Jaswa,+Rahul

Like just about every other judge in this community, I try to be as objective as possible. But I think that debate is obviously a game of persuasion, and some arguments are naturally more persuasive than others--in my mind, the burden of proof is higher to prove that tyranny, nuclear war, etc. are good (these are extreme examples, you should use this standard for determining how to extend all different types of arguments in front of me). So, if you call that subjectivity, then by all means i'm subjective and you should debate accordingly. That being said, i've gone for both tyranny and nuclear war good a handful of times, so don't hesitate to run it back if this is your strategy--i'll give you a fair decision.

In my career, I have gone for every possible style of argument--stupid or otherwise. Nowadays, I tend to go for critique arguments more than anything else, but that is more a representation of my partner's ideological preferences than anything else. That being said, don't hesitate to roll out your counterplans, disads, topicality, etc.--I am well rehearsed in these types of debates and enjoy watching them develop. (For example, I used to write Cal's politics files.)

One word of advice, and this applies to every judge I know: if you don't outline the decision calculus for me or any other judge, the judge is forced to evaluate the debate the way they think they should, which might not be how you see it. Explicitly define the parameters of my decisionmaking process, and your chances of winning will go up dramatically. That being said, absent contestation (and this is critical, because I think anything is up for debate), I will probably defer to debate of competing interpretations (so offer a competing framework like reasonability, aff teams!), the aff gets their advantages against the alternative (but still has to win that those outweigh, aren't solved by the alternative, etc.), risk calculus, etc.

A couple quick disclaimers: evidence reading is subjective. Everyone reads things in different ways and everyone has different abilities to interpret dense, highly technical, or any other card. Debaters have a role in how judges read evidence--indict the other teams evidence and I will probably read their evidence with less enthusiasm/openness. Indict qualifications and I will give their evidence less credibility when I read it (assuming you win your qualifications indicts). Indict the types of studies their evidence uses, recency, etc. and you will find yourself in a uniquely good position when it comes time for me to compare evidence.

I'm sympathetic to defense--if the neg concedes defense that should take out their whole DA, then I have no problem saying they get 0% risk (ie if neg concedes plan is covert, no link, I think neg gets 0% risk of DA; if neg concedes "low probability of nuclear war," I think they probably just get a small risk of their DA).

Specifically, these are the ideological lines I generally follow:

K's--I don't think framework necessarily wins the aff the debate--make your interpretation clear: do they not get an alternative, just links to the plan, aff gets their advantages... be clear about what the function of your arguments are. Just because I like critical arguments does not mean that I am sympathetic to overly generic and meaningless arguments. I don't assume that critiques are voting issues--make clear why your alternative is preferable to the plan or permutation or why justifying their assumptions is a prior question. That being said, just because your evidence is generic, that doesn't mean your link explanations have to be. The great thing about critique debate is that it re-introduces a higher level of debater explanation--articulate clear, specific links with specific impact possibilities/explanations and it will be hard for you to lose to a permutation or link turn. Mostly, I just want you all to debate like what you're saying has a point that should implicate my decision process.

I am of the opinion that most judges who say that critique teams use too many "buzzwords" are people who don't understand philosophy well enough. This has a limit--if you're a postmodern word generator, I will think you are incompetent and give your arguments little credit (if I can even decipher them). But, if you skillfully and aptly use philosophical language like epistemology, ontology, metaphysics, existentialism, etc. I will know what you are talking about and you will not need to over-explain this in "common everyday language."

CP's/DA's/Case--Love it. I lean negative on arguments like conditionality, pics, etc., but have won many rounds and will vote on the aff side of these arguments if they are won. This means that you //cannot drop defensive arguments//--I think that the onus is on the aff to decisively prove why the negatives introduction of a counterplan, etc. into the debate make it strategically unfair/undebatable for the aff. That being said, I do not think the negative needs to win "net offense" to win a theory debate--they just need to win that it was "fair or educational enough."

This is an ideological preference that I always disagreed with when I was debating in high school; now that i'm in college my threshold for theory debates has become substantially higher; a 2 minute 2AR on conditionality bad probably isn't sufficient unless the 2NR really drops the ball.

Topicality--obviously as a judge I don't like watching stupid and contrived topicality debates, but I understand the strategic utility of a-spec (time tradeoff with the 2AC), t-substantially is without material qualifications (I won dozens of rounds on this argument my senior year of high school, including big bid rounds, break rounds, etc.), and the vast array of other stupid arguments. I evaluate topicality somewhere in the middle between persuasiveness and technically: make clear the types of ground you lose and why it's important, what aff's they allow and why they're bad, and then exploit concessions like jurisdiction takes out reasonability, overlimiting outweighs underlimits, etc. and I will be right there with you. That being said, I think it is hard to be aff in topicality debates; if you don't have a good counter interpretation, it is your responsibility to be damn persuasive on the reasonability debate (which I am quite sympathetic too if argued correctly). Don't let the neg get away with making silly arguments and you'll be fine.

One disclaimer--if the 2NC/1NR drops c/i--only our case is topical, you are not guaranteed to win. Unless the neg has said that absolutely limited topic is best, depth o/w breadth, you will have a hard time beating 2NR arguments about why that leads to bad, narrow education in my mind. You might win, but I would not count on it unless it is screwed up in a significant way.

New arguments in the 2NR/2AR--I don't have a super black and white outlook on this; I think most arguments in the last rebuttal are questionably new and questionably related to arguments in past speeches. 2NR should tell me to protect them, and the 2AR should explain why arguments which seem intuitively new are not, or demonstrate how they are related or where on the flow they were in prior speeches. I'm a good flow when i'm judging debates, and you will probably not be able to trick me into thinking arguments were made which weren't, so don't count on trickery (unless that's your thing, you need it, and you're good at it, in which case go right ahead).

"Performance teams"--i'm cool with it, I find myself to be a very objective judge when it comes to evaluating framework debates like these. Neg--just because you think framework = genocide is a bad argument, doesn't mean you should disregard it. These arguments are fair game just as are criticisms of topicality. I find claims like "only learning instrumental policy debate brackets discussions into violent ones--we become a debate community conditioned into thinking that the marginalized need to be disciplined and bombed" to be more persuasive than some others. The key to framework debates for the neg is winning fairness as a prior consideration, and for the aff is winning education as prior.

To close, most importantly, debates, even at the TOC, are meant to be fun. Competition is great--go in their with a cutthroat attitude (but don't cross the line), embarrass your opponents in cross-x, make funny jokes, and you'll be on your way to excellent speaker points (and credibility with your arguments). Argue with me after the debate if you want, but i'm not going to change my decision (or speaker points, unless you insult me). Debate hard, make good arguments, and have a good time.

I really like debate, and more than others, I like to judge it. If I put a longer-than-usual amount of time into my decision this should not frustrate you; I can recognize a crush just as easily as anybody else, but I want to be careful--especially at the TOC (I am rarely the last person to decide on a panel, but equally rarely the first).