Tate,+Tara

Glenbrook South, Illinois
I have coached actively in high school debate for ten years. Prior to this, I coached at Colleyville; before that... I coached at the University of North Texas for two years and debated for Emporia State University (KS) in college. Every year, I find that I judge fewer and fewer debates and am a little bit less in the literature. I still judge around 50 debates a year.

The “macro” level: I am involved in debate due to (1) the community and (2) the competition (in that order). I enjoy judging debates in which both of those values are exhibited. “The community” aspect is shown in regards to treating your partner and your opponents with respect and actually interacting with me as one of the participants in the round (i.e. joking around with me, talking with me instead of at me, etc.). “The competition” stems from my love of strategy innovation that tends to take place outside of the actual round and in the research. This statement is probably the most telling of where some of my defaults lie in regards to arguments (which will be listed in the “micro” level section below).

In my mind, tabula rasa is a myth…I try to evaluate the round based on the arguments articulated. But “evaluate” is a subjective term…

If I had to pick my ideal debate round, it would be where the Negative ran a very well-researched PIC that was specific to the Affirmative plan/case area (i.e. picking out of “persons in poverty" and reading the poverty PIC is not one) and the Affirmative had offensive justification for what the Negative CP is testing…

The “micro” level: These are the defaults that I come into a round with on particular arguments. Debaters that ignore these defaults will find it more difficult (not impossible, mind you) to pick up my ballot than debaters that don’t ignore these insights.

Topicality – it is no secret…I am not a fan of T debates coming into the round. I genuinely believe that many negative Topicality interpretations arbitrarily and artificially limit out the Affirmative. Keep your fifteen-second T shells in your boxes. My default is that Affirmatives should be reasonably topical…this is probably one area where offense/defense is not as crucial to me, in comparison to other areas. I do find myself voting Negative on T much more than my defaults would predict, because Affirmatives will not engage on why the framework of competing interpretations is bad, why limits are bad, why bidirectionality is good, etc… I guess I ultimately find that many T violations are more arbitrary and unpredictable than the Affs that the Neg is trying to exclude.

Counterplans – rounds are generally better when they are in them. I definitely lean negative in regards to PICs and conditionality in regards to theory debates. An Affirmative will need to win some offense on a net-benefit if they do not win a solvency deficit on the CP (unless it is one heck of a defensive argument…). I am open to good Aff debates on 50 state fiat.

Disadvantages – I evaluate links vs. link turns through a uniqueness filter first. Impact analysis, starting in the block, is imperative. Kudos to the Negatives that can articulate ways that the disadvantage implicates the case debate. If you go for a DA in a round, however, you will need to win some case mitigation or a CP that solves part of the case. Affirmatives can, in the end, still win a round if they are winning some mitigation on the disad but winning 100% risk of their case impact. I love politics debates and that is one area of the literature base that I do keep up with. Make your uniqueness claims warranted. If you are reading intrinsicness arguments on the Aff, make sure to invest the time to make it a decent argument in front of a judge that is coming into the debate loving politics DAs. :)

Case debate – a lost art…I treat advantages like I do disadvantages. Affirmatives often overclaim their advantages and the 2NR will say nothing. Negatives can win a lot of mitigation on the case with internal link arguments, alternate causalities, etc.

Critical arguments – I like very case-specific criticisms…whether the specificity is from the evidence or from a good debater that spins specific link stories. I find myself more and more wondering how the framework for the K implicates the case debate. I don't find framework debates are often necessary for the Aff. A negative can win the link level of the K, but still lose because (1) the alternative does not solve for the case or (2) there is no external impact. Very rarely will I find that winning a link on a criticism proves zero solvency from the affirmative’s solvency mechanism.

Other things: (1) It takes little argumentation for a team to be able to beat Malthus in front of me, especially if the “death checks” tend to be individuals that the majority is oppressing in the status quo…for example, tortured refugees and womyn dying from eating disorders from a patriarchal society are not death checks. (2) I only write down the words said by the individual who is supposed to be speaking. If your partner is prompting you during the 1AR, I will only write down the words after the 1AR reiterates the statement. The same is true for performance affs in which the speakers split the speeches (although I assume this can be up for debate within the round). (3) Sexist and other oppressive language should be avoided. Despite popular belief, though, this is not an absolute voter for me. I did my masters’ thesis on feminist rhetoric and still catch myself inadvertently using sexist language from time to time. There is definitely room for a team that inadvertently uses this language to argue why they should not lose the round. (4) Cross-reading and clipping cards is a sure-fire way to cause you to get little to no speaker points and, possibly, a loss in a round. Debaters that do this frequently do not realize that certain voice inflections indicate when they are skipping over words as they are trying to find random words to read. I also pay attention to text of cards and reading sentences that have a noun but no verb is also a good indicator you are doing the dirty deed. I thoroughly love what I do and I enjoy judging debate rounds when the debaters do what they can to make the debate rounds enjoyable for all the individuals participating. Hopefully, you will fall into that category and I will get the pleasure of watching you in action. :)