Yang,+Alisa

Westminster '14.

To answer preliminary questions – flashing is not prep, tag-team cross-x is fine, speed is fine, and I’m really fine with listening to anything, although I do know less about critiques than I do other things in debate.

I’m a 2n at heart. ♥ That doesn’t implicate the round that much, but I’d say that means I will be protective of the 2nr and be pretty suspicious of new 2ar arguments.

I’d prefer not to sit after the round trying to pick up pieces of half-argued/half-resolved arguments and piecing them together. Lots of judge intervention makes me sad. It makes me sad //and// drains my energy. Tell me what to vote for and why I should care.

Tech > truth, but that doesn’t mean truth doesn’t matter at all. Some things are just so bad/untrue that they can be beaten with by a couple of simple arguments.


 * Flowing **– Flowing is a wonderful skill, but it’s hard. I’m not a robot and I will miss stuff if you are not clear. That being said, emphasize analytics when made, sign post, and slow down on tags. *To encourage good flowing, if you give me your flow at the end of the round, and I think it’s good, you can get up to .5 additional speaker points (+ this means you read this philosophy, so yay). If this means a 28.5 becomes a 29 or a 29 becomes a 29.5, so be it.


 * Topicality **– I like a good topicality debate. Arbitrary T violations make me lol. Key things to a successful T debate? A description of the world of your interpretation, impact comparison, evidence comparison, and lots of explanation + clash. I also think winning predictability is fairly important. I default to competing interpretations, but reasonability is a fair game. Why is it unacceptable for the neg to just win a marginally better counterinterp? One more thing – RVIs are a no-no, and I will not vote on them.


 * Disads **– Totally fine. Turns case args are key, but I strongly think that all parts of a DA are important. Neg teams should make sure to win all parts of a disad, and aff teams, vice versa, should make sure to point out the weak parts of a disad.


 * Counterplans – **Yay! I love aff-specific counterplans the most, including specific PICs. I think the aff should impact solvency deficits and the neg should set up solvency framing for the counterplan (sufficient vs necessary). *I won’t kick a CP unless explicitly told otherwise.

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Theory is usually a reason to reject the argument (except for conditionality), but there is leeway to convince me otherwise. Here are some of my personal biases – <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Condo – 2 condo or less is fine. 3+ conditional options make me wince a little, even as a 2n. <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">International fiat & 50 state fiat – I like them, and I’ve kind of bonded with 50 state fiat over this year. I think the least an aff can do is have a fed key warrant. 50 state counterplans that have a bunch of additional planks without solvency advocates are definitely questionable. <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Delays CPs, word pics, normal means CPs, consult CPs are probably bad. <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">And counterplans should be both textually and functionally competitive.
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Theory **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">– Make sure if it comes down to this, there is substance and explanation from the very beginning.

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">1) To be honest, I am more convinced by race critiques than all other “random-philosophical-babbling” critiques. 2) me if you read death good: -_- 3) one off K debates…sigh
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Critiques **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">– I’m more versed in generic critiques like cap and security, and I might have read some literature from x author but that doesn’t mean I will know what you’re arguing in round. I expect explanation on every moving part from the neg. It’s really problematic if, by the end of the round, I still have no clue what you are going for. I think critiques are usually weakest in their alternatives, and the aff should attack them! Tricky things that the aff should answer/good for the neg: indicts of the aff’s epistemology, value to life arguments, reasons why the aff can’t weigh case, floating PICs, turns case args, and root cause args. Other things –


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Performance/non-traditional/k-affs – **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">K affs that defend implementation of a plan (and only that) are totally fine. I like topical plans, but I don’t automatically dislike untopical affs, although I believe being germane to the topic is important. I’m flow oriented, so if you don’t go line by line or decide to read a poem why x is bad for 5 minutes, things could get messy…. Clean it up. Don’t just sway me with pathos – I want responsive arguments I can compare at the end of the round. Hip-hop, okcool, just make it interact the opposing side and tell me how it implicates the ballot. Same with any round, I don’t want to end up doing work for any side, so explainexplainexplain. Why is your nontraditional framework better? Kudos to performance teams that actually believe/think that their performance is key to debate. Performance teams that shift in round, answer all cross-x questions sketch-ily (please be upfront in cross-x), and run stuff just to trick their opponents make me value their performance less.If you’re neg, framework is a solid idea.

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">a) Avoid bad speaking habits (weird breathing, starting a speech unclear at max speed, screeching, etc.).
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Speaker points – **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">How to get good speaker points (27.5 = average):

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">b) Have a good strategy and execution. I’m a sucker for specific strategies.

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">c) This isn’t obvious to some people, but be nice – and this is super important to me. Debates can get aggressive but there’s a line that should not be crossed. Don’t be mean to your opponents, your partner, or me. Specifically, in the last case, if you decide to be rude, I will (un)happily do the same.


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">On cheating **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">, I agree with this guy<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"> wholeheartedly, “Clipping is bad. Like, really bad. If I catch you I'll drop you a zero and tell your coach and make my Facebook status about it and roofie your dog and shun you forever. If there's anything else I could list here that might deter you from clipping imagine I said that too.” One additional thing – __all types__ of cheating (lying about reading ev, stealing prep, etc.) are bad. So don’t do it.


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">MYBIGGESTPETPEEVEEVEROHEMGEE **<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; line-height: 1.5;">– Please don't ever make these arguments <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 1.5;">sweeping generalizations: “you go to [insert private school] so…. you’re racist, don’t understand struggle, conditionality can’t be bad vs you, have all the money ever, and can’t ever be skewed in a debate round cause you have all the damn cards in the world, etc.”