Teiche,+Alex

Background: I debated for Bainbridge High School from 2008-2012, competing both nationally and locally. I qualified to the TOC my senior year and finished with a winning record.

I thoroughly enjoyed debate and I hope you do as well. Do what makes you enjoy debate and if you win a ballot story, I'll vote on it. If you have any questions before or after the round, do not hesitate to ask. I do enjoy judging a lot; I'm also not currently coaching anyone. This means that if I'm judging at a tournament it's because I want to spend that weekend judging, not because I'm obligated to.

General: I view debate as a game(similar to Chess), in which you manipulate arguments, resulting in me signing the ballot for you or your opponent. As a result, I will vote on anything. Debate is a unique linguistic/philosophical sandbox in which I'm not comfortable excluding any type of argument(unless that exclusion is justified and won in round). If you have some really complicated/unusual/nontraditional/Gedankenexperimental strat, I'm not a bad judge to try it in front of. Two exceptions to this are that I cannot make a decision based on anything said outside of the round(where round is defined as the beginning of the AC to the end of the 2AR), and I will not vote on arguments that make personal attacks.

Basically, do your thing and if you win the argument I'll vote for you. I would go so far as to say I want to see the strangest thing you've got, but I would rather see you do what you want to do.

Experience-Related Biases: I will be most comfortable evaluating rounds that come down to philosophical/critical/framework/theory related arguments. This DOES NOT mean that you should run those things if that's not what you're most comfortable with, I just feel it unfair to not state any experience/knowledge related biases in my paradigm. I will not prefer these arguments because I like them, but I will have a much better grasp on how they interact in round.

Theory: I like good theory a lot, and would much rather judge a good theory debate than a bad framework debate. That said, I would rather judge a bad framework debate than a bad theory debate. If your theory strategy is reading pages of generic blocks I won't be impressed(your speaks will notice). If you win I'll vote for it, but I probably won't enjoy doing so. If you do very deep comparative analysis between the specific theory arguments your making and the specific arguments your opponent is making, starting in the first speech theory occurs, I'll be impressed(your speaks will notice).

On competing interpretations/reasonability: I don't default either way intrinsically, so I'll evaluate the round whichever method is won/whichever ends up happening if no arguments are made on the issue. That said, I am much more comfortable voting under a competing interps paradigm. If you plan to make reasonability appeals, you need to do an above average job explaining why your appeals to reasonability can interact with your opponents interpretation without an explicit counter interp.

A few stylistic points:


 * If you have an advocacy text(plan text, cp text, theory interp, alt text, perm text, metaethic text), please read it at conversational speed so I can understand(and potentially write down) every word.
 * If you are perming something that has a text, you should have a perm text.
 * The easiest way to win the round in front of me is to do significant in depth comparative analysis. This applies to philosophical/critical arguments, theory, pre-fiat arguments, utilitarianism, noncategorizable framework debate, etc. It applies to everything. I want to see weighing both within and between all layers of the debate. This is probably the most important part of a round to me.
 *  Speed is fine, if you're unclear or too fast for me I'll yell clear. Please start at ~70% of top speed and work your way up over several seconds.
 * Speaker points will be allocated based on how clever/innovative/streamlined/efficient your strategy is. Unless you are outright rude, presentation is not a factor.
 * If you want to get good speaks, please do not run AFC in the 1AR without an explicit interp(that you extend) in the 1AC. This is one case where I will have the world's lowest threshold to vote against this argument, even to the point where I would consider a reasonability claim to be sufficient.