Debating the Merits of the Current Debate Topic
posted by Jon Cruz on October 20th, 2008
NEW YORK, N.Y. — Every installment of “Topic for Debate” features a pertinent discussion of current debate practice and theory.
As debate on the September-October resolution winds down, I’d like to revisit the conversation that was sparked when the topic was first announced. Debaters often find reason to nitpick just about any resolution that’s announced. With this particular resolution, the talk appeared to be more heated. Some said it would ruin the first two months of competition; others said it would save Lincoln-Douglas debate itself. Having debated the resolution, what are your thoughts on how the topic has been playing out?
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Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 21st, 2008 17:26
Actually, my optimistic views were rather dampened by the boring debates this topic created. I did like how it seemed less policy oriented, in the form of policy techniques and spreading.
Posted from: 24.90.20.221
October 21st, 2008 17:42
i don’t understand how the content of the topic meant that people didn’t speak as fast…
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 21st, 2008 17:55
I didn’t either, but it seems that because there simply appears to be a lack of applicable arguments, evidence and strategies for either side of this resolution, people seemed to have more time to communicate with the judges, rather than spread evidence, rather than spread evidence. Which I liked.
Also, you didn’t encounter disadvantages, and other policy debate tactics (besides kritiks.) But, the rounds were simply boring, with the same stuff being said over and over again.
Posted from: 24.90.20.221
October 21st, 2008 18:03
if people didn’t have enough “evidence” that just meant they didn’t prepare well enough. in fact, at the major national circuit tournaments, everyone went just as fast as they would on any other resolution.
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 21st, 2008 18:08
Chill out man, I was simply observing what was happening in my local circuit. And personally, our team prepared just as hard as ever, but evidence just seemed to be harder to find, excluding some valuable philosophical sources. i.e, John Stuart Mill, Immanuel Kant, etc.
Posted from: 24.90.20.221
October 21st, 2008 18:30
every time you start a controversial discussion and someone responds to your claim you always claim they’re being harsh, condescending, or they should “chill out”. how are you a debate coach if every time someone disagrees with you, you take it so personally
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 21st, 2008 18:36
I never called you harsh or condescending. However, if you disagree with me, then I have the right to defend my case, don’t I?
But, you’re right. I guess I assumed your tone to be arrogant, but looking over what you said, you probably didn’t mean it to be such. It is hard to tell over the computer, haha. And, the one or two times in the past that I’ve said “chill out”, that is because they really were being impolite. So my bad, I take that back.
Though, the fact that you’re arguing that my use of the word chill out was inappropriate, doesn’t that mean that your taking it personally, when you say that I shouldn’t take things personally? Just a thought…
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 21st, 2008 18:42
Oh and anon/asmitty, just because I make offer my opinion doesn’t mean that you must attack it every time. We may be debaters, but that doesn’t mean we have to argue over little everything.
Posted from: 24.90.20.221
October 21st, 2008 19:00
“We may be debaters, but that doesn’t mean we have to argue over little everything.”
title of the article: DEBATING the merits of the current topic
Posted from: 24.130.194.63
October 21st, 2008 19:00
OMG MR. JONES CAN YOU STFU NO ONE CARES GO TO NSD.
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 21st, 2008 19:05
Thank you Pete. I’m sure that gained you loads of respect.
Well that asmitty, if we’re supposed to be debating the merits of the topic, then why don’t you contribute as to why or why not this was a good topic? So far, all you’ve done is attack my opinions.
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 21st, 2008 19:05
*then
Posted from: 71.104.147.161
October 21st, 2008 19:11
Mr. Jones said:
“I did like how it seemed less policy oriented, in the form of policy techniques and spreading.”
Mr. Jones also said:
“But, the rounds were simply boring, with the same stuff being said over and over again.”
What have we learned folks? Slower, less technical debate with less evidence is really boring!
I rest my case
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 21st, 2008 19:21
Right, that’s why we need to find the “happy medium.” And maybe its possible to have interesting debates with less spreading and stuff, and still be interesting, but it seemed impossible with the current resolution. I mean, who wants to debate something that has no solution? And really, at least the felon resolution has real world application, that can keep the judges awake.
Posted from: 24.90.20.221
October 21st, 2008 19:21
i’m not “asmitty”
and i think the resolution was boring. however i made my opinion after witnessing debates where people did extensive research on the non-generic literature and debated technically, or as you call “policy”. many of the rounds were irresolvable and came down to who won presumption or whose ground skepticism was, which avoided the resolutions conflict entirely.
Posted from: 71.104.147.161
October 21st, 2008 19:26
Comparing fast, technical LD rounds to policy demonstrates a clear lack of knowledge of both events.
Posted from: 192.195.154.109
October 21st, 2008 19:44
“Mr. Jones said:
“I did like how it seemed less policy oriented, in the form of policy techniques and spreading.”
Mr. Jones also said:
“But, the rounds were simply boring, with the same stuff being said over and over again.”
What have we learned folks? Slower, less technical debate with less evidence is really boring!
I rest my case”
Do you know what the word “but” means?
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 21st, 2008 19:54
Exactly. I said but, not therefore. Thanks, @17.
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 21st, 2008 19:59
Oh, and spreading isnt a technical argument, fitz. Its the reason why the Nfl national comitee came up with LD, to avoid the strartegy of spreading. Policy Debate lost its comunication factor, so they cameup with an alternative. Look it up if you dont believe me.
Posted from: 24.90.20.221
October 21st, 2008 20:06
if you’re so into communication then just join public forum, another activity created for your blessed “communication factor”. obviously LD is too technical for you to comprehend so stick to what’s not intellectually stimulating
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 21st, 2008 20:11
Woah back up. Who said that I hated technical arguments? As Fitz contends, theres a difference between that and policy. And who says you cant have both communication and logical, technical arguments?
Posted from: 75.25.130.115
October 21st, 2008 20:50
I have not debated this topic extensively, nor have I watched many really high-profile or really local/novice rounds on the topic, so my view of the topic might be somewhat limited. Yet, here are my observations:
- the topic was death for stock debate. Dumb stock debaters ran “13 warrants for util/deon standard, then 1 contention linking their standard to res” cases, which were abysmal. Smarter stock debaters took some more interesting approaches, such as establishing a meta-standard which allows us to weigh moral theories, but this meta-standard turned out to be “stop extinction” so often it got boring. I am sure there were still some good stock debates, but all the ones I’ve seen were horrible. As a result, debaters that were either too dumb or too inexperienced to think of more creative ways to debate (novices, and, judging from “Mr. Jones’” post got screwed.
- Parametrics were more widespread than usual, and more average non-TOC debaters started using them. I don’t think they were the most strategic way to affirm this resolution specifically, but at least more people learn paramerics theory.
- Most smart debaters ran weird stuff to avoid getting prepped out, which is good because it forced debaters to become more well-read on philosophy beyond “Kant and Mill”.
- The number of references to Hitler rose dramatically.
- I actually haven’t seen a single debate that came down to presumption, but I can see how that would happen.
- Overall, the topic was boring and confusing for really lay or inexperienced people, but great for those that were on the brink of being pushed into becoming proficient in philosophy.
P.S. I’m not sure how can we emphasize communication and use tech simultaneously, given how non-debate people would not necessarily understand tech. Anyways, lay v. flow and Ld v. policy debates are about as old as deon v. util, so w/e.
Posted from: 75.25.130.115
October 21st, 2008 20:52
*(novices, and, judging from “Mr. Jones’” post, local debaters)
Posted from: 69.228.134.216
October 21st, 2008 20:53
Look, I favor technical (meaning disads, kritiks) debates, but please to ___ stop bagging on Mr.Jones My coach favors the local style of debate, and I respect him and Mr. Jones for that.
Although I do appreciate the technical debate style, I also have respect for others, and I refuse to just bash Mr. Jones’ ideas.
Posted from: 76.212.197.234
October 21st, 2008 20:56
I actually liked the topic. I was displeased in the beginning because I didn’t want lots of debates about utilitarianism. I am quite happy to say that I underestimated my peers. When the resolution gave them a some what boring topic, they just went outside of the box to make it interesting.
Posted from: 129.170.202.142
October 21st, 2008 23:15
This is how I conceive of the terms being used here:
‘policy-ish’ means using empirical and real-world interps of the resolution. For example, it means interpreting “democratic societies” in the felons topic to mean “societies that are currently democracies” instead of “hypothetical societies that are democratic and that’s all we know about them” and then impacting to that interp.
“technical” means a flow-centric focus: e.g. the judge giving higher priority to a dropped bad argument than an answered good one, and the debaters acting as though this will happen.
“fast” and “evidence” are pretty obvious.
and this is just random, but “disad” is not really a policy technique. A disad is something bad that happens when you affirm (in policy, affirm a certain way). Most LD NCs are disads: they say why something (eg not having the death penalty) would lead to x, and tell us why x is bad.
I can see people not liking speed,or not liking policy-ish interpretations. But there’s a legitimate problem when a topic is shallow and has little evidence. S/O ‘08 was shallow. Yes, there was more than Kant and Mill. But there always is in the standards debate in any LD resolution. This lacked any substantive topic area. Yes, there was “stuff to be found if you researched.” But there was much less than usual, and nothing whatsoever that couldn’t have been used on every other LD resolution ever.
So what did people do? From my very limited perspective,they ran crappy, vaguely critical philosophy. If anything, this topic placed a high premium on “finding something weird or confusing.” Often, this lacked strong internal links or was impenetrably written. This “could” have inspired a deep look into the nature of morality, but that evidence tended to either not exist or suffer from the above problems. One of the most interesting issues (that I know was argued) was “whose ground is skepticism?” which is a pretty poor epitaph. I’ll be glad for felons.
Posted from: 75.210.128.187
October 22nd, 2008 06:31
In AZ we have already switched to felons. And I was just starting to like innocents.
Posted from: 24.165.9.37
October 22nd, 2008 08:22
mr. jones–
i did not post on this thread. if i wanted to post, i would have posted as “asmitty”. you claim to be a coach, but the content and tenor of your posts suggest otherwise. if you want to convince me otherwise, tell me who you are and where you coach. i’m obviously not one to censor people because i disagree with them, but your pattern of posting seriously suggests that you are trolling, and if i ran VBD i would ban your IP.
as for the topic, i only judged 5 rounds on it (thanks, MJP!) but it seemed like good people came up with creative strategies while bad people kept regurgitating the same 4 or 5 boring-ass arguments. i’m not really into overly philosophical topics, but it didn’t seem like a total disaster.
Posted from: 208.118.184.3
October 22nd, 2008 10:49
I thought it was a terrible topic to start the year with. I also thought it made it very difficult to help train novices, and I would go so far as to say that it discouraged novices from doing LD. I judged over 60 rounds on the topic at local, regional, and national tournaments.
Posted from: 67.181.192.175
October 22nd, 2008 10:59
At the circuit varsity level I agree with Smitty, this topic wasn’t a total disaster. I do think that most of the regional/local rounds were substantially messier and less comprehensible than on the average topic. It seemed that it was difficult for many to understand how traditional framework translated. What I mean by that is that I saw, at non-circuit tournaments, more people than normal with criteria like ‘utilitarianism’ or ‘good’.
Where I thought the topic was truly disastrous was at the novice level. 1) Teaching 14 year olds justifications for ethical systems is NOT easy. Trying to broach meta-ethics is worse. This was a terrible teaching topic for younger students. 2) The dullness of this topic on face hurt recruitment. I know I’m not alone in this, because I’ve talked to other coaches about it. I coach at a small school, but we get a large number of novices each year. This year the LD/Policy split was 1/3 LD, 2/3 Policy. Not that I have a problem with those percentages, but a good number of students that chose policy did so EXPLICITLY because the LD topic “sounded boring” and the policy topic “seemed more interesting”.
Disaster? On the whole, no. Good for the community? I’m going to go with no here as well. Productive for a certain brand of student that will now be more competent at criteria debate. Overall, no bueno.
Oh, what is a disaster is the proliferation of Mr. Jones. I’m with Smitty in this regard too.
Posted from: 66.193.5.121
October 22nd, 2008 11:07
In my opinion this topic was really no better or worse that any of the other recent topics we have debated. I enjoyed listening to substanative, articulate debaters discuss it, and found listening to people spewing garbage at high speeds on it quite tedious and distasteful; but no more so than when they have done so on other topics. I am not sure about other areas, but in our area at least, there has actually been a larger number of novices in LD than usual. In fact for the first time in many years the novice LD divisons have been bigger at out local tournaments than the novice public forum ones. I can not say if that is due primarily to the topic, but that has been an explanation offered by several coaches I have spoken to.
Posted from: 128.252.254.28
October 22nd, 2008 11:07
“[B]ecause there simply appears to be a lack of applicable arguments, evidence and strategies for either side of this resolution, people seemed to have more time to communicate with the judges, rather than spread evidence, rather than spread evidence. Which I liked.”
surely the characteristics of any great resolution
Posted from: 98.201.178.59
October 22nd, 2008 11:28
i went to grapevine and marks on this topic, in addition to a few locals.
initially, i was very optimistic about this topic; i felt like it had a lot of potential to stimulate interest in various modes of ethics. i felt like it would help debaters on both the local [yet experienced, not novice] level as well as within a given regional or national circuit develop more cohesive and intelligent frameworks that clearly articulate burdens and what is / isn’t resolutional.
i was very wrong. i feel like it was the students that ruined the tournaments on this topic, not the topic that ruined the tournament for the students. skepticism was so poorly ran on this topic, and isn’t even a good, nor interesting, argument. everyone is talking about how parametrics were being ran, but the only one i heard was just war theory [also very boring and not a great argument]. further, those who did run unique or critical interpretations of ethics only really did it for the sake of confusing their opponent; when someone who was technically proficient was the other kid, debate would revert back to the 1AC with 30 pre-empts, no offense, and skepticism arguments that weren’t skepticism arguments until the end of the 1ar.
so in retrospect, i hate this topic because i feel like kids decided to make it worse than it was off the bat.
Posted from: 98.201.178.59
October 22nd, 2008 11:29
i do agree with anjan though about the ability to teach novices on this topic. very boring, difficult, and frustrating. felon voting is a great novice topic though.
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 22nd, 2008 13:40
What is skepticism?
Posted from: 72.73.186.173
October 22nd, 2008 14:13
@ Mr. Jones - Skepticism is, generally speaking, a systematized doubting of normative/truth/value claims.
However, I wouldn’t say that this topic has been overall terrible. I have to agree with Quinn and Anjan that it made teaching students newer to the activity very difficult due to its meta-ethical nature (that it asked (or at least implied a desire for) debaters to argue for the preferability of a moral system in itself, instead of an ethical resolution which would ask debaters to apply ethical systems to a concrete action). This is not to say, however, that there isn’t a large amount of cardable literature out there on the subject, just that most debaters have trouble navigating those arguments. I’m also confused as to why critical positions on this topic were so strongly avoided; this topic seems to not only call for but actually demand arguments which challenge our common ethical presumptions. But, whatever. Strangely, I did (*gasp*) enjoy debating this topic. I’m not sure why that’s so; it may be that the topic was terrible and I was fortunate enough to get good rounds or that I just have deviant preferences pertaining to debate.
At the very least, though, we can all agree on one thing: this topic has made us better at combating the much-reviled taint of injustice argument.
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 22nd, 2008 14:28
Thank you very much, Sasha.
Posted from: 71.104.147.161
October 22nd, 2008 16:49
Wow. I really wish Mr. Jones coached me.
Screw being self-coached…
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 22nd, 2008 17:05
Well, if your wondering Fitz, I did coach a team to the top 25 at nationals in PF this year…
Posted from: 71.104.147.161
October 22nd, 2008 17:17
Damn. Now I definitely want you to coach me!
Posted from: 71.104.147.161
October 22nd, 2008 17:17
btw, my name is Fritz, not fitz. It’s German and has an R.
Posted from: 76.219.139.225
October 22nd, 2008 19:08
im beginning to agree with asmitty, is this mr. jones dude for real?
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 22nd, 2008 19:17
Alright, I made a mistake with @41’s name. My bad.
Posted from: 71.104.147.161
October 22nd, 2008 19:54
That’s okay, Mr. Jane
Posted from: 75.42.1.123
October 22nd, 2008 20:07
Argumentation with Mr. Jones > Actual relevant discussion
ok then…
Posted from: 71.104.147.161
October 22nd, 2008 21:53
Mr. Jones wishes he was someone just a little more funky
Posted from: 66.91.82.161
October 22nd, 2008 22:42
I thought that it was a really bad resolution for september/october. basically every novice at my school chose to do policy because the resolution seemed so dull for ld. more importantly, it is extremely tough for a freshman with no knowledge of anything relevant to debate to learn how to debate while learning moral philosophy philosophy at a pretty theoretical level. imo, the death penalty topic and to a lesser extent, the healthcare topic were great for sept/oct because they allowed new ppl to learn about philosophy just through thinking about a very accessable current events topic.
Posted from: 70.248.168.200
October 23rd, 2008 00:59
HOLY SHIT MR. JONES TOP 25 AT POFO MAN YOU MUST BE MAD LEGIT
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 23rd, 2008 04:49
Hah not really, its all thanks to their desire 2 succed. My job as the coach is simply 2 give them the push in the right direction.
Posted from: 209.181.228.22
October 23rd, 2008 05:25
This topic was interesting to research, and not as fun to debate (although sasha and I did have a pretty epically insane round). I feel that I got a lot of valuable research out of this topic, and came up with some interesting arguments.
Finally, it might have just been me, but for a topic that most people probably intuitively side aff, there seemed to be a pretty big neg bias
Posted from: 207.80.142.5
October 23rd, 2008 06:35
phelan, i think there was a significantly less neg bias than most topics. i think the fact that the aff was more intuitive helped explain why people at some tournaments, like at grapevine, flipped aff in outrounds and won.
Posted from: 70.184.29.2
October 23rd, 2008 07:26
Wow. Mr. Jones was simply expressing his opinion like everyone else on this post, and you guys attack and insult him? Are you guys for real?
Posted from: 71.63.243.119
October 23rd, 2008 07:42
“HOLY SHIT MR. JONES TOP 25 AT POFO MAN YOU MUST BE MAD LEGIT”
“Hah not really, its all thanks to their desire 2 succed. My job as the coach is simply 2 give them the push in the right direction.”
I treasure these little VBD moments…Still, I agree w/ 52, not totally sure what the all fuss is about.
Posted from: 98.198.172.6
October 23rd, 2008 18:39
i think we can all agree that the nuke weapons topic was the best
Posted from: 141.161.124.127
October 23rd, 2008 20:02
Though I agree that this topic was not ideal for novices in the manner than Dan Meyers brings up, I do think that the resolution attempted to force debaters to directly clash, at least at the basic novice level of debate cases of utilitarianism v. deontology. As such, I don’t think that the topic was a complete waste because it did get closer to framework clash than “Resolved: x (action) = y (value judgment)”. However, I think that this is was a fundamental skill when all the topics were a lot more abstract in the past. I just don’t think that it should be absolutely detested as the first topic for debaters, but it may have gotten some off on the wrong foot for more current “x=y” topics.
Posted from: 71.104.147.161
October 23rd, 2008 21:21
@ 54
No. I do not think we can agree on that.
Posted from: 70.231.158.153
October 23rd, 2008 21:53
nah, it was the most fun of recent topics, save eminent domain, but even that pales in comparison.
actual grounds for argumentation aside, the nukes topic incited a fervor in debate that made every round a bit more fun. talking about nukes is what every LDer wants to do anyways. well, maybe not every single one, but a bunch do.
Posted from: 64.91.192.78
October 27th, 2008 20:11
I grew to appreciate the topic overall
although I honestly thought that it was a really really bad topic when debating in front of lay judges, especially when debates degenerated into philosophical one-upmanship
Posted from: 69.1.19.142
October 28th, 2008 14:39
I think the topic represented the utmost of what LD ought to be. I found the process of really digging into metaphysics, differing moral theorys, and in debth philosophy in general to be awesome. Although, most others might disagree, (i did run Scanlon moral contractualism on neg, and on aff i ran that killing and letting die are morally just as bad,) i think the emphasis on philosophy lessened the authinticity of cards (since its easier to see how thats just another person’s opinion) which i think is good for any type of debate but especially LD since it places higher worth on creativity and comprensive understanding- most philosophical ideas arent really something that u should be able to speed through and still convey understanding to a judge- than speed,spreading, and argueing over the flow.
(this is coming from someone who dislikes speed cause hes bad at it, and dislikes policy style evidence argements- cause hes never that prepared)
Also: as a 4th year regional debater in alabama- I was very disappointed with the increased use of jargon and policy tactics, i saw for the first time- prevelent use of kritiks (saying universal standards of morality dont exist), and with those resolutional abusive arguements (people saying the word “to” meant to try so only the neg actuall saves life, and then also off cases- so i guess its just that i felt slightly offended by the “eliteism” (of people who went to some fancy camp or debate in that kind of style) implied when i walk into an out round, and i loose cause i have to ask what an off case is, and then defend that the resolution is worth debating in the first place)- thats my rant- dont bother attacking me - i’ve already pretty much explained why i feel the way i do
Posted from: 72.213.162.95
October 28th, 2008 16:59
I agree. Nicely spoken, @59
Posted from: 208.120.131.125
October 28th, 2008 18:54
who is Mr. Jones?
Posted from: 76.219.139.225
October 28th, 2008 20:38
@ 61
You can ride all day long
Another mike diesel production (Mike Jones)
But you’ll never catch Mr. Jones (Mr. Jones)
He’s got a gang that’s far too strong (Ice Age Ice Age Ice Age)
Your friends know it, that’s why you’re all alone (All alone)
Chasing the man you can’t see (Mike Jones)
So just walk away and let him be
He’s got a shotgun so go back home (Who? Who?)
Cuz you’ll never get Mr. Jones (Mike Jones)
Posted from: 208.120.131.125
October 28th, 2008 21:21
@ 62:
thanks for clearing that up.
Posted from: 66.91.82.161
October 28th, 2008 21:50
@ 59
how is discussing the existence of universal standards of morality not deep philosophic dialogue?
why does speed and jargon preclude good philosophic dialogue?
how is using and evidence and being creative mutually exclusive?
if you think ld is all about creativity, why do you dismiss non-stock forms of argumentation such as kritiks?
if policyesque arguments harm you because you “Aren’t Prepared,” doesn’t that mean that that is your problem, not people who are running those types of arguments?
Posted from: 69.233.255.144
October 28th, 2008 22:04
@62 ROLFMAO
who! (mike jones) who! (mike jones) who! (mike jones)
Posted from: 96.242.12.41
October 28th, 2008 22:29
HA HA HA HA HA HA
Posted from: 24.130.194.63
October 28th, 2008 23:04
Mr. Jones strikes up a conversation…
Posted from: 70.184.29.2
October 29th, 2008 07:23
Haha, you guys are silly!
Btw, Fashaan, do you have an account on Forensicsonline.net? If you do, check it, I think I sent you a pm.
Posted from: 74.128.56.106
October 29th, 2008 16:19
cool site
Posted from: 65.124.147.51
November 3rd, 2008 08:41
I tend to agree that LD is influinced in a negative way by policy debate. I just finished reading ballots for my students and ran across judge comments like strengthen your links/impacts. As a judge, I ran into students making “non-unique” arguments. Non-unique is a fine approach but in LD you have to break it down and not depend on the 1 second comment to shift burden over to the other side. Personally, the vocab is my only complaint. Policy is for the hard-core speech student. Explaining the impact or uniqueness of an argument is a relevent argument but using the speech vocab as shortcuts harms the product. My grandma should be able to walk into a Lincoln Douglas round and understand what is going on.
Posted from: 167.206.203.14
November 3rd, 2008 11:38
“Policy is for the hard-core speech student. Explaining the impact or uniqueness of an argument is a relevent argument but using the speech vocab as shortcuts harms the product.”
why?
if jargon is saying “no link” instead of “the arguments don’t follow from one another”, then the content of a “bad” debaters speech will be identical to a “good” debters, except more word economical because they’re using debate terms. but if the actual argument is essentially the same, one style is not better or worse than the other.