Foster,+Evans

Debated at Caddo for 4 years, 5 technically. I do not debate in college.

I am not sure what a "judge philosophy" really is but here are some of my thoughts: Please debate however you want to. I value no argument over any other, i may have a more intimate understanding of some arguments, but i will always decide on how you debate instead of how i feel about an argument.

I ran primarily critical arguments in high school. while it is true that i am more interested in these arguments, it does not neccesarily mean i am biased towards them. In fact, it may be harder to win a k in front of me because of my interest, i have a higher standard for this type of arguement in general and reading complex argument without devoting enough time to explain them will do you more harm than good. I think alot of criticisms require the majority of the negatives time to explain and the nature of the literature requires more argumentative development. Creativity and new ideas are welcome for the both the affirmative and the negative.

tl,dr : i like the k, but explain your argument, if its insanely complex it'd better be the majority of the debate

i enjoy a good theory debate. I believe the theoretical legitmacy of any k or counterplan is always up for debate no matter how many advocacies exsist in the round. i think more debaters should argue theory(and T) like a disad, debating at the link/internal and impact level. I do not mean your topicality/condo bad needs uniqueness, i simply mean that there isnt enough calculus on theory flows these days. Too many theory debates consist of blippy extensions and furious block reading and not enough thought and analysis. To be quite frank, alot of high school theory debating is just plain fail. i know the recent trend in debate is towards rediculous numbers of advocacies (multiple counterplans and kritiks) for the negative but, despite being a former 2n, i am still iffy on the legitimacy of such strategies. i have no problem with a flexible and versatile 1nc but if the goal is to confuse and overstrech rather than educate I think the debate has missed the point. Impacting your theoretical arguments is a good idea, but simply saying things "reject the argument not the team" with no analysis to why that is what i should do that is a bad idea. I am predisposed to vote down a team whose strategy is theoretically illegitmate instead of simply not evaluating that particular argument but I could be convinced otherwise. My thoughts on topicality are similar to my thoughts on theory. I think more debaters need to look at topicality almost like a disad. Its not some apriori reason to automatically reject an affirmative and needs to be debated at the link/impact level.

tl,dr : i enjoy theory, but impact calc is important on it and topicality, all arguments should be theoretically justified. i dont think the neg needs 13 counterplans and a k to win, but am open to reasonable amounts of flexibility.

i also enjoy a good counterplan debate. i personally prefer a well thought out and strategic pic to something like an agent/consult/condition CP. ie i prefer well researched CP's that directly deal with the affirmative to something that doesn't really deal with the plan.