Christiansen,+Jacob

I debated for three years in high school at Millard South. My debate experience has taken place all over the Midwest, and a tournament in California. I do not currently debate in college, but I watch rounds online as often as I can and generally keep up with the debate world.

I have the most experience doing performance-style debate and just generally running the K. I’ve read literature from Spanos, Foucalt, Bataille, and a host of other kritical authors. Most commonly I read heg/state criticisms or structural violence. I almost never ran an argument with a plan text. All this has a few implications for you as a debater: 1) Most obviously, I am willing to vote on an affirmative argument absent a plan text. 2) If you want to try something new or experimental in front of me, please do. 3) I am persuaded by arguments about the power of discourse. 4) I generally understand and preference the K to other types of arguments. If you have a K that you can effectively run, it’s probably in your best interest. It’s more likely I’ll understand your K than any other “traditional policy” type argument. 5) If you’re a strict policy team, put me low on your pref list. 6) While I am willing to vote for, and do my best to understand, your traditional policy arguments... I will always need you to slow down and explain policy arguments. That means DAs/CPs/Case debates need to be clear and well flushed out on both sides. Jargon will only hurt you on this point.

Now on to more specific things:

FW: Please don’t disguise FW as topicality. If you want to run FW, just do it. Because I debated absent a plan text for most of my debate career I’ve hit framework many, many times. So I have a TON of experience dealing with FW. My K debate experience means that I am more sympathetic to the K team then to the FW team. You will have to win a solid amount of offense against a K team to pick up on FW in front of me. I also know that K teams generally put a ton of offense of their own on the FW flow, and one of the major issues with FW debaters is their failure to put enough defense on the flow. To win FW you must both effectively answer the K team’s offense, and win offense of your own. I don’t confine the world of FW to the purely technical either. I am willing to be persuaded, on with side, by arguments appealing to ethics or a judge’s “role of the ballot. In saying all this, I am probably more sympathetic to FW than other hard-K debaters. I am fully willing to vote for it, provided that you win the round. A final note, if you want to kick FW at any point you HAVE TO HAVE TO HAVE TO answer the K teams offense against you. I am always willing to allow a team to exploit dropped offense.

Topicality: I am willing to listen to, and vote on a T debate. However, I generally find them to be lacking in any serious clash. If you want high speakerpoints while debating T, both aff and neg, make sure to interact with the other teams interpretations, standards, etc. If you don’t prove your interpretation better, you lose. This goes beyond just reading me your standards again in the

2NC/1AR/2NR. Also, things to note: I am willing to buy that standards can be voters if you make that argument, it’s not just implied. I’m willing to here theoretical and kritikal objections to T, but they need to be against topicality NOT framework. I am persuaded by the argument that topicality and fw are distinct types of arugments. K teams, your generic FW block is not going to cut it against a solid T team.

Disads: meh. If you win it you win it. Solid impact calculus will be your best advantage.

Counterplans: Probably my favorite “policy” argument. I appreciate unique, well thought out counter plans (especially with kritikal net benefits.) If you can prove you solve the aff, and win a risk of your net benefit, you’ve come a long way in front of me. But as with disads, I’m going to need the impact calc. I’m willing to let you kick the counterplan text and go for the net benefit as a disad to the case if you win a specific link to plan action, and not just the lack of the counterplan action.

Perms: I’m a perm hack. Straight up. Neg-you’re going to need to spend some solid time answering the perm. That goes beyond just your generic perm block to specific situations and specific perm. Win not only reasons why the two don’t work together but also reasons why the perm is a bad thing. You’re in a way better position if I have a decent argument on the flow about why the perm would have negative outcomes. Aff-go. Fight. Perm. I REQUIRE A NET BENEFIT TO THE PERM. You will not be picked up if all you can prove is that the perm would work. I need a reason why it’s //good//. Even if that reason is just that it proves the negative is noncompetitive—it needs to be articulated not assumed.

K: I think I’ve made myself clear. Love the K. Read it a lot. However, I have a lot of experience with a variety of kritiks, so I’m going to know if you don’t know what you’re talking about or if you’re just wrong. Read it well, know what you’re talking about. I think every judge prefers specific links to general ones, but I think this is especially true in the case of the kritik. Don’t fall into the old K-debater habit of just reading a generic link and calling it good. Make it specific to the affirmative’s case, not their topic. I am willing to allow analytical arguments to be solid links as long as they’re articulated well.

Theory: Bleh. I’ll listen, maybe even pull the trigger. But I won’t like it.

Case: I LOVE CASE DEBATE! Read it. Make it specific. Make it offensive. Don’t just read “__can’t solve” cards, make it a case turn. End of story? Case debate is good. On both sides.

Speaking: Anything you want me to write down you need to make clear. That means tag lines and analytics need to be SIGNIFICANTLY slower than the speed of you reading a card. Especially for long blocks of no cards (theory, T, analytics, etc) I need you to slow down and speak clearly. I award speakerpoints based on your ability to effectively communicate to me what your argument is, NOT how fast you can go.

3 arguments I have a particular affinity for for: 1) biopolitics--LOVE THIS KRITIK! Probably my favorite kritik ever written. 2) any argument that seeks to achieve justice for Native American people (the opposite of this applies too. If it can be proven that your argument has negative effects for Native American people, good luck winning my ballot.) 3) Structural violence kritiks

Any questions you can email me at jacobchristiansen476@gmail.com and I will generally try to answer quickly. Good luck!