Update: Here's some SetCol lectures and links to hella lit I compiled a while ago:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1UzbBrwOK3BDTgMTgV2KNnS14BiLKb4e1

Update: If you love to run theory in LD, you probably should strike me.

I've never particularly liked theory, but over the last couple years theory in LD has turned into a profoundly uneducational whine-off that devolves into students running baseless accusations of "abuse". Especially in a time where debaters are starting to call out real life abuse they may face from the debate community, it's becoming harder and harder for me to stomach rewarding "their definition is abusive because now I have to run theory and that's a time skew" (which is self-fulfilling) type theory arguments with a ballot. I firmly believe that the discourse we use in rounds can shape our worldviews and community norms. "Abuse", a term that should carry significance, is subconsciously rendered meaningless because it's flippantly tossed around to win a ballot. It develops connotations of self-serving technicalities that I firmly believe seep into how we view people speaking out about real abuse.
(It occurred to me that some debaters may want to borrow the above paragraph, so if you do, please keep the cutting I've bolded to avoid accidentally misrepresenting the argument.)

Short version: I’m a flow judge down with most K’s, spreading, CPs (condo or uncondo) narratives, performance, and projects. If you bite into your own K, you're screwed. For the love of coffee, SIGNPOST. Don’t run bad science. I love IR and current events. I hate Eurocentric perspectives. Theory debate is meh at the best of times when it’s done well and downright painful when it’s done poorly or unnecessarily. (update: just don't run theory in front of me) I really don’t have a strong opinion one way or the other on RVI’s. Topicality: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ . Weigh impacts. I will listen to whatever you have to say as long as it is well supported, do not just assume certain things are good or bad. Case debate is fun. Framework debate is interesting, whoever wins framework controls how I will view the round and usually gets my ballot. I’m incredibly non-interventionist (unless someone’s winning the “the judge should be a critical intellectual” arg, then be prepared for what intellect you have unleashed.) and rarely vote on presumption, unless something egregious happens in round. Don’t be a jackass - at this point, and especially given how misogynistic debatespace can be, if you're excessively rude to your opponent I am not going to reward that type of behavior with a ballot if it's an otherwise close round. Like, it's not that hard to not be a jerk, it usually saves you time.

Last thing - lots of teams have been running Indigenous something or other in front of me. I guess they inherently assume this is good judge adaptation. It frequently is not. If you are planning on doing this, please scroll down to the bottom and read my opinions on this instead of telling me how to think about my own identity.

(Also, I like a lot of different things. I'm super nerdy. Please don't feel constrained in the breadth of arguments you can run in front of me; there's more to me than my race. *cries single tear*)

^you’ll probably be fine with just that, the rest is provided for kicks and giggles.
Launching the Logorrhea

Use your head! Analysis: I want to see critical engagement with the literature. Don’t just say that something is true or desirable because some author said so. Explain what you are arguing in your own words, tell me why it matters and why it is important to be heard in this round. Blippy arguments aren’t going to have much punch. When you extend, restate the analysis; I dislike extending points for the sake of just having stuff on the flow, tell me why it’s important in the round.

Disads: I want a clear link/internal link story. This is often lacking in politics disads, which are interesting when done well and awful when they’re like “voting for this bill drains the president’s political capital”. Be specific and intrinsic. Impact calc is important as is reminding me why I should be weighing all this under your framework. I’m not tied to Probability >Magnitude or Manitude>Probability – you convince me which one I should prioritize. Timeframe can be a good tie-breaker for this.

Theory: See update at the top. If you run it, please make sure it's warranted. I have voted on it and will if it isn't responded to, but it’s not exactly my favorite type of debate. Clarify what you mean by “reasonability” and why you are being more reasonable.

Non-topical Affs: Go for it. Extra-topical plans: If you’re all debating the resolution straight up, being extra-T isn’t very fair.

Let's be clear on the need for speed: I can handle pretty fast spread, just make sure to enunciate. I will yell clear if needed, but after 2 or 3 "clears" you will start losing speaks if you don’t listen. Please don’t spread out teams that can’t spread; it’s mean and I will be mean back to you on the ballot.

Speak up! I award speaker points for content, strategy, and structure more than talking pretty.Let's all play nice. Watch your rhetoric; anything racist, sexist, xenophobic, homophobic, abelist, or transphobic will nuke your speaks. My speaks are generally higher than 26. 27-27.5 is average-proficient, 28 is awesome, 29 is " I really wanted to give you 30, but there was (blank) tiny issue". 29.5-30 means the round was pure beauty in motion.

RVI's: Ok, for whatever reason, this is like cilantro for most people in the debate community; they either think they're the best, most clever thing ever or that they're a horrible abomination. I really, seriously, don't have a strong opinion either way, I think it is very much a case by case situation.

K's: Feel more than free to be creative and unique, just make sure it makes sense. What I mean is that you should thoroughly understand what you are running, stay consistent with your framework, be able to handle the obvious questions it will incur. Back it up with analysis and justify why this is significant. It is always really obvious when somebody is running a case that was just handed to them by a coach or more senior competitor. I’m decently familiar with critical literature/arguments regarding Anthropocentrism, Ecofem, Indigeneity/Settler Colonialism, and Racial Positionality. I know little bits and pieces of other areas (like Disability Politics or Queer Theory – and a bunch of random stuff written by Marxist doctors on healthcare and neoliberalism; I had a weird summer in 2016.) and am more than happy to listen to whatever you want to run, I just might not be terribly familiar with the lit so make sure to clearly explain the thesis. Please feel free to ask me before the round if you want a clarification on my knowledge base. Furthermore, if you are critiquing somebody's rhetoric within the round and tell me that the role of the judge is to be a critical intellectual, don't bite into that rhetoric. It will end badly for you.
There are a few specific K's that I have more strict criteria for.
Nietzsche: Please for the love of all that is good in the world, don't run a Nietzsche K in front of me unless you have actually read some Nietzsche. All the bastardized embrace suffering stuff I hear all the time is not Nietzsche.
Give Back the Land/Decolonization: This can either be done really well or really poorly. A lot of the time, running this is pretty much just commodifying the suffering and exploitation and genocide of hundreds of Peoples for the ballot in a round. Please don't be one of those teams or I will drop you. Read “Decolonization is not a Metaphor” if you disagree with this and then think about what I said again. If you are running this case without any cards from Native authors, that is a serious paternalistic problem. It's also hard when the "plans" proposed don't leave room for biracial Native Americans, especially considering we have the highest "out-marriage" rates of any ethnicity. I don't wanna hear any "Noble Savage" type garbage. If you argue that we need to increase Indigenous knowledge production and all the stuff happening to Natives is really bad and oppressive and stuff, but you don't have a goddamn plan for tangibly reducing harm to people like me, stop talking. Things like rates of substance abuse, suicide, domestic violence, poverty,and cultural erasure have affected my life and my family and friends. THIS IS NOT A GAME TO ME. These are not arguments for your academic curiosity. These are real things that affect real people. I do not have the luxury to play with these concepts in academic abstraction, and I won't tolerate you doing so. If you want to argue in-round solutions, they better actually be solutions. None of this "we need to imagine a different government" BS. We have been imagining for a long time. If you are running this case to help rhetorically overthrow colonialist power structures and are actually representing Native voices, then you belong on the other half of the equation are running this case for the right reasons.

Also
Speed K's: Just have solid reasons for why your opponent spreading is abelist or exclusionary. If you have a disability that makes spreading either impossible for you to perform yourself or listen to/flow, if you have asked your opponent not to spread before the round, and your opponent still spreads, then yes absolutely run a speed K.

Quick thing on poetry- a lot of arguments I’ve heard against poetry being used in round are really classist and racist. I do not believe that poetry is only a tool of the elite and educated or that marginalized individuals who use it are traitor pawns of the ivory tower. Arguments that essentially boil down to “poetry is exclusionary because it’s bourgeoisie” are not going to work for me. Arguments that say poetry only embodies White ideals of beauty and that PoC poetry will inevitably be co-opted are viscerally offensive to me.
I won't drop you in the round if you run this, but I will drop the argument.

Narratives: Hell. Yes. I strongly believe narrative debate has an important role in asserting the voices of marginalized groups in academia. These are experiences and perspectives that the overwhelmingly wealthy white able cis/het male institutions of academia have isolated. Other authors publishing nuanced work on these topics can be rare, which is part of where narrartives come in to fill that gap. Narratives are NOT whining- narrative debate is a way for the debater to become a producer of knowledge. Talking about structural violence with first person language does not make these topics any less academic; somebody else does not need to study you for your problems to be worthy of being heard and debated.
That being said, if you are running a narrative – do NOT make sweeping assumptions about your opponents or judges, particularly in regards to things that nobody should have to feel forced to disclose about themselves to a room full of strangers, like mental health status, gender identity, sexual orientation, or a history of experiencing abuse/domestic violence. Your job is to attack power structures, and I have no tolerance for teams who invalidate their opponents' identities and their rights to display them how/when they choose to.

Please don't let the round turn into the Oppression Olympics. Don't let your args against narratives devolve into "actually, I am more oppressed than you because X " - narratives are to highlight structural violence, it's not personal. It is not about you, the debater running a narrative is an empiric to a larger argument that highlights particular systems of power. We shouldn't have to pretend like these systems don't apply to us in some way when we run cases, and at the end of the day, nobody is attacking YOU, they are indicting particular systems of power. Engage with the power structures in the round.

Each round is different, so these are just guidelines and if you have a question that this didn't answer, feel free to ask.
Good luck, have fun!

Judge for Dallastown

Etiquette stuff:

1 .I time debate and my time is the official time but you are welcome to time yourself. Flex prep is fine as long as your opponent(s) agree.

2. Aggressive is fine as is shouting but if you are a racist or sexist then I will probably deduct points.

3. I don't care if you spread as long as you are articulate -you are at a debate not an auction.

In Debate
I really like empirically-supported arguments. Framework debate is also good...don't assume that I know the philosophy to which you are referring...it's part of YOUR job to explain it.

All that being said, I do like a good solid traditional debate with lots of evidence.

Contact:

Email Cayman1@gmail.com if you have questions. If the questions are about a specific flow, please mention the round/flight/tournament.  Please don't try to reach me via any social media you find me on; I'm not likely to check them in a time-sensitive situation at a tournament.

Online Judging:

Unless tournament rules say otherwise or both teams are sending actual speech docs over SpeechDrop, everyone needs to be on the Email chain. I'll still read evidence sparingly unless asked to, but it's important that everyone is on the chain to verify what evidence gets sent when (and that it was sent to all participants instead of accidentally choosing 'reply' vs 'reply all'.) Because these rules and norms are relatively new and still in flux, I'm inclined by default to drop the card and not the team if one side can't fully/correctly comply with an evidence request.

I probably won't be looking at Campus/Cloud/Zoom very much during speeches. My ballot/comments, timer, flow, and any relevant evidence are already competing for screen space.

Since automated flips are time-sensitive and inflexible, if you have any questions for me that may influence how you flip, I'll try to get into the virtual competition room early with time to spare. If you're in the room and don't see me there, Email me. Normally, I try to avoid answering questions about specific hypotheticals where one team can hear me and the other can't, but I'll make an exception under this ruleset if one team needs to know before their coin flip timer expires and then I'll make an effort to fill the other team in as similarly as I can before the round starts. Also before the round starts, I'll verbally confirm who won the flip and which choice each side made, in case it becomes relevant to mid-round arguments.

However fast y'all think you can go without sacrificing clarity is modified by both your microphone and your opponents' speakers. I'll let you know if you're unclear to me; if your opponents are unclear to you, either clarify in cross or err on the side of asking for more evidence from the last speech.

If you're waiting for a card to start prep, please don't mute yourselves until prep starts. Prep starts when the requested cards (if any) arrive in the Email chain (or when debaters are obviously prepping) and stops when someone from the prepping team un-mutes and says to stop prep. If your opponents gave you the wrong card, I'll reset prep to where it was when you started, but if you just want to ask for more cards, please do so all at once rather than constantly trying to pause and un-pause prep.

Should you feel compelled to run a theory argument, please make sure that the interpretation and standards take the current online format into account.

If y'all want to ask your opponents clarifying questions during your own prep time, you're welcome to do so, but it's up to them whether to answer.

Cross can get especially messy when feedback and dueling microphones are involved. Please be mindful of the technical issues that talking over each other can cause and interrupt sparingly.

Background:

• Policy and LD since 1998
• Parli and PF since 2002
• WSDC and WUDC since 2009
• Big Questions since it became a non-meme event*
• Coach for Howard County, MD teams (Atholton, Centennial, Marriotts Ridge, Mt Hebron, Oakland Mills, River Hill, etc.) 2007-2020
• Capitol Debate camps & travel team from 2008-2013
• James Logan Forensics Institute from 2012-2013
• SNFI Public Forum 2010-2019
• Bethesda Chevy Chase 2019-2022

J-V, NCFLs, NJFL, Round Robins, etc.:

• If I'm judging you in a format where you don't get prefs or strikes and judge assignments are random, it's more my job to adapt to you than your job to adapt to me. Issues with stylistic choices or execution are more likely to find their way into the ballot comments than into the speaker points.
• Do what you do best; don't second-guess yourselves and do what you think I want to hear if it's not what you're good at.
• Don't take your norms for granted. If you and your opponent have different ideas of what debate should be or how it should be evaluated, tell me why the way that you do it is superior, the same way you would with any other argument.
• If you have a panel, do what you have to do to win the panel. If the easiest way to win is to pick up the two lay parent-judges sitting on either side of me and doodling on their ballots while trying to look attentive, so be it. I won't hold panel adaptation against teams. Making me feel engaged and useful is not why you're here.
• Some leagues ban disclosure. Some leagues ban verbal feedback. Those rules are bad for education and bad for debate. If you have questions about your round, find me after the round and we'll talk about what happened.

Evidence:

• I don't like calling for cards. If I do, it's either because of a factual/ethical dispute between teams about what the author actually says, because the round had a total absence of weighing outside of the quoted impact cards, or for educational reasons that aren't going to affect my RFD. How teams spin the cards matters, as does how well teams seem to know their cards.
• I assume ignorance over malfeasance. If you think the other team is being unethical, be able to prove it. Otherwise, correct/educate them by going after the evidence or citation instead of the people.
• Smart analytics beat un-smart cards every time.
• If you haven't read the article or chapter or study that your evidence is quoting, you probably shouldn't be using that evidence yet. When I'm evaluating impacts, it does you no favors to add a second sub-level of probability where I have to wonder "But do they know that the evidence actually says that? If so, did they make X argument on purpose?"
• Saying the word "Extend" is not extending evidence. You're extending arguments, not authors, which means there should be some explanation and some development. Repetition is not argumentation.
• If you're using digital evidence, it's your responsibility to be able to show the other team. It is not your opponents' responsibility to own laptops or to bring you a flash drive. I'm fine with teams using Email to share evidence - with the notable caveat that if I catch you using internet access to do anything outside tournament rules, your coach and the tab room are both going to hear about it. "Can I Email this so I don't risk getting viruses on my USB?" is a reasonable question most of the time. "Can I get on Messenger so my assistant coaches can type up theory extensions for me?" is NOT an acceptable interpretation of that question.
• Prep stops when you stop working with the evidence: either when the flash drive leaves the computer or when you send the Email and stop typing or when you stand up with the evidence in hand.

Speed:

• I care more about clarity than speed. If I can't understand you, I'll let you know.
• If you can't understand your opponents, let them know in CX/CF/Prep. Deliberately maintaining an incomprehensible speed to stop your opponents from refuting arguments they can't comprehend is probably not a winning strategy especially in Parli and PF, where speech documents and wikis don't check.
• Quality > quantity. "Spreading" isn't some arbitrary brightline of WPM; it's when you're talking faster than you can think. Doesn't matter which event. Don't get discouraged just because your opponents are faster than you.

Event-specific stuff:

• CX:
• Check the judge philosophies Wiki.
• If your strategy relies on preffing only judges like me and then telling other teams they can't read their arguments in front of the judges that you've preffed, then please rethink your strategy.
• I've coached and run a wide variety of arguments. One of the easiest ways to lose my ballot is to be dogmatic and assume that because I've coached it, I like it, or that I think it's intrinsically true. If you have guessed an argument that I actually enjoy running and/or believe in, that still doesn't mean you'll be held to a lower standard on it.
• With the (hopefully obvious) exception of status theory, I'd prefer to be able to reject the argument instead of the team. You probably want to hedge your bets by telling me how the round changes if the argument is(n't) rejected.
• Kick your own arguments; don't leave it up to me to decide what should or shouldn't be kicked unless you're actually ok with either option.
• L-D:
• The majority of L-D I've judged in recent years has been fairly traditional/local; it's probably the event I judge least at bid tournaments on the national circuit, so it's probably best to treat me as a recovering policy judge.
• I try not to intervene on theory. If you're winning it, I'll vote for it, even if doing so makes me feel dirty, as long as it's warranted/impacted/developed like any other winnable argument. That said, my theory norms have been largely calibrated by the arguments' CX analogues., so if you think there's something L-D specific I should be aware of (no 2NC's role in disclosure, the absence of a second CX when determining whether answers are binding/whether clarifications are sufficient, the difference between neg block and NR in creating side bias, etc.) be explicit about it.
• In-round discourse probably comes before theory, T/FW probably come before other theory.
• I'm not convinced there's such a thing as a "pre-standard" argument. An argument might operate on a higher level of standards than anything else currently in the round, or on a mutually conceded standard, but it still needs to be fully developed.
• PF:
• I strongly prefer for the second-speaking team to adapt their definitions/burdens in their initial speech and frontline in 2RB to create clash. I won't auto-drop you for using the 2RB the same as you would have the 1RB, but you're not doing your partner's 2SM any favors.
• Deliberate concessions early in the round can get you a long way. Just know and explain where and why they're strategic.
• Cite authors when possible. The university your author went to / was published by / taught at / is not your author. The way to get around a dearth of source diversity is to find more sources, not to find as many different ways as possible to cite the same source.
• Teams that start weighing in RB typically have an easier time getting my ballot than teams that just spit out a bunch of constructive arguments and wait for reductive speeches to weigh anything.
• CF should be focused on asking actual questions, not repeating speeches or fitting in arguments you didn't have time for. "Do you agree", "Isn't it true that", "How would you respond to", and "Are you aware" are rarely ingredients of genuine questions. Good CFs will clarify and focus the round by finding where common ground exists and where clash matters.  If you think something in CF matters, mention it in your team's next speech.  If you or your partner have no intention of referencing something in your next speech, 
• SM cannot go line-by-line in most rounds. There's literally not enough time. There are more and less technical ways of looking at the big picture, but you do need to look at the big picture.  My standards for SM coverage (especially 2SM) have increased since the speech length increased 50%, so spending the extra time on comparing warrants and weighing is probably better than re-ligitating the rebuttal
• GCF is a hard place to win the round but an easy place to lose the round. Make sure that you and your partner are presenting a unified front; make sure that you're investing time in places that deserve it, make sure that if you're trying to introduce something new-ish here that you tie it into what's already happened this round.
• FF shouldn't be a notable departure from SM. Offense matters, especially if you're speaking first.
• Parliamentary:
• Naming arguments is not the same as making arguments. I can't easily vote on something that you haven't demonstrated intellectual ownership of.
• My threshold for beating arguments is inversely proportional to the silliness of the argument.
• "but [authority figure] says X" is not an argument. Especially in an event where you can't directly quote said person. I don't want to know whether Paul Krugman says the economy is recovering. I don't want to know whether Nietzsche says suffering is valuable. I want to know why they are right. Your warrants are your own responsibility.
• Intelligently asking and taking POIs is a big factor in speaker points.
• Most rounds come down to how well the PMR answers the Opp block. If the Opp block was much better done than the MG, there might be no PMR that could answer well enough, but that's rare. Parli seems to have much more potential for teams that are behind to come back than most other events.
• I'm generally tech > truth. In Parli, however, depending on how common knowledge the topic is and whether internet prep is allowed, a little more truth can beat a lot more tech. Don't be afraid to stake the round on a question of fact if you're sure it's actually a question of fact.
• I should not have to say this, but given the current state of HS Parli, if I am confident a team is lying and I already intend to drop them for it, I may double-check the relevant fact online just to make 100% sure. This is not me "accessing the internet on behalf of" the team I'm voting for; this is me going the extra mile for the team that I was already intending to vote against anyway. Suggesting that the losing team should be given a win because I gave them a second chance before I signed my ballot is asinine.
• If you have a collection of 2 or 3 Ks that you read against every opponent, I don't think that aligns with the intention of the format, but I can certainly be convinced that fidelity to that intent is overrated. That said, you should make an extra effort to engage with your opponents and show how your criticism creates clash rather than sidesteps clash.
• Limited-Prep
• Extemp - Source diversity matters. I will look ev up online if it sounds sketchy. I do care that you give a direct answer to the actual question you drew, but not every question is written in a way that deserves a definite yes or no answer: if you don't, your speech should still contain elements of nuance and advocacy beyond "...well, yes and no" and should show me why all the simple answers would have been wrong.
• Impromptu - I don't have a strong preference for one structure over another, but some prompts lend themselves more to certain structures. Not everything needs to be forced into a 3x1 or a 2x2 if it doesn't fit the procrustean bill. Recycled anecdotes and tropes are somewhat inevitable, but canned speeches defeat the purpose of the event.
• Interp/Platforms/Congress
• How did you end up with me as a judge? I'm so sorry. You're probably sorry too. Someone probably desperately needed a judge to stop the tournament from running grossly overtime, and all the other potential volunteers either ran faster or hid better than I did. We'll both make it through this somehow. It'll be a learning experience.

I am a parent and a lay judge​. That being said, I'm only familiar with traditional LD.

If you're a strict circuit debater, please strike me or plan on going lay. ​As far as traditional debate goes:

Things I like:

● Weighing your impacts clearly

● Full extensions - Tell me why what you're extending matters.

● Structured speeches/Signposting

Things I dislike:

● Being abusive in CX/aggressive in general

● Definitions debate - You can go for it, but don't expect to wow me

● Spreading

● Being late to the round

General:

● The obvious: don't be racist, homophobic, etc.

● I will disclose, but will keep it brief.. There'll be more comments in the e-ballot.

● I try to average a 28 in speaker points. I’d say clear rebuttals are the best way to up your speaks.

If you have questions, please ask me before the round starts.

Hi friend

My name is Nevin and my pronouns are they/them.

This paradigm is for LD mostly.

Sparknotes

(1) Please give me your case (if possible before the round) nevinekara@gmail.com

(2) Be super big picture and weigh (why should u win and they lose)

(3) I like non T stuff, Ks, and performance. But dumb down the Ks and make sure the performance makes sense.

(4) T and theory are fine as long as u aren’t rude about it.

(5) don’t be messy

On speed/speaking

(1) Email me your case, flash me your case, make a speech drop, or something. I just need to see a case.

(2) I disassociate when people spread sometimes so make sure that what you are saying is in the doc or slow down when you want me to hear something specific.

(3) If you don’t read something that is in the doc, edit it and send a new copy.

(4) Please don’t yell or talk aggressively.

Aff

(1) Do whatever you want, but make sure everything you are doing has a purpose.

(2) If you want to read something nontopical or anti topical, a good chunk of the 1AC should be explaining why you are doing that and make sure you don’t lose that explanation in the 1AR and 2AR.

(3) If you aren’t topical, don’t pretend to be. But if you just have an interesting interpretation of the resolution that isn’t common, be prepared to defend why your interpretation is good for debate under your own standards and theirs.

CX

(1)) Ask strategic questions or forfeit the rest of your time (no penalty to speaker points).

(2) CX is binding. No take backsies.

(3) flex prep is NOT binding as is preferably only for clarification.

Ks

(1) I like Ks. I don’t like when people kick Ks. Neither of those things affects how I vote (unless it’s a white boy reading wilderson).

(2) please be super big picture and dumb down the K. Not for your opponent, for me.

(3) If you don’t understand the thesis of your K, maybe don’t read it.

(4) I like identity Ks. Just make sure the links are clear. They can all be generic links if you want but I prefer that at least a few are specific to the round and what your opponent did or said wrong. It’s always more fun that way.

Performance

(1) I did this :D

(2) reading a 30 second poem does not necessarily make your case performative. A big part of performance (in my opinion) is gut checking.

(3) make sure to be super big picture about why your performance is necessary and why the ballot/judge’s support is key

(4) Don’t be afraid to divorce yourself from debate norms.

(5)Your opponent might try to out tech you. Don’t let those bastards win! Spend the majority of your time in all your speeches contextualizing your case and explaining why an Aff/Neg ballot matters.

(6) point out when they are doing things that are harmful and make sure to say something like “vote them down for this” or “they should lose because of this”

(7) don’t read against a novice unless they deserve it (i.e. they are known to be racist or something)

DAs

(1) This is just a fancy contention, so I refuse to flow them on separate sheets of paper.

(2) Make sure to weigh. Extinction doesn’t outweigh just because you or your card without a warrant says so.

CPs

(1) Stupid CPs make me laugh. The others hurt my brain.

(2) Don’t accidentally do a CP that links into a criticism you make of the AC (I wish I didn’t have to say this) If you contradict yourself and your opponent calls you out, I won’t let you kick out of your CP to resolve the contradiction because I will consider that an offensive argument for the Aff

T

(1) Make sure the violation is clear and specific

(2) Make sure the shell functions as a unit (its just tacky if I can tell you copy pasted parts of the shell from other shells)

(3) I don’t mind if you read T just to waste time (this is NOT how I feel about theory shells though)

(4) Don’t read T against a performance unless you are going to go all in on it and are prepared to defend why a topical world is a good one for 6 minutes in the NR.

Theory

(1) Don’t read frivolous theory or tricks. We both know what that means.

(2) Don’t be afraid to read a shell in front of me. If you have a good abuse story and some bomb standards, I will easily vote for you.

(3) Don’t spread the whole thing and really try to give a good 30 second big picture overview at the end.

(4) If you are winning on the standards debate, you win the round. You don’t have to extend every part of a shell to win with me as a judge.

(5) I like RVIs they make me laugh and I enjoy voting on them when someone drops or mishandles them

(6) don't read theory or T in front of me if your opponent is lay or from a small school.

Other stuff

(1) Be nice and don’t be racist

(2) Keep your own time

Tabula rasa and flow-oriented. I probably won't go out of my way to brief myself on a resolution. Civility is expected. Incivility damages your speaker points. Bullying will cost you the round and will be reported.

Volunteer traditional judge.

While doing debates online, please keep your delivery slow and clear.

Be kind. Good luck.

Hi! I’m Sarah. I use she/they pronouns. I graduated from Penn State in the spring of 2022. I’m now at Cornell Law School. I currently don’t have any program affiliation, but I love the activity and am glad to be involved however I can. If you have questions about this paradigm, any of my decisions, want to talk about law school applications, or just need a friendly ear, feel free to reach out via Facebook or email (ses452@cornell.edu).

General things

• I’m a person first, educator second, and adjudicator third. You do what you enjoy and I’m excited to learn from you. Tell me what to do with the ballot and I’ll listen.

• I’ll do my best to be tabula rasa. I’ll share my biases because I can’t be perfectly neutral as much as I might want to. Everything in this paradigm (except decent human being things) are only defaults, you can change them easily with an argument.

• Tech over truth but it’s way better when your arguments are at least dubiously true.

• I’d like novices to stick broadly to the topic and to reasonably understandable arguments. It helps nobody to hand your novice a Baudrillard file. I’m pretty willing to fill in the gaps for novices making smart arguments who don’t make them in technically correct ways.

• I’m good with speed if and only if everyone in the round is, please slow on tags.

• Don’t do things to make the debate community a worse place. It shows a lot more skill to win elegantly and cleanly by an inch than to bash the other side and win by a mile.

• Please make complete arguments - this means at minimum have internal links, ideally ones with warrants. If your argument isn’t complete, I can’t vote on it even if nobody points out the flaws.

• I get that there are things the community universally accepts even without links (e.g. politics disads) and I’ll probably give those to you if nobody points out the lack of links. I’ll err on the side of granting them for predictability but I want to be up front that since I’m new to judging I don’t know yet where my threshold is.

• It’s fun and makes for less frustrating decisions when you weigh and meta-weigh.

• CX is underutilized and it would be cool if you accomplished something with it.

• Things I reserve the right to stop the round and give you the L for:

• Doing or reading something the other side explicitly asked you not to do for mental health reasons

• Misgendering someone after being corrected

• Explicit bigotry (exception: if everyone in the round agrees beforehand to test arguments like “sexism good for econ,” I think that can be educational. But you can’t spring that on someone)

• Making arguments about sexual violence or suicide without ASKING the other side if it’s okay. Content warnings that do not ask are not okay. If you do this I will stop you and confirm with everyone in the round that it is okay before continuing, and if it’s not and you can’t read a different position, the round will end and you will lose

• Ad hominem arguments - you can attack the argument or the framing, but not the person or intention

Feedback and evaluation

In novice or JV divisions, I’ll type out notes mid-speech. I think it’s more important that you get specific feedback than that my flow is perfect. In open, I’ll prioritize my flow but make a point to be extremely detailed during the RFD. The distinction is mostly that open debaters can benefit a lot more from strategic analysis. I’ll also do everything I can to give you tips on fixing errors instead of just pointing them out. If you feel like you’d learn more from a different kind of feedback than this, just let me know and I’m happy to oblige.

Speaker points are silly, arbitrary, and biased. My hope is if enough people simply refuse to take them seriously, it will disavow people of the notion that they have any value as a metric and we can get rid of them. As such, you’re all getting 30s unless you do something worth getting 0.

Ballot comments on Tabroom go to you and your coach (and anyone else with access to your team's Tabroom page). Nine times out of ten this is good for education. If for some reason (and I won't ask the reason), you do not want your coach to see your feedback, just let me know privately and I'm happy to give feedback orally or share it via PDF in the Speechdrop instead of putting it on the ballot.

Counterplans

• Dispo > condo (dispo means a CP is like a disad where you can extend defense but can’t kick out of offense)

• Two condo fine if it’s a CP and an alt, more than that probably bad

• Perms are probably advocacies

Theory

• I-meets are terminal defense on theory

• Competing interps > reasonability. I’ve been told I think of theory in the NPDA sense more than the LD sense if that helps anyone

• I don't need proven abuse. I honestly don't know what proven abuse is. If your practice is bad, it probably had some impact on strategy. You don't need to execute a bad strategy to prove that it's bad.

• I’m probably more amenable to resource disparity arguments than a lot of people as a product of debating for a student-run team in college

• Disclosure theory is elitist and bad. Aff disclosure is probably good, but 9/10 times people don’t do it because they don’t know how (especially with these new confusing caselist updates). Educate, don’t punish

Kritiks

• Alts should either have some evidence indicating solvency in the traditional sense (of fixing the problem you present) or subvert traditional notions of solvency. Alts that do neither probably do nothing and the other side should point this out

• Alts that operate in a different paradigm than the aff (e.g. discourse alts compared to policy affs) need a ROB to be cohesive. Otherwise you’re just talking past each other because the government could do the aff and you could do the alt and there’s no contradiction. Perms are really strong here and at best with these alts and no FW you win on K turns case

• Fiat is illusory, but that doesn’t mean it’s not valuable, and it would be better if you had more than “the plan isn’t real”

Performance

• Nontopical affs should have neg ground and you should be able to tell us what it is during CX.

• If the neg ground is theory and you then make IVIs to theory I’m going be really persuaded by arguments that there is no neg ground

• It’s much preferable imo if the neg ground is topic generics (e.g. a movements case where the effect is change to election laws, a topical plan text with narrative evidence, or a critique of NFA elections in the direction of the topic)

• In novice divisions you have to be topical or at least have topical neg ground - predictability reasons are overwhelming when it comes to making newbies want to stay in debate

Miscellaneous thoughts

• I won't enforce the rules simply because they're the rules. Appeals to the rules are fine though if you warrant why following the rules is good.

• One piece of unethically cut or cited ev → drop the arg + ballot comments to your coach. If it happens again, auto-loss. Unless you’re a novice, in which case still fix it but you get more leeway

• New NR and 2AR arguments don’t get flowed

• Zoom lets you do cool things and if you need to screen-share to do them that should be allowed. We ought to get something out of this virtual debate thing

• Baum-Barret is a garbage card written by people who need to at minimum SKIM Rawls before incorrectly citing him. I’m pretty sure most people under the veil of ignorance would care a lot more about the threat of crushing poverty than a 1% risk of nuclear war

• Evidence comparison > tons of cards that all say the same thing

I’m sure I’m missing something. I’ll try to edit as I notice things. Feel free to ask any questions before round!