Fang,+Zhou

Not sure if this page will be too useful since I don't plan to judge a lot. My name is Zhou Fang and I debated for Miami Palmetto Senior High. I attended the TOC my junior year and took second at the Sunvitational and Iowa Round Robin. I currently attend Duke University in North Carolina.

I'll try to intervene as little as possible, but below are my default preferences.


 * Speed:**

Speed should be no issue as long as you are clear. I will yell clear two times before your speaker points begin to drop.


 * Substantive Leanings:**

I admittedly prefer util debates that include specific evidence and good evidence/impact comparison. This does not mean that I won't listen to skepticism or tricks like contingent standards; it is in your best interest to run the strategy that you are best at executing. One caveat I will put in this is that if spikes or contingent standards in your case are not specific enough to an argument I will give leeway to the other debater for pointing this out (IE I will listen to something like "I didn't know how to engage this argument because the implications were not clear enough in the case").

Please be comparative in your debates. Whether your arguments rely on tricks such as contingent standards or util impacts, you need to compare them so I know what to do with my ballot. Your weighing doesn't have to be structured, but it does have to be comparative. I am a big fan of embedded clash and argument interaction. However, please be explicit in explaining how arguments function relative to each other. I think that overviews and extensions which effectively frame the debate are extremely important in rounds.


 * Theory:**

By default I view theory as an issue of competing interpretations, but will listen to reasonability arguments if they are contextualized well. I think "offensive counter-interpretations" are really just new interpretations which say the original theory shell is abusive. If you can distinguish between when a counter-interpretation should be implicitly an RVI and when it shouldn't, then you should justify it both in the wording of the counterinterp as well as in the reasons to prefer for why your opponent's interpretation is abusive. I believe that you can "theory" a theory argument, but if your reasons to prefer are simply reasons why you should get access to that argument, then I don't think it's a reason to vote. **In other words, offense is necessary in theory debates, but having offense on theory does not necessarily imply that your counterinterp is an RVI.** If this is not clear to you, you can ask me questions before the round. On theory, I default to rejecting the argument rather than the debater. I think that the best shells explain why the specific violation should be enough to cross the threshold for punishing with a loss.