Pang,+Hong+Mei

My name is Hong Mei and this is my 7th year doing debate. I am a collegiate debater with The New School, and have experience in a broad range of arguments. I used to debate with the Baltimore Urban Debate League before moving to NYC for college.

I am open to listening to the arguments that debaters introduce into the debate. Debaters work hard to debate so I will work hard to adjudicate debates. However, this does not mean that I don’t have predispositions to specific arguments. I still have a lot to learn in debate, and judging is a learning experience for me, as it is a teaching experience. I think debate has a lot of intrinsic value, and these benefits are different for different people. My role is to make sure that this activity remains meaningful for those who invest time energy and passion into the activity. Debate should be an activity for education that leads to making the world a better place. What that means should be at the discretion of the debaters and if you can win that the world would be a better place after I vote for you (preventing nuke wars or alleviating oppression) then you will probably win.

Some general pet peeves: · Morally repugnant arguments will cost you speaker points. Depending on how bad it is I will not have a problem intervening if you start saying racist, sexist, violent things. · Overviews are important and helpful, especially in the last rebuttals. · I don’t know everything there is to know about the topic even though I think it is a good topic. Explain. Explain. Explain. · Evidence comparison is crucial and you have to be able to explain to me what I should prioritize. · Impact calculus seems to be obvious but not enough people do it, believe it or not. Do it. · Do not speed through your one-line or theory arguments/ evidence. My flowing is not immaculate and I am not a robot, I am a human being. If I can’t understand you I will not have your evidence or arguments written down. Your bad not mine if at the end of the round that politics uniqueness makes or breaks the debate and I don’t have it down. · CX is important—these are speeches. Do not throw them away. I might not flow them but it doesn’t mean that I am not paying attention

__The specifics: Arguments __ Affs- Do what you want. Straight up, performance, critical, etc. Make sure you can defend it. Most of the time teams do not spend enough time extending the awesome evidence they have in the 1ac. This does a dis-service to the 8mins of speech. Use the evidence in the 1ac. Analyze the arguments and make the pieces of evidence matter.

Framework- The most important part of the debate, especially in clash of civilizations debate. Not going to lie, but my predispositions lean towards the more critical teams. However, it does not mean that they would automatically get my ballot. · K teams you gotta work for it- you have to explain why education outweighs and why fairness is a bad standard (for whatever reason that you have in the substantive arguments in the 1ac/1nc). What are the impacts of policy framework and why is that bad? Also, how does your aff/advocacy statement/performance/ role of the ballot solve? · Policy teams- why is fairness key to education? Do your impact analysis. What does the 1ac/1nc justify that makes debate bad? Why is the resolution necessary as a first step to access much of what the 1ac says? You don’t have to be draconian to win these debates. Explain. Explain. Explain.

CP/DA debates- not my favorite but you can run this. If you are going to pref me and I end up being at the back of the room for a policy throwdown be warned that this is not my strong suit. Make sure that you do more than shadow extensions and compare the scenarios. Be sure to resolve theoretical issues before substantive ones. Also make sure you don’t make theoretical issues the only issue in these debates (ugh). Make sequencing and prioritization args.

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Theory- I have a high threshold for theory args. I don’t like them. I prefer substantive debates. But if it comes down to it I probably would defer to reasonability. If it is a competing interps debate you have a high burden to show the internal links among the standards. In round abuse happens and I am sympathetic. Prove it. I will vote for it.

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The K/performance debate - For most of my debate career I have been running performance-based arguments and variations of the K. I am familiar with most of the literature (ID politics, postmodernism, capitalism, etc) but the important part of the K debate is being able to tell a story. Winning framework usually wins you the debate. What is the role of the ballot? What is my role as the judge? How do you want me to weigh the impacts of the K vs the 1AC? You need to be framing these debates in relation to the substance of the arguments that you are running. Ie- explain to me what it means to vote for you. Why should I prioritize your arguments than traditional frameworks for looking and thinking about the world? What does the world look like after I vote for you?

__<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Miscellaneous __ · <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Be nice. This includes being nice to your partner. Being mean or unnecessarily aggressive will cost you speaker points. Fine line to trek between assertiveness and unjustified aggression. If they said something offensive channel the anger to something production—like beating them in arguments. Getting indignant won’t win you the round. · <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Open CX is fine. Just let your partner speak. If you dominate CX after I said you shouldn’t then both your speaker points will suffer. · <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Speaker points usually start at 26.5- 29.5. I haven’t given out a 30 in a very long time and 29.5 is rare. Work for it. <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">