TLDR: Former NFA-LD debater. Make the arg, tell me why it matters. Tabula Rasa.

NFA-LD

I'm tabula rasa and use an offense-defense paradigm. Show me impacts, and win your link story.

I love most theory and have a standard threshold when voting on it. Vagueness is cool, Topicality's cool, condo's cool, vague CP theory cool, etc etc. I see disclosure theory as outside my jurisdiction as a judge of the round. I judge tech over truth

Unless the debaters tell me otherwise- I default to the NFA-LD rules.

I think CPs/Alts should be mutually exclusive and net beneficial.

I love K debate but hate debates when the K doesn't link. give me a link to the aff, and argue the K well. you need alt solvency.

I think T is a voting issue; it'll be a battle trying to convince me otherwise- win the interp/violation level.

I prefer affs with plans and am highly receptive to the TVA- if your aff has no plan you better know how to hang in the framework debate. Please interact with the theory sheet.

For most policy-style rounds: tell me why your impacts matter and win your story. I like clean debates and rebuttals, so your organization is key.

Run whatever you want at whatever speed you like, I ask that a speech drop be provided and that you listen to your opponent if they ask you to slow.

leave the personal out of the room.

policy

make a speechdrop

speechdrop.net

I am very comfortable with Ks, Theory, Speed, and Topicality debates. Will vote on stock issues if you tell me why it matters. Don't spread your opponent out, if they say "speed" and you keep going, i will be receptive to speed Ks and procedurals.

High School LD and PF

I teach LD, I'm comfortable with PF. I want IMPACT COMPARISON!! spread only if your opponent is ok with it.

I have debated in Lincoln-Douglas since the beginning of my Junior year of high school. While competing with FSU, I focus mainly on Civic Debate while also working on parli and LD. I am the graduate assistant for Florida State for the next two years!

I prefer policy debates that focus on the contents of the argument as opposed to technicalities or debate rules, however, topicality debates are always welcome. I will evaluate each round based on the evidence you provide and the construction of your case. I do not appreciate spreading as it will be harder for me to follow your argument if you choose to spread, but I understand that it is sometimes necessary to make all of your points in a limited time frame. I flow by hand so it is easier for me if you speak at a normal rate. I would prefer that the affirmative side comes to each round with a well-prepared plan as I am not familiar with every piece of literature used in kritiks, but am always open to learning and evaluating new information.

Finally, I will not tolerate any kind of sexism, racism, hatred, or purposeful misgendering in my rounds. If you say something offensive to your opponent's identity, I will ensure that your speaker points and my evaluation of the round reflect that. You are all adults and should be able to have a spirited argument without being disrespectful and resulting to ad hominem. With that being said, I look forward to hearing the creative ideas y'all bring to the table! This is a topic I care a lot about so I'm excited to hear the arguments y'all bring forth :)

//shree

I am a social studies & math teacher who is no longer involved in full-time argument coaching. I am judging this tournament because my wife, a mentor, or a former student asked me to.

I previously served as a DOD at the high school level and as a hired gun for college debate programs. During this time, I had the privilege of working with Baker Award recipients, TOC champions in CX, a NFA champion in LD, and multiple NDT First-Round teams; I was very much ‘in the cards.’ Debate used to be everything to me, and I fancied myself as a ‘lifer.’ I held the naïve view that this activity was the pinnacle of critical thinking and unequivocally produced the best and brightest scholars compared to any other curricular or extracurricular pursuit.

My perspective has shifted since I’ve reduced my competitive involvement with the community. Debate has provided me with some incredible mentors, colleagues, and friends that I would trade for nothing. However, several of the practices prevalent in modern debate risk making the activity an academically unserious echo chamber. Many in the community have traded in flowing for rehearsing scripts, critical thinking for virtue signaling, adjudication for idol worship, and research for empty posturing. I can’t pretend that I wasn’t guilty of adopting or teaching some of the trendy practices that are rapidly devolving the activity, but I am no longer willing to keep up the charade that what we do here is pedagogically sound.

This ‘get off my lawn’ ethos colors some of my idiosyncrasies if you have me in the back of the room. Here are guidelines to maximize your speaker points and win percentage:

1 – Flow. Number arguments. Answer arguments in the order that they were presented. Minimize overviews.

2 – Actually research. Most of you don’t, and it shows. Know what you are talking about and be able to use the vocabulary of your opponents. Weave theory with examples. Read a book. Being confidently clueless or dodgy in CX is annoying, not compelling.

3 – Please try. Read cards from this year when possible; be on the cutting edge. Say new and interesting things, even if they’re about old or core concepts. Adapt your arguments to make them more ‘you.’ Reading cards from before 2020 or regurgitating my old blocks will bore me.

4 – Emphasize clarity. This applies to both your thoughts and speaking. When I return, my topic knowledge will be superficial, and I will be out of practice with listening to the fastest speakers. Easy-to-transcribe soundbytes, emphasis in sentences, and pen time is a must. I cannot transcribe bots who shotgun 3-word arguments at 400wpm nor wannabe philosopher-activists who speak in delirious, winding paragraphs.

5 – Beautify your speech docs. Inconsistent, poor formatting is an eyesore. So is word salad highlighting without the semblance of sentence structure.

6 – No dumpster fires. Ad hominem is a logical fallacy. I find unnecessarily escalating CX, heckling opponents, zoom insults, authenticity tests, and screenshot insertions uncompelling. I neither have the resources nor interest in launching an investigation about outside behavior, coach indiscretions, or pref sheets.

7 – Don’t proliferate trivial voting issues. I will evaluate a well-evidenced topicality violation; conditionality can be a VI; in-round harassment and slurs are not trivial. However, I have a higher threshold than most with regards to voting issues surrounding an author’s twitter beef, poorly warranted specification arguments, trigger warnings, and abominations I classify as ‘LD tricks.’ If you are on the fence about whether your procedural or gateway issue is trivial, it probably is; unless it’s been dropped in multiple speeches, my preferred remedy is to reject the argument, not the team. Depending on how deranged it is, I may just ignore it completely. I strongly prefer substantive debates.

8 – Be well rounded. The divide between ‘policy,’ ‘critical,’ and ‘performance’ debate is artificial. Pick options that are strategic and specific to the arguments your opponents are reading.

9 – Not everything is a ‘DA.’ Topicality standards are not ‘DAs.’ Critique links are not ‘DAs’ and the alternative is not a ‘CP.’ A disadvantage requires, at a minimum, uniqueness, a link, and an impact. Describing your arguments as ‘DAs’ when they are not will do you a disservice, both in terms of your strategy and your speaker points.

10 – I’m old. I won’t know who you are, and frankly, I don’t care. Good debaters can give bad speeches, and the reverse can also be true. Rep has no correlation to the speaker points you will receive. 28.5 is average. 29 is solid. 29.5 is exceptional. 30 means you’ve restored my belief in the pedagogical value of policy debate.

I have been involved with competitive speech and debate for over 20 years now as a competitor, coach, and judge. I have a Master of International Affairs with a concentration in National Security and Diplomacy studies. My initial background is in high school policy debate, I also competed in collegiate Lincoln-Douglas for Western Kentucky and was part of their NPDA / NPTE parliamentary debate program.

By default my framework is net-benefits / cost-benefit analysis. Really this means weighing impacts and telling me who is winning in terms of magnitude, probability, and time frame.

NFA-LD Paradigm

I believe this event exists to be a single person policy debate which means defending a stable form of advocacy with a solvency advocate. I think there are ways that you can access kritikal impacts with this that

Performance Debate (specific for 2023-24 topic)- I don't like performance debates. But for this topic, I am very open to soft left affs as I believe this topic has some potentially strategic avenues to make the debate more competitive for the aff. It is going to be easier for you to get my ballot with a plan text and then a kritikal advantage (and that is not mutually exclusive to some of the kritikal schools of thought) that sometimes topics are written in such a way that there are strategic and literature-based reasons to pursue an affirmative that can play both in the world of policy impacts and in the kritikal world.

My view of the role of the ballot: Here is the short version of my philosophy on this, if you tell me that voting aff is a symbolic victory that buys currency for something greater than what happened in this round, as a judge I just don't see it that way. There are only 3 functions of the ballot as far as I am concerned: 1) An evaluation of how both debaters performed in this round 2) Which debater made the best arguments (OR WON) this debate and 3) to show I met my judging obligations for the tournament.

Case Examples:

A performance aff I will probably not vote for- Advocacy: Use your ballot as a tool to reject the patriarchal order of the nuclear age that envelopes the debate space and embrace a feminist international relations lens of nuclear weapons.

I am not opposed to FEMIR literature. In fact the sheer volume of the literature as it applies to this years topic makes it fair game. However, the reason I am not likely to vote for this is you are not going to find solvency that says rejection in a debate round is going to solve the fundamental problems and harms in the literature.

An aff that I am more likely to listen to- The USFG will adopt a no-first use nuclear policy.If you were to then run a threat construction advantage that had clear indicators of how no-first use leads to the deconstruction of threats and the literature supports that then that is a much more likely path to getting me to vote for a kritikal advantage.

Another aff I could see myself voting for- Plan: "The USFG will unilaterally disarm itself of its nuclear weapons". If you then ran the entire case with FEMIR literature and that was your advantage, I would be open to listening because this approach is heavily grounded in the literature.

Spreading-I can handle speed as long as it is clear. However, if I do not flow it because you were not clear then I won't go back and look at the email chain to do the work for you. That to me is intervention and doing extra work for you.

Topicality-I will vote on topicality if you can tell me what specific ground you have lost . Be able to articulate why the ground you have lost is key to your ability to debate. For instance, if we are in a foreign policy debate and the aff runs that "The USFG should consult NATO on __x__" that is taking away ground for you to test the effectiveness of the plan.

Compare that to "they have an advantage that should be the basis for negative disadvantage". It is possible the aff might have done better research to secure the internal links to solving for the impact. That doesn't mean that your ground was taken away.

If you can prove that the aff has taken away core negative ground then by all means run with it. But don't tell me it's a voter for the potential for abuse because that is not an impact.

Affirmatives- if you run a counter-interpretation on T, please remember to tell me how you meet your interpretation and have counter-standards. You could have the best counter-interpretation in the world but if you don't meet it then you have proven two different ways how you fall outside the topic.

I don't believe in RVIs for T.

Kritiks- I am fine with kritiks if: 1) Please give me some specific links. I get sometimes if a new aff is sprung on you that you need to run generic links but if you really understand the literature base, you should be able to write some sort of analytical link story. I am increasingly frustrated with links that are based on "you use the state therefore link"

2) Give me a textual alternative that has a solvencyadvocate. Don't just tell me "reject the aff", instead I need to know what this new world / paradigm looks like and how it solves the harms of the aff and avoids the impacts of the kritik.

Counterplans- I think that once a counterplan is run presumption flips aff and it becomes a question then of which side presents the better policy outcome. I believe to be competitive a counterplan must be mutually exclusive from the plan itself (yep I'll vote on PICs bad) and have a net benefit the plan can't capture. I am also old school enough to believe that a permutation requires solvency.

Theory-I won't vote on theory arguments unless you show me that actual damage has been done. I would prefer not being bogged down in you reciting theory arguments written by debaters who have long sense graduated that don't even pertain to the argument. I think too often theory debates become an excuse to not engage with the arguments that on a logical basis could be taken down.

Having said that, will I entertain theoretical objections to the plan such as vagueness, F-Spec, A-SPEC or minor repair? Yes because while they are theoretical, they are ultimately grounded on discussions of the policy. But I will only vote on these if you show that you have lost ground.

High School Paradigm

I think that in high school we have a division of the types of debate for a reason so my paradigm is broken up to help make it more reader accessible. I will start with some broader issues before moving to the specific events.

Flash / Prep Time / Email

I consider time spent with a flashdrive to be prep time until you hand the drive to your opponent or until the email has been sent. I do not want to be part of the email chain because my focus should be on the round and listening to your delivery, not a CSI style re-examination of the round after the fact to try and piece together what happened.

Spreading

I keep a pretty tight flow but please make sure you slow down for the tag lines. I will say clear once and if you continue to be incomprehensible then speaks will drop. Realize that articulation is just as important because if your judge doesn't flow it, it doesn't count.

Speaks:

I will not disclose speaker points after a round (until Tabroom posts it) please don't ask. In order to earn 30 speaks you have to have a nearly perfect combination of round vision, articulation, and refutation.

Performance Debate

Please don't run performance arguments in front of me. I personally think there are better forums for high school students to address the issues that are often encompassed in "performance debate" and those avenues are in the public speaking and interpretation events. In those events you actually have to change pieces

The ballot serves as a tool to show the tournament I judged the round and could make a decision. The ballot is not a form of currency that gives your arguments more power.

Kritikal Arguments

Having said that I don't like performances, I welcome a kritikal debate provided that the framework is sound, that there is a clear and specific link (please note just because a team was assigned to affirm is not reason enough to say they link). There also needs to be a clear alternative. Please don't take the lazy way out and just say "reject" or "discursively interrogate". Give me actual text with solvency for the alt.

Theory

I think that a theory debate is ok provided that there are actual warrants to the arguments and you can prove demonstrated abuse that has happened in the round to justify voting for or against the argument. Too often theory debates devolve into reading claims off frontlines someone long ago wrote for your team and don't have any meaning to you so you can't explain how it functions. I am not going to do the math for you on this so please make sure that the argument chain is clear.

Policy Debate

I think policy debate should be about actual policy with a plan. I default to the policy-making paradigm of cost benefit analysis unless I am told otherwise.

Topicality- I am not likely to vote on topicality unless you show me in round abuse. Just the potential of abuse is not enough for me to vote. Also please don't just use JARGON. If it is the first time I am judging you make sure that

Make sure that your counterplans or kritiks can actually solve the harms of the affirmative. Plan inclusive counterplans are pretty much an invitation for the rare vote for me on theory if the aff can demonstrate that there is lost ground.

Also make sure on disadvantages that you have uniqueness and that the direction of the link actually ties to the impact. Lastly, please make sure that your politics disads make sense. Don't just make the link jump to the impact to say we are going to have a nuclear war.

Make sure you IMPACT your arguments and compare.

Lincoln- Douglas

While I think there could be a place for a plan in a util framework I would prefer to see a value criterion-debate here. If you can explain adequately how a plan fits and is warranted then we can have that debate.

Please do not just take your policy teams kritik files and turn it into a case and assume that this is a way to win the round. There have to be actual implications as it relates to the round.

Public Forum

I am open to most ideas of how to approach Public Forum but tend to revert to cost benefit analysis as a default. Make sure that you give me clear arguments with clear impacts. Don't just throw out a debate buzz word and hope that I will interpret it as such. If you are going to use terms like "turn" make sure it is an actual turn.

Make sure that if there is an argument you think is going to win you the round that you carry it throughout the debate. Please don't magically resurrect an argument in final focus that has not been present since the constructives and then tell me it is the most important thing in the round.

Lastly when it comes to the final focus, I know that time is a major hurdle at times but you do not have to go for every argument in order to win. Please tell me how your argument compares to your opponents' and explain why your arguments matter more.

Background: debated in NPDA and NFA-LD for 3 years and coached part time for high schools for 6 years. Judged NFA-LD for 2 years. Taught debate part-time remotely for a year during the pandemic bringing Chinese students to American virtual high school tournaments. I graduated in 2022 with a bachelors in economics and now work in regulatory compliance consulting for hedge funds and private equity funds.

Conditionality: by default I'll let neg kick an advocacy. Will evaluate conditionality theory in the 1AR and there are multiple neg advocacies.

Impact Framing: I like voting on impact framing arguments. If nothing else gets brought in I default to policymaking utilitarianism until someone tells me to evaluate arguments a different way (k/framework/framing).

Theory: don't make fairness and education just a blip at the end. Incorporate a solid explanation of how something is bad for debate. I won't buy "fairness is bad"

I default to competing interpretations. Will still listen to reasonability.

I probably won't vote for RVIs on T.

Kritiks: will vote on kritiks. I prefer kritiks that are well-thought-out, and preferably topic-specific, and not relying only on generic state links.

Speed: I'm fine with fast debates

Please refer to everyone involved in the round gender-neutrally unless otherwise stated by a participant or judge.

CX Teams: Aff starts the email chain ASAP.
Yes, include me. My email is: amber@lamdl.org

high school debate: crenshaw high school ( policy )
college debate: st. john's university ( BP )
currently: i'm usually running tournaments, as such, i'm not really keeping up with current arguments, authors, strats etc. anymore. assume i'm used to your evidence at your own risk.

--

hi i'm amber (they/them) and i want you to have fun and learn new things. debates are for learning, not for whoever gets to nuclear war fastest. tech issues aren't considered prep,

I HAVE TINNITUS AND CANNOT UNDERSTAND MONOTONE READERS.if you're spreading you need to enunciate the tags at least. please ask for clarification on this.

general stuff:

1. you as the debater have 1 job: tell me, the judge, how to vote. i value impact calcs, world comparisons, and depth over breadth on all flows. if you're running framework, keep it alive till the end of the debate because i love an easy vote. keep your args and flows organized so that by the 2AR/2NR you have a clear flight path for your future ballot.
2. if you're non-black and running black args as gotchas, i'm going to break tabroom giving you extremely low speaks.
3. nearly all spreading speeds are fine, but i will always value clarity over reading a bunch of stuff, especially if you're unable to speak clearly, or get quieter as you spread.
4. on that, neg teams that read 17 half assed args (CP with no plan text, K with no alt, DA with no impacts etc) are wasting their time, the other team's time, and most importantly, my time. don't do it, you will not get my ballot.
5. i dock speaks for being rude to your partner or opponents. the competition is never serious enough to warrant actual malice or bad vibes in or out of a round.
6. i'm not a very technical judge. the last thing i want to do at the end of a round is pull evidence and spend 10 minutes going back and forth with myself. to coaches: if you have novice or jv debaters who are on the cusp of transition into a higher division, i'm the judge for them.

Updated 7/15/24 for Post-Season

Hi everyone, I'm Holden (They/He)!

University of North Texas '23, and '25 (Go Mean Green!)

If you are a senior graduating this year, UNT has debate scholarships and a program with resources! If you are interested in looking into the team please contact me via my email listed below and we can talk about the program and what it can offer you! If you are committed to UNT, please conflict me!

I would appreciate it if you put me on the email chain: bukowskyhd@yahoo.com

Most of this can be applied to any debate event, but if there are event specific things then I will flag them, but they are mostly at the bottom.

The TLDR:

Debate is about you, not me. I think intervention is bad (until a certain point, those exceptions will be made obvious), and that letting the debaters handle my adjudication of the round as much as possible is best. I've been described as "grumpy," and described as an individual "that would vote on anything," I think both of these things are true in a vacuum and often translate in the way that I perceive arguments. However, my adherence to the flow often overrides my desire to frown and drop my head whilst hearing a terrible argument. In that train of thought, I try to be as close to a "no feelings flow bot" when adjudicating debates, which means go for whatever you want as long as it has a warrant and isn't something I flat out refuse to vote on (see rest of paradigm). I enjoy debates over substance surrounding the topic, it's simulated effects, it's adherence to philosophical principles, and it's critical assumptions, much more than hypertechnical theory debates that aren't based on things that the plan does. Bad arguments most certainly exist, and I greatly dislike them, but the onus is on debaters for disproving those bad arguments. I have voted for every type of argument under the sun at this point, and nothing you do will likely surprise me, but let me be clear when I encourage you to do what you interpret as necessary to win you the debate in terms of argumentive strategy.

I take the safety of the debaters in round very seriously. If there is ever an issue, and it seems like I am not noticing, please let me know in some manner (whether that be through a private email, a sign of some kind, etc.). I try to be as cognizant as possible of the things happening in round, but I am a human being and a terrible reader of facial expressions at that so there might be moments where I am not picking up on something. Misgendering is included in this, I take misgendering very seriously and have developed the following procedure for adjudicating cases where this does happen: you get one chance with your speaks being docked that one time, more than once and you have lost my ballot even if an argument has not been made related to this. I am extremely persuaded by misgendering bad shells. Respect people's pronouns and personhood.

Tech > Truth

Yes speed, yes clarity, yes spreading, will likely keep up but will clear you twice and then give up after that.

Debate influences/important coaches who I value immensely: Colin Quinn.

Trigger warnings - they're good broadly, you should probably give individuals time to prepare themselves if you delve into discussions of graphic violence. For me, that includes in depth discussion of anxiety, depression, self-harm, and suicide.

I flow on my laptop, and consider myself a pretty good flow when people are clear, probably a 8-8.5/10. Just be clear, number your arguments, and slow down on analytics please.

Cheating, including evidence ethics and clipping, is bad. I have seen clipping become much more common and I will vote you down if I feel you have done so even without "recorded" evidence or a challenge from another debater.

For your pref sheets (policy):

Clash debates - 1

K v K debates - 1

Policy throwdowns - 1/2 (I can judge and am fairly confident in these debates but have less experience in this compared to others and need a bit more hand holding)

For your pref sheets (LD):

Clash debates of any kind (Policy v K, K aff v framework, phil v k, etc.) - 1

K - 1

Policy - 1

Phil - 1

T/Theory - 1/2

Tricks - 4

Trad - 5/Strike

I'm serious about these rankings, I value execution over content and am comfortable judging any type of debate done well.

The Long Version:

Who the hell is this person, why did my coach/I pref them?

Hello! My name is Holden, this year will mark my 9th year in debate. I am currently a communication studies graduate student at the University of North Texas, where I also got my bachelors in psychology and philosophy. During my time as a competitor, I did policy, LD, and NFA-LD. My exposure to the circuit really began my sophomore year of high school, but nothing of true note really occurred during my high school career. College had me qualify for the NFA-LD national tournament twice, I got to octas twice, broke at majors, got gavels, round robin invites. I now coach and judge exclusively, where I have coached teams that have qualified to the NDT, qualified to outrounds of just about every bid tournament, gotten several speaker awards, have accrued 30+ bids, and made it to elimination rounds and have been the top speaker of the TOC.

I judge a lot, and by that I mean a lot. Currently at 600+ debates judged since I graduated high school in 2020. I think this is because judging is a skill, and one that gets better the more you do it, and you get worse when you haven't done it in a while. I genuinely enjoy judging debates because of several reasons, whether that be my enjoyment of debate, the money, or because I enjoy the opportunity to help aid in the growth of debaters through feedback.

I do a lot of research, academically, debate wise, and for fun. Most of my research is in the kritikal side of things, mostly because I coach a bunch of K debaters. However, I often engage in policy research, and enjoy cutting those cards immensely. In addition, I have coached students who have gone for every argument type under the sun.

Please call me Holden, or judge (Holden is preferable, but if you vibe with judge then go for it). I hate anything more formal than that because it makes me uncomfortable (Mr. Bukowsky, sir, etc.)

Conflicts: Jack C. Hays High School (my alma mater), and the University of North Texas. I currently consult for Westlake (TX). Independently, I coach American Heritage Palm Beach CW, Barrington AC, Bellevue WL, Clear Springs EG, Jordan FJ, Jordan KV, McNeil AS, Plano West AR, and Plano West RC.

Previously, I have been affiliated with Jordan (TX) institutionally, and with Cypress Woods MM, and East Chapel Hill AX.

What does Holden think of debate?

It's a competitive game with pedagogical implications. I love debate immensely, and I take my role in it seriously. It is my job to evaluate arguments as presented, and intervene as little as possible. I'm not ideological on how I evaluate debates because I don't think it's my place to determine the validity of including arguments in debate (barring some exceptions). I think the previous sentence means that you should please do what you are most comfortable with to the best of your ability. There are only two concrete rules in debate - 1. there must be a winner and a loser, and those are decided by me, and 2. speech times are set in stone. Any preference that I have should not matter if you are doing your job, if I have to default to something then you did something incorrect.

To summarize the way that I think about judging, I think Yao Yao Chen does it best, "I believe judging debates is a privilege, not a paycheck. I strive to judge in the most open-minded, faor, and diligent way I can, and I aim to be as thorough and transparent as possible in my decisions. If you worked hard on debate, you deserve judging that matches the effort you put into this activity. Anything short of that is anti-educational and a disappointment."

I’ve been told I take a while to come to a decision. This is true, but not for the reason you might think. Normally, I know how I’m voting approximately 30 seconds to 1 minute after the debate. However, I like to be thorough and make sure that I give the debate the time and effort that it deserves, and as such try to have all of my thoughts together. Believe me, I consider myself somewhat comprehensible most times, I find it reassuring to myself to make sure that all my thoughts about the arguments in debate are in order. This is also why I tend to give longer decisions, because I think there are often questions about argument X on Y sheet which are easily resolved by having those addressed in the rfd. As such, I try to approach each decision from a technical standpoint and how each argument a. interacts with the rest of the debate, b. how large of an impact that argument has, c. think through any defense to that argument, and d. if that argument is the round winner or outweighs the offense of the opposing side.

If it means anything, I think most of my debate takes are in camp "2N who had to be a 2A for a while as well so I think mostly about negative strategy but also think that the aff has the right to counter-terrorism against negative terrorism."

What does Holden like?

I like good debates. If you execute your arguments in a technically impressive manner, I will be pleased.

I like debates that require little intervention, please make my job easier for me via judge instruction, I hate thinking.

I like well researched arguments with clear connections to the topic/the affirmative.

I like when email chains are sent out before the start time so that 1AC's can begin at start time, don't delay the round any more than it has to be please.

I like good case debating, this includes a deep love for impact turns.

I like it when people make themselves easy to flow, this includes labeling your arguments (whether giving your arguments names, or doing organizational strategies like "1, 2, 3" or "a point, b point, c point, etc."), I find it harder to vote for teams that make it difficult for me to know who is responding to what and what those responses are so making sure I can flow you is key.

I like debaters that collapse in final speeches, it gives room for analysis, explanation, and weighing which all make me very happy.

I like it when I am given a framing mechanism to help filter offense. This can takes place via a standard, role of the ballot/judge, framework, fairness v education, a meta-ethic, impact calculus, or anything, I don't care. I just need an evaluative lens to determine how to parse through impact calculus.

What does Holden dislike?

I dislike everything that is the opposite of the above.

I dislike when people make problematic arguments.

I dislike when debaters engage in exclusionary practices.

I dislike unclear spreading.

I dislike messy debates with no work done to resolve them.

I dislike when people say "my time will start in 3, 2, 1."

I dislike when people ask if they can take prep, it's your prep time, I don't care just tell me you're taking it.

I dislike when debaters posture too much. I don't care, and it annoys me. Debate the debate, especially since half the time when debaters posture it's about the wrong thing. There is a difference between being firm, and being performative.

I dislike when debaters are exclusionary to novice debaters. I define this as running completely overcomplicated strategies that are then deployed with little to no explanation. I am fine with "trial by fire" but think that you shouldn't throw them in the volcano. You know what this means. Not abiding by this will get your speaks tanked.

I dislike when evidence exchange takes too long, this includes when it takes forever for someone to press send on an email, when someone forgets to hit reply all (it's 2024 and y'all have been using technology for how long????). If you think email chains aren't vibe then please use a speechdrop to save all of us the headache.

I dislike topicality where the interpretation card is written by someone in debate, and especially when it's not about the specific terms of art in the topic.

I dislike 1AR restarts.

How has Holden voted?

Since I started judging in 2020, I have judged exactly 620 debate rounds. Of those, I have voted aff approximately 52.23% of the time.

My speaks for the 2023-2024 season have averaged to be around 28.588, and across all of the seasons I have judged they are at 28.525.

I have been a part of 197 panels, where I have sat approximately 12.69% of the time.

What will Holden never vote on?

Arguments that involve the appearance of a debater (shoes theory, formal clothing theory, etc.).

Arguments that say that oppression (in any form) is good.

Arguments that contradict what was said in CX.

Claims without warrants, these are not arguments.

Specific Arguments:

Policy Arguments

Contrary to my reputation, I love CP/DA debates and have an immense amount of experience on the policy side of the argumentative spectrum. I do good amounts of research on the policy side of topics often, and coach teams that go for these arguments predominantly. I love a good DA + case 2NR, and will reward well done executions of these strategies because I think they're great. One of my favorite 2NR's to give while I was debating was DA + circumvention, and I think that these debates are great and really reward good research quality.

Counterplans should be functionally and textually competitive with germane net benefits, I think that most counterplans probably lose to permutations that make arguments about these issues and I greatly enjoy competition debates. Limited intrinsic permutations are probably justified against counterplans that don't say a word about the topic.

I am amenable to all counterplans, and think they're theoretically legitimate (for the most part). I think that half the counterplans people read are not competitive though.

Impact turn debates are amazing, give me more of them please and thank you.

I reward well cut evidence, if you cite a card as part of your warrant for your argument and it's not very good/unwarranted then that minimizes your strength of link/size of impact to that argument. I do read evidence a lot in these debates because I think that often acts as a tie breaker between the spin of two debaters.

Judge instruction is essential to my ballot. Explain how I should frame a piece of evidence, what comes first and why, I think that telling me what to do and how to decipher the dozens of arguments in rounds makes your life and my job much easier and positively correlates to how much you will like my decision.

I enjoy well researched and topic specific process counterplans. They're great, especially when the evidence for them is topic specific and has a good solvency advocate.

I default no judge kick unless you make an argument for it.

Explain what the permutation looks like in the first responsive speech, just saying perm do both is a meaningless argument and I am not filling in the gaps for you.

For affs, I think that I prefer well developed and robust internal links into 2-3 impacts much more than the shot gun 7 impact strategy.

Explanation of how the DA turns case matters a lot to me, adjust your block/2NR accordingly.

K's

Say it with me everyone, Holden does not hack for the kritik. In fact, I've become much more grouchy about K debate lately. Aff's aren't defending anything, neg teams are shotgunning 2NR's without developing offense in comparison to the 1AR and the 2AR, and everyone is making me feel more and more tired. Call me old, but I think that K teams get too lost in the sauce, don't do enough argumentative interaction, and lose debates because they can't keep up technically. I think this is all magnified when the 2NR does not say a word about the aff at all.

This is where most of my research and judging is nowadays. I will be probably know what you're reading, have cut cards for whatever literature you are reading, and have a good amount of rounds judging and going for the K. I've been in debate for 8 years now, and have coached teams with a litany of literature interests, so feel free to read anything you want, just be able to explain it.

Aff teams against the K should go for framework, extinction outweighs, and the alt fails more.

Framework only matters as much as you make it matter. I think both sides of the debate are doing no argument resolution/establishing the implications of what it means to win framework. Does that mean that only consequences of the implementation of the plan matter, and I exclude the links to the plans epistemology? Does that mean that if the neg wins a link, the aff loses because I evaluate epistemology first? Questions like these often go unresolved, and I think teams often debate at each other via block reading without being comparative at all. Middle ground interps are often not as strategic as you think, and you are better off just going for you link you lose, or plan focus. To sum this up, make framework matter if you think it matters, and don't be afraid to just double down about your interp.

My ideal K 1NC will have 2-3 links to the aff (one of which is a link to the action of the aff), an alternative, and some kind of framing mechanism.

I have found that most 2NR's have trouble articulating what the alternative does, and how it interacts with the alts and the links. If you are unable to explain to me what the alternative does, your chance of getting my ballot goes down. Example from both sides of the debate help contextualize the offense y'all are going for in relation to the alternative, the links, and the permutation. Please explain the permutation in the first responsive speech.

I've found that most K teams are bad at debating the impact turn (heg/cap good), this is to say that I think that if you are against the K, I am very much willing to vote on the impact turn given that it is not morally repugnant (see above).

I appreciate innovation of K debate, if you introduce an interesting new argument instead of recyclying the same 1NC you've been running for several seasons I will be extremely thankful. At least update your cards every one in a while.

Please do not run a K just because you think I'll like it, bad K debates have seen some of the worst speaks I've ever given (for example, if you're reading an argument related to Settler Colonialism yet can't answer the 6 moves to innocence).

K tricks are cool if they have a warrant, floating piks need to be hinted at in the 1NC so they can be floating.

For the nerds that wanna know, the literature bases that I know pretty well are: Marxism, Security, Reps K's, Afro-pessimism, Baudrillard, Beller, Deleuze and Guattari, Halberstam, Hardt and Negri, Weheliye, Grove, Psychoanalysis, Scranton/Eco-Pessimism, and Settler Colonialism.

The literature bases that I know somewhat/am reading up on are: Accelerationism (Fisher, CCRU people, etc.), Agamben, Abolition, Bataille, Cybernetics, Queer pessimism, Disability Literature, Moten and Harney, and Puar.

A note on non-black engagement with afro-pessimism: I will watch your execution of this argument like a hawk if you decide to go for it. Particular authors make particular claims about the adoption of afro-pessimist advocacy by non-black individuals, while other authors make different claims, be mindful of this when you are cutting your evidence/constructing your 1NC. While my thoughts on this are more neutral than they once were, that does not mean you can do whatever. If you are reading this K as a non-black person, this becomes the round. If you are disingenious to the literature at all, your speaks are tanked and the ballot may be given away as well depending on how annoyed I am. This is your first and last warning.

K-Aff's

These are fine, cool even. They should defend something, and that something should provide a solvency mechanism for their impact claims. Having your aff discuss the resolution makes your framework answers become much more persuasive, and makes me happier to vote for you, especially since I am becoming increasingly convinced that there should be some stasis for debate.

For those negating these affs, the case debate is the weakest part of the debate from both sides. I think if the negative develops a really good piece of offense by the end of the debate then everything else just becomes so much easier for you to win. I will, in fact, vote for heg good, cap good, and other impact turns, and quite enjoy judging these debates.

Presumption is underrated if people understand how to go for it, unfortunately most people just don't know how. Most aff's don't do anything or have a cogent explanation of what their aff does to solve things and their ballot key warrant is bad, you should probably utilize that.

Marxism will be forever underrated versus K affs, aff's whose only responses are "doesn't explain the aff" and "X explains capitalism" will almost always lose to a decent 2NR on the cap k. This is your suggestion to update your answers to challenge the alternative on some level.

Innovation is immensely appreciated by both sides of this debate. I swear I've judged the exact same 2-4 affs about twenty times each and the 1NC's just never change. If your take on a literature base or negative strategy is interesting, innovative, and is something I haven't heard this year you will most definitely get higher speaks.

Performance based arguments are good/acceptable, I have experience coaching and running these arguments myself. However, I find that most times when ran that the performance is not really extended into the speeches after this, obviously there are some limitations but I think that it does give me leeway for leveraging your inevitable application of the performance to other areas of the debate.

T-Framework/T-USFG

It may be my old age getting to me, but I am becoming increasingly convinced that fairness is a viable impact option for the 2NR to go for. I think it probably has important implications for the ballot in terms of framing the resolution of affirmative and negative impact arguments, and those framing questions are often mishandled by the affirmative. However, I think that to make me enjoy this in debates negative teams need to avoid vacuous and cyclical lines of argumentation that often plague fairness 2NR's and instead

In my heart of hearts, I probably am aff leaning on this question, but my voting record has increasingly become negative leaning. I think this is because affirmatives have become quite bad at answering the negative arguments in a convincing, warranted, and strategic manner.

Framework isn't capital T true, but also isn't an automatic act of violence. I think I'm somewhat neutral on the question of how one should debate about the resolution, but I am of the belief that the resolution should at least center the debate in some way. What that means to you, though, is up to you.

Often, framework debates take place mostly at the impact level, with the internal link level to those impacts never being questioned. This is where I think both teams should take advantage of, and produces better debates about what debate should look like.

I have voted on straight up impact turns before, I've voted on counter-interps, and I've also voted on fairness as an impact. The onus is on the debaters to explain and flesh out their arguments in a manner that answers the 1AR/2NR. Reading off your blocks and not engaging specific warrants of DA's to your model often lead to me questioning what I'm voting for because there is no engagement in either side in the debate.

Counter-interpretations seem to be more persuasive to me, and are often underutilized. Counter-interpretations that have a decent explanation of what their model of debate looks like, and what debates under that model feature. Doing all of the above does wonder.

In terms of my thoughts about impacts to framework, my normal takes are clash > fairness > advocacy skills.

"Fairness is good because debate is a game and and we all have intrinsic motivation to compete" >>>> "fairness is an impact because it constrains your ability to evaluate your arguments so hack against them," if the latter is more in line with what your expalantion of fairness is then 9 times out of 10 you are going to lose.

Topicality (Theory is it's Own Monster)

I love T debates, they're absolutely some of my favorite rounds to adjudicate. They've certainly gotten stales and have devolved to some model of T subsets one way or another. However, I will still evaluate and vote on any topicality violation. Interps based on words/phrases of the resolution make me much happier than a lot of the LD "let's read this one card from a debate coach over and over and see where it gets us" approach.

Semantics and precision matter, this is not in a "bare plurals/grammar means it is read this" way but a "this is what this word means in the context of the topic" way.

My normal defaults:

- Competing interps

- Drop the debater

- No RVI's

Reasonability is about your counter-interp, not your aff. People need to relearn how to go for this because it's a lost art in the age of endless theory debates.

Arbitrary counter-interpretations that are not carded or based on evidence are given significantly less weight than counter-interps that define words in the. "Your interp plus my aff" is a bad argument, nad you are better served going for a more substantive argument.

Slow down a bit in these debates, I consider myself a decent flow but T is a monster in terms of the constant short arguments that arise in these debates so please give me typing time.

You should probably make a larger impact argument about why topicality matters "voters" if you will. Some standards are impacts on their own (precision mainly) but outside of that I have trouble understanding why limits explosion is bad sans some external argument about why making debate harder is bad.

Weigh internal links to similar pieces of offense, please and thank you.

Theory

I have judged numerous theory debates, more than the average judge for sure, and certainly more than I would care to admit. You'll most likely be fine in these debates in front of me, I ask that you don't blitz through analytics and would prefer you make good in-depth weighing arguments regarding your internal links to your offense. I find that a well-explained abuse story (whether that be potential or in-round) makes me conceptually more persuaded by your impact arguments.

Conditionality is good if you win that it is. i think conditionality is good as a general ideology, but your defense of it should be robust if you plan on abusing the usage of conditionality vehemently. I've noticed a trend among judges recently just blatantly refusing to vote on conditionality through some arbitrary threshold that they think is egrigious, or because they think conditionality is universally good. I am not one of those judges.If you wanna read 6 different counterplans, go ahead, but just dismissing theoretical arguments about conditionality like it's an afterthought will not garner you any sympathy from me. I evaluate conditionality the same no matter the type of event, but my threshold of annoyance for it being introduced varies by number of off and the event you are in. For example, I will be much less annoyed if condo is read in an LD round with 3+ conditional advocacies than I will be if condo is read in a college policy round with 1 conditional advocacy.

Sure, go for whatever shell you want, I'll flow it barring these exceptions:

- Shells abiut the appearance and clothing of anoher debater.

- Disclosure in the case in which a debater has said they can't disclose certain positions for safety reasons, please don't do this

- Reading "no i meets"

- Arguments that a debater may not be able to answer a new argument in the next speech (for example, if the 1AR concedes no new 2AR arguments, and the 2NR reads a new shell, I will always give the 2AR the ability to answer that new shell)

Independent Voters

These seem to be transforming into tricks honestly. I am unconvinced why these are reasons to reject the team most of the time. Words like "accessibility," "safety," and "violence" all have very precise definitions of what they mean in an academic and legal context and I think that they should not be thrown around with little to no care. Make them arguments/offense for you on the flow that they were on, not reasons to reject the team.

I will, however, abandon the flow and vote down that do engage in actively violent practices. I explained this above, but just be a decent human being. Don't be racist, sexist, ableist, homophobic, transphobic, etc.

Evidence Ethics

I would much prefer these debates not occur. Nor would I really prefer to adjudicate a evidence rules issue as a theory shell. If you stake the round I will use the rules of the tournament or whatever organization it associates itself with. Debater that loses the challenge gets a 25, winner gets a 28.5.

For HS-LD:

Tricks

I have realized that I need more explanation when people are going for arguments based on getting into the weeds of logic (think the philosophy logic, IE if p, then q). I took logic but did not pay near enough attention nor care enough to have a deep understanding or desire to understand what you're talking about. This means slow down just a tiny bit and tone down the jargon so my head doesn't hurt as much.

My thoughts about tricks can be summarized as "God please do not if you don't have to, but if you aren't the one to initiate it you can go ham."

I can judge these debates, have judged numerous amounts of them in the past, and have coached/do coach debaters that have gone for these arguments, I would really just rather not deal with them. There's little to no innovation, and I am tired of the same arguments being recycled over and over again. If you throw random a prioris in the 1A/1N do not expect me to be very happy about the debate or your strategy. If I had to choose, carded and well developed tricks > "resolved means firmly determined and you know I am."

Slow down on the underviews, overviews, and impact calc sections of your framework (you know what I'm talking about), Yes I am flowing them but it doesn't help when you're blitzing through independent theory argumetns like they're card text. Going at like 70% of your normal speed in these situation is greatly appreciated.

Be straight up about the implication and warrant for tricks, if you're shifty about them in cross then I will be shifty about whether I feel like evaluating them or whether I'm tanking your speaks. This extends to disclosure practices, you know what this means.

Tricks versus identity-based kritikal affirmatives are bad and violent. Stop it.

Phil

I love phil debates. I coach plenty of debaters who go for phil arguments, and find that their interactions are really great. However, I find that debate has trended towards a shotgun approach to justifying X argument about how our mind works in favor of analytical syllogisms that are often spammy, underwarranted, and make little to no sense. I prefer carded syllogisms that identify a problem with ethics/metaphysics and explain how their framework resolves that via pieces of evidence.

The implication/impact of the parts of your syllogism should be clear from the speech they are introduced in, I dislike late breaking debates because you decided to hide what X argument meant in relation to the debate.

In phil v phil debates, there needs to be a larger emphasis on explanation between competing ethics. These debates are often extremely dense and messy, or extremely informational and engaging, and I would prefer that they be the latter rather than the formr. Explanation, clear engagement, and delineated weighing is how to get my ballot in these debates.

Hijacks are cool, but once again please explain because they're often just 10 seconds long with no actual warrants.

Slow down a bit as well, especially in rebuttals, these debates are often fast and blippy and I can only flow so fast

For those that are wondering, I'm pretty well read in most continental philosophy, social contract theorists, and most of the common names in debate. This includes the usual Kant, Hobbes, Pragmatism, Spinoza, and Deleuze as well as some pretty out of left field characters like Leibniz and Berkeley.

I have read some of the work regarding Rawls, Plato, Aquinas, Virtue Ethics, ILaw, Particularism, and Constitutitionality as well.

I know I have it listed as a phil literature base, but I conceptually have trouble with people reading Deleuze as an ethical framework, especially since the literature doesn't prescribe moral claims but is a question of metaphysics/politics, proceed with caution.

Defaults:

- Comparative worlds > truth testing

- Permissibility negates > affirms

- Presumption negates > affirms

- Epistemic confidence > modesty

Trad/Lay Debate

I mean, sure, why not. I can judge this, and debated on a rather traditional LD circuit in high school. However, I often find these debates to be boring, and most definitely not my cup of tea. If you think that you can change my mind, please go ahead, but I think that given the people that pref me most of the time I think it's in your best interest to pref me low or strike me, for your sake and mine.

NFA-LD:

Everything above applies.

Don't think I'm a K hack. I know my background may suggest otherwise but ideologically I have a high threshold for execution and will punish you for it if you fail to meet it. Seriously, I've voted against kritikal arguments more than I've voted for them. If you are not comfortable going for the K then please do not unless you absolutely want to, please do not adapt to me. I promise I'll be so down for a good disad and case 2NR or something similar.

"It's against NFA-LD rules" is not an argument or impact claim and if it is then it's an internal link to fairness. Only rules violation I will not roll my eyes at are ethics challenges.

Yes non-T affs, yes t - framework, yes cap good.heg good, no to terrible theory arguments like "must delineate stock issues."

Why are we obsessed with bad T arguments that do not have an intent to define words in the topic in the context of the topic? Come on y'all, act like we've been here.

Speaks:

An addendum to how I dish out speaks , any additional speaker points you get via challenges cannot get you above a 29.7, the other .3 is something you have to work for.

For speaker points challenges, those that know them can utilize them, this will be edited after TFA.

I don't consider myself super stingey or a speaks fairy, though I think I've gotten stingier compared to the rest of the pool.

I don't evaluate "give me X amount of speaks" arguments, if you want it so bad then perform well or use the methods I have outlined to boost your speaks.

Here's a general scale I use, it's adjusted to the tournament as best as possible -

29.5+ - Great round, you should be in late elims or win the tournament

29.1-29.4 - Great round, you should be in mid to late elims

28.6-29 - Good round, you should break or make the bubble at least

28.1-28.5 - About the middle of the pool

27.6-28 - You got some stuff to work on

27-27.5 - You got a lot of stuff to work on

Anything below a 27: You did something really horrible and I will be having a word with tab and your coach about it

Judy Butler: Hired Gun

Affiliations: Too numerous to list

Experience: High School: 29 years; College: 27 years

I will not attempt to characterize what the purpose or value of debate is in this missive; merely how I tend to evaluate the debates I get to judge. I think of myself as a teacher and the debaters as students and strive to treat them with the respect that relationship deserves. I thoroughly enjoy judging debates from almost any theoretical perspective. I also strive to support new ideas, sources of evidence, academic fields and literature entering debate that have traditionally been undervalued.

I like judging debates where the debaters directly address each other's arguments from the jump as opposed to waiting until rebuttals to compare arguments.

I like judging debates where the arguments/positions evolve in relation to one another as opposed to simply in vacuums - I will totally listen to debates about conditionality and don't have attitude about multiple advocacies.

I like judging debates when the debaters show respect for each other, including their partners - contempt for an argument or position is different than contempt for a person.

I like judging theory debates that have depth as opposed to breadth - five or seven words are really not arguments, nor are they flowable. I ten to shy away from voting on theory arguments that require that I "punish" debaters. I prefer theory arguments that are grounded in the effect on the debate process and the value of including or excluding certain argumentative perspectives and practices.

I like judging debaters that focus on comparison and argument evolution rather than repetition and tend to reward both content and style when apportioning speaker points. Specifically, winning your argument is different than answering theirs: saying why you are right AND why they are wrong is the minimum necessary to answer/extend an argument and put yourself in a position to win that argument in the last rebuttals. Ideally, this level of extension could begin in the 1NC and could continue throughout the debate by all the following speeches.

I promise to be riveted to your speeches, your cross-exes, and my flow. I flow what the evidence says, not just your label. I hope that softens the blow when I say that I don't want to be on the email chain - the debate I'm judging is the one I heard and flowed, not the one I read. If I need/want to see something I will ask - but I need you to be clear in the first place. If you want to understand and comprehend the quality extensions I am asking for in real time, clarity when you originally read your evidence is critical.

PS: Your prep time stops running when you have sent the speech - not before

Happy Debating!

Background: I am currently the Director of Debate at Illinois State University. I have been involved in debate since 2001. I was awarded the 2020-2021 Fulbright Award to coach debate in Taiwan.

DISCLOSURE THEORY IS LAZY DEBATE AND I WILL GIVE YOU NO HIGHER THAN 15 SPEAKER POINTS IF YOU RUN THIS POSITION (this means at best you will get a low point win). I will also NOT evaluate it OR flow it.

I believe that the debate is yours to be had, but there are a few things that you should know:

1. Blippy, warrantless debates are mind numbing. If you do not have a warrant to a claim, then you do not have an argument even if they drop it. This usually occurs at the top of the AC/NC when you are trying to be "clever." Less "clever," more intelligent. I do not evaluate claims unless there are no real arguments in a round. Remember that a full argument consists of a claim supported by warrants with evidence.

2. I CANNOT flow speed due to an issue with my dominant hand. I will give you two verbal "speed" if you are going too fast. After that I quit flowing and if I do not flow it I do not evaluate it. Additionally, I do believe that the speed at which you go should be accessible to everyone in the round, this means your competitor, other judges on a panel, AND audience members. I am very open to voting on accessibility and/or clarity kritiks. SPEED SHOULD NOT BE A TOOL OF EXCLUSION!!!!!!

3. I often vote for the one argument I can find that actually has an impact. I do not evaluate moral obligations in the round (if you say "Moral Obligation" in college LD Debate I stop flowing, take a selfie, and mock you on social media). This does not mean I will not vote for dehumanization is bad, but I need a warrant outside of just telling me I am morally obligated to do something. Moral obligations are lazy debate, warrant out your arguments. HIGH SCHOOL LD DEBATERS- IGNORE THIS, I will vote for moral obligations if they are explained and well warranted.

4. Run whatever strategy you want--I will do my best to evaluate whatever you give me in whatever frame I'm told to by the debaters--if you don't give me the tools I default to policy maker/net benefits, if it's clearly not a policy maker paradigm round for some reason I'll make something up to vote on...basically, your safest bet is to tell me where to vote and why to vote.

5. If you are rude, I will not hesitate to tank your speaker points. There is a difference between confidence, snarkiness, and rudeness.

6. When running a kritik you need to ensure that you have framework, impacts, links, an alternative text, alt solvency, and role of the ballot (lacking any of these will make it hard for me to vote for you)...I also think you should explain what the post alt world looks like. I'm very easily persuaded by arguments about the post-alt world not being possible if the debater running the K does not explain the post-alt world to me.

7. If you are going to run a CP and a kritik you need to tell me which comes first and where to look. You may not like how I end up ordering things, so the best option is to tell me how to order the flow. I do not like operating in multiple worlds as I believe that is abusive to the affirmative, especially given the speech times in NFA-LD. I am easily persuaded to vote against a debater that does this if their opposition makes it a voting issue.

8. Impact calc is a MUST. This is the best way to ensure that I'm evaluating what you find to be the most important in the round.

9. Number or letter your arguments. The word "Next" or "And" is not a number or a letter. Doing this will make my flow neater and easier to follow and easier for you to sign post and extend in later speeches. It also makes it easier for me to make a decision in the end.

10. I base my decision on the flow as much as possible. I will not bring in my personal beliefs or feelings toward an argument as long as there is something clear to vote on. If I have to make my own decision due to the debaters not being clear about where to vote on the flow or how arguments interact, I will be forced to bring my own opinion in and make a subjective decision rather than an objective decision. I do reserve the right to intervene when any -ist argument is made or advocated for.

11. If you advocate for a double win I automatically vote for the other person, issue you 1 speaker point, and leave the room. This is a debate, not a conversation. We are here to compete, so don't try to do something else.

12. Wilderson has stated that he does not want his writings used in debate by white individuals. He believes that the use of his writings is contradictory to what he overall stands for because he feels like you are using his arguments and black individuals as a tool to win (functionally monetizing black individuals). So for the love of all that is good please stop running these cards and respect the author's wishes. If you are white and you run his evidence I will not evaluate it out of respect for the author.

13. I will give you auto 30 speaker points if you read your 1AC/1NC out of a black book with page turns. (this is still offered for digital debates)

Really, I'm open to anything. Debate, have fun, and be engaging. Ask me any questions you may have before the start of the round so that we can all be on the same page :) I also believe this activity should be a learning experience for everyone, so if after a round you have any questions please feel free to approach me and talk to me! I truly mean this because I love talking about debate and the more each debater gains from a round will provide for better rounds in the future for me to judge. If you ever have questions about a comment or RFD please ask. My email is sjcarl3@ilstu.edu

Background

First, I want to be up front with you about my forensics experience and debate background. I am currently the Director of Forensics at Truman State University (2022-present), primarily responsible for coaching the IE squad. My background is largely in IE; I competed in speech throughout all 4 years of high school (Richwoods High School - Peoria, IL, 2010), on the two-year circuit (Illinois Central College – East Peoria, IL), and transferred to the four-year circuit in 2012 (North Central College – Naperville, IL). I received the National Champion title in Dramatic Interp at NFA in 2013, and was National Champion in Informative Speaking at PKD in 2014. After college, I coached IEs while getting my MA from Northern Illinois University, then left the forensics community between 2016-2021 while working on my Ph.D. in Communication at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. I have been at Truman since fall 2021.

I have limited debate judging experience.

Preferences

When it comes to judging debate rounds, I come in pretty much as a blank slate. My IE experience leads me to prefer hearing more of the argumentation guiding the claims in the debate, rather than rushing through your speeches to get more information in. I love the performative and stylistic elements of this activity, but I have to understand the debate in order to judge it. I want you to spell out the connections of your evidence to your argument and understand the links you are making, then be able to explain those to me intelligibly. I want you to be respectful of your opponent, but I do enjoy a little competitive banter. I like when arguments are logically and validly critiqued and hearing competitors’ responses to their opponent’s questions/concerns.

On top of coherence, I will look towards other public speaking aspects to form my opinion about who is most persuasive in the round. This of course includes the argumentative elements that are said in the debate, but also the ways in which competitors engage their opponents, the judge(s), and other elements that factor into a speaker’s credibility (e.g., confidence, tone, nonverbal cues, etc.).

I enjoy hearing “weird” case arguments that analogize or extend the debate topic to other fields/concepts/issues, but will always prefer these arguments be within the scope or vicinity of the respective NFA-LD resolution for the year. As the opponent, if you think we shouldn’t adjust how we frame the debate, please argue why. I want you to persuade me on how I should judge the round. If you present an argument that needs further explanation or knowledge to understand, please provide it.

That being said, I do not particularly enjoy seeing documents specifically titled “lay case” or anything similar that denotes my potential for understanding you. Please don’t confuse my lack of debate experience with an incapacity to think critically about arguments. Use your regular case, then make arguments in the debate clearer if you think they are too complicated to understand for a particular judge, but you wouldn’t call your constituents dumb to their face if you were running for a public office.

I will not know right away what you are saying if you throw lots of technical jargon into the debate, but may be able to pick up what you mean by context clues. This is a risk you can take if you wish.

I will download case documents in the round and will judge the round based on what happens in the debate itself. I will not necessarily go back and look at evidence later, unless in cases of suspected or alleged rule violations. I try to provide clear reasons for my decision on the ballot, but if you ever have any concerns or questions, please reach out – bdavis@truman.edu.

ADOF for Washburn University

Please treat your opponent with kindness and respect. I get it sometimes this is hard to do—cx can get heated at times. Just know that keeping your cool in those situations goes a long way with me. Guaranteed if you’re rude speaks will suffer. If you’re really rude you will get the Loss!

Quality of evidence matters. Credential comparisons are important – example- Your opponent’s evidence is from a blog vs your evidence is from a specialist in the field of the debate---you should point that out! Currency comparisons are important – example- Your opponents impact card from 2014 is based off a very different world than what we exist in now---you should point that out. Last thing here—Over-tagged / under highlighted cards do not impress me. Good rule of thumb—if your card tag is longer than what you have highlighted I will consider that pretty shady.

Speed vs Delivery- What impresses me—debaters that can deliver their evidence efficiently & persuasively. Some can do this a little quicker than others and that is okay. On the flip side— for you slower debaters the great balancer is I prefer quality evidence / arguments and will always privilege 1 solid argument over 5 kind-of-arguments—you just have to point that out. Cross-applications / impact filter cards are your friend.

I prefer you embrace the resolution- What does this mean exactly? No plan text Affirmatives = 90% chance you will lose to T. If you could write an advocacy statement you probably could have written/found a TVA. What about the other 10%? Well, if your opponent does not run or collapse to T-USFG / does not put any offense on your performative method then you will probably get my ballot.

Theory/procedurals- Aff & Neg if you’re not making theory args offensive then don’t bother reading them. Negs that like to run 4 theory/procedural args in the 1NC and collapse to the one least covered—I will vote on RVI’s—This means when kicking out, if an RVI is on that theory sheet you better take the time to answer it. I view RVI’s as the great strategic balancer to this approach.

Case debate-Case debate is important. Key areas of case that should be addressed: Plan text (plan flaw), circumvention, direct solvency turns / defense, impact filters / framing, rolb claims.

Counterplan/disad combo - If I had to choose what debate island I would have to live on for the rest of my life-- I would choose this one. I like generic process cp/da combo’s just as much as hyper specific PICs/with a small net-benefit. CP text is important. Your CP text should be textually & functionally competitive. CP theory debates can be interesting. I will give all cp theory arguments consideration if framed as an offensive reason to do so. The only CP theory I will not listen to is PICs bad (never). Both aff/neg should be framing the rebuttal as “Judge we have the world of the cp vs the plan” here is why my world (the cp or plan) is better.

K debates - I am a great believer in topic specific critical lit – The more specific your link cards the better. If your only link is "you function through the state" – don’t run it or do some research and find some specific links. I expect K Alts to have the following: 1. Clear alt text 2. Carded alt solvency that isolates the method being used 3. Tell me what the post alt world looks like. If your K happens to be a floating PIC that is fine with me but I will consider theoretical argument in opposition as well—Yes, I will listen to a Floating PIC good/bad debate.

Last thought: Doing your own research + Cutting your own evidence = more knowledge gained by you.

“Chance favors a prepared mind” Louis Pasteur

Debate is a fun competitive research game. Ask questions if you have them.

Hi!I am a first-year PhD student at the University of Tennessee studying nuclear engineering and doing research at the Tennessee Ion Beam Materials Laboratory. I competed in parliamentary debate at the University of Illinois on the NPDA circuit and did congressional debate for three years at Hampshire High School in Hampshire, IL in ICDA, NSDA, and IHSA tournaments. At the University of Illinois, I was the president of the Illini Forensics speech and debate team, and helped coach parli and LD.

In terms of personal politics, I won’t let them influence my voting decisions or speaker scores that I give out. I’ll definitely push back against any dumb ideas in my feedback in ballots, but I’ll definitely try my hardest to not let that reflect in speaker scores or my RFD (of course no judge is perfect at this and they’re lying if they say they are). Only exception is blatantly racist, sexist, homophobic, any kind of -ist or -ic arguments will cause me to dock speaker points and will be a voting issue, but it should be addressed by the other team in their speeches if it comes up regardless.

Parliamentary:
1. No/minimal spreading. Without cards and without shared documents, it's incredibly hard to hear clearly. Online debate exacerbates this issue, as mic quality is terrible. I won't necessarily vote on spreading, but if you're speaking fast enough to where I can't understand you, I won't be able to completely flow your argument, so you'll appear to have dropped arguments on my flow.

2. Kritiks must be absolutely rock solid and grounded in reality for me to vote on them. I generally despise Ks, especially in parli, because they are almost always prepared ahead of time and just minorly adapted for the individual topic. If you do decide to run a K, make it understandable and realistic, don't start quoting obscure theory that is beyond a reasonable level of familiarity. THAT BEING SAID I try my best to vote on the flow, so if you run an annoying K but the other team doesn't respond properly, I'll have to vote for it but I won't be happy.

3. I will only vote on theory if there is proven abuse that is not sufficiently responded to by the other team. Big fan of RVIs, run them if the other team runs frivolous T.

4. I am much more concerned about the quality of arguments than I am about the technicality of your arguments. Better arguments = better communication.

5. Signpost please! Be clear when moving onto different advantages, disadvantages, counter plans, etc., and give a roadmap of your speech before you give it, you can do this off time if you like.

6. Have fun, don't get angry at each other. We all do debate for fun, no need to make it overly competitive.

Policy and LD

1. I’m fine with speed (to an extent). In policy you have cards and the arguments are usually predictable enough to follow along. The only time I dock speaker points for spreading is if I think your case or your own personal speaking style would be helped by slowing down. If you’re spreading so fast that I can’t understand your arguments, that’ll reflect on the flow not because I don’t like spreading but because I can’t flow arguments that aren’t clear.

2. Kritiks must be absolutely rock solid and grounded in reality for me to vote on them. Don’t run a K because you want to shoehorn your grand political ideology into every single debate you have. If you don’t prove that voting for the K has real world impacts and that it’s not just trying to fiat mindset, 99 times out of 100 it’s just cringe. Ground your Ks in a very tangible voting issue that I can feel good voting about. If you run it, also be aware that I will DEFINITELY vote for a T that attacks a silly K for making the debate non-educational. THAT BEING SAID I try my best to vote on the flow, so if you run an annoying K but the other team doesn't respond properly, I'll vote for it.

3. I will only vote on theory if there is proven abuse that is not sufficiently responded to by the other team. Running theory/topicality and the other team responding badly does not automatically mean you won the debate on theory/topicality if you haven’t proven that you’ve lost ground or the educational value of the debate. I love RVIs on pointless T.

4. Signpost, please. I am not a policy judge first and foremost, I’ve only ever competed in Parli on the college circuit, congress in high school, and a little IPDA, so please tell me where you are in your arguments because with spreading (which again is fine) and the different format, it’s very easy to get lost.

6. Cross-ex- I flow it, but please make sure to apply what you asked in cross-ex in your speeches. Respond to it in your speeches as if I didn’t flow it. Don’t just ask questions for the sake of asking questions, make them all intentional.

7. Have fun! If you take debate so seriously to the point where you actually get mad or tilted at an argument, that’s probably more on you than it is on the other team. We all do debate for fun.

If you have any questions for me before/after a round or want clarification on feedback, feel free to reach out to me at stevenfrankowski8@gmail.com, I’ll keep an eye on my email before rounds during prep for parli if you have any questions during prep and try to respond during prep.

Congress

1. Clash - This is a form of debate and I expect to hear a battle of ideas. This also indicates that you are listening.

2. No spreading - Congress is as much about clearly communicating ideas as it is about content.

3. Research - State your sources; I will judge based on research quality, both the source and date of the research cited are important. Along with this, youneed analysis on your research. Stating quotes or stats without any reason for why I should care will get you docked speaker points and speech score.

4. Content - Make sure when you give a speech that you are bringing in new arguments, if you get up and only restate other debaters' arguments you are missing the point of debate. As debate evolves, make sure you evolve with it. If the focus of the debate starts to center around one pivotal thing, make sure you bring that up. If you make a claim without a link or quote evidence without any analysis, I generally take that as if the evidence was not brought up at all. Link both to the bill and to other speakers' arguments.

5. Questioning - This is not a time to give a speech or preempt your speech. Point out flaws in logic, or clarify certain terms, but don't just ask them to restate their contentions.

Hey y'all, my name is Porter. This is my 7th year being involved in debate. Octafinalist at 2021 NFA-LD National Championship. Pronouns are he/him.

I would HIGHLY encourage the debaters to set up a speech drop (speechdrop.net), especially if the debate is occurring online/hybrid. If for any reason that does not work, please include me on any email chain at porter.giles@gmail.com.

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BIO: I am currently a senior at Illinois State University, where I now help coach and judge. I did 4 years of Lincoln-Douglas in high school, and I competed at nationals my senior year. I competed in NFA-LD my freshman and sophomore years of college, and spent my junior year abroad in Japan. I am a political science major with a minor in East Asian studies. I worked as the assistant debate coach for the LD team at Lincoln Southwest HS from 2020-2022, and University High School from 2021-2022.

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Case:

When evaluating rounds I will look to the framework , but I do a lot of the decision-making based on the impact level (for HSLD). I'm not a huge fan of traditional debates in HS-LD these days, so make sure you are doing it very well if you want to go for that. I like to see a lot of clear extensions of arguments that either go dropped or are under-responded to by your opponent, as well as good impact calculus. If you can make turns on your opponent's arguments go for it, I love to see that. PLEASE for the love of all things good give me some in-round clash rather than 45 minutes of unresponsive arguments that don't link to each other.

Side note: I will not vote for debaters who run arguments that speak over others' voices. Ex: white debaters running blackness.

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Speed: 8/10

In terms of speed, I can keep up with most spreading although in an online format you are running the risk of poor connection interfering with your speeches. SLOW DOWN FOR TAGLINES!! Clarity is more important to me than whether or not you can go Mach-5 and read 12 off-case positions. If your opponent is clearly new to the activity I will dock your speaks if you spread them out of the round. If you do this on top of being exceptionally rude to your opponent, I will most likely drop you.

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K:

I'm fine with the K debate, so long as you explain the alt and the links in a clear manner. Warrant analysis is a MUST on the K debate. I am most comfortable with critical arguments surrounding capitalism, consumption, necropolitics/biopower, and migration, although I will listen to anything if you explain the literature well. If you are reading a K aff I have a high threshold to vote against you on theory.

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Topicality/Theory:

Go for it. I enjoy the T debate at this point in my debate career and I am comfortable evaluating it. Slow down for your shell so that I don't miss anything you might want me to hear.

I probably need at least some instance of proven abuse, otherwise, give me a very compelling reason as to why I should vote on potential abuse. I generally have a very high threshold to voting on T against K affs.

Side note: I will NEVER under ANY circumstance, vote for disclosure theory. If you do choose to run disclosure in front of me, I will give you no higher than 26 speaker points.

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TL;dr Prefs:

tech > truth

phil - 3

Theory - 2

CP - 1

DA - 1

K - 1

tricks - Just don't do it.

Email: Jenna.gorton@washburn.edu

I prefer speech drop

NFALD-

I did NFA LD for 4 years for Washburn University. I currently am a grad assistant for Washburn's debate team. My favorite type of argument is T/theory/rules. As long as you're impacting out why fairness and education matter and are reading 4 parts on the sheet I'm willing to listen to basically any theory position. That being said, I also like aff outweighs T arguments or other offense generated against theory sheets. I don't come into the round assuming debate is good or bad so it's the debaters job to persuade me. I consider myself tech>truth on theory sheets as long as you are making actual warranted arguments and aren't just saying claims.

If I have to intervene because of a messy flow or because nobody extended an impact I become a stock issues judge. As such, I tend to have a much higher threshold for whichever team doesn't have presumption.

Speed is fine. I don't have a preference. If I miss something because you weren't clear that is on you. I probably won't clear you so use reasonable discretion.

Please run your weird cheater affs/strats in front of me. Of course you have to theoretically justify them on the back end, but this activity can be so boring and I want to see your creativity.

I'm very sympathetic to arguments focused on pointing out deployment errors in general (no uniqueness on a disad, only claims with no warrants on standards debates, dropped args are true args, vague interps bad, etc. etc.).

On Ks I'm not a huge fan of links of omission. I also am VERY sympathetic to criticisms of non-indigenous debaters reading set col or other such arguments. If the link isn't a link of omission there are exceptions.

If you're going for presumption and have a counteradvocacy please don't also extend the alt/CP. Just go for presumption.

I think it's the judge's responsibility to intervene if anything problematic was said to another debater and I will even if the other team doesn't call it out. I am also likely to intervene if you're excluding someone using speed or by not sending analytics if you have been communicated with about this before the round. It's cool to do mid-round off time clarification questions or to type up analytics to send if asked by your opponent to resolve these issues.

Overall, I tend to want to vote without thinking very much if possible. This means a good collapse can easily win my ballot even if the rest of the debate was not going in your favor. If you're winning everywhere but don't collapse to anything and the other team does collapse to something I'm going to lean towards the team that collapses to something unless it's just completely unwinnable.

I'll probably learn more about myself as I judge more NFALD and I'll try to update the paradigm if I figure out more of my biases. If I judge you and you think some way I've evaluated something is strange let me know because I'll throw that up in my paradigm. My goal is never to surprise anyone with a decision so if I am pretty consistently biased toward certain args then I'd like to know so y'all can have a heads up.

High school debate- I will be voting neg unless the aff convinces me that the plan CAN and should change the status quo. If solvency and an advantage is not extended into the last speech I will probably vote neg (see exceptions below). If the aff is going for an impact or perception based link turn you don't need to extend aff solvency. If you collapse to most link/internal-link turns/aff turns off-case arguments you MUST also extend aff solvency.

If the negative reads a counter advocacy or theory sheet and collapses to it then the aff only has to prove that it's preferable to the counter advocacy, that the counter advocacy doesn't solve, or that the theory sheet is not offensive against the aff.

I enjoy good clean theory debates with clash and warrants. If a theory sheet does not include all 4 parts and warranted arguments about how the theory sheet impacts the debate space I will be tempted to intervene. If you are planning to go for theory, theory sheets should be warranted in the first speech where they appear instead of being a list of buzzwords that get re-contextualized into arguments in later speeches.

I am almost always going to vote for the team who collapses to one or two synergistic arguments with impact framing over a team who points out every dropped argument on the flow without context for why it matters.

If I have to intervene because of a messy flow from both teams/little to no collapse done from either side I tend to vote negative on presumption UNLESS the negative has extended a counterproposal into their final speech in which case presumption flips aff.

Speaker points/rank are assigned based mostly on who wins and then who made the debate the most clear and accessible (including to your partner). Condescending behavior towards partners who might not be as experienced is the fastest way to lose speaker points/rank.

I competed in UIL Policy for four years in high school and 3 years of NSDA Policy. After graduating, I went to Texas A&M and competed in NFA-LD for 3 years. Last year, I began coaching for a 2A High school in Texas. This year I am a Grad Assistant at WKU. 

You do you. Debate in your style. Run the arguments you want to run. As long as the arguments are warranted and you can give me clear voters on why the argument matters, I am willing to vote for nearly anything. Don't be racist, homophobic, transphobic, etc.

T- I was a very heavy T debater and am willing to hear just about any T argument that is imaginable. I just ask that you make it reasonable. FX and Xtra T are arguments that I like and enjoy hearing on both sides of the round. If you are going to debate T, explain the voters more than just saying "Fairness and education." Explain why those things matter in debate. 

DA- Please explain why the disad outweighs the aff and impact it out. Affs, respond to more than one part of the disad. Don't lose because you only put defense on the flow that the neg was prepared for. 

K- I am open to almost any and all k's. I am not super well read in a lot of k lit so if you are able to inform me of the lit, I am okay with you running it. I have ran as a competitor and am willing to vote on arguments like death good.

CP- I will listen to and vote on CP's if they are run well, but they are my least favorite argument overall. I feel that CP's don't have a lot of ground that is given and most rounds with CP's boil down to a perm. This doesn't mean that you cannot run them. On some topics, CPs are necessary and I understand that. My feelings towards CP will not interfere with any round decisions. 

TL;DR: I am open to just about anything as long as it is done well and warranted. If you have any specific questions, feel free to ask. Run what you feel is best for the round. Please don't be rude or problematic in your speeches or arguments. I will vote you down if you say something that is blatantly problematic or offensive. Just because it is an argument does not excuse any racism, homophobia, sexism, etc.

I've been judging Congressional Debate at the TOC since 2011. I'm looking for no rehash & building upon the argumentation. I want to hear you demonstrate true comparative understanding of the advantages and disadvantages of the plan presented by the legislation. Don't simply praise or criticize the status quo as if the legislation before you doesn't exist.

L-D Paradigm:

Each LDer should have a value/value criterion that clarifies how their case should be interpreted.

I prefer to evaluate a round by selecting whose V/VC weighs most heavily under their case. Winning this is not in itself a reason for you to win. Tell me what arguments you're winning at the contention level, how they link, and how much they weigh in comparison to other arguments (yours and your opponent's) in the round.

Voting down the flow, if both sides prove framework and there’s not a lot of clash I would move on to the contention level and judge off the flow.

PUBLIC FORUM

SPEED
Don't. I can't deal with speed.

EVIDENCE
Paraphrasing is a horrible practice that I discourage. Additionally, I want to hear evidence dates (year of publication at a minimum) and sources (with author's credential if possible) cited in all evidence.

REBUTTALS
I believe it is the second team's duty to address both sides of the flow in the second team's rebuttal. A second team that neglects to both attack the opposing case and rebuild against the prior rebuttal will have a very difficult time winning my ballot as whichever arguments go unaddressed are essentially conceded.

SUMMARIES
The summaries should be treated as such - summarize the major arguments in the debate. I expect debaters to start to narrow the focus of the round at this point.

FINAL FOCUS
FOCUS is key. I would prefer 2 big arguments over 10 blippy ones that span the length of the flow. If you intend to make an argument in the FF, it should have been well explained, supported with analysis and/or evidence, and extended from its origin point in the debate all the way through the FF.

IMPACTS

I rock with the nuclear war impact, but it's getting a little old, lol. The concept of a nuclear war is too complex and I find that it's been thrown too loosely in the debate space. I know it's cliche, but please don't generate this impact and tell me you win on magnitude and expect that to be a reason for me to give your team an easy ballot. If one of your impacts genuinely leads to an outbreak of a nuclear war, please warrant it well.

INTERPoverall: I pay real close attention to the introduction of each piece, I look for the lens of analysis and the central thesis that will be advanced during the interpretation of literature. When the performance is happening, I'm checking to see if they have dug down deep enough into an understanding of their literature through that intro and have given me a way to contextualize the events that are happening during the performance

POI: I look for clean transitions and characterization (if doing multiple voices).

DI: I look for the small human elements that come from acting. Big and loud gestures are not always the way to convey the point, sometimes something smaller gets the point more powerfully.

HI: I look for clean character transitions, distinct voices, and strong energy in the movements. And of course the humor.

INFO: I'm looking for a well researched speech that has a strong message to deliver. Regardless of the genre of info you're presenting, I think that showing you've been exhaustive with your understanding is a good way to win my ballot. I'm not wow'd by flashy visuals that add little substance, and I'm put off by speeches that misrepresent intellectual concepts, even unintentionally. I like speeches that have a conclusion, and if the end of your speech is "and we still don't know" then I think you might want to reassess the overall direction you are taking.

FX/DX: When I'm evaluating an extemp speech, I'm continually thinking "did they answer the question? or did they answer something that sounded similar?" So keep that in your mind. Are you directly answering the question? When you present information that could be removed without affecting the overall quality of the speech, that is a sign that there wasn't enough research done by the speaker. What I vote on in terms of content are speeches that show a depth of understanding of the topic by evaluating the wider implications that a topic has for the area/region/politics/etc.

Updated for IPDA and Policy judging

Craig Hennigan
University of Nevada Las Vegas

TL/DR - I'm fine on the K. Need in round abuse for T. I'm fine with speed. K Alts that do something more than naval-gazing is preferred. Avoid running away from arguments. Actual dropped arguments will win you the round. I vote a lot on good CP/DA combinations.

I debated high school policy in the early 90’s and then college policy in 1994. I also competed in NFA-LD for 4 or 5 years, I don't recall, I know my last season was 1999? I then coached at Utica High School and West Bloomfield High school in Michigan for their policy programs for an additional 8 years. I coached for 5 years at Wayne State University. I was the Director of Forensics at Truman State University for 7 years and now am the Director of Debate at UNLV and started in 2022.

Dropped arguments can carry a lot of weight with me if you make an issue of them early. This being said, I have been more truth over tech lately. Some arguments are so bad I'm inclined to do work against it. If its cold conceded I will go with it, but if its a truly bad interpretation/argument, it won't take a lot to mitigate risk of it happening. I have responded well to sensible 'gut check' arguments before.

I enjoy debaters who can keep my flow neat. You need to have clear tags on your cards. I REQUIRE a differentiation in how you say the tag/citation and the evidence.

With regard to specific arguments – I will vote seldom on theory arguments that do not show significant in-round abuse. Potential abuse is a non-starter for me, and time skew to me is a legit strategy unless it’s really really bad. My threshold for theory then is pretty high if you cannot show a decent abuse story. Showing an abuse story should come well before the last rebuttal. If it is dropped though, I will most likely drop the argument before the team. Reminders in round about my disposition toward theory is persuasive such as "You don't want to pull the trigger on condo bad," or "I know you don't care for theory, here is why this is a uniquely bad situation where I don't get X link and why that is critical to this debate." Intrinsic and severance perms I think are bad if you can show why they are intrinsic or severance. Again, I'd drop argument before team.

I don't judge kick. If the CP is in the NR, the SQ isn't an option anymore.

I don’t like round bullys. If you run an obscure K philosophy don't expect everyone in the room to know who/what it is saying. It is the duty of those that want to run the K to be a ‘good’ person who wants to enhance the education of all present. I have voted for a lot of K's though so it's not like I'm opposed to them. K alternatives should be able to be explained well in the cross-x. I will have a preference for K alts that actually "do" something. The influence of my ballot on the discourse of the world at large is default minimal, on the debate community default is probably even less than minimal. Repeating jargon of the card is a poor strategy, if you can explain what the world looks like post alternative, that's awesome. I have found clarity to be a premium need in LD debate since there is much less time to develop a K. Failing to explain what the K does in the 1AC/NC then revealing it in the 1AR/NR is bad. If the K alt mutates into something else in the NR, this is a pretty compelling reason to vote against the K.

Never run from a debate. I'll respect someone that goes all-in for the heg good/heg bad argument and gets into a debate more than someone who attempts to be tricksy in case/plan writing or C-X in order to avoid potential arguments. Ideal C-X would be:

"Does your case increase spending?"

"Darn right, what are you gonna do about it? Catch me outside."

I will vote on T. Again, there should be an in-round abuse story to garner a ballot for T. This naturally would reinforce the previous statement under theory that says potential abuse is a non-starter for me. Developing T as an impact based argument rather than a rules based argument is more persuasive. As potential abuse is not typically a voter for me and I'll strike down speaker points toward RVI's based on bad theory. Regarding K's of T, it is a high bar and you probably shouldn't do it.

Anything that you intend to win on I need to have more than 15 seconds spent on it. I won't vote for a blip that isn't properly impacted. Rebuttals should not be a laundry list of answers without a comparative analysis of why one argument is clearly superior and a round winner.

Performance: Give me a reason to vote. Make an argument still with the performance. I don't typically want to do extra work for a debater so you need to apply your performance to arguments your opponent makes. I don't place arguments on the flow for you through embedded clash.

Small note: If you're totally outmatching your opponent, you're going to earn speaker points not by smashing your opponent, but rather through making debate a welcoming and educational experience for everyone.

Policy:Most of this is the same. Know that I'm getting older. I used to be around an 8 on the scale of speed and its probably dropped down to a 7. This means don't spread analyticals if you want me to vote on them. If you group 4-5 perms at once very quickly I may not get them all. I'm only in the game 2-3 times a year so some of the newer terminology or tricks I may not be as up to speed on. I won't vote on short blip arguments. Not the biggest fan of too many conditional worlds, 1 K and 1 CP is my default. I don't do judge kick either. I'm probably a bit of a dinosaur in this area now.

IPDA: IPDA is not policy nor should it resemble policy. I'm much less flow oriented. I'm of the belief that IPDA is far more of a speech activity and judge it accordingly. Dropped arguments carry weight, but less weight for me if they aren't really quality arguments. I'm of the opinion that a debater can win even if they aren't winning "on the flow" by being persuasive and speaking well. This is a publicly oriented event, so being cordial and good natured is important. This is a showcase to what debate ought to look like for the public, so treat it that way. I aim to be a judge that tries to leave behind my Policy/LD experience to substitute my speech experience and quality argumentation knowledge.

Card Clipping addendum:

Don't cheat. I typically ask to be included on email chains or ideally a speechdrop so that I can try to follow along at certain points of the speech to ensure that there isn't card clipping, however if you bring it up I in round I will also listen. You probably ought to record the part with clipping if I don't bring it up myself. Also, if I catch clipping (and if I catch it, it's blatant) then that's it, round over, other team doesn't have to bring it up if I noticed it. If its obviously unintentional then I'll warn you about it. (like you're a novice or you skipped a non-strategic line by mistake).

I judge one, perhaps two tournaments a year as a favor to my alma mater. I competed in Parli and LD debate from 2002-2006, including IE Speech events. I flow on paper. I do enjoy Kritiqs and other uses of theory, but am not in the community enough to be aware of fads and commonly used acronyms. This will be the first time I will be hearing any of the cases. I can handle a medium amount of speed, but I'd rather not have to vote on who dropped the least arguments, because both competitors tried to speed each other out of the round. I feel that speed can be used just as an exclusionary tool, that neither benefits the quality or quantity of arguments. I teach high school Physics as a career. I have a PhD in Science Education, so I have more than cursory knowledge of the science behind nuclear weapons, and as a educator would point out misconceptions on the ballot-although I wouldn't vote on it. This will be my first time judging online.

PFD addendum for NSDA 2024

I am incredibly concerned about the quality of the evidence read in debates and the lack of sharing of evidence read.

Teams who send evidence in a single document that they intend to read in their speech and quickly send an addendum document with all evidence selected mid speech will be rewarded greatly.

I will ask each team to send every piece of evidence read by both teams in ALL speeches.

Competed:

2011-15 – Lawrence Free State, KS, Policy (Space, Transportation, Latin America, Oceans)

2015-17 – JCCC, KS, NDT/CEDA (Military Presence, Climate Change); NFA-LD (Bioprospecting, Southern Command)

2017-20 – Missouri State University, MO, NDT/CEDA (Healthcare, Exec Authority, Space); NFA-LD (Policing, Cybersecurity)

Coached:

2016-17 – Lawrence High School, KS, (China Engagement)

2017-19 – Olathe West High School, KS, (Education, Immigration)

2019-22– Truman High School, MO, (Arm Sales, CJR, Water)

2020-Present– Missouri State University, MO, (MDT Withdrawal, Anti-Trust, Rights/Duties, Nukes); NFA-LD (Climate, Endless Wars)

2022-23- Truman State University, MO, NFA-LD (Elections)

2022-Present - The Pembroke Hill School, MO, (NATO, Economic Inequality).

Always add:

phopsdebate@gmail.com

Also add IF AND ONLY IF at a NDT/CEDA TOURNAMENT: debatedocs@googlegroups.com

If I walk out of the room (or go off-camera), please send the email and I will return very quickly.

Email chains are STRONGLY preferred. Email chains should be labeled correctly.

*Name of Tournament * *Division* *Round #* *Aff Team* vs *Neg Team*

tl;dr:

You do you; I'll flow whatever happens. I tend to like policy arguments more than Kritical arguments. I cannot type fast and flow on paper as a result. Please give me pen time on T, Theory, and long o/v's etc. Do not be a jerk. Debaters work hard, and I try to work as hard as I can while judging. Debaters should debate slower than they typically do.

Evidence Quality X Quantity > Quality > Quantity. Argument Tech + Truth > Tech > Truth. Quals > No Quals.

I try to generate a list of my random thoughts and issues I saw with each speech in the debate. It is not meant to be rude. It is just how I think through comments. If I have not said anything about something it likely means I thought it was good.

Speaker Points:

If you can prove to me you have updated your wiki for the round I am judging before I submit the ballot I will give you the highest speaker points allowed by the tournament. An updated wiki means: 1. A complete round report. 2. Cites for all 1NC off case positions/ the 1AC, and 3. uploaded open source all of the documents you read in the debate inclusive of analytics. If I become aware that you later delete, modify, or otherwise disclose less information after I have submitted my ballot, any future debate in which I judge you will result in the lowest possible speaker points at the tournament.

Online debates:

In "fast" online debates, I found it exceptionally hard to flow those with poor internet connections or bad mics. I also found it a little harder even with ideal mic and internet setups. I think it's reasonable for debates in which a debater(s) is having these issues for everyone in the debate to debate at an appropriate speed for everyone to engage.

Clarity is more important in a digital format than ever before. I feel like it would behoove everyone to be 10% slower than usual. Make sure you have a differentiation between your tag voice and your card body voice.

It would be super cool if everyone put their remaining prep in the chat.

I am super pro the Cams on Mics muted approach in debates. Obvious exceptions for poor internet quality.

People should get in the groove of always sending marked docs post speeches and sending a doc of all relevant cards after the debate.

Disads:

I enjoy politics debates. Reasons why the Disad outweighs and turns the aff, are cool. People should use the squo solves the aff trick with election DA's more.

Counter Plans:

I generally think negatives can and should get to do more. CP's test the intrinsic-ness of the advantages to the plan text. Affirmatives should get better at writing and figuring out plan key warrants. Bad CP's lose because they are bad. It seems legit that 2NC's get UQ and adv cp's to answer 2AC thumpers and add-ons. People should do this more.

Judge kicking the cp seems intuitive to me. Infinite condo seems good, real-world, etc. Non-Condo theory arguments are almost always a reason to reject the argument and not the team. I still expect that the 2AC makes theory arguments and that the neg answers them sufficiently. I think in an evenly matched and debated debate most CP theory arguments go neg.

I am often not a very good judge for CP's that require you to read the definition of "Should" when answering the permutation. Even more so for CP's that compete using internal net benefits. I understand how others think about these arguments, but I am often unimpressed with the quality of the evidence and cards read. Re: CIL CP - come on now.

Kritiks on the Negative:

I like policy debate personally, but that should 0% stop you from doing your thing. I think I like K debates much better than my brain will let me type here. Often, I end up telling teams they should have gone for the K or voted for it. I think this is typically because of affirmative teams’ inability to effectively answer critical arguments

Links of omission are not links. Rejecting the aff is not an alternative, that is what I do when I agree to endorse the alternative. Explain to me what happens to change the world when I endorse your alternative. The aff should probably be allowed to weigh the aff against the K. I think arguments centered on procedural fairness and iterative testing of ideas are compelling. Clash debates with solid defense to the affirmative are significantly more fun to adjudicate than framework debates. Floating pics are probably bad. I think life has value and preserving more of it is probably good.

Kritical Affirmatives vs Framework:

I think the affirmative should be in the direction of the resolution. Reading fw, cap, and the ballot pik against these affs is a good place to be as a policy team. I think topic literacy is important. I think there are more often than not ways to read a topical USfg action and read similar offensive positions. I am increasingly convinced that debate is a game that ultimately inoculates advocacy skills for post-debate use. I generally think that having a procedurally fair and somewhat bounded discussion about a pre-announced, and democratically selected topic helps facilitate that discussion.

Case Debates:

Debates in which the negative engages all parts of the affirmative are significantly more fun to judge than those that do not.

Affirmatives with "soft-left" advantages are often poorly written. You have the worst of both worlds of K and Policy debate. Your policy action means your aff is almost certainly solvable by an advantage CP. Your kritical offense still has to contend with the extinction o/w debate without the benefit of framework arguments. It is even harder to explain when the aff has one "policy" extinction advantage and one "kritical" advantage. Which one of these framing arguments comes first? I have no idea. I have yet to hear a compelling argument as to why these types of affirmative should exist. Negative teams that exploit these problems will be rewarded.

Topicality/procedurals:

Short blippy procedurals are almost always only a reason to reject the arg and not the team. T (along with all procedurals) is never an RVI.

I am super uninterested in making objective assessments about events that took place outside of/before the debate round that I was not present for. I am not qualified nor empowered to adjudicate debates concerning the moral behavior of debaters beyond the scope of the debate.

Things that are bad, but people continually do:

Have "framing" debates that consist of reading Util good/bad, Prob 1st/not 1st etc. Back and forth at each other and never making arguments about why one position is better than another. I feel like I am often forced to intervene in these debates, and I do not want to do that.

Saying something sexist/homophobic/racist/ableist/transphobic - it will probably make you lose the debate at the worst or tank your speaks at the least.

Steal prep.

Send docs without the analytics you already typed. This does not actually help you. I sometimes like to read along. Some non-neurotypical individuals benefit dramatically by this practice. It wastes your prep, no matter how cool the macro you have programmed is.

Use the wiki for your benefit and not post your own stuff.

Refusing to disclose.

Reading the 1AC off paper when computers are accessible to you. Please just send the doc in the chain.

Doing/saying mean things to your partner or your opponents.

Unnecessarily cursing to be cool.

Some random thoughts I had at the end of my first year judging NDT/CEDA:
1. I love debate. I think it is the best thing that has happened to a lot of people. I spend a lot of my time trying to figure out how to get more people to do it. People should be nicer to others.
2. I was worse at debate than I thought I was. I should have spent WAY more time thinking about impact calc and engaging the other teams’ arguments.
3. I have REALLY bad handwriting and was never clear enough when speaking. People should slow down and be clearer. (Part of this might be because of online debate.)

4. Most debates I’ve judged are really hard to decide. I go to decision time often. I’m trying my best to decide debates in the finite time I have. The number of times Adrienne Brovero has come to my Zoom room is too many. I’m sorry.
5. I type a lot of random thoughts I had during debates and after. I really try to make a clear distinction between the RFD and the advice parts of the post-round. It bothered me a lot when I was a debater that people didn’t do this.

6. I thought this before, but it has become clearer to me that it is not what you do, it is what you justify. Debaters really should be able to say nearly anything they’d like in a debate. It is the opposing team’s job to say you’re wrong. My preferences are above, and I do my best to ignore them. Although I do think it is impossible for that to truly occur.

Disclosure thoughts:

I took this from Chris Roberds who said it much more elegantly than myself.

I have a VERY low threshold on this argument. Having schools disclose their arguments pre-round is important if the activity is going to grow/sustain itself. Having coached almost exclusively at small, underfunded, or new schools, I can say that disclosure (specifically disclosure on the wiki if you are a paperless debater) is a game changer. It allows small schools to compete and makes the activity more inclusive. There are a few specific ways that this influences how ballots will be given from me:

1) I will err negative on the impact level of "disclosure theory" arguments in the debate. If you're reading an aff that was broken at a previous tournament, on a previous day, or by another debater on your team, and it is not on the wiki (assuming you have access to a laptop and the tournament provides wifi), you will likely lose if this theory is read. There are two ways for the aff to "we meet" this in the 2ac - either disclose on the wiki ahead of time or post the full copy of the 1ac in the wiki as a part of your speech. Obviously, some grace will be extended when wifi isn't available or due to other extenuating circumstances. However, arguments like "it's just too much work," "I don't like disclosure," etc. won't get you a ballot.

2) The neg still needs to engage in the rest of the debate. Read other off-case positions and use their "no link" argument as a reason that disclosure is important. Read case cards and when they say they don't apply or they aren't specific enough, use that as a reason for me to see in-round problems. This is not a "cheap shot" win. You are not going to "out-tech" your opponent on disclosure theory. To me, this is a question of truth. Along that line, I probably won't vote on this argument in novice, especially if the aff is reading something that a varsity debater also reads.

3) If you realize your opponent's aff is not on the wiki, you should make every possible attempt before the round to ask them about the aff, see if they will put it on the wiki, etc. Emailing them so you have timestamped evidence of this is a good choice. I understand that, sometimes, one teammate puts all the cases for a squad on the wiki and they may have just put it under a different name. To me, that's a sufficient example of transparency (at least the first time it happens). If the aff says it's a new aff, that means (to me) that the plan text and/ or advantages are different enough that a previous strategy cut against the aff would be irrelevant. This would mean that if you completely change the agent of the plan text or have them do a different action it is new; adding a word like "substantially" or "enforcement through normal means" is not. Likewise, adding a new "econ collapse causes war" card is not different enough; changing from a Russia advantage to a China, kritikal, climate change, etc. type of advantage is. Even if it is new, if you are still reading some of the same solvency cards, I think it is better to disclose your previous versions of the aff at a minimum.

4) At tournaments that don't have wifi, this should be handled by the affirmative handing over a copy of their plan text and relevant 1AC advantages etc. before the round. If thats a local tournament, that means as soon as you get to the room and find your opponent.

5) If you or your opponent honestly comes from a circuit that does not use the wiki (e.g. some UDLs, some local circuits, etc.), I will likely give some leeway. However, a great use of post-round time while I am making a decision is to talk to the opponent about how to upload on the wiki. If the argument is in the round due to a lack of disclosure and the teams make honest efforts to get things on the wiki while I'm finishing up my decision, I'm likely to bump speaks for all 4 speakers by .2 or .5 depending on how the tournament speaks go.

6) There are obviously different "levels" of disclosure that can occur. Many of them are described above as exceptions to a rule. Zero disclosure is always a low-threshold argument for me in nearly every case other than the exceptions above.

That said, I am also willing to vote on "insufficient disclosure" in a few circumstances.

A. If you are in the open/varsity division of NDT-CEDA, NFA-LD, or TOC Policy your wiki should look like this or something very close to it. Full disclosure of information and availability of arguments means everyone is tested at the highest level. Arguments about why the other team does not sufficiently disclose will be welcomed. Your wiki should also look like this if making this argument.

B. If you are in the open/varsity division of NDT-CEDA, NFA-LD, or TOC Policy. Debaters should go to the room immediately after pairings are released to disclose what the aff will be. With obvious exceptions for a short time to consult coaches or if tech problems prevent it. Nothing is worse than being in a high-stress/high-level round and the other team waiting until right before the debate to come to disclose. This is not a cool move. If you are unable to come to the room, you should be checking the wiki for your opponent's email and sending them a message to disclose the aff/past 2NR's or sending your coach/a different debater to do so on your behalf.

C. When an affirmative team discloses what the aff is, they get a few minutes to change minor details (tagline changes, impact card swaps, maybe even an impact scenario). This is double true if there is a judge change. This amount of time varies by how much prep the tournament actually gives. With only 10 minutes between pairings and start time, the aff probably only get 30 seconds to say "ope, actually...." This probably expands to a few minutes when given 30 minutes of prep. Teams certainly shouldn't be given the opportunity to make drastic changes to the aff plan text, advantages etc. a long while after disclosing.

I’ve been involved in competitive forensics in one way or another for 30+ years. I competed primarily in pre-merger CEDA and have coached CEDA/NDT, NPDA, IPDA, BP, and NFA LD at various points during that time.

I don’t think I’m absolutely ideologically opposed to any particular type or form of argument.

I’m probably a bit behind the times in terms of theory.

Topicality: I think the proposition matters. I’m more open to discussions about how it matters or what role it plays in the debate but, in my opinion, the proposition is a critical stasis point that encourages argumentative clash. I don’t have a good answer for what my threshold on topicality is. I think it’s a viable check for the negative. However, if the affirmative interpretation is reasonable, I probably wouldn’t spend much time on T. If you don’t think the affirmative interpretation is reasonable, you should spend time explaining and comparing implications of the competing interpretations.

Critical Arguments: Link work is important. I’m more flexible in terms of alternatives. Explanation is important. Don’t assume that I’m familiar with the esoteric literature base that your argument is grounded in. I’m a fan of performative consistency.

Counterplans: The neg should invest time in explaining and applying standards for competition. The aff should do the same with permutations and relevant theory. Because participants often take those theory debates for granted and make assumptions about what is known, agreed upon, and understood, I tend to prefer substantive debates on counterplans.

Stylistic Preferences

I like judging debates when I can keep up and when I feel like I’m in the loop. I haven’t been in a lot of fast or highly technical debates in a while. Plus, I never had the best flow. So, you’ll want to slow down and give me pen time. I’ll stop flowing if this is a problem.

I enjoy debates when there is a clear and well justified framework for how arguments interact with each other and, as a result, should be evaluated. My default is to put procedural questions first, critical questions second, and policy questions third. The lines between those are sometimes blurry. Feel free to make arguments that would rearrange that hierarchy or, assuming you have an alternative, that suggest those categories are outdated, arbitrary, exclusionary, etc.

I like listening to debaters who see the big picture and are able to figure out which arguments matter and which ones don’t. Make (smart) choices. World building and comparison is appreciated.

I don’t have fun judging when arguments are underdeveloped or lack explanation, when you assume that I’m going to do work for you, when you assume that we’re all on the same page about some theoretical precept, when you make ten blippy claims when two or three well developed arguments will do, when you throw everything at the wall and expect me to figure out what sticks, when you continue to talk about an argument even though I’ve turned that page over and haven’t been flowing for a minute.

I don’t like watching debates where participants are smug, rude, overly aggressive, dismissive, mean, etc.

Hey y'all - I assume you're here to figure out how I evaluate debate - all of that information is included below.

Addendum for College LD:

I think most of this information will apply to LD - most of my experience with LD is from the Kansas High School circuit, which is traditional in comparison to the National College circuit, but hopefully my description of how I evaluate policy arguments will help! Also please feel free to ask questions!

A few things about me as a person:

First and foremost, I would appreciate a content warning for domestic violence and sexual assault. Thanks!

Second, I am no longer coaching in high school. I’m typically average 5-10 rounds a year on the high school topic now that I don’t coach. I sometimes coach and judge NFA LD. I remain current on politics, the economy, international relations, etc. I previously coached at Topeka High and Shawnee Heights. I debated the space topic, transportation infrastructure topic, and Latin America topic. I divided my paradigm into several categories - an overview of my paradigm, a list of arguments and how I feel about them, and general framing concerns. Any questions? just ask

Third, I’m open to different speeds, but I am telling you right now that I will be unable to flow top speed without a speech doc. Additionally, be cognizant of the fact zoom can make you less clear. Also, I will not do the work to flow top speed theory, overviews or general analysis - slow down when you want me to pay attention. I'll be fairly apparent when I stop flowing. If it is especially bad I will clear you. I want to be on the email chain - hannahjohnson93@gmail.com

Overview:

I'm open/willing to hearing any type of argument (performance, critical, semi-critical, policy, etc.). If y'all don't provide me a framework for how to view the round or a Role of the Ballot that is clearly articulated and developed, then I will default into a policy maker mindset. If y'all are rude to each other, I will write about it on your ballot and most likely dock you speaks, ranks or even give you the L depending on the severity of your actions. I am easy to read as a judge so if you see me stop flowing or looking annoyed it probably means what you're doing is rude or doesn't make sense to me. I'm fine with speed, but clear tags and analysis are appreciated. I want you to be empowered to debate what you want to debate in front of me - this is your round, not mine.

How I evaluate Debaters and their actions:

I've developed a zero-tolerance policy if debaters are rude to any of the debaters in the round - expect a reduction in speaks or losing the round due to your behavior. You are accountable for the way you act so I don't feel like warnings are necessary. Additonally, I hold you accountable for the arguments you choose to read. Therefore, if your arguments are sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic, or targeted towards any person or group in a negative-way, expect a reduction in speaks or losing the round. If you have questions about this, please ask me before the round starts - I want to make debate educational and inclusive.

Affs:

I'm open/willing to listen to any type of affs. Non-T affs are fine IF they are rejecting the topic. If you are Non-T and upholding the use of the Fed Gov, you better have good T blocks written. Any aff needs to provide me with a clear method of how you solve and a way I should view the round.

Topicality:

When I wasn't taking politics in the 2NR, I was probably taking T. Every level of the T flow is important to me so you must extend and explain interp, standards and voters. Saying "we access fairness and education best" isn't going to win you the round. You need to tell me HOW you access fairness and education the best. I enjoy Topical Versions of the Aff, Case Lists and Core of the Topic args. If you can explain to me why your interp is better for fairness/education in this round and in debate in general, you'll have an easy time winning my ballot. Also, I probs default to competing interps.

Disads:

Generics are fine, but I prefer them to have case-specific links (analytical or carded). When I was in high school, I ran politics disads and would often take them into the 2NR so I'm fairly confident in my ability to understand them.

Counterplans:

I am fine with listening to any CP, but you have to be able to answer why PICs are bad, Delay CPs are bad, Condo is bad, etc. I will vote on any of these arguments depending on the level of abuse in round. Otherwise, when running a CP have a clear net ben. Also, I'm fine with CP funding planks. I don't buy 2NC CP amendments, but I'll only vote against them if the aff makes an arg - make sure your plan text read in the 1NC makes sense and isn't just "the 50 states (insert plan text here).

Kritiks:

I'm not familiar with most K lit so you'll want to develop clear analysis about the K. I am most familiar with Neolib, Cap and Security, but my familiarity DOES NOT mean I will do the necessary analysis of cards for you. In the rounds I've watched so far this year, framework has been underutilized by teams. Read framework!!! Explain your alts - your alt solvency is important and I won't vote on a blippy extension of Zizek.

Framework:

You need a clear interp of what the framework or Role of the Ballot should be. There needs to be clash on the framework about why the aff/neg team's framework is good/bad for debate and for education/fairness in the round.

Fringe Args:

I'm not the judge to talk about aliens/wipeout/goos/etc in front of, but if you still feel inclined to do so, impact out your illogical args logically.

Generic Framing:

I view debate as an educational activity. I want the best education and most fair experience for both teams. Use this framework when explaining your theory arguments. Otherwise, anything you do to directly harm a debater in round will be counted against you because it conflicts with the aim of using debate as an educational tool.

Justin Kirk - Director of Debate at University of Nebraska-Lincoln

General philosophy – Debate is primarily a communications based activity, and if you are not communicating well, your arguments are probably incoherent, and you are probably not going to win many debates in front of me. It is your responsibility to make quality arguments. An argument consists of a claim, a warrant, and an impact. Evidence supports argumentation, it does not supplant it. However, analytic arguments and comparative claims about argument quality are essential to contextualizing your evidence and applying it to the issues developed throughout the debate. Quality arguments beat bad evidence every time.

I flow every debate and expect teams to answer arguments made by the other team. You should also flow every debate. That does not mean start flowing after the speech documents run out. Cross-examinations that consist mostly of "what cards did you read" or "what cards did you skip" are not cross examinations and do you little to no good in terms of winning the debate. If you have questions about whether or not the other team made an argument or answered a particular argument, consult your flow, not the other team. The biggest drawback to paperless debate is that people debate off speech docs and not their flows, this leads to shoddy debating and an overall decline in the quality of argumentation and refutation.

Each team has a burden of refutation, and arguing the entire debate from macro-level arguments without specifically refuting the other side's arguments will put you at a severe disadvantage in the debate. Burden of proof falls upon the team making an argument. Unwarranted, unsupported assertions are a non-starter for me. It is your responsibility is to make whole arguments and refute the arguments made by the other side. Evaluating the debate that occurred is mine. The role of my ballot is to report to the tab room who I believe won the debate.

Online Debate - everyone is adjusting to the new world of online debate and has plenty of burdens. I will be lenient when judging if you are having technical difficulties and provide ample time. You should record all of your speeches on a backup device in case of permanent technical failures. Speech drop is the norm for sharing files. If there are bandwidth problems, I will ask everyone to mute their mics and videos unless they are talking.

Paperless Debate – You should make every attempt to provide a copy of the speech documents to me and the other team before the speech. The easiest way to resolve this is through speech drop. I suspect that paperless debate has also led to a substantial decrease in clarity and corresponding increases in cross-reading and clipping. I have zero tolerance for cheating in debate, and will have no qualms about voting against you, assigning zero speaker points, and speaking to your coaches about it. Clarity is a must. You will provide me speech documents to read during the debate so I may better understand the debate that is occurring in front of me. I will ask you to be clearer if you are not and if you continue to be unclear, I will stop flowing your arguments.

Topicality – Is good for debate, it helps to generate clash, prevents abusive affirmatives, and generally wins against affirmatives that have little to no instrumental relation to the topic. Topicality definitions should be precise, and the reasons to prefer your topicality violation should be clear and have direct relation to your interpretation. Topicality debates are about the scope of and competition generated by the resolution. I usually default to competing interpretations, as long as both sides have clear, contextual, and well warranted interpretations. If your interpretation is missing one of these three elements, go for another argument. Reasonability is a winnable argument in front of me as long as you offer specific and warranted reasons why your interpretation is reasonable vis-à-vis the negative. I vote on potential abuse and proven abuse.

Kritiks – Should be based in the resolution and be well researched with specific links to the affirmative. Reading generic links to the topic is insufficient to establish a link to the affirmative. Alternatives should be well explained and evidenced with specific warrants as to the question of link solvency. A majority of kritik debates that are lost by negative teams where they have failed to explain the link debate or alternative adequately. A majority of kritik debates that are lost by affirmative teams when I am judging are ones where the affirmative failed to sufficiently argue for a permutation argument or compare the impacts of the affirmative to the impacts of the criticism sufficiently. I firmly believe that the affirmative gets to weigh the advantages of the plan against the impacts of the criticism unless the link to the criticism directly stems from the framing of the Affirmative impacts. I also believe that the affirmative can usually win solvency deficits to the alternative based upon deficits in implementation and/or instrumentalization of the alternative. Arguments that these solvency deficits do not apply because of framework, or that the affirmative has no right to solving the affirmative, are non-starters for me.

Counterplans – Yes. The more strategic, the better. Should be textually and functionally competitive. Texts should be written out fully and provided to the other team before cross examination begins. The negative should have a solvency card or net benefit to generate competition. PICs, conditional, topical counterplans, international fiat, states counterplans are all acceptable forms of counterplans. NR counterplans are an effective means of answering new 1AR arguments and add-ons and are fair to the affirmative team if they are responses to new 1AR developments. I believe that counterplans are the most effective means of testing the affirmative's plan via competitive policy options and are an effective means of solving for large portions of the affirmative. Counterplans are usually a fair check against new affirmatives, non-intrinsic advantages, and affirmatives with bad or no solvency evidence. If you have a theoretical objection to the counterplan, make it compelling, have an interpretation, and win offense. Theoretical objections to the counterplan are fine, but I have a high threshold for these arguments unless there is a specific violation and interpretation that makes sense in the context of competitive demands in debate.

Disads – Yes and yes. A likely winning strategy in front of me usually involves going for a disadvantage to the affirmative and burying the case with quality arguments and evidence. Disadvantages should have specific links to the case and a coherent internal link story. It is your job to explain the causal chain of events that leads to the disadvantage. A disadvantage with no internal links is no disad.

Case Debate - Is a lost art. Most affirmatives are a hodgepodge of thrown together internal links and old impact evidence. Affirmatives are particularly bad at extending their affirmative and answering negative arguments. Especially new affirmatives. Negative teams should spend a substantial portion of the debate arguing why the affirmative case is problematic. Fewer and fewer teams invest any time in arguing the case, at the cost of a criticism or disadvantage that usually isn't worth reading in the first place. Time trade-offs are not nearly as valuable as quality indictments of the 1AC. Spend those three minutes answering the advantages and solvency and don't read that third criticism or fourth disadvantage, it usually doesn't help you anyway. Inidict the 1AC evidence, make comparative claims about their evidence and your evidence, challenge the specificity or quality of the internal links.

Evidence - Qualifications, context, and data matter. You should answer the evidence read in the debate because I will read evidence at the end. One of the largest problems with paperless debate is the persistence of reading cards to answer cards when a simple argument about the context or quality of the evidence will do. It takes less time to answer a piece of terrible evidence with an analytic argument than it does to read a card against it. It is useless to throw good cards after bad.

Speaker Points - Are a reflection of the quality of speaking, arguments, and strategic choice made by debaters in the debate – no more, no less.

Disclosure (12/2/23 update) - I lifted this from Parker Hopkins at his blessing who borrowed from Chris Roberds.

TLDR - disclosure is an essential element to small-school competitiveness, the educational functions of the activity, and should be practiced by all teams.

I took this from Chris Roberds who said it much more elegantly than myself.

I have a VERY low threshold on this argument. Having schools disclose their arguments pre-round is important if the activity is going to grow/sustain itself. Having coached almost exclusively at small, underfunded, or new schools, I can say that disclosure (specifically disclosure on the wiki if you are a paperless debater) is a game changer. It allows small schools to compete and makes the activity more inclusive. There are a few specific ways that this influences how ballots will be given from me:

1) I will err negative on the impact level of "disclosure theory" arguments in the debate. If you're reading an aff that was broken at a previous tournament, on a previous day, or by another debater on your team, and it is not on the wiki (assuming you have access to a laptop and the tournament provides wifi), you will likely lose if this theory is read. There are two ways for the aff to "we meet" this in the 2ac - either disclose on the wiki ahead of time or post the full copy of the 1ac in the wiki as a part of your speech. Obviously, some grace will be extended when wifi isn't available or due to other extenuating circumstances. However, arguments like "it's just too much work," "I don't like disclosure," etc. won't get you a ballot.

2) The neg still needs to engage in the rest of the debate. Read other off-case positions and use their "no link" argument as a reason that disclosure is important. Read case cards and when they say they don't apply or they aren't specific enough, use that as a reason for me to see in-round problems. This is not a "cheap shot" win. You are not going to "out-tech" your opponent on disclosure theory. To me, this is a question of truth. Along that line, I probably won't vote on this argument in novice, especially if the aff is reading something that a varsity debater also reads.

3) If you realize your opponent's aff is not on the wiki, you should make every possible attempt before the round to ask them about the aff, see if they will put it on the wiki, etc. Emailing them so you have timestamped evidence of this is a good choice. I understand that, sometimes, one teammate puts all the cases for a squad on the wiki and they may have just put it under a different name. To me, that's a sufficient example of transparency (at least the first time it happens). If the aff says it's a new aff, that means (to me) that the plan text and/ or advantages are different enough that a previous strategy cut against the aff would be irrelevant. This would mean that if you completely change the agent of the plan text or have them do a different action it is new; adding a word like "substantially" or "enforcement through normal means" is not. Likewise, adding a new "econ collapse causes war" card is not different enough; changing from a Russia advantage to a China, kritikal, climate change, etc. type of advantage is. Even if it is new, if you are still reading some of the same solvency cards, I think it is better to disclose your previous versions of the aff at a minimum.

4) At tournaments that don't have wifi, this should be handled by the affirmative handing over a copy of their plan text and relevant 1AC advantages etc. before the round. If thats a local tournament, that means as soon as you get to the room and find your opponent.

5) If you or your opponent honestly comes from a circuit that does not use the wiki (e.g. some UDLs, some local circuits, etc.), I will likely give some leeway. However, a great use of post-round time while I am making a decision is to talk to the opponent about how to upload on the wiki. If the argument is in the round due to a lack of disclosure and the teams make honest efforts to get things on the wiki while I'm finishing up my decision, I'm likely to bump speaks for all 4 speakers by .2 or .5 depending on how the tournament speaks go.

6) There are obviously different "levels" of disclosure that can occur. Many of them are described above as exceptions to a rule. Zero disclosure is always a low-threshold argument for me in nearly every case other than the exceptions above.

That said, I am also willing to vote on "insufficient disclosure" in a few circumstances.

A. If you are in the open/varsity division of NDT-CEDA, NFA-LD, or TOC Policy your wiki should look like this or something very close to it. Full disclosure of information and availability of arguments means everyone is tested at the highest level. Arguments about why the other team does not sufficiently disclose will be welcomed. Your wiki should also look like this if making this argument.

B. If you are in the open/varsity division of NDT-CEDA, NFA-LD, or TOC Policy. Debaters should go to the room immediately after pairings are released to disclose what the aff will be. With obvious exceptions for a short time to consult coaches or if tech problems prevent it. Nothing is worse than being in a high-stress/high-level round and the other team waiting until right before the debate to come to disclose. This is not a cool move. If you are unable to come to the room, you should be checking the wiki for your opponent's email and sending them a message to disclose the aff/past 2NR's or sending your coach/a different debater to do so on your behalf.

C. When an affirmative team discloses what the aff is, they get a few minutes to change minor details (tagline changes, impact card swaps, maybe even an impact scenario). This is double true if there is a judge change. This amount of time varies by how much prep the tournament actually gives. With only 10 minutes between pairings and start time, the aff probably only get 30 seconds to say "ope, actually...." This probably expands to a few minutes when given 30 minutes of prep. Teams certainly shouldn't be given the opportunity to make drastic changes to the aff plan text, advantages etc. a long while after disclosing.

(Justin's final thought on disclosure) - JV and Novice divisions need disclosure the most. There is a reason that CARD and ADA Novice divisions use a packet. There is a reason that the Nothern Tier used a packet when it was still a thing. Disclosure on the wiki serves a similar if not a congruent function for the community. Give those coaches some time to prepare their young debaters to engage their opponents and have a productive debate!

NCFL Update: Don't clip. Idk why this tournament is so wild about this. If you have evidence that is highlighted, and you don't read all of the highlighted portion but act like you did (i.e. don't say "Mark the card at _____"), you are cheating and committing and ethics violation. This will result in an autoloss and the lowest possible speaker points I can give you UNLESS the other team clips. In which case both teams will get minimum speaks and I'll be very grumpy trying to determine a winner. Any questions about this? Don't risk it, ask before the round. I'm happy to clarify.

Jan 2024 Update:

Extend your arguments. Extend your arguments. EXTEND YOUR ARGUMENTS! (THIS IS FAR MORE IMPORTANT FOR ME THAN WHAT TYPE OF ARGUMENT YOU READ) Some of the debates I've watched this year have me so frustrated cuz you'll just be absolutely crushing in parts of the debate but just not extend other parts needed to make it relevant. For example, I've seen so many teams going for framework this year where the last rebuttals are 5 minutes of standards and voters and just no extension of an interp that resolves them. Or 2ARs that do so much impact calc and impact-turns-the-DA stuff that they never explain how their aff resolves these impacts so I'm left intervening and extending key warrants for you that OR intervening and voting on a presumption argument that the other team doesn't necessarily make. So err on the side of over extending arguments and take advantage of my high threshold and call out other teams bad argument extension to make me feel less interventionist pulling the trigger on it. What does this mean? Arguments extended should have a claim and a warrant that supports that claim. If your argument extension is just name dropping a lot of authors sited in previous speeches, you're gonna have a bad time during my RFD. The key parts of the "story" of the argument need to be explicitly extended in each speech. For example, if you're going for T in the 2NR then the interp, violation, the standard you're going for, and why it's a voter should be present in every neg speech. Whatever advantage the 2AR is going for should include each part of of the 'story' of aff advantage (uniqueness, solvency, internal link, impact) and I should be able to follow that back on my flow from the 1AR and 2AC. If the 2AR is only impact outweighs and doesn't say anything about how the aff solves it, I'm partial to voting neg on a presumption ballot

Ways to get good speaks in front of me:
-Extend your arguments adequately lol - and callout other teams for insufficient extensions
-Framing the round correctly (identifying the most relevant nexus point of the debate, explain why you're winning it, explain why it wins you the round)
-Doc is sent by the time prep ends
-One partner doesn't dominate every CX
-Send pre-written analytics in your doc
-At least pretend to be having fun lol
-Clash! Your blocks are fine but debates are SOOO much more enjoyable to watch when you get off your blocks and contextualize links/args to the round
-Flow. If you respond to args that were in a doc but weren't actually read, it will hurt your speaks
-Utilize powerful CX moments later in the debate
-If you have a performative component to your kritital argument, explain it's function and utilize it as offense. So many times I see some really cool poetry or something in 1ACs but never get told why poetry is cool and it feels like the aff forgets about it after the 2AC. If it's just in the 1AC to look cool, you were probably better off reading ev or making arguments. If it's there for more than that, USE IT!

WaRu Update 2023: I think debaters think I can flow better than I can. Slowing down on pivotal moments of the debate to really crystalize will make you more consistently happy with my RFDs. If you're going top speed for all of the final rebuttals and don't frame my ballot well, things get messy and my RFDs get worse than I'd like.

Krousekevin1@gmail.com

Background:

I participated in debate for 4 years in High School (policy and LD for Olathe East) and 3 years in College Parli (NPDA/NPTE circuit). This is my 6th year assisting Olathe East debate. I've done very little research on this topic (emerging tech) so please don't assume I know your acronyms or the inner workings of core topic args.

I have no preference on email chain or speechdrop, but it does irritate me when debaters wait until the round is supposed to be started before trying to figure this stuff out.

Speed:

I can keep up for the most part. Some teams in the national circuit are too fast for me but doesn't happen often. If you think you're one of those teams, go like an 8/10. Slow down for interps and nuanced theory blocks. 10 off rounds are not fun to watch but you do you.

Argument preferences:

In high school, I preferred traditional policy debate. In college I read mostly Ks. I studied philosophy but don't assume I know everything about your author or their argument. Something that annoys me in these debates is when teams so caught up in buzzwords that they forget to extend warrants. EXTEND YOUR ARGUMENTS. Not just author names, but extend the actual argument. Often teams get so caught up in line by line or responding to the other team that they don't extend their aff or interp or something else necessary for you to win. This will make me sad and you disappointed in the RFD.

I'd rather you debate arguments you enjoy and are comfortable with as opposed to adapting to my preferences. A good debate on my least favorite argument is far more preferable than a bad debate on my favorite argument. I'm open to however you'd like to debate, but you must tell me how to evaluate the round and justify it. Justify your methodology and isolate your offense.

I don't judge kick CPs or Alts, the 2NR should either kick it or go for it. I'm probably not understanding something, but I don't know what "judge kick is the logical extension of condo" means. Condo means you can either go for the advocacy in the 2nr or not. Condo does not mean that the judge will make argumentative selection on your behalf, like judge kicking entails.

K affs- I don't think an affirmative needs to defend the resolution if they can justify their advocacy/methodology appropriately. However I think being in the direction of the resolution makes the debate considerably easier for you. I wish more negs would engage with the substance of the aff or innovated beyond the basic cap/fw/presumption 1nc but I've vote for this plenty too. I have recently been convinced that fairness can be impacted out well, but most time this isn't done so it usually functions as an internal link to education.

I'm of the opinion that one good card can be more effective if utilized and analyzed well than 10 bad/mediocre cards that are just read. At the same time, I think a mediocre card utilized strategically can be more useful than a good card under-analyzed.

Any other questions, feel free to ask before the round.

LD Paradigm:

I've coached progressive and traditional LD teams and am happy to judge either. You do you. I don't think these debates need a value/criterion, but the debates I watch that do have them usually don't utilize them well. I'm of the opinion that High School LD time structure is busted. The 1AR is simply not enough time. The NFA-LD circuit in college fixed this with an extra 2 minutes in the 1AR but I haven't judged a ton on this circuit so how that implicates when arguments get deployed or interacts with nuanced theory arguments isn't something I've spent much time thinking about. To make up for this bad time structure in High School LD, smart affs should have prempts in their 1AC to try and avoid reading new cards in the 1AR. Smart negs will diversify neg offense to be able to collapse and exploit 1AR mistakes. Pretty much everything applies from my policy paradigm but Imma say it in bold again because most people ignore it anyways: EXTEND YOUR ARGUMENTS. Not just author names, but extend the actual claim and warrant. Often teams get so caught up in line by line or responding to the other team that they don't extend their aff or interp or something else necessary for you to win. This will make me sad and you disappointed in the RFD.

Email: jonkmantis@gmail.com

Debated four years at Glenbrook South High School, and five years at the University of Kansas.

In high school, I went for policy arguments for three years and critiques for one.

In college, I went for critiques all five years.

I have the most experience going for postmodern authors, but I also have experience going for various other theories.

Chad Meadows (he/him)

chadwickmeadows@gmail.com

If you have interest in college debate, and would be interested in hearing about very expansive scholarship opportunities please contact me. Our program competes in two policy formats and travels to at least 4 tournaments a semester. Most of our nationally competitive students have close to zero cost of attendance because of debate specific financial support.

Debate Experience

College: I’ve been the head argument coach and/or Director of Debate for Western Kentucky University for a little over a decade. WKU primarily competes in NFA-LD, a shorter policy format. This season (2023) we are adding CEDA/NDT tournaments to our schedule.

High School: I’ve been an Assistant Coach, and primarily judge, for the Marist School in Atlanta, Georgia for several years. In this capacity I’ve judged at high school tournaments in both Policy Debate and Public Forum.

Argument Experience/Preferences

I feel comfortable evaluating the range of debates in modern policy debate (no plan affirmatives, policy, and kritik) though I am the most confident in policy rounds. My research interests tend toward more political science/international affairs/economics, though I’ve become well read in some critical areas in tandem with my students’ interests (anti-blackness/afropessimism in particular) in addition I have some cursory knowledge of the standard kritik arguments in debate, but no one would mistake me for a philosophy enthusiast. On the nuclear weapons topic, almost all of my research has been on the policy side.

I have few preferences with regard to content, but view some argumentative trends with skepticism: Counterplans that result in the plan (consult and many process counterplans), Agent counterplans, voting negative any procedural concern that isn’t topicality, reject the team counterplan theory that isn’t conditionality, some versions of politics DAs that rely on defining the process of fiat, arguments that rely on voting against the representations of the affirmative without voting against the result of the plan.

I feel very uncomfortable evaluating events that have happened outside of the debate round, especially in the CEDA/NDT community where I have limited knowledge of the context regarding community trends.

I have little experience evaluating debates with some strategies that would only be acceptable in a 2-person policy debate context - 2ac add-ons, 2nc counterplanning, 2ac intrinsicness tests on DA, etc. I’m not opposed to these strategies, and understand their strategic purpose, but I have limited exposure.

Decision Process

I tend to read more cards following the debate than most. That’s both because I’m curious, and I tend to find that debaters are informing their discussion given the evidence cited in the round, and I understand their arguments better having read the cards myself.

I give less credibility to arguments that appear unsupported by academic literature, even if the in round execution on those arguments is solid. I certainly support creativity and am open to a wide variety of arguments, but my natural disposition sides with excellent debate on arguments that are well represented in the topic literature.

To decide challenging debates I generally use two strategies: 1) write a decision for both sides and determine which reflects the in-round debating as opposed to my own intuition, and 2) list the relevant meta-issues in the round (realism vs liberal internationalism, debate is a game vs. debate should spill out, etc.) and list the supporting arguments each side highlighted for each argument and attempt to make sense of who debated the best on the issues that appear to matter most for resolving the decision.

I try to explain why I sided with the winner on each important issue, and go through each argument extended in the final rebuttal for the losing team and explain why I wasn’t persuaded by that argument.

Public Forum

Baseline expectations: introduce evidence using directly quoted sections of articles not paraphrasing, disclose arguments you plan to read in debates.

Argument preferences: no hard and fast rules, but I prefer debates that most closely resemble the academic and professional controversy posed by the topic. Debate about debate, while important in many contexts, is not the argument I'm most interested in adjudicating.

Style preferences: Argumentation not speaking style will make up the bulk of my decision making and feedback, my reflections on debate are informed by detailed note taking of the speeches, speeches should focus their time on clashing with their opponents' arguments.

My competitive background is mainly in parli, but I judged LD throughout the 17/18 season and have been head coach of an NFA-LD program since 2018.

Debate is ultimately a communication endeavor, and as such, it should be civil and accessible. I don't like speed/spreading. I can handle a moderate amount especially as I follow along with your doc (I want to be included on speechdrop, email chains, etc.), but there are two good ways to know when it's too much: 1) the point at which you’re gasping for air/doing big double breaths or 2) if you have to raise your voice an octave higher to maintain the pace. I will call speed if necessary, ignore it at your own risk. If your opponent asks you not to speed and you spread them out of the round, I will drop you -- even if you won the flow. Same with being rude or disrespectful. Debate is already scary and no one wants to be spoken to like they're stupid. Being a jerk in-round will lose my ballot.

I will vote on anything* (with one exception below). Topicality debates are fine. I don't like when it's used solely as a time skew, but when it is necessary, I want you to engage in the standards debate and make it specific to the round. Warrant your claims, give examples. I don't need proven abuse, but I do need a vision of why your interpretation is better for debate.

I will vote on Ks. I enjoy a good critical argument, but don’t assume I’m familiar with all of your literature. Make the link story clear and specific to the round in the 1NC. I want to hear a well-developed alternative, one that's not super vague. If your alt is essentially just to reject the aff, tell me what that's going to accomplish, impact it out. The role of the ballot is really important for Ks.

My favorite types of rounds are ones that engage in direct clash and cover the flow.

* I will not listen to an 'extinction good' argument. I will submit the ballot for your opponent and leave the room immediately. In addition to just being a bad idea, I find the argument to be violent and inappropriate for the debate space. Enough people (including myself) deal with suicidal ideation on a regular basis and no one should be subjected to that idea for a competitive win. It's gross.

Me in a nut-shell: I debated for four years at Michigan State University from 2008-2012. I coached at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) from 2012-2014. After that, I went and got my PhD in Communication Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM). I coached at Marquette off and on while at UWM. Now, I am an Assistant Professor at Texas State University.

Update Texas 2020: I have not judged on the space topic, so my familiarity with the topic (and accompanying communal norms/beliefs) is likely *very* poor. I will work very hard to follow your arguments, but you will likely need to spend more time explaining them.

The Basics:

I have judged off and on for the past few years--not as much as I used to. I usually flow on pen and paper, so you might want to slow down a tad for theory, topicality, long tags.

Less is more -- one of the most common comments I make at the end of the round is "I think you tried to too many arguments and did not develop them"

Assumption-centered debate is bad. Do not assume I know or understand your argument; do not assume I know or understand how your argument interacts with other arguments in the debate. Explain it, substantiate it, defend it. Classic example: "this was answered in the overview" -- my typical thought, "how so?"

Technical concessions significantly affect my decisions. Even if the "thesis" of your position answers an argument, you should be explicit about how it does. I will likely think you dropped something if you overuse implicit clash.

Defense matters, but offense is critical. Another common theme in my decisions is "I thought you did an excellent job playing defense to 'x,' but you did not really extend your offense." This has been especially true in the framework and topicality debates that I judged in the past.

Paperless – I’ll stop prep when the jump drive is out of your computer.

Mark cards as you read them.

If someone is caught cheating (clipping cards/fabricating evidence), that person will receive zero speaker points and the team that the person was on will receive a loss. If you make a challenge, have evidence (recording). I will stop the round once a challenge is started.

Racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, and ableist language and arguments lower speaker points and can result in a loss. Please, just don't.

Case Debate: Yes, please. Impact defense has its place, but I would hope you would have more to say on the case.

Disads: Yes, please. I did a lot of politics work back in the day, and I still follow politics very closely. Winning uniqueness doesn’t mean that you have won a link. Winning a link doesn’t mean that the DA is unique. If you go for a disad and the case, note that I have historically voted affirmative on try-or-die (if the conditions for try-or-die are actually present). The negative should have some sort (even if it is minimal) of harms related defense or explicitly set up another way for me to evaluate impacts in the 2NR. Conversely, I find it very difficult to vote aff if they do not respond well to DA solves or turns the case.

Counterplans: Reject the argument, not the team is my default for all theory arguments besides status of the counterplan questions. Having said that, I still think the negative needs to flow, notice theory arguments, and say RANT.

I’m fairly affirmative on a lot of competition questions (ie certainty counterplans). Lately, I have found that more teams need to be willing to at least introduce the permutation to do the counterplan in the debate. Although, I certainly have voted for these counterplans in the past and will likely continue to do so.

I usually default to not kicking the counterplan for the negative if the negative does not explicitly say that I have this option in a speech or in cross-examination.

Conditionality: I’m pretty neg if there is only one conditional counterplan. I would say that I am neutral with two conditional counterplans. Three or more, I am pretty aff.

Critiques: In most judging pools, there are usually a good number of judges who are better for the critique than me. Have I voted on the critique? Yes. Am I as familiar with most critique literature as other judges? Likely not, and I feel like I lean aff in a lot of nexus questions involved in these debates.

Obviously, the more specific the critique to the plan, the better. When I vote for the critique, it is usually because the negative as done a lot of specific link work and/or a solid job of extending "the tricks" (alt solves the case, ethics first, root cause) and the affirmation has done a comparatively poor job of responding to those tricks or challenging the alternative. The affirmative is typically a good spot if they (1) don't forget about their aff, (2) challenge the alternative, and (3) respond to "the tricks."

I am a poor judge for positions based on the view that suffering or death are good or are inevitable. I am also a poor judge for Baudrillard and friends.

No-Plan Affs: I generally enter a debate thinking that it will involve a discussion of a plan, and I have much more experience judging debates that center on plans. Have I voted for affs without a plan against framework? Yes, a few times. Have I voted for framework against a aff without a plan? Yes, a few more times.

I usually find topicality/framework arguments persuasive, especially if they emphasize the benefits of research and switch-side debate on a predictable and stable status point. If you decide against reading a plan, you are better served defending why that choice is good instead of solely arguing why topicality/framework is bad. The more concrete the advocacy of the 1AC the better. The clearer the tie to the topic the better. When I have voted for no-plan affs, the aff did an excellent job justifying their aff and used their aff well to link or impact turn the negative's position. The easiest way for teams advancing topicality/framework to lose is by forgetting their impacts or failing to respond to an impact-turn of their position. In the debates that I have judged involving no-plan affs, the teams that did the best job framing and articulating a metaphor for what debate is generally did better (examples: "debate is a game," "debate is a training ground for activism," "debate is an educational activity where we can explore and develop views of the world and how it works"). I will say this: I am better for affs without plans that focus on exclusion/marginalization in society and/or debate than I am for high theory Ks (either on the aff or neg).

Topicality: If the aff is at the core of the topic and literature, I am pretty good for the aff against a contrived T interpretations. That said, on large topics, I can be persuaded that a limited vision of the topic is necessary, especially when one's interpretation is supported with strong evidence.

If you still have any questions, please ask before the round starts OR email me at josh.h.miller08@gmail.com. If I can tell that you enjoy debating, I will probably enjoy judging the debate.

***UPDATED AS OF JANUARY 30, 2024***

The Short Version

I’ve been involved with LD on and off since 1991. I am a traditionalist when it comes to LD and hold to the principles behind its founding. I evaluate rounds primarily on stock issues. I believe the annual resolution is the object of the round and that ballot’s sole role is to make a decision on that topic. I don’t like speed. I evaluate based on what I can perceive orally in the round, and while I will download your “Speechdoc” I won’t go hunting to validate your arguments after the debate. I take a good and detailed flow, based on what I hear, but I am a critical listener who won’t check his expertise at the door. Be ethical. Follow the rules. Don’t be mean to each other and don’t treat your judge like they are your opponent after the round.

The More Nuanced Version

The Background Stuff

I was Truman State’s Director of Forensics from 1999-2009 and again, on an interim basis, from 2014-2015. I'm currently the interim LD coach for the 2023-2024 season. During that time I coached IE, LD, and NPDA. Since then I’ve been working in administration. Prior to that I was at the University of Kansas working with a NDT/CEDA program, and before that at Wayne State working with both IE and LD. As an undergrad I did primarily IE and LD. It is important to underscore that I have been out of active coaching for most of the last decade, though I usually come back for a tournament or two each year. This means it is important to be careful about assumptions that you might make with a long-term contemporary judge and their knowledge base about contemporary jargon, newer theories, etc.

Me as a Judge vs. Me as a Coach

I am currently serving as a debate coach for Truman on an interim basis. Out of respect for my students who have worked so hard to be where they are, and out of respect for the person who will eventually be their permanent coach, I am meeting them where they are on the kinds of positions they run and the style of debate they employ. This may differ significantly from my paradigm here and as a judge. This is where my paradigm has changed significantly in the last month. I had adapted my paradigm at the beginning of the year to show greater flexibility to align with my team’s competitive preferences. This is a stance I don’t feel I can take as we head into the late and post-season. They know that, and we respect each other’s views.

My Orientation Toward NFA-LD in General

I have been involved with LD since its inception in 1990-1991. I was on the original committee that made the first permanent rules in 1992. I am not a fan of what NFA-LD has become in recent years. I try as best I can to adhere to the original goals of the event while respecting the rules as they have been amended since. I have a strong negative disposition toward speed. I believe the object of the debate is the NFA resolution, which is a proposition of policy, and I will evaluate the debate using the stock issues and the effective weighing of advantages and disadvantages. I also overlay my participation in the round using the “Critical Listener Perspective” (see Minch, K. and Borchers, T. (1996) “A philosophy for judging Lincoln-Douglas debate.” National Forensic Journal, pp. 19-36). This perspective aims to view NFA-LD as an individual event and to balance the aspirational objective standards of the flow with some of the critical subjectivity found in individual events judging. The essence of this perspective is this statement:

“A critical listener perspective for Lincoln-Douglas debate presumes that the audience members (most importantly the judge) are the locus of the round. They are critical listeners who are capable of evaluating the debate based upon their experience, specialized knowledge, and use of standards for what is educationally valuable and who permit subjective standards to influence how the decision is reached. This view assumes that the judge will consider both objective and subjective standards in evaluating a Lincoln-Douglas round and will not shy away from correcting perceived inadequacies in the presentation through the pedagogically beneficial act of critiquing the speech act and ranking it according to all of its merits.”

Rules

While I have expressed some opinions in public and in writing about the natural evolution of rules in events, I am probably not the person you want to argue with about ignoring the rules outright, or why the rules are evil. I don’t have problems with the rules being changed, but I do believe those changes need to be legislated by the organization and not by my ballot. If you plan to invoke the rules for some purpose, be sure you are following them as well. If you raise an objection based on the rules, be sure you know the rule and the basis for your claim is crystal clear. Norms and rules are not the same thing. There is no rule, for example, requiring pre-round disclosure. You might like it and it might make the world a wonderful place, but it’s not a rule. I'm not going to vote on violations of norms. So don’t make an argument that treats it like a rule. If the alleged rule violation is going to require the involvement of the tournament staff (a violation of the Code of Ethics), please make sure that is clearly stated and in line with the tournament rules and policies so I know what your intentions are.

Framework

As the rules apply to the framework for judging the debate, I will operate within the recommended paradigm of stock issues. You should be filtering your analysis of the round through that lens as much as you can. This means I will vote on inherency or solvency IF you make them an issue and persuade me that your arguments are sufficient to do so. I will vote on topicality, but my distinct preference is that you go for that issue exclusively, or almost exclusively, in the NR if that’s what you want to hang your hat on. I don’t necessarily need to see evidence of in-round abuse to vote on T. As this season has unfolded, I have come to an even firmer position on “Kritik Affirmatives,” which I find incompatible with the stock issues framework. If you run one in front of me, you do so at your own peril. You are here to debate the resolution that the community has selected and that is a shared expectation when the parties enter the round. My job is to adjudicate a debate on that topic and render a decision as to the relative persuasiveness of your positions on the policy in question. To be absolutely clear, this should in no way be interpreted to suggest that I don’t see value in the forms of advocacy presented in critical or performative argumentation - just that I think the object of this activity is the national topic and positions that do not focus on that topic function to exclude participants in the activity who enter the exchange expecting to learn about that topic.

Speed and Space

I think one of the benefits of having LD situated in an organization that also sponsors IE is the potential for cross-application of skills developed in debate and IE. I like a debate that is persuasive, that tells a good story, and that even leaves me a little entertained. At the same time, I like good clash, robust use of evidence, and lots of analysis. I also believe in efficiency and word economy, not speed. Foundationally, I believe in the "orality" of NFA-LD. While the text of cards is often the proof in our argumentation, debate exists in a live space and not in the exchange of documents. If we didn't care about the verbal communication, we wouldn't have tournaments, we'd just have an electronic exchange of dueling briefs and counter-briefs. The debate happens in the speeches, not in a post-round attempt to reconstruct the narrative. I believe the debate happens within the timed speeches. It does not happen after the round with me pulling and re-reading your evidence. If I can’t understand your cards, I’m not going to sort it out for you later unless a rules or ethical violation has been alleged. It’s your job to tell me how I should evaluate the round, so leave yourself time to do it and don’t leave me picking-up the pieces for you. I do download your speech doc in the round for general understanding and in case of appeals, but I expect you to make the evidence clear orally. You need to be thinking about what a universal auditor of your debate can cognitively process and reasonably make meaning from within the time constraints of the debate.

If your speed exceeds my level for what feels appropriate, I will give you a verbal warning – “speed” – and will follow the NFA rules and drop you if you do not slow down. If your opponent asks you for a slower round, I expect you to comply.

If you make eye contact with me from time to time during the debate, you will know when I’m frustrated.

Do You Like X? Will You Vote on Y?

I will accept any positions that function within a policy framework and/or utilize the stock issues. I have no inherent biases one way or another as to topicality, counterplans, spec positions, etc. I am open to kritikal arguments on the negative, so long as they can be filtered through a policy frame of reference (i.e.: a kritik that stems directly from the rhetoric of, or rhetorical implications of, a particular policy action on perspective) and qualitatively weighed. In short, the kritik functions for me like a disadvantage wherein I am weighing the implications of the kritik as a factor in the broader cost-benefit analysis.

Don’t Worry

I flow on my laptop and am sometimes moving documents between your speech docs and the flow. I also write comments on the ballot during the round in an attempt to be thorough about feedback on particular speeches. Do not worry that either of these things means that I’m not flowing or a judgment is already in progress.

“Post Rounding”

I will give an oral critique, within the constraints set by NFA for completing rounds on time. I will disclose the decision unless NFA says not to in a particular round. I will answer reasonable and polite questions asked about my decision or the evaluation of different issues. I do not, however, wish to have a debate about the debate with you. If you don’t like my decision, that’s your prerogative. Feel free to go vent to your teammates or your judge. If I feel I am being harassed, I will stop the critique.

Please limit spreading unless necessary and be respectful to your colleagues.

K's must be directly relevant to the topic at hand. Please do not use a one-for-all K to moral grandstand.

Feel free to ask me any questions prior to the round beginning.

Toni Nielson

Co-Director of Debate, Fullerton College (2017 - forever I suspect)

Executive Director - Bay Area Urban Debate League (2013-2017)
Co-Director of Debate at CSU, Fullerton for 7 years (2005-2012)
Debated in College for 5 years
Debated in High School for 3 years
Rounds on the Topic: less than 5

Email Chain: commftownnielson@gmail.com

I just want to see you do what you are good at. I like any debater who convinces me the know what they are talking about.

Here’s what I think helps make a debater successful –

1. Details: evidence and analytics, aff and neg – the threshold for being as specific as humanly possible about your arg and opponent's arg remains the same; details demonstrate knowledge
2. Direct organized refutation: Answer the other team and don’t make me guess about it – I hate guessing because it feels like intervention. I'm trying to let the debaters have the debate.
3. Debating at a reasonable pace: I ain’t the quickest flow in the west, even when I was at my best which was a while ago. I intend on voting for arguments which draw considerable debates and not on voting for arguments that were a 15 seconds of a speech. If one team concedes an argument, it still has to be an important and relevant argument to be a round winner.
4. Framing: tell me how you want me to see the round and why I shouldn’t see it your opponents way
5. Comparison: you aren’t debating in a vacuum – see your weakness & strengths in the debate and compare those to your opponent. I love when debaters know what they are losing and deal with it in a sophisticated way.

Some style notes - I like to hear the internals of evidence so either slow down a little or be clear. I flow CX, but I do this for my own edification so if you want an arg you still have to make it in a speech. I often don't get the authors name the first time you read the ev. I figure if the card is an important extension you will say the name again (in the block or rebuttals) so I know what ev you are talking about. I rarely read a bunch of cards at the end of the debate.

Now you are asking,
Can I read an aff without a plan? I lean rather in the direction of a topical plan, instrumentally implemented these days. This is a big change in my previous thoughts and the result of years of working with young, beginning debate. I appreciate policy discussion and believe the ground it provides is a preferable locus for debate. So I am somewhat prone to vote neg on framework must implement a plan.

Can I go for politics/CP or is this a K judge? Yes to both; I don't care for this distinction ideologically anymore. As far as literature, I lean slightly more in the K direction. My history of politics and CP debate are more basic than my history of K debate.

Theory - lean negative in most instances. Topicality - lean affirmative (if they have a plan) in most instances. I lean neg on K framework which strikes me as fair negative ground of a topical plan of action.

Truth v Tech - lean in the direction of tech. Debate, the skill, requires refuting arguments. So my lean in the direction of the tech is not a declaration to abandon reality. I will and do vote on unanswered arguments, particularly ones that are at the core of the debate. Gigantic caveat, I will struggle to vote on an argument just because it is dropped. The concession must be relevant and compelling to the debate. I will also be hesitant to vote on arguments that fly in the face of reality.

Here's what I like: I like what you know things about. And if you don't know anything, but get through rounds cause you say a bunch and then the other team drops stuff - then I don't think you have a great strategy. Upside for you, I truly believe you do know something after working and prepping the debate on the topic. Do us both a favor: If what you know applies in this round, then debate that.

Good luck!.

drmosbornesq@gmail.com

My judging paradigm has evolved a great deal over time. These days, I have very few set opinions about args. I used to think I had a flawless flow and a magnet mind but now I can't follow each little detail and/or extremely nuanced or shrouded arguments with 101% accuracy like once upon a time. Still pretty good tho lol. And that said, I believe I've come to prioritize debaters' decisions more than ever and try harder than ever to base my decision on what debaters are trying to make happen in the round, and how well they do it, as opposed to how I logically add up what occurred. No judge can totally eliminate their process of sorting things out or their lived personal experience but I try to judge rounds as the debaters tell me to judge them, and with the tools they make available to me. I do think debate is about debaters, so I try to limit my overall judge agency to an extent. But sometimes my experience with traditional policy debate matters and favors a team. Sometimes my lived experience as a brown dude effects my encounter of an argument. These things happen and they are happening with all of your judges whether they admit it or you know it or not. I competed with "traditional policy arguments" (which, frankly, I am unsure still exist #old) but by now I have voted for and coached stupidly-traditional, traditional, mildly-traditional, non-traditional, and anti-traditional arguments in high-stakes rounds for a ton of programs in high school, college, internationally, in different eras, dimensions, all kinds of shi*. If you think your reputation matters in how I see the round, don't pref me. If you or your coaches are used to attacking in the post-round, you're gonna play yourself because I'll either be 101% and crush you or I won't care and I'll just mock you. Debate's a game but we are people so we should treat each other with respect. Self-control is one of the hallmarks of critical thinking and a disciplined intellect; if you cannot make peace with results in a subjective activity, you are simply not an elite debater, imho. Take it or leave it. Good luck to all debaters, seriously -- it's a hell of a thing.

Background: I competed in policy debate for four years in college at the University of Mary Washington. I coached policy debate for seven years, public forum for one year, and LD debate for five years.

Despite my policy background I am committed to the spirit of LD. This means that while you can speak quickly, you should be comprehensible and both debaters should be ok with going fast. I have seen too many debates where a varsity debater unnecessarily spreads out a novice debater.

Topicality is a voting issue. I am unlikely to vote on a reverse voting issue on topicality even if it is dropped. Arguments about why topicality is problematic may be reasons to include your affirmative, but are rarely reasons for you to win the debate. It is probably best in front of me to frame these as expanding the interpretation of what the topic can be, rather than rejecting a topic all together.

The citation rules are so widely disregarded that I would feel uncomfortable enforcing them, especially if there is no conversation between the debaters about reading them prior to the first speech.

Winning topicality or any other theory issue requires more work than winning on a substantive issue. This is to say, if both teams go for substance I have to pick a winner, but if one team goes for theory I can assess that they have not surpassed the burden required to reject the other team. This does not mean that T and theory are unwinnable arguments in front of me. In order to win you should clearly explain your interpretation, explain how the other team has violated it, explain why your interpretation makes for good debates, explain what the opponent does or justifies, and explain why that is bad for debate. This is not code for I do not vote on theory. I will vote on theory.

Negatives should narrow the debate in their second speech. Pick the arguments you are winning and go in-depth. I will give affirmative’s wide latitude in debate where the negative goes for everything in a messy way. Going for T and substance is usually a mistake, unless one or both are such a clear win that you have extra time (this happens rarely).

Presumption goes to the status quo, which means that ties go to the negative (in the world of a counterplan presumption is up for debate). A negative can sometimes make a persuasive case that the affirmative has to prove solvency, which is a separate issue from presumption.

Many debate arguments can be defeated without cards by making smart, warranted, analytical arguments. I wish I saw more of these types of arguments.

I don’t subscribe to an offense defense paradigm; good defense is in many cases enough, especially with theory debates.

I am increasingly willing to intervene in theory debates. Two speeches does not allow for proper theory development and gives both sides the ability to simply block out every speech. Counterplans like consultation and 50 state fiat require a very low threshold to defeat on theory. I am not a fan of conditional counterproposals in LD. Negative arguments like the affirmative doesn’t get permutations are generally nonstarters.

I will vote on kritiks but prefer them specific to the topic and with a hardy dose of explanation about why it relates to the specific claims of the 1AC. I am not a good judge for generic backfile checks with one card that is semi relevant to the topic area. Some additional clarification. Changes to how the round should be evaluated (moving from the question of the desirability of the policy) need to be made explicitly and early and should include substantive justification about why the change excludes or makes undesirable the aff.

Final speeches need to make choices and clearly identify their path to the ballot. One part of this is the order you present ideas in your speech.

Things that will get you lower speaker points/make it hard for you to win.

1. Be rude to the other team.
2. Not answer or be evasive when answering cross ex questions.
3. Be unclear in CX about the status of counter plans
4. Being unable or unwilling to explain your arguments in CX
5. Read unwarranted/unqualified evidence.

One way to get (perhaps unfairly) good speaker points from me is to be entertaining. Many debaters, who were not the best at debate, but nevertheless were pleasant to watch debate, (being funny, speaking passionately, being nice to their opponents) have received speaker points that would typically fall outside of their skill range.

My name is Matt. I did NPDA/NPTE style debate at Washburn University for 5 years, and coached it at Texas Tech for another two. I am currently a Ph.D. student at Penn State, and am studying the rhetoric of fascism.

Enough about me, here is how I view debate

Affs: If you are affirmative, you should defend some sort of concrete action. I tend to think that affs need stable plan/advocacy texts because it's important to generate stable offense for negatives. Good affirmatives have clear advantages and have some relevance to the topic. This doesn't mean that I won't listen to critical affirmatives or performances, but I do think you should try to link it some how to the resolution, even if that is a rejection of the resolution. Regardless of the affirmative, I tend to reward well researched affs that have high quality evidence, clear taglines, and impacts.

DA/CP: These are great! You should read them, but make sure you explain how they interact with the aff. Good disads turn the aff. Excellent CPs solve some portion of the aff. CPs can be conditional, but I'd prefer you only read one.

Theory: Theory is a great tool when used responsibly. I tend to like most theory. I default to competing interpretations, unless you just straight up meet. I dislike when debaters read too much theory. 2AC's should really avoid adding too many new theory sheets. NRs collapsing to theory should ONLY be collapsing for theory.

K debate: You should have a clear alternative with links that describe why the plan trips the impacts. Saying "Plan uses the USFG" is fine, but that's only a link. Have multiple links. Also it's important that you very clearly describe the world of the alternative. Providing a simple two-sentence explanation of the action of the alt is recommended. As for framework, I think that frames are best used for photographs and NRs.

Here are some other important things:

1. Perms are not advocacies, and I don't think they have net benefits. Advocacies have net benefits, but perms do not. They are tests of competition, so you should talk about competition.

2. I don't like silly theory. I think if you read an argument in the 1NC, you should be willing to go for it. I'll vote on potential abuse if you tell me to, but you've gotta tell me to.

3. Disclosure should happen before the round. If not, I will vote accordingly on theory.

4. I get lost easily when the following lit bases are read in front of me: Baudrillard, Bataille, Nietzsche, and really anything in this tradition of really high continental theory.

5. I prefer depth. I really don't wanna see you read 7 off in the 1NC just to spread the other team out.

6. Don't be rude in CX. Don't talk over each other, and let your opponent answer questions.

Background

I competed in speech and debate at the college level from 2010-2014. My primary debate event was NPDA, but I also competed in some LD and attended policy camp and workshops. My favorite things to run were performance-based critical arguments (e.g., hip-hop), critical race theory, feminist criticism, queer theory-based arguments, but I mostly debated case in NPDA due to partner preference. I coached IEs and a small amount of novice Parli at CSU Long Beach from 2014-2016, and I provided a few argument consultations to some high school debaters. For the last 7 years, I have been removed from competitive debate, focusing almost entirely on public debate and dialogue events, research workshops, and other forms of critical public engagement. As of November 1st, I have judged at three NFA LD tournaments and one online IE tournament.

I do not need content warnings for sensitive topics, but you should always check with your opponent, read other judge’s paradigms for elimination rounds, and consider providing them if there is an audience.

Speed

I prefer debates at a conversational rate of speech, but I am slowly getting better at understanding slightly swifter rates of speech. Sometimes I struggle to hear or process spreading (I cannot actually make out the words, and the sound at that speed doesn't help me process the card information before me). However, in elimination rounds feel free to defer to what most judges in the round prefer, and I will do my best to adapt (but if I diverge in a 2-1 ruling with an absolutely inarticulate understanding of the round, know that I tried my best).

Affs

I am open to anything (policy, topical K-affs, non-topical K-affs that critique debate or higher ed, etc.), but regardless of the argument you run, you need to provide the grounds and warrant for your claims. I am big on stock issues for policy affs. For K-affs, read the Kritik section below.

Regardless of your aff type, be sure you also have your best, most relevant cards in your 1AC. There are too few speeches in LD to add too much to the backend.

Advantages/Disadvantages

I need a solid link story for ad/disads and I need clearly articulated impact calculus between them. I am a fan of analysis at the link level as I think there is a strong burden for the Aff to show a propensity for their ability to solve or garner an advantage, and I think the same rule applies to disads for the negative. Also, don’t make me do the work of impact calculus; that’s your burden.

Counterplans

I am open to all sorts of CPs (including PICs), but the negative needs to defend a CP’s theoretical legitimacy if challenged. I also require a clear link story and explanation of exactly how a CP avoids a disad and/or garners a unique benefit that the Aff doesn’t. I do think it is ethically best if the neg is upfront about the conditionality of their CP (unconditional, conditional, dispositional) and I am open to argumentation about CP theory.

Kritiks

I am open to K debate, but I need your K’s philosophical premises explained clearly. In all my days of performing critically oriented academic research and graduate coursework on queer theories, critical race theory, settler colonial studies, etc., I can tell you that everyone has their own “Lacan,” “Foucault,” “Fanon,” etc. If you don’t want my very particular rhetorical interpretation of your critical argument to guide my evaluation of the round, then please summarize the key theses (or “common knowledge”) you want me to use when understanding your critical lens. In other words, I do not want to intervene, so guide me clearly through the terrain of your argument so that I can reasonably follow without having to review my own version of the map I drew myself the last time I traveled in the critical territory you bring the round to.

All criticisms need to have a 1) strong link story to the specific thing being critiqued (the specific plan or take on the resolution, the specific language used in round, the specific aspects of intercollegiate debate being criticized, etc.; 2) a clearly defined alternative; and 3) an impact.

Try to avoid convoluted alternatives, or be ready to explain or "paint a picture" of what the alternative means. If you ask me to prefer deconstructive textual activism over the 1ac, I need to know what your definition of deconstructive textual activism is and how your K functions as that sort of activism or relates to the world of such efforts. You need to make clear to me what your advocacy or alternative is, what my role is in evaluating the round, and what function my ballot serves in the round.

Cross Examination

I will typically flow cross-examination but I will not consider it within my evaluation of the round unless those comments are brought up within round (i.e., "In cross-ex they said [xyz], which means [abc])."

Rebuttals

Final rebuttals should provide the judge any necessary instructions for evaluating the round. I don't just need an overview of your argument (although that is helpful), but I need: your impact calculus, judge instructions, and a way to understand the framework/theory debate (if relevant).

I would consider myself fairly tab. The debate is what you make of it and I do not think that as a judge I should demand certain arguments from debaters. The most important things for me to see in a round, are clash, and impact comparisons.

This will be my 8th year in debate. I debated at Montgomery High School for four years in policy on the TFA and UIL circuits. I did policy at The University of North Texas for a year and a half. Now I compete in NPDA for UNT.

Policy-

Speed: It's fine but manage your clarity. Slow down for tags and analytics. This is extremely important because if I can't get the arguments down then I cannot evaluate them at the end of the round.

T: I love T. I think that it is an incredibly strategic argument and that it is an important debate to be had. That being said make sure that if you read T that it has a strategic purpose. I tend to default towards competing interpretations, but that does not mean that I cannot be persuaded by reasonability.

DA: My preferred strat as a debater is cp+ da.

CP: Love it. (see above).

K: I need a good explanation of the thesis of your kritik. In my opinion, the best link argument is one that links to the action of the plan, but if you have a compelling reason why your reps links are important I will evaluate them. Your impact framing should tell me why I should evaluate your impacts over the aff's.

FW:just saying that the aff is abusive bc they aren't part of the res is not enough for me. You should have a reason why your interp is good for education or why it gives us access to some important form of education. FW should not be a way to avoid engaging with the K.

K/performance affs: I think the conversations behind these arguments are incredibly important in debate, but I do not have a lot of experience here. I think a clear explanation of what my vote does is important. Also give me reasons why we should reject the traditional forms of debate.

Theory: It's fine. There should be clear voters and if your argument is that I should drop the team then you should have a good warrant for it.

LD-

Overview: I did LD a little bit in high school and some NFA LD in college. Since my background is in policy the way I view arguments will be the same as in the last section. I still like to see clash and impact comparison, etc.

When it comes to specifics:

da- I need the link to be clear cause imo I think that’s the hard part of policy args in ld.

Cp- yes unless there's compelling args why not. Pics are cool but theory is also welcome.

K- great but I need a clear explanation the of thesis and link stories. I think the best links are to the aff action, but if you have reasons why reps links are good I’ll evaluate them.

T- love it it's my bread and butter. But it should be used strategically and not just thrown in at the last minute.

Theory- LD theory is new to me but if there is clash and compelling arguments ill evaluate them.

Speech Docs: MoStateDebate@gmail.com
?'s: Preeves22@gmail.com
Asst Coach at MoState.
2x NDT Qualifier for MoState, Graduated in 23'.
3rd at NFA Nationals 2021, 4x NFA Nationals Qualifier

Random Thoughts:

- I do not care what you do, Everything is up for debate (besides objectively wrong things).

- Please keep track of your time, I want to keep track of your speech and the docs, not the time.

- You will often do better if you debate best rather than adjusting to this paradigm.

- I'll probably take a long time to decide as I try to be respectful of the time and energy that we put into this game. I really try to invest in debate as much as everyone else does, and love to reward bold strategic choices (no, not spark).

- My decisions are going to be what's exactly on my doc, and speaker points will be how well you articulated the thing from the flow to being understood + clarity.

- Evidence Quality is under rated. I'll 1000% read your evidence during, and after the round. You should probably tell me HOW to read it. If it does not say the thing that you think it does, things will not go well for you.

Specific ?'s:

Policy v. K ideological divide (the stuff that matters for prefs).

- I tend to like both for different reasons. I think that being strategic is the best thing that you can do in front of me, be bold and embrace your decisions whole-heartedly. My first 2 years of college debate, I debated exclusively the K (pomo, cybernetics, queerness, etc.), and the last 2 1/2 years, I debated mainly policy. With that in mind, that means I don't have ideological underpinnings that assist either side.

- I think that the strongest part of the K is the Link, and weakest part is the Alt. Policy AFF's tend to have more warrants for how they solve things, than why they actually do. I think that it behooves both teams to play to the others weakness. K's are better at why, and Policy stuff is better at how, explain to me which is better.

Policy:

- I tend to think that offense is where I always start, and the place that teams should always spend the most time on. Impacts tend to be the things that decide debates, and make everything else important as they leak out of that.

- Case debating is a lost and dead art, please bring it back. Hyper specific case negs or good impact D debating is the best stuff to watch.

CP's:

- CP Texts for Perms >>>>

- Fine with Judge Kick, if it makes sense. Should be more than a 10 second blurb.

- PICs are cool, and often strategic.

DA:

- Turns Case is ESSENTIAL, and is usually the difference between a Win that can be easily sought out, and a Win that I scratch my head for a while at.

Topicality:

- T should have a case list, of what is and isn't T.

- Reasonability is probably bad, unless you have a good argument about why your AFF is essential to the topic thus -> Competing Interps !

- Quals are better than no Quals

Theory:

- I think there is a sharp divide between the neg being strategic, and just trying to make the 2AC's life hard by not really debating stuff. I think hard debate should be rewarded, and cowards shouldn't. The best strategies that we always remember were never the 12 off with the 9 plank CP, but the 4-5 off with the impact turns etc. With that said, I think 3 condo is probably my limit (each plank counts as 1 unless stated otherwise by the neg), and contradictions are fine until the block.

K's:

- Telling me why your links mean that I should weigh the AFF and how that implicates their research is probably much better than just stating why your model of debate is better. Vice Versa for AFF, telling me why your research praxis is good, and should be debated is better than telling me why it's a pain you can't weigh the AFF. I think that fairness is an impact, but we have been on the fairness spiel for like 20+ years.

- More impact analysis > no impact analysis.

K AFF's/FW:

- I think that teams should probably read a plan text, and talk about the resolution. But if you want to read a AFF without a plan text, go for it as long as you do it well. Usually, negative teams going for framework do so poorly.

- I usually prefer fairness as an externalization of education, and how it impacts the game of debate in terms of making us better people and/or better educators.

- Definitions are under-used, and I think that the best AFF's make us really ponder how we should collectively view the topic.

Updated November 2022

Dan Stanfield

2 Years at Los Rios Community College

1 Year at CSU Fullerton

1 Year at UNLV

2 Years Coaching at UWG

2 years @ Baylor

Iowa 2019 - 2020

IC 2022

Coached for CKM on TI topic

Coached for Juan Diego on Surveillance

Coach for SLC West Education

Coached for CKM Immigration - CJR

Coached for Nevada Union Immigration - CJR

Add me to your email chain stanfield.dan@gmail.com

Michigan 2023 Update:

Pronouns: they/them

Please don't over adjust your content to me, I am a lover of debate in all its forms. Make the arguments you want to make and I'll evaluate the debate.

I have had very few rounds on this topic so if there is any topic specific jargon err toward a higher degree of explanation.

October 2022 Update:

Taylor Swift lyrics cleverly incorporated will result in a speaker point boost. Jokes in poor taste will result in a speaker point drop. Buyer beware.

"I am a firm believer that debate is for debaters. I had my time to make others listen to whatever (and I do mean absolutely whatever) I wanted to say, and its my turn to listen to and evaluate your arguments, whatever they may be. While I'm sure I have my limitations make me adapt to you instead of the other way around" -- Lindsay VanLuvanee

I will attempt to limit the amount my predispositions will influence how I evaluate a debate round. Don't feel as if you need to change your strategy to debate in front of me, do what you do best, because the alternative is usually subpar debate. The final two rebuttals should write my ballot for me, teams that accurately break the round down and are reasonable about what they are and are not winning will usually be rewarded with increased speaker points.I enjoy a high level of specificity and nuance broad sweeping claims will get you nowhere. I place importance on how pieces of evidence get debated, as opposed to simply constructing debates based on the pieces of evidence that have been introduced. While I also place a premium on quality evidence (which, I would like to be able to hear during your speech), I believe that a smart analytic argument has the potential to gain equal traction to a solid piece of evidence. Quality always trumps quantity.

I find cross ex to be the most important part of debate its one of the few times I feel I get to connect with the individual debaters, while I don't flow it I pay very close attention to it, and what happens here will inform how I see large portions of the round.

Theory:
Theory needs to be well executed. Debates in which theory blocks do the arguing almost always favor the neg.

I don’t like cheap shots.(This does not mean I won't vote on them, I'll just be cranky about it) I like arguments to be well developed. Most cheap shots are not reasons to reject the team and significant time would need to be spent in order to convince me otherwise. However, it is your burden to point out how irrelevant many theory arguments that are advanced in debates are, as a concession may force my hand.

Nearly all theory questions I end up siding in favor of the negative, I think conditionality is fine, any potentially abusive CP is checked by quality of evidence. 50 States Fiat is one arg where an affirmative could convince me this is a reason to reject the team it is likely to still be an uphill battle.

Judge Kick: I think this deserves its own section, when the 2nr goes for a CP I believe the debate is solely a question of plan versus the CP. While a 2nr can instruct me to to kick the cp for them if the 2r wins offense against the counterplan an affirmative can respond that I shouldn't kick the counterplan for the negative and I am likely to side with the affirmative. If the 2nr contains a counterplan I have a very strong predisposition that if the affirmative wins substantive solvency deficits to the counterplan or other offense against it that outweighs the net benefit than I should be voting aff. And that I then shouldn't decide to then evaluate the status quo (i..e the net-benefit) vs. the plan.


T:
Separate from the framework section, I really enjoy evidentiary T debates that aren't clash of civ debates. I find these are some of the most nuanced debates about what the resolution means which is always compelling to me. I evaluate topicality like a DA offense v defense. For affirmatives here do not place all your eggs in the basket of reasonability, I think only reasonability is only a question of the interpretation and not the aff or plan itself. Any other interpretation of reasonability I don't think constitutes an actual argument.

FW

First contrary to popular belief I do not hack for framework, however this year I have noticed myself voting for framework more often than I don't vote for framework. For me there are a few ways the framework debates break down in terms of impact, primarily between procedural and education based impacts. By procedural I mean those impact arguments that result from things such as limits, or grounds internal links to impacts like clash, fairness, debatability. The second form of framework are those arguments about decision making skills, topic education, deliberative democracy.

If you are negative reading framework I cannot stress how much I would rather see the version of framework that couches its arguments in terms of the procedural side, ie. limits , ground, etc. I believe this is the most strategic form of the argument. I believe debate is a game and impacts that make the game unable to be played by one side or the other constitute a reason to vote negative. Explanations of the impact that have been compelling to me is that I strongly believe there should be a negative path to victory, a negative that couches their impacts like this will have greatly increased my likelihood to vote for framework. For affirmatives debating this style of framework if you win a counter interpretation that provides a limit on the topic and can explain why that limit on the topic mitigates some portion of the negative offense regards to limits or debateability, then that is the best route for getting me to vote affirmative. I will also say YOU NEED OFFENSE, playing the middle ground will not get my ballot I need impact turns big disads to their interpretation of the topic with well explained impacts. If affirmative I do not need 5-10 barely explained disads to FWI need 1-4 well explained and warranted DA's to the negative interpretation.

Conversely it is much harder to win my ballot exclusively going for arguments about topic education, decision making skills, or deliberative democracy. I believe any affirmative that is even close to knowing what they are doing will be able to easily impact turn these arguments. This isn't to say you shouldn't read these arguments at all they can be excellent external impacts to your interpretation, but instead you should use these arguments as a supplement to the more game-playing/ procedural versions of the argument.

For negatives who have framework as their go to strat THE CASE STILL MATTERS , the reason for this is the case determines the weight I give to affirmative impact turns / disadvantages to framework. If the affirmative solves 100% of their aff then I gave 100% of the weight of their impact turns to framework, conversely if the aff solves maybe 1% of their aff then the strength of the disadvantages or impact turns will be drastically reduced.

Topical version of the aff: You don't have to have one to win but it can help. They also don't have to solve the entire aff instead they are a test to show that the content of the aff is not precluded by the resolutional prompt. For affirmatives the topical version of the aff doesn't solve our aff not very persuasive to me. However, an argument that the topical version of the aff is not in fact topical under the negative's interpretation of the topic is persuasive. Similarly an argument that the topical version of the aff in fact does not allow for the content of the aff to exist. Form based arguments from affirmatives are also compelling to me in response to topical versions of the aff, how the content may exist but the form of it would not be, can be an extremely persuasive argument against both the topical version, as well as also acting as offense against the negatives interpretation.

Beyond counter interpretations it can be incredibly helpful for an affirmative to have a counter model of what debate looks like, which can act as a filter for a variety of the negatives arguments as well as acting as a type of uniqueness for your own impact turns to a negatives interpretation of the topic.

Something I've told to a few debaters this year may help further contextualize what I've said here -- "If both affirmative and neg execute absolutely perfectly I probably lean slightly negative" -- however it should be noted that I have never seen this perfect execution take place.

The K:
I will do my best to limit my predispositions from giving explanation or advancing arguments for the other team. Specificity and spin are important for both sides of the debate. I don’t like generic explanations of meta theory with no tie to the affirmative. Similarly, I don’t like generic responses to critical theory outside of the context of the aff. Generic evidence does not force generic explanation.

Disability k's -- Due to how I spent my last two years in debate , this is obviously a body of literature that I am extremely familiar with however if you are not familiar with it trying to pick it up just because I am in the back of the room is a terrible decision, and one you will almost certainly regret. Secondarily I thought I should include my thoughts on the various ableist language arguments. Essentially most of the time I believe these arguments in and of themselves don't constitute a great argument unless its an especially violent piece of language this doesn't mean what you say doesn't matter what it does mean is that the negative needs to explain to me why the language warrants a negative ballot and not just punitive measures like maybe lower speaker points or not evaluating certain pieces of evidence. I'm happy to explain this further if there are questions.

Recent years I have found I have a tendency to enjoy arguments described as "high-theory" IF THEY ARE EXECUTED WELL. I have coached teams to read all variety or arguments from the cap k to baudrillard, so if the death K is your jam then you should go for it. A lot of my current academic work revolves around disability and psychoanalysis so take that as you will.

If you ask anyone at Baylor they will tell you (and are correct) in that I really enjoy hearing arguments about psychoanalysis I find this to be an incredibly interesting area of argumentation and always enjoy when the affirmative or negative has to do with these questions of psychoanalysis.

CPs/Das:
I love a good, well-researched, specific strategy. The more generic your strategy becomes, the greater the chance of me assigning an extremely low risk to these arguments. Sometimes there is simply no link. Absolute defense does exist.

The last thing I will say is that debates that I have fun in will be rewarded by higher speaker points. I have fun when I see well thought out and deployed strategy.. Make me laugh and you will be rewarded. Be nice.

Also, I adore good puns (well maybe bad ones even more) make some clever puns in your speeches and you will be rewarded with speaker points.

Change in 2014

excessive / intentional use of racial slurs, jokes in bad tase, misgendering, ableist slurs will result in much lower speaker points. Note: an ableist slur is the R word , or derogatorily referring to someone as a cripple. It is not saying the word stand in your plan text/advocacy statement.

Matt Stannard

stannard67@gmail.com

Me: he/him, I participated in policy debate for West Jordan High School and Weber State University, I have coached multiple formats at Eastern Utah, Long Beach, Wyoming and Lewis & Clark, and have directed and/or taught at a vast multitude of institutes.

Delivery: I will, shockingly enough, miss your unclear analytics. Speak clearly no matter your rate of delivery. Over-enunciate. Don't leave comprehension to chance; control what I write down.

The (very important) game: all styles and formats of debate are good, policy/critical/procedural all valuable, I am not the state, topics and topic research are good, I vote for all kinds of arguments even when I intellectually disagree with them, debate should be both very accessible and very challenging.

Important needs and assumptions: besides clarity, I have these predispositions: (1) conditionality is fine until the 2NR; you need to explicitly tell me what advocacy you are kicking. (2) I seem to have a greater need than other judges for good solvency cards for affs, counterplans, and K alternatives. Many K alts I hear feel vague to me at the outset. Love voting for movements and don't think fiat is confined to the state, but the threshold is specific advocacy with solvency cards. (3) political and social implications of T and other procedural/framework interps can be reasons to prefer/reject them, weighable against other reasons. They aren't "genocide" per se, but they aren't ideologically neutral; debate it out. (4) aff should provide a clear statement of advocacy, neg should provide a clear reason to reject the aff.

Tech: I judge online a lot, please use the best mic tech you have and don't project your vocals directly into an internal laptop mic. Prep time ends when you say so and then IMMEDIATELY hit send, and in all debate tech scenarios if anything goes wrong don't panic, we'll be fine and figure out what to do.

Ethics: be chill to each other outside of your speeches (in your speeches you should feel free to be ruthless if that's your thing), don't cheat, let's all commit to dismantling classism, racism, sexism, heteronormativity, patriarchy, ageism and ableism, and to listen to those affected by exclusion--not just as debaters making arguments but as responsible and accountable human beings making our world. It's okay that debate is weird and different. Please make it a safe place for everyone.

For EMail chains - Nadyasteck@gmail.com

Hey y’all, Nadya here, I’m glad that I’m getting the opportunity to judge you in this round! For the sake of a pre-round TL:DR-

I want my opinion to come into play as little as possible during the round. I would like to be told how to vote and why, by the end of the rebuttals I will almost always pick the easiest simplest route to ballot possible. You can do this through Impact Calc, Framing debates, link directionality claims, etc. I don’t particularly care what the debate ends up being about, topical or in total rejection of the resolution I’ll be fine either way. I am fairly familiar with Policy, Kritik, and theory debate, do what you want. I will give you the best possible feed back I am capable of at the end of the round. I am most familiar with NPDA and NFA-LD.

Some more specific things for when you have time to read more -

General Things -

- Unless told otherwise I vote tech over truth, I am compelled by arguments to throw out my flow and eval the truth claims in the round as they exist in their entirety and will listen to them, you just have to win that I eval them first

- I find that people have gotten less interesting clear in their impact calculus as of late, I would like more explicit and clear articulations as to why I should care about what impact. Absent being given this context in a round I will default to probable over high magnitude impacts.

- My experience with debate, I was the Director of Debate at Lewis and Clark College for the last 5 years. Before that I competed in NPDA and NFA-LD for 5 years in college. I read a little bit of everything as a debater but had some particular favourites (Queer Pes, D&G, DeCol, Impact Turns)

- I have no problem voting on terminal defense if the round comes down to it, but I am always much more excited to get to actual vote offense in a round.

- I’m fine with you going fast if you want, its not really a huge problem so long as you aren’t weaponizing speed to exclude other people in the round go wild. I have a pretty low threshold needed to be met to vote on speed theory

- I don’t vote on disclosure, don’t take this as a challenge, I DO NOT VOTE ON DISCLOSURE, I do not care if its conceded, I do not care if you think you’ve got the version of the argument to get me to finally change, I will not vote for it under any circumstances.

- Please please please, read analytics, be smart, just saying an argument isn’t an argument because it doesn’t have a piece of evidence immediately attached to it doesn’t mean that an argument wasn’t made, as long as its explained an analytic is a perfectly valid argument and needs to treated as such.

• I like creative extensions of the aff, I like well structured overviews, and in general am always excited to see what weird new things you all come up with, so please show me what you’ve got, I love seeing the limits of what debate is capable of
• It’s something I never really thought to put but after judging with a few folks and some convos with other judges I think it bares stating, I don’t auto presume presumption flips aff just because a counter advocacy of some type is read, I believe that the negative always has the status quo as an option, you are welcome to make arguments to the contrary and I’ll happily listen but if I don’t vote for your presumption trigger it’s probably because you didn’t make the argument.

Theory Specifics-

I will vote on theory read in basically any speech within reason, I think that if abuse happens in the 1NR than the 2AR has a right to read arguments about it happening, it doesn’t mean I will automatically vote on it, but I will at least flow and eval it.

• Some jurisdictional issues regarding theory. Theory is by default Apriori, you can always make the argument that it isn’t or that I should evaluate something else first. “This is an NFA-LD rule” is not a voter its a statement, the action of them breaking a rule has a result, that is your voter. Fairness and Education are bad voters, please contextualize them, what kind of fairness, education about what? Please make sure you have a clear interpretation, please please please make sure its clear, I will hold you to the interp you read out of the first speech it is read out of. I will default to competing interpretations as an eval mechanism unless told explicitly not too.
• - lighting round, Yes I’ll vote on 1AR theory, Condo is fine until it isn’t, Dispo is okay until it isn’t, Pics are good until they aren’t, Floating pics are great until they aren’t, CP theory is always a good option, I’ll vote on spec but I won’t be happy about it, Potential abuse is fine but proven abuse last forever.

Kritik Specifics

- I am familiar with most common critical authorship that has been popular in the last decade or so. This includes; Cap of all flavours, Queerness stuff, Blackness lit, Decol and Set Col stuff, PoMo stuff like D&G, Ableism stuff, and a few fringe things. Feel free to read whatever kind of kritik you want to in front of me and I will evaluate it to the absolute best of my ability.

- I’m not super picky about how you read a kritik, but I do think that every kritik needs to functionally make three claims in order to function. First, a Kritik must make some kind of evaluative claim, what should my ballot focus on and what impacts should be prioritized. Second, a Kritik must have a link to the specific actions either advanced explicitly or methodologically endorsed by the aff plan. Third, there needs to be a clear and explicit alternative that has a clear solvency claim.

- If you want to read a K Aff go wild, I did it a lot when I was a debater, I am usually sympathetic to them and enjoy a good K Aff, that being said, I do still expect you to fill your time and be strategic. If you’re rejecting the topic wholesale fine, but tell me why, give me a reason why the topic should be abandoned. Make sure that you are advancing a clear methodology in your 1AC as well, I don’t so much care what that method is just make sure you stick to it, I find that I am exceptionally compelled by a a good contextualization or warranted analysis of the 1AC vs theory etc. out of the 1NC. A sneaky 1Ar/2AC restart will almost always net you high speaks in my book, its a hard thing to do well but if you can manage a tricky restart to the debate in the second aff speech I won’t shut up about it.

- Rapid Fire, Links of omission are bad and warrant link turns of omission please be specific on your link sheet, you can read a K and theory at the same time I find that I not super compelled by “you read theory which is a form of X violent practice so it links to your K” like if you want to go for the double turn go for it but like its not a strong arg, K and theory operate on different levels which I evaluate comes first is up to you and your opponent, floating pics are fun please read them strategically but make sure you can answer the theory sheet first.

Policy Specifics

- I am fine evaluating a good Case vs CP and DA combo. In fact a good DA/PIC combo is one of perhaps the most fun strategies that exists in the negative tool box. I am fine with any sort of case argument. I will vote on terminal defense, the sqo is neg ground and if the aff can’t solve than the aff doesn’t change the sqo, so I vote negative. I am not happy to vote on terminal defense, but as they say, the status quo is always an option I guess.

- I find that too often people read uniqueness args at each other but never think about the way those arguments actually interact with each other. I think that the best way to win a policy debate is to win the uniqueness level. Who cares if the aff solves an impact if the sqo already solved it right? I think that too often we focus on impact debate and link debate and forgo some of the fundamentally important arguments that are needed to win these claims. If you’re reading this now, take it as a reminder, when was the last time you updated your 1AC uniqueness? Cutting updates should happen before every tournament, don’t let yourself lose because you didn’t stay on top of your research.

- Straight Case is perhaps the best thing a 1NC can read, if you read straight case in front of me you will almost certainly net 30 speaks no questions asked. I’ve almost never not voted on this strategy, just case defense and impact turns or link turns is such a compelling strategy and as you’ll find out, a lot of people are a lot less ready to actually defend their case than you may think.

Some last minute fun things -

- Try to have fun, I love voting on goofy stuff and am fine to have a good time. The only argument that has a 100% win rate in front of me is Wipe Out so like who cares what I think anyway right?

Missouri State Debater (NDT-CEDA) 2007-2011; Judged NDT - 2011-2014; 2023-present

Greenwood Lab School - Middle and high school coach - 2011- 2023

Crowder College Director of Forensics (NFA-LD and IPDA debate formats) - 2015-2023

Missouri State Tournament Update

I have spent the last decade being around basically every other kind of debate besides NDT. I have judged at primarily regional and end of year national policy tournaments (NSDA and NCFL) for middle/high school and a ton of NFA-LD at the college level.

I have been working with novices and the packet this past month so I have some exposure to the topic (I also debated nukes) but you should assume I need a bit more explanation than the average judge about your argument.

Things I know to be true about myself as a judge:

1) I have a higher threshold for explanation and explaining how arguments interact than others. That is likely supercharged by the fact I haven't been around NDT in a few years. There are arguments that are just understood to mean certain things and I might not know what that is. Defer to explaining WHY winning an argument matters and interacts with the rest of the debate, even if you think it is obvious.

2) I don't have a lot of tolerance for unnecessary hostility and yelling (I am not talking about you being a loud person. You do you. I am talking about this in the context of it being directed towards others) in debates. There are times you need to assert yourself or ask a targeted series of questions, but I would much prefer that not to escalate. There is very little that is made better or more persuasive to me by being overly aggressive, evasive, or hostile.

3) Debate is an educational activity first, competitive second. I will judge the debate that happens in front of me to the best of my ability. Full stop. However, I believe in the educational value of what we learn in debates and will likely defer to the education side of things when in conflict.

4) My debate knowledge base is primarily shaped by NDT norms circa 2007-2012. I know some of those norms have changed. I will do my best to adapt the way the community has.

5) Policy arguments are more comfortable to me and what I know best. I would not consider myself particularly well versed in the nuances of most "K" literature that is read these days. However, with proper explanation and connections, I think I can judge any debate that I am presented with.

There is a ton not covered here. Feel free to ask questions or clarify. As I judge more, I am sure I will have more specific thoughts about specific parts of these debates and will add more.

**I have judged this NFA topic once (1). Please go slow and explain. If youre fast on tags, or fast on theory, it is entirely your fault if you drop because there was an argument I didn’t hear or understand.

They/Them

Competitive Debate Participation: Millard North 2014-2017 (PF), University Nebraska-Lincoln 2017-2021 (NFA-LD, 1 v. 1 policy)

Coaching: Assistant Debate Coach, Lincoln High School 2017-2018. Assistant Debate Coach, Marian High School 2018-2021; 2023-Present

Email: addissonLstugart@gmail.com

TBH you can probably avoid the rest if you're familiar with Nadia Steck's or Justin Kirks paradigms.

TL/DR:

Content warnings: If you are running something sensitive, you need to have a trigger warning. This means things such as suicide, human trafficking, domestic violence, etc. NEED to have a disclaimer before you say them. Furthermore, you NEED to have a back-up plan if reading it puts the safety of someone in the room in jeopardy. And, for both of our sakes, please don't use something sensitive solely as a means to win a round. Commodification of trauma isn't something that I will listen to.

I will vote on content warning procedurals.

Tech > Truth (what does that mean?)

I will always disclose first and will always give a detailed rfd. Not doing so is bad for education

Speed is a wonderful thing in all events unless it's used as an exclusionary tactic. If either opponent doesn't want speed, neither do I.

You can probably tell if I’m buying an argument based on my facial expressions.

Judge intervention will only ever happen if the safety (physical/mental) of a student in the round is at jeopardy.

Presume/default neg in all circumstances UNLESS the alt/cp does more than the aff. Then presumption flips aff.

Flex prep is a-okay in all events.

Evidence

I will call for evidence after round in 3 circumstances:

1. I have read the evidence beforehand in some context and believe that how you are construing it is wrong and unethical

2. The opposing team has asked me to

3. The round is decided on this evidence

Speaks:

Should be primarily based off of skill of debate, not eloquence of speaking.

While I believe speaks are arbitrary, I will generally determine speaks through this loose model:

28-29: You debated incredibly well. Strategic choices were made, and I have very little feedback for improvements.

27.5-28: Most frequently awarded speaks from me, baseline for my evaluation.

27: Arguments were poorly explained and require much more development throughout the round.

If you owe someone an apology at the end of the round, I may drop your speaks down to <26.

For public forum debate:

Observations: I will listen to anything. I LOVE strategic observations. I LOVE observations that narrow the topic based on grammar/interpretations of the resolution.

On the flow: Don't drop turns. Extend terminal offense. Ghost extensions of terminal defense from rebuttal--> final focus are the only extensions I allow to not be in summary. Other than that, if you want it weighed in final focus, have it in summary.

Rebuttal: It is preferred, but not required, for the second rebuttal to cover both sides. I used to card dump in my rebuttals, so I understand how it can get you ahead on the flow, though. I'm not strategically against it, but pedagogically I am.

Summaries: This is the MOST important speech in the round. This should set up the framing for the final focus, and should have all of the offense you want to go for in it. All previous opposing offense needs to be addressed in this speech (for example, if team a drops team b's turns in summary, strategic strat is for team b to sit on them in final focus. It's too late for team a to come back on that part of the flow.)

Final focus: The same framing should be given as was given in summary. But overviews or underviews are the best. I flow summaries and final focuses in columns next to each other. The final focus' main job is impact analysis. Explain to me why your impacts o/w because, as an owner of four dogs, if left to my own fruition, I could vote for 10 dog lives over nuclear war.

For Lincoln Douglas/CX Debate:

Inherency: I THINK THIS IS ACTUALLY A VERY VALID ARGUMENT TO GO FOR. Ya got me, I am a stock issues judge

"status quo acts as a delay counterplan" = *chefs kiss*

Value/criterion: I will typically default util~ especially in muddied v/c debates.

PLEASE, for the love of all that is good and holy, COLLAPSE V/C DEBATES IF IT DOESN'T MATTER (if I have to see another util vs consequentialism debate ???? I might SCREAM)

Also, please explain how the substance of the ac or nc actually relates to your v/c, or better yet, how it could *also* relate to your opponents.

Theory: After being in the activity for a while I have come to the conclusion that proven abuse is a silly metric to win theory debate. I do not believe that in order to win theory you should have to skew yourself out of your own time.

I am unlikely to vote for RVI's on theory in regards to things like "the theory is just a time suck".

I find “Drop the argument, not the team” to be fairly persuasive for general theory arguments (excluding t).

I probably won't vote for condo bad when there's one conditional advocacy.

Topicality: (I will never vote on "they have to prove abuse") I default competing interpretations on t but will listen to reasonability arguments. I believe effects t/extra t can be independent voters with independent standards. I think a dropped violation will *almost* always win a t debate. But because t is try or die, consider the following:

1. If you win the "we meet", reasonability explanations are easier.

2. T is something the neg has to win, not that the aff has to prove opposite. What does that mean? I am not doing the work for the neg to find the aff untopical. Extend and EXPLAIN your standards. (utilize clash, don't just rely on blocks) Tell me why the neg's definition is better than the aff's. Tell me why things like competitive reciprocity is key to eduaction, etc. I know all of these things but will judge *only* based on your explanations.

3. T is just like any other debate. The interp is the claim. The violation is the warrant, the standards are the internal link to>>> the voters being the impacts. So, just like any other debate, I expect you to win on all parts of the flow *especially because topicality is try or die for the aff*.

5. HOWEVER, I will always prioritize being tech over truth. That means that *even if* I don't agree with one's sides strats, or find that they are bad at performing the t strat (or responding) if the opposite side drops something of importance (a violation, concedes a voter, or even a standard that is sat on as the key internal link) I am probably voting there. Concessions are the easiest way for me to pick a winner on T debates.

Tricks: Take like 15 seconds to crystallize it after you do it to make sure I got it, and if you don't do this, don't be mad at me if I don't catch on.

Kritiks: I am open to all kritiks, but I am not familiar with all of the literature. Don't expect me to know the argument off the top of my head, but expect me to flow it and (hopefully) understand it the way that you communicate it to me. Debate is inherently a communication activity, and k debaters can lose sight of this. If it helps you to understand my experience with k's better, when I compete, I always go for framework.

I say K aff's have a higher burden of proof for solvency/explanations than standard policy affs.

Disclosure: Well first off, everyone should disclose. Debate is for education, not just the wins. IDK how I feel about voting on this theory. I have, but I don't like it.

Da's: disads with specific links are probably for the best. I am all about the net bens to counterplans. I am open to any type of argument here.

Counterplans: "Yes. The more strategic, the better. Should be textually and functionally competitive. Texts should be written out fully and provided to the other team before cross examination begins. The negative should have a solvency card or net benefit to generate competition. PICs, conditional, topical counterplans, international fiat, states counterplans are all acceptable forms of counterplans." -Dr. Justin Kirk; the man, the myth, the legend.

Background: Masters student at University Nebraska Lincoln studying Communication Rhetoric with an emphasis on critical theory and film. Former 2021 NFA-LD National Champion, 2019 Missouri State Policy Champion, 2018 NCFL LD Quarterfinalist.

While I will likely vote for almost anything if you have the proper framework to justify it. I am a former critical anti-blackness debater. I believe debate is more than a game and my experience in the activity has obviously informed my love for critical debate. Critical education is a cornerstone of this activity that I love to explore. However, you can read just about anything in front of me but you should know my strengths and weakness as a judge. Don't think reading critical stuff is a auto-win, far from it, I'll hold you to a somewhat higher standard because I know what good K debate looks like and I understand it.

I'm not super well versed in the intricacies of policy argumentation despite my 10 years in this activity. I just ask you to meet me where I'm at. I love a good policy debate whenever the story of the AC is CLEAR and EXTENDED throughout the entirety of the debate. Your AR's shouldn't just be extension and tech, I need overviews and clear articulations of what the AFF does, what it solves and why it matters. Run your heg/econ/war policy AFF, just do it well. If you do run policy, do it well. However, I draw the line at any death/extinction good arguments. It's weird and privileged asf. If you think your opp can be construed as accelerationist or fascist, call it out as so and you will likely win. I'm tired of hearing "all humans need to die". I won't auto-down vote but if your opp impacts out your genocidal rhetoric, you're cooked tbh.

Policy NC's: In order, I prefer K's, Case Turns, DA's, CP's, Topicality, and Theory. I expect the AFF to cover all negative positions unless AR theory says otherwise. I will vote for topicality on policy AFF's but it will be an uphill battle reading framework against a non-T critical AFF. If it feels exclusionary, and the aff wins that it is, good luck.

Test your critical sauce in front of me, I will vote for K's/Critical AFF's them or give in depth feedback on how to improve them. I have a moderate/deep knowledge of most identity/class based critical literature and surface level understanding of po-mo crit lit. Run your critical/non-T AFF if you can win the topicality/methods debate, run the K if you know the actual links to the AFF. Rebuttal articulation is EVERYTHING.

If you're reading a non-T critical AFF, I would like your evidence to be rooted in the topic through the lens of your critical theory . I will be more sympathetic to well-crafted (rare) framework against non-T AFF's that are filled with backfile cards that have been read ad-nauseam in nearly all debate communities since 2000-2010 or even worse, cards that aren't even about the topic or identity. I'm not asking for you to role play the state, that's whack asf, i'm just asking you to innovate. I don't wanna hear the same afropess, be gay do crime and cap K cards that have been circulating in the community for decades. I want you to apply contemporary critical theory to the specific resolution at hand, you don't have to affirm the resolution but please, have to 1/3 or 1/2 or 2/3 of your AFF cards use same language used in the topic. There are scholars of all identities writing about Nuclear War, find them and amplify their voice. Framework is always an uphill battle in front of me but it's much easier when the AFF is not engaging with critical lit rooted in the topic.

K's: You need to clearly articulate why and how the AFF specifically links, and clearly isolate these links in the rebuttals. Explain why the perm isn't possible. Do not read afropess if you're not black. If you read links of omission, you better hope your opponent does not have a good response to why links of omission aren't real because I find those arguments persuasive. Links should be predicated off AFF action, language, impacts, politics, advantages etc.

Theory: Sure, I guess. I don't know much about condo/dispo/presumption, etc., so just try to explain them a little more than you'd usually have to for judges like me. I am less hesitant to vote for theory if it comes from an affluent or white team running frivolous theory interps against marginalized debaters/small schools. I encourage smaller teams to run disclosure theory against their opponents. If you're in policy, I may not be familiar with certain theory arguments.

Speed: I'm comfortable with speed if you go slow on tags and share docs. I flow on my laptop for most debates. Since I flow on my laptop, flash all docs and if you can, analytics too. Extra speaks for flashing analytics.

How to Get My Ballot: Win thesis-level claims and tell me where to vote and why. Exploit concessions (with warrants).

Feel free to email me at andre.j.swai@gmail.com for additional thoughts after the round and questions about college debate.

Please do not read arguments that can be interpreted as glorifying suicide. This is a specific vein of death good that I do not want to hear. If you have questions, please ask before round.

I EXPECT YOU TO USE SOME WAY TO FILE SHARE FOR ALL DEBATES!!! THE IDEA THAT EVERYONE SHOULD NOT HAVE ACCESS TO THE CARDS YOU READ IS SILLY AND MAKES FOR BAD DEBATES. FAILURE TO SHARE YOUR EVIDENCE WITH YOUR OPPONENT AND MYSELF WILL RESULT IN A MAX OF 25 SPEAKER POINTS AND A LOSS IN ELIMS.

Disclosure updates in things i vote on section

I prefer for us to use speechdrop.net for file sharing but if we have to use one, add me to the email chain: dieseldebate@gmail.com

"debate is bigger than any one person. I believe in debate. I believe in the debate community. I believe that debate is one of the most valuable educational programs in the country and I am proud that it is my home."- Scott Harris

Are you a high schooler interested in debating in college??? If so, you should contact me and ask about it. We have scholarships for dedicated debaters who want to invest in our program and would love to welcome you to our team!

_______________________

Experience:

Competing

2012-2016: Policy Debate at Lee's Summit West High School, 2x national qualifier [Transportation infrastructure, Cuba Mexico Venezuela, Oceans, Surveillance]

2016-2020: NFA-LD at University of Nebraska-Lincoln [SOUTHCOMM, Policing, Cybersecurity, Energy]

2020 NFA-LD debater of distinction

Coaching

2018-2019: Justice Debate league Volunteer

2020: Lincoln Douglas Lab leader for the Nebraska Debate Institute

2020-2022: Assistant NFA-LD Coach for Illinois State University

2019-2023: Head LD coach for Lincoln Southwest High School

2022: Lab leader for the Collegiate Midwest Lincoln Douglas Cooperative

2022: Varsity LD and progressive argumentation lab leader for the Nebraska Debate Conference

2022-present: Assistant Director of Debate for the University of Nebraska- Lincoln (NFA-LD, some NDT-CEDA)

individuals who shaped my perspectives on debate: Justin Kirk, Adam Blood, Nadya Steck, Dustin Greenwalt

_______________

SPEAKS

0-20: Your coach needs to have words with you about how belligerent/ racist/ homophobic/ rude you are to other members of the community. I have no tolerance for these kinds of things and you shouldn't either. Debate is dying and we are a community. Being aggressive and being rude are separate things. Be kind to one another.

25-26: You failed to do anything correct in the round

26-27: you do minimal correctly. You have not come to grasp with what debate is and how arguments function together.

27-28: You get a c-b on this debate. some important dropped args or framing questions are not challenged

28-29: You handled this round well. There were minute problems that can be resolved easily that can bump you up.

29-29.5: You are a solid debater and have done exactly what I would do (or slightly better) to answer different arguments. Typically this range is also associated with you winning against a very good opponent, or very easily.

30: I have no corrections. You have had a perfect round and all of your arguments are on point and delivered properly. You have made some kind of strategic decision that I did not think about that I find genius.

______________

WILL VOTE ON

Disclosure theory - if you read disclosure on either side and do not have open sources available for both sides on your wiki, I will massively doc your speaks. This argument exists to create better standards for debate. Failure to do so will result in dreadful speaks and a very easy out for your opponent to just say that you did not meet the burdens expressed in your argument.

theory out of 1AC

Speed theory (if justified, see speed section)

Framework v. K affs

Framework turns v. other positions (Ks, DAs, Case args)

CPs in HS LD

CP theory

Ks in HS LD (See K section in policy for specifics)

Speaking for others arguments (There are ways to not make this problematic. However, identity is very individualized and commodification of someone else's identity for your own gain is a problem for me. For instance, do not be a white male debater reading the narrative of a black woman.)

______________

NFA-LD/ Policy

SPEED: I can do speed. I do have some conditions though. READ T SHELLS SLOWLY!!!! I need to hear the definitions, standards and voters. Bottom line is if it isn't on my flow I can't vote for it. Speed SHOULD NOT be used as a weapon especially if there is a specific debater in the round that has a disability that hinders them from spreading or flowing quick speech. Be respectful of individuals and their experiences.

TOPICALITY/THEORY: needing proven abuse is wrong. Affs that say dont vote on potential abuse are wrong and should read counterinterps that apply to their affs. If the neg interp is bad then warrant that out in the standards debate. I do say if you want to win T you need to go all in in the NR and win the full shell. When it comes to theory I love it. I tend to flow it on a different sheet so tell me when I need to pull one out. That being said I don't see theory as a means of winning the ballot. It is just a means of getting me to not evaluate an argument. This can be changed though. I have done a lot of weighing condo bad v. T. Theory v. theory is always a fun time. Warrant out why some shells are weighed first in the round and explain to me how different shells interact with each other. T is never a reverse voter though and neither is theory. Predictability is not determined by whether or not something is on the wiki or if you have seen it before. Predictability is based on whether or not an interpretation is predictable given the resolution. The same goes for reasonability. Negs who read T should be able to provide a TVA or establish that the education we get from judging the 1AC is bad for the topic.

DISADS: Run them. This is one of my favorite arguments to see and evaluate. I think it is the best way to establish comparative offense. However, if you run generic links that's no bueno for me. generic links from the Neg means generic responses from the Aff are acceptable. I don't want a generic debate y'all. give me some links that pertain to the case at hand.

CPs: They exist. I never really ran them but I do know how they work and I will evaluate them. Also prove it competitive. (Hint: I like Disads. that can help.) I will vote for the perm on presumption if you don’t prove them to be competitive as long as there’s a perm on the CP.

KRITIKS: I like the k debate and will vote for them but explain the literature. I have read some of the authors including Deleuze and Guattari, Puar, D’andrea, Ahmed, Wilderson, Tuck and Yang, and most of the authors that relate to neoliberal subjectivity as it applies to consumption. I have also seen antiblackness and afropessimism rounds that I have enjoyed a lot. But that does not mean I am entirely up to date on the newest literature or how your lit plays into the round. Just explain it to me. NEVER RUN MULTIPLE IN ONE ROUND!!!! The Alt debate turns ugly and I don't want to deal with that. Affs should either have a plan text or an advocacy statement as to what they do. I don't like performance debate as much as just reading the cards, however I have voted for poetry performance in rounds. I will listen to identity args. Race, disabilty, and queer lit are all acceptable in front of me and I can/ will evaluate them. Neg should be able to defend alt solvency. I am not going to automatically grant that. I will not kick the alt for you. saying "if you do not buy the alt kick it for me" is not an argument. If you do not explicitly say "kick the alt" or something of that nature I will evaluate the alternative. If it does not solve then I will be persuaded by risk of aff offense. I also want to point out that P.I.L. was correct, Anger is an Energy. If structures upset you, feel free to rage against them. This can include the debate, economic, racial, gendered, and other spaces. If you are oppressed and you are angry about it, I will not limit your ability to angrily refute the system.

K's that I am v familiar with: SetCol, Cap, Afropess, fem, ableism, militarism, Biopower/ Necropower, Islamophobia

k's that I know a bit less: queer theory, Baudrillard

CASE: I am always here for the growth, heg, and democracy bad debates as well as the prolif good ones. My strategy typically was to go T, K, O so I enjoy hearing why heg is bad and how the alt avoids it and how the aff isnt topical.

PRESUMPTION: I will not vote for terminal defense on the flow. I need an offensive reason to vote for you. Whether that be a disad, K, or advantage I need something to evaluate to give me a reason to reject the other team. Find it, win it, and extend it. Also, do the calculus for me of what impacts matter and why they matter. When I do the calculus I look to magnitude, timeframe, and probability. Explain why you fit into those please.

CONDO: I find it disingenuous to read more than one condo advocacy in one round in NFA. You can do it if you win the theory debate but I will be more lenient to theory in a world of multiple conditional advocacies. If you are running multiple advocacies please make it only be CPs. I don't want to see a CP and K in a round because almost always the CP will link to the K and I think that's cheating. That is different for policy and I consider it much more debatable then.

PLANLESS AFFS: I believe the aff should do something. How that happens is up to the aff. I do not reject planless affs on face but they should at least have an advocacy. otherwise, I am persuaded by vote neg on presumption because the aff functionally does nothing. arguments about the importance of rhetorical challenges is a way to do this.

_________

HS-LD

For any arguments that relate to it see above. In terms of how I evaluate LD rounds I rely heavily on the framework debate to determine how I will evaluate the round. Pay it it's due and try to win it. However, if you are able to show how your arguments fall into your opponents’ framework then I will be willing to vote for you if they win the framework shell. Also please clash with each other. I have seen too many rounds where each speech is just explaining 1ACs and 1NCs and I don't have a specific reason to vote against one or the other. At that point my personal morals let me decide how I feel about the topic. You don't want that. I don't want that.

I think a lot of LD debaters fail to recognize the importance of uniqueness to their arguments. If the squo is in the direction of the arg you are talking about, you need to prove uniqueness for whatever point you are making.

I tend to default to the idea that Fiat does not exist in HSLD until I am told otherwise. This is an easy arg to make especially with a res that uses the word "ought".

I am more progressive when it comes to LD due to my policy background. This means PICs, Ks, CPs and DAs are all acceptable. weigh them and explain the args as they apply to the aff case.

Phil cases and I do not get along very well. It confuses me and I find that debaters are not the best at explaining philosophy in the limited amount of time we have in debate rounds.

I prefer single standard debate as well. Death is bad and morality is good (but subjective) I dont need a specific mechanism for how we prevent or entrench one or the other. if you read it thats fine but I probably won't look at it that much unless you thoroughly explain it to me.

how to pref me

policy style args (CP, K, DA)-1

Theory-1

phil-3

tricks-these are typically not arguments and hold minimal weight for me

______________________________

PF

If you have me in the back of the room for NSDA most likely it will be for public forum. That being said, I am not extremely experienced when it comes to public forum debate. I have coached and debated it in an extremely limited capacity but have substantial experience in other formats. The debate is yours but I have a few things that ought to be known before you walk into the room and start doing your thing.

1. Debate is a game of comparative warrants and impacts. Too many people in PF try to rely on just making claims without substantiating those claims with proper warrants. Just giving me a number is insufficient to prove the causality of an argument. I need to understand what the reasoning is behind WHY a number exists.
2. Uniqueness MATTERS! I have seen too many debaters (in all activities) fail to explain the uniqueness of their claims and arguments. The resolution provides an overarching truth claim that provides some direction as to how the world reorients itself post implementation. What does each world look like and how is it a shift to the status quo?
3. Evidence is incredibly important to me. If you choose to paraphrase, it will negatively impact your speaker points. I emphasize the use of actual properly cut cards in PF. I understand this is not a common practice so if I ask for evidence that you have read, you need to be able to provide the source and the lines where your arguments came from. Failure to do this will result in me not evaluating an argument, filing an ethics complaint, and tanking your speaks. Don't plagiarize or lie to me in a debate.
4. Speaker position does not influence me too much. I keep a rigorous flow that consists of all of the arguments made by both teams. You should pref the side you want before picking the order in front of me.
5. PLEASE provide an actual impact in debates. most PF rounds I have judged do not express an actual impact story and get stuck at internal links. you need a reason that your contentions are a problem
6. Finally, for any of it that applies above, please consult my LD and policy sections of my paradigm to see if any arguments should or should not be read at this tournament. Also, ask any questions that you may have before the round. I enjoy talking to people and hope to enjoy the debate you present me with.

__________________

At the end of the day it is my job to sit in the back of the room and listen to discourse on the issues presented. It is your job to determine how that discourse happens. Just because I say I do or do not like something should not change your strategy based on the round. I have voted for things I never thought I would and have changed my opinions about things a lot. I give higher speaks to anyone who can read my paradigm and change my opinion or do something that is incredibly intelligent in round. Do what you are comfortable with and I will adjudicate it based on what is in front of me.

Other than this PLEASE feel free to ask me. I only bite on tuesdays. Pref me a 1 and I'll be able to give you an experienced and fairly well rounded and open round.

Background: Debated NFA-LD for 4 years at Central Michigan University. Currently a graduate student at Clemson University.

Contact Info: TylerNicholas008@gmail.com // Please feel free to email me with any questions or additional thoughts/comments/clarifications following your round, or regarding any conversations you'd like to have about my paradigm or debate, in general.

TLDR: Do your thing, and have fun with it.Just as much as judge adaptation is a skill for competitors, I think judges should also adapt to the debaters. Run what you want to the best of your ability, and I'll do my best to evaluate the debate that you, as the debaters, choose to have. I will vote on anything if the justification for doing so is well-warranted/articulated and sufficiently argued (though, my threshold for some things is higher/lower than others). I should be fine with your speed if you want to go fast, but please go slow on tags and analytics if you want to make sure I get everything. I like cohesive neg. strategies that gel well together (i.e. that are not contradictory/conflicting). Make choices in the rebuttals, and collapse cleanly. Going for everything is usually not the wave. Tell me where/how I should vote and why. Be kind to your opponent.

Overview:

I came into debate as a true novice, which I feel has a few implications for how I view debate: (1) It means that, probably compared to other people in the community, I have very few deeply ingrained notions about what debate "should" look like, based on its past/evolution, and (2) it means that, in many ways, I'm still learning debate and may not be as up on some debate-specific things as other judges (particularly lingo/norms that are transplanted from other forms of debate, like HS policy).

LD Rules:

Because debate, in my experience, is such a heavily norms-based activity, I'll probably feel uncomfortable voting against something *just* because it's a rules violation, particularly in cases where the community norm/consensus is significantly skewed from the rules (such as "full cites"). However, that doesn't mean I won't vote on these kinds of arguments or that I don't think "rules" can operate as their own voter (such as with T). But, in most cases, if you want me to vote on anything rules-based, you'll probably need to tell me it's a rule AND why that matters (i.e. what are the implications of the rule for debate and why is debate better if we follow this rule). It should also go without saying that I won't vote on a rule if you, yourself, also break that rule. On the flip side, I'm open to "rules bad" arguments too, but they need to be similarly well-warranted.

On speed, I'm fine with it as long as your opponents is also, but I think debate should be accessible. Speed should never be used as a tool of exclusion, and you should always prioritize clarity over speed. If your opponent says "speed" or "clears" you and you fail to adjust, it will probably reflect poorly in your speaker points. I saw someone once say something along the lines of "a debate in which two debaters are reading well-warranted arguments and citing well-qualified sources -- and spreading -- is the most educational activity in the world", and I agree with that sentiment. However, I do tend to think that speed is probably doing more harm than good for the growth of the activity as a whole, particularly in terms of recruitment and retention of novices. I also think debate, as a communication-oriented activity, benefits greatly from competitors speaking "conversationally" (though, this is obviously a somewhat arbitrary term) and persuasively. Take that as whatever you'd like; that's just my two-cents.

Stock Issues:

If you're reading a policy/resolutional advocacy, you should probably have them, and my threshold is probably lower to win these sorts of arguments than other rules-based arguments -- especially if the aff can't clearly articulate how they meet the stock issues paradigm.

On T/Top-level Theory:

In the interest of full transparency, adjudicating T debates is not my favorite. This should, by no means, prohibit you from running and or going for T if you think it's a viable strategy, but it will be much more compelling to me if you genuinely think and have a good argument for why your opponent isn't T. If you are going for T, a clean flow and choice-making will go a long way towards the ballot. Impact out standards/arguments and tell me why they mean you win the sheet. I'm probably one of the few judges you'll get that default reasonability, proven abuse, and truth>tech, but that doesn't mean I won't evaluate in a "competing interps" framework if you win that I should, or that there needs to be proven abuse for you to win the sheet.

Regarding other types of top-level theory, such as vagueness, if you think you have a legitimate argument, go for it. I think a lot of what I said for T goes for these arguments too. I'm not a huge fan of random, weird top-level theory that's clearly just about throwing off your opponent, but I will vote for it.

CPs/CP theory:

Personally, I think PICs are dope. As a debater, I ran a lot of PICs and think more debaters should, particularly when they're specific and contextual to the aff. With that being said, however, I will definitely vote for PICs bad if it is argued well. On CPs, I'm cool with condo, but the threshold for your opponent winning "condo bad" is significantly lower if you read multiple conditional counter-advocacies, *especially* if they conflict (which they probably do). I have a very low threshold for beating conflicting/contradictory arguments.

In answering CPs, I'm also not a big fan of blippy, one-line perms and am likely to treat 2AR extrapolations of them as new.

Rebuttal theory:

I honestly don't think I've seen this a lot in LD, but just to touch on it, if you have a valid reason to run it, go for it; however, if you want to win it, you probably have to go all in on it, given the LD speech order and time constraints. I probably have a high-threshold for voting on it, to be honest, unless the violation is obvious/egregious.

As a last note on all theory, I need a clearly articulated reason why I should reject the team and not just the argument.

Kritikal debate:

I love critical debates, especially those oriented around the resolution and debates about debate. I'm down with Ks and K affs, including language/rhetoric Ks. With Ks, give me clear, specific links and clearly explained alternatives, preferably with an in-round function, and tell my role as a judge -- how, why, and where to vote. With K affs, I'd prefer you have a defensible advocacy text, and if you're not defending the topic, I'd prefer your advocacy still have a clear connection to the topic or very clear reasons as to why we should reject the topic altogether.

The last thing I'll stress about Ks is that I think clarity about and understanding your position are extremely important -- both to critical theory, in general, and in-round accessibility and debate. I need to understand your position to vote on it.

Final thoughts/General Stuff:

I love debate. My favorite rounds to watch are ones where debaters are having fun, competing at a high level, and being kind to one another. Attack arguments, not your opponent. There is a threshold for rudeness, over which you risk losing the round and or get very low speaker points. Any overt racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, xenophobia, or any other form of explicit discrimination/violence toward your opponent automatically loses you the round and gets reported to the tournament organizers and your coach. Additionally, if your arguments reference sensitive materials or topics, a trigger warning before you read them is highly encouraged.

[This paradigm is a living document and is still a work in progress. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, please feel free to voice them before or after the round -- or through email.]

I've rewritten my paradigm now that I've graduated and I've shifted to primarily judging NFA LD. I am also a little bit of a hoarder so if you want to see my old paradigm, it's at the bottom of this one. I still believe most/all of those things about debate, I am just endeavoring to make it more concise and NFA specific going forward.

A Little about me:

I debated at University of Nebraska-Lincoln for 4 years (2019-2023). I won the NFA-LD grand prix and nationals my last year (imo largely because of judge/opponent adaptation) but that does not necessarily qualify me as a good/bad judge. I competed at 3 policy tournaments with UNL.

I also coached high school LD for three years at Lincoln North Star High School in Nebraska (2020-2023).

Before that I was a policy debater at Shawnee Mission West in Kansas (2016-2019).

My topic knowledge is probably a 4/10. I am now in law school which means I don't cut cards right now because I don't have time, but I am planning to judge NFA pretty regularly for UNL.

My senior year I primarily read affs that were either squarely topical with large impacts or affirmatives with non-USFG advocacy statements instead of plan texts. On the negative I went for T (60%) or the K (30%) in 90% of my rounds. This doesn't mean you have to debate that way, that's just where I am coming from.

I like speechdrop, but I don't care enough to make you use it. If we do an email chain use wallenburg.debate@gmail.com.

TLDR:

I flow, which comes before almost all my other preferences. I like fast (but accessible) debate. I think the time limits in NFA are broken which changes how I would like to evaluate certain arguments. I will vote for nearly anything that has warrants. If you read a plan text, it should be topical, if you don't read a plan text, I think your aff should be at least tangentially related to the topic. I like when negative debaters lay their cards on the table in the NC to prioritize explanation over shock value in the NR.

General Things:

Speed: Sure. Go probably 90% of full speed and slow down on analytics. I flow on paper because I don't type very fast. Clear and slow is better than fast and non-understandable. If your opponent asks you to slow down for accessibility reasons you should. If you ask for someone to slow down for accessibility reasons and then in another debate go really fast, I will not be very forgiving. Those who do this create a poor perception of all requests for slowing down which harms people who actually need to have conversational debates.

Style: Frame my ballot. Tell me which arguments matter the most, why they matter, and why you are winning them. Fewer arguments that are well explained are almost always better than trying to make as many bad arguments as possible. Don't be afraid to "kick" me if you're in front of a more traditional panel. I will still flow and vote off that flow, so if you can win both the technical and ethos debate it will be better for you.

NFA Specific Opinions: 2ARs need to do pick their two or three best arguments and then do line by line on the negative's answers to those arguments from the 1AR. NCs should be less afraid of reading only 1 or 2 off. NRs (generally) shouldn't read cards except to answer cards that the aff read in the 1AR. I think generally more than 1 Conditional advocacy breaks the game, but you should probably get to read that one advocacy conditionally. When the Negative goes for multiple off case arguments that aren't part of the same route to the ballot (i.e. DA + K or T instead of CP + DA), I think the aff gets a ton of leeway in answering them all. The 6-3 time tradeoff just necessitates it and neg debaters will find their time is better spent in the NR really explaining 1 route to the ballot instead of shadow extending it all. I am frustrated with NFA judges that have really ideological oppositions to certain arguments and styles, I think it is just as much my (our) job to adapt to you as it is your job to adapt to me (us) and as such I will endeavor to listen to all of your (non-bigoted) arguments with an open mind.

Disclosure Theory: I am at a crossroads with how I evaluate disclosure right now. We can talk about this more, and I'm open to opinions or suggestions. Generally, I think everybody should be disclosing arguments they have read before on the Wiki. I also tend to evaluate theory arguments very technically. In the spirit of transparency, however, here are a couple thoughts I'm still working through in these debates (and I think they deviate pretty substantially from what people assume about me, hence the relative length):

(1) I am more likely to vote for disclosure theory against someone who knows better. In practice, this means I give more credence to potential abuse arguments against debaters who have been doing this for awhile and/or respond to disclosure with a really big "disclosure bad" shell. On the flip side, I have found myself defaulting to proven abuse/functional application when disclosure is run against new debaters or those that are losing the "tech" simply because they have never had a deep theory debate before.

(2) Often, people think "Nick will vote on disclosure theory" and so they jettison what would otherwise be a clean cut win on a different position. This makes me sad. 100% I would rather vote on the DA/Aff/K/etc. and tell your opponent after the debate "also you should really disclose or answer theory better." It allows me to give better feedback and will likely help you in speaker points, which I think are both good things for you.

(3) I find it hard to establish a discernible difference between "full text on the wiki" "Tags on the wiki" and telling someone what the aff is 15 minutes before the round (a) when asked and (b) with the willingness to send them a copy if they want it. If you don't ask for disclosure so that you can read disclosure, I think you should evaluate whether you actually wanted a fair debate in the first place.

(4) The more you are reading blocks for disclosure theory in the NR/1AR, the less likely I will be to vote for you. I don't want to weigh a novice's reading of their Top 10 teammate's blocks if I can say with substantive certainty that they would not be able to explain the arguments absent those blocks. I know this is the practice with all arguments, but it just makes me feel especially weird with disclosure theory and Idk why (probably an offshoot of my opinion in point (1)).

Arguments:

Affs: Should have an advocacy and an impact. I think if you're going to claim to be Topical you should be topical. If you aren't trying to be topical I prefer you just impact turn T instead of going for defense (I never much cared for "the people are the USFG" arguments). Don't read cards you don't need in the 1AR, you don't have time.

Disadvantages: Sure, I think you should read your best link card in the NC. I (generally) don't think you get add on scenarios in the NR. Specific links are always better than non-specific links.

Counterplans: Yes. Explain how they solve the aff, how they avoid the net benefits, and why they are theoretically legitimate. Do what you can justify, but I tend to fall pretty in line with (policy) established convention as to whether a certain type of CP is cheating or not. I will say I do like PICs and I think that judges that auto reject PICs are actively inhibiting creative negative debaters and rewarding affirmatives for lazy plan writing.

Kritiks: I lived here for the longest in College. Stylistically I think the NC should read less cards and spend more time articulating the links on the case. Why wait until the NR to make link arguments when you can have two shots at explaining it to me to understand it? Framework arguments should be in the NC/1AR. I don't think the NR needs to go for the alt, but it does need to explain why it doesn't need the alt. I think affirmative debaters get too generic answering kritiks, and should make more specific analytical arguments instead of just asserting "perm double bind." 2ARs should collapse more on these - if you're winning the no link debate, go for the perm. If you're winning the impact turn debate, who cares about the perm?

Topicality: (Against the aff with a USFG plan text) I love a good T debate. I think that topicality informs how we write plans in the future which means competing interpretations and potential abuse are (generally) truer arguments. Define words in the resolution, put any TVAs/ExtraT/FXT/impact framing issues in the NC shell. The NR should go between overviewing/explaining disadvantages to the affirmatives interpretation and line by lining the 1AR responses. Here, again, the aff should pick their battle in the 2AR.

(Against the aff with a non-USFG advocacy) I think this is a viable strategy. You should do more establishment of impacts in the NC then you might against a topical aff. Think of this as more a disad to their method than a prior question, which means you should be making arguments on the case about why topicality harms the aff's ability to solve itself in the NC. You will be hard pressed to win this debate if you do not put some amount of argumentation on the aff. You can win fairness alone but I think it's better explained as an impact to clash/education. Affirmatives should read 2-3 good 1AR impact turns based in AC evidence and explain them in the 1AR instead of 10 blippy, generic arguments. The 2AR should pick the best one and explain it against every macro impact the NR extends.

**********OLD PARADIGM***********

Last Edited in April of 2023.

TLDR:

Do whatever you want. I typically default to offense/defense paradigm and I think judge adaptation should be a two-way street: yes you should probably do what your judges prefer because its strategic, but judges should also make every effort to understand and evaluate your arguments fairly. I am very frustrated by judges that give RFDs like "I don't evaluate this kind of argument" or "You were going too fast so I didn't even try to flow you." I prefer affs are at least based in literature about the resolution. I started with more exposure to Policy style arguments but have since become somewhat of a "K hack." I love impact turns, T debates, tricky DA's, and well thought out Critical debates, not necessarily in that order.

Style Preferences:

Speed - Yes I can handle speed, but please don't go full out. I can flow pretty well, but going too fast will likely hurt you more than it will help you. I would say the 1AC/1NC should be like 90% of top speed, and warrants/rebuttals should be 75%, I'm not a very fast typist so I will likely flow on paper.

Frame my Ballot - Please. The 2NR/2AR should almost always start out with an overview of "You vote Aff/Neg Because..." if you fall into the nasty habit of just going straight into line by line without telling me where to look first in the debate, but your opponent gives a clear, concise overview of how I should evaluate the round and which arguments matter the most, you may not like my decision.

Round Vision - Keep an eye out for technical mistakes and cross flow applications. My partner and I came back from a lot of debates that we were very clearly losing by correctly analyzing bad 2NR kick outs or 1AR mistakes. Making strategic concessions and cross applications will be rewarded.

Adapt - If you're debating in front of a panel don't be afraid to kick me and cater to the other judges interests. I get it, no hard feelings. I will still make my decision based on a technical analysis of the flow unless explicitly instructed otherwise.

Argumentative Things:

Affs - I would prefer that Affirmatives are in the direction of the resolution, and have a stable advocacy, otherwise I will likely find a parametrics argument pretty persuasive. I have read planless affirmatives and I think they have lots of merit, but where teams go wrong is shadow extending aff cards but not explaining their method or solvency mechanism. What does the advocacy do? How do you resolve violence? Do you need to resolve violence? I think these are questions that need to be answered early in the debate. That being said, I think impact turns to FW should use the aff. I am not a big fan of copy and pasting your generic K aff blocks to every aff you read when your evidence justifies much more nuanced answers to framework. As for Affs with Plan Texts, I'm down for whatever. My senior year Alex and I mostly read soft left affs with a framing page, but we also occasionally went for a big stick economy aff with a lot of preempts to Cap and Dedev, so read what you want and I should be able to handle it.

Impact Turns - Yes. Please. Dedev and prolif good were my favorite. Focus your attention on the Sustainability debate, impact analysis, and Impact defense. Read any impact turn you want. Although hearing something like death good or wipeout will probably make me sad.

Topicality - I love a good T debate, but the key word there is good. I default to competing interpretations and I don't think you need to win in round abuse to win T. I typically view T as a Disadvantage to the Affirmative through an offense/defense paradigm and I think fairness is just an internal link to education. 2NC/1NR should have a case list and hopefully have a TVA. The biggest problems teams have when going for Topicality in front of me is warranting out their DAs. Why does the aff explode limits? What do they justify? Why is the ground they take core neg ground and why is that bad? Answering the why question will make topicality debates more persuasive for me. When answering T make sure you have offense or a very clear we meet. ***Pet Peeve: Reasonability is an interpretation level argument, not a violation level argument. "We are reasonably topical" makes absolutely no sense. You are either topical or you aren't, and whoever wins the interpretations debate decides that.

Disadvantages - Yes. There was always a Politics DA in my 1NC's in high school and I love them. The best 2NC's/1NR on DA's will have an overview of some form on top. Brink DAs are much more persuasive than linear DAs. Be sure to make turns case arguments and really flesh out your links in the block. Conversely, dropped turns case arguments in the 1AR typically make a neg presumption ballot significantly easier. Read whatever DA's you like and I can jive.

Counterplans - Also yes. The Bread to the Disad's butter. I think that judge kick is implied in condo and if you want to make a more in depth argument about why I shouldn't judge kick the cp for the neg then that debate should start in the 2AC. Conversely, if the aff wins no judge kick I am sympathetic to arguments about presumption flowing aff if a counterplan is in the 2NR. When reading counterplans sufficiency framing is your friend. Make your net benefits clear and your solvency warrants clearer. Carded counterplans are always better than non-carded counterplans, but pointing out that the aff evidence advocates for your generic CP is also pretty cool. I am always telling teams to do more framing in these rounds. What does the counterplan solve and why does it matter? I will draw the lines, but I will be hesitant.

I would say my opinions about counterplan legitimacy are pretty mainstream. If it's typically thought of as a "cheating" counterplan, I probably think its cheating too. That doesn't mean don't read it, just spend enough time to actually win the theory debate. Nuanced interpretations and fewer, better arguments are preferable to your 9 point "yes delay CPs" blocks.

Kritiks (When You are Neg) - Yes. I will listen to K's but I am probably not very familiar with your literature. I am probably a little bit more sympathetic to framework arguments about ontology/epistemology/pedagogy/etc. than some other judges, and I think the most effective way to win the framework debate is to get impacts external to fairness alongside all of your typical clash impact turns. I don't think you need to go for the alt if you can win framework and impact calc. If you do go for the alt, I think the most persuasive debaters describe it more as a process and less as a singular event. The link debate is the most important part, and an analytical extrapolation of generic links and how they interact with the case in the 2NC is more persuasive than reading 10 new cards that don't say much about the aff. My senior year when I went for the K, I mostly went for a Zizek Cap K with a really buff 2NC Framework (I look back and feel silly saying that). I also read Agamben and Security. In college I have focused my research on Ecological Pessimism (A Climate oriented spin off of OOO), Managerialism, Necropolitics as it is theorized by Achille Mbembe, Militarism, China Threat Construction (Pan), and critical pedagogy. The teams I coach read a lot of Warren/Wilderson, Puar, Munoz, and Edelman so I'm being exposed to that lit too. Everything outside of those I probably have a working knowledge of, but you will probably have to do more explaining to me than you might have to with another judge. If I don't understand the core thesis by the end of the round, it will be very hard to win my ballot.

Case Debate - Is a lost art. The more you can attack the internal links of the aff, the more likely you can pick up my ballot. I will vote on presumption if a significant amount of case answers are mishandled or good DA turns the Aff arguments are won. If you are debating against a plan-less aff do what you do - I could listen to a methods debate or a FW debate - I think often teams that read plan-less affs are really only ready for the latter, so you might consider using that to your advantage.

Theory - SLOW DOWN ON YOUR THEORY BLOCKS. The key to a good theory debate is a nuanced interpretation. The more tailored you can make your interpretation to the debate that is happening to subsume the other team's offense, the better off you will be. Theory is almost always a reason to reject the Argument and not the team, but I think the best aff theory is used to justify abusive permutations like Perm do the counterplan. Condo is a different beast, and a reason to reject the team if won. I would prefer the 2AR not devolve to condo, but I also understand that sometimes you get spread out or there are egregious performative contradictions that warrant a complete throw to theory. In these situations outline the in-round abuse and make your impacts clear - ensure that you can explain why your interp is not regressive.

**********************************************HIGH SCHOOL LD****************************************

Because I live in Nebraska I guess I have to include this stuff too...

Top Level: SHARE CASES. I don't understand this permissibility with not seeing your opponents evidence, not for flowing purposes but for checking reliability of the evidence, but it seems more prevalent in HS LD than other places. Pet peeve is debaters who don't share the AC/NC until after they give it or ask which evidence to send instead of just sending the whole doc :)

I have now been coaching/judging LD for the better part of 3 years and more often than not I find myself evaluating these rounds very similarly to how I would evaluate a policy round. With that being said, see above for my policy preferences if you want to have a progressive round, with a few caveats below. If you find yourself more of a traditional or phil debater, that's cool too, read on...

TRAD: This is the LD type I did when I went to high school in Kansas City. If you want me to just evaluate value v value with degrees of solvency, tell me why that's the best method for debate. I prefer arguments steeped in argument quality and structural fairness as opposed to arguments that appeal to "the spirit of LD" or "Morality is useful for everyday life." I find the first to be arbitrary and the second to be just silly. If you are debating against a Traditional case with a progressive case, focus on similar aspects of the framing debate. Tell me why it is pedagogically/competitively valuable to abandon pure value v value debate. I think there is a litany of reasons on both sides of this question and it is up to you to parse out.

PHIL: These are the concepts that are most foreign to me. I enjoy philosophy in my everyday life, but I don't often read a whole lot of books/papers through the philosophical lens of Kant or Locke or what have you. With that being said, I can often understand phil arguments, they just need more explaining in front of me. Explain how your philosophy better explains the world and moral action, and why it specifically takes out the competing method. Don't just say "act omission distinction," tell me what that is and why it's good/bad. Phil cases that I've coached and have begun to understand, but am by no means well versed in are Kant, MacIntyre, and Locke.

PROGRESSIVE: If you're actually reading paradigms this is likely why you're here. I try to be tabula rasa (don't we all?) but I do have preconceived biases that are not hard to overcome with well-developed argumentation. I tend to think that the round should be some flavor of hypo testing where the aff defends the whole rez and the neg defends the status quo or a counter advocacy that is not related to the resolution to resolve aff offense. If the aff reads a plan text, that's fine, justify it and parse it out. I think that gives the negative more leeway for Counterplan or PIC offense, as well as Topicality or Theory. On condo, I think that anything more than 1 or 2 condo in LD is abusive but can be persuaded to think less or more is permissible. I consider myself to be a connoisseur of theory debates, but I hate having 3 or 4 theory arguments flying around from the get-go. I would much rather you focus on one theory argument and really developed and debate it, instead of relying on your opponent dropping standard 3 subsection C.

A CAVEAT ON T WHOLE REZ: If you think this is your best option for the NR go for it, but I want to be very clear on how I often find myself adjudicating these arguments: 1. Grammar over pragmatics is silly to me, I likely won't be as persuaded by a grammar argument about what kind of plural the word "states" is but I would be much more persuaded by a Limits DA. 2. I don't think an interp card is necessary for this argument. I think it's just as viable as a theory argument like solvency advocate theory or Condo - affirmative teams that rely on "You don't have a card for that" will receive much less sympathy from me than teams that make their own counter interp and have the standards debate.

For the most part, everything above about policy debate applies, if you have any specific questions please ask me before the round and I will be happy to answer them. GLHF!

2 quick caveats about how I time debates before I get to my paradigm.

1. I try to keep a running clock. The moment your speech ends cross ex begins. The moment cross ex ends, either your prep begins or the roadmap for the following speech begins.

2. If you are paperless, your prep times ends as soon as you send or share your speech doc.

With that said...

I believe that debate is an activity where the boundaries are defined its participants. This means that I am open to hear whatever kind of debate you want. If you wish to innovate new radical approaches to debate, I am open to hear them. If you wish to have a more traditional debate I am open to hear that as well. It is important for me that you situate my space in the debate. This means that if you want me to decide the debate by comparing the size of your impacts you should say it, and if you wish for me to take a different approach you should make that explicit. Despite my attempt to allow the debaters to control the direction of the debate no one is a truly blank slate, I do have some debate dogmas. I will try hard to make them obvious here, and if there is any confusion feel free to ask me.

You only get credit for arguments that I have on my flow. If you are difficult to understand because you are too fast or unclear, and as a result I miss something, that is YOUR fault. I will try to let you know (with both verbal and non-verbal cues) if I'm missing what you're saying, but its on you to adapt. 

I prefer debates where there are a smaller number of well developed arguments as opposed to debates with 10 off. This does not mean that you have to read slowly, it just means develop your arguments, and in general the team with the better explained, better developed arguments will win the debate.

While I encourage debaters to find new, innovative ways to affirm the topic, this is not carte blanche to say anything you want. The topic is important, and as intellectuals, competitors, and activists we have an obligation to find something related to it to affirm. This does not mean that I am excited about hearing T debates. In general I lean aff on T and will let the Aff do their thing as long as it is germane to the topic, and debatable. In sum, feel free to read your non traditional Aff, but be prepared to explain why it is relevant to the topic, and why it is a debatable issue.

Also related to this discussion- I believe that voting Aff is an affirmation of the resolution. You can affirm the resolution in any way that you choose (as long as you can defend it, and it is debateable), but in the end of the day, voting Aff means that I am saying yes to some version/interpretation of the resolution. While I am open to all sorts of Affs, the one kind of Aff that will make me lean Neg on Framework/T questions is an Aff that says that the resolution is bad, or totally eschews any semblance of a connection to the resolution. This doesn’t mean that you have to fiat anything, or pretend to be the federal government, but if you don’t want to defend those things you should explain what you think the resolution means, and defend it. Be prepared to debate the framework. I generally don’t like debates that are entirely about this, but in debates with countervailing approaches to form and content, framework is an unquestionably important element of a debate. It’s alright to kritik someone’s approach to the debate, but be prepared to describe what your alternative approach is and why it is better.

Slow down on theory. If I miss something because you are blazing through a block with reckless abandon, you won't get credit for it. I tend to lean negative on CP theory, and if a theory issue can be resolved by rejecting the argument instead of deciding the entire debate on it, I will generally try to do so. 

Don’t just assume that I have read the critical theory that you are debating. YOU HAVE AN OBLIGATION TO EXPLAIN YOUR ARGUMENTS! This applies to kritiks as well as other policy based arguments. I won’t vote on an argument that you win but I don’t understand, and I won't be embarrassed or feel any regret about telling you that I don't understand your argument, as this is evidence of your failure to clearly explain your argument, and not evidence of my inability to comprehend sensible arguments.

I love a healthy dose of competition as much as the next person, but don’t be a jerk. Humor is good and will be rewarded, emotion and power are great as well, just don’t let the debate turn into a pissing contest over something not at all important to the debate.

With that said, Have fun, respect each other, and good luck!

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.

E-mail: benrichwill@gmail.com

Hi y'all! My Tabroom name is Benjamin (he/him) but I also go by Ben. I am Graduate Assistant at Western Kentucky University in the second year of an MAE program. I debated for KCKCC in 2016 and 2017 where I competed in a variety of debate formats, including NDT/CEDA, NFA-LD, and NPDA.

Top level, I view debates through the lens of comparative advantages; put simply, you win if the world you are advocating for is better than the other team's. Tell me what your best arguments are and why they mean you should get the ballot.

Argumentative innovation will be rewarded. I tend to like teams who stretch the boundary of the resolutional question without abandoning topic education.

I would like the downtime time of debates (document sending, setting up stands, etc) to be minimized as possible.

Framework/Affirmative Kritiks: I never read affirmative kritiks while competing so if teams would give a good 2AC explainer that would be nice. I like framework debates because they display analytical skills of speakers; debaters who go beyond my expectations will get high speaks. While I primarily think that debate is a game and fairness is a voting issue, I am not fixed to that notion. For the nukes topic, almost all of my research has been policy arguments.

Disadvantages: Affirmatives should read offense against disadvantages. Negatives should apply the disadvantage to the case debate. Impact turn debates are fun for me.

Counterplans: The best 1NC's have case specific counterplans. I err negative on most theory arguments but I still can be convinced to vote aff on overly abusive counterplans, for example CP’s that have purely artificial competition. The best 2AC responses involve add-ons/new offense. Unless there is a reason otherwise, I view counterplans through the lens of sufficiency.

Negative Kritiks: I like negative teams that can adequately explain how their alternative resolves all of the links to the criticism. I like affirmative teams that effectively weigh the impacts of the 1AC against the K

Case debate: Negatives should engage with the scholarship of the 1AC. While generic impact defense is important, it does not suffice as a strategy. Affirmative teams should utilize their 1AC in the 2AC/1AR to hedge against offensive negative arguments.

Conditionality: I generally think that hard debate is good debate and that affirmatives teams should be able to defend the 1AC from all angles. However, I have become increasingly sympathetic to affirmative teams that have to defend against multiple counterplans with multiple conditional planks.