politically and/or socially motivated by the world to run the k you are running for me to really be persuaded by it. I need Ks to have a strong explanation of either the world or debate. Ks on the aff need a clear method and solvency. I don't mind if this isn't as strong on the neg unless the aff makes it a thing. In k v fw rounds I need both sides to have models of debate and comparison work being done on the offense. I lean towards skills, clash, tva for the neg. Generally I need links to be as specific as possible for any kind of offense or argument. I will consider any theory argument. But if you are going for them, be as contextual to the round as possible. Frankly, 4+ off is irritating to me no shade but I live for drama so go ahead but that raises the bar for you and lowers it for the aff.

other: sorry if I get sleepy, it's probably not because of the round

Alyssa Sawyer Notre Dame San Jose 6 rounds

Last changed on Sat January 20, 2024 at 8:20 AM PDT

hi! i'm aly (second year out, qualified to toc x2 (semis senior year))

toplevel:

have fun and be kind

show up before the round start time, that is when the 1ac should begin. starting early, sitting down early if you've won, taking less prep, etc = speaks boost.

please be as clear as possible, signpost, and do complete warranting (a conceded tagline is not an argument); i have no problem not voting on arguments i didn’t understand or flow in the first speech they were introduced - this is especially true considering i am much less involved than i used to be

i primarily read and am better for policy debates about the topic

arguments start at zero and go up with warranting based on the claim, ie larger or unintuitive claims need stronger warrants (spark/ontology need more warranting than nuke war bad/contingency)

compiling a doc and flow clarification are prep or cx; there is no flow clarification time slot in debate

not a fan of scripted rebuttals, arguments recycled across topics, and strategies that rely on your opponent missing something

will not vote on:

arguments that deny the badness of racism/sexism/ableism/homophobia/death/etc, this is probably an auto loss with very low speaks depending on severity

independent voters that are not labeled as such in the speech they are introduced and do not have a reason why they are

less necessary specifics:

needs to prove the aff is bad; links don’t need to be to the plan, but should be to ideas that a good potion of the aff focuses or relies on

if i can’t coherently explain your theory of power back to you, you will not win

please answer the case/contextualize links… or i will probably vote on extinction ows

not a fan of ks that rely on blippy 2nr tricks to win (vtl/unwarranted root cause/etc)

dont like long overviews — preferably put stuff on the line by line and in the order of the 1ar

i will disregard a floating pik claim if it isn’t hinted at in the 1nc or cx

policy:

please weigh / ev comparison / argument resolution

spin is more important than the evidence but it’s not if your opponent points it out, so make sure you still have warrants

inserting rehighlighings is fine for defense (but you still need to explain it in the speech), you should read for offense

default judge kick

default policy presumption

theory:

good for topic related t args, not so great for spreading through plans bad blocks or any other similar silly generic

theoretical objections to process cps should be permutations, not theory

in the absence of any argumentation(these can all be changed w a sentence): ci on t, reasonability on theory, dtd on 1nc t and theory, dta on 1ar theory except condo, no rvis, t > 1nc theory > 1ar theory > everything else, fairness and edu are voters

k affs:

non t affs—never ran them, not great for you if you’re aff

please try to put stuff on the line by line as much as possible, or contextualize your top level arguments

don't feel comfortable adjudicating personal narratives/performances/survival strats/ad-homs

phil:

needs to be sufficiently explained (especially if not kant), but i'm a big fan of taking advantage of the fact that most util justifications are missing pieces and/or assume consequentialism

default epistemic confidence

lay/trad/novices:

go slow and be accessible

i will evaluate every round technically regardless of style, that being said lay debaters can beat circuit debaters through solid warranting and isolation of key args

ev ethics:

would prefer to see this read as a shell instead of you calling it - if you call it on something friv that doesn’t change the meaning of the evidence you're not getting great speaks. this is what constitutes a challenge:

—card starts or ends in the middle of a sentence or paragraph

—the original text of the cited work has been edited (not bracketed)

—card has been cut to make a claim that the actual article does not make (this should be really obvious if you are calling it)

clipping:

you need a recording and i’ll evaluate based on tournament or nsda standards

online:

record your speeches, i won't let you regive them if you cut out

other:

i coach for dd -- relevant policies here: https://www.debatedrills.com/club-team-policies/lincoln-douglas-team-policy

Calvin Tyler Brophy College Prep 6 rounds

Teja K Vepa Hire 1 rounds

Last changed on Tue January 2, 2024 at 12:44 PM EDT

Update for Loyola 2020

Honestly, not much has changed since this last LD update in 2018 except that I now teach at Success Academy in NYC.

Update for Voices / LD Oct 2018:

I coach Policy debate at the Polytechnic School in Pasadena, CA. It has been a while since I have judged LD. I tend to do it once a or twice a year.

You do you: I've been involved in judging debate for over 10 years, so please just do whatever you would like to do with the round. I am familiar with the literature base of most postmodern K authors, but I have not recently studied classical /enlightenment philosophers.

It's okay to read Disads: I'm very happy to judge a debate involving a plan, DAs and counter-plans with no Ks involved as well. Just because I coach at a school that runs the K a lot doesn't mean that's the only type of argument I like / respect / am interested in.

Framework: I am open to "traditional" and "non-traditional" frameworks. Whether your want the round to be whole res, plan focused, or performative is fine with me. If there's a plan, I default to being a policymaker unless told otherwise.

Theory: I get it - you don't have a 2AC so sometimes it's all or nothing. I don't like resolving these debates. You won't like me resolving these debates. If you must go for theory, please make sure you are creating the right interpretation/violation. I find many LD debaters correctly identify that cheating has occurred, but are unable to identify in what way. I tend to lean education over fairness if they're not weighed by the debaters.

LD Things I don't Understand: If the Aff doesn't read a plan, and the Neg reads a CP, you may not be satisfied with how my decision comes out - I don't have a default understanding of this situation which I hear is possible in LD.

Other thoughts: Condo is probably a bad thing in LD.

Update for Jack Howe / Policy Sep 2018: (Sep 20, 2018 at 9:28 PM)

Update Pending

Please use the link below to access my paradigm. RIP Wikispaces.

http://judgephilosophies.wikispaces.com/Vepa%2C+Teja

Scott Wheeler Peninsula High School

Last changed on Tue January 2, 2024 at 3:03 PM EDT

Overall:
1. Offense-defense, but can be persuaded by reasonability in theory debates. I don't believe in "zero risk" or "terminal defense" and don't vote on presumption.

2. Substantive questions are resolved probabilistically--only theoretical questions (e.g. is the perm severance, does the aff meet the interp) are resolved "yes/no," and will be done so with some unease, forced upon me by the logic of debate.

3. Dropped arguments are "true," but this just means the warrants for them are true. Their implication can still be contested. The exception to this is when an argument and its implication are explicitly conceded by the other team for strategic reasons (like when kicking out of a disad). Then both are "true."

Counterplans:
1. Conditionality bad is an uphill battle. I think it's good, and will be more convinced by the negative's arguments. I also don't think the number of advocacies really matters. Unless it was completely dropped, the winning 2AR on condo in front of me is one that explains why the way the negative's arguments were run together limited the ability of the aff to have offense on any sheet of paper.

2. I think of myself as aff-leaning in a lot of counterplan theory debates, but usually find myself giving the neg the counterplan anyway, generally because the aff fails to make the true arguments of why it was bad.

Disads:
1. I don't think I evaluate these differently than anyone else, really. Perhaps the one exception is that I don't believe that the affirmative needs to "win" uniqueness for a link turn to be offense. If uniqueness really shielded a link turn that much, it would also overwhelm the link. In general, I probably give more weight to the link and less weight to uniqueness.

2. On politics, I will probably ignore "intrinsicness" or "fiat solves the link" arguments, unless badly mishandled (like dropped through two speeches). Note: this doesn't apply to riders or horsetrading or other disads that assume voting aff means voting for something beyond the aff plan. Then it's winnable.

Kritiks:
1. I like kritiks, provided two things are true: 1--there is a link. 2--the thesis of the K indicts the truth of the aff. If the K relies on framework to make the aff irrelevant, I start to like it a lot less (role of the ballot = roll of the eyes). I'm similarly annoyed by aff framework arguments against the K. The K itself answers any argument for why policymaking is all that matters (provided there's a link). I feel negative teams should explain why the affirmative advantages rest upon the assumptions they critique, and that the aff should defend those assumptions.

2. I think I'm less technical than some judges in evaluating K debates. Something another judge might care about, like dropping "fiat is illusory," probably matters less to me (fiat is illusory specifically matters 0%). I also won't be as technical in evaluating theory on the perm as I would be in a counterplan debate (e.g. perm do both isn't severance just because the alt said "rejection" somewhere--the perm still includes the aff). The perm debate for me is really just the link turn debate. Generally, unless the aff impact turns the K, the link debate is everything.

3. If it's a critique of "fiat" and not the aff, read something else. If it's not clear from #1, I'm looking at the link first. Please--link work not framework. K debating is case debating.

Nontraditional affirmatives:

Versus T:

1. I'm *slightly* better for the aff now that aff teams are generally impact-turning the neg's model of debate. I almost always voted neg when they instead went for talking about their aff is important and thought their counter-interp somehow solved anything. Of course, there's now only like 3-4 schools that take me and don't read a plan. So I'm spared the debates where it's done particularly poorly.

2. A lot of things can be impacts to T, but fairness is probably best.

3. It would be nice if people read K affs with plans more, but I guess there's always LD. Honestly debating politics and util isn't that hard--bad disads are easier to criticize than fairness and truth.

Versus the K:
1. If it's a team's generic K against K teams, the aff is in pretty great shape here unless they forget to perm. I've yet to see a K aff that wasn't also a critique of cap, etc. If it's an on-point critique of the aff, then that's a beautiful thing only made beautiful because it's so rare. If the neg concedes everything the aff says and argues their methodology is better and no perms, they can probably predict how that's going to go. If the aff doesn't get a perm, there's no reason the neg would have to have a link.

Topicality versus plan affs:
1. I used to enjoy these debates. It seems like I'm voting on T less often than I used to, but I also feel like I'm seeing T debated well less often. I enjoy it when the 2NC takes T and it's well-developed and it feels like a solid option out of the block. What I enjoy less is when it isn't but the 2NR goes for it as a hail mary and the whole debate occurs in the last two speeches.

2. Teams overestimate the importance of "reasonability." Winning reasonability shifts the burden to the negative--it doesn't mean that any risk of defense on means the T sheet of paper is thrown away. It generally only changes who wins in a debate where the aff's counter-interp solves for most of the neg offense but doesn't have good offense against the neg's interp. The reasonability debate does seem slightly more important on CJR given that the neg's interp often doesn't solve for much. But the aff is still better off developing offense in the 1AR.

LD section:
1. I've been judging LD less, but I still have LD students, so my familarity with the topic will be greater than what is reflected in my judging history.

2. Everything in the policy section applies. This includes the part about substantive arguments being resolved probablistically, my dislike of relying on framework to preclude arguments, and not voting on defense or presumption. If this radically affects your ability to read the arguments you like to read, you know what to do.

3. If I haven't judged you or your debaters in a while, I think I vote on theory less often than I did say three years ago (and I might have already been on that side of the spectrum by LD standards, but I'm not sure). I've still never voted on an RVI so that hasn't changed.

4. The 1AR can skip the part of the speech where they "extend offense" and just start with the actual 1AR.

Vontrez White Harvard-Westlake School 6 rounds

Last changed on Fri April 26, 2024 at 7:38 AM PDT

he/him/they/them

wvontrez@gmail.com

For college debate, use this email: debatecsuf@gmail.com

CSUF 22

Coach @ Harvard Westlake

--------------------------------------

S Tier - LARP, Plan v K
A tier - Clash of Civs
B tier - K v K, Phil
C tier - Theory debates, Trix

D/F tier - memes

I did policy debate for 4 years at Downtown Magnets (shout out LAMDL) and 4 years at Cal State Fullerton. I debated mostly truthy performance debates and one-off K strats in high school and debated the K in a very technical way in college. Currently coach flex teams in LD.

I would say my debate influences are Jared Burke, Shanara Reid-Brinkley, Jonathan Meza, Anthony Joseph, Travis Cochran, Toya Green, and Scotty P.

TLDR: I will vote for anything, as long as it's impacted out. The list of preferences is based on my comfort with the argument. Fine with speech drop or email chain.

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General

I think debate is a game that can have heavy implications on life and influence a lot of things

Tech > Truth, unless the Tech is violent (racism good, sexism good, etc.)

Good for all speeds, but clarity is a must

I default my prioritization to theory, T, and then substance. This can be changed if argued

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Theory

Disclosure is probably good, can vote on the impact turn though

Yes competing interps, lean no RVIs, DTD

Shells need an interp, violation, standards, voter

Reasonability OK but explain why you are reasonable

Need a good abuse story/how does my ballot set norms? Why does my ballot matter? How does this implicate future debates?

I think condo is good

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LARP

Absurd internal link chains should be questioned

Default util

No zero-risk

Uniqueness controls the link

Impact turns are good

Perms are tests of competition, not new advocacies

Yes judge kick

New evidence in NR as long as it's a logical extension of the NC. I'm okay with the 2AR doing this as well to check back, but it may not be strategic.

Will read evidence if told to do so

Quality ev > Card dump of bad ev

CPs need to compete on a functional and textual level

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I have a reading background in several critical literature bases. I am most read in anti-capitalist theory, afro pessimism, fugitive black studies, settler colonialism, and Baudrillard. For the sake of the debate, assume I know nothing and explain your K.

Winning theory of power important

Perm solves the link of omission

Specific link > state bad link

Contextualized link > state bad link

Affs should weigh the aff vs. the K, negs should tell me why this isn't possible OR deal with affs impacts.

Extinction outweighs debate probably good here

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K Affs

I appreciate affirmatives that are in the direction of the topic. Affs that don't defend any portion of the resolution need a heavy defense of doing so

I try not to have a leaning into T-FW debates, but I find myself often voting negative. Similar to Theory/T, I would love to hear about the affirmative's model of debate compared to the negative's. Impact turns to their model are awesome but there is a higher bar if I don't know what your model is.

Read a TVA -- Answer the TVA

Fairness is an impact. Clash is important. Education matters

KvK debates are super interesting, but I hate when they become the Oppression Olympics. Perms are encouraged. Links of omission are not. Contextualize links to the affirmative and clearly tell me how to evaluate the round.

Presumption isn't gone for enough in these debates

Lean yes on perms in KvK/method debates

Performances should be used offensively. I will flow your poems/videos/whatever, just have a defense of it and utilize it to win

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Phil

I think phil AC/NCs are interesting

Explain it well and you will be fine

Default epistemic confidence if the AC is phil

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Tricks

Do not hide tricks

Answer them

Preferably not extempted

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Speaker Points

Pretty much summed up here

If you make a joke about Jared Burke, +.1 speaker point

Elmer Yang Westlake 6 rounds

Last changed on Thu April 18, 2024 at 6:16 AM CDT

Hi Everyone! I'm Elmer, I debated in Policy in High School, coached Debate through College (first 2 in Policy, last 2 in LD) and just recently graduated with a Business degree from UT-Austin. I currently work at a FinTech firm as a Business Analyst and do part-time independent coaching. I coach, judge, and research a decent amount so I can follow-on substantive topic jargon but don't be overly aggressive with acronyms.

TOC Conflicts - Actively coaching Memorial DX, Notre Dame San Jose AG, Westridge TW, San Mateo YR. Conflicted with St Agnes EH, Westlake MR, Strake JW, and Strake NW.

email - elmeryang00@gmail.com

This paradigm has been changed to reflect the most important aspects of my judging. When I was a younger judge/coach in the community, I used to have pretty heavy predispositions and annoyances. Now, I care most about you performing your best regardless of style. Everyone has spent so much time on this activity and it would be a disservice to not see you at your best due to my dispositions. The only true thing that annoys me when judging is avoidance of clash. If you chose to introduce an argument for me to listen to, I expect that you know it and are prepared to rigorously defend it through an attack from multiple angles. If you introduce an argument that is so obviously put with no thought and meant to just be hidden and dropped (yes this is most but not all of modern day Tricks debate, but also reflective of incomplete DA's, T shells w/o cards or offense, and 3 second Condo Shells), I will be sad and annoyed that you did not care enough to produce your best. Whether you are reading a K-Aff about Clowns, the Arrow's Paradox, or the Politics DA, I just want to see that you care and you've put thought into your craft. Debate is so much easier to judge if you as debaters look and feel like you're enjoying it and I will enjoy judging you.

That said, I do have argument styles I'm more familiar with. I work mostly with K v K, Policy v Policy, Topicality, and K v Policy debates. I occasionally work with light Phil (mostly just Kant and Pragmatism) and almost entirely in Phil v K debates. I very rarely work with or encounter Theory and Tricks debate. I have no predispositions towards arguments, but the less experience I have with them, walk me through your claim, warrant, and ballot or else I will mostly likely evaluate the debate in a way that you would not expect or like like.

Things that increase likelihood of high speaks (and also winning):

1] Clarity - I've judged both fast, clear debaters and slow, clear debaters. I have no issue with speed but I do have issue if you're going faster than I can flow or process.

2] Strategy - showcase that you've come prepared OR make tactical moves on the fly in the middle of the round.

3] Innovation - I've been judging for a while so a lot of debates tend to be reduxes of debates I've judged in the past. Introducing new args or making new spin on args I've heard before often impresses me.

4] Vision - demonstrate that you are able to see the round from a multi-layer and dimension perspective. If you can connect the dots between args on different flows and comparatively weigh them, that will go a long way for speaks and the ballot.

5] Packaging - 90% of the time, the thing that distinguishes a winning arg from a good arg is how you frame and phrase it. Explaining complex args simply is an art and being able to explain why it matters is extremely important in any round.

Lastly:

1] Absent a Perm or Theory, my RFD in a Process CP or CP/DA debate will be "does the risk of a solvency deficit outweigh the risk of a net benefit" - resolve that question.

2] Do Impact COMPARISON not Impact Weighing. I can intuitively understand why your Impact is bad, why is it worse than your opponents. In a debate style with so little time, you need to invest a significant chunk of it on resolving arguments.

3] Topicality arguments need cards to compose of real arguments. I would prefer if they defined the words in the resolution but if you give me a master class on grammar principles, I will be impressed.

4] K debates now are super Framework heavy and there's only been once that I've decided the Neg has won Framework but lost the debate. However, I wish they were heavier on the Link. Ontology is a thing but it usually is not a thing that can be resolved by the Alt or worsened by the Aff. The worse your link, the higher burden it puts on the Alt (and the inverse of that is true). Good link debating is the most important part of any K v Policy or K v K debate.

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