Last changed on
Wed February 7, 2024 at 8:54 PM EDT
Email Chain: Geodb8 AT gmail dot com
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Debated in the New York Urban Debate League (Bronx Law) 2008-2014 and the University of Iowa 2014-2019.
Summer Lab leader: 1x ECLI, 1x DDI, 2x NYUDL, 3x Cal Berk, 1x GDI.
Argument assistant: West H.S., McQueen H.S., Lane Tech H.S., and most recently, CSU Long Beach.
General thoughts:
I vote for the team that did the better debating. I default to first weighing the impact calc debate and focus almost exclusively on the flow to determine what arguments to evaluate. I do not like judge intervention and prefer you all successfully determine the best metric to evaluating the debate.
Speaker points:
While speed is completely fine, please do not sacrifice clarity to “get through a card,” it translate to poor spreading and muddles the rest of the speech. Remember to follow your roadmap, allocate time, sign post, and commit to line-by-line refutation. Refrain from disorganization, shadow extensions, and poor rhetorical skills. While all Cross examinations are open, consider they are as important to your speaks as constructives and rebuttals.
Affirmatives:
Whether or not you read a plan is less important than winning offense against a competing strategy, procedural violation, or DA. In short, win that the aff is a good idea/performance/policy implementation.
a) K/Performance AFF’s
I think 1ACs should be tangibly related to the resolution. 1ACs are research projects and yearly resolutions are the result of a research paper written and voted for by the community. Effectively your AFF is a response to community consensus and their underlying assumptions.
K’s
Critiques are arguments based on philosophical inquiries. If you do not know or understand the philosophy you are advancing it will likely show throughout the debate and can negatively effect speaker points. More importantly, I will not fill in gaps for inaccurate or poor-quality arguments. Remember I focus on what’s happening/the flow.
That aside, I am very familiar with philosophies across numerous cannons.
CP’s
Neg has the burden to prove mutual exclusivity, a CP without a net benefit is just another plan and plan plan debate isnt a thing, the permutation will probably win every time.
a) Method debates
While I am sympathetic to “no-perms,” the negative must prove a link greater than omission. The best Counter methods are stylistically, theoretically or methodologically different than the 1AC then generate offense based on those differences.
Procedurals
a) T/FW
Topicality is a debate about words, the (mis)use of them and their importance. T’s appendage, Framework is a heuristic for debate, a vision for how competitors should engage the activity. While the words topicality and framework are used interchangeably a good debater will identity what they are being called to answer/defend so to make more convincing arguments.
i) Framework specific
Limits is an internal link to a terminal impact; K aff counter interpretations should be bound by the resolution; ontology/epistemology arguments are responsive to FW; I usually vote for FW on TVAs, ground, and procedural fairness.
b) Theory
Easiest debates to decide. Difficult debates to execute. Do not go for theory if you aren’t informed of the meticulous refutation you must accomplish to get the ballot. Believe it or not, there was once a time people went for theory their entire final rebuttal. Conversely, ask whether those few seconds amounts to a W or just defense to prevent the other team from winning on theory.
c) Ethics violations:
These are acts or words done by a competitor that deserves ending the debate. Preferably the tournament organizers resolve the alleged issue. This includes card clipping.
Card clipping claims STOP the debate. Note: I am always either following a speaker on my own pc or listening for the last word they say in each card.However, a card clipping violation requires the claimant provides evidence otherwise I will be stuck piecing together what I believe happened as opposed to whatI know happened.
A more subtle way of committing an ethical violation is stealing prep.
I use to steal prep. Only in the sense that I put my plastic podium, laptop, flow, and sent out the email chain after prepping. But the intentional stealing of prep, actively writing materials, organizing speech docs or speaking to your partner is not fair and excessive prep stealing will result in considerable speaker point deductions.
DAs
Quick observation —the community has elected to have these debates in various parts of the flow as opposed to just a DA page. Linear DAs are on an all time high and overlooking these random DAs may cause a card to turn into a viable strat.
DA proper —I subconsciously rely on an offense/defense paradigm on every flow and can follow internal link chains so I am game for traditional DA debates.
En fin
I start deciding who won by organizing my flow in order of importance, I read evidence if contested or heavily relied on, I weigh your arguments against each other and confirm lines can be drawn between speeches so to discern new arguments.
Lastly, I’m usually flowing cross examination. Explain your arguments well, ask good questions and above all, be respectful.
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Notes:
- James Roland an outstanding educator in the activity gave a lecture at the first camp I attended on being a successful Policy Debater: https://puttingthekindebate.wordpress.com/tag/james-rowland/
- Top 5 debate movie: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EacYl00YzZ0
