Kovnick,+Elliot

The philosophies of the judges I most admire tend to explain relatively little in terms of which arguments debaters should run. Objectivity is, therefore, an ideal I will strive to reach in my own judging. However, while I strongly believe that debate should be entirely about the debaters, I also understand that we all have biases that cause us to make decisions counter to our ideals for judgement and that it would be irresponsible of me to suggest otherwise. I tend to believe that the best way to know what those biases are is through looking at what judges empirically vote for. Unfortunately, I haven't judged enough rounds for that data to be available; therefore, I will just tell you some general statements about things I, myself, have done in debate/personally believe about debate, and you can interpret these as biases or not, as you will, knowing that I will actively attempt to prevent them from affecting my decision. My argumentative history -- I'm currently a Freshman, debating for UC Berkeley. I debated in policy for four years in high school and one in middle school at Rowland Hall. I was a 2A for the first two years of high school but have been a 2N ever since. In my Freshman and Sophmore year of high school, I read primarily policy arguments. By the end of my high school career, I went exclusively for Kritiks and Topicality and only read kritikal affs. Specifically, I read a lot of Baudrillard, Bataille, Queer Theory, and Human Security (not regular security). Since I started debating in college, I have begun attempting to read a more diverse array of negative positions. I have begun reading more policy literature, as well as afro-pessimism literature. The arguments I read are reflections of what I am intellectually interested in and what I view as strategic, rather than reflections of my actual ideological beliefs. Things related to Ks/debating against Ks -- I'm very conflicted in terms of what I actually believe -- in an outside of round sense -- about framework as a strategy against k affs, because although I, myself, have read mostly kritikal affs and think there are educational aspects to them, I do think there are also some benefits to a more limited topic. I have found that, in my own prep, it has been easiest to effectively prepare against an opponent when their affirmative is at least related to the resolution; however, I have also read affirmative's unrellated to the resolution. Framework is neither engagement with the aff nor is it not engagement with the aff; it is one or the other depending on how it is read. There is no "most" important part of a K. It is illogical to claim that the link is more important than the impact or vice versa (because you can't make monolithic statements about rounds, "Ks" as a category, or even with regards to any individual K, especially given that the parts are dependant on each other...). In a similar vein, I do not think winning an alt is necessary to win every K (although, it is necessary to win many and perhaps most). Fight me, Jonah. Things related to T/Theory -- I'm super interested in T and theory. Debaters don't read either of those positions enough. Also, I don't think debaters, in high school, read enough cards on topicality. People should have more nuanced theory interpretations that are specific to their position. People shouldn't read "cheating" CPs, but they would win more if they did. I don't know how I feel about conditionality. Although, "condo" is certainly bad. Things that are miscellaneous in nature -- Generally, the more disclosure the better. CX is undervalued. Defense is too. If the possibility of both a negative and positive risk of something exists (i.e. links and link turns), how can there not also be the possibility of zero risk? Do the percentages just skip zero? Extinction impacts are silly in a real world, but they are rarely challenged in an effective enough way, in debates themselves, for that statement to actually mean anything. In terms of the tech/truth question, I tend to debate in a pretty techy way that is very centered on the flow. I'm not even really sure what it would mean for someone to vote on truth over tech. I think many judges are more reluctant than they should be to vote on arguments that are collectively considered bad, even when they are answered poorly. Finally, I love bad jokes, particularly puns. If you make them, I will not give you more speaker points, but I will be amused and maybe even like you more as a person.