Speech doc + make fun of me for using yahoo + postrounding virtually: abaner@berkeley.edu

I did LD back in high school (couple of state wins + T20 NSDA + T20 NCFL). I do NPDA at Cal now (won NPTE Nationals 2023 [carried by partner moment]). I coached James Logan LD last year.

TLDR

• Fine with any speed but if you're above 350 wpm please send a speech doc. Will shout clear/slow/loud if I need it.
• Willing to watch any debate y'all want to have. Idc what you run if you run it well.
• Powertagging is bad. Paraphrasing (cough cough pf) is nonideal. Evidence ethics is legit. I will do the whole autoloss + 20 speaker points thing if you stake the round on it.
• Speaks are probably sexist, classist, and or rascist. Read 30 speaks theory and I'll give both teams 30s.
• If the word ends with -ist and is bad, you shouldn't be it. Please. I will drop you and report you to tab. Also, please don't run afro-pess if you are nonblack. Zion, Joshua, and Quin do a wonderful job explaining why: https://thedrinkinggourd.home.blog/2019/12/29/on-non-black-afropessimism/#:~:text=In%20the%20words%20of%20Rashad,reduce%20Blackness%20to%20ontological%20nothingness.
• Weighing is nonnegotiable. Please. I have watched too many rounds withoutgood weighing. Please say one of the magic weighing words and then tell me why your mechanism is more important than your opponents/why you win under your mechansim. I default to SOL, then magnitude. But please please please weigh and metaweigh. Please.
• PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE COLLAPSE I BEG YOU
• Parli: I protect but just call the POO (obviously doesn't apply to other events). I barely know the high school norms are for POIs but ask away I guess.

Other TLDR things that I've collected over the years that are just preferences and don't change how I'll vote, but change my happiness in the round.

• Not a big fan of Nebel T :( I'll vote on it if you win it on the flow but like generally I'd much rather hear a debate about the substance of the aff plan vs you saying bare plurals + "this event being LD" means that the aff doesn't get the plan. Ideally, most sucessful debaters I've seen have read both and collapsed to whatever is cleaner

• I'd rather vote on substance than blips which means that if you have a choice to collapse to a 10 second line vs a 2 minute card out of your 1AR (or MG, or whatever the correct thing is for you're event), be strategic and go for what's the easiest out, but it'd make me happier if you went for the substance.

• The more I coach and read postmodernism, the less I think I understand it. Maybe I'm getting dumber, but I swear it made more sense when I ran it in high school.
• Stop saying gut check. I don't know what gut check means in the context of a flow round. If something is improbable, give me a warrant about why it's improbable.
• My favorite rounds to watch/judge K vs Case, Case v Case and K v K. This season Holden and I have changed our neg strat to be T + K + Disad, but prior to this year most of my rounds in college are a mixture of K v Theory or K v Case. This means nothing about what you should do, and everything about what I find interesting. Do what you feel comfortable with, and I will vibe.
• Saying try or die <<< doing smarter collapsing to something else

Case:

Is super cool!

• I like new + fun arguements. Read some crazy DA, go for the impact turn, make a hyper specific aff. Case is one of the places I feel like creativity shines through the most, and I love hearing cool case arguements.
• Link you impacts back to framework pls (for LD only)
• Linear disads are annoying! If you are going to run one you need to explain the link differential a lot more clearly.
• Chill with counterplans (pls stop saying "NSDA rules mean no counterplans" and respond fr). Condo (/dispo) is probably good but willing to listen to theory.
• Will listen to any CP (cheaty CPs, PICs, etc.) unless explicitly told they are bad by a theory sheet.
• I believe that the aff burden is to prove a) why the plan is desirable and b) is better than the cp. I will judge kick -- I don't thinking collapsing to a turn on the counterplan means that you prove the plan is desirable, especially if the neg is allowed multiple conditional counterplans (given the aff doesn't read T).
• Perms are tests of competitions please stop saying you added an advocacy lol
• Weighing is super important in case v case rounds. The sooner you pick a framing and tell me why you win, the easier evaluating the round is.

Kritiks:

I've run Buddhism, Althusser, Foucault, and MLM (not as much MLM as other cal teams) mainly. I mostly run Buddhism. I've coached Set Col and Deleuze.

• Down for anything but the longer the average word length of the author you're reading is, the slower you need to go if you want me to understand.
• If you're alt starts with "I/We already ruptured the debate space so vote for us for fun" pls stop making the author of your lit base turn in their grave (if they have passed) or contribute to their sadness (if they are alive)
• I think K-affs need to win (a?) topic harm(s?) to justify why they are k-ing out, and on the neg you need to win a link to the aff.
• Specific links >>>>> generic links.
• Frameouts are legit and underutilized.

THEORY TO K BRIDGE! In a K vs FW T round, don't just say 'a prori' or repeat your apriori tag as a reason for your arg to be layered first. I've had too many rounds where I have no clue who is apriori because the clash was just both debaters saying "we are a prorir"

Theory:

As a top note, chill on the friv T! I'd rather not have to vote on shoe specc or tropicality again :(

• Defaults: competing interps > reasonability, text > spirit, acc abuse > potential abuse, drop the arg > drop the debater. As with all defaults, feel free to win the arguement on the flow and my mind changes.
• In a vacuum, I like RVIs. I think if you do them and win why you get RVIs (assuming the other team says you shouldn't), I will happilly vote on them.
• Check your interps before you read them -- I've been in far too many rounds where people have read "text > spirit" and then have accidently used the wrong wiki name (it changed!) or had something else wrong with their text
• Big fan of bidirectional T that's set up well in flex!
• (Parli:) MG theory is chill. Anything after that probably not. I heard PMR theory was cracked tho.

Phil:

I read all type of phil in high school. I've read all the common LD authors before (Kant, Habermas, Rawles, Virtue Ethics, Land Ethics, etc...) and some niche ones like Levinas.

• If it took you 2+ reads to understand your card because of the writing style, I will not get it on first listen. Either a) send me your case (should already be disclosed) and b) slow down and c) add explinations in your own words frequently
• Phil frameouts are insane and a huge part of what makes phil LD tick. When you're weighing, go the extra step don't just tell me why you're arguements link -- tell me why your opponents don't.
• Don't be shifty in cross when explaining your author

That was long. Ask me questions preround if you need to or send me an email. Feel free to postround too.

ty Ozan for this poem:

"weigh

i begged you

but

you didn’t

and you

lost

-rupi kaur"

disclaimers for preffing:

- i competed four years at archbishop mitty high school, policy for two years and parli for two years after, won chssa parli 2021. went to nats in congress three years in a row, was a semifinalist sophomore year and quarterfinalist senior year.

- i'm cool with the common k's (cap, neolib, security, etc), as a debater i have experience with running antiblackness, orientalism and queer k's. im good with anything, but im probably not familiar with ur niche lit base so just explain it well. if you're a super high level k or theory debater however, consider preffing me low lol

- spread if you want, i'll say slow or clear if i need to

my judging preferences:

1. if u cause harm in the debate space ill drop u immediately

2. tech over truth unless you don't warrant

3. organize uq/l/il/mpx and signpost

4. impact everything out or it doesn't matter; if i'm judging parli, everything should be centered around your weighing mechanism

5. im down for friv theory, unless u make the debate completely inaccessible to your opponents EDIT: if you are going to run theory, please for the love of god, run it well. don’t give me shitty theory shells to evaluate instead of substantive k/case debate. you may not suffer but i do

6. everyone gets a 29, make an atla/aot/jjk/shadow and bone reference and i'll give you a 30. speaks end up being arbitrary and ableist/sexist anyways so just have fun

7. stick around for feedback, i'll always try to disclose. email me at nishita.belur02@gmail.com if you need anything else

It’s been a while since I’ve debated - it may take me longer to evaluate a round but not much about my thinking process has changed!

background

HS parli & NPDA; won TOC/NPDI/Stanford, etc.

general things

- I view debate through an offense/defense paradigm. Offense means this argument is a win condition for you. Defense means this is argument is not a win condition for them. If you want me to evaluate the round in a different way, I am open to those arguments.

- I believe every claim should be warranted in order for it to be the best version of that argument. This makes weighing easier - aka I see that something has a probability/magnitude/timeframe if there's an empiric or analytic to prove it. This doesn't mean I won't evaluate claims that are not warranted, but I have a paradigmatic preference for warranted claims over unwarranted claims.

- When you extend an argument, here are some useful things to do:

1. the tagline/warrant you want me to extend
2. a brief explanation of what it is
3. the implication of that argument.

- To me, an implication of an argument is how it functions within an offense/defense paradigm. For example, "we link turn the aff" has an offensive implication because it is a win condition for you. Conversely, saying "the aff has no solvency" has a defensive implication because it means their case is not a win condition for them. If you don't know the implication to an argument, force yourself to come up with one. It will make you better at debate and life but also debate doesn't matter so it's okay.

- In general, collapse to the most strategic arguments. This is why I emphasize treating the debate through an offense/defense paradigm because you can then isolate if an argument has a strategic function to leverage.

case

- I'm most experienced with case debate, and I like good case debates. You can win anything on a disad <3

- Warrant your links. Aka find case studies of where your plan has worked before.

- Do not read disads where the status quo is bad. Squo should solve. Otherwise, its a linear disadvantage. My partner once banned me from writing DAs because this is a hard concept so it's honestly okay. I also don't believe deficit spending DAs are convincing arguments.

- Read CPs that solve for the some/all of the aff. Do not read advantages to your counterplan. Read disads to the aff. Your job as the neg is to disprove the aff. You have not done that if you are passing a plan with its own advantages. Unfortunately, there's no clash.

- I default to functional competition > textual competition because I believe perms are first and foremost a test of competition, not an advocacy. Functional is the substance level of the round. Textual refers to texts.

- Only read uniqueness you can solve for. Aka you cannot solve for your global climate change uniqueness if your plan is only that San Francisco implements solar panels.

theory

- Interps describe the model of debate you defend for all rounds. It is not just about what happened in this round (unless its topicality). Your standards should justify your interp being a good model for debate, and not about what happened to YOU SPECIFICALLY. Along the same lines, you should not be answering the standards of a shell by saying "we did not do this," but rather why the logic of that standard is wrong/good/etc. This is something I also didn't understand until later, so I get if this is difficult to execute.

- I default to competing interps. Reasonability should be read with a brightline. If you say reasonability means I should gut check something, I take this to mean judge intervention based on what I personally think, but this is kinda lame because I personally hate intervention. Therefore, my gut check is to default to competing interps lmao, unless you make it very explicit that you don't want me judging based on the flow whatsoever.

- Please weigh between standards. Treat theory shells like you would case arguments. If both teams are trying to say they solve for war, each team still has to weigh their China/US and Russia/US internal link scenarios against each other. Similarly, if both teams say they solve for fairness, each team has to weigh their predictability and limits standards against each other.

kritiks

- K vs K rounds tend to become pretty messy when neither team leverages their framework or offense, so I end up voting on presumption to limit intervention if I have no choice. Presumption is the idea that if there is a lack of offense in the round, I will vote for the status quo. As a result, I believe presumption defaults negative, unless the negative provides a counter advocacy. In this case, it flips affirmative.

- K's are hard, but here are some things you should do:
1. frame out your opponents with an epistemic/ontological/semiotic skew claim
2. have warranted links that also function as case turns, and
3. find a way for your alternative/advocacy to solve parts of your opponents case.

- If you don't know what these mean, that's okay. All I'm looking for is offense that will win you the round. If there's a bunch of parallel claims being made with no broader explanation as to how I should evaluate the round, this is where my job becomes difficult. If you find yourself confused, we can talk about it later its nbd!

Hello reader, my name is Joel Brown (he/him/his)!

I competed in Policy and Parli on a very lay circuit in high school, and then I competed in Parli and LD in college at Chabot College and at the University of the Pacific. I was also an assistant Parli coach at Washington High School for a year. Altogether, I have a fair amount of experience with policy-style debate.

I try to be impartial about what arguments or strategies you choose to deploy in the round, but I do care that you deploy them well - provide warrants for your arguments, and provide clear decision calculus in the rebuttals. Specifically, don't just link your arguments to x impact, there needs to be an explicit weighing of the impacts in the round.

I'm able to keep up with spreading for the most part, but don't sacrifice clarity for speed as this often impacts your argument quality and consequently your speaker points too.

I'm game for theory debate, but I expect a clear abuse story outlined in the standards that relate to your impacts in the context of the round. I'm not predisposed to either proven or potential abuse threshold, as both have real impacts - hash out the threshold question in the round and then explain your abuse story from there.

Disad/Counterplan debates are also a great option - go with whatever you think fits the round best or what you're most comfortable with. All counterplans MUST be functionally mutually exclusive with the plan or else the perm is terminal defense that I will vote on as the easiest out in the round.

I also think case debate has become something of a lost art, meaning that you can win terminal defense in front of me so long as you frame it correctly and pair it with turns. When it comes to case debate, I won't automatically vote on a risk of offense if that offense is predicated on a claim with missing/dubious warrants.

I frequently ran kritiks as a competitor and I enjoy judging rounds where critical arguments are made on either side, but that doesn't mean I automatically know the lit base you're citing inside and out - my flow benefits from 1) slowing down when introducing your thesis and/or framework at the top 2) presenting a well-developed link story that indicts the specific actions of your opponents case 3) explaining how your alt solves the K per the framework. I am most familiar with critical arguments pertaining to capitalism, race, gender, colonialism, biopower, and the environment. I am less well-versed in other literature, but I can usually track a well-explained and cohesive thesis for the most part.

Round vision is key to wining in front of me - PLEASE COLLAPSE IN THE BLOCK/PMR OR ELSE IT BECOMES OBJECTIVELY DIFFICULT FOR ME TO VOTE FOR YOU. It is both easier and more compelling for me to vote for the team that identifies and collapses to a few points of key offense than for the team that keeps doing line-by-line in the rebuttals without providing coherent impact calculus.

Feel free to ask any further questions before the round!

Mira Loma HS '22 | UC Berkeley '26

Email: holden.carrillo@berkeley.edu

In high school I competed in PF for 3 years, mostly on the national circuit, and had an average career. In my second year doing parli at Berkeley and won NPTE last year. I coached LD at James Logan last year and currently coach parli at Campolindo.

Public Forum

TL;DR:

I'm two years removed from the circuit so be aware that I may be unaware of newer norms. Tech > Truth, speed is fine but I don't like blippy arguments/responses, good warranting and good weighing are musts. Respond to everything in 2nd rebuttal. Overall, I'm chill with most things that go in round, and I'll do my best to adapt to you.

Front-Half:

• Speed: Add me to the email chain. I'd like docs sent in the first four speeches, even if you're going slow. If you send a doc, any speed is fine. If you don't, don't go faster than 275 wpm, anything under shouldn't be an issue.
• Evidence: While I paraphrased in HS, I'm not super proud of it. While I'm not a huge stickler for paraphrasing/reading cards, paraphrasing is a bad norm and I'm down to vote for paraphrasing theory if it's run correctly and won.
• Cross: I'll probably be half listening to cross, so I'll never vote off of anything here unless it's said in speech. However, cross is binding, just make sure someone mentions it in a speech. If both teams agree, we can skip any crossfire and have 1 minute of prep as a substitute.
• Rebuttal: 2nd rebuttal must frontline everything, not just turns. Advantages/disads are fine, 4 minutes is 4 minutes, but my threshold for responses will increase if you implicate them to their case. Blippy responses are tolerable but gross, I'd like it if you weighed your turns and your evidence when you introduce it.

Back-Half:

• Extensions: My threshold for extensions are very very very low. I think that extensions are a silly concept and uneducational (especially in PF). As long as you talk about the argument, it's considered extended. However, this doesn't mean that you can be blippy in the front half, and this doesn't mean that defense is sticky. Unless your opponents completely dropped their argument, dropped defense still needs to be mentioned at least briefly in summary.
• Weighing: Be as creative as you want, I hate judges that don't evaluate certain weighing mechanisms like probability and SOL. If 2 weighing mechanisms are brought up and both are equally responded to without any metaweighing, I'll default to whoever weighs first. If nobody weighs then I'll default to SOL (please don't make me do this).
• Final Focus: I know this is cliche, but the best way to win my ballot is by writing it for me. You're best off specifically explaining why your path to the ballot is cleaner than theirs rather than focusing on minuscule parts of the flow.

Progressive Debate:

• Theory: I'm probably a bit better at evaluating theory debates than LARP ones. I'll evaluate friv theory - if the shell is dumb then the other team shouldn't have an issue with winning it, but please don't be abusive to an inexperienced theory team. For accessibility reasons, if no paradigm issues are read, I'll default to DTA (when applicable), reasonability, and RVIs.
• Kritiks: Anything should be fine, but while I had a few K rounds in PF, most of my K experience comes from parli (i.e. I still don't know if proper alts outside of "vote neg" are allowed in PF). There's a lot of literature I'm not familiar with, so please take CX to explain this stuff especially if it's pomo. Love good links.
• Tricks: Big fan of them, don't know why there's so much stigma around them. With that being said, if you're hitting an unexperienced team, my threshold for responses are low, but feel free to run tricks.

Also, uplayer your prefiat offense. Please. Not enough teams do this in PF and it makes my ballot hard.

Other:

• I presume the team that lost the coin flip unless given a warrant otherwise. If there's no flip I'll presume the 1st speaking team
• Big fan of TKO's
• Big fan of content warnings
• Big fan of tag-teaming
• Not a big fan of discrimination/problematic rhetoric. This should go without saying, but you'll be dropped.

Speaker Points:

Speaks are dumb and stupid and bad. You'll most likely get high speaks from me anyways, but if you want a 30, just win and debate well. Here are some other bonuses:

• + 1 for disclosing on the wiki (show proof before the round)
• + 1 for showing proof of you streaming my mixtape
• + 0.5 for a Lil Uzi Vert/Ariana Grande reference in speech
• + 0.1 for every CX skipped
• + 0.1 for every swear word
• - 0.1 for wearing formal clothing in an online round
• Instant 30's if you run spark, dedev, CC good, wipeout, or any other fun impact turn
• Instant 30's if you run any prefiat argument
• Instant 30's if both teams agree to debate without any prep time
• Instant 30's if you weigh/respond to their case for at least 30 seconds in 2nd constructive

I know this is short, so feel free to ask me any questions before the round

Parliamentary

TL;DR: Most of my parli experience is on the college level, so I might be unaware of specific norms in HS Parli. Tech > Truth, speed is fine but I don't like blippy arguments/responses, good warranting and weighing will take you a long way. Overall, I'm chill with most things that go in round.

Case:

• Love it, I'm a case debater primarily.
• Please please please please please terminalize your impacts. For some reason some HS parli teams struggle with this. Why does your impact matter, go the extra step during prep.
• I'm a sucker for squirrelly arguments and impact turns.
• Please weigh, I mean it. The earlier you weigh, the higher my threshold for responses are. If 2 weighing mechanisms are equally competing with no metaweighing, I'll default to the first one read.
• I love lots of warranting.
• Go for turns.
• Skim through my PF paradigm to see detailed opinions on case, but to put it briefly I'm pretty simple and am cool with anything.

Theory:

• Good with theory, probably the most comfortable with my decisions here.
• MG theory is good, but will listen to warrants otherwise. I probably won't vote for theory out of the block/PMR unless it's a super violent violation.
• I'll evaluate friv theory - if the shell is dumb then the other team shouldn't have an issue with winning it, but please don't be abusive to an inexperienced theory team.
• I really don't understand the norm of no RVI's in parli. If a team runs theory on you, GO FOR RVI'S!!! I'm not an RVI hack but I want to see more RVI debates.
• I'll default to CI's and DTD if no paradigm issues are read.
• I find myself leaning towards text > spirit and potential abuse > actual abuse but can be convinced for either side

Kritiks:

• While I'm totally cool with K's, I'm also not familiar with a lot of lit, esp some of the weird pomo authors, but at the same time I'll 100% vote for something I don't understand if you win it.
• When competing, I usually run Buddhism, Althusser, or some variation of cap, that's what I'm the most comfortable with. Any common K with a clear topical link should be fine though.
• Non generic links >>> but this isn't necessary.
• I feel a lot more comfortable judging K's vs. T-FW/case/dumps than K v K debates (while I really don't care what you run, that's what I have the most experience in)

Other:

• Speed is cool (top speed like 250-275 depending on how clear you are), but if I say slow and you don't slow then I'll stop flowing.
• Extensions are silly. While I do have a threshold for extending, that threshold is very low so the only time it would be a good idea to call out your opponents on their extending is if it's literally nonexistent.
• Perms: If you're gonna perm something, respond to the perm spikes!!! Perms are a test of competition, not advocacy.
• Tricks are good, but my threshold for responses are low, especially if you're hitting a less experienced team.
• Condo's good, but you can convince me that condo's bad.
• Presume neg until I'm told otherwise
• Big fan of content warnings
• Big fan of tag-teaming
• Not a big fan of discrimination/problematic rhetoric. This should go without saying, but you'll be dropped.
• Collapse. Please.
• Flex is binding but needs to be brought up during speech for me to evaluate it.
• Repeat your texts or say them slowly.

Speaker Points:

Speaks are dumb and stupid and bad. You'll most likely get high speaks from me anyways, but if you want a 30, just win and debate well. Here are some other bonuses:

• + 1 for showing proof of you streaming my mixtape
• + 0.5 for each Lil Uzi Vert/Ariana Grande reference in speech
• + 0.1 for every swear word
• - 0.1 for wearing formal clothing in an online round
• Instant 30's if you run spark, dedev, or any other fun impact turn
• Instant 30's if you run any prefiat argument
• Instant 30's if both teams agree to debate without flex (if applicable)

As I'm writing this I feel like I'm missing something. Feel free to ask me questions before the round.

LD/Policy

TL;DR: I have literally zero policy experience and limited LD experience. I know enough to be a decent enough judge, but may be unaware with specific norms on the circuit. Tech > Truth, speed is fine but I don't like blippy arguments/responses, good warranting and lots of weighing are important. I'm most comfortable with LARP and theory, but overall I'm chill with most things that go in round and I will vote on virtually anything.

Quick Prefs:

1 - LARP

1 - Theory

3 - Tricks

3 - K v. Case/T-FW

4 - K v. K

5 (Strike) - Phil

General:

• Add me to the email chain. I'd like docs sent in as many speeches as possible, even if you're going slow. If you send a doc, any speed is fine. If you don't, don't go faster than 275 wpm, anything under shouldn't be an issue.
• I'll probably be half listening to cross, so I'll never vote off of anything here unless it's said in speech. However, cross is binding, just make sure someone mentions it in a speech
• Extensions are silly. While I do have a threshold for extending, that threshold is very low so the only time it would be a good idea to call out your opponents on their extending is if it's literally nonexistent.
• If you're gonna perm something, respond to the perm spikes!!! Perms are a test of competition, not advocacy.
• Presume neg until I'm told otherwise
• Big fan of content warnings
• Big fan of tag-teaming
• Not a big fan of discrimination/problematic rhetoric. This should go without saying, but you'll be dropped.
• Collapse. Please.
• Condo's good, but it's easy to convince me that condo's bad.

LARP:

• Love it, definitely the most confident in my decisions here.
• Most of my debate experience is through util! Obviously this doesn't mean that I'll drop you if you run something outside of it, but don't assume that I'll know whatever FW you run, even if it's common in LD.
• I'm a sucker for squirrelly arguments and impact turns.
• Please weigh, I mean it. The earlier you weigh, the higher my threshold for responses are.
• I love lots of warranting.
• Go for turns.
• Skim through my PF paradigm to see detailed opinions on case, but to put it briefly I'm pretty simple and am cool with anything.

Theory:

• Definitely prefer theory over most other prefiat arguments.
• 1AR theory is fine, but I'll listen to warrants otherwise/arguments on how to evaluate it. I probably won't vote for theory after the 1AR unless it's a super violent violation.
• I'll evaluate friv theory - if the shell is dumb then the other side shouldn't have an issue with winning it, but please don't be abusive to an inexperienced theory team.
• From my understanding, going for RVI's isn't super common in LD/policy. If someone runs theory on you, go for RVI's!!! I'm not an RVI hack but I want to see more RVI debates.
• I'll default to CI's and DTD if no paradigm issues are read.
• I find myself leaning towards text > spirit and potential abuse > actual abuse but can be convinced for either side

Kritiks:

• While I'm totally cool with K's, I'm also not familiar with a lot of lit, esp some of the weird pomo authors, but at the same time I'll 100% vote for something I don't understand if you win it.
• When competing, I usually run Buddhism, Althusser, or some variation of cap, that's what I'm the most comfortable with. Any common K with a clear topical link should be fine though.
• The more links the better, preferably have them not generic, but this isn't necessary.
• I feel a lot more comfortable judging K's vs. T-FW/case/dumps than K v K debates (while I really don't care what you run, that's what I have the most experience in)

Other:

• Most of my tricks experience is in PF, so maybe LD/policy is different, but tricks are generally good. While you can totally run them on me, my threshold for responses are low if you're hitting a less experienced team.
• I have so little exposure to phil, please don't run it on me. It doesn't mean I won't evaluate it, but when I do evaluate it I can't guarantee a correct ballot.

Speaker Points:

Speaks are dumb and stupid and bad. You'll most likely get high speaks from me anyways, but if you want a 30, just win and debate well. Here are some other bonuses:

• + 1 for showing proof of you streaming my mixtape
• + 0.5 for each Lil Uzi Vert/Ariana Grande reference in speech
• + 0.1 for every swear word
• - 0.1 for wearing formal clothing in an online round
• Instant 30's if you run spark, dedev, or any other fun impact turn

As I'm writing this I feel like I'm missing something. Feel free to ask me questions before the round.

No longer active in debate. Please refer to Raffi Piliero for all thoughts, comments, questions, and concerns.

speed is fine as long as you make an email chain/speech drop - email is obinnadennar@gmail.com

im fine with all types of debate. i love critical arguments/case positions that engage with various types of philosophy. k debate is my favorite. cool with everything else.

one note on theory: i do not like frivolous theory (i.e. down my opponent since they are wearing socks - yes, i have seen this shell). if your opponent gets up in the next speech and says this is stupid and don't pay attention to it. i will discard it and i will not see it as a voting issues. that being said, if there is actual abuse in the round, theory is not only fine but welcomed. competing interps over reasonability.

please feel free to ask any questions before the round. ill be more than happy to answer them

she/her

Experience: I've been involved in debate for 10 years. Four years of National Circuit and Local Circuit High School LD at Chatfield Senior; four years of College NPDA/NPTE Open Parli for Parliamentary Debate at Berkeley; three years of coaching experience for Parliamentary Debate at Berkeley and Campolindo High School.

TL;DR: The short version is that I strive to evaluate the round as technically and objectively as possible. Read whatever arguments you want (provided they are not rhetorically violent), win them on the flow, and don't be oppressive/violent. Ks and k affs are great, theory is great, CPs are great, disads are great, case affs are great. Never worry about me auto-rejecting an argument because it's 'blippy' or 'frivolous', just make sure it's sufficiently weighed.

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Long version: The following details apply to both parli and LD, and if there's a paradigmatic difference between the two events, I will make note of it.

Philosophy: The principle that guides my judge philosophy is that judge intervention, while inevitable to some degree, is generally bad and should be minimized whenever possible. Paradigms that welcome judge intervention open the door for judges to make decisions (sometimes subconsciously; sometimes explicitly) on arbitrary criteria like presentation and rhetorical appeal. Evaluation of these criteria frequently comes down to race and gender, as well as being unfair and uneducational to the debaters in the round, so it should be avoided as much as possible. I do believe there can be instances of judges intervening in rounds for good, but on whole, as a general model for how debate ought to operate, I think judge intervention does more harm than good.

Three immediate implications of this:

[1] I default to strength of link to determine the truth value of arguments, warrants, empirics, etc. That means I don't care how "blippy" an argument seems, only whether it is contested; if an argument is conceded, then it has 100% strength of link and therefore is true. I will not intervene on the truth value of arguments, warrants, and empirics, for the reasons explained above (intervening on whether arguments are "true" sets a bad precedent about what the role of the judge is in debate rounds), and because I don't trust myself to know enough about the world to be able to verify the minutia of your arguments.

[2] I generally use paradigms that prioritize 'tech' over 'truth.' To this day, I am still confused about what 'truth' means as the opposite of 'tech.' How does the judge evaluate a round "truthfully"? Does that just mean the judge intervenes on the truth value of arguments (see point 1)? How does the competitive nature of debate factor in to 'truth' paradigms? If there are some arguments that are not open to debate ('true' arguments), wouldn't the more 'true' side have a massive advantage over the other? As a result, I think tech debate paradigms are more fair and educational, so I default to them.

[3] I use speaker points to reward good strategic calls and execution, rather than performance or rhetorical appeal. I don't like evaluating elements of debaters' in-round performances, such as persuasion, affect, rhetoric, speaking style, etc (again for the reasons above). However, if you are rhetorically violent in round, your speaks will be far lower.

All of the other details of my paradigm stem from these three points.

General:

- I have no preferences about the following: rejecting the resolution, conditionality/multicondo, 'cheater' CPs, PICs, Ks, 'frivolous' theory, etc. I am more than happy to evaluate these strats, but I think your opponents get to at least try to read theory in response.

- Personally, in order of most to least enjoyed, I prefer Ks, then theory, then case/advantages/disadvantages debates. However, my preferences will never factor into my decision, and I am more than comfortable evaluating any of these types of arguments.

Delivery/Speaks:

- I'm very comfortable with speed, but I know it can be a barrier to teams as well. I will default to evaluating speed but if your opponent asks your to slow or clear, please listen to them. I also don't think tech debate is intrinsically tied to speed; it's possible to have a technical debate that is not fast if speed is a barrier to teams. This means a) tech is not a reason why speed is good, and b) speed is not a reason why tech is bad or inaccessible.

- Don't worry about "performing well" in front of me. As previously mentioned, I will not give speaks based on performance.

- I will say clear as much as I need and I won't penalize speaks for clarity. I use speaks to reward good strategic calls, execution, and well-written files.

- I will not lower your speaks for calling points of order/information, so call away!

Policy/Case stuff:

- I default to believing in durable fiat.

- I default to evaluating your advantages through net benefits and util/some other form of consequentialism unless you specify otherwise.

- Specificity is good! I would much rather vote on your super specific investment bubble disad than your generic government spending disad.

Counterplans:

- I like CPs, especially well-constructed/creative advantage CPs.

- From the general section: I have no disposition for or against condo of 'cheater' CPs. Feel free to read them, but assume your opponents get to try reading theory about them.

- I default to evaluating perms as tests of competitions, but I will evaluate them as advocacies if you give me a reason why.

- I prefer arguments about functional competition and competition through net benefits to arguments about textual competition.

- I default to no judge kick, but I will evaluate it if you make the arguments.

Theory:

- I love theory :)

- I default to potential abuse over proven abuse, but feel free to do weighing between the two in round.

- I have a relatively low threshold for what counts as abuse on theory. Since I default to potential abuse, I vote for the better norm for debate between the interp and the counter interp. This means I am very comfortable voting on 'frivolous' theory and potential abuse.

- I default to competing interpretations over reasonability. I think it's hard to evaluate reasonability without a brightline for what is considered to be 'reasonable.' I also don't know how to decide what is reasonable without being interventionist (see the judge intervention section).

- I default to dropping the team on theory, but I have no disposition between dropping the team or the argument.

- I default to theory being a priori to the rest of the debate.

- I default to fairness and education not being voters. This means you have to explicitly read fairness and education as voters in order for me to vote on theory; I will not "assume" they are there.

- I have an extremely high threshold for 2AR/PMR theory.

- I have an extremely high threshold for reasons why case impacts (advantages or disadvantages) should come before theory.

- I default to no RVIs. That means you have to make the argument that theory is a reverse voting issue, I won't just assume that it is. However, I love RVIs and think they're underutilized right now in parli.

Kritiks:

- I love Ks and K affs. I see myself as primarily a K coach, judge, and former debater.

- I have a good understanding of most foundational critical theory, so don't be afraid of reading your arguments in front of me. Read your pomo nonsense; read your more structuralist positions.

- I care a lot about the quality of Ks. I really love Ks that are dense, well-written, and demonstrate a clear understanding and commitment to the lit base from which they're pulled. I don't love Ks that are nothing more than an assemblage of arguments you think are strategic. Use file writing as an opportunity to show me that you've done your homework. Obviously I won't hack against a K I think is poorly written or anything, I'll vote on the flow, but I might decrease your speaks if I think your K is particularly bad.

- As a debater, I tended to reject the resolution more than I defend it, but I am perfectly happy evaluating rounds either way. From above: I think you're probably able to reject the resolution, but your opponents probably get to try reading theory against it. For what it's worth, all else held equal, I think I probably err towards the kritik on the question of weighing k impacts vs fairness and education (55-45), but I think the reason why is because teams frequently fail to explain why concepts like 'fairness' and 'education' matter in the context of the framework/impacts of the K, thus losing if the aff frames out the interp. If you can read framework and with this debate, you will probably win my ballot.

- I default to epistemic modesty over confidence. This means without any in-depth explanation, I'll evaluate your frameout as a reason why your impacts are more probable than your opponents, and why your opponents have a lower probability of solving their impacts. If you want me to evaluate your frameout as terminal defense, or a reason the k is sequentially a prior question to the aff, you need to do the technical extensions of why that is necessarily the case.

- I evaluate the alt like a CP in reference to competition and the perm; if I should evaluate the alt as more of a performance instead, please let me know and explain what this means in the context of the round.

- I don't love reject alts. I'd prefer your alt to be specific, concrete, and actionable. This is probably my biggest K pet peeve.

- I default to theory being a priori to the K, but I'm extremely sympathetic to arguments that the K should come first for a litany of reasons.

Other:

-Non-Black debaters should not read afro-pess, I will drop you if you do. Read: https://thedrinkinggourd.home.blog/2019/12/29/on-non-black-afropessimism/

- I default to presumption flowing neg unless the neg reads (and goes for) an advocacy other than the status quo, but I want this to be debated out in the round.

- I tend to have a high threshold for what counts as "contradictory" arguments; or at least, I think conditionality probably resolves a large degree of contradictions. So, I'm sympathetic to the argument that contradictions don't matter if you kick out of one half of the contradiction. However, if you're uncondo, you do need to be careful not to double turn yourself (for example, by reading an uncondo cap K and an econ DA).

- I will do my best to protect against new arguments in the rebuttals, but it's always better to call points of order just to be safe. There's always a chance I misevaluate whether an argument is new or not, so play it safe and point it out to me. I won't lower speaks or anything for calling points of order, so there's no perceptual risk.

- I will vote on IVIs, but to be transparent I'm not the biggest fan if they're read frivolously. Specificity is necessary here. If you do go for an IVI, you need to do the technical work of explaining why this piece of offense functions independently of the rest of the flow. Absent some justification, I will evaluate IVIs as a piece of offense on the layer it was read. If you want me to evaluate it as an a priori voting issue, I need framing that justifies this. This isn't to say that I won't evaluate IVIs, but it means that you need to do the work of explaining why it's a priori.

- (Parli) The LOR doesn't have to extend every word of the MO. I think the LOR can largely do whatever it wants to, as long as it's not new. The LOR can never really lose the round, but it definitely can win it.

- (LD) Please include me in the speech doc or email chain if there is one.

- If you have other questions I haven't answered, please ask me before the round!

Summary

It’s your debate, I’m down to hear any argument. Comfortable with case/K/T/tricks/phil in roughly that order, but happy to evaluate any argument you make (including rejecting the res). As a debater, I went for a roughly even mix of K/case in tech rounds. Speed is fine if your opponents can handle it. Weighing and warranting win rounds. Be respectful to everyone in the round. Call the POO, articulate the cross-application, make the debate as explicit as possible for me. Email p.descollonges@gmail.com.

Background

I competed in parliamentary debate for six years, mostly at Nueva. I was most successful at tech parli, but also found success at both NorCal and Oregon lay tournaments (see bottom of paradigm for notable results if that matters for your prefs for some reason—it probably shouldn’t). I also debated 4 NPDA tournaments last year. I’m a sophomore at UChicago and coach for Nueva. You can reach me at p.descollonges@gmail.com. To prevent this paradigm from being too unwieldy, I’ve only included actionable preferences (i.e. preferences that have a clear impact on what arguments you should be making). Outside of these explicit preferences, I strive to evaluate all arguments fairly, but if you’re interested in my specific thoughts on an argument, feel free to ask me before/after the round (e.g. whether I personally like condo—I’m more than happy to evaluate it, but I also think condo bad is underused).

NON-PARLI EVENTS (feel free to skip if you are a parli debater!!):

I'm fine with speed up to ~300 wpm. If you're in PF, go as fast as you want. For LD, feel free to spread, I'll slow if needed. For policy, you'll probably need to cut speed, but feel free to ramp and I'll slow when I need to—just give me pen time and a speech doc.

I do not know your event. I do not know your norms. I'm sorry about that! I'll do my best to evaluate your round still. Regardless of event, I will vote on clearly articulated framework/weighing/sequencing claims ALWAYS, especially if I'm not comfortable with your event. In general, I assume defense cannot win rounds. I default to a net benefits/other offense-based framework, I'm willing to evaluate stock issues framing but am probably awful at it and need a justification for it.

My lack of knowledge about norms is not an excuse to be sketchy. I am more than happy to look up the (conviniently nationally codified!) rules for non-Parli events if something feels wrong to me. This doesn't mean I'll drop you for reading a K aff (because hopefully you're reading implicit or explicit args that breaking rules is good if there's a rule against your position); but it does mean that you shouldn't expect to get away with e.g. gross speech time violations. I'll generally defer to anything both teams seem to agree on if both teams seem comfortable and I am unfamiliar with the event, unless you try to convince me to give you a double win or something in that vein.

I am a parli person. This does not mean I don't care about evidence. I have a low threshold for ballot comments about sketchy evidence. I have a much higher, but still comparatively low, threshold for intervening on evidence ethics. I have an extremely low threshold for not voting on evidence your opponents call out as sketchy if it is sketchy. I will read cards necessary to decide my ballot (yes, this includes in PF.) I will not vote against you because e.g. you citing a specific sub-conclusion that helps you from a study that argues generally in the opposite direction unless your opponents point it out, in which case I will read the card. I will affirmatively intervene to disregard or vote down blatantly fabricated, misconstrued, or excessively powertagged evidence in compliance with NSDA evidence rules (7.4.A/B/C). I will also strive to comply with NSDA rules for formal challenges (7.2/3), but am not experienced with this procedure. Please just be ethical with your evidence.

Feel free to read my parli paradigm if you want an idea of more specific preferences! Ask me before the round if you have any questions.

PARLI:

Logistics

I hate protected time, but will grudgingly accept that some tournaments use it. It’s ultimately up to the speaker—I will not intervene if the speaker wants to take a POI during protected time. I will follow tournament rules on grace periods, but grace periods aren’t speech time—please don’t make new arguments. I will disregard them.

Call the POO. I protect in the PMR, but give the benefit of the doubt to the speaker unless a POO is called. Incorrect answers to a POO do not waive this protection. I do not protect in the LOR, because there are situations where the aff would prefer I not protect—call the POO if you want me to drop the arg. In novice/beginner rounds, I reserve the right to protect.

Please don’t shake my hand. I don’t care if you sit, stand, etc.—as long as I can understand you, you’re fine. I don't care what you're wearing.

I’ll give at least one of oral or written feedback depending on the specific circumstances of the round, defaulting to a longer oral RFD with a summary in the ballot. You are welcome to record anything I say after the round and/or request I write it out in the ballot. I will try to get substantive and substantial feedback to you in all circumstances—if the tournament bans disclosure and/or we’re running on a tight double-flighted schedule, expect a longer ballot. My preference is to give both an RFD in which I explain how I analyze the arguments in the round and individual speaker feedback, but in complicated outrounds especially, there’s a chance I won’t get to individual speaker feedback. If you’re specifically curious, always feel free to ask. I’m open to postrounding, but if I’m talking to you, I can’t change my ballot. If you think there was a genuine equity issue in the round and I've already submitted my ballot, the person to talk to is the tournament equity director, not me.

I’ll ask for any information I need for my ballot (e.g. speaker positions). No double-wins, no double-losses except in rounds with equity issues.

Speaker Points

If the tournament seeds based on speaks (speaks, -1HL, or z-score) as the first tiebreaker for teams with the same number of wins, I’ll default to 29s (or as close as possible). I’ll give 30s to anyone who impresses me, particularly with strategic argumentation. I will not hesitate to drop your score as a clear signal that I disapprove of some behavior (see equity section below), but will not go below 29 due to mistakes or perceptions of you as a “weaker” debater.

If the tournament does not seed based on speaks as the first tiebreaker, I’ll give speaks in the ~26.5-29.7 range in most rounds. You’ll get higher speaks for good strategic calls, clean argument execution, and cool extemporaneous warranting. Arguments I like that I haven’t heard before are 30s. I won’t go below 26.5 except as a statement of active disapproval (i.e. if you get a 26.5 or below, your debating was not bad/sloppy/inexperienced, it was problematic).

Equity

Please strive to be a good person in round and out of round. Be respectful to your opponents. I will stop the round if necessary to protect any participant in it. If you are uncomfortable, I’d appreciate it if you communicated that to me (or the tournament staff!) in some way.

Misgendering your opponents will result in lost speaker points at minimum and a round loss if egregious and/or intentional. This is also true for gendered/racialized/etc. negative comments or behavior. As a white man, I don’t have a great way to evaluate the exact harms of specific behaviors, so I’ll generally defer to preferences expressed by affected individuals in dicey situations and/or go to the tournament.

Regardless of current literature on the net effect of content warnings, in the context of the debate rounds, content warnings seem clearly net-good in terms of their risk-reward tradeoff. Let me know if there’s anything I can do to make the round better for you!

Case

I love case debate. I wish more people did case debate. Good case debate will make me very happy as a judge. That means clear arguments with clear impacts, good interaction with your opponents arguments, and a clear (and preferably explicit) articulation of what offense will win you the round. Warranting is also key. Arguments with well-explicated warrants backing them up will almost always beat arguments without warrants.

The best way to win a close case debate is weighing. The best way to win a close weighing debate is to do metaweighing. Please tell me whether I should prefer e.g. evidence or logic. Please explain to me how that applies to your arguments specifically. If you do this, you will win 90% of the case debates I have seen.

I’d love to see more link turns. I’d love to see more uniqueness leveraged after the PMC/LOC. I’d love to see more warrants on internal links.

CPs

Down for anything. Win the theory debate. I’ll evaluate all CP theory I can think of. I’ll also evaluate all CPs I can think of, but please have good reasons to prefer, especially if you’re reading delay, etc. Condo is fine by default. Dispo means you can kick it if there’s no offense by default. PICs are fine by default.

Advantages to non-mutually-exclusive CPs are not offense (or defense). Advantages to mutually-exclusive CPs are black swans, but I’m open to hearing why they’re offensive. Perm debates are good, but please don’t say anyone is “stealing” anyone’s advantages.

Evidence

Please do not fabricate evidence. Please do not plagiarize unless the tournament requires you to do so (please reference evidence you use rather than presenting it as original analysis). If the tournament empowers me to do so, I will check your evidence after submitting my ballot, and go to tab/equity if I discover something that seems like an intentional fabrication. Obviously, you have limited prep—mistakes are human, and I won’t hold them against you.

If you give me author’s name/date/source for a claim, you’ll likely win contests over whether that literal claim is true or not. This does not modify the strategic position of the claim in the round. If you do not give me a citation for evidence, I will treat your claim as a claim. Given that I try to be tabula rasa, this is normally fine (i.e. in most debates, it won’t matter if you cite a source for the US unemployment rate).

Ks

I like hearing good K debate! I really like hearing new shells, well-thought-out strategies, good historically-backed warranting, and solid links. I really dislike hearing canned shells from backfiles you don’t understand.

I like KvK debate. I am open to rejecting the res, I’m also open to framework. I have a high threshold on Ks bad theory from the aff, but would consider voting for it.

I’m most familiar with Marx, modern Marxists, and queer/disability theory, but I’m open to hearing anything—just explain it well.

Please have specific links that are not links of omission. Please give me a role of the ballot.

I’m not convinced the aff gets a perm in a KvK debate, but I’ll default to allowing it.

T/Theory

I’m happy to listen to literally anything. I generally prefer fairness on T and education on theory, but please don’t feel bound by that. Jurisdiction is absolute BS but I’ll vote for it.

I default to competing interps over reasonability, potential over proven abuse, and drop the argument when it makes sense. I do not default to theory being a priori, make the argument (especially if your opponents could plausibly uplayer theory). I do not understand why an OCI is not a separate shell, but I’ll listen to them. I’ll reluctantly vote on RVIs, the more specific the better. I view RVIs as making local offense on the theory sheet a global voting issue by default, but will appreciate and evaluate specific texts as well.

If an argument boils down to "did the team say the magic words," I'll default to the team that spent the most time on it in absence of argumentation on either side (e.g. what counts as an RVI). If that doesn't make sense to you, ignore it, and rely on good argumentation rather than linguistic technicalities.

Results

College: Second seed at NPDA nats '23;Mile High Swing 1 Finalist

Champion/Co-Champion: Evergreen ‘21, ‘22; Campo ‘21; TFT ‘17; Lewis and Clark ‘22; UoP ‘20; NorCal Champs ‘21, ‘22

Finalist: TOC ‘22

Semifinalist: NPDI ‘19, ‘20, ‘21

Update for ToC 2023

I want to be impressed by your debating.

1. I am more distanced from the community now, so wow me with the new meta and some innovation or just go for heg. I will struggle a bit with speed and I may not resolve complicated layering debates in predictable ways, particularly on positions I am unfamiliar with. I tend to find ballots on fairness.

2. Since I care less about competition and more about pedagogy, I'm less inclined to vote for frivolous positions in close debates. I will not intervene against your new tricks, but beware my wrath on your speaks.

3. Let your timer ring in NSDA campus if your opponent is speaking over time. There are too many weird, untimed speeches happening online to not be clear about this.

4. If there are technical, "West Coast" debaters that are deliberately making debate less accessible, I am open to voting on arguments that this specific behavior is bad and ought to be punished. However, I will not vote on arguments that say that all arguments of a certain kind are bad. If your strategy is to complain that a position is prima facie inaccessible, you should strike me.

Argument content and speed seem to be the two aspects of debate that people find inaccessible. I caution any team reading arguments about the accessibility of debate:

First, genuine attempts to engage are a necessary condition to win that a position is inaccessible. For example, if the 1NC argues that the 1AC is too fast and therefore inaccessible, I would expect that the negative littered the 1AC with POIs asking for clarification. The optimal scenario for accessibility is one in which requests for certain practices are made before the round begins, ideally before prep.

Second, a viable alternative vision of debate, this round, and the ballot is necessary. What should debate look like? How does the ballot affect it? Do I completely abandon the burden of rejoinder or apply a different standard? An argument about accessibility should answer all of these questions. If you don't provide an alternative to the burden of rejoinder, I'll likely vote on conceded responses to speed bad or cross-applications of critical arguments against K's bad, because those are common arguments that you tend to drop. That will be difficult for you, but you have been forewarned.

Third, realize that inaccessibility is not solved by excluding certain positions or practices. Mandating debaters speak below a certain rate or banning critical positions is not liberatory - it's antithetical to liberation for some, and a bit authoritarian for my taste. You are reading a position to win the round just like everyone else. That's cool, but do not pretend/argue that speed is the worst form of exclusivity and that a ballot for you would solve everything.

TL;DR

Move fast and break things. You do you, unless you avoid line-by-line, give meaningless overviews, or drop arguments. Don’t do that. Do some argument resolution. Adapt to your opponents and think strategically before the speech/round/tournament.

Arguments require warrants. Tech >>>>>>>>>> Truth. Good framing makes voting simpler. I’m a link person more than a uniqueness person. K affs are fine, but I like fw. I enjoy direct, substantive clash. Theory is fine.

Background

he/him/his; Bellarmine College Prep ‘19, Georgetown ‘23; I like economics; debated at Bell, Notre Dame, and MVLA; coached at MVLA; coached Evergreen MS.

In high school, I read politics, heg, and long, conditional 1NCs. I went to one college tournament and read a queer temporality performance aff, framework, cap, and theory (and case!).

My resting face can be frowning or stern. Don’t take it badly - I’m just thinking.

Ballot

I will intervene on speech times, giving at most one win, that I only flow what the designated speaker says, and that structural violence in debate is real. If necessary, give content/trigger warnings before the round/speech. Deliberate misgendering along with anything else morally abhorrent is an auto-loss.

Claims require warrants. Pointing out that an argument lacks a warrant is sufficient for terminal defense. Empirics > analytics > testimonies. Interaction does not require signposting, but it helps.

Conceded claims need not be extended. If an argument is dropped, I will consider it true. But, I should be able to explain the arguments I’m voting on, so a quick explanation when extending an important argument would hel.

Style

I don’t care iff I can understand you. I will yell clear if necessary, but after a three times, I will stop flowing. Slow down on tags and be clear with subpoints, please. Except in cases where your opponent is unable to compete with your speech, I’m down for speed. If you’re in doubt, I will default to tournament norms for speed/tech.

Case, I guess

Case defense is overrated, case offense is appropriately rated, framing is underrated. A long framing sheet, even as early as the 1AC, is great. Impact terminalization and weighing is a must in case debates. Absent these arguments, intervention is more likely necessary to resolve the debate.

Infinite condo with intrinsicness perms is sounds like a fun model for debate. I find myself arguing that uniqueness controls the link but believing that the other way around is more correct.

I find it difficult to evaluate turns case scenarios, squo solves, or solvency arguments that are not articulated in the context of the advantage(s).

CP

Turns out that a fresh-out-the-oven cp that defaces the absurd cherry-picking that is the aff's solvency mechanism gets me just as excited as it would get anyone else. If the 1AC internal links aren't tight, punish them. The more specific, well-warranted the solvency deficit and net benefit are, the better. PICs and actor counterplans are not good strategies.

CP theory is probably reject the argument. 2A’s, don’t bother with shell theory if the 1AR can explain the obvious brightline. It's a hard sell for me that PICs are ever legitimate on (functionally) one-topical-aff topics.

Conditionality is great and underutilized. 1 condo makes theory an uphill battle, 2 is fine, 3 is pushing it, 4+ and I'll be more sympathetic to the aff.

K’s

I wasn’t the most prolific K debater, but I’m down. If you're reading complex high theory, I'm a bad judge for you - not because I'm particularly biased against the K, but because I'm not well-versed on many lit bases and I haven't judged a lot of high theory K rounds, so I might not necessarily resolve a messy debate in the way you expect.

The criticism should disagree with and disprove the aff. I have a high threshold for voting on sweeping claims about the structure of society/the world. I’m inclined to weigh the plan/the 1AC in some form. I am more convinced by 1NCs that engage with the case.

Lit I’m comfy with: SetCol, Security, Neolib

Leave time for questions.

Framework

Bread-and-butter fairness first is fine, but I avoided this strategy, although skews eval is probably True. I'm enthused by, well-read in, and interested in watching debates of the more interesting framework impacts - self-questioning, debatability, epistemic humility, etc. Procedural fairness is still an impact, though. Defenses of policymaking are fine, args like "policymaking key to solving climate change" are silly.

IVIs

My threshold for IVIs is 1. a sufficiently strong claim to the ballot and 2. they do not operate under any existing framework in the round.

If an independent voting issue's offense operates under an existing framework in the round, it is probably not an IVI. Examples of each side of this:

1. Reading SetCol on the neg conditionally is probably a relink to the K, but unless it's a categorically distinct abuse/offense/violation, it's not an IVI.

2. Regardless of whether or not "discourse matters" framing exists in a round, saying a slur is obviously distinct from using language of settlerism. I'll drop anyone who does it instantly, but it's useful to clarify that the IVI exists under my threshold - "slurs bad" operates under a distinct framework and has a clear claim to the ballot - the IVI is justified.

If you spam IVIs, I will take a baseball bat to your speaks. An additional link to your criticism is not, in fact, an independent voting issue.

There seem to be a disturbing number of IVIs that are essentially "answering our argument is a form of {whatever we criticize}, it's an IVI." This is not how debate works. If the position centers the issue of white people/cishet people/settlers/whomever, yeah, maybe. If it's a case turn - hurts the folks you're trying to help - that's not an IVI, it's a response with which you must engage. Your ideas are subject to criticism.

Critical Affirmatives

The affirmative should be topical or impact turn fairness cleanly to win my ballot. Beware, my most controversial ballots are finding thin routes to the ballot on framework.

Develop a couple pieces of thesis-level offense and lbl effectively. You will lose if you drop fairness first (skews eval, etc.) in the 2AC. I find I often give low speaks to 2ACs on critical affirmatives because they are terrible at answering framework (which is silly, and yet...).

Unless the aff impact turns framework, the counter-interp is usually undercovered by the negative. LBLing the standards debate is usually a waste of time.

Theory/Tricks

Paragraph theory > shell theory, especially on CP theory. I don’t need an interpretation to know what condo bad or actor CPs bad means.

I default to competing interps. Absent contradictory arguments, reading an interp is not necessary to win theory, but it helps. I think reasonability (substance crowdout) is underutilized and has potential value as metatheory. All other brightlines are terrible. I’m ambivalent about RVIs - debate them. I default to and am inclined to drop the argument, barring condo.d

I'll grudgingly tolerate friv. I dislike NIBs and/or presumption triggers that have sweeping implications (truth value). I’m uncomfortable but willing to abandon offense-defense for truth-testing or anything else.

Rebuttals

Please don’t call the POO, I’ll protect. Don't POO the 1NR. I hold the line on new args higher than most judges. No new layers that are not sublayers that are responsive to arguments in the block.

I prefer early-breaking debates. I would rather the 2nd constructives make arguments about the leeway I should give the rebuttal than leave me to protect or not. Do more weighing and warrant comparison.

Other

Presumption goes to advocacy of least change absent other argumentation. In a relevant case, I will apply this standard paradigmatically (e.g. a round in which 1. all offense is zero-risk 2. the negative reads a counterplan 3. no presumption arguments are made).

Splitting the block is fine.

Explaining dense arguments will make voting on them easier.

Unless you gain significant, asymmetrical advantage from disclosure, or someone in the round requests that I do not disclose, I will disclose. Please ask questions and argue with me if you think it’ll help you be a better debater. I won't change my decision, but as long as the conversation does not become circular, I don't really care if you argue with me (as long as we maintain basic respect).

Policy >>>>>>>>>> Value > Fact. My ideal value or fact debate involves a disclosed, relevant, directional plan-text in prep and no “must/must not read plan” or trichot theory. Debate is your space, do what you want with it.

Claiming that an argument was “conceded” has replaced substantive clash in a disturbingly large number of speeches. Overusing the phrase “conceded” or (even worse) “cold conceded” will cost you speaks.

I will likely grant permission for you to audio record my RFD. Please ask before recording.

Don’t call me “judge.”

Here are cool things I didn't do/wasn't able to do/didn't do as often as I wished. If you do them well, you'll get a speaks bump; if you do them poorly, I'll be sad: embedded clash; numbering frontline responses; speed, clarity, and efficiency; advantage counterplan + impact turn; going for the politics DA with good link arguments as a real strategy; courts CPs; being a K team.

Speaks

29.7+ – top speaker.

29.3-29.7 – top 5-10 speaker.

29-29.3 – top 20 speaker.

28.5 -29 – a 75th percentile speaker at the tournament; should break.

28.2-28.5 – a 50th percentile speaker at the tournament.

27.8-28.2 – a 25th percentile speaker at the tournament.

27-27.8 – a 10th percentile speaker at the tournament.

Be clear even when you are being unclear.

Similar Debaters

Please reach out to ask questions or talk debate

I don't talk about debate with anyone anymore, but when I did, it was with Riley Shahar, Sierra Maciorowski, Alden O'Rafferty, Trevor Greenan, and Brian Yang. If you can't reach me pre-round, Riley and I coached (and debated) together and are similar paradigmatically, they will know how to answer your questions.

I judge many different formats, see the bottom of my paradigm for more details of my specific judging preferences in different formats. I debated for five years in NPDA and three years in NFA-LD, and I've judged HS policy, parli, LD, and PF. I love good weighing/layering - tell me where to vote and why you are winning - I am less likely to vote for you if you make me do work. I enjoy technical/progressive/circuit-style debates and I'm cool with speed - I don't evaluate your delivery style. I love theory and T and I'll vote on anything.

Please include me on the email chain if there is one. a.fishman2249@gmail.com

Also, speechdrop.net is even better than email chains if you are comfortable using it, it is much faster and more efficient.

CARDED DEBATE: Please send the texts of interps, plans, counterplans, and unusually long or complicated counterinterps in the speech doc or the Zoom chat.

TL:DR for Parli: Tech over truth. I prefer policy and kritikal debate to traditional fact and value debate and don't believe in the trichotomy (though I do vote on it lol), please read a plan or other stable advocacy text if you can. Plans and CP's are just as legitimate in "value" or "fact" rounds as in "policy" rounds. I prefer theory, K's, and disads with big-stick or critically framed impacts to traditional debate, but I'll listen to whatever debate you want to have. Don't make arguments in POI's - only use them for clarification. If you are a spectator, be neutral - do not applaud, heckle, knock on desks, or glare at the other team. I will kick any disruptive spectators out and also protect the right of both teams to decline spectators.

TL:DR for High School LD: 1 - Theory, 2 - LARP, 3 - K, 4 - Tricks, 5 - Phil, 99 - Trad. I enjoy highly technical and creative argumentation. I try to evaluate the round objectively from a tech over truth perspective. I love circuit-style debate and I appreciate good weighing/uplayering. I enjoy seeing strategies that combine normal and "weird" arguments in creative and strategic ways. Tricks/aprioris/paradoxes are cool but I prefer you put them in the doc to be inclusive to your opponents

TL:DR for IPDA: I judge it just like parli. I don't believe in the IPDA rules and I refuse to evaluate your delivery. Try to win the debate on the flow, and don't treat it like a speech/IE event. I will vote on theory and K's in IPDA just as eagerly as in any other event. Also PLEASE strike the fact topics if there are any, I'm terrible at judging fact rounds. I will give high speaks to anyone who interprets a fact topic as policy. I try to avoid judging IPDA but sometimes tournaments force me into it, but when that happens, I will not roleplay as a lay judge. I will still judge based on the flow as I am incapable of judging any other way. It is like the inverse of having a speech judge in more technical formats. I'm also down to vote on "collapse of IPDA good" arguments bc I don't think the event should exist - I think college tournaments that want a less tech format should do PF instead

TL:DR for NFA-LD - I don't like the rules but I will vote on them if you give if you give me a reason why they're good. I give equal weight to rules bad arguments, and I will be happiest if you treat the event like one-person policy or HS circuit LD. I prefer T, theory, DA's, and K's to stock issues debate, and I will rarely vote on solvency defense unless the neg has some offense of their own to weigh against it. I think you should disclose but I try not to intervene in disclosure debates

CASE/DA: Be sure to signpost well and explain how the argument functions in the debate. I like strong terminalized impacts - don't just say that you help the economy, tell me why it matters. I think generic disads are great as long as you have good links to the aff - I love a well-researched tix or bizcon scenario. I believe in risk of solvency/risk of the disad and I rarely vote on terminal defense if the other team has an answer to show that there is still some risk of offense. I do not particularly like deciding the debate on solvency alone. Uniqueness controls the direction of the link.

SPEED: I can handle spreading and I like fast debates. I am uncomfortable policing the way people talk, which means that if I am to vote on speed theory, you should have a genuine accessibility need for your opponents to slow down (such as having a disability that impacts auditory processing or being entered in novice at a tournament with collapsed divisions) and you should be able to prove that engagement is not possible. Otherwise I am very likely to vote on the we meet. I think that while there are instances where speed theory is necessary, there are also times when it is weaponized and commodified to win ballots by people who could engage with speed. However, I do think you should slow down when asked, I would really prefer if I don't have to evaluate speed theory

THEORY/T: I love theory debates - I will vote on any theory position if you win the argument even if it seems frivolous or unnecessary - I do vote on the flow and try not to intervene. I'll even vote on trichot despite my own feelings about it. I default to fairness over education in non-K rounds but I have voted on critical impact turns to fairness before. Be sure to signpost your We Meet and Counter Interpretation.

I do care a lot about the specific text of interps, especially if you point out why I should. For example, I love spec shells with good brightlines but I am likely to buy a we meet if you say the plan shouldn't be vague but don't define how specific it should be. RVI's are fine as long as you can justify them. I am also happy to vote on OCI's, and I think a "you violate/you bite" argument is a voter on bidirectional interps such as "debaters must pass advocacy texts" even if you don't win RVI's are good

I default to competing interpretations with no RVI's but I'm fine with reasonability if I hear arguments for it in the round. However, I would like a definition of reasonability because if you don't define it, I think it just collapses back to competing interps. I default to drop the debater on shell theory and drop the argument on paragraph theory. I am perfectly willing to vote on potential abuse - I think competing interps implies potential abuse should be weighed in the round. I think extra-T should be drop the debater.

Rules are NOT a voter by themselves - If I am going to vote on the rules rather than on fairness and education, tell me why following rules in general or following this particular rule is good. I will enforce speaking times but any rule as to what you can actually say in the round is potentially up for debate.

COUNTERPLANS: I am willing to vote for cheater CP's (like delay or object fiat) unless theory is read against them. PIC's are fine as long as you can win that they are theoretically legitimate, at least in this particular instance. I believe that whether a PIC is abusive depends on how much of the plan it severs out of, whether there is only one topical aff, and whether that part of the plan is ethically defensible ground for the aff. If you're going to be dispo, please define during your speech what dispo means. I will not judge kick unless you ask me to. Perms are tests of competition, not advocacies, and they are also good at making your hair look curly.

PERFORMANCE: I have voted on these arguments before and I find them interesting and powerful, but if you are going to read them in front of me, it is important to be aware that the way that my brain works can only evaluate the debate on the flow. A dropped argument is still a true argument, and if you give me a way of framing the debate that is not based on the flow, I will try to evaluate that way if you win that I should, but I am not sure if I will be able to.

IMPACT CALCULUS: I default to magnitude because it is the least interventionist way to compare impacts, but I'm very open to arguments about why probability is more important, particularly if you argue that favoring magnitude perpetuates oppression. I like direct and explicit comparison between impacts - when doing impact calc, it's good to assume that your no link isn't as good as you think and your opponent still gets access to their impact. In debates over pre fiat or a priori issues, I prefer preclusive weighing (what comes first) to comparative weighing (magnitude/probability).

KRITIKS: I'm down for K's of any type on either the AFF or the NEG. The K's I'm most familiar with include security, ableism, Baudrillard, rhetoric K's, and cap/neolib. I am fine with letting arguments that you win on the K dictate how I should view the round. I think that the framework of the K informs which impacts are allowed in the debate, and "no link" or "no solvency" arguments are generally not very effective for answering the K - the aff needs some sort of offense. Whether K or T comes first is up to the debaters to decide, but if you want me to care more about your theory shell than about the oppression the K is trying to solve I want to hear something better than the lack of fairness collapsing debate, such as arguments about why fairness skews evaluation. If you want to read theory successfully against a K regardless of what side of the debate you are on, I need reasons why it comes first or matters more than the impacts of the K.

REBUTTALS: Give me reasons to vote for you. Be sure to explain how the different arguments in the debate relate to one another and show that the arguments you are winning are more important. I would rather hear about why you win than why the other team doesn't win. In parli, I do not protect the flow except in online debate (and even then, I appreciate POO's when possible). I also like to see a good collapse in both the NEG block and the PMR. I think it is important that the LOR and the MOC agree on what arguments to go for.

PRESUMPTION: I rarely vote on presumption if it is not deliberately triggered because I think terminal defense is rare. If I do vote on presumption, I will always presume neg unless the aff gives me a reason to flip presumption. I am definitely willing to vote on the argument that reading a counterplan or a K alt flips presumption, but the aff has to make that argument in order for me to consider it. Also, I enjoy presumption triggers and paradoxes and I am happy to vote for them if you win them.

SPEAKER POINTS: I give speaker points based on technical skill not delivery, and will reduce speaks if someone uses language that is discriminatory towards a marginalized group

If you have any questions about my judging philosophy that are not covered here, feel free to ask me before the round.

RECORDINGS/LIVESTREAMS/SPECTATORS: I think they are a great education tool if and only if every party gives free and enthusiastic consent - even if jurisdictions where it is not legally required. I had a terrible experience with being livestreamed once so for the sake of making debate more accessible, I will always defend all students' right to say no to recordings, spectators, or livestreams for any reason. I don't see debate as a spectator sport and the benefit and safety of the competitors always comes first. If you are uncomfortable with spectators/recordings/livestreams and prefer to express that privately you can email me before the round and I will advocate for you without saying which debater said no. Also, while I am not comfortable with audio recordings of my RFD's being published, I am always happy to answer questions about rounds I judged that were recorded if you contact me by email or Facebook messenger. Also, if you are spectating a round, please do not applaud, knock on tables, say "hear, hear", or show support for either side in any way, regardless of your event or circuit's norms. If you do I will kick you out.

PARLI ONLY:

If there is no flex time you should take one POI per constructive speech - I don't think multiple POI's are necessary and if you use POI's to make arguments I will not only refuse to flow the argument it may impact your speaks. If there is flex, don't ask POI's except to ask the status of an advocacy, ask where they are on the flow, or ask the other team to slow down.

I believe trichotomy should just be a T shell. I don't think there are clear cut boundaries between "fact", "value", and "policy" rounds, but I think most of the arguments we think of as trichot work fine as a T or extra-T shell.

PUBLIC FORUM ONLY:

I judge PF on the flow. I do acknowledge that the second constructive doesn't have to refute the first constructive directly though. Dropped arguments are still true arguments. I care as much about delivery in PF as I do in parli (which means I don't care at all). I DO allow technical parli/policy style arguments like plans, counterplans, theory, and kritiks. I am very open to claims that those arguments should not be in PF but you have to make them yourself - I won't intervene against them if the other team raises no objection, but I personally don't believe PF is the right place to read arguments like plans, theory, and K's

Speed is totally fine with me in PF, unless you are using it to exclude the other team. However, if you do choose to go fast (especially in an online round) please send a speech doc to me and your opponents if you are reading evidence, for the sake of accessibility

POLICY ONLY:

I think policy is an excellent format of debate but I am more familiar with parli and LD and I rarely judge policy, so I am not aware of all policy norms. Therefore, when evaluating theory arguments I do not take into account what is generally considered theoretically legitimate in policy. I am okay with any level of speed, but I do appreciate speech docs. Please be sure to remind me of norms that are specific to what is or isn't allowed in a particular speech

NFA-LD ONLY:

I am not fond of the rules or stock issues and it would make me happiest if you pretend they don’t know exist and act like you are in one-person policy or high school circuit LD. However, I will adjudicate arguments based on the rules and I won’t intervene against them if you win that following the rules is good. However, "it's a rule" is not an impact I can vote on unless you say why following the rules is an internal link to some other impact like fairness and education. Also, if you threaten to report me to tab for not enforcing the rules, I will automatically vote you down, whether or not I think the rules were broken.

I think the wording of the speed rule is very problematic and is not about accessibility but about forcing people to talk a certain way, so while I will vote on speed theory if you win it, I'd prefer you not use the rules as a justification for it. Do not threaten to report to tab for allowing speed, I'll vote you down instantly if you do. I also don't like the rule that is often interpreted as prohibiting K's, I think it's arbitrary and I think there are much better ways to argue that K's are bad.

I am very open to theory arguments that go beyond the rules, and while I do like spec arguments, I do not like the vague vagueness shell a lot of people read - any vagueness/spec shell should have a brightline for how much the aff should specify.

Also, while solvency presses are great in combination with offense, I will rarely vote on solvency alone because if the aff has a risk of solvency and there's no DA to the aff, then they are net beneficial. Even if you do win that I should operate in a stock issues paradigm, I am really not sure how much solvency the aff needs to meet that stock issue, so I default to "greater than zero risk of solvency".

IPDA ONLY:

I personally don't think IPDA should exist and if I have to judge it I will not vote on your delivery even if the rules say I should, and I will ignore all IPDA rules except for speech times. Please debate like it is LD without cards or one-person parli. I am happy to vote on theory and K's and I think most IPDA topics are so bad that we get more education from K's and theory anyway. I'll even let debaters debate a topic not on the IPDA topic list if they both agree.

TLDR

Theory>K>Case. I am not a K debater so be careful with what you run. Mag>Prob>Timeframe. I vote on offense defense paradigm: Offense = win condition for you. Defense = argument is not a win condition for your opponents both are needed but offense wins you the round. Don’t be mean please. Tech>Truth for most part. Have fun :)

Case

• Please warrant your claims (Internal links, Impacts, etc.) as it makes it easier for me to weigh. It adds a layer or probability/ solvency to your plan/impact

• Any type of CP is cool aside from timeframe CP

• CP should not have its own advantage and instead should just show me how it solves for the aff’s UQ without tripping the disad

• Disads that say squo bad without solvency makes it easy for me to vote aff on try or die

• Love to vote on tix DA but they have to be written well if they are run

• Try to make everything un-conditional especially aff neg condo is fine but my threshold on condo bad is pretty low

• Please sign post

• Call out POOs and shadow extensions I protect flow but want to make sure you caught it

• Perms

• I think mutual exclusivity can come through funding, political reasons etc. This is because I tend to view CPs as opportunity costs over advocacies.

• You need to give me warranted reasons on why it is competitive however

• I will vote for perm as a test of comp as a voter issue for fairness but it needs to be run in the proper way and just blipping it will not get you my ballot.

• Allow CP mutually exclusivity via net ben if you can prove why you are not being abusive/extra topical

• Always have anti-perm blocks when reading cp

• Extensions

• Extend UQ point 2 and links 2 and 3 from the first disad (C+)

• Extend UQ point 2 as it shows how the USFG is a bad actor and extend the second and third links as they show how by using the USFG we create a cycle of dependency and neocolonialism tendencies (A)

• Both pass one just is better

• From David Gomez Siu

• read offense, I'll only vote on things in the last speech, so if you want me to vote on it, it better be extended through the other speeches explicitly

• I like links more than UQ and often have more than links than UQ points in my own case

• Read good links= win

• Take 1-2 POIs

Theory

• Competing interps > reasonability unless its a speed T or a similar debate space inaccessible T. However if you do say reasonability you need to give me bright line

• Default to no RVI unless it is friv T

• Will vote on friv T but the responding team has more leverage than if the T was not friv

• Don't vote on disclo as a T or anything else out of round

K's

• I am not a very good K debater so only run it if you feel it is the best possible thing for you to run

• Don’t run a K unless you understand it

• Don’t run a K to exclude easiest way to lose a round

• Will not vote on identity as I do not feel comfortable and it forces outing

• Aff K is fine but I do think you have to be prepared to take a ton of POIs and are not allowed to reject any because the neg had no way to prep for the K

Miscellaneous

• Speaks start at 27 and go up depending on content.

• Tech over truth explanations

• I default to tech over truth but I am open to arguments that say I should weigh truth over tech and disregard the flow when technical debate is sidelining disadvantaged teams

• For case debate, I don't Google evidence or verify any of your claims but I probably have some clue about the topic at hand so do not outright bs. I also don't accept unwarranted or unexplained claims as 100% true even if it is conceded

• Tag teaming is fine by me but flow only what speaker says

If there are any questions shoot me a pm on messenger/facebook or email me at vivekgarg2004@gmail.com

Live and have fun :)

Background

Lay & flow (circuit) parli debater for Notre Dame & Los Altos (2013-17). Coached at POI 2017, currently coaching for Sequoia High and private students & helping out with NPDL office hours.

General/tl;dr

I will vote for anything that is not downright morally repugnant as long as you explain it well; whoever has the clearest path to the ballot and explains that will likely win. Make my decision easy and explain where I should be voting. Run whatever you want, but do it well - know your own strengths and debate based on that! I will default to comparing all arguments on both sides against each other - ie K vs case, theory vs K, etc - unless you explain why one type of argument comes first.

Speed

I will call clear if I have to, but speed isn’t a problem. Keep taglines slow just for the sake of me keeping a clean flow. The more signposting you do, the faster I can flow. That being said, your speaker points will suffer if you are clearly excluding your opponents from the round by spreading!

If you're being spread out: make it very clear that you can't keep up by calling slow and clear as much as you need to; that being said, speed theory is very rarely run well, you're probably better off spending your time making responses if you have even a chance of doing so or else go all in on speed theory if you have literally nothing.

Kritiks

I’m down as long as they actually have a link, you understand them/can actually explain them, and you take steps to ensure the other team has a chance to engage. You better have a solid alt and alt solvency that explains how you resolve the links if you expect to be winning on the K. K affs can get rather sketch in parli - disclosing that you're not defending fiat is probably a good idea but I don't really have any way to verify it unless you show me a message or something refusing to disclose. Again, I'm not going to intervene against any of these choices - it just means you'll have to win any theory arguments concerning the legitimacy of what you've done. I'm fine with performance Ks, but if you're running an identity based K for an identity that you are not, I will certainly be very receptive to arguments against that. I'll take your arguments at your word, but be ready to explain how you give the neg ground.

Basically, you're welcome to run Ks, but actually do it well - confusing your opponent is a bad way to win the round! Also, I am very much against reading messed up or abusive arguments just to skew your opponents out of the round - while I won't intervene against you unless absolutely necessary, your speaker points and my opinion of you as people and as debaters will greatly suffer.

While I didn't run many Ks myself, I'm decently familiar with cap, fem, antiblackness, anthro, Nietzsche, Baudrillard, Orientalism, Heidegger, security, colonialism [and probably some other stuff I've forgotten] but this does not mean you should explain less.

I'm not a huge fan of framework arguments that entirely exclude the other side, but I will evaluate them if run. If they're read against you - please answer them and leverage offense under both frameworks so I don't have to vote on them!

DAs/CPs

Love them, make them strategic. Make sure to explain how the CP functions. Defend against the perm; I view perms as test of competition not an advocacy. Good case debate is better than bad K or theory debate, so don’t be cheaty just because you have a backfile. A specific, well-warranted DA will beat a generic any day, but if you have to go generic, at least explain it well and how it relates.

One conditional advocacy is chill, more is potentially kinda sketch but I'll listen to arguments attacking having any or justifying having tons, you just have to win it. Delay, conditions, consult etc CPs are probably cheating, PICs/agent ones are usually fine and uniqueness/advantage CPs are great. But again - all up for debate, if you can justify it go for it. Keep your texts stable.

Case

Good case debate is great! You should always have a clear plan text specifying what you're actually doing - small affs are solid within reason (as long as you have very clear net benefits you should be fine). Make it very clear in your advantages what your links are. Don't be extratopical.

Theory

I default to competing interps and no RVIs, but I don’t default to theory comes first unless you tell me to. You need to explain why theory comes before the K if there is one (and vice versa). I don’t need articulated abuse to vote on theory, but if it is there, point it out or articulate why potential abuse is enough in this instance. If you are going for theory, you better actually go for it. I probably won’t vote on it if it is only 30 seconds in the rebuttal. Receptive to arguments on PICs/condo on both sides; whoever wins the standards debate will probably win that.

Be very clear in labeling interp, standards, etc - I will vote on what you said, not what you meant. If you're going for theory - impact out the standards, internal link turn the other side's standards, etc.

If you're going for reasonability - give me a brightline (in addition to explaining why I should prefer it obviously).

Policy is objectively the best way to debate most rounds, but if you really want to run trichot I'll evaluate it. I dislike most spec shells so if you're reading it, it better either be very relevant or very good.

Weighing

If you're not using some sort of standard util/net benefits framework, explain how I should be evaluating the round. I default to probability over magnitude unless you give me a reason otherwise. Weighing is your job, not mine, so do it. If your opponents drop a point, don't just say they dropped it and thus we win moving on, you still need to impact it out.

Speaking of, terminalize your impacts (death, dehumanization etc). Economic growth is not an impact; nuclear war and extinction scenarios have their place but they better actually be relevant - think of all the marginalization or proxy war impacts you're missing out on by just reading the same extinction scenarios every time! Spend your time on the important areas of clash - ie if the debate comes down to who controls the uniqueness, focus on that, if it's more about whose impacts should be weighed higher, do that, if it's a question of who links harder to the same impacts, focus on the links!

Evidence

The actual warrant is more important to me than the citation, make sure to explain the argument but also provide evidence if necessary. A good analytic is probably better than a bad stat. Please don't spend all your time arguing over whose source is more credible, if you have clashing evidence use logic and analysis to explain why yours should be preferred!

Miscellaneous/Speaking

I don’t shake hands.

Shadow extensions are awful, I will happily accept a point of order on them. Once you've point of ordered a team 2-3 times, I've definitely gotten the picture and you can stop (aka I do not automatically protect against new arguments in the rebuttals unless they are blatantly 100% new, but I will after a couple point of orders). If I'm protecting against a super new argument, I'll stop flowing but if you're unsure feel free to call it.

Questions: please ask and answer them! Be respectful, don't interrupt the speaker unless they've let you stand there for 30+ seconds without any acknowledgement. Once they've said "at the end" or "I don't have any more time" a couple times, be a decent person and wait till the end unless absolutely vital, it's just annoying. As for taking questions: you should always take a question about framework/plan text, and another is nice if you have time. Don't take tons of questions though, this is your speech, be assertive and use your time for yourself!

Calling "status" and "text" (for plans/CPs, K alts, ROTBs, or interps) is 100% legit, please do it (no need to wait to be acknowledged). Always ask status!!

Don't steal prep between speeches or spend excessive time thanking everyone (once, briefly, is plenty).

Tagteaming is all good, but don’t be that kid who tag teams the whole time - no puppeting. Your speaks will suffer.

Speaks are based on strategy more than anything else, but good presentation is also a plus.

I will also use speaks to punish clearly offensive or incredibly abusive behavior/arguments in round - be a decent human being and this shouldn't be an issue!

**Feel free to FB message me with any questions

I did two years of circuit LD at Miramonte High School and graduated in 2015. I graduated from UC Berkeley in 2019 after doing four years of NPDA parliamentary debate.

I have no desire to impose my own views upon the debate round. In deciding the round, I will strive to be as objective as possible. Some people have noted that objectivity can be difficult, but this has never seemed like a reason that judges shouldn't strive to be objective. I, overwhelmingly, prefer that you debate in the style that you are most comfortable with and believe that you are best at. I would prefer a good K or util debate to a bad theory or framework debate anyday. That's the short version--here are some specifics if you're interested.

May 28th 2020 NFA-LD Update:

I'm new to NFA-LD LD so feel free to ask me questions. Most of the paradigm below applies, but here's some specific thoughts that could apply to NFA-LD.

1. Cards v. Spin: I tend to err that spin and analysis trump evidence quality in the abstract. Intuitively, a card is only as good as its extension. However, I will listen to framing arguments that indicate judges should prioritize debate's value as a research activity and prefer cards to spin.

GGI 2019 Parli-Specific Update:

While I will generally vote for any strategy, I would like to discuss my thoughts on some common debates. These thoughts constitute views about argument interaction that should not make a difference in most debates.

• K affs versus T: Assuming the best arguments are made, I err affirmative 60-40 in these debates (The best arguments are rarely made.) However, I tend to believe that impact turns constitute a suboptimal route to beating topicality. I differ from some judges because I believe that neg impact framing on T (procedural fairness first, debate as a question of process, not product) tends to beat aff impact framing. However, I err aff on the legitimacy of K affs because I'm skeptical of the neg's link to that framing. Does T uniquely ensure procedural fairness? Thus, to win my ballot, teams reading K affs must take care to respond to the neg's specific impact framing. They cannot merely read parallel arguments.
• Conditionality: I lean strongly that the negative gets 1 conditional advocacy. 2 is up for debate and three is pushing it. Objections to conditionality should be framed around the type of negative advocacies and the amount of aff flex. For example, perhaps 2 conditional advantage counterplans is permissible, but not 2 conditional PICs.

Past Paradigm:

Also:

• Absent weighing on any particular layer, I default to weighing based on strength of link.
• I probably won't cover everything so feel free to ask me questions.
• Taken from Ben Koh because this makes sense: "If I sit and you are the winner (that is, the other 2 judges voted for you), and would like to ask me extensive questions, I will ask that you let the other RFDs be given and then let the opponent leave before asking me more questions. I'm fine answering questions, but just to be fair the other people in the room should be allowed to leave."

Delivery and speaks:

• Fine with speed.
• I'm not the greatest at flowing, so try to be clear about where an argument was made.
• High speaks for good strategic choices and innovative arguments. I will say clear as much as necessary and I won't penalize speaks for clarity.

Frameworks:

• I default to being epistemically conservative, but will accept arguments for epistemic modesty if they are advanced and won.
• I am willing to support any framework given that it is won on the flow.
• I'm willing to vote for permissibility or presumption triggers. However, there must be some implicit or explicit defense of a truth-testing paradigm. The argument must also be clear the first time that it is read. If the argument is advanced for the first time in the 1AR and I think that it is new, I will allow new 2NR responses.
• Many framework debates are difficult to adjudicate because debaters fail to weigh between different metastandards on the framework debate. For example, if util meets actor-specificity better, but Kantianism is derived from a superior metaethic, is the actor-specificity argument or the metaethic more important?

Theory and T:

• I default to no RVI, drop the argument on most theory and drop the debater on T, competing interpretations, and fairness and education not being voters. Most of these defaults rarely matter because debaters make arguments.
• I don't think that competing interps means anything besides a risk of offense model for the adjudication of theory. That means, for example, that debaters need to justify why their opponent must have an explicit counter-interpretation in the first speech.
• I, paradigmatically, won't vote on 2AR theory.
• I'm willing to vote on metatheory. I probably err slightly in favor of the metatheory bad arguments such as infinite regress.
• I'm willing to vote on disclosure theory.
• Fine with frivolous theory.

Utilz:

• I default to believing in durable fiat.
• Debaters should work on pointing out missing internal links in most extinction scenarios.
• I default that perms are tests of competition and not advocacies.
• I probably err aff on issues of counter-plan competition.
• Err towards the view that uniqueness controls the direction of the link. However, I'm willing to accept arguments about why the link is more important.
• I will evaluate 1ar add-ons and 2nr counter-plans against these add-ons. This is irrelevant in most debates.

K's:

• There are many different kinds of kritikal argumentation so feel free to ask questions in round.
• I'm unsure whether I should default to role of the ballot arguments coming before ethical frameworks. I personally believe that ethical arguments engage important assumptions made by many ROB arguments. However, community consensus is that ROB's come first so I will usually stick with that assumption if no argument is made either way.
• I default to fairness impacts coming before theory, but I'm willing to evaluate arguments to the contrary.
• I don't have strong objections to non-topical positions. However, I believe debaters should probably engage in practices like disclosure that improve the theoretical legitimacy of their practices.
• Willing to vote on Kritikal RVI's/impact turns to theory.
• I'm willing to listen to arguments that there shouldn't be perms in method debates. However, I find these arguments not very persuasive.

Note for HS Parli:

Everything above applies. Except for the stuff about prep time. The only parli specific issue is that I will listen to theory arguments that it is permissible to split the block. Feel free to ask me any questions

Cathy Kenderski

Background:

current berkeley freshman. i don't compete in debate here, but was ranked 2nd nationally in high school, top speaker at 2021 TOC, competed for campo

Case:

Warrant your links please

Have uniqueness in the right direction, especially on neg. no linear disads!

If you guys don't weigh (please do), I default to probability>magnitude>time frame.

Theory

If you win it, I'll vote on it. will vote on rvis if articulated well

Potential abuse > proven abuse, theory is about the model of debate you justify

While I'll vote on friv t, I dislike friv t debates and would rather not have to evaluate them.

meta theory > theory > kritik > case

Kritik:

I am most familiar with Marx, Mao, Deleuze, and Guattari. I like articulation of what your world looks like post alt. If you think it's something I'll be unfamiliar with, include a thesis.

Speed:

i haven't debated in a while so nothing too crazy but i was generally a fast debater so i should be fine

Miscellaneous

I protect the flow

My baseline for speaks is a 28

If the tournament permits, I will disclose my decision

Be nice to each other

i think the debate space is quickly becoming an echo chamber, which is pretty antithetical to what i think debate is for. i want you to know that i genuinely enter this round with no biases as to what you run. i will evaluate you based on strength of argument alone, irrespective of whether or not i agree with you. this should not have to be said, but you'd be surprised at the number of judges who think the debate space is an extension of their own political project.

This is easier said than done but try to have fun. If you have any questions post-round, my email is cathykenderski@berkeley.edu

To give you some idea of my competency, I debated policy in high school for a couple years. I was alright, not spectacular, but I at least competed in Chicago in a fairly competitive circuit. Like any good judge, all I want is a good debate that tells me clearly how I should vote. This means that framework and role of the ballot are always an issue to be covered. If it's a normal, policy vs policy round, then you probably will agree on FW and ROB and won't need to talk about it much, but at the very least tell me HOW I should evaluate a debate and WHY I should prefer your method of evaluation to others. IE: Should I prefer debates that result in better education on the topic? Or debates that promote better intellectual habits?

At the end of the day, I will try to be tech over truth, but my idea of what the truth is will inevitably bias you to certain tech. The best thing I can do for you is let you know what sorts of things I buy more often than not. I'm going to be pretty partial to Ks. I tend to be more sympathetic to kritical takes on Framework (I tend to prefer debates that promote better moral/intellectual habits) but if you argue better than the other team that we should prefer policy/topic discussion, like any halfway decent judge I'll do my best to put my personal beliefs aside. Even though I prefer K Frameworks, you still always have to argue framework and argue it well. I've seen far too many K rounds so close to greatness that extoll some wonderful and interesting philosophy, but fail to mention what that has to do with debate and me voting for them. Always bring it back to the role of the ballot and why I am voting for you.

Now, for speaker points. Generally, I'm going to give the lowest speaks to whoever strikes me as the biggest pain in the neck. Debate is about being right, being convincing, and to that end, being charismatic. It is not about being mean or making fun of your opponent. Unless you're genuinely funny about it. In which case I will give you speaks for making me laugh. If you misgender anyone in round who has their pronouns on tabroom, especially if they have them up on the zoom call, I will dock you speaks. If you do it repeatedly, I will eviscerate your speaks. I also think that the names of Parli speaches are really silly and I'm kind of in love with the old timey British aesthetic. If you put your hand on your head when you ask a question, I will give you +1 speaks. If someone else in the round asks you a question without doing so, and you say wig is flying, I'll give you +1 speaks. You can get a max of +1 speaks for these silly reasons per round.

I debated LD and PF in hs, APDA in uni. Currently studying applied math, biology, and computational medicine at Johns Hopkins

Pronouns: He/Him

Email Chain/Contact: ikhyunkim2138@gmail.com | Facebook

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Quick Prefs

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Note: For PF teams, I am comfortable with Ks, Theory, etc. just execute it well...please

1-2: K/LARP
3-4: Phil/T/Theory
5-6: Tricks (please just strike me)

It seems like there is a tendency to pref based on speaks given so here are some quick stats on that

LD

Avg Aff Speaks: 28.9
Avg Neg Speaks: 28.8
Avg Overall Speaks: 28.8
Side Skew: 50.575% Aff, 49.425% Neg

PF

1st Speaker Avg Speaks: 28.8
2nd Speaker Avg Speaks: 28.7
Side Skew: 42.500% Aff, 57.500% Neg (idek what's going on here tbh)

CX

Avg Speaks: 29.1

Last Updated: 10.22.2022

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Defaults

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• I default to truth-testing

• I default to semantics > pragmatics

• I default to epistemic modesty but I don't mind using epistemic confidence; just warrant why I should.

• I default to competing interps. Feel free to run RVIs when deemed appropriate but warrant why I should err towards accepting the RVI.

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Non-T

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• No matter what you do, please have a non-arbitrary role of the ballot else I will likely struggle in terms of framing the debate on both sides. Make sure you explain how your case functions in the round and explain why it's important through the ROB/J/S. That said, explain why we should reject/interpret the resolution differently.

• Aff, please respond to TVA as too many rounds with these types of affs have been lost because of a dropped interp or dropped TVA. Conversely, neg, please run TVA on these types of cases and it will make your work a lot easier if you win it. However, TVA is not enough for you to win the round.

• Cross is binding for me as I do believe that you can garner links/DAs off of the performance of either you and or your opponent even if your evidence says something else. That said, I'd like to emphasize that for these debates that the form of the evidence presented becomes far less restricted and there isn't some inherent hierarchy between them so don't disregard them.

• The permutation tends to be more awkward to both understand and evaluate in these debates so I'd suggest that you overexplain the perm to make it clear. This includes how you sequence the perm.

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K

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• Ks that only link to the aff’s FW and not to their advocacy feel awkward to me, so take that with a grain of salt.

• I default to perms being a test of competition rather than advocacy. You can try to change this, but you'll have to overexplain to me what it means for a perm to function as advocacy and clearly characterize the advocacy of the perm.

• PF teams, I love hearing Ks but only if they are well done. This means you should know what you are talking about and have a deep understanding of the literature you are reading. That said, please don't be a prick by reading a K in front of a team that clearly has no experience with progressive debate (just use your common sense, it's not that hard to figure this out).

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T/Theory

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• I don’t have defaults w.r.t. to voter questions such as DTD vs DTA, fairness/education being a voter, etc. It is YOUR job to tell me why your shell is a voting issue.

• I don’t particularly have an issue with RVIs. Feel free to go for an RVI, but I will need convincing on why you get them in the first place, characterize/construct it for me, etc.

• Please don't run frivolous theory in front of me. If the round becomes messy because of it, then your speaks will suffer.

• PF teams, while I am a supporter of theory in PF, please please please don't read shells unless there is/are an actual abuse story behind them. If not, your speaks will suffer.

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LARP

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• I generally am not a fan of conditional counterplans especially since I feel like the neg time skew arguments can be really strong. That said, I am fine with listening to them and will vote on them just please don't be dodgy by not clearly answering whether the counterplan is conditional or not.

• If the neg is running a conditional counterplan, I won't kick it unless it's clear that the counterplan is kicked. This means that just because squo is better than aff doesn't mean I default to voting neg if it wasn't made clear that the conditional counterplan is kicked.

• My position on perms is the same in LARP strategies as it is for Ks.

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Phil

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• If you are comfortable doing so, feel free to message me on FaceBook or email me if you want to ask if I know your philosopher well. Otherwise, don't assume that I am well-read up on the specific philosophy that you're reading and do the work of walking me through with it.

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Tricks

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... <- this summarizes my thoughts and feelings about tricks, take that as you will

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Other Points of Interest

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• Aff/Pro should have a speech doc ready to be emailed by round start time. Flight 2 should enter the room at Flight 2 start time.

• If both sides are fine with it, I’m fine with granting flex prep. Don’t be rude about it, or else your speaks may suffer. Don’t take too long flashing prep unless you want your prep docked along with your speaks

• Engaging with the tagline alone ≠ engaging with the argument or the card. This is a huge pet peeve of mine so please don't just engage with the tagline but engage with the internal warranting of the cards being presented. Cards don't exist simply to back up the claims made by taglines but they have within them their own layers of argumentation which is centralized by a thesis that links to the tagline. TL;DR respect what the authors are actually saying especially given that probably over 80% of your speech is their words verbatim.

• If your speech includes abbreviations or acronyms, please explain them first. Never assume that I know what they mean.

• While I recognize there's no obligation to share your analytics, I will award +.3 speaker points for those speeches including all/nearly all analytics in the speech doc AND that are organized in a coherent manner.

• I tend to make facial expressions that reflect how well I am processing an argument when it's being read i.e. if I am confused then I'll look confused and if I think the argument is good then my face will show this.I apologize in advance if my expressions confuse you; strike me if this is an issue.

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Concluding Remarks

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If you have any questions for me before the round starts about my paradigm, please ask after all the debaters are in the room so I don't have to repeat myself. Quick shoutouts/other paradigms that may be worth your time looking at of those who have influenced me as a debater, judge, and a person include Anne-Marie Hwang, Adam Tomasi, Sim Guerrero-Low, Michael Koo, Martin Sigalow, and Annie Wang I am more than happy to explain my decision whether it be in person after the round or through email/social media. Thanks for reading, good luck and have fun!

She/Her

If you know you know.

2/18/24 Update - Final Update:

Abstractly T-FW is true, but concretely K Affs still have the ability to win these debates because 95% of all topics are reactionary. In other words, I'm a T hack but I'll vote for the K Aff if you beat T.

Hi y'all! I am a former speech and debater for Bellarmine College Preparatory in the Coast Forensics League. I have finished my undergrad at UC Berkeley, studying Political Science and Philosophy. Although I have done speech for a majority of my four years competing in high school, I have done a year of slow Policy Debate and was a Parliamentary Debater during my senior year of high school. I am now an Interp coach at Bellarmine College Prep and a Parliamentary/Public Forum Debate and Extemp Coach at The Nueva School. These past few years, I have been running Tabrooms at Tournaments as compared to judging. And even if I have been judging, I am almost always in the Speech and Congress judging pool.

The tl;dr: Be clear, concise, and kind during debate. I will listen to and vote on anything GIVEN that I understand it and it's on my flow. Spread and run arguments at your own risk. Evidence and analysis are a must, clash and weigh - treat me as a flay (flow + lay) judge.

If you want more precise information, read the event that you are competing in AND the "Overall Debate Stuff" if you are competing in a Debate.

Table of Contents for this paradigm:

1. Policy Debate

2. Parliamentary Debate

3. Public Forum Debate

4. Lincoln Douglas Debate

5. Overall Debate Stuff (Speed, Theory, K's, Extending Dropped Arguments, etc.)

6. IE's (Because I'm extra!) (Updated on 01/2/2024!)

7. Congress

For POLICY DEBATE:

I feel like I'm more policymaker oriented, although I started learning about Policy Debate from a stock issues lens, and am more than comfortable defaulting to stock issues if that's what y'all prefer. I'm really trying to see whether the plan is a good idea and something that should be passed. Offensive arguments and weighing are key to winning the debate for me. For example, even if the Neg proves to me that the plan triggers a disadvantage and a life threatening impact, if the Aff is able to minimize the impact or explain how the impact pales in comparison to the advantages the plan actually offers, I'd still feel comfortable voting Aff. If asked to evaluate the debate via stock issues, the Neg merely needs to win one stock issue to win the debate.

Evidence and analysis are absolutely crucial, and good analysis can beat bad evidence any day! Evidence and link turns are also great, but make sure that you are absolutely CLEAR about what you are arguing and incredibly explanatory about how this piece of evidence actually supports your argument.

Counterplans - They're great! Just make sure that your plan text is extremely clear. If there are planks, make sure that they are stated clearly so I can get them down on my flow! Make sure that you explain why the CP is to be preferred over the Plan - show how and explain explicitly how you solve and be sure to watch out for any double binds or links to DA's that you may bring up! Counterplans may also be non-topical.

Topicality - Yeah, it's a voting issue. It's the Negative's burden to explain the Affirmative's violation and to provide specific interpretations that the Affirmative needs to adhere to. Further, if T is run, I must evaluate whether the plan is Topical BEFORE I evaluate the rest of the debate.

For Theory, Ks, etc. see the "Overall Debate Stuff" below.

I'm not too up on most arguments on this year's topic, so again, arguments need to be explained clearly and efficiently.

For PARLI DEBATE:

In Parli, I will judge the debate first in terms of the stronger arguments brought up on each side through the framework provided and debated by the AFF (PROP) and the NEG (OPP). If you win framework, I will judge the debate based on YOUR framework. However, just because you win framework, doesn't necessarily mean that you win the round. Your contentions are the main meat of the speeches and all contentions SHOULD support your framework, and should be analyzed and explained as such. If it's a Policy resolution round, I tend to judge by stock issue and DA's/Ad's (see the above Policy Debate paradigm). If a fact or value resolution round, I tend to judge through framework first before evaluating any arguments that come afterwards.

Counterplans - They're great! Just make sure that your plan text is extremely clear. If there are planks, make sure that they are stated clearly so I can get them down on my flow! Make sure that you explain why the CP is to be preferred over the Plan - show how and explain explicitly how you solve and be sure to watch out for any double binds or links to DA's that you may bring up! Counterplans may also be non-topical.

Similar to Policy, by the end of the 1 NR, I should know exactly what arguments you are going for. Voting issues in each of the rebuttals are a MUST! Crystallize the round for me and tell me exactly what I will be voting on at the end of the debate.

In regards to POO's, I do not protect the flow. It is up to YOU to POO your opponents. New arguments that are not POO'd may be factored into my decision if not properly POO'd. POO's should not be abused. Be clear to give me what exactly what the new argument/impact/evidence/etc. is.

I expect everyone to take at least 1-2 POI(s) throughout their speeches. Anything short is low key just rude, especially if your opponent gives you the opportunity to ask questions in their speech. Anything more is a time suck for you. Be strategic and timely about when and how you answer the question.

For PF:

I strongly believe that PF should remain an accessible type of debate for ALL judges. While I do understand and am well versed in more faster/progressive style debate, I would prefer if you slowed down and really took the time to speak to me and not at me. Similar to Policy and Parli, I want arguments to be clearly warranted and substantiated with ample evidence. As the below section explains, I'd much rather have fewer, but more well developed arguments instead of you trying to pack the flow with 10+ arguments that are flaky and unsubstantiated at best.

For PF, I will side to using an Offense/Defense paradigm. I'm really looking for Offense on why your argument matters and really want you to weigh your case against your opponents'. Whoever wins the most arguments at the end of the round may not necessarily win the round, since I think weighing impacts and arguments matters more. Please make sure that you really impact out arguments and really give me a standard or framework to weigh your arguments on! So for example, even if the Pro team wins 3 out of 4 arguments, if the Con is able to show that the one argument that they win clearly outweighs the arguments from the Pro, I may still pick up the Con team on the ballot. WEIGH , WEIGH, WEIGH. I CAN'T EMPHASIZE THIS ENOUGH! Really explain why your impacts and case connect with your framework. Similar to LD, if both teams agree on framework, I'd rather you focus on case debate or add an impact rather than focus on the framework debate. Though if both teams have different frameworks, give me reasons and explain why I should prefer yours over your opponents'.

The second rebuttal should both focus on responding to your opponents' refutations against your own case AND should refute your opponents' case. If you bring up dropped arguments that are not extended throughout the debate in the Final Focus speeches, I will drop those specific arguments. If it's in the Final Focus, it should be in the Final Summary, and if it's in the Final Summary, it should be in Rebuttal. I will consider an argument dropped if it is not responded to by you or your teammate after the rebuttal speeches. For more information regarding extensions, please look at the "Overall Debate Stuff" section of this paradigm.

Please use the Final Focus as a weighing mechanism of why YOUR team wins the round. I'd prefer it to be mainly summarizing your side's points and really bringing the debate to a close.

Most of all, be kind during crossfire.

For Lincoln Douglas Debate:

Similar to PF, while I did not compete in LD, I have judged a few rounds and understand the basics of this debate. I am more old-school in that I believe that LD is something that focuses more on arguing about the morality of affirming or negating the resolution. The Affirmative does not need to argue for a specific plan, rather, just needs to defend the resolution. However, I have judged a handful of fast rounds in LD and do understand more progressive argumentation from Policy Debate. I have also judged policy/plan centered LD rounds.

So there's framework debate and then we get to the main meat with contentions. With the framework debate, I'm open to essentially any Value or V/C that you want to use. If you and your opponent's Value and V/C are different, please provide me reasons why I should prefer your Value and V/C over your opponents. Weigh them against each other and explain to me why you should prefer yours over your opponent's. Please also tie your contentions that you have in the main meat of your speeches back to your Value and V/C. For example (using the anonymous sources resolution from 2018-2019), if you're Neg and your Value is democracy and your V/C is transparency because the more transparent news organizations are the more accountable they can be, your contentions should show me that in the your world, we maximize transparency, which allows for the best democracy. The best cases are ones which are able to link the Value and V/C seamlessly into their contentions.

If you win the framework debate, I will judge the debate based on YOUR framework. However, just because you win framework, doesn't necessarily mean that you win the round. Your contentions are the main meat of the speeches and all contentions SHOULD support your framework, and should be analyzed and explained as such.

If you and your opponent agree with V/C and V, move on. Don't spend extra time on stuff that you can spend elsewhere. Add an impact, add a DA, add an advantage, add a contention, etc.

By the time we get to rebuttals, I should have a decent grasp about what voting issues I will be voting on in the debate. A lot of the 1 AR should really be cleaning up the debate as a whole and weighing responses by the Neg with the Aff case. 1 NR should really spend a lot of time focusing on really summarizing the debate as a whole and should give me specific voting issues that the debate essentially boils down to. Feel free to give voting issues at the end of throughout your speech. They usually help me crystallize how I will be voting.

I usually decide the winner of the debate based on which side best persuades me of their position. While this debater is the one which usually wins the main contentions on each side of the flow, it may not be. I usually think of offense/defense when deciding debates! As a result, please WEIGH the contentions against each other, especially when we get into the rebuttal speeches. Even if you only win one contention, if you are able to effectively weigh it against your opponent's contentions, I will have no issue voting for you. Weigh, weigh, weigh - I cannot emphasize this enough!

***Here's an example of how I decided a round with the Standardized Testing resolution: The AFF's value was morality, defined as what was right and wrong and their V/C was welfare, defined as maximizing the good of all people. The NEG's framework was also morality, defined in the same was as the AFF's but their V/C was fair comparison, defined as equal opportunities regardless of background. Suppose AFF dropped framework, I would then go on to evaluate the debate under the NEG's Value and V/C. AFF had two contentions: 1. Discrimination - Standardized testing increases discrimination towards low income and minority communities, and 2. Curriculum - standardized testing forces teachers to teach outdated information and narrow curriculum thus, decreasing student exposure to social sciences and humanities. NEG had two contentions: 1. GPA Inflation is unfair - standardized testing allows for the fairest comparison between students since GPA could be inflated, and 2. Performance Measurement - the SAT accurately measured academic performance for students. Thus, in making my decision, I would first ask, how do each of the contentions best maximize fair comparison and thus, maximize morality. Then I would go down the flow and decide who won each contention. I do this by asking how each argument and responses functioned in the debate. For example, did the AFF show me that standardized testing discriminates against people of color and low-income households? Or was the NEG able to show that adequate resources devoted to these communities not only raised scores, but also ensured that these communities we better prepared for the exam? Another example, was the NEG able to prove that if colleges no longer accepted standardized testing scores, would grade inflation result in impossible comparisons between students? Or could the AFF prove that grade inflation would not occur and that there would be heavier reliance on essays and not GPA? After deciding who won which contention, I analyze the debate as a whole - Was the GPA contention outweighed by other issues throughout the debate? (ex: Even if NEG won the GPA Contention, did AFF win the other three contentions and prove that the other three contentions outweighed NEG's winning contention? Or if AFF only won one contention, did that ONE contention outweigh any of the other contentions the NEG had?) Ultimately, the winner of the debate is who BEST persuaded me of their side through each of the contentions brought forth in the debate.

I'm also totally fine with policy type arguments in an LD round. However, while I did do a year of slow Policy Debate and feel more comfortable evaluating these type of arguments, I think that Policy and LD Debate are two different events and should thus be treated as such. Unless both debaters are comfortable with running Policy Debate type arguments in round, stick to the more traditional form of debating over the morality of the resolution. If both debaters are fine running more policy type arguments, go for it!

Overall Debate Stuff:

I'm kinda stupid - write my ballot for me. It is your job to help me understand complex arguments, not the other way around. Don't expect me to understand everything if you're spreading through an argument and you can certainly not expect me to vote on an argument that I don't understand. In other words, "you do you", but if it's not on the flow or I don't understand it, I won't vote on it.

Speed - Consider me a slow lay flow judge. While I can handle medium-slow speed, I'd prefer it you just spoke in a conversational manner as if you were talking to your parents at the dinner table. If you want to run a Kritik, Counterplan, Theory, etc. go ahead and do so, just make sure that you say it in a speed I can understand it in. Remember, if you go too fast to the point where I just put my pen down and stop flowing, your arguments aren't making it on my flow and I will not vote on them. I will yell "SLOW" and "CLEAR" a maximum of three combined times in your speech if you are going too fast or I cannot hear/understand you. If you see me put my pen down and stop flowing, you have lost me completely. Moreover, try to avoid using fast debate terminology within the round. I may not be able to understand what you are saying if it all goes over my head.

Truth v. Tech - I feel like I have a very rudimentary understanding of these terms, so if you are a debater who loves running K Arguments, Theory, 10+ DA's, likes to spread a bunch, and is unwilling to adapt to a lay judge, do us both a favor and strike me. I run a very fine and nuanced line with truth v. tech. I feel like I'm slightly tech > truth, but ONLY SLIGHTLY so. I will do my absolute best to evaluate the round solely based on the flow, but I do think that there are arguments that are just bad, like (generically listing) "racism/homophobia/ageism/poverty good" or just linking everything to nuclear war. Let me illustrate this with an example:

The Neg tries to prove that an excess of immigration within the United States will result in Trump starting a nuclear war against country "x" as a diversionary tactic because he is losing his hardline immigration battle. Personally, I do not believe this will happen, but if this is the only argument left in the round and the Affirmative drops this and the Negative extends this throughout the debate, I will have no choice but to vote Neg to prevent more lives from being lost. However, if the Affirmative is able to show me that nuclear war will not occur or can effectively delink or turn the Negative's argument of nuclear war or can outweigh nuclear war (i.e. benefits of passing plan outweigh the possibility of nuclear war, which only has a close-to-zero percent chance of happening), I will be more inclined to believe that the Affirmative has won this argument based on any evidence/turn they give me, but also based on what I personally believe will happen. I will not arbitrarily insert my own beliefs into the debate, but if the debaters create a situation in which that case occurs, as with the example seen above, I will be inclined to vote for the debater that has the more true argument and the argument that makes more sense logically with me.

Tabula Rasa - As seen with the example above, I'm not Tabula Rasa. I really don't think that any judge can truly be "tab," for who am I to decide what is true? Again, I won't arbitrarily insert my beliefs into the debate, but if the debaters have an argument that I believe is "true," I will be more inclined to buy that argument unless a team convinces me otherwise. In other words, there exist arguments that I am more likely to agree with and arguments I am more likely to buy and vote on. Either way, I will evaluate the round from what I have written on the flow. Furthermore, take these examples:

The Affirmative claims that Santa Fe is the capital of California while the Negative claims that Santa Fe is the capital of New Mexico. In making my decision, I will side with the latter based on outside knowledge and because it is the argument I think is more "true" based on outside knowledge.

The Affirmative claims that Santa Fe is the capital of California. The Negative does not respond to this claim. While I do not think that the Affirmative's claim is true, the Negative does not respond to this argument and thus, I will consider the Affirmative's argument as valid and evaluate the round as such.

Judge Intervention - Take this as you will, but I strongly also believe that I as a judge should not arbitrarily intervene during the debate and should listen to the arguments presented in the round as brought up by the debaters. So like what I wrote under the Policy Debate part of the paradigm, go ahead and run whatever argument you want. As long as I understand it, I will put it on my flow. See "Speed" and "K's/Theory" portion of this section for more information about what arguments you should run if I'm your judge. It is ultimately a debater's job to help me understand their/his/her argument, not vice versa. Moreover, I will not weigh for you - that being said, if neither team runs arguments that I understand and neither team weighs, I will be forced to intervene.

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Brief note: OK, so I get that the non interventionist approach contradicts the fact that I am more inclined to vote for an argument that I think is "true." As a judge I can promise you that I will flow what I can listen to and will evaluate the round holistically. I am an incredibly nuanced person and I think my paradigm reflects this (perhaps a little too much)...

~~~

PLEASE CLASH WITH ARGUMENTS! CLASH! CLASH! CLASH! Don't let the debate devolve into two boats sailing past each other in the night. At that point, it's completely pointless. I'd also prefer fewer well developed arguments over that of many arguments loosely tied together. Please don't brief barf or pack the flow with pointless arguments which aren't well developed. I may not include undeveloped arguments in my RFD if I deem that they are pointless or unimportant to the debate overall. Also, over the course of the debate as a whole, I would prefer fewer, but more well developed arguments, rather than a ton of arguments that go unsubstantiated.

Tag-Team CX/Flex Prep - I'm fine with this, just make sure that you're the one talking for most of the time. Your partner can't and shouldn't control your time. It is your Cross-Examination/Cross-fire after all. Same with speeches - essentially, don't have your partner be constantly interjecting you when you are speaking - you should be the one talking! If it seems as if your partner is commandeering your cross-examination or speech time, I will lower your speaks. Also totally fine with flex prep - you may use your prep time however you'd like, but since this time is not considered "official" cross-ex time, whether or not the opponent actually responds to the question is up to them. While I do not flow CX, I do pay close attention and if I look confused, I am more often thinking intensely about what you said, rather than emoting disagreement.

Roadmaps + Overviews - Please have them, and roadmaps may absolutely be off-time! I literally love/need roadmaps! They help me organize my flow make the debate/your speech a lot easier to follow! There should be a decent overview at the top of (at the minimum), each rebuttal - condense the round for me and summarize why you win each of the major arguments that comes up. Don't spend too much time on the overview, but don't ignore it.

K's and Theory - I'm not familiar with any literature at all! While you may choose to run K's or Theory (it is your round after all), I will do my very best to try and understand your argument. If I do not understand what you are saying, then I will not put it on my flow or vote on it. If you go slow, I will be more inclined to understand you and flow what you are saying. Again, not on the flow/don't understand = I won't vote on it.

Conditionality - This is fine. Though if you decide to kick anything, kick it earlier in the debate, don't wait until the 2NR unless it is strategic to do so. Please also make sure that your arguments are not contradictory - I have had to explain to teams about why running a Capitalism K on how the government perpetuates capitalism and then also running a CP where the Federal Government is the actor is ironic. In any case, kick the whichever argument is weaker and explain why Condo is good. Also, don't advocate for an unconditional position and then proceed to kick it or drop it. That would be bad.

Cross-applying - Don't just say "cross-apply my responses with Contention 1 on the Aff Case with Contention 2 on the Neg Case." This doesn't mean anything. Show me specifically how you group arguments together and explain how exactly your responses are better than your opponent's. Moreover, show me how your cross-application effectively answers their arguments - Does it de-link a disadvantage? Does it turn an argument? Does it effectively make Aff's actor in the plan powerless? Does it take out a crucial piece of evidence? What exactly does your cross-application do and how does it help you win the debate?

Dropped Arguments + Extensions - In regards to dropped contentions, subpoints, or impacts, I will personally extend all contentions, arguments, impacts, etc. that you individually tell me to extend. For all those arguments that were not extended and were dropped by the opponent, I will NOT personally extend myself. You must tell me to extend all dropped arguments or I will consider it dropped by you as well. All dropped contentions, subpoints, impacts, etc. should not be voter issues for the side that dropped it. I will drop all voter issues that were stated in the rebuttal if they were dropped by your side.

I did Interp, so my facial expressions will be turned "on" for the debate. If I like something, I will probably be nodding at you when you speak. Please do not feel intimidated if I look questioned or concerned when you speak. It does not show that you are losing the debate, nor does it show that you will be getting less speaks. However, if I seems like I am genuinely confused or have just put my pen down, you have lost me.

In regards to all debates, write the ballot for me, especially in the rebuttal speeches. Tell me why you win the round, and weigh arguments against each other!

ALSO, SIGNPOST, SIGNPOST, and SIGNPOST. The easier you make it for me to follow you in the round, the easier I can flow and be organized, and the easier you can win. Trust me, nothing's worse than when you're confused. KEEP THE ROUND CLEAN!

Don't be a jerk. It's the easiest way to lose speaker points. (Or even perhaps the round!) Good POI's/CX Q's and a good sense of humor get you higher speaks.

Links/Impacts - Be smart with this. I'm not a big fan of linking everything to nuclear war, unless you can prove to be that there is beyond a reason of a doubt that nuclear war occurs. So two things about impacts/links - the more practical and pragmatic you can make them, the better. I'm more inclined to buy well warranted and substantiated links to arguments. For example:

Plea bargaining --> incarceration --> cycle of poverty (These arguments are linked together and make logical sense. If we added "nuclear war" after "cycle of poverty," I'll just stare at you weirdly.)

Second, truth v. tech also applies with impacts and links, so if the Aff brings up a nuclear war will be caused by Trump as a diversionary tactic due to more immigration, and the Neg refutes that logically by taking out a link, I'll probably buy their argument (see the truth v. tech example I give). If the Neg doesn't respond, then the argument is valid. However, if the Neg is able to essentially group arguments and respond to them while weighing and shows me that even if they didn't answer this argument, Neg wins most everything else, I may still vote Neg.

I firmly believe that debate is not a game. It is an educational opportunity to demonstrate knowledge and to communicate efficiently between groups of people. Please don't try to make debate more complicated than it already is.

In regards to evidence in all debates: Yes, you need it - and should have a good amount of it. I know you only get 20 minutes to prep in Parli, and that you're not allowed internet prep (at some tournaments). But I need you to substantiate all claims with evidence. It doesn't have to be all subpoints and for every argument, but I will definitely be less inclined to vote for you if you only have one citation in the 19 minutes you speak, while your opponents have 7+ citations in the total 19 minutes they speak. Do not give me 7 minutes of analytics with no evidence at all. More evidence = more compelling. That being said, make sure that you also have a very strong amount of analytics as well. Don't just give me a lot of evidence without good analytics. Good analysis props up evidence and evidence supports good analysis. I would also much rather have a 4-5 good/solid pieces of evidence over 10+ trashy cards that don't help your case or add much to the debate. Essentially what I'm trying to say here is that good analysis > bad evidence any day, any round, and QUALITY > QUANTITY!!!

Do not CHEAT and make up cards, or clip cards, or anything of the like. Just don't. I will give you an automatic loss if you choose to do so. (Please don't make me do this...)

Time yourselves using whatever method you feel comfortable with! iPhone, SmartWatch, computer timer, etc. If you are taking prep, please announce it for me and your competitor to hear. Flashing or sending documents does not count as prep, though this needs to be taken care of in an expeditious manner. If you are caught abusing prep time, I will tank your speaks.

WEIGH - WEIGH - WEIGH!!! This is SO IMPORTANT, especially when debates come down to the wire. The team that does the better weighing will win the round if it's super tight! I won't weigh for you. Make my job easy and weigh. Again, as pieced together from previous parts of the paradigm, even if a team drops 3 out of the 5 arguments, if the team is able to show that the two arguments they do win outweigh the 3 arguments they lost, I will be more inclined to vote for that team that does the better weighing. I also love world comparisons, so weigh the world of the Affirmative and Negative and tell me which one is better for society, people, etc. after the implementation or non-implementation of the plan!

I will not disclose after the round (if I'm judging in the Coast Forensics League)! I usually disclose after invites though, given enough time. Either way, if you have questions about the round, please feel free to come and ask me if you aren't in round! I'll make myself visible throughout the tournament! If you can't find me, please feel free to contact me at xavier.liu17@gmail.com if you have any questions about the round! Please also feel free to contact me after the tournament regarding RFDs and comments!

FOR IE'S:

Ok. Now onto my favorite events of Speech and Debate. The IE's. First, I did Interp for a lot of my years competing, specifically DI, DUO, and OI. I've also done EXPOS (INF) as well. Take the Platform Events paradigm with a grain of salt. While there are many things that you could do to get the "1" in the room, I am particularly looking at several things that put you over the top.

PLATFORM EVENTS:

For Extemp (IX, DX) - I will flow your speech as thoroughly as I can. Please expect to have CITATIONS - at the minimum: news organization and date (month, day, year). An example: "According to Politico on February 13th of 2019..." If you have the author, even better - "John Smith, a columnist for Politico, writes on February 13th of 2019..." Please note that fabricating or making up citations or evidence is cheating and you will be given the lowest rank in the room and reported to Tab. You must have strong analysis within your speech. This analysis should supplement your evidence and your analysis should explain why your evidence is pertinent in answering the question. Good evidence and analysis trumps pretty delivery any day. Most importantly, make sure that you ANSWER THE QUESTION - I cannot give you a high rank if you do not answer the question.

For Impromptu (IMP) - I will flow your points as thoroughly as I can. I expect to see a thesis at the end of the intro and two to three well developed examples and points that support your thesis. While you do not have to have citations like Extemp, I would like to see specificity. Good analysis is also important and you need to make sure that your analysis ties into the thesis that you give me at the top of the intro. I also don't really like personal stories as examples and points in the Impromptu. I feel like personal stories are really generic and can always be canned. However, if done well and tied in well, personal stories do enhance the Impromptu! Use your discretion during prep time to decide if you want to use a personal story in your speech and how effective your personal story is. I also give bonus points and higher ranks to originality rather than canned speeches. Most importantly, make sure that you clearly develop your points and examples and explain why they apply to your thesis. I will default to California High School Speech Association (CHSSA) rules for Impromptu prep - 2 minutes of prep, with 5 minutes speaking - unless told otherwise by Tab/Tournament Officials.

Time signals for Impromptu and Extemp: With Extemp, I will give you time signals from 6 minutes left and down, Impromptu from 4 left and down. 30 seconds left will be indicated with a "C," 15 seconds left will be indicated with a closed "C," I will count down with my fingers for the last 10 seconds of the speech, with a fist at 7 or 5 minutes. I will show you what this looks like before you speak so you know what each signal looks like. With Impromptu prep, I will verbally announce how much prep is left: "1 minute left," "30 seconds left," "15 seconds." I will say "Time" when prep has ended. If I forget to give you time signals: 1. I fervently apologize; 2. This is probably a good thing since I was so invested in your speech or getting comments in; 3. You will NOT be responsible any time violations if you go overtime because it was my fault that you went overtime in the first place. #3 only applies if I literally forget to give you time signals; ex: I give you a time signal for 6 minutes left, but not 5, 4, 3, 2, or 1. If I forget to give you a signal for 4 minutes left, but get everything else, you're not off the hook then. I will also not stop you if you go beyond the grace period. Continue speaking until you have finished your speech.

For Original Advocacy and Original Oratory (OA/OO) - I will be primarily concerned with content. I will be looking for establishment of a clear problem (harms) and how that is plaguing us/society (inherency), and then I will be looking for a solution of some sort to address this problem (solvency). There must be some combination of these three in your speech. I will also be looking for evidence, analysis, and a strong synthesis between the two. Good speeches will have solid harms AND will explain how the solution solves their harms. Delivery should be natural, not canned or forced and facial expressions should not be over exaggerated.

For Expository Speaking/Informative Speaking (EXPOS/INF) - Again, primarily concerned with content. While Visual Aids (VAs) are important, they should serve to guide the speech, not distract me. That being said, I do enjoy interactive VAs that not only enhance the piece, but make me think about what you are saying. While puns and humor are both important, jokes should have a purpose in guiding your speech and enhancing it, and should not be included for the sole purpose of making anyone laugh. While I think that there doesn't necessarily need to be a message at the end of the speech, I should most definitely be informed of the topic that you are speaking to me about and I should've learned something new by the end of the 10 minute speech. Transitions from aspect to aspect in the speech should be clear and should not leave me confused about what you are talking about.

General Stuff for Platform Events:

1. Content > Delivery (Though I did Interp, so delivery is pretty important to me as well. Kinda like a 60-65% content, 35-40% delivery.)

What I have below is taken from Sherwin Lai's Speech Paradigm for Platform Events:

2. Projection and Enunciation are not the same as volume.

3. Repetitive vocal patterns, distracting hand gestures, robotic delivery, and unneeded micromovements will only hurt you.

4. Pacing, timing, and transitions are all important - take your time with these.

5. Natural Delivery > Forced/Exaggerated

6. Time Signals for OO, OA, and EXPOS - I am more than happy to give time signals, but since I am not required to give time signals for these events, I will not hold myself personally responsible if I forget to give signals to you or if you go overtime. It is your responsibility to have figured out time before the tournament started.

INTERPRETATION EVENTS:

I am most well versed in DI, OI, and DUO, but as a coach, I've worked with DI, OI, HI, POI, OPP, and DUO.

For Dramatic Interpretation, Dramatic Duo Interpretations, and Dramatic Original Prose and Poetry (DI, DUO, OPP) - Subtlety > Screamy, any day, any time. I'm not against screaming, but they should be during appropriate moments during the piece. Emotions should build over time. At no point should you jump from deadly quiet and calm to intense and screaming. Gradually build the emotion. Show me the tension and intensity over time. Screaming when you erupt during the climax is perfectly acceptable. Further, intensity can be shown without screaming, crying, or yelling. The quiet moments of the piece are usually the ones I find most powerful. THINK and REACT to what you are saying. Emotion should come nearly effortlessly when you "are" your piece. Don't "act" like the mom who lost her daughter in a school shooting, BE that mom! Transitions and timing are SUPER IMPORTANT, DON'T RUSH!!!

For Humorous Interpretation, Humorous Duo Interpretations, and Humorous Original Prose and Poetry (HI, DUO, OPP) - Facial expressions, characterization, and blocking take the most importance for me. I want to see each character develop once you introduce it throughout the piece. Even if the character doesn't appear all the time, or only once or twice throughout the script, I want to see that each character is engaged throughout the piece itself. Most importantly, please remember that humor without thought is gibberish. What I mean by this is that you should be thinking throughout your piece. Jokes are said for a reason - use facial expressions to really hone in on character's thought and purpose. For example, if a character A says a joke and character B doesn't get it, I should see character B's confused reaction. I will also tend to reward creative blocking and characterization. However, note that blocking should not be overly distracting.

For Programmed Oral Interpretation, Prose Interpretation, and Poetry Interpretation (POI, PRO, POE) - Regarding emotion, facial expressions, and character development, see the above text in the two paragraphs above regarding DI and HI. Personally, I place a little more emphasis on binder tech - the more creative the better! I think binder events are the synthesis of good binder tech, good script selection, and good facial expressions/emotion. Obviously, it's harder to do, since you have multiple characters in multiple parts of your speech and each have a distinct mood and personality.

For Oratorical Interpretation (OI) - Please err on the side of natural emotion over forced facial expressions. I am not a big fan when speakers try to force emotion or simply convey no emotion when speaking. Script selection is obviously a big deal in this event. Choose a speech with a promising and important message and see if you can avoid overdone speeches.

General Stuff for Interpretation Events:

A lot of this and my Interpretation paradigm is very much similar to Sherwin Lai's Speech Paradigm. He and I agree on a lot of things, including what I will write below.

1. Subtlety > Screamy - I tend to enjoy the small nuances of emotion. Build the emotion throughout, don't go from "0 to 100 real quick." Don't force emotion.

2. "Acting is reacting." - Each movement and action should have a purpose. Swaying or distracting micro-movements are bad. When one character or partner says something or does something, there should be a reaction from another character or by the other partner. Watch what is happening and react accordingly.

3. Let the eyes speak. Eyes are underutilized in Interp - I feel like everyone is so focused on facial expression and eyebrows/body language, that they forget about the eyes. Intensity can be portrayed in absolute silence.

4. If I am not laughing during your speech, it's not because it's not funny. I am just super focused on you and watching every little part of your blocking and your facial expressions.

5. Please watch body position - misplaced feet, hands, or mistimed blocking is a big no-no.

6. No blocking > bad blocking - you don't need to be doing something ALL the time. Sometimes, standing still and doing nothing is better than always doing something.

7. Use pacing and timing to your advantage.

8. Quality of cut is fair game.

9. Message of the piece - I don't think that there necessarily needs to be a super strong message to the piece itself. I'd be totally fine if the piece was literally 7 short stories that were interwoven together and each story had it's own little thing going on. I'm more concerned about the performance/technical blocking itself. That being said, if I literally do not understand what is going on in the piece, we have a big problem. Exception to this is OI.

10. THINK!!!!!!!! And do not let the energy wane!

11. Time Signals for DI, HI, DUO, OPP, POI/POE/PRO, OI - I am more than happy to give time signals, but since I am not required to give time signals for these events, I will not hold myself personally responsible if I forget to give signals to you or if you go overtime. It is your responsibility to have figured out time before the tournament started.

CONGRESSIONAL DEBATE

I have only judged Congress a handful of times, so please take what I write with a grain of salt.

In regards to speeches, I do not value speakers who speak at the beginning of a session more than those who speak towards the end, or vice versa. Opening speeches and the first couple speeches (around 1-2 on each side) afterwards should set up the main arguments as of why the chamber should be voting in favor or against the piece of legislation. After the 2nd speech on each side, you should really be clashing with arguments, impacting out both evidence and analysis, and weighing arguments against each other. Rehashing arguments made by other Congressional Debaters or "throwing more evidence" as a response to arguments is unimpressive.

During cross, if you just toss around random questions that do not actually pertain to the debate, your ranks will suffer. Remember to attack ideas and engage with the speaker who just spoke - save the argumentation for the speech. If you get the other speaker to concede something and you are able to use that in your speech, ranks will go up.

Respond to the actual links or the claims themselves and convince me why your claim is stronger. I welcome direct responses and refutations to another Congressperson's arguments, though please make it clear whom you are responding to and what the argument is. For example: "Next, I would like to refute Rep. Liu's argument that this bill would disadvantage states in the Midwest."

I'm a big stickler for Parliamentary Procedure, which means that if you are a PO, mistakes will be costly. Further, if you are acting like a biased PO, favoring certain speakers or debaters over other, you will be dropped.

Also, please note that "motion" is a noun. "Move" is a verb. So it's not: "I motion to adjourn." It would be: "I move to adjourn." PO's, remember that you cannot "assume unanimous consent" - a member of the chamber must ask for unanimous consent.

~~~

Feel free to ask me any questions about the paradigm, both speech and/or debate before the round begins. Or feel free to email me questions about my paradigm at xavier.liu17@gmail.com.

If you are confused about the RFD/comments I have written for either speech and/or debate, please also feel free to contact me whenever you'd like to at the above email.

GOOD LUCK AND HAVE FUN!!! GO. FIGHT. WIN.

Hi, I'm April! Currently an Undergrad at UCLA; I did highschool Parli for all 4 years, qualifying to TOC for 3 and also compete sometimes on the college circuit, I went to NPDA so generally I know some stuff!

Overviews:

- In general, I will vote for anything if u win them including the most random stuff.

- I'm generally okay with speed but for online tourneys -> maybe go a bit slower; I'll slow or clear u if needed though so no worriesPLEASE SIGNPOST.

- speaks wise: I'm pretty chill on those, if u manage to sneak an "it be like that sometimes" into ur speech ill give u thirty speaks, any meme reference will also give u thirty speaks

- I'm tabular rosa -> if u drop sky is pink then I gotta vote for it

- I'll protect the flow if I think it's super new but otherwise pls POO but after like 2 or 3 POOs u can probably just go to the bathroom and stop pooing

- I default to presumption flowing neg unless the neg reads args (and goes for) reasons otherwise, or if they r mostly an advocacy not the squo but this would depend on how things r debated in round

Actual debate stuff:

Case:

-I analyze a lot of the round and case debate via an offense/ defense paradigm -> you must have unique reasons as to why you are winning and not just arguments about why the team is wrong

- Please have impact weighing -> tell me why u win on magnitude, timeframe, or probability

- Please have your uniqueness in the right direction! [neg should say squo good, aff should say squo bad]

- Please collapse

- Warrants are pretty important I guess it helps me analyze how weighing should generally go

CPs

-Have a reason why it's competitive!

- Pls give me solvency but not advantages to your CP, generally, you should have separate disads to the aff's case

Theory

- I love Theory! Run the wackest thing if you want I'm super down to vote on it if u win it

- Collapse!! I wanna see weighing!!! (Fairness vs education) stuff like that

- I default to competing interps but down for reasonability if u tell me why

- I also default to - dropping the team, theory being Apriori

- RVIs r wack but down to vote for them once again if u tell me why

basically, tell me why... (ain't nothing but a heart ache)

Ks

- I like Ks! I'd say im pretty familiar with most Ks (mostly familiar with MLM, Baudrillard, some OOO stuff, anthro) unless it's a new one but super down to hear them and vote for them

- Pls extend ur framework -> extend ur ROB, if its a K v K debate, pls engage with why ur ROB matters more etc. ; Also in generally layer your framing ie. tell me why ur ideas come first

- Give me implications of ur warrants and esp if ur giving me them as a refutation; if the revolution in the Philippines worked, that's great but tell me why I should care about that warrant as a response or as a reason why I should vote for your argumnt

- Not super comf evaluating identity Ks especially if they are personal I don't rly want to have to evaluate different ppls suffering for rounds lmfao but feel free to run it, just know that I'm probably not the best for understanding the implications of it etc.

Pls don't be rude, racist, sexist, etc. but u should probably know that already : )!

Feel free to ask any questions before the round starts!

for more details click here

TL;DR

Debate is a game. Run whatever you want, just win it on the flow. Hit me with your new K, some frivolous theory that you’re worried other judges won’t buy, or literally anything else. Speaks based on execution of strategy.

Background

I'm a recent grad of UC Berkeley who debated in NPDA (tech parli), and now I coach the college team Parliamentary Debate at Berkeley, as well as the high school team at Campolindo HS. My partner Ryan Rashid and I won all three nats in NPDA my junior year, but I have next to no experience outside of parli (just some high school PF and lay LD), so I'm relatively unfamiliar with LD and policy norms. I did and teach pretty much all the stylistic things—equal amount of case, theory, and Ks. I love writing K links, collapsing to tix/elections DAs, and prepping clever T shells courtesy of shoddy resolutions. (The last one is kind of a joke, but also not really.) Point is, I have no preference for what you read, please just do what you're best at. I'd rather see a good K debate with quality clash than a bad case debate, and vice versa.

General note: My philosophy on debate has been primarily shaped by Trevor Greenan, Brian Yang, Ryan Rashid, June Dense, Will White, and Lila Lavender.

Kritiks

- If you're in a hurry you can skip this section—read whatever K you want lol, I don't pick favorites

- My background in academics and debate leans slightly more toward sociology than pomo. I've taken courses (and written Ks) about critical refugee studies, settler colonialism, anthropocentrism, etc., but have yet to truly grasp more than the barest bones of Bataille, for example. That being said, I definitely have experience with pomo—I've read/collapsed to Buddhism, Barad, Foucault, Nietzsche, etc. and competed against Lacan more times than I can count (shout out to the Rice team for that one). So feel free to read pomo if that's your thing, just be a tad gentler with me and don't assume I've read/heard allll the terminology before

- I'm a hoe for really well-warranted links that are specific to the aff and have imbedded DAs/solvency deficits. Also detailed and specific reasons why you solve the aff (if that's an arg you like to go for), either in the impacts or on the alt

- Theses can be helpful for more complex Ks, but def not necessary for your generic cap shell. I often write Ks that draw from multiple lit bases, and for me, a thesis creates a more cohesive story for something that can be kind of frankenstein in nature

Theory

- I love theory. I've been told I have a low threshold for frivolous theory (probably a consequence of too many rounds with Ryan and Brian), but my favorite is topicality, or any other interps that are very specific to the resolution/Aff. If it's clear that your interp had to be written during the 2 minutes before the LOC, that's my jam. Ofc you can read generics too, I'll just be slightly more bored and slightly less impressed

- MO and PMR theory will be an uphill battle with me, the latter most of all because it can't be contested by the other team, which makes my job so very hard, and I am lazy. But if the abuse is truly egregious and didn't occur until the MG/block, or if it's a matter of rhetorical violence, read the new arg and I'll do my best to evaluate it. But please weigh the new shell against the other team's remaining offense

- MG theory is fine, I read it all the time, but I'm also comfortable rejecting it if the Neg wins arguments for why it's bad or in-evaluable

- I don't need proven abuse under competing interps (it's about what your interp justifies, not what you actually did)

- Text vs. spirit of the interp should be debated in-round, and I'll evaluate under whichever is won. If somehow it's relevant but completely unmentioned by either team, I'll default to text over spirit

- I default to competing interpretations, but I'll use reasonability if you win args as to why I should AND if you have a briteline for it, cuz I don't feel like intervening. For example, a briteline (that I think works relatively well) is that I should evaluate whether the aff interp is good or bad based on all the offense-defense arguments read about it, and decide theory based on that, regardless of whether there's a counter-interp text. You could have a different briteline, but either way, explicitly tell me what it is, because "evaluate theory using reasonability" means different things to different people. I would prefer not to treat it as just a gut check, but if you don't define it, that's what I'll assume you mean

- I think theory is an RVI if and only if you tell me that it is, provide warrants, and then win that arg

- I default to drop the arg, although drop the arg sometimes = drop the debater, like for T. But obviously, reading "drop the debater" with even just one uncontested warrant is sufficient for me to change this default

- I didn't do circuit LD, so explain slightly more to me the definitions/implications of buzzwords that aren't as common in parli. The best example I can think of is semantics vs. pragmatics: I NOW know what they both mean, but I did NOT a year ago, and that made it difficult for me to render a decision in favor of blippy semantics first args in NPDI finals. Still read arguments like that if you want, just define and implicate them out, don't assume that I know all the things

Case

- I enjoy niche disads, like a hyper-specific tix scenario, or a biod disad about endangered turtles that live near where the plan happens. These can be hard (or impossible) to find though, depending on the res, so don't sweat

- I also definitely understand the value of tried and tested generics - I read a lot of backlash DAs and consult CPs, and inv con, so it's okay to read that too. Read whatever you think is strategic for the rez

- I enjoy technical CP debate. PICs are fun unless I'm read a shell that tells me otherwise. Same thing for consult CPs, delay CPs, agent CPs, etc.

- Perms on CPs. Make them. Any perm is fine, unless the other team gives me a reason why it's not

- In the absence of explicit magnitude/probability/timeframe/etc. weighing, I default to using only strength of link. In other words, I’m more inclined to vote for arguments that are dropped or comparatively under-covered, but you can prevent this by telling me why your impact is high [magnitude/probability/etc.], and why [magnitude/probability/etc.] comes first

- I love clever case strats that exploit a mistake the other team has made, like collapsing to a straight turn or a double turn. Don't be afraid to do something "risky" like that, I can follow along

Everything Else

Here's some miscellaneous beliefs that I have about debate and will utilize by default; however, I'm willing to evaluate otherwise, even in the opposite direction, as long as you give me sufficient reason to in-round:

- I think unconditionality means you *technically* have to defend the advocacy throughout the round, but that could include conceding defense so the sheet doesn't matter anymore

- I believe that perms are a test of competition, not an advocacy

- I'm not game for shadow extensions that aren't at least mentioned in the MG/MO, even if the argument is conceded. In other words, I think the member speeches should have to extend every piece of offense their team intends to collapse to

- I will do my best to protect during the LOR and PMR, but I don't trust myself to catch everything and neither should you, so call points of order please. I'll rule on all of them immediately, to the best of my ability, because you usually need to know my stance for the sake of the rest of the speech

- New weighing is fine in the LOR/PMR, but make sure it's actually weighing, not sequencing or anything else. E.g., saying "fairness is more important than education because debate could survive without education, but not without fairness" is acceptable weighing, but saying "fairness is more important than education because it's the internal link to education and skews the round" is a sequencing argument that should be read before the rebuttal speech

- I think condo's p dope, so run however many off you want, but also I'll drop you if the other team wins a condo bad shell

- I think dispo is condo in a suit, but if you can get a we meet out of it, go off sis. And if you think they might use their dispo status to meet your condo shell, preempt that in the violation please

- Presumption flips neg, unless the neg reads a CP/alt, in which case it flips aff

- I find “truth over tech” arguments incoherent and self-refuting; “truth” in debate is only ever arrived at through evaluation of the flow (or judge intervention, which I will not do), so in order to convince me that truth outweighs tech, you’d have to win that claim via the tech flow…which seems to indicate that tech still > truth

- I will drop your ass for racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, etc. rhetoric or behavior

- Non-Black debaters should not read afro-pess, I will drop you if you do. [Added March 29th, 2023.] Read: https://thedrinkinggourd.home.blog/2019/12/29/on-non-black-afropessimism/

- To pick you up on an IVI, I need reasons why that IVI outweighs all the impacts your opponents are going for

I debate Parli for four years at WHS and now I study nuclear engineering @ Berkeley

TLDR: I am a flow judge and evaluate tech>truth, I like evidence-based debates and will always evaluate evidence-based arguments and refs over every logical warrant unless you give me explicit reasons to do otherwise. If you are running a K you might want to refer to that part of the paradigm. I will also evaluate scientific evidence above all other types of evidence, I'll refer you to the K section if you want to know how this affects Ks.

Presentation:

please keep yourself to a speed that will let me comprehend you, (i.e. please don't spread your lungs out, I can take fast speeds but I'm growing old and my ability to understand speeches delivered at mach speed is waning).

I don't really care about formalities, just signpost.

I dislike speaker points, I will give you them based on how well you wrote your arguments

All texts in chat

Case:

This really should be like every other judge in parli debate. Evidence, warrants, impacts, extensions, etc. I like wide collapses because it gives me multiple reasons to prefer your advocacy. If you have a narrow collapse and it is a big-stick/round winner impact then I will obviously evaluate that above. You have to weigh impacts, if you don't you will lose. If both sides fail to weigh impacts, I will default to who wins their links.

- Constitutionality is NOT an impact, the constitution can be amended and changed.

Theory:

I am quite familiar with theory and was a bit of a theory hack in high school. I dislike lay theory a lot, don't try running it because it's really unclear what I'm supposed to do with it. If you are going to run theory, run it in Interp, Violation, Standards, Voters format. Theory is very viable when run correctly and I will not hesitate to vote on it. Also, extend your standards and make sure to do work on them because I often evaluate that before any major voter level arguments.

Some notes on Theory:

If your opponent runs Trigger Warning Theory, just apologize and make sure to read trigger warnings in future speeches. I don't want people arguing against the concept of trigger warnings because that's not only morally reprehensible but it also sets a dangerous precedent. If you still do not read relevant trigger warnings after your opponent has asked you or has run theory on you, I will drop you and tank your speaks.

"Friv Theory" is completely fine and I don't really have an issue with it unless it requires your opponents to do something like take off their shoes which can make them really uncomfortable. Otherwise, it is just as valid as any other argument in the debate. Tricks are super fun to judge and make the debate interesting.

I default to competing interps over reasonability; No preference for Fairness vs Education; If you run a K and decide to leverage it against Theory, it needs to be extremely well done. (If you say that Fairness skews eval of the flow, I will not consider opposition arguments about pre-round equity unless they manage to explain how it also skews eval of the flow); I will not eval "spirit of the interp" arguments.

I evaluate RVIs and have a fairly low threshold for them.

Finally, I am perfectly fine with replacing the weighing mechanism/definition if both sides agree to it and won't penalize either side. It's not necessary to run theory in those instances.

Kritiks

TLDR: You have to run the K super super well, I don't really have a tolerance for bad/weak argumentation on the K level. This means that given the information you provide, your links and impacts have to make logical sense to someone who has never read the source material. Your alt solvency also has to be really well explained, Ks are an all or nothing here, if you run a bad K that makes no logical sense I will point out logical inconsistencies and give your opponent the win by default.

Familiar Lit Areas:

- Security

- SetCol

- Anthro

- Religion

- Cap

Just because I mainly know these specific Lit Areas doesn't mean that I won't evaluate any other K. I love new and interesting Ks with interesting ideologies/ important systematic issues to highlight.

I love Ks and love seeing them be debated but there are very important boundaries to not cross.

POMO

I don't like pomo. I can briefly explain why if you ask but I would stray away from most pomo, nietzsche is fine tho.

Identity Ks

Identity Ks are important in debate because they are used as survival strats by marginalized groups in this space. That being said I have 3 main notes about Identity Ks.

1. Every other judge has already said this but DO NOT RUN A K ABOUT A GROUP YOU ARE NOT PART OF. I will drop you.

2. Do not assume your opponent to be CisHet, this can cause forced outing, and attempting to do so will result in you being dropped

3. Attacking the concept of religion or highlighting its rhetorical violence is NOT the same as attacking members of a specific religion. The former is a valid argument, the latter is an equity violation.

K Generics

Read extensive framework; Bonus points if your framework allows your opponent to leverage their case which means more clash

I will evaluate Theory against Ks so be prepared for that

Links are pretty important and I don't like the Epistemic Skew argument very much because it nonuniques itself imo. This means you have to actually win your links substantially. I am also very receptive to the perm double bind.

If you have any questions, please ask them before the round or email me at mehulnair@berkeley.edu.

Hi! I'm Gratia (she/her). I'm currently a sophomore at UCLA. I did parli at Bishop O'Dowd, where I competed for 4 years and coached novices as a junior and senior.

tldr: I'm down to evaluate any debate but am more familiar with theory and case than Ks. With that being said, I'll try my best to evaluate whatever debate you want to have.

General:

You can read any arguments (as long as they're not racist, sexist, ableist, transphobic, or violent in any other way) but I can't promise that I'll know your lit base so explain them well. I love theory. Please use impact calc! Framing and layering are/should be your best friends. I love clean collapses. You can talk fast but please don't spread, it's been a while since I've really been involved in debate.

Debate is for YOU (the debaters) so I want you to have whatever debate you want. Please don't exclude your opponents or read harmful arguments in the process of doing so, but other than that I will listen to any debate. If your opponents say/do anything that makes you feel unsafe or is violent I am more than happy to do whatever I can to help.

If you have any questions about anything here or the round feel free to ask or email me (gratiaorafferty@gmail.com)!

TECH>TRUTH

Case:

Please please please have warrants and explain why they're important, don't just read a quote. Be sure to do impact calc in your last speech AND tell me why I should prefer the impacts you have over the impacts your opponents have (ex: why magnitude matters more than probability or vice versa).

CPs are fine, but please spend time actually explaining them (don't just read the CP text and move on). I also love theory so I'm willing to listen to CP theory.

I love nuanced and specific link and internal link scenarios!! If you have some and use warrants within them I will be so grateful. I'm also a big fan of good brink scenarios.

Theory:

By far my favorite argument as a debater, I'm willing to listen to any theory argument (some of my favorites to read were framework and no neg fiat if that gives any context). Please explain how you access fairness/education and do weighing within the theory debate!!

I default to competing interpretations and drop the debater unless you make arguments for something else. If you're going for reasonability please provide a brightline. I think RVIs are okay if you have sufficient justifications and can respond to your opponent's RVIs bad arguments.

I'm okay with conditionality but also willing to hear condo bad and vote on it if done well.

Ks:

I am the least experienced with Ks but ran a few and hit a fair amount (and loved reading framework). I probably don't know much about your lit base (unless it's cap or set col) so you have to explain your arguments. That being said, I'm definitely willing to vote on Ks. Take questions!! None of us are going to have fun if the other team can't engage in the debate because they don't understand your argument. Ks and K lit can be confusing and isn't accessible to every team so if you don't take any of your opponents' questions I will give you low speaks (and I honestly probably have the same clarifying questions as your opponents).

Speaks:

I don't give speaks based on how "pretty" you speak, but rather based on your strategy. For example: if you have really great links in the PMC/LOC, cover your bases well in the MG, collapse well in the block, or give a clean collapse in the PMR, I will give you high speaks.

I will give low speaks if you don't slow/clear when asked, say anything violent/ offensive, or otherwise make the debate unsafe and inaccessible.

EMAIL (for email chains/mid-round memes): mikayiparsons@gmail.com

I use they/them pronouns! Please respect that! For example: "Mikay is drinking coffee right now. Caffeine is the only thing that gives them the will to keep flowing."

NPDA:

I debated for Lewis & Clark in parli for 4 years and coached at SDSU for 2. I liked policy and critical debate - no preferences there, read what you want to read. Some caveats: especially in K v K debates, I am prone to buy your argument more if you spend time explaining your method/advocacy, how it solves, and why it's better than the other one (hopefully with offense!). If I can't explain what your solvency mechanism is as I am writing my RFD, there is a low likelihood that I will vote on it. For theory debates, if you do not collapse and choose to go for theory and other offense, there is a low likelihood that I will vote on the theory. If you clearly win the sheet in a way that requires absolutely no intervention on my part fine, but that is highly unlikely if you are not collapsing. Be nice, have fun, and maybe read some overviews or something idk.

I've been out of the college parli world for a few years, so I do not know the current popular blocks/arguments being read. That doesn't mean you shouldn't read them; just take the extra 10 seconds to explain why you are reading what you are reading, add some warrants that others might fill in for you in their heads, etc. I am also not as fast of a flower as I was a few years ago, so I may ask you to slow down (I want to get as clean and accurate of a flow as possible!). I've outlined some more specific preferences in the high school section below, but I am happy to answer any questions you may have!

ALL HIGH SCHOOL DEBATE:

Background: I competed in high school Policy for two years on a not very good Idaho circuit, with a few LD/Pf tournaments thrown in the mix. Additionally, I competed for Lewis & Clark College in Parliamentary Debate for four years. The majority of the literature I have read involves critical feminism and queer theory and phenomenology, which makes me pretty decent at understanding the majority of critical debates. In debate, however, I probably read policy/straight up arguments at least 70% of the time, and thus can understand those debates just as well.

The way to get my ballot: I appreciate well warranted debates that involve warrant and impact comparison. Please make the debate smaller in the rebuttals and give a clear story for why you have won the debate. This limits the amount of intervention that is required of me/all judges and will make all of our lives much easier. I will auto-drop teams that yell over their competitors' speeches or belittle/make fun of the other team/me. I value debate as an accessible, educational space, and so if you prevent it from being either of those two things, I will let you know.

Speed: I was a somewhat fast debater and can typically keep up in the majority of rounds. If you are reading cards, slow down for tag lines, author affiliations, advocacies, and interpretations, because those are pretty important to get down word for word, but feel free to go fast through the rest of the card. If you are cleared/slowed by the other team and do not slow down/become more clear, I will give you low speaks (again, debate is good only insofar as it is educational and accessible - spreading people out of the debate is boring and a silly way to win).

Theory: I love theory and believe it is currently underutilized in high school debate. I appreciate well thought out interpretations and counter-interpretations that are competitive and line-up well with their standards/counter-standards, as well as impacted standards that tie in with your voters. Theory is a lot of moving parts that require you fit them together into a coherent story.

Condo: I think conditionality is very good for debate, but also love hearing a good theory debate about condo. I have a pretty level threshold for voting either way, so have the debate and I will decide from there.

Critical affs/negs: I love hearing K's that are run well, both on the aff and neg! I have voted for and run critical affirmatives, and have also run/voted on framework answers to those very affirmatives. I am about as middle of the road as you can get, so again have the debate and I will decide from there based upon the arguments presented in round.

Finally, if you've made it this far, please please please do what you can to make debate educational, accessible, and worth all of our time. Coming in and being mean/spreading out some novices will not make you better debaters, so there is no point in doing so! This activity means so much to so many people; the least we can all do is be respectful of those around us.

LES PHILLIPS NUEVA PF PARADIGM

I have judged all kinds of debate for decades, beginning with a long career as a circuit policy and LD coach. Speed is fine. I judge on the flow. Dropped arguments carry full weight. At various times I have voted (admittedly, in policy) for smoking tobacco good, Ayn Rand Is Our Savior, Scientology Good, dancing and drumming trumps topicality, and Reagan-leads-to-Communism-and-Communism-is-good. (I disliked all of these positions.)

If an argument is in final focus, it should be in summary; if it's in summary, it should be in rebuttal,. I am very stingy regarding new responses in final focus. Saying something for the first time in grand cross does not legitimize its presence in final focus.

NSDA standards demand dates out loud on all evidence. That is a good standard; you must do that. I am giving up on getting people to indicate qualifications out loud, but I am very concerned about evidence standards in PF (improving, but still not good). I will bristle and register distress if I hear "according to Princeton" as a citation. Know who your authors are; know what their articles say; know their warrants.

Please please terminalize impacts. Do this especially when you are talking about a nebulosity called "The Economy." Economic growth is not intrinsically good; it depends on where the growth goes and who is helped. Sometimes economic growth is very bad. "Increases tensions" is not a terminal impact; what happens after the tensions increase? When I consider which makes the world a better place, I will be looking for prevention of unnecessary death and/or disease, who lifts people out of poverty, who lessens the risk of war, who prevents gross human rights violations. I'm also receptive to well-developed framework arguments that may direct me to some different decision calculus.

Teams don't get to decide that they want to skip grand cross (or any other part of the round).

I am happy to vote on well warranted theory arguments (or well warranted responses). Redundant, blippy theory goo is irritating. I have a fairly high threshold for deciding that an argument is abusive. I am receptive to Kritikal arguments in PF. I will default to NSDA rules re: no plans/counterplans, absent a very compelling reason why I should break those rules.

LES PHILLIPS NUEVA PARLI PARADIGM

I have judged all kinds of debate for decades, beginning with a long career as a circuit policy and LD coach. I have judged parli less than other formats, but my parli judging includes several NPDA tournaments, including two NPDA national tournaments, and most recent NPDI tournaments. Speed is fine, as are all sorts of theoretical, Kritikal, and playfully counterintuitive arguments. I judge on the flow. Dropped arguments carry full weight. I do not default to competing interpretations, though if you win that standard I will go there. Redundant, blippy theory goo is irritating. I have a fairly high threshold for deciding that an argument is abusive. Once upon a time people though I was a topicality hack, and I am still more willing to pull the trigger on that argument than on other theoretical considerations. The texts of advocacies are binding; slow down for these, as necessary.

I will obey tournament/league rules, where applicable. That said, I very much dislike rules that discourage or prohibit reference to evidence.

I was trained in formats where the judge can be counted on to ignore new arguments in late speeches, so I am sometimes annoyed by POOs, especially when they resemble psychological warfare.

Please please terminalize impacts. Do this especially when you are talking about The Economy. "Helps The Economy" is not an impact. Economic growth is not intrinsically good; it depends on where the growth goes and who is helped. Sometimes economic growth is very bad. "Increases tensions" is not a terminal impact; what happens after the tensions increase?

When I operate inside a world of fiat, I consider which team makes the world a better place. I will be looking for prevention of unnecessary death and/or disease, who lifts people out of poverty, who lessens the risk of war, who prevents gross human rights violations. "Fiat is an illusion" is not exactly breaking news; you definitely don't have to debate in that world. I'm receptive to "the role of the ballot is intellectual endorsement of xxx" and other pre/not-fiat world considerations.

LES PHILLIPS NUEVA LD PARADIGM

For years I coached and judged fast circuit LD, but I have not judged LD since 2013, and I have not coached on the current topic at all. Top speed, even if you're clear, may challenge me; lack of clarity will be very unfortunate. I try to be a blank slate (like all judges, I will fail to meet this goal entirely). I like the K, though I get frustrated when I don't know what the alternative is (REJECT is an OK alternative, if that's what you want to do). I have a very high bar for rejecting a debater rather than an argument, and I do not default to competing interpretations; I would like to hear a clear abuse story. I am generally permissive in re counterplan competitiveness and perm legitimacy. RVIs are OK if the abuse is clear, but if you would do just as well to simply tell me why the opponent's argument is garbage, that would be appreciated.

tl;dr: I am open to almost any argument you want to read and will do my best to judge the round the way you lay it out for me.

Background

I’m a first-year at UC Berkeley now competing in NPDA as a 1A/2N and am currently coached by Amanda Miskell, Will White, lila lavender, and June Dense. I competed for EVHS for four years in NPDL debate as mostly a 2A/2N, but I have some experience with 1A/1N when I mavved at NPDI ‘21. My thoughts on debate so far have been mainly shaped by Trevor Greenan, lila lavender, Will White, Amanda Miskell, so feel free to check out their paradigms - I’ll probably evaluate rounds in a similar way.

General

My decision is based almost entirely and primarily on my flow (i.e. tech > truth), however if intervention is inevitable, I will try to find the easiest, least interventiony path to the ballot. In a similar fashion to Trevor, I will prioritize (in roughly this order): conceded arguments with weighing/framing, conceded arguments that are otherwise extended, arguments with substantive warrant analysis, arguments with implicit framing, and, worst case, the arguments I can better understand the interactions of. Speed is fine, although be mindful of “slow/clear” calls (see lila’s paradigm for the steph stew 2022 incident - I have very similar thoughts on speed). While I do protect, feel free to call your POOs.

Case

My 1ACs/1NCs for the first half of my career were typically two advantages or DAs with large uniqueness blocks and impact work. Given this, I tend to believe strong uniqueness and on the flip side good defensive analytics make arguments compelling. A structured approach to answering case arguments by section with an overview, signposting, and a good collapse is your best bet to beating back these arguments.

I default to fiat being durable, utilitarianism/net benefits as the moral framework, and counterplans being conditional, but am open to arguments to the contrary.

Read any counterplan you want, cheater or not, but I’ll also vote on MG theory here if it’s won.

Theory

Have fun - I lived for theory and I am generally a fan. Collapse to what is strategic - just bc you think I’m a theory hack should not mean you poorly collapse to theory for the hell of it. In fact, I now think bad or unnecessary theory collapses typically lead to a boringish debate compared to a similar quality K or case collapse (still means make strategic choices! if theory makes sense go for it).

My view on theory is that it boils down to case debate with a slightly different structure. This means UQ, links, impact analysis, and collapse should be a big part of any theory debate.

I default to competing interps, and need a good warrant to prefer reasonability + a brightline. Theory is you upholding a model of debate through your interp vs any counterinterp, so you want to do comparative standards and voter work in your collapse.

I did go for MG theory frequently in high school so I will respect your decision to read/go for MG theory, but poorly read multiple sheets in the MG will make me sad.

Kritiks

Since getting into NPDA, I’ve almost exclusively read variations of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism (MLM) on both the aff and the neg. In high school, I got a lot more into kritiks in my junior and senior year, with a lot of Buddhism, and some MLM and Baudrillard. I find these arguments to be a valuable and fun tool in debate and am happy to evaluate these debates to the best of my ability.

Don’t assume I know your literature and esp in high school if ur reading smt nuts then take questions (it’ll help me too!).

Specific links to the aff are much more compelling than generic links or those of omission, which I will hold a higher threshold on.

I enjoyed K affs a lot more in my senior year and I’m down to hear them. I think FW/T is good when done well - I personally like the “we lead to better versions of ur aff bc truth testing is good” version more than the “drop them!! they didn’t fulfill their burden!!” complaining version but you do you.

Random Specific Thoughts Post NPTE 2023

Genocide seems pretty bad! The PMR seems to exist! Topicality and spec seem to be different things!

I have similar thoughts to Tim: The PMR should probably get to read new offense against the block’s rhetoric bc how would the MG predict that the block was gonna say slurs. IDK seems to make sense to me. And I will not randomly intervene to decide what rhetoric is “reasonably egregious” or not, ESPECIALLY if I’m a CIA-employed Zionist imperialist actor (to clarify which I am not). That seems pretty bad to me idk!

I have no idea wtf extending the perm means. I feel like if you want to extend a perm to get rid of an unconditional counterplan then you have to either read or pick some kind of terminal defense to get rid of your own competition. For example, you need to say “extend this defense” which means the counterplan doesn’t work and so the world of the counterplan solely is the status quo. Then if you extend the perm that makes sense to me because then the uncondo counterplan is the status quo so the world of the perm vs the CP is the same as the world of the aff vs the status quo. If you don’t do this then the only way you can get rid of offense on your counterplan probably seems to be actually kicking it. But I am slightly iffy about this so explain how extending the perm gets rid of the uncondo CP please thx.

Everything seems like fiat based on my understanding - if fiat is saying that we “should” do something and then imagine the consequences of that action then almost everything seems like it fiats an action. This also extends to the pre/post fiat distinction since either smt that is prefiat is saying their speech act has done something to change the world in which case I don’t know why I have to vote for you uniquely if that impact has already occurred, or my ballot will do something in which case the “pre” vs “post” fiat distinction seems mildly blurry to me but idk. This probably does not change the way I evaluate rounds, since I’ll assume the traditional fiat = policymaking fiat paradigm until someone tells me that fiat is what it rly is, in which case you can do a lot more weighing with the policymaking 1AC. This still doesn’t preclude framework analysis, in which case I will default to epistemic modesty over confidence (this means impacts = probability of ur framework being true x ur impact).

If you have any questions, feel free to message me on Instagram (@tejas.prabhune), Messenger (Tejas Prabhune), Discord (papaya#8124), email me at prabhune@berkeley.edu, or ask away before the start of round!

I’m very down to be postrounded at the above places as well - I encourage you to push me to be a better judge.

Hello!

Quick stuff: debate is cool and should be fun and enjoyable for all. Also see these rankings based on my level of knowledge or comfort voting on, from most comfortable to least:

1. Policy/ case debate

2. Kritiks

3. Most theory

4. Non-T Aff

5. Weird theory

None of that is to say that I won't vote on the lower-ranked things, I'll just need more explanation. Also, I'm okay with listening to RVIs but I probably have a high threshold for voting.

Background

I'm Arshita (she/they) and I'm a recent graduate from UOP. In my last season I was the top speaker at the 2022 NPDA national tournament, but I have not been involved in any kind of debate since April up to the time of editing this paradigm (11/12/22). That said, I have roughly 8 years of debate experience (mostly high school PF, NPDA, and NFA LD) and feel comfortable listening to most things with the hope that you are comfortable with your strategy and are able to present a good quality debate.

I want to include one of my former coach's paradigms here because he's a big inspiration of mine and I pretty much agree with how he views debate.

"The metaphor of the highway patrol: On top of being a decision making robot, I think part of my job as a judge is refereeing but I try to perform that function like a member of the highway patrol. If you are driving 70 in a 65 and no one calls to complain about your driving making them unsafe I am probably going to let you drive along. If you are going 95 in a 65 and I deem that as a clear and present danger to the drivers you share the road with, I will likely feel obligated to get involved. Most of the time that will probably just result in a warning or fix-it ticket unless something particularly egregious occurs. Drive approximately the speed of traffic and recognize that you share this road with a variety of people with different backgrounds, abilities, and experiences that might inform how they approach their travels.

Actual Debate Philosophy Stuff: In an ideal world I believe the Aff should be topical and the Neg should be unconditional. I’m partial to defense and think it can absolutely be terminal. I vote on kritiks as long as I understand them and especially their solvency mechanism and mutual exclusivity. I am not comfortable judging on the basis of your identity or anyone else’s. I am more likely to have your arguments if you go 85% of your top speed. The PMR should be small, the LoR should be preemptive. I will do my best to protect from new arguments in the rebuttals. Most RVI’s are dumb. If the format has rules I take them seriously but assuming neither side cares about those rules I am willing to just let the competitors play. I think you introducing a performance into the round and straying away from “traditional” debate invites me to make my decision on the basis of whether that performance was particularly compelling or cool."

Parli Specific Stuff

Splitting the block. No.

Protecting the rebuttals. I'll try my best but call the POO anyways please.

Tag-teaming. Don't care but I will get annoyed if you are feeding your partner their speech.

Presumption. The neg gets this unless there is a CP/alternative in which case the negative has the burden of proving their advocacy is better than both the aff and the status quo.

MG theory. This is fine and sometimes even cool.

Competing Interps vs Reasonability. I default to competing interps unless I'm compelled to evaluate under a different standard. You don't need proven abuse to win your theory shell unless I'm evaluating under reasonability. And please tell me what reasonability means.

Permutations. Please read them. I don't think these are advocacies, but are tests of whether the CP/alt is competitive with the aff.

For other things, you should ask me. My email is arshita.237@gmail.com. Have fun!

I am a former high school parliamentary debater who is currently in college. I will vote for any argument as long as you give me a good enough reason to do so. Just make sure you understand the arguments you read because if you don't I won't be as convinced. You can speak as fast as you'd like. Be respectful to your opponents (that should go without a saying). Default to K > T > case unless you tell me otherwise. Weigh impacts and layers of the round.

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Updates from NPDI 2023

Read the perm. if you go slow know that I will fall asleep. I hate case debate because no one knows how to write unique DAs. Like pls read my paradigm lol i.e. Policy affs 2 (applies to neg as well I guess).

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I am a current student at UC Berkeley’26 and compete for PDB.

In high school, I competed for Flintridge Prep in parli, policy, and a few tournaments in LD. I was coached by Khamani Griffin (my thoughts about debate were influenced by him but are not the same). I was a flex team in HS: policy aff, tech neg, but I also read DAs and CPs bc my district was lay.

I have almost exclusively read the K + K-aff last year (MLM).

Send me speech docs scott.schuster1@icould.com

WSD at bottom. PF at bottom.

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General

1. I generally don't care what you read unless it is clearly problematic. You still have to justify what you read. (tab judge: tech>>>>Truth)
2. I can hang with most speed (if online slow down a bit 70-80% top speed). I'll slow if I can't understand you. You don't have to slow unless slowed. Don't spread out novices unless both teams are chill.
3. I'll try to evaluate the round to the best of my ability. if you don't agree/ don't understand email me.
4. I'll try to protect the flow. Still call Point of Orders
5. Speaks are fake. I'll default 28-29.
6. Blueberries (still links to fruit T though so L)
7. I shouldn’t have to say this, but some members of the community need to hear this: don’t be racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, etc. if you make these arguments, I will drop you instantly, give lowest speaks, and have a nice conversation with your coach. Also if you cite, read, or defend in any way a Nazi, someone who the Nazi’s used to justify their theory, or someone who was generally related to them I will do the same.

Parli/Policy/TOC LD

Policy affs:

1. I am down to evaluate these. I pref the k aff right now, but I have read policy affs every round in HS.
2. Pls make these interesting. Don’t just paste in generic back-file advantages. I would prefer you to read something I have never heard before than the standard heg or Econ adv you read every round.
3. I will still evaluate generics, but not happily.

DAs/CPs

1. I went for these quite a bit in my district. Similar to policy affs section, don’t read generic DAs If you can.
2. I am down for PICs or cheater CPs.
3. I don’t have a way I lean on condo yet. I’ll vote on condo, but I probably won’t vote on n-1 interps where n is the number of CPs they read.

Theory/Topicality

1. I have read both of these extensively in policy.
2. I have a low threshold to vote on t.
3. I am down to listen to MG theory, loc theory. Tell me which I should evaluate first.
4. I’ll vote on anything that is not Shoes T or Nebel T.
5. I have a high threshold for speed t. Unless you have an access need, I probably won’t vote on speed t.
6. If you read disclosure and are a big/well-funded school, I probably will be very unlikely to vote for you. If I think they just straight drop the arg and vote on that, I probably tank speaks.

K/K-affs

1. These have been my main strategy this year. I am learning more of them and probably will like these debates a lot.
2. My main lit base is Mao. I have heard debates on a few other Ks. I.e. I won’t know your lit base, so pls explain it well.
3. I like FW debates for the K-aff but am also down to hear k v k debates.

WSD

If I am judging you in WSD, I will treat it like any other debate round. I don't care about any of the nonsense point systems. At the end of the day, Worlds is a debate event and all debate events have standard things I am looking for. Warrant your claims. I have yet to see a worlds debater do that. I will not vote on any arguments that rely on warrantless claims.

PF ONLY (If you are in another event I will not eval in this way)

Pf is not policy-lite. Don't treat it as such.

Probably best to strike me if you do any of the things below. I am 100% down for tech when it is read correctly. However, if you read tech and don't know how to deal with it, I will eval it to the best of my ability but tank speaks (i.e. 25s). This includes the K, K-Aff, T, Theory, T-FW, FW (kritical sense). i.e. literally anything that came from LD/Policy/Parli. If you read a K that follows the pattern of "I am some ______ (*insert demographic here*) and I should win for that" without reading any lit I will eval but tank speaks. If I have heard the same aff word for word I will tank speaks. pls write your own cases especially if your team has more than 2 teams.

I have been told PF is starting to read theory from LD/Policy. If this is your shell and you don't have the 4 parts of a shell, I will tank speaks. You need to have an Interp, Vio, Standards, and Voters. No paragraph T for PF.I have also heard you have been reading these positions in the wrong way like you took the name and went a very different direction. If I see this and your T shell is garbage I will have a hard time evaluating it.

If both sides read any of the previously mentioned arguments and do it so poorly I can't eval the debate/ anger me enough I will flip a coin.

If you spread in a manner that is trying to mirror other debaters but you can't spread I will tank speaks. Pls just speak how you would in any normal conversation. Don't double breath if you don't put a word in between the breaths.

Speech docs should be sent on time. prep doesn't stop until you hit send. Don't send speech docs unless going like 250+ WPM. I will call for card docs at the end of the round. Analytics are not nice to put in, they are a must. You have 3 mins + any unused prep time to send the doc after the round or I will drop you and tank speaks. I take evidence ethics in PF EXTREMELY seriously. I will drop if everything is not provided.

I am not the happiest with PF right now, so don’t test me. You can ignore my paradigm, but don’t get mad when I drop you and tank speaks.

Hi y’all, I’m Brenna (she/her). I compete in NPDA, formerly at Diablo Valley College and currently for Parliamentary Debate at Berkeley. I used to do NFA-LD, speech, and IPDA if that's important to you. I won the 2023 NPDA and NPTE championships with my partner, Tristan Keene. I am also the varsity coach for Campolindo High School. I think that judges should do their best to be unbiased adjudicators, and I will try to do just that. However, I’m not going to pretend that I don’t have *some* preconceived biases and opinions, so it’s probably best I make those known. Thus, this paradigm. Some paradigms I like include: June Dense, Tristan Keene, Adeja Powell, and Will White.

TLDR: I exist at the mercy of the flow. I will literally evaluate anything. I will not fill in gaps for you no matter how small. My preferences will not decide how I evaluate, only how happy I will be after round.

General things about Brenna:

1. I default to the flow and will not intervene UNLESS there is bigotry occurring in the round. This means that if you continue reading this paradigm and find out I don't really like your favorite thing to read, you can still read it. I'll evaluate it. But I won't have fun.
2. If I have a preference towards evaluating case, K or theory debates, I'm not aware of it.
3. 27 is usually my absolute minimum for speaks, I'll only give you less than 27 if you are super mean or problematic. I eval not according to speaking ability but according to execution of strategy. +0.1 point for every dollar you give me before round. If you can't put your money where your mouth is, don't ask me for a 30 arbitrarily.
4. Please collapse. For the love of god, collapse.
5. Please interact with your opponents' arguments. Implied clash is gross.
6. Shadow extensions are new arguments
7. I stop flowing the second the timer goes off.
8. i am a hard ass on cheating. i dont care if everyone does it, if u do it in front of me i will do something about it.
9. I will probably take a long time to make my decision, sorry (see: i exist at the mercy of the flow)
10. Please be nice!

Speed:

I can hang, and when I can’t I will call slow/clear. Do not sacrifice clarity for speed and do give pen time. I'm okay with debaters calling slow on their opponents as many times as they need, and I'd really prefer if the debate was accessible. I really don't want to vote on speed T, but I guess I will if I have to...

Case debate:

It’s good. I like it. In fact, there’s probably nothing I like more than a good case debate. Terminalize your impacts and do impact calculus. I don't really have any notable preferences for case debate except for the following.

General note:

If there is such thing as a uniqueness hack, I am one. I find that most people do not know how to properly write uniqueness or utilize it in debate, which means that if you do, I will be very happy! Winning global uniqueness as an overview to your collapse is a likely way to win my ballot. Uniqueness controls the directionality of the link.

Aff:

It is the job of the MG and the PMR to extend the aff beyond just the statement: "extend the aff". I do not implicitly grant the affirmative team the positions read in the PMC just by virtue of them being read in the PMC. Again, shadow extensions are new arguments.

I read soft left aff's a lot early in my career, and have come to view them as boring and untrue. Either reject the res or embrace the fact that you're defending the state.

Link turns:

Turns are miniature disads, they require uniquness and an impact.

CPs:

I like all except for delay. If you read delay I think you're a bad person.

I think PiC's are fine and super duper justifiable especially if the aff is not a whole law res. I'll vote on PiC's bad, so like... win on the flow i guess?

Condo is good. Condo bad theory is fine. PMR collapses to MG theory have gotten boring to me, but I’ll still vote on ‘em.

Kritiks:

I would say my partner and I have read the K plenty, but are not K debaters by any means. The K's I've read include: Cap, kritiks of rationalism and western epistemology, Eco, fem killjoy, Han Pu Ri, Lacan, and bojack horseman. I will venture to say that outside of a debate context, i am familiar with most lit read in debate.

Please have a really clear thesis and solvency explanation, and I mean clear beyond just the PMC/LOC (ie, please actually know what your K is before you read it, I'm sorry but I will be annoyed if you're reading a K you can't explain past the shell itself). K links should be specific to the aff. Other than that, go buck wild!

Have specific links please, and pleaseeee make sure your alt solves your impacts. that means if you reject fiat, your impacts should be in round/rhetorical/epistemological. if ur k solves for climate change than probably just embrace the object fiat.

Aff K's: Down! I want more than just frame outs in response to Framework T, and keep K v K debate clean PLEASE bc it's so easy for everyone involved to get lost in the sauce.

Theory:

A good T collapse is probably my favorite thing to watch. I am willing to vote on potential abuse on T if you tell me why I should, and I will resort to competing interpretations if no one tells me otherwise.

I guess I'm kinda trad insofar as I would really just prefer to watch rounds where theory is limited to T, spec (a,e,f), PICs bad, or condo bad. I'll vote on other things, but I won't have as much fun. I think the proliferation of "frivolous theory" is a problem, but again, I really really really resort to the flow, and I think it is possible to keep intervention at a 0 on theory specifically. So if you execute "interp: debaters must not wear shoes" or the like perfectly, i will roll my eyes and sign the ballot for you.

My threshold on voting for RVI's is incredibly incredibly high. I think this is due to the fact that I have never seen a well warranted or executed RVI collapse. Prove me wrong.

Tricks:

I think an argument is a claim, a warrant and an implication. Absent that, I'm hesitant to vote on an argument. Take that as you will.

Point-of-order's:

I protect, but call still, please.

I think that about covers it. Good luck, have fun!

There is no grace time in parliamentary debate!! I stop flowing when your speech time has ended.

When I judge in person, I'm usually waking up like 4 hours earlier than normal, so I tend to yawn a lot during debates. Sorry if it's distracting, and I promise I am not getting bored or falling asleep!

General

These are all ultimately preferences. You should debate the way you want to debate.

For online debate: put texts in the chat for every advocacy/ROTB/interp. Texts are binding.

I'm okay with speed and will slow/clear you if necessary. If you don't slow for your opponents, I will drop you.

I will protect in the PMR but call the POO.

Please give content warnings as applicable. The more the merrier.

A safe debate is my primary consideration as a judge. Do not misgender your opponents. I will not hesitate to intervene against any rhetorically violent arguments.

If any debater requests it, I will stop a round and escalate the situation to Tab, tournament equity, and your coaches. I will also do this in the absence of a request if I feel like something unsafe has occurred and it is beyond my jurisdiction/capacity to deal with it.

Case

Weigh, interact with your opponent's arguments, and signpost!! I prefer when your weighing is contextualized to the argument you want me to vote on, rather than across-the-board generalizations of preferring probability or magnitude. Unwarranted links have zero probability even if they are conceded. Cross-applications need to be contextualized to the new argument.

All types of counterplans are game and so is counterplan theory. Perms are a test of competition. I have no idea what a neg perm is, so if you read one, you have to both justify why the negative is entitled to a perm and also what a neg perm means in the context of aff/neg burdens.

I would prefer it if you cited your sources unless the tournament explicitly prohibits you from doing so. If there is an evidence challenge that affects my ballot, I will vote before I check your evidence, and if I find intentional evidence fabrication, I will communicate that information to tab.

Theory/Topicality

Theory is cool! Please have a clear interpretation and have a text ready. I am happy to vote on whatever layering claims you make regarding theory vs. Ks. In the absence of layering, I will default to theory a priori.

I won't vote on theory shells that police the clothing, physical presentation, or camera usage (for online debate) of debaters. I will evaluate neg K's bad theory, disclosure, and speed theory as objectively as possible, but I don't really like these arguments and probably hack against them. Aff K's bad/T-USfg is fine. I will drop you for reading disclosure in the form of consent/FPIC theory. I'll vote on all other theory shells.

I default to competing interpretations, potential abuse > proven abuse, and drop the argument. To vote for reasonability, I need a clear brightline on what is reasonable. I am neutral on fairness vs. education. I'm neutral on RVIs, but I'll vote for them if you win them. I am good with conditional advocacies, and also good with hearing conditionality theory.

Kritiks

KvK is currently my favorite type of debate to judge. Rejecting the resolution, performance Ks, and framework theory are all fine with me. Please read a role of the ballot. If you are interested in learning more about K debate, please email me and I will send you any resources/answer any questions you may have.

Tech v. Truth

I default to tech over truth, but I probably lean towards truth more than your average tech judge. I'm open to arguments that say I should weigh truth over tech and disregard the flow when technical debate is sidelining disadvantaged teams. I think while technical debate can be a tool for combatting oppression in the debate space, skill at technical debate is definitely correlated with class, income, and whiteness. As such, I'm willing to hear arguments that ask me to devalue the flow in favor of solving a form of violence that has occurred in the round as a result of technical debate.

Miscellaneous

For speaker points, I give 27s as a baseline. I won't go below this unless you are violent or exclusionary. Please answer 1-2 POIs if there isn't flex.

My resting face and my frowning face are the same, and I have very expressive nonverbals– I recognize that this combo can be intimidating/confusing and I strongly urge you not to use my nonverbals as indicators of anything. I promise I don't hate you or your arguments, it's just my face!

Good luck :^)

I don't really judge anymore. If you are a debater and want to see my paradigm for some reason, email me firstname dot lastname at gmail.

About me: Senior at UC Berkeley majoring in Environmental Sciences and Legal Studies. Current Head Coach of Maybeck HS, former Assistant Coach for Berkeley High School (2021-2022), former captain of Washington HS's team 2019-2021). During my competitive run, my partner and I championed Stanford's national invitational and broke at Tournament of Champions; I now compete on the Cal Mock Trial Team

Case Debate:

• Argument structure - Please use a consistent argument structure throughout the round (e.g. uniqueness, links, and impacts) and signpost throughout your speech

• Always weigh your impacts - please terminalize and weigh your impacts. It's not enough for you to link out your advantages/disads to death or climate change. You have to explain how I should weigh those against the other impacts in the round.

• Citing evidence - Follow any rules for citing evidence that the tournament provides. If none are provided, citing the name of the source and date of publication is enough for me

Theory Debate:

• Feel free to run whatever kind of theory you want as long as you do sufficient weighing/layering (tell me how I should evaluate this argument compared to everything else in the round)

• Not a fan of frivolous theories and anything that's run to skew your opponents out of the round.

Kritiks:

• I'm generally unreceptive to K's but feel free to run them. If you do, please explain your framework, links, impacts, and alt very clearly and do sufficient weighing/layering.

• Please signpost because I may get lost if you don't

Final Comments:

This is just a brief summary of my judging preferences. Feel free to contact me at abishiva@berkeley.edu if you have any questions! And just remember that debate is a fun and educational activity, so just enjoy yourselves and you'll do great!

Background: competed for 3 years in PF in high school and 1 year in Policy and Parli respectively.

Email chain: ahs.birder@gmail.com

I'm pretty open to, and will vote on, pretty much any argument (K, pics, fw, condo etc. and theory saying all the above are bad are all fair game) - as long as they're explained well, which means comprehensible to a lay audience: so take the time to explain the warrant (+ impact if applicable) and extend it through every speech, don't assume a) that I know what you're talking about or b) that I'll remember what you said in earlier speeches. Give me a convincing argument for why you won the round in your final speech - in the sense that I should be able to vote for you without having listened to any of the debate beforehand (although ofc I'll be flowing the whole thing). I try really hard not to intervene.

I'm ok with speed but please slow down for tags and send me a speech doc!

Please be nice to each other, be charitable and play fair with each other (for example, please no prep time/card calling shenanigans, I trust you guys to be chill with that) and overall relax during the debate, we're all here to have fun! :) (also please free to be casual/comfortable re. attire, especially online)

If you have any questions (or just want to chat), feel free to shoot me an email or ask me before round! This isn't out of courtesy, I genuinely love talking about anything and everything!

World Schools note for Cal -First time judging this - still figuring out the point system & norms so to be as fair as possible here's how I find myself voting so far:

• winning team will be the team who had better argumentation / framing. Don't use this as an excuse to do things that would not be in the norms of world schools tho, like excessive speed / more theoretical stuff / anything exclusionary to teams that aren't prepared for it. Also since no low point wins, a killer reply speech can't save 3 bad constructives. If it's close enough though, the team who I think won on paper will win on tabroom. Surprising myself with who the winner is by just adding up the points speech by speech made me too sad.
• High style points = good sign posting, clear extensions, creative arguments, confident responses to POIs. I don't care as much that a speech is perfectly polished so much as that it is creative and effective and doesn't waste time. To honor the vibes of WSD, if you're confident / funny, your score will be higher. If you're rude / make excessive POIs / read word for word off a paper, your score will be lower. That being said, your performative ability will most likely not be what determines the round for me.
• High content points = I like the stuff you put on the paper. A good mix of defensive and offensive responses (not just cross applications of your own case). Having flushed out substantives (rather than blips that come out in later speeches). Creative arguments that aren't all US-centric. Stats aren't as important in world schools as clear logic, so make sure everything has a claim & reasoning & impact of some sort.
• Strategy points = Good extensions, good framing, good time management, and consistency across each speech on your team.
• IMO, POIs are more for you than for me. Get clarification on their case / get the other side to say something you can use against them / catch them in a double bind to use later. I'm probably not going to flow anything new from a POI unless you bring it up in a speech later and tell me why it matters. Making them probably won't impact your score much unless they're really good or really bad.

TLDR as of Feb '24: Will listen to almost anything, preference for case since I'm much better at judging it (imo), and my ability to comprehend speed is not great these days and I for whatever reason am incapable of flowing on a computer so if you go too fast for me to be able to actually pen to paper write it down I may miss stuff. Wouldn't object to being classified more as flay than flow at this point, but a unique / interesting round is better than a boring / recycled round - take that however you want. And full disclosure idek what a trick is unless it's that grains of sand stuff - that I definitely do not like pls I will have flashbacks to the worst rounds I ever debated lol

- debated in high school parliamentary debate for four years (2015-2019) for Campolindo and Mountain View / Los Altos (won a few things, went to TOC x3, but also it's been a long time and the circuit has def changed)

- coached PF for a few years and a lil bit of parli

For Parli

For the record, I will in fact listen to and vote on anything you read so long as it's done well, below are my preferences but of course they are not hard and fast rules; you do you - it's your round not mine.

- I haven’t competed in years and mostly coached slower events such as PF, so spreading super fast is probably not in your best interest, and in a limited prep event like parli with 8 min for a constructive if you're saying the right things you probably don't need to go egregiously fast anyway.

- I prefer the structure of case debate solely because I'm better at judging it - if you feel like going for critical impacts that is fine but I would much rather hear a well warranted critical advantage or disadvantage than an over rehearsed and framework heavy kritik

- If you do decide to read a K I won't hate you but here's my disclaimer: I did not read Ks except like 4 times ever. I studied philosophy in college so I'm relatively familiar w most stock K theory & I read some satirical stuff / Baudrillard. But also I hate misinterpretations / butchering of philosophy to better suit your case so if you read a K it better be good. And regardless of my knowledge if you read a K still assume I do not understand, and be as clear as possible. While I'll do my best to place it in the context of the round reading a K in general means there is a marginally higher chance I will make what more k-oriented judges would consider the wrong decision. So bear that in mind.

- if reading more complex or identity related kritiks be especially sure you actually understand what you are talking about and the implications behind it. I'll probably hold you to a higher standard of explanation on these

- I don't like frivolous theory so if you're reading it at least make it ridiculous and fun lol. Theory is important when an action a team has taken has changed the course of the round. Theory is less important when the shell itself is what changes the round. But I guess at a certain point it becomes satire and then it loops back to maybe being important again?

- Justify your impact framing. Magnitude is probably overrated. What would make the world actually better is if people thought about probable and structural impacts of their actions. I'll definitely vote on magnitude if given reason to though.

For PF

- I don't really flow cross cause I'm not abt that many columns on my flow but I promise I'll listen :) Bring up any important cross developments in a speech as well and I'll definitely flow it then

- Sticky defense (unless you give me a reason otherwise) so long as you mention it in FF, so you can ignore through summary if conceded

- If you plan on going fast to the point where you go beyond the average person's flowing capabilities, you should email me & your opponents your evidence. But also I'm fine with more speed in PF because a 4 minute constructive just seems so short to the Parli side of me

- not a fan of paraphrasing & if you do make sure citations are clear

- if you are reading norm-setting theoretical arguments or critical identity args look to my parli notes

About:

Claremont McKenna College '23 | Archbishop Mitty '19

Hi there! My name is Jon Joey (he/they) and I competed in Parliamentary, Public Forum, and Congressional Debate at the national circuit level for three years at Archbishop Mitty High School. After graduation from Mitty, I served there as an Alumni Coach for two years and personally coached the 2021 CHSSA Parliamentary Debate State Champions. I also briefly competed in National Parliamentary Debate Association tournaments in my undergraduate years and was heavily involved in the collegiate MUN circuit.

My current affiliation is with Crystal Springs Uplands School, where I am the Head Debate Coach for both the Middle and Upper Schools.

In the interest of inclusivity, if you have ANY questions about the terms or jargon that I use in this paradigm or other questions that are not answered here, feel free to shoot me an email at jtelebrico23@cmc.edu—and please Cc your coach or parents/guardians on any communication to me as a general practice!

Parli Paradigm (last updated 11.09.23 for NPDI)

Important parts bolded and underlined for time constraints.

General

• TL; DR: Debate how you want and how you know. If you need to adapt for a panel, I will meet you where you are and evaluate fairly.

• STOP stealing time in parliamentary debate! Do not prep with your partner while waiting for texts to be passed. There is no grace period in parliamentary debate—I stop flowing when your time ends on my timer. In the event of a timing error on my end, please hold up your timer once your opponent goes overtime.

• The debate space is yours. I can flow whatever speed and am open to any interpretation of the round but would prefer traditional debate at State. Don't be mean and exclusionary. This means a low threshold for phil, tricks, etc. but I will exercise a minute amount of reasonability (speaks will tank, W/L unchanged) if you're being intentionally exclusionary towards younger/novice/inexperienced debaters (e.g. refusing to explain tricks or clarify jargon in POIs or technically framing out teams for a cheap ballot). No TKOs though, sorry.

• Please adapt to your panel! I will evaluate as I normally do, but please do not exclude judges who may not be able to handle technical aspects of the debate round.

• I keep a really tight flow and am tech over truth. Intervention is bad except with respect to morally reprehensible or blatantly problematic representations in the debate space—I reserve the right to exercise intervention in that case.

• I prefer things to be framed as Uniqueness, Link, Impact but it doesn't matter that much. Conceded yet unwarranted claims are not automatic offense for you.

• Doing impact weighing/comparative analysis between warrants is key to coming out ahead on arguments.

• Collapse the debate down to a few arguments/issues/layers. Extend some defense on the arguments you're not going for and then go all in on the arguments that you're winning.

• Rebuttals are also very important! The 1NR cannot be a repeat of the 2NC and the 1AR should be engaging with some of the new responses made in the block as well as extending the 2AC. Give overviews, do comparative world analysis, do strategic extensions.

• Please do not mention your program name if the tournament has intentionally chosen to withhold that information. I would also generally prefer debaters stick to "My partner and I" vs. saying something like "Mitty TK affirms."

• This paradigm is not a stylistic endorsement of one regional style of debate over another (e.g. East v. West, logical v. empirical, traditional v. progressive). Debaters should debate according to how they know how to debate—this means that I will still evaluate responses to theory even if not formatted in a shell or allow debaters to weigh their case against a K argument. There is always going to be a competitive upshot to engaging in comparison of arguments, so please do so instead of limiting your ability to debate due to stylistic frustrations and differences.

Framework

• In the absence of a weighing mechanism, I default to net benefits, defined therein as the most amount of good for the most amount of people. This means you can still make weighing claims even in the absence of a coherent framework debate. To clarify this, I won't weigh for you, you still have to tell me which impacts I ought to prioritize.

• Framework cannot be backfilled by second speakers. Omission of framework means you shift framework choice to your opponents.

• For CFL: Please respect trichotomy as these topics were written with a particular spirit and are meant to serve as preparation for CHSSA (should = policy, ought or comparison of two things = value, on balance/more good than harm/statement = fact)

• Any and all spec is fine.

• Read and pass texts to your opponents.

• Epistemic confidence > epistemic modesty. Win the framework.

Counterplans

• I tend to default that CPs are tests of competition and not advocacies. Whether running the CP or articulating a perm, please clarify the status of the CP.

• I think counterplans are super strategic and am receptive to hearing most unconventional CPs (PICs, conditional, advantage, actor, delay, etc.) so long as you're prepared to answer theory. These don't have to necessarily be answered with theory but affirmative teams can logically explain why a specific counterplan is unfair or abusive for me to discount it.

Theory

• I'm a lot more willing to evaluate theory, or arguments that set norms that we use in debate.

• I default to competing interps over reasonability, meaning that both teams should probably have an interp if you want to win theory. Feel free to change my mind on this and of course, still read warrants as to why I should prefer one over the other.

• I'm slowly beginning to care less if theory is "frivolous" as my judging career progresses but, by the same token, try not to choose to be exclusionary if you're aware of the technical ability of your opponents. Inclusivity and access are important in this activity.

Kritiks

• Kritiks are a form of criticism about the topic and/or plan that typically circumvents normative policymaking. These types of arguments usually reject the resolution due to the way that it links into topics such as ableism, capitalism, etc. Pretty receptive to these!

• I find KvK debates quite confusing and difficult to evaluate because debaters are often not operationalizing framework in strategic ways. Win the RotB debate, use sequencing and pre-req arguments, and contest the philosophical methods (ontology, epistemology, etc.) of each K. On the KvK debate, explain to me why relinks matters—I no longer find the manslaughter v. murder comparison as sufficiently explanatory in and of itself. I need debaters to implicate relinks to me in terms of one's own framework or solvency.

• Read good framework, don’t double turn yourself, have a solvent alternative.

• When answering the K, and especially if you weren’t expecting it, realize that there is still a lot of offense that can be leveraged in your favor. Never think that a K is an automatic ballot so do the pre- v. post fiat analysis for me, weigh the case against the K and tell me why policymaking is a good thing, and call out their shady alternative.

• I think that teams that want to run these types of arguments should exhibit a form of true understanding and scholarship in the form of accessible explanations if you want me to evaluate these arguments fairly but also I'm not necessarily the arbiter of that—it just reflects in how you debate.

Speaks

• Speaker points are awarded on strategy, warranting, and weighing. As a general rule: substance > style.

• The path to a 30 probably includes really clean extensions and explanations of warrants, collapsing, weighing.

• Any speed is fine but word economy is important—something I've been considering more lately.
• Not utilizing your full speech time likely caps you at a 28. Use the time that has been allotted to you!

• Despite this, I am pretty easily compelled by the litany of literature that indicate speaker points reify oppression and am pretty receptive to any theoretical argument about subverting such systems.

• I don't have solid data to back this up but I believe my threshold for high speaker points for second speakers is pretty high. See above about doing quality extension and weighing work.
• Sorta unserious but I wanna judge a nebel T debate in Parli really bad—30s if you can pull it off!

• My current speaks average aggregated across both Parli & PF is 28.7 [H/L = 30/27; n=234; last updated 09.24.23].

Points of Information/Order

• PLEASE take at least two POIs. I don't really care how many off case positions you're running or how much "you have to get through" but you can't put it off until the end of your speech, sit down, and then get mad at your opponents for misunderstanding your arguments if you never clarified what it was in the first place. On the flip side, I won't flow POIs, so it's up to you to use them strategically.

• Tag teaming is fine; what this looks like is up to you.

• Call the P.O.O.—I won't protect the flow.

Fun Parli Data Stuff, inspired by GR (last updated 02.15.23):

• Rounds Judged: n = 170
• Aff Prelim Ballots (Parli): 72 (42.35%)
• Neg Prelim Ballots (Parli): 98 (57.65%)
• Aff Elim Ballots (Parli): 26 (50.00%)*
• Neg Elim Ballots (Parli): 26 (50.00%)*

Feel free to use this to analyze general trends, inform elim flips, or for your "fairness uniqueness."

*this is pretty cool to me, i guess i'm not disposed to one side or another during elims ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

For anything not covered here, feel free to ask me before the round!

Boba Tea Fan | TOC 21 | Stanford 25 | He/Him | BA Candidate International Relations | BS Candidate Economics

bwthomas@stanford.edu

Questions about anything? Ask me before the round.

Parli Section for Berkeley:

Hi all! If you're a Parli debater, you can safely ignore everything other than this paragraph + the next paragraph, since all of that is meant for policy, and policy requires...detailed...paradigms. I really enjoy debate, so as long as you give it your all, I will too. I am pretty ideologically neutral, so just make good arguments and you will win. What you need to know about me is that I was a policy debater throughout high school, so while I am not expecting you to line by line like this is policy, I will view the debate in a fairly technical way. Another result of this is that I do not care if you make claims that are unintuitive on face, as long as you win them. Finally, I think correctly identifying what arguments you actually need to win the round and throwing the rest to the wayside is a a sign of skilled debating, not cowardice, and I appreciate this. I currently compete in British Parliamentary and APDA, which has moderated my policy influences to an extent, but just remember that I love the flow lol

If you run theory you need a clear interpretation and you need to clearly explain the relationship between the interpretation and the impacts.If you just say buzzwords, you will lose. Your job is to convince me to literally intervene in a debate. My bar for intervention scales with the intervention you request. It will be hard to make me drop a team even if you go all-in on theory. Asking me to interpret fiat a certain way, by contrast, is pretty easy.

Important Things:

--Most judges do impact calc backwards. Your claim has 0% probability even after you presented it and your warrants and evidence build this up. Bad evidence and arguments have marginal impacts on this even if the other team drops them. This means I will vote aff/neg on even analytic defense if it levels the argument. I very rarely will assign an argument as true or false, instead I will assign a probability range to it and evaluate accordingly. If you need more elaboration about this, I basically agree with everything my dude Vincent Xiao has in his top level section, except I am fine with death good.

--I will read all of your evidence, but only evaluate the highlighted words. I also care who your authors are and if you do not make qual comparisons, I will. This means if you cut a blog post or an op-ed, I will not evaluate it differently than an analytic and I will reward you for cutting peer reviewed journals in the relevant subject area. Numbers and data are good. "X" author is biased or a hack is a real argument I care about, but only if you have reasons why they are wrong.

--CX is binding and underutilized. I will flow it. Being unable to explain how something links to an impact, what the alt actually does, etc. are all things that will count against you.

--Reasonability means that I determine whether the just the aff interp is good or bad by looking at the offense it generates versus the offense against it. Competing Interps means I evaluate the world of the C/I versus the world of the Interp. This means whether you win reasonability is significant in front of me, since it is not a gut check and if you read T blocks assuming reasonability is a gut check your offense will fall flat.

--More good is better than less good. This is the only argument required in most framing debates. Don't be scared to just use Util for impact calc. Most rounds you won't really win extinction without a concerted effort, so I care about impacts deeper in the chain. Do more people die becoming climate refugees than would die in the US-China war?

--You can read your K Aff and I am probably at least familiar with the lit. I am highly familiar with cap, semiocap, and biopolitics. See K/FW section for more detailed thoughts.

--Buzzwords are almost always an excuse for not explaining your argument. If you tell me X obfuscates Y or that Z is a libidinal investment I do not care unless you explain and implicate the argument. These are claims absent further elaboration.

--I will not evaluate things that happened out of round. You can talk about your identity, but not that of anybody else. If you do, it will be reflected in your speaker points.

--If you try to avoid clash by being sneaky, I will intervene to punish you because this is anti-educational and you're wasting everyone's time. If you hide aspec under T, turn a case card into a separate K, etc. and blow it up in the block I will just give the other team new answers. If you aren't sure if something falls into the sneaky category, it does.

-Clash gets speaks.

-I like debate, so my decision will probably take a while. Most judges will be lazy and go with their gut feeling. I will not. I will play close attention as long as the debate is good.

K Affs:

--I have not seen a K Aff I do not believe loses to presumption. Most K Affs make broad impact claims without any--or at best, an ambiguous--solvency mechanism. I will reward 2NR presumption pushes.

--I will punish you for explaining your Aff in the 2AC. Anything I can't clearly trace back to a clear 1AC argument will be evaluated as new and as analytic.

--Most K Affs are use deliberately impenetrable language to make simple claims. Explain and implicate your argument or I will have to do it for you.

--Nontrad is fine, but only in your speech. Don't go overtime or interrupt the other team. That is against the rules and I will just give you an L.

--Please do not spread poetry. It's actually just disrespectful to the poets. Additionally, performance for the sake of performance has proliferated in K debate. Absent reasons why your performance matters, I will just evaluate it as analytics and maybe give you some speaks if it was cool.

--State good is a convincing case turn against every K Aff.

--You get perms in methods debates, but only if they make sense given your 1AC.

FW:

--Clash of Civ Debates are stale from groupthink and a lack of basic critical thinking on both sides. If this is you, I will be frustrated, give you bad speaks, and you will probably lose.

--FW is about Models of Debate. The K aff does not garner offense from the 1AC, but from the model of debate generated by their C/I. Likewise, FW is not about whether the 1AC was debatable. Absent a clearly defined C/I that makes sense I will probably conclude you do not access your offense. If your counterinterp is arbitrary and does not have a resolutional basis, you will lose absent a highly effective impact turn to a resolutional stasis point. I am significantly better for Baudrillard-esque arguments than most other K affs.

--Theory precedes content. In a FW debate, the aff is no longer relevant. I will hold this line even with affs that claim to have in-round solvency, even if this is conceded. This becomes messy if cards are crossapplied as offense on FW, but in this case I only care about clearly crossapplied and explained elements. I will never vote on external offense if FW is lost. I will also never let you go for offense against the neg reading FW in the first place. You do not get to pick an aff that forces the neg into one hypergeneric and then say they can't read it. I don't care what your reasoning is.

--Because of the way I evaluate impacts, fairness FW is viable in front of me, but I think Miles (Cal FG) style FW with larger external impacts like movements or conflict resolution is a stronger argument.

Ks on Neg:

--Framework debates usually feel like a prescripted formality. I have the same concerns as with K Affs: does your counterinterp make sense? Frameworks that are clearly arbitrary and self-serving are non-starters (e.g., ROB is to align with Blackness). I can be persuaded by any variation of the epistemology FW interps, but winning the aff is good is offense under these interps unless the neg also wins consequentialism is bad. Affs should read epistemology offense. If your epistemology is realist and realism is good and I vote based on epistemology, then I should vote aff.

--Alt debate is a lost art. A good alt generates offense against the aff via mutual exclusivity. If you can't generate uniqueness with either FW or an alt I vote neg unless you have a specific link turns case scenario. Affs should use the world of the alt as offense -- if the alt destroys the state or capitalism and these are good and outweigh the K, the aff wins.

--2NCs should have cards. If I can't trace your arguments to evidence, that's a problem especially when you make incredibly broad claims.

--Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. We should destroy everything about the status quo and replace it? Your alt card needs to be fire. Structural claims, ontology claims, etc., need to be explained with structural or ontological evidence--X thing happened one time does not prove structures or ontology.

--Most kritiks are incredibly Eurocentric and international examples invalidate their claims. I am probably going to be a history minor, so calling out ahistorical claims that abound in K debate also goes a long way, especially the genetic fallacy.

--Perms should be specific and have clear ways they work.

--Specific links, especially with quotes, are great.

T:

--Unless T is contrived, I am a good judge for it.

--Caselists and explanations are great.

--T is actually a impact debate most of the time.

--Most T evidence is really bad. Use this to your advantage

CP:

--I love a CP that actually clashes with the aff. CPs that do the opposite of the aff are really cool.

--Cheating CPs are cheating. Please don't read them in the first place. I am easily convinced by theory and will be very forgiving of 1AR timeskew.

--I won't judgekick. If you read an advocacy, defend it or don't.

--Unlimited or arbitrary condo is probably bad. Go ahead and go for condo. X number of condo limits are unconvincing because they are never not arbitrary.

--PICS are cool but why not just read it as a DA? You can probably change my mind.

DA:

--A complete DA has uniqueness, link, (internal links) and an impact. Multiple of these can be in a card, but if they're not all in the 1NC you don't have a real argument. It's going to be difficult to go for that in front of me, especially in the 1NR.

--If you want extinction from nuclear war or climate change you have to earn it with real evidence and a clear reason you access it (why is this aff key to climate change broadly?). Reading Ng 19 with 15 words highlighted is not earning an extinction impact. However, if you win it I will reward you. Extinction is really bad!

--Extinction is not infinitely bad -- there is still value in the universe (unless you really make a push there is not) -- it is just [insert very large number] bad.

--Less buzzwords, more tell me why your DA matters more than the aff.

--Turns case is a lost art. Please spend some time on DA turns case.

Pronouns: He/Him/His.

* note for TOC * judge paradigms that include things like "I will drop you if you run a kritik," you just don't want black, indigenous, and students of color to access this space and it shows.

Specifics for Parli:

I am the Head Coach of Parliamentary Debate at the Nueva School.

ON THE LAY VS. FLOW/ TECH FIGHT: Both Lay (Rhetorical, APDA, BP, Lay) and Tech (Flow, NPDA, Tech) can be called persuasive for different reasons. That is, the notion that Lay is persuasive and Tech is something else or tech is inherently exclusionary because it is too narrowly focused on the minutiae of arguments is frankly non-sense, irksome, and dismissive of those who don’t like what the accuser does. I think the mudslinging is counter-productive. Those who do debate and teach it are a community. I believe we ought to start acting like it. I have voted for tech teams over lay teams and lay teams over tech teams numerous times. One might say that I do both regularly. Both teams have the responsibility to persuade me. I have assumptions which are laid out in this paradigm. I am always happy to answer specific or broad questions before the round and I am certain that I ask each team if they would like to pose such questions before EVERY round. I do not want to hear complaints about arguments being inaccessible just because they are Ks or theoretical. Likewise, I do not want to hear complaints that just because a team didn’t structure their speeches in the Inherency, Link, Internal Link, Impact format those arguments shouldn’t be allowed in the round.

Resolution Complications: Parli is tough partly because it is hard to write hundreds of resolutions per year. A very small number of people do the bulk of this for the community, myself being one of them. I am sympathetic to both the debaters and the topic writers. If the resolution is skewed, the debater has to deal with the skew in some fashion. This can mean running theory or a K. It can also mean building a very narrow affirmative and going for high probability impacts or solvency and just winning that level of the debate. There are ways to win in most cases, I don’t believe that the Aff should be guaranteed all of the specific ground they could be. Often times these complaints are demands to debate what one is already familiar with and avoid the challenge of unexplored intellectual territory. Instead, skew should be treated as a strategic thinking challenge. I say this because I don’t have the power to change the resolution for you. My solution is to be generous to K Affs, Ks, and theory arguments if there is clear skew in one direction or another.

Tech over truth. I will not intervene. Consistent logic and completed arguments these are the things which are important to me. Rhetorical questions are neither warrants nor evidence. Ethos is great and I’ll mark you on the speaker points part of the ballot for that, but the debate will be won and lost on who did the better debating.

Evidence Complications: All evidence is non-verifiable in Parli. So, I can’t be sure if someone is being dishonest. I would not waste your time complaining about another teams’ evidence. I would just indict it and win the debate elsewhere on the flow. However, there are things that I can tell you aren’t good evidence: WIKIPEDIA, for example. Marking and naming the credentials of your sources is doable and I will listen to you.

Impacts are important and solvency is important. I think aff cases, CPs, Ks should have these things for me to vote on them. If the debate has gone poorly, I highly advise debaters to complete (terminalize) an impact argument. This will be the first place I go when I start evaluating after the debate. Likewise, inherency is important. If you don’t paint me a picture of a problem(s) that need solving, should I vote for you? No, I shouldn’t. Make sure you are doing the right sorts of storytelling to win the round.

If there is time, I ALWAYS give an oral RFD which teams are ALWAYS free to record unless I say otherwise. I will do my best to also provide written feedback, but my hope is that the recorded oral will be better. I do not disclose in prelims unless the tournament makes me.

My presumption is that theory comes first unless you tell me otherwise. I’m more than happy to vote on K Framework vs. Theory first debates in both directions.

I flow POI answers.

Basically, I will vote for anything if it’s a completed argument. But, I don’t like voting on technicalities. If your opponent clearly won the holistic flow, I’m not going to vote on a blippy extension that I don’t’ understand or couldn’t summarize back to you simply.

Speaker points:

BE NICE AND PROFESSIONAL. Debate is not a competitive, verbal abuse match. Debaters WILL be punished on speaker points for being rude (beyond the normal flare of intense speeches) or abusive. Example: saying your opponent is wrong or is misguided is fine. Saying they are stupid is not. Laughing at opponents is bullying and unprofessional. Don’t do it.

Theory:

I’m more than happy to evaluate anything. I prefer education voters to fairness voters. It is “reject the argument” unless you tell me otherwise. Tell me what competing interpretations and reasonability mean. I’m not confident most know what it means. So, I’m not going to guess. Theory should not be used as a tool of exclusion. I don’t like Friv-theory in principle although I will vote on it. I would vastly prefer links that are real, interps that are real, and a nuanced discussion of scenarios which bad norms create. Just saying “neg always loses” isn’t enough. Tell me why and how that would play out.

Counter Plans:

Delay CPs and Consult CPs are evil, but I will vote for them.

The CP needs to be actually competitive. You also need a clear CP text. Actual solvency arguments will be much rewarded and comparative solvency arguments between the CP and the Plan will be richly rewarded.

DAs:

Uniqueness does actually matter. Simplicity is your friend. Signpost what is what and have legitimate links. Give me a clear internal link story. TERMINALIZE IMPACTS. This means someone has to die, be dehumanized, etc.. If the other team has terminalized impacts and you don’t, very often, you are going to lose.

Kritiques:

I was a K debater in college, but I have come around to be more of a Case, DA, Theory coach. I also have a Ph.D in History and wrote a dissertation on the History of Capitalism. What does that mean? It means, I can understand your K and I am absolutely behind the specific sort of education that Ks provide. That being said a few caveats.

Out of round discussion is a false argument and I really don’t want to vote for it. Please don’t make me.

Performances are totally fine and encouraged. But, they had better be real. Being in the round talking isn’t enough, you need warrants as to why the specific discussion we are having in the debate on XYZ topic is uniquely fruitful. Personal narratives are fine. If you are going to speak in a language other than English, please provide warrants as to why that is productive for me AND your opponents. I speak Japanese, I will not flow arguments given in that language.

I would prefer that you actually have a rough understanding of what you are reading. I don't think you should get to win because you read the right buzzwords.

Alternatives:

Alternatives need to be real. If they put offense on the Alt, you are stuck with that offense and have to answer it. Perms probably link into the K, please don’t make me vote for a bad perm.

Impacts:

I am less likely to vote against an aff on a K for something they might do. I am very likely to vote on rhetoric turns, i.e. stuff they did do. That is, if you are calling them racist and they say something racist, please point it out. Your impacts compete, but that doesn’t mean that you don’t have to answer their theory arguments or make your own. I would encourage you to show how your impacts compete pre- and post-fiat. Fiat isn’t illusory unless you make it so and extend it.

There is also a difference between calling the aff bad or it’s ideology bad and the debater a bad person. In general, debaters should proceed as if everyone is acting in good faith. That doesn’t mean that rhetoric links don’t function or that I won’t vote on the K if you accuse your opponent of promoting bad norms--intellectual, ideological, social, cultural, political, etc.. However, if one takes the pedagogical and ethical assumptions of the K seriously, Ks should not be used as a weapon of exclusion. No one has more of a right to debate than another. To argue otherwise is to weaponize the K. We want to exclude those norms and that knowledge which are violent and destructive to communities and individuals. We also probably want to exclude those who intentionally spread bad norms and ideology. However, I severely doubt that a 15-year-old in a high school debate round in 2022 is guaranteed to understand the full theoretical implications of a given K or their actions. As such, attacking the norms and ideology (e.g. the aff or res or debate) is a much better idea. It opens the door to educate others rather than just beating them. It creates healthy norms wherein we can become a stronger and more diverse community.

Framework:

I love clean framework debates. I hate sloppy ones. If you are running a K, you probably need to put out a framework block. I would love to have that on a separate sheet of paper.

Links:

Links of omission are vexing. There is almost always a way to generate a link to your K based on something specifically in the aff case. Please put the work in on this front.

Case:

I love case debate, a lot. Terminal defense usually isn’t enough to win you the debate. But defensive arguments are necessary to build up offensive ones in many cases. Think hard about whether what you’re running as a DA might be better served as a single case turn. Please be organized. I flow top of case and the advantages on a separate sheet.

Specifics for Public Forum:

Please give me overviews and tell me what the most important arguments are in the round.

Evidence:

Unless we are in Finals or Semis, I'm not going to read your evidence. I'm evaluating the debate, not the research that you did before the debate. If the round is really tight and everyone did a good job, I am willing to use quality of evidence as a tie-breaker. However, in general, I'm not going to do the work for you by reading the evidence after the round. It's your responsibility to narrate what's going on for me and to collapse down appropriately so that you have time to do that. If you feel like you don't have time to tell me a complete story, especially on the impact level, you are probably going for too much.

Refutation consistency:

I don't have strong opinions regarding whether you start refutation or defense in the second or third speech. However, if things are tight, I will reward consistent argumentation and denser argumentation. That means the earlier you start an argument in the debate, the higher the likelihood that I will vote on it. Brand new arguments in the 4th round of speeches are not going to get much weight.

Thresholds for voting on solvency:

PF has evidence and for good reason. But, that doesn't mean that you can just extend a few buzzwords on your case if you are going for solvency and win. You have to tell me what your key terms mean. I don't know what things like "inclusive growth" or "economic equity" or "social justice" mean in the context of your case unless you tell me. You have 4 speeches to give me these definitions. Take the time to spell this stuff out. Probably best to do this in the first speech. Remember, I'm not going to read your evidence after the round except in extreme circumstances and even then...don't count on it. So, you need to tell me what the world looks like if I vote Pro or Con both in terms of good and bad outcomes.

Theory:

I haven't come across any theory in PF yet that made any sense. I'm experienced in theory for Policy and Parli. If there are unique variations of theory for PF, take the time to explain them to me.

Kritiques:

There isn't really enough speaking time to properly develop a fleshed out K in PF. However, I would be more than happen to just vote on impact turns like Cap Bad, for example. If you want to run K arguments, I would encourage you to do things of that sort rather than a fully shelled out K.

Specifics for Circuit Policy:

Evidence: I'm not going to read your cards, it's on you to read them clearly enough for me to understand them. You need to extend specific warrants from the cards and tell me what they say. Blippy extensions of tag lines aren't enough to get access to cards.

Speed:

Go nuts. I can keep up with any speed as long as you are clear.

For all other issues see my parli paradigm, it's probably going to give you whatever you want to know.

Specifics for Lay Policy:

I do not understand the norm distinctions between what you do and circuit policy.

As such, I'm going to judge your rounds just like I would any Policy round --> Evidence matters, offense matters more than defense, rhetoric doesn't matter much. Rhetorical questions or other forms of unwarranted analysis will not be flowed. You need to extend arguments and explain them. If you have specific questions, please ask.

TL;DR I have some experience and am a progressive judge, so you can do whatever as long as you make sure you explain things and have warrants. The best way to get my ballot is generating lots of offense and doing good weighing / impact comparison. If you're looking at this right before a round trying to decide on your strategy, run whatever you want.

Experience:

-3 years Parli at Ashland HS (Oregon); broke at TOC my senior year

-4 years NFA LD (basically solo policy) at Lewis & Clark; 2022 National Champion

-3 years as head coach at Catlin Gabel HS

-Current law student, if that matters

-Well over 100 rounds judged; 37-5 on the winning side when judging on elim panels.

Main Judging Philosophy:

Progressive/Flow judge. I vote on the flow and will vote for you if you win. Do that however you want; just make sure you sufficiently explain your arguments so they are actual arguments rather than claims with no warrants.

Please collapse in your final speeches! It makes things so much cleaner, and if you give me a clear path to the ballot instead of trying to messily go for everything, it will only help you. Same for weighing: if you weigh your impacts things will be so much cleaner and easier for me to vote for you.

Ks are fine on the aff or neg. Framework is fine. T is fine. Theory is fine. DAs and CPs are fine. Tricks are fine. It's all fine just make the arguments you want to make.

Speed is fine. I'd like to be on the email chain or file sharing if applicable. For Parli, please slow down on tags and important texts (e.g., plan texts, topicality interps, etc.)

Misc:

Disclaimer: if you say anything blatantly racist/sexist/homophobic/transphobic or generally bigoted I will give you zero speaker points and you will lose. Just be nice please.

Note that I do not always flow author names, so when extending cards, please give me the tagline or reference what the card actually says rather than just saying "extend Smith 21." I don't want to have to look for it in the doc.

Happy to answer detailed questions before the round! Just trying to keep this short.

I'm Sarah, I did CX for 3.5 years in high school, 2 years in college at JMU doing NDT/CEDA, and then just under 2 years of NPDA at Western Washington University ending as a semifinalist with my partner in 2020. I've been coaching middle school and high school parli for the last 4ish years.

Prefs-

Now that we're back to in-person tournaments, please feel free to ask me any specific questions before the round starts if there's anything I can clarify.

this is still a work in progress

On the K-
I'm most familiar with MLM, however I can keep up with and evaluate most everything. I know the framework tricks, if you know how to use them. I have a high threshold for links of omission. I default aff doesn't get to weigh the aff against the K, unless told otherwise. I see role of the ballot arguments as an independent framing claim to frame out offense. I default to perms as tests of competitions, and not as independent advocacies. For K affs-you don't need to have topic harms if your framework has sufficient reasons to reject the res, but from my experience running nontopical affs I find it more strategic if you do have specific justifications to reject the res (I guess that distinction is more relevant for parli).

On theory-
I default to competing interps over reasonability, unless told otherwise. I have kind of a high threshold for reasonability, especially when neg teams have racist/incorrect interpretations of how debate history has occurred in order to justify reactionary positions. If you have me judging parli-I default to drop the debater; and if you have me judging policy/LD-I default to drop the argument. I default to text of the interp. Parli specific: (if no weighing, do I default to LOC or MG theory? I'll come back and answer this). I don't default to fairness and education as voters, if you just read standards, then I don't have a way to externally weigh the work you're doing on that flow. I default theory apriori, but I have a relatively low threshold for arguments to evaluate other layers of the flow first. I default to "we meet" arguments working similarly to link arguments, the negative can still theoretically win risk of a violation, especially under competing interps. For disclosure arguments-I have a very high threshold for voting on this argument in parli, given that it's nearly non-verifiable. For other formats, I think disclosure and the wiki are good norms. In general, admittedly I have a high threshold for voting on t-framework.

General/case stuff-
Case-CPs don't get to kick out of particular planks of their CP in the block, if there are multiple. I default to no judge-kick. Given no work done in the round, uniqueness matters more than impacts. Fiat is durable.

I default to impact weighing in this order if no work is done in the round: probability, magnitude, timeframe.

If I am judging you in an event that you read evidence in the round-if there's card-clipping, it's likely to be an auto-drop. If you misconstrue evidence, I won't intervene but I'll have a low threshold for voting on it if the other team brings it up.

They/them

Quals: Been doing nat circuit coaching and competing since 2019

Theory: I don't feel strongly about things like condo, dispo, or anything as such. Stonger feelings I do have are event specific and listed at the end of the paradigm. I have a list of defaults but I can def be persuaded otherwise.

• Topicality comes before other forms of theory (like spec!)
• 1NC theory comes before 1AR/2AC theory
• Competing interps > reasonability
• Text > Spirit of the interp
• Drop the debater > Drop the argument
• Meeting the interp is terminal defense
• Theory comes before substance
• Fairness and education are voters
• No RVIs

K Debate: Sure! I was mainly a K debater when I competed. I'm pretty tired of hearing post-structuralist nonsense that amounts to inclusive oppression or do nothing. Cap debates are done wrong in many debates for a lot of the same reasons.

• Reject alts are fine but have a pretty low chance of winning my ballot short of conceding alt solvency.
• I think debates can be won on frame outs paired with a risk of solvency.
• Don't care for role of the ballot debates, however, if done right they can still win rounds if you go for it as a question of whether or not the other team textually meets the role of the ballot. Almost like theory!
• I still don't know what no perms in a methods debate means!
• Critical affs dont need links to the topic if theres substantive framing that justifies the aff.
• Links can be disads to the perm but tell me why!

Case:

• Fiat is durable
• Stock issues are not my favorite path to the ballot
• I don't judge kick counter plans unless told to
• kicking planks in a plan or counter plan is cool unless someone wins a theory violation

LD Specific: A couple of quick notes

• You should disclose. I wont auto vote on disclosure but I'll have a high threshold for responses to it
• Either flash analytics or slow down/clear because I'm not going to get the 2 page long overview at 670 WPM
• I evaluate most tricks like theory interps

Parli Specific: I've had these happen enough times back to back that if you do these things its either an auto L and/or 25 speaks

• Reading a K Aff then going for 2AC theory and impact turns to T at the same time when they have the same impact
• Reading a neg perm gets you 25 speaks. Going for it gets you an L.
• Disclosure theory because theres no speech docs or wiki in parli, how do I even verify it!
• Speed bad theory gets you 25 speaks but an auto L if you're an open circuit debater who spreads and read speed bad
• K's bad theory gets you 25 speaks.

MISC: A couple of ground rules!

• Don't read Afropess/social death claims if you're not black
• Not voting on cap good
• Not voting on heg good
• Not voting on racism good
• Terminal defense is hard to win
• Give me pen time

My name is Connor (he/him) and I have four years of high school parli debate experience. During that time I considered myself to be a "flay" debater, meaning that while I did use theory and other technical arguments I almost always structured my debates around case. As a judge, I will evaluate any arguments that you can prove are important.

Case

• I love good case debate with warranted uniqueness, a strong link chain, clearly terminalized impacts, and organized clash on the line-by-line

• Organization will boost your speaks

• I generally like when people collapse on a few impacts in their voters

• I assume probability>magnitude>time frame>reversibility if not told otherwise

• Please do impact calculus

Counterplans

• Please have a specific counterplan text. It would also be ideal if you could give a hardcopy to me and the other team if it's a particularly complex one

• Try to be mutually exclusive, run perms as a test of competition

• Run theory against CPs you think are abusive

Theory

• Love theory with a clear interp, standards, and voter issues

• I probably have a higher threshold for friv theory than most, but will still vote on it

• My default is competing interpretations, if you argue for reasonability give me a brightline

Ks

• Assume I know nothing about your lit base, Ks were never my area of expertise

• Please try not to run something super generic, tell me how the aff or the res applies to your argument

• Signpost as clearly as possible

Speed

• Ok with some speed, but probably can’t keep up with spreading

• I would encourage you to call “slow” or “clear” on the other team if needed

Misc

• I flow answers to POIs

• Call POOs if the new argument is borderline

• Answer a POI or two in your constructive speeches

• Tag teaming is fine, just make sure the speaker ultimately says everything

Feel free to approach me before the round with any questions or concerns and I'll be happy to answer.

I have been coaching Parli, NFALD, and IPDA for several years, before that I competed in all three, so I've seen a lot. Mostly a flow judge.

Historical references make me happy because history provides a framework from which discussions can grow. Misuse of historical warrants makes me sad because bad faith arguments are the death of civilized society.

I definitely prefer case debate. Those who are careful about choosing their ground will find it fairly easy to win my ballot.

I sometimes vote on theory if I think that the AFF has questionable topicality, but it's always important to consider the time tradeoffs, because everyone will get confused if the whole debate is just theoretical.

I occasionally vote on a K, but only if you make it CLEAR and explain the theories plainly, for the judges AND your opponents. Respect is the key word here. I’m not a fan of abusive frameworks that are designed to box the other team out of the debate, so I'll probably look for a way to weigh case directly against the K because I believe that's the most functional way to view debate.

Evidence blocks are good because some facts work well together and this increases the efficiency of listing warrants... But canned arguments in Parli make me sad because there's an event for that and it's called LD. Having a favorite argument is not the same as having a canned argument, it's all about when and how you use it.

I basically never vote on RVIs, they're infinitely regressive and boring to hear.

This is a sport for talking; part of my job as a judge is to provide a theoretically level playing field which adheres to the rules of the event.

So... Tabula Rasa, but I'm still a debate coach doing the writing on that blank slate.

both sides need to eat more fruit they look malnourished

paradigm lol https://docs.google.com/document/d/13yNM4bIspRBuLD2AH2PAhv5JZzOYJIPEd2rTdz59TwM/edit?usp=sharing

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tf why does only the sparkle emoji work