Mills,+Laurel

I debated for Sheboygan North HS for four years and qualified for the TOC my junior and senior years. I’m currently a freshman at the University of Wisconsin – Madison.

I’ve done some minimal reading on the topic but Marquette (Sept. 18-19) will be my first time judging, so you should probably remember that if you will be using a lot of acronyms or whatever.

I’ll listen to pretty much anything, so debate what you’re best at and don’t take my argument preferences below too seriously. I am very flow-oriented and will try to intervene as little as possible.

Topicality: It’s fine, but it’s not my favorite. Impact calculus is important. I don’t have any preferences in terms of which types of interpretations I find persuasive. I default to a competing interpretations framework but can be persuaded otherwise.

DAs: are good?

Counterplans: are great, the more specific the better…

I don’t hate “cheating” counterplans as much as most people. I won’t get mad if you read them or dock your speaker points, but I’ll probably be persuaded by aff theory arguments because they’re true.

Kritiks: I like them/went for them, but might not be very familiar with the more obscure literature. It’s the same as with counterplans - I love specific kritiks with clear alternatives but dumb/generic ones are likely to run into problems when the aff answers are all true.

When I debated, I tended to think of the alt as the focal point of most K debates. I’ll definitely be persuaded by specific evidence on the mechanism of the alt and explanation of how it solves the impacts in the round. I’ll also be persuaded by good disads to the alt and reasons it doesn’t solve the case or anything else.

Theory: Depends on how well it’s explained/impacted. It might be difficult to win most counterplan theory in front of me (except condo bad on which I tend to be ambivalent) unless there is clear abuse. Poorly developed and/or really stupid theory arguments are a waste of time, I think most would agree.

Performance-based arguments: I am not the best judge for these. I will listen to them, but will not vote on things that attempt to make personal appeals to me. I think these sorts of arguments must feel very invasive from a judge’s perspective and I will probably end up evaluating them the way I would most kritiks, including any framework debate that takes place. No matter how true or persuasive your argument is to me as a person, I will not use that to intervene against the other team.

Again, everything I’ve just said is how I feel about arguments in the abstract, not necessarily the way you debate them. So do what you like, be nice, have fun.

If you have any other questions ask me.