UHSAA 1A2A3A State Debate 23
2023 — Ogden, UT/US
Policy Paradigm List
All Paradigms: Show HideAssistant coach at Rowland Hall.
I am currently a student at the University of Utah majoring in both classical philology and German. I love language, both as a heuristic tool and as a vehicle for persuasion. I debated at Weber State University (2017-2019) for Ryan Wash (whom I can only aspire to imitate as an adjudicator in each and every debate I judge) and at Copper Hills High School (2014-2017) for Scott Odekirk.
I will for nearly no reason insert anything I think independent of the debate round into my decision or evaluation of said round. I don't care if you think something is a bad argument or morally suspect, if either of these things are true in context of the round it should simply be easy to beat. This applies to most all things, illogical or not. This also means I have a low threshold for what needs to be said to beat a bad argument.
Tech > Truth ... BUT it will be nigh impossible to convince me to vote for a factually untrue argument.
I strongly believe that debate is a game which you can choose to approach however you would like. Because of this, you should attempt to win in any way possible. PIK's, theory, cheating CP's are all fair game if you can defend them (some are easier to defend than others of course).
Framework when not contextualized to the AFF being read in the round is pretty much never going to persuade me. Framework debate has become too formulaic and repetitive resulting in facsimiles of prior debates playing out against different AFF's sometimes three times a tournament. Some blocks and card extensions are obviously universally applicable, but they still need some case specific analysis done for the round that is happening. The ability to make unique arguments on the spot is a sign of a good debater. This all goes doubly so for K's.
K AFF specifics: 1. I need to know what it means to vote AFF before the end of the 2AR or I will just vote NEG on presumption. 2. Impact turns to framework are good and your best way to winning my ballot. 3. There must be a role for the negative which you have clearly outlined at some point in the round (the negative can argue that it is bad, but it must exist). [EXCEPTION: If your argument is that the negative should not exist at all (hard to convince me this is good)].
Framework specifics: 1. There are many impacts to framework, but the best of them is fairness. 2. Good TVA's need evidence. 3. Extend your interp in the 2NR and read good definitions in the 1NC.
Framework update (12/06/2023): I have found myself voting neg in framework debates far more than I used to. I think that this is due to K AFF's being more unfair to debate against because teams have decided to provide less and less ground to the negative. DEBATE IS A GAME. I think competitive incentives overdetermine ALL of the value most K AFF's think they have. That being said, I still vote AFF on the K when NEG teams go for contrived, unarticulated framework shells that are non-responsive to the debate at hand OR when the 2NR mishandles a bunch of impact turns to their model of debate.
Misc. Arguments:
- The 1AR is allowed new responses if the 1NC reads an embedded ASPEC sentence on a topicality shell and it is NOT flagged. Stop doing this.
- 50 state fiat is a reason to reject the argument not the team.
- No inserting re-highlightings, you MUST read them or they DO NOT exist.
- If you have to ask what cards were read or marked that is CX time. Learn to flow.
1 CARD MAXIMUM IN THE BODY OF THE E-MAIL!!!! DO NOT ASK.
My speaker points scale, while fairly average (majority 28's), can easily be increased with humour. What ever happened to debaters being funny and persuasive in round, and why are these two things not more intricately connected with one another? Also, don't go faster than you know you should, slurring your speech at 400WPM will not help you win a round, focus on making good concise arguments with less filler and you won't need to force yourself to talk at Mach 10.
I am okay with any kind of debate, as long as you can explain it well. I did two years of high school LD, one year of policy in college, and I have coached more or less 4 years. If I can't understand you then I can't flow your arguments. If I can't flow your arguments I can't vote for them.