So ernie if you want to reply, that’s cool, but I’m out.

So in a world where you yell clear, you enable one debater to be 25-50 wpm faster, leaving the opponent behind.

AT: Miscellaneous arguments…
yelling clear takes 1 second, and I’m not sure it impedes flowing.

AT: The opponent is relieved when you yell clear.
The other debater may be relieved when you yell clear, but that’s just means they’re happy that you don’t get it either/the opponent might slow down. Theoretically, though, they’d be better off if you didn’t get it.

AT: You’re not yelling clear continuously, so you’re not enabling a precise threshold.

Agreed that you’re not continually yelling clear, but the debater still uses your yelling of clear to find a fairly precise threshold. 1-2 yellings of clear is all it takes.

AT: you already punished them by docking speaks.
The speaks punishment is non-unique. Whether or not you yell clear, your paradigm for docking speaks in response to lack of clarity remains the same.

AT: The room is noisy/you’re asleep in the morning, so you should let them know when you need more clarity.

I’ve been conceding that judge’s speed threshold varies throughout this discussion. That doesn’t imply that the debater should get to know the threshold. So the room noise and judge humanity arguments don’t have much impact on my arguments.

AT: Speed good
Fast debate might be good, but I’d argue that this principle has limits since most fast debater actually aren’t efficient and could make as many and probably higher quality arguments if they slowed down a bit. Even if we agreed on speed good, I still prefer competitive equity over the advantages of higher speeds. So, if yelling clear hurts the other debater, to me, it outweighs the “lost” advantage of higher speeds.

1. I don’t think it advantages the fast debater. See my argument about how I’m likely to get down more than the opponent. Almost every time I’ve asked one debater to clear up/slow down, the other debater has shown a non-verbal sign of approval. Moreover, I’m not continually yelling clear to let the debater adjust to my “maximum”–once or twice is enough. They are still punished by me not flowing while I yell clear and the arguments I missed in the mean time; moreover, speaker points still go down. Finally, see my argument about how room conditions vary and sometimes I can’t tell that this is the case until the round has started.

In the end, I don’t think its an incredibly big deal. I really don’t see any reason why debaters are substantively/structurally disadvantaged. I think that fast debate increases depth of argumentation when done right and, given that I can’t articulate exactly where my limit is, I see no problem with allowing debaters to adjust.

Oh–one final issue. Judges are humans, not robots. There are certain times of the day when I’m better able to flow than others. Thus, I think I have an obligation to let them know when I’m drastically below where I have been flow-wise other times that I’ve judged them.

But again, the point I make is that the debater doesn’t have a right to know the exact threshold. Knowing the exact threshold advantages the fast debater. (see above arguments). So yelling clear substantively helps the fast debater.

Ernie is right that there is a risk that my paradigm disadvantages fast debaters since they can’t know whether they’re too fast. Once again though, it trades off with the advantage of speed.

So the choice for the debater is to make 25 answers at 350 wpm, causing me to miss 10% of the args, or make 20 at 300wpm, with me missing 5%. So, the debater has to learn how to balance risk. Also, remember that some cues regarding the judge’s opinion always exist- for example, whether they’re writing.

Finally, even if both our advocacies harm one debater substantively, I would rather harm the fast debater, since they took the proactive choice to be fast to the point of being unclear. The opponent shouldn’t be punished by the fast debater’s lack of clarity. Yelling clear does exactly that.

This is especially a problem in the beginnings of cases (esp aff ones) where debaters start at full speed, and fail the basics of good public speaking (i.e. that you should start slowly and increase in speed so that a person is familiar with your voice, that you should ORGANIZE arguments and pause to give judges time to write, etc.)

If a debater isn’t willing to put in the effort to make themselves as clear, coherent and understandable as possible, they are gambling that the judge will try to adapt to them by saying anything.

Even though I know many refuse because it’s a strategic advantage–see jay’s point here:

“regardless of whether the args are too fast for the judge, the opponent still has to TRY to answer, so knowing the judge’s threshold has ZERO effect (and definitely no positive effect) on the opponents strategy, while having positive effects (as discussed above) on the fast debaters strategy.)”

On a different note, besides speed a fundamental problem I notice in delivery is that debaters speak WAY TOO SOFTLY and TOO QUIETLY. Even when I ask debaters to speak loudly they just patently refuse. As a result, I miss arguments, give up flowing, etc.

Here’s a hint: if there’s a loud air conditioner….if the judge is sitting a distance away from you… if peopel are leaning in to try to hear you, you should probably raise the volume a bit.

I yell clear because I have no way of showing in my paradigm when a debater is going too fast or at what point I can’t really understand them. Given this, I am punishing a debater for 13 if I do not indicate to them that they are going too fast. I think we generally have an idea as to what a link is in debate, meaning that it is a debater’s own fault if she fails to present one. I don’t think there is a communal understanding on what 300 as opposed to 350 wpm sounds like because most people don’t do drills (shame on those of you who don’t). If debaters make me yell clear multiple times, they are punished through a drop in speaker points (and the fact that I am not flowing while I am telling clear). I don’t think I’m advantaging the faster debater generally because I think I can usually flow at least part of what they are saying on my computer when they are going to fast/being too unclear while I doubt that the opponent can understand at all. I’m a crappy flower but computers make flowing much easier.

When I put up a paradigm, I am stipulating how I am going to judge (for example not yelling clear), and debaters may or may not adapt to my stipulation. I’m not sure that’s me adapting to them. It is me trying to make my preferences publicly known, but that’s self interest as much as anything. So no, I don’t see how I adapt to debaters.

“by admitting that different judges evaluate the same round in a different way is to say that adaptation is the most important aspect of debate. each judge likes to hear things differently and may evaluate the same rg in a different manner (as many have seen me do at various tourneys…). so yes, it is an inherent good.”

I have no idea how judge diversity changing evaluation of rounds means “adaptation is an inherent good” That doesn’t seem to logically follow.

RE: Smitty
I’m not sure who has made the speed bad argument. I’m just making an argument about how judges should not enable or prevent speed. even if we agreed speed good, I think my arguments still apply completely on the issue of yelling clear.

Finally, unless a VERY clearly articulated advantage is shown for yelling clear, it seems that the default should be for the judge to remain quiet. After all, why would we default to judges participating in the round?

So, while we clearly agree that the problem is speed used for bad purposes, I’m hard pressed to believe that it is simply a neutral tactic among many that can be used well or poorly. I think most people would agree (although maybe this is just my own misperception) that they see more “bad speed” than “good speed”. That’s not surprising given what I described above – speed is an effective vehicle for getting away with bad arguments. I think its fair to say that this tactic has become increasingly problematic in terms of the quality of argumentation we want to encourage and so a) debaters and coaches should reexamination the choices they are making as to when and how they use speed and b) we should have a discussion about effective ways to check the problem.

It is true that more speed also checks speed, but there is a limit to that logic. Debaters can only go so fast and remain comprehensible. There is a ceiling on speed and its not far off from what many debaters can do. Regardless you still get to the point where the person spreading is going fast enough that more speed on the other side won’t cope. Also, checking speed with more speed tends to just produce blip wars, which doesn’t solve the underlying concern of improving the quality of argumentation. So, at the end of the day my own belief is that focusing on strategic choices as a check will be more effective and tend, by and large, to produce better debate. I don’t have a complete disagreement here – certainly you probably need to move faster to deal with a spread – but as I say I don’t think that is where our focus should lie if the object is to improve the quality of argumentation.

I also want to make clear that I’m not opposed to some level of speed – certainly speed that is faster than conversational has evolved into the community norm. I rarely penalize for speed unless it is in fact employed to facilitate intellectually unrigorous arguments. But there is reason to be concerned here, and too many people are consistently winning by intentionally using bad arguments. I think we need to face up to that and figure out what to do. I know most folks on this discussion aren’t in disagreement with that, so I’m not targetting anyone specifically. I’m just saying we need to avoid the conclusion that we should stick our heads in the sand and hope existing practices will solve the problem without proactive efforts on our part.

but i am troubled by Jay saying that you give an advantage to the debater that went too fast for you first. it disadvantages the opp far more. if tehy see that you can handle that speed or think you can bc the other debater did, then they could go even faster and would end up losing a lot more. even if they didn’t go faster or as fast then tehy could just lose time in responding to args and worrying about misflowed args that you didn’t flow either. that means that tehy have to waste prep time and change their strat based on an arg that isnt in teh round. if you yell clear then you set the standard for both debaters.

further, facial signals only advantage the debater that is speaking because the opp is flowing args not looking up. or they could be looking at the opp’s cards during the speech. so they can only read you during speech and CX. that means that you create a system that is more disadvantageous. if you yell clear then that sets up a clear standard for both debaters to rely on for their clarity and spreading capabilities.

“Also, the idea of meeting the debaters halfway on adaptation doesn’t really make sense to me. It’s not true that adaptation is some inherently good thing…The only reason adaptation has any value is because it gives the debater a better chance at getting the win from the judge.”

do you have a paradigm up? if so then that is meeting the debaters part of the way there. if you are truly a clean slate then neither debater should know anything about you. rather, by admitting that different judges evaluate the same round in a different way is to say that adaptation is the most important aspect of debate. each judge likes to hear things differently and may evaluate the same rg in a different manner (as many have seen me do at various tourneys…). so yes, it is an inherent good. although there should be limits to how much a judge can speak out during a round bc that would be to much influence, but all those args fall prey to ‘no b/l’. what i am saying is that the line should be drawn at ability to understand the words that are coming out of a debaters mouth. they can look up your paradigm if they want specs on the qualitative nature of args. tehy can’t do that with speed bc what is comprehensible is dif for every person.

damnit juju, i don’t have your knowledge of the 36 chambers and hence can’t come up with cool quotes at the end of posts.

moreover, even if adam and co. are right about strategic vision being an effective antidote to speed:
a) i have no clue why there’s a tradeoff.
b) speed is also an effective antidote to speed. most “fast” debaters in LD are not very fast. if 1ARs cannot figure out what arguments are important and cover them, they deserve to lose. again, policy debate illustrates that debaters can cover even very quick spreads.

finally, the argument that there is a distinction between clarity and speed is true, but that is not a justification for holding fast speech to higher standards of clarity than slow speech. judges who consciously look to punish faster debaters or who are unwilling to work harder to compensate for their flowing inadequacies are, frankly, doing a disservice to the debaters and not doing their job.

What I mean is that involuntary cues aren’t controllable. That implies that they’re an objective fact in the round…like time limits. So it is a skill for some debaters to be able to access advantages from involuntary cues. That skill should be rewarded, since it uses a fact of debate to increase chances of the win.

Voluntary cues, on the other hand, like yelling clear, are a proactive choice that affect the outcome of the round. Again, intervention is a hairy issue, but barring some overwhelmingly good argument in favor, I’m not sure why I should proactively change the round.

It’s a skill to be able to watch a judge and decide whether they’re super into an argument (ie circling it on their flow), lost (i.e. searching for the right place to write on their flow), or just unhappy.

While I think that you’re right that intervention is a hairy issue, I’m not sure why my argument bites into the brightline issue you’re talking about.

All I’m saying is that the debater doesn’t have some inherent right to that sweet spot that’s too fast for the opponent, and ok for the judge. So, as a judge, I don’t know why I should do something PROACTIVE (i.e. yell clear) to let them access that sweet spot.

Also, the idea of meeting the debaters halfway on adaptation doesn’t really make sense to me. It’s not true that adaptation is some inherently good thing…The only reason adaptation has any value is because it gives the debater a better chance at getting the win from the judge.

Given the judge in theory has no reason to try to give the W to a specific debater, the idea of a judge “adapting” is nonsensical. Maybe you meant something different by adaptation/I’m misunderstanding you?

We should do both. Incentives exist to debate in an intellectually unrigorous way, but debaters are free to choose not to debate that way. Debaters should be held responsible in terms of speaker points for their choices, but the main point of my argument is that debaters should choose not to abuse speed. They may want to win more than they want to do the intellectually honest thing, but my argument isn’t about policy, its about the choices students and coaches should make.

The thrust of my comment on strategy was exactly what you said – the use of real strategy can check back bad speed so that people aren’t loosing to it all the time. If I were to tick off a list of my five favorite debaters off all time that is one of the outstanding characteristics in their styles. That is one answer as far as how to approach beating the problem. The other is probably speaker points, and another is probably coaching.

the problem is that this form of argumentation is strategic. it wins rounds. and that’s the sad part. if other kids let their opps get away with ridiculous args then obviously they are going to lose. the answer isn’t employ speed better its to get ppl better at answering those shitty spreads. this is why too many negs win rounds. there’s a reason why the 2AR exists. it wins rounds for a reason. you can clarify the debate and weigh args against each other and advance a position on a whole. if we stop caring about the micro-args on each flow then more diversification occurs and each small dumb arg matters less because other debaters can give weighing analysis that weighs on the level of how good the warrants are for each arg rather than actually answering the entire spew.

don’t hate the playa, hate the game

So maybe this does influence spks a bit, but they’re already so messed up to begin with in LD that there’s really no impact to yelling clear. When everybody is already giving out 29.5s and 30s like they’re candy and regard a 28 as ‘bad’ then there’s probably something wrong with the system already…

further, if you’re already giving involuntary signals then what’s the problem with yelling out to the debaters? sure in one instance the debater has to be more observant and ‘read’ the judge. but isn’t that giving the debater who doesn’t read off as many blocks an advantage? like, there’s absolutely no way to delineate between that notion of intervention.

really, i think we have to reconceptualize our notions of intervention. If giving signals to debaters is a form of intervention then i don’t know what adaptation means. Judges aren’t simply a blank slate computer, they are still a human evaluating a round. I mean, the idea of having to actually evaluate arguments seems kind of novel in LD…

My answer to are you ok with speed is usually “Can you be clear while going fast?”

Also, like Julian, I usually involuntarily give signals to a debater that I can’t understand them.

Finally, debaters need to realize that blippy speed is a disaster. I find that for me at least, maximum tolerable speed is partly a function of how long each argument is. If you’re reading framework arguments at the same speed you read evidence, you’re making a mistake in my opinion. I usually need people to slow down during their theory blip wars, for example.

Yeah I remember SLP and taking The Tourvillain under my wing. What it do?

See I got my own lable, it’s goin DOWN NOW

1. I’m not inclined to tell a debater to speak more clearly both for the reasons articulated above and because the practice is full of implementation problems:

a. The no-brightline argument is more complicated than Kamil suggests. Comprehensibility is an impossible standard to apply consistently. What if I get the gist of an argument without it being totally clear? Do I impose the same burden of clarity for arguments I’m more familiar with than other arguments – comprehensibility as a standard wouldn’t allow for that. We all know cards we could flow if someone read it while eating a banana because they’re so familiar to us. What about a debater I’ve judged 10 times on a topic so I’m familiar enough to know a number of their arguments? Some of these will be problems already without adding into the mix the question of when I should and should not yell clear.

b. Debaters tend to be variably clear and unclear. Do I only yell clear when they are totally incomprehensible for a long time? How long do I have to wait before its apparent that they are not going to become clearer, and by then have they wasted a huge chunk of their speech? Do debaters really want me gauging that in my mind while trying to flow in as detailed a way as possible? Sometimes I’ve found myself yelling clear when the debater has moved on and is already speaking more clearly. That just confuses people. Should I risk yelling clear in the middle of a speech and throwing someone off? Doing that to a 1AR in a tight round might be enough to cause a loss by itself.

c. A judge does more than assign a win/loss – she also rates the quality of the debater relative to the field through speaker points. Telling a debater to clear improves his or her speaker points relative to what they would have received had they not been told to clear (hopefully). In effect a judge has coached a debater in the middle of the round and therefore improved their quality in relation to the field (at least in the judge’s mind), which is unfair to the field in general. It also starts to look a lot more like intervention. In that way the practice is analygous to yelling “weigh” or “remember to extend the impact.” I suppose a judge could protect against this by just assigning the speaker points they would have given absent saying “clear,” but that is a hopelessly speculative and subjective endeavor.

d. When I’m yelling clear I’m neither flowing nor listening. That might only be for a second, but if someone is really going fast and that second contained the warrant to the only piece of offense they then extend, it can be a problem. If I’m saying clear more than once and for both debaters, the problem is amplified. It puts both debaters in a position to not know what is on my flow. We probably can’t get rid of that problem, but I see no reason why a judge should augment it.

2. As a general rule I can handle speed and won’t drop debaters for speed I consider excessive (though I’ll reduce speaker points). It’s been commented in a couple of places that debate is a communicative activity. That’s a truism, I suppose. I don’t doubt that there is significant value to teaching strong communication skills, but a) there are vehicles which are probably better suited for that, and b) to say the activity is communicative is to beg the question – what constitutes good communication and to what degree ought we to enforce norms of good communication? Moreover, different discursive settings always have idiosyncratic discursive norms. That doesn’t mean that we can’t weigh the value of teaching communication in relation to other stylistic issues in terms of the purposes we are trying to achieve, but it does mean that saying debate is communicative is only half of the argument.

I am generally not a fan of hyper-speed for a different reason, which is that it is often used to avoid or obscure substantive argumentation. My own view is that the paramount value (forgive the pun) of debate is to teach and develop rigorous and critical thinking. It is not only pragmatically useful, but most debaters report (speaking only from my experience) that it is also important in developing their own sense of self and personal beliefs. Value judgments like that will of course never be universally agreed upon, but I don’t think you will find many people making a convincing argument that thinking poorly and uncritically are compatible with anyone’s conception of what constitutes good debate. When speed enables a person to intentionally use bad arguments to garner a strategic advantage, it not only compromises the intellectual integrity of the activity but also makes it so insular that its educational purpose is largely frustrated (if not totally obliterated in some rounds).

In a competitive activity there will of course be an impetus to win, and this means that people are likely to employ as much strategy as they feasibly can. There is a certain intellectual value in this; we could draw the analogy to chess. But of course the only object of chess is to win. Our desire to win has to be constrained by our desire to maintain intellectual integrity, basic fairness, and educational value. Strategy can be an ally here, not an enemy. The ability to substantively engage with the critical elements of an advocacy is the very heart of stategy. Spewing as many bad arguments as you can think of, though often called “strategy,” hardly seems to fit the term in any meaningful sense. It strikes me as among the more thoughtless ways to debate.

I know there aren’t a lot of new revelations here, but for what it’s worth I hope that debaters will take Dr. Patterson’s thoughts to heart and consider what goals they are advancing when choosing what level of speed to employ.

But anyway, I don’t think calling for ev or saying clear is interventionist. I know there’s the “no b/l arg” for yelling clear, but that’s kind of logically fallacious… like, the bright line is very clear. only in issues of ability to hear the words being uttered can you yell out in the round. There are ways to gauge how much a person knows about certain args bc they should probably post in their paradigms (or FB for ppl who post books) what they’ve read. Not everybody is amenable to critical theory and psychoanalysis, and that should be already obvious. Further, teh debater should make the implicit links in teh arg clear so that ppl can understand it anyway.

some may say that this gives the other debater a disadvantage, but theres a reason ppl don’t bitch as much about this in policy… its expected that you read that material. In fact, if a debater hasn’t read Foucault yet, then they sadly aren’t holding up to their research burdens on any topic. his analysis of power is one of the most influential things to come out of the French school of thought.

The same goes for speed, it should be expected that you can handle faster forms of debate. Don’t lower the standard, rather make kids learn how to understand it. That’s why there are novice and JV divisions at tournaments. You wouldn’t expect a kid who never did debate to be able to understand some args that ppl read even if they were slowly read just because there is a research burden and level of understanding of nuances.

Other than that, i really agree with the third to last paragraph from juju and downward. i mean, the activity wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for HS kids who want to learn and debate, and it seems like we should keep the activity up for them. I mean, coaching is a huge portion that one devotes to, but we’re still educators who should let students explore new forms of argumentation and really find themselves in the philosophy they espouse in a round.

Why should I give any clues that I’m not understanding?

Insofar as using speed is a strategy, why should I tell a kid whether or not it is a good strategy for them in the round? Would I yell “make the link” or “what’s the impact” to queue a debater to make better links or be more specific with their impacts? That is probably a problem.

YAY GOOGLE

If someone is speaking excessively quickly for me to keep up flowing I am not going to do anything about it. I do this not because I think it would be interventionist or give an unfair advantage to him/her, but because s/he deserves any negative consequences which may result from speaking quickly by choosing to speak at such a pace. This doesn’t mean I won’t do absolutely anything. At most I’ll frustratingly stare (not to get their attention, but because that’s just what always seems to happen) at the debater in an attempt to comprehend what’s being said and then flowify the incoherent babble through my pen. So anyone who uses eye contact and notices me not flowing should take that as a warning because I flow as much as I possibly can for reasons I don’t need to explicate here. Though I will say that a main motivating factor is to check back any new extrapolations you may hide in future analysis in an attempt to trick me – I dare you to succeed.

As an aside I don’t think that confusing the judge is something unique of speeding. Aggrandized rhetoric from certain authors is purposely used by debaters, though not necessarily for means of discombobulation, and no judge is going to yell “clear” or “cut out the bullshit” DURING round. Partly because the judge has an obligation, I believe, to answer all questions a debater may have before the round. Including “Will you listen to (a.k.a. Will you not unilaterally exclude arguments regardless of whether they are (technically) won by a certain side) cards with specialized jargon from a field of study you’re not familiar with?” AND “Will you listen to arguments that are being spoken too quickly to completely understand?” I think it’s perfectly legitimate for a debate to ask before the round “Is this too fast?” and then proceed to give a demonstration of how fast s/he’ll argue. Thus, I don’t see why judges should do something differently when they’re confused by speed as opposed to when they’re confused by jargon. Both things can be prevented prior to round. Any debater who CHOOSES to practice such practices risks certain things (like those mentioned in previous posts, namely, speaker points, a judge’s ignoring of an argument, and a judge’s inclination to vote against you for being unnecessarily difficult). [I would never do the last and rarely would do the second]

In addition, I am always open to arguments with an appeal to in-round understanding and I know that there is a convincing case to be made for them (as the characterization of debate as an activity of communication makes clear). An argument like “If you didn’t understand it the first time you heard the argument don’t vote on it because X” OR “Don’t call any items read after round because I only have a very limited amount of time in round to clarify what was read while you (the judge) can read the evidence indefinitely (and possibly interpret it differently than it was conceived of in round)”. For me the metaphysical possibility to make such arguments takes the supposed “obligation” to make the round clear off the judge and puts the onus on the debater to make the judge only evaluate what was clear. I’m probably a little biased toward this view (of making debaters responsible for everything they can possibly be responsible for) for non-debate reasons…but I’ll just say that both judge and market intervention should be avoided at all costs.

Do I care if I’m on a panel and a fellow adjudicator yells “clear”? Not at all. Even though it may conflict with what I would do in that situation it’s their round as well and it makes it somewhat easier for me to flow. I would only be in disagreement with yelling clear in such an instance since it was the debater’s strategic choice to speak quickly and I don’t think the judge should limit a debater’s freedom to win as they please. This issue of strategy has already been touched on so I’ll stop.

Speaking quickly is a razor and I walked the line on that silver blade. The evil that debaters do lives on and on…

This effectively enables the debater to be as unclear as “safe”, thereby increasing their odds of being too unclear for the opponent, but just barely at the judges threshold.

I much prefer a world where speed is a strategic tradeoff- you get to make more arguments, and you increase your odds of out-teching your opponent, but you risk the judge missing a key argument.

And as a judge, I have no problem saying that I missed an argument– that suggests that the debater went too far on the strategic tradeoff. Some would argue that it’s unfair for the debater to not know the specific threshold, but I’m not sure why the debater has the right to that knowledge.

I don’t think we can possibly overstate the significance of JW’s vision in creating the TOC. Many aspects of debate that make it entertaining, enlightening, and worthwhile extend from the national scope that is a direct result of the system he has built. And it was fun to read how that came about.

And the Jonly Wonly line is classic…just classic. :)

I agree with Maeshal; I’ve done that before and I didn’t even think to include that on the list. Point taken.

I also agree with Jennie about the paradigms.

There are times during rounds when the clarity of articulation or of argumentation — or of both — is lacking. If we were to jump in during the round with hints to debaters about adaptation, where’s the brightline to where we stop? The number of times we as judges have been tempted to yell out “new argument/no link/you’re getting muddled and confusing, etc ” are innumerable. And yet we don’t, because to intervene is to skew the round and to take away the advantage of the better-adapting debater.

Again, I do sympathize with debaters like Earl — it’s difficult to juggle flowing, comprehension, and judge adaptation all at once, and it takes a while for the best debaters to be able to handle it all. It does come in time, though.

On the judges side of things, I do hope that more judges feel comfortable putting in their paradigms that they can’t flow top speed, prefer a moderate pace of delivery, or won’t vote on arguments we don’t understand by the end of the round. We owe it to debaters to be upfront about those things and to help them adapt to our judging styles.

I agree with Seth’s two cases in which a judge should call evidence. In those cases, I think the practice is not only valid but probably preferred since it has nothing to do with communication issues. (A common instance of an outside force interfering with the round might be a school bell ringing during the reading of a case or card.)

I do differ with Seth on the “inadequate flower” point, but that’s only because I agree with Rebar that really, judges should be indicating if they can’t understand something. (Jim Menick has a policy of saying “speed” out loud if he can’t follow, with two warning “speed”s and then a punishment “speed” that causes your points to be reduced. Some judges yell clear. Others make it very visually clear that they aren’t flowing what they can’t understand.)

Unfortunately, I think some judges use the opportunity to call evidence as an excuse to be lazy, and I think some other judges call lots of evidence at the end of the round to look cool.

But to resolve a debate over the precise wording or legitimacy of the evidence, or to make up for a factor beyond the judges’ control? Yes, I think calling for evidence in those cases is valid.

i think judges should make very clear when something is unclear or inaudible. i myself have problems flowing things that are unclear or inaudible, so i can seriously sympathize. however, if the judge is not willing to make such gestures, it is absurd (at least in my opinion) for the judge’s problem that they deign not to inform anyone about. policy debate is a whole other issue, but in LD there is literally no excuse not to notify the debaters whether something is unclear or inaudible. i would much rather have a critic yell at me or some similarly over the top tactic than continue to flow and then complain post-round about clarity or speed. notification by dropping of the pen is also preferable.

A) Often the judge misses parts of essential arguments through no fault of the debaters. An inadequate flower who’s afraid of admitting it in their paradigm or by shouting speed, daydreaming, a pen unexpectedly runs out, whatever. The judge should do the honorable thing and make up for their mistake after the round, rather than hold the debaters accountable for a situation outside their control.

B) Obviously, flows don’t account for every word or exact rhetoric. If the precise wording of a piece of analysis becomes an issue, examining the written document is a necessity to making an accurate decision, which is the ultimate goal of any round.

First, inaudible speech …. before we knew it, many judges were reading almost everything that was uttered in the debate. It wasn’t long until this practice spread to high school debate.

—-

I agree so much. I believe that debate should be a communicative activity and that reading arguments after the round undermines the purpose of having a round at all.