The Mirthful Ballot
posted by Jon Cruz on May 13th, 2005
Let’s be lighthearted. What are some of the funniest comments you’ve received on a ballot as a debater, or funniest comments you’ve written on a ballot or given during oral critique as a judge?
I’ll start the ball rolling. Rohan Kadakia of Mission San Jose employed quite the dramatic hand movements during rounds this season. Doug Lieb had a suggestion for him at the Vassar Round Robin last September.
“Try to keep your gestures within five feet of your person.”
Share yours! (Thank you to Rohan for permission to share that.)
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Posted from: 69.244.74.75
May 13th, 2005 19:16
When a policy team from my school slaughtered another school, the judge writes on the ballot: “I could have negated on T, the coutnerplan, or [something else]. Either way, they were fucked.”
Posted from: 143.229.132.226
May 13th, 2005 19:18
While nothing particularly original, I enjoyed my “T[opicality] K[ritik] O[verview]” ballot for Adwait Parker this season.
Posted from: 68.212.169.77
May 13th, 2005 19:18
wrote on a ballot in a round where two kids spent the entire round arguing with/insulting/mocking each other: “I vote affirmative because I have to pick one of you”…the speaker points totaling to 25 (both players combined on a 30 point scale) also got some laughs.
p.s…tab room ended up agreeing with my point totals so i wasn’t being that judge
Posted from: 204.210.37.132
May 13th, 2005 19:46
TIME MACHINE BACK TO 1992. CAPTAIN JASON BALDWIN AT THE HELM.
-paul’s triples ballot at berkeley for my teammate
Posted from: 70.241.102.95
May 13th, 2005 19:47
One of my ballots said, “I know it may be hard for you to prevent, but try not to be as Black while you debate.”
In regard to my saying “Pimp” during CX whenever my opopnent answered.
Is that funny or just racist?
Posted from: 70.180.111.226
May 13th, 2005 19:55
“The affurmative [sic] did real good. It sounded like he was talking to me.”
North Lousiana debate is amazing.
“I vote on CX.”
“As far as your 1ars go, try to quit sucking.”
“I affirmed because of Hitler.”
That one still confuses me, since no one mentioned him that round.
After a paradigm saying “I try to avoid intervention and have no preferences.”:
“The affirmative made the arguments I wanted to hear.”
Posted from: 143.229.132.226
May 13th, 2005 20:01
Hearing Richard Sodikow say “son, you need to learn how to debate” is sure to be disheartening.
Posted from: 68.196.118.231
May 13th, 2005 20:06
wheres tara tedrow gooing to college
Posted from: 68.196.118.231
May 13th, 2005 20:06
wheres tara tedrow gooing to college
Posted from: 68.196.118.231
May 13th, 2005 20:07
wheres tara tedrow gooing to college
Posted from: 68.226.193.6
May 13th, 2005 20:15
>North Louisiana debate is amazing.
*walks out of room before North Louisiana/South Louisiana gets going and David gets jumped, endangering the current poster in the process*
*after things calm down, returns with teammates’ CX ballot marked with the following message: “DO NOT USE HELL, DAMN, OR CRAP IN YOUR SPEECH”*
Posted from: 206.135.93.9
May 13th, 2005 20:45
Vegas judging being notoriously awsome, i once got picked up because i was “confident, personable, charming and charismatic”.
Posted from: 69.165.250.222
May 13th, 2005 20:51
Nothing beats S. Fla judging…at Crestian, the judge who didn’t speak english and had her 10 year old son translate for her post round.
Posted from: 68.212.169.77
May 13th, 2005 20:53
tara claims she is going to wake forest…but i think that’s her slang for planning to spend the rest of her life panhandling on the streets of winter park
Posted from: 68.212.169.77
May 13th, 2005 20:57
in the defense of the 10 year old translating kid at crestian that eric p mentions… he did inspre one of the most interesting complaints ive ever heard a coach make about the judge pool
Posted from: 64.170.194.158
May 13th, 2005 21:01
“you are a pretentious, arrogant, bastard, but they dropped too many arguments.”
“YOU ARE RUINING LD!!!! But the Aff never said that.”
Posted from: 68.210.46.25
May 13th, 2005 21:11
After a local tournament early this year, I was looking through our novices ballots when I came across one of the funniest comments I’ve ever read:
“Watching this round was like watching two blindfolded children swing at a pinata.”
Posted from: 141.156.217.228
May 13th, 2005 22:05
A graduated teammates’s ballot:
“Jon, Nice Suit
Anna, Nice Legs”
He lost.
As far as oral critiques go, Mike Baer got this gem a while back:
“Here’s my flow of the round - the black pen is you, the red pen is your opponent, and the green pen is me.”
Posted from: 204.147.92.3
May 13th, 2005 22:13
Back in the day:
“You could sell snow to an Eskimo”
Posted from: 69.249.50.38
May 13th, 2005 22:18
jon cruz manages to underline important words thousands of times for added emphasis…its impressive
Posted from: 68.88.64.116
May 13th, 2005 22:26
My brother doesn’t keep a lot of debate memorabilia, but he did save his favorite ballot ever. It uses words such as “baught off” “decentrlitization” “defigned” and “minortys.”
Posted from: 67.182.133.186
May 13th, 2005 23:15
One of my favorites was a ballot that had an RFD prefaced by : “I know this wasn’t an arguement made in the round but…” Which is sad enough on it’s own but continued that “…I think that justic effects more people than democracy so i negate”
Posted from: 24.6.187.21
May 13th, 2005 23:56
AC: “Who ARE you dawg??” - Ashan Peiris
Posted from: 137.22.120.67
May 14th, 2005 00:27
Mike Baer’s 2003 Wake Octos ballot: “To all parents, coaches, teammates, and anybody else reading this ballot. Mike has informed us all in the round today that he ‘likes to dress up like a school girl and get his ass spanked on weekends.’”
That round featured the best CX session I’ve ever seen…
Posted from: 67.42.243.178
May 14th, 2005 00:38
I have a few, all of them real:
I had a ballot that suggested that I smoke pot to help calm down before a round.
I had another ballot, 2 years later, call my delivery “zealous”.
I’ve also had a host ballots that have told me something about “John Lock [sic]” and things like that.
A lot of my forensics friends have had some funny ones:
Unexplained comment on a drama ballot: “Long, LONG- pull it out!”. We still have not dechiphered that one.
Another ballot told one of our duo teams that “you are both very attractive, which makes this piece more believable.”
I think ballots are great.
Posted from: 136.167.228.15
May 14th, 2005 06:51
Excerpt from my favorite ballot ever:
“Maybe someday, you’ll look back on this and think “Wow. I wonder who thought that this was a good idea.” I feel like I’m watching a bizarre episode of “Listen to Me” and you’re the girl who comes up and tells the judges that she had an abortion and everyone loves her. It’s great you have this argument. Try to remember why LD was even “invented.”
Thank you, NCFL.
Posted from: 80.187.148.121
May 14th, 2005 08:01
“Aff Comments:
Cute Tie
Speech was ok too”
“you need to start learning the fundamentals of LD and stop using all that fuck-o. Come on, this is LD not policy.”
Posted from: 24.180.185.21
May 14th, 2005 08:35
Both Tim and I wrote the same thing, completely unprovoked, judging together on a panel at NFL qualifiers:
“This debate was like two ships passing in the night.”
I added: “Now here’s the point where I intervene”
But that’s really not all that funny. I think the best comment I wrote all season was to Corey Barwick:
“Hand, Unger, and Etzoni… Those authors definately definately agree”
Posted from: 24.180.185.21
May 14th, 2005 08:43
Or better yet, our Nationally qualified Orator, who was the runner up at the State tournament as a sophmore, got this comment in prelims this year:
“you talk too much about pinocchio”
(Pinocchio is her running metaphor)
Posted from: 24.117.238.53
May 14th, 2005 10:57
From a policy round this year:
“I totally knew you were high.”
Posted from: 71.110.192.241
May 14th, 2005 11:01
“Ms. Heine needs to learn that God is the Supreme Being Who gives us all our rights”….ouch…i was running a card for the Sept/Oct topic that said rights are social constructs, and it included “rights cannot be God given because…”didn’t mean to offend anyone with that oh well
Posted from: 128.220.251.100
May 14th, 2005 11:09
Jim Menick used to have a ballot posted on the HenHud debate website from “back in the day”…it was written to Josh Rubin or one of those former sluggers and read verbatim:
“Stop scratching your balls in CX”
Posted from: 24.20.200.89
May 14th, 2005 11:32
This is why I became a bit frustrated with Federal Way: After a paradigm declaring that: “THis is your round, I’ll just vote on the flow,” I got this on the ballot: “This just wasn’t a flow round. In fact, I stopped flowing after the first speech. If the aff had used Iran, it might have been different, but you didn’t so I voted neg.” This judge also explained to me that she didn’t understand why I kept bringing up the criterion late in the round.
Posted from: 143.229.132.226
May 14th, 2005 11:42
i think the point of this thread is funny comments on ballots? not necessarily comments you disagreed with?
Posted from: 69.23.246.38
May 14th, 2005 12:05
I once got a ballot from Dave McGinnis that said “double losses!”
haha that never happened, but I did get the double loss
Posted from: 68.12.94.38
May 14th, 2005 12:09
“Way to light her up like the fourth of July in CX”
“Your NR needs work” (My opponent conceded in CX)
Posted from: 68.12.94.38
May 14th, 2005 12:09
“Way to light her up like the fourth of July in CX”
“Your NR needs work” (My opponent conceded in CX)
Posted from: 128.220.251.100
May 14th, 2005 12:14
2001 CFL Nationals, 3rd round (2-0 high-high pairing), myself (seed 2) against the destructive Pete Myers of Needham (seed 1)…swing vote RFD:
“your use of neon paper is distracting and makes it hard to follow your speeches”
she still voted correctly, as Pete - in his traditional fashion - royally snaked me, but that wasn’t exactly the same reasons I had for thinking I lost :)
Posted from: 66.188.188.253
May 14th, 2005 13:23
Lauren Cork’s ballot from a judge who sat out in the Minnesota State final round this year:
“This is a pretty clear negative win. Though I could be wrong and have been before.”
Posted from: 67.83.102.109
May 14th, 2005 13:43
Negative was very logical, however he just told me why he should logically win.
-and-
I voted off affirmatives comments in 2AR about how negative criterion supports him because, if affirmative can prove he better acheives it, he would win the round.
Posted from: 24.6.251.224
May 14th, 2005 14:25
at a league i dropped a ballot that said:
“watch chipping nail polish. Grooming is important for debate”
whats even worse is i was wearing opaque pearl nail polish… you can barely even see it…
Posted from: 69.110.144.206
May 14th, 2005 14:26
“I feel I must affirm every round because I am a social worker”
Posted from: 69.110.144.206
May 14th, 2005 14:26
“I feel I must affirm every round because I am a social worker”
Posted from: 68.97.30.254
May 14th, 2005 14:50
Not to undercut Pat, but I think the ballot on the Hen Hud website read, “dont scratch your balls through your pocket during CX.” A minor difference, but I think the pocket adds to the humor.
Posted from: 66.27.188.11
May 14th, 2005 15:03
From a friend of mine at a local tournament:
“Neg posits that because of the definition of the word ‘above’, an affirmative ballot is impossible. Affirmative argues that this argument would unfairly skew ground and thus make debating at all impossible. Well … life isn’t always fair. I negate!”
And a personal and perennial favorite of mine:
“The [debater who is not me] had superior eye contact to [me], and thus I [vote for whichever side I am not].”
Sigh.
Posted from: 67.83.100.178
May 14th, 2005 18:47
Not exactly the ballot, but the gist of it:
You debated better, but your opponent said “Marketplace of Ideas.” Therefore she wins.
Posted from: 128.36.76.241
May 14th, 2005 19:03
a few favorities:
Logan octos..a year ago: “I vote for the positive.”
me, Berkeley doubles 2 years ago:
“This round is like a duel where both people shoot,a nd both people hit each other and are dead. *throws hands up in the air* So who won the duel?”
me, in a highland RR oral critique:
“What happened in this round to the affirmative is like playing Halo 2, where someone got hit with a sticky grenade…they tried to run away after
getting stuck, but well…. “
Posted from: 24.116.198.9
May 15th, 2005 01:17
ej, a local judge wrote on matt’s ballot:
listening to you read your ac is just about as passionate is listening to someone read from the phonebook. i take that back, someone reading from a phonebook would probably be more interesting.
Posted from: 66.77.226.63
May 15th, 2005 09:50
Not mine, but,
“You were as credible as FOX News, and your CX was like an episode of Fat Albert.”
Posted from: 68.196.114.181
May 15th, 2005 11:09
haha…
one of my ballots had said “Matt is the Man!!”
and I got perfect speaks ;)
—
actually, in that round I had accidentally spoken “si” instead of “yes.” Of course, I had a young judge, and that also showed up on my ballot as -
dude! awesome spanish Matt!
Posted from: 67.188.81.238
May 15th, 2005 13:53
Rohan tends to get funny ballots:
“On answering questions, try not to sound as heartless as you did today :-( I’d hate to be on the road bleeding as you walk by”
Posted from: 170.215.98.117
May 15th, 2005 15:45
At CFLs, Rick Brundage was debating a kid in an avocado green suit; he lost. Rick was aff. One of the ballots read:
“The aff has better arguments and more logic.
Neg - nice suit!”
This judge voted neg.
Posted from: 63.193.118.145
May 15th, 2005 18:39
a friend of mine got an extemp ballot that said “you continuelly referred to the economist but you never told me there name.” (exact ballot, with spelling and everything.)
when mike dorsi judged me earlier this year, he said that i lost the round because i won the standard. oh for shame.
Posted from: 64.58.31.70
May 15th, 2005 20:21
“They don’t have flying monkeys in Africa.”
…
“You had a whole lot of logic but no reasoning.”
“Why are you making arguments about the REAL WORLD?!?! LD is about VALUES- stop telling me you’re going to ’solve things.’”
(the thesis of my case was that we can’t evaluate rights in a vaccuum)
“community? nation? which is better? nation-big. community- small. AFF.”
—-the same judge to me after the round
“you’re a very…spirited…debater.”
Posted from: 67.101.219.126
May 15th, 2005 21:25
My favorite ballot is posted on my office wall. Jon Cowperthwait (one of our alumni) was judging at the first CPS Invitational. He wrote, among other things, “This round made me feel like taking up heroin.” The debaters never received the ballot because I made Jon rewrite it. If you’re at CPS in December, ask to see it. We’re talking classic!
Posted from: 24.6.203.183
May 15th, 2005 22:39
“don’t struggle”
Posted from: 24.161.161.155
May 16th, 2005 07:34
my teammate, kevin pratt, got a ballot that said ‘you look like Napoleon Dyanamite, Gosh!’ and all over the ballot, there was pictures of random things and more quotes from Napoleon like ‘my lips hurt real bad.’
Posted from: 24.161.161.155
May 16th, 2005 07:35
my teammate, kevin pratt, got a ballot that said ‘you look like Napoleon Dyanamite, Gosh!’ and all over the ballot, there was pictures of random things and more quotes from Napoleon like ‘my lips hurt real bad.’
Posted from: 12.216.148.58
May 16th, 2005 12:40
“This was no a good round.”
Posted from: 208.147.72.120
May 16th, 2005 13:06
At work now, so here’s the exact wording of the Cowperthwait ballot.
This round nearly pushed me off the wagon–I haven’t smoked a cigarette in years, but I NEEDED one during the Utopia discussion. Christ.
I will give the neg. the benefit of the doubt in assuming you just didn’t understand aff’s (brilliant!) consistency argument. If you DID understand it and still refuted it the way you did, I’d take up heroin.
Posted from: 66.26.67.103
May 16th, 2005 14:05
Lets see:
These people’s cases are as screwed as the resolution. I vote for Aff because Neg did not counter the sheer bullshit of the Aff.
-
If this wasn’t sistricts i would vote for you but since your opponenent is obviously older and therefore more experienced in debate i vote for neg
-
You have a good case although it does not relate to the resoulution at all. You are supposed to be talking about privacy. (She was way off the mark, that was two resoutions ago) I lost of course.
Posted from: 66.26.67.103
May 16th, 2005 14:05
Lets see:
These people’s cases are as screwed as the resolution. I vote for Aff because Neg did not counter the sheer bullshit of the Aff.
-
If this wasn’t sistricts i would vote for you but since your opponenent is obviously older and therefore more experienced in debate i vote for neg
-
You have a good case although it does not relate to the resoulution at all. You are supposed to be talking about privacy. (She was way off the mark, that was two resoutions ago) I lost of course.
Posted from: 66.26.67.103
May 16th, 2005 14:06
Lets see:
These people’s cases are as screwed as the resolution. I vote for Aff because Neg did not counter the sheer bullshit of the Aff.
-
If this wasn’t sistricts i would vote for you but since your opponenent is obviously older and therefore more experienced in debate i vote for neg
-
You have a good case although it does not relate to the resoulution at all. You are supposed to be talking about privacy. (She was way off the mark, that was two resoutions ago) I lost of course.
Posted from: 24.214.98.75
May 16th, 2005 15:07
i have to agree w/ ernie, “this is no a good round” is one of my favorite ballots ever and became a motto of mine at the TOC (ask anyone who saw the desktop background on my laptop - thanks to petey for the illustration)
Posted from: 24.214.98.75
May 16th, 2005 15:13
oh, also, after ive made my decision when judging novice rounds (usually after the 1AR) i like to draw pictures on ballots, typically of imaginary animals. my favorite was the unitorshird, a combination unicorn-tortise-sheep-bird.
Posted from: 68.164.92.161
May 16th, 2005 23:34
My team mate, Lauren Low, lost to a blind debater at UOP, under RFD “Eye Contact” was listed.
Posted from: 63.229.216.8
May 17th, 2005 11:26
yay! two rounds which i was in are mentioned on this thread! Grapemountain’s is my fav.
Posted from: 64.12.116.203
May 17th, 2005 14:25
I believe it was “this was no a good debate”
Posted from: 24.1.187.146
May 17th, 2005 22:34
“you use too many big words, but i really believe that you understand them”
(the biggest word in my case was ‘criterion’)