p.p.s paul tyger is funny

p.p.p.s who cares

i for one am totally willing to admit that i cannot get a bid for the life of me. damn you jake nebel!

im usually all for the anonymous posts, but wow, you clearly have no idea what is going on.

BC

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-94JhLEiN0

Sorry, AT–coming up with creative synonyms for “stupid” is kinda a hobby. ;-)

shut up phelan.

FAIL.

A few things I want to re-emphasize from my original post –

1. VBD is VBd: I simply don’t understand the claim that somehow VBd and those who manage it are violating some pledge to be more open by posting information on VBI, daily activities of the camp, etc.. I don’t see space for me to comment on/post information about NDF and NSD on either of these websites and if in fact these websites did include an interactive element like VBd, I certainly wouldn’t hold it against these institutions to post information about their own camp on the website they host. I also wouldn’t expect them to post information about VB and what happened Day 6 at camp there either. I understand that the very nature of VBD being VBd means that there is going to be a limit on the “open-ness” of the website, but I dont think it is correct to say that because of this VBd doesn’t attempt to be as open as possible. Where I think Ernie goes wrong is in suggesting that wanting to have a successful website means wanting to monopolize debate. You may not want to say that the intent of the people who run the site is to maintain that monopoly, but that seems to be exactly what you are saying and that is what I have an issue with. For example, the posts during camp about the modules, practice rounds, etc. have purely been for logistical reasons to give all students, instructors quick online access to the schedule and the daily curriculum. Parents frequent the site throughout camp to see what their children are doing and working on and thus threads on the pub quiz and the free day help in this regard. Jon Cruz posting about Nerd Night at camp is really just Jon’s attempt to project his inner-nerd, not an attempt to unite the nerds of the world to join VBI in its attempt to take over the debate community. I apologize for those who cant understand that “Victory Briefs” daily is not just about debate, it is about “Victory Briefs” and also debate, but this is not solid ground for a criticism that VB doesn’t do its best to promote debate.

2. The purpose of my post was an attempt to address the problem as much as possible by trying to get people to take a more active role in creating their own thread/discussion on the website. Larry McGrath, Jake Gelfand, etc. used to have regular threads on VBd and though these individuals were in fact VB employees at one point, their threads were their own creation and they planned it how they wanted. My post was intended to bring these types of threads back. I will re-iterate that I am sure the managers of VBd would be more than happy to post an “ask Ernie” or “ask Hershey” thread or any other debate-relevant and insightful idea that anyone not associated with VB might propose. I am still more than willing to help make this happen and to coordinate requests (timmyc1029@gmail.com) but as far as I know these requests or suggestions haven’t happened. Dave says that “As long as posters don’t have the ability to independently initiate threads, then we’re limited to discussing the topics raised by the VBD folks.” While Dave may be right that VBd is not a place where the viewers can create their own independent threads, this doesn’t seem to respond to the claim I made that if there is something that doesn’t happen on VBd that those not involved would like to see and it functions within the structure of the current website, bring it on. There is no filter other than appropriateness. Tournaments send requests to post their information – it gets posted, Coaches send request for discussions about larger debate questions like paradigms – they are posted. As far as I can tell, the only limitation for non-VBd folks to discuss what they want and have relevant threads is the fact that there hasn’t been any requests by non-VBd folks. I have seen a lot of criticisms, but no requests. Again, I recognize this isn’t user driven and would still require some level of acceptance by the “VBd folks”, but as long as the thread is not to discuss VB as the devil, I doubt there would be a problem.

I am also glad that Ernie makes my argument for me. He is nice to point out that VBd is Bietz and Cruz’ job. As such, everything that is not VB related on this website (and there is plenty – tournament posting and information, coaches requets, etc.) would seem to violate the corporate ethos, no? By this logic they shouldn’t be doing anything other than talking about VB. The response to this of course will be that all those things that are non-VBd related are part of the corporate attempt to take over the community. It is here though that the argument seems to be break down though as by this logic VBd should just shut down and not attempt to be open at all because they are bastards if they talk about VBd and a corporate monopoly if they talk about anything else. Leaving the VB critical posts on the website are part of our corporate strategy? It makes people love us more? As far as I am concerned, leaving the posts serves one crucial purpose right now – a response to your arguments. The discussions that happen on VB threads are all open (minus hate speech). Go ahead and say that this is part of the marketing strategy but I think people can see that this statement is the one that is absurd.

I agree with Ernie that claims A and B of his list are quite silly, what I take issue with is the claim of C and its effect on claims A and B. To suggest the VBd is ALWAYS an attempt to promote itself is just wrong as is the claim that the people involved with the site are always promoting VB. I also want to be clear in my belief that promoting VB is not = to monopolizing debate. I have referenced a few examples of this above.

Let me also say that my comments are not intended to prove VB is holy and all those that criticize it ought be scorned. I also don’t think that VBd is the only way that discussions ought to happen in the community. Jon’s effort to re-start an open forum is a necessary action and I commend him for it and those who are willing to help with it (Ernie, Eric, etc.). But I doubt that will stop the shitting on VBd. As such, instead of the criticism, I would love to see people submitting their ideas and requesting their own threads so that the VB is evil and controls debate knowledge talk is put to rest.

p.s. – Happy Birthday Eric Palmer and AT (I hope I am not off the XMas list already)

DFK says: “When you said Arguably the biggest cult celebrity in debate history – at least in the past 5 years- is epalm,” were you describing Eric during his debate career or Eric as a coach? If you were discussing the former, I’d argue that VBD was not as centralized in 2004 as it is now.”

Anyone want to explain why this is responsive?

1. The term “terminally retarded”. Wow… nuf said.
2. No birthday shout outs for Epalm or AT :(

Really?

Christian- it’s incorrect to coin Ken’s post as “terminally retarded.

Daryl- When you said “Arguably the biggest cult celebrity in debate history – at least in the past 5 years- is epalm,” were you describing Eric during his debate career or Eric as a coach? If you were discussing the former, I’d argue that VBD was not as centralized in 2004 as it is now. If you were discussing the latter, I don’t think it accounts for the concerns regarding celebrity DEBATERS whose careers receive an extra boost as a consequence of online coverage.

Aside from the perpetuating uproar in this thread, I think we should consider that at heart, ALL OF US (from Cruz to Eric) have a shared goal of facilitating accessibility to the greater debate community.

Maybe some of us believe that there are different means to the same end, but that doesn’t justify insincere attacks against others.

Maybe we should all play it on the court and focus on accumulating as many bids as Nadir Joshua.

1) Debate coaches are still sharp debaters, as witnessed by the lengthy rebuttals.
and,
2)It seems there has been some tangible change of the status quo, (the forum, or at least the forum arriving sooner), through discussion and DEBATE. Good to see a real life example of the advantage of “good debate” we argue in theory debates.

Seeing substantial discussion on an argument at most tangential to the post I think proves the possibility of immense discussion and change that can occur with a formalized forum and a variety of debate resources.

I don’t see anyone to “blame” necessarily except for everyone who have avoided creating new web resourced, despite their own will.

Stay tuned. :o)

THAT SAID

Tim-

You know I love you, but your post is incredibly naive. There are two basic arguments which seem simply asinine to me.

1. VBD would shut down all dissent if it was really a monopoly/evil corporation/what have you

Why in the world would they do that? If they were to actually shut down all dissent, people would not support the website like they do now. This is a website FOR DEBATERS–largely, in my experience, people who don’t like to be ruled with an iron fist. As long as it doesn’t rise too high, you can just claim that everyone is being irrational/unreasonable. I’m not really sure that I want to say that the intent is to MAINTAIN monopoly, but you can’t honestly expect me to believe that the dominance of VBD wasn’t desired from the get go for marketing purposes. It hasn’t always been Jon, it isn’t just him being benevolent. It is part of the strategy to have a successful debate website, and if we can’t agree on that, this discussion is pointless.

2. Jon and Bietz spend a lot of time on this website.

Of course they do. ITS A JOB. I know how hard you work as a lab leader. ITS A JOB. Not that you don’t genuinely care about the kids. I know you do. But ITS A JOB. You can’t just swing around the “we work hard” stick and expect us to think you are saints.

I’m not saying Jon and Bietz are evil. I do not believe that. I know they both work hard to make debate accessible. That being said, it is just plain silly to pretend that

A. VBI’s success has nothing to do with VBD;
B. VBI doesn’t use VBD to promote itself; and
C. That any time someone associated with VBI does something to help the website, their intent is purely benevolent.

I think there are some claims about victory briefs that go too far on this thread. I refuse to believe, however, that VBI/VBD/The people involved are entirely beyond reproach.

That said, maybe I’m just crazy.

http://www.lddebater.com/circuit-discussion-f6/forums-articles-and-vbd-t130.htm#596

Why can’t we say that having both an independent forum and VBD is a good thing? If someone defends a forum outside of VBD, they are accused of ignoring VBD’s contributions to the community. If they defend a VBD-only approach, they are said to be supporting Big Brother’s mind control mission.

I think some common ground needs to be found or this war will end up being pretty pointless.

1. Has there ever been a workshop/institute/camp discussion thread on vbd? I know cross-x.com has one and I cant help but feel like letting debaters discuss their personal expireince with various camps is the best way to get real tangible unbiased feedback about camps all across the country. (Maybe this would solve for the 100 people watching nebel and theis at the glenbrooks?)
2. Cross-x.com is definitely corporate, but it also has extremely redeeming qualities like the forum section. I think the ability to discuss things like Theory, Critiques, Culture, Evidence Trading, etc could be extremely helpful in the creation of a more sound paradymic model than the value/criterion.
3. Virtual Debates are prolly a bad idea, but they would be fun and might be good for novices. That being said, there should definitely be a novice question thread-it will lead to the proliferation of much better quality arguments and evidence, thus education.

“The perception of VBD as the “Fox News of Debate” as a “corporatized media outlet” or an “in-house propaganda outlet for VBI” is absurd.”

When I say that VBD behaves like an “in-house propaganda outlet for VBI” I don’t *necessarily* mean it as a put-down, but I think it’s pretty clearly the case.

VBD posts lengthy coverage of VBI, including what each of the labs does every day and photos. This is clearly propaganda, or advertising, or what-have -you.

Sure, that’s their right, but that means that VBD isn’t an even-handed reporting site about the debate community as a whole.

VBD doesn’t feature a day-by-day breakdown of what happens at UNT, or NSD, or NDF. It doesn’t publish photos from those camps. It doesn’t celebrate the birthdays of people associated solely with those camps (I’ve never seen “HAPPY BIRTHDAY ERIC PALMER!” or, for that matter, “HAPPY BIRTHDAY, AARON TIMMONS!”)

Tim might be right that VBD sometimes publishes threads featuring commentary from people not associated with VBD, and I agree that’s very open-minded of them, but it is not the kind of democratic institution that a message-board is. As long as posters don’t have the ability to independently initiate threads, then we’re limited to discussing the topics raised by the VBD folks. I don’t consider that ideal.

My point is that VBD sometimes appears to be a website about “debate.” But it is actually a website about “Victory Briefs.” And I think it’s important that we’re clear about that.

As to whether VBD is a monopoly:

I think it clearly is. There isn’t another site that does or can compete. VBD has all of the market share in terms of debate communication.

Pointing out that people are free to not look at VBD, or that VBD obtained its monopoly through fair business practices, misses the point. You can have a debate about whether monopoly is good or not. If you determine that monopolies aren’t good (a position for which there are a number of good arguments), then it’s irrelevant if a monopoly is arrived at through fair practices. The monopoly itself, as a state of affairs, is a problem.

lets be honest, arguably the biggest cult celebrity in debate history – at least in the past 5 years – is epalm(no offense) and its not like vbd ever overtly plugged him.

Shouldn’t you be educating the youth of America?

Gary: NFL points.

“I don’t like monopoly. I don’t like the weird admixture of the objective reporting of results alongside evaluative judgments. I don’t like the corporatization of media outlets.”

as including the “monopoly” observation under the heading of criticisms of VBD. In any case, I wasn’t intending and didn’t suggest that I was intending to respond to everyone who’s addressed the monopoly issue on this thread. I’m also not intending to address the issue of celebrity culture, aside from the comments of birthday announcements. I don’t think “celebrity culture” is all that big a deal and I don’t think VBD is all that responsible for it, but I don’t have anything especially productive to say on those points.

As regards the issue of forums and user-generated content, I’m not sure what “stronger effort” it should make beyond making an endeavor to set up a forum, which was there and perfectly servicable for a period of time but just didn’t end up gaining a lot of traction, let alone the effort at a neutral, non-affiliated forum that Jon is currently making. I also don’t know why it’s any more their responsibility than anyone else’s. Suggesting that it is, to me, seems to similarly imply that VBD’s media monopoly is somehow its fault (otherwise, why would it be VBD’s responsibility to fix?).

Nobody (except perhaps the anonymous poster) is accusing Jon Cruz or Mike Bietz of deliberately shutting down other websites so that VBD could have a monopoly. Some individuals are merely stating that VBD has played a crucial role in shaping the celebrity status of debaters–particularly of those associated with VBI. Since VBD is the only widely used forum for the discussion in the debate community, it should take stronger efforts to be an “open-source home for information and discussion about debate” (as Dave puts it) rather than a means of promoting debaters associated with and staff members of VBI.

Eric’s suggestion that “in a perfect world, we’d have something like VBD, except it (a) would not be affiliated with a camp and (b) would have forums and user-generated content” is probably true, but in the real world, it’s unrealistic to expect anyone to put in the amount of time required to maintain a site of VBD’s quality for no return at all, and while user-generated forums certainly would be a good thing, I still feel like most people would prefer to get their debate news in the format that VBD provides it in. So, in the best world we can realistically expect, there would be a site like VBD, that provides lots of cool content, some but not most of it specifically in the service of the organization creating that content, alongside a neutral, non-affiliated, user-moderated forum. If Jon can get the Westman-replacement he’s proposing off the ground, then I think we’d be in a pretty good place.

Oh, and the idea that birthday shout-outs create a culture of celebrity-worship in debate is absurd, while the suggestion that Jon should be giving them to every one of his 2500-odd facebook friends who has some debate affiliation is terminally retarded.

I don’t want to create another “circuit”-only forum. I want to include a lot of perspectives, from around the national circuit and from outside of it. That isn’t a criticism of LDDebater.com; I just want to include something that is broader, like the LDDebate.org of old. As I mentioned early, I was a “local circuit” debater for a small team when I competed. I always strive to include local circuit stories here on VBD; I’d like a place for people of all debate types and styles and calendars to feel comfortable.

As an aside, I may have been unclear; I didn’t mean to say that LDDebater.com has a similar corporate function as Cross-X.com, just that Cross-X.com is often cited in discussions on this issue, and that I have a feeling many in the LD community are unaware that it actually is a “corporate” site.

The reason a forum from another party is valuable is because it eliminates the perception that a small group of people possess total control over the media. I am not sure the answer to “VBD has too much power” is for one of the leaders of VBD to build the alternative to VBD. An independent alternative may go a long way.

I think what Marble was saying about the LD Debater forum is that it shares similarities in terms of forum structure with Cross-X, not that it has the same objective as Cross-X. In light of that, I don’t think it is fair to claim that it has a similar “corporate” structure or something like that.

Though I would like to think that multiple forums could exist in harmony, I am not sure that is the case. We only have one debate discussion forum at the moment, right? The idea that two thriving forums would emerge at the same time and enjoy long-term success seems unrealistic.

Circuitdebater/lddebater.com is a really cool resource and I hope it lives on.

“multiple sites can exist in harmony.”
That’s true of sites with different format (i.e. VBD-news bulletin format and CD-forum format) which provide different services, but I’m not sure why the LD community would need two clones of LDDebate.org

I am in the process of bringing back what LDDebate.org was, with a few tweaks. Many thanks to those who have posted who have already agreed to help, and to Mike West, who has already been very helpful.

Stay tuned.

Jon’s heart is in the right place and I look forward to trafficking the new message boards when I should be editing cases.

Mercutio was killed when Tybalt accidentally stabbed him under Romeo’s arm, so why is he now clogging VBD with pointless nonsense?

also i agree with eric on all counts

I am in the process of purchasing a site to serve such a purpose. It will have no affiliation with Victory Briefs or VBD and I will be including community members from many institutes (or no institutes) as moderators. I will not be selling ads on the site and will personally absorb the cost out of my own pocket. LDDebate.org was definitely an important resource for me when I was younger and I’d like to see something similar for debaters and coaches today.

I know there was an earlier attempt at this, and it didn’t pan out. I was only very tangentially involved, and was not included as a founder. I want to put my energy into this project. I will work hard to make this one succeed as a large, heavily-trafficked, neutral community resource. I obviously think VBD has an important function in our activity but, contrary to popular belief, I have never believed that it should be the only resource, and I certainly agree with Eric that there needs to be a place where there is no central determination of topics for discussion. I imagine myself being a pretty hands-off moderator on such a site (following the model of Mike West), though I might indulge myself and be the (or a) Northeast moderator.

I’ll have further details very soon, as I am starting to work them out now. I am genuinely thankful that this conversation has helped re-motivate me to create such a space. I bet we can make it work out.

It’s a fact that VBD has brainwashed debaters, judges, coaches, and all other members of the community. Laugh at me and call this a conspiracy theory. Laugh at me and call this an “unreasonable, emotional” attack on a goodhearted institution. Laugh at me and delete my post…But I don’t care. I’ll have the last laugh.

The effect of biased reporting on the nature of Lincoln-Douglas debate has been enormous.

Let’s see Jake Nebel’s face glorified and worshiped whenever we type in victorybriefsdaily.com and hit enter. Interstingly enough, a Bronx Science debater once told me that Jon is “obsessed” with Jake Nebel and will almost always vote for him. So Jon, why didn’t you strike yourself from judging Jake at regular season tournaments? Why do you rave about how Nebel is the Tom Rollins of debate when Mangus clearly pointed out that you have an extremely strong opinion about a guy who did a different activity way before your time? Why do you treat certain debaters more favorably than others? How are you not biased? The fact that a grown man is “obsessed” with high school debaters makes me sick.

Let’s see VBD call itself unbiased yet yell exclusive “happy birthday” shoutouts to members of their own institution as opposed to ALL members of the debate community (and if you think this is way to difficult Mr. Cruz and Mr. Bietz, use a really instrumental tool called facebook).

Let’s see the “Stephen Hess Wins TOC” thread buried immediately after he wins the most competitive tournament in the country (I know I’m bringing up a pretty old thread here, but I’m just that old).

I’m tired of victorybriefs monopoly on debate media coverage. Although some may argue that debaters like Theis and Nebel are exceptional debaters, I’ll concede that. But it’s naive to claim that their success is also a product of VBD’s coverage of them as celebrity debaters. For instance, during semis of Glenbrooks this past year, I had the choice of watching the Gooderham vs. Khalessi round or the Nebel vs. Theis round. I was literally only ONE of THREE people watching the former round while almost 100 people packed into another room to watch Nebel vs. Theis. JP and DFK, two pretty competitive debaters who had many big wins during their carriers, didn’t even get an audience due to Theis and Nebels’ popularity in the community. Talk about celebrity culture….

Instead of being presented with objective reporting, we’ve received biased coverage. VBD is the Fox News of Debate.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTGyNxzXrpE

I mean I get that that other post is meant as humor, but I think VBD should decide if it is (A) an open-source home for information and discussion about debate, or (B) an in-house propaganda outlet for VBI.

I feel like in a perfect world, we’d have something like VBD, except it (a) would not be affiliated with a camp and (b) would have forums and user-generated content. This isn’t the subject matter of this thread so I won’t push this line any further if you don’t, but then again, that’s part of the problem (central determination of subject matter)…

If you want to talk about openness in discussions online, I’m down. I think these issues are inextricably linked.

This isn’t (and wasn’t) just an emotional outburst. I think I have made a reasonable claim about the way this website often operates. The original comment you made was completely unreasonable, regardless of how humble Kris was in his apology. I’ve see this happen over and over again on this website.

Bietz, I’m not claiming you are a conspiracy theorist. I am claiming that there do tend to be unreasonable responses on this website to reasonable questions/thoughts.

And, while we’re on the subject, lets not pretend VBD doesn’t have a marketing strategy. It is a business. Your former employees have openly discussed some of the features of said strategy. If Kris were to make the claim you accuse him of, it honestly wouldn’t be that unreasonable.

I will repeat: As sloppy as his comment was, so to was my haste in reading in to the comment.

This conversation has devolved into complete silliness. I thought that when I made my last post – thus the footnoting of the eric palmer comment.

If we are going to have a real discussion about how we treat each other online, at tournaments, etc, I’d be happy to. But to have it couched where emotions have, apparently, been so riled up is probably not wise.

I love apologies that are shrouded by sarcastic remarks.

Am I the only one who thinks its ridiculous that if you say something mildly inflammatory about anyone associated with VBD you are being rude, unreasonable or paranoid?

That said, given how much accusation and innuendo that exists on these threads, facebook, aim, or whatever, I don’t think it is out of the realm of reasonability to have people clarify their intentions.

And, its nice to see that eric thinks that “the vast majority of posts and articles on vbd are awesome.” (1) haha.

–
(1) See comment 32 & 33 on thread “http://victorybriefsdaily.com/2009/07/06/harvard-announces-changes-for-2010-tournaments”

That is absolutely not what I meant and would have been an absurd claim to make a) about Jon’s intentions and b) about some conspiracy orchestrated by the staff at vbi. Clearly vbi and Jon and the Bronx team wouldn’t do that.

Looking back on the way I phrased my comment, I recognize that it lacked precision and clarity–for that I apologize. I’ll clarify my intentions below. However, I’m fairly concerned that in the face of ambiguity you wouldn’t give me the benefit of the doubt before interpreting a comment as absurd slander against an institution that has been run by so many of my closest friends in the activity, an institute I’ve chosen to work at in the past, and one that I’ve trusted a number of my students with. Furthermore, jesus christ, I might not be a genius, but at least give my intelligence more credit than to ascribe an asinine conspiracy theory interpretation to something I posted. I’m owed better than that, even in light of some (admittedly) ambiguously phrased comment.

To explain what I meant: I think the vast majority of posts and articles on vbd are awesome, especially those that give due recognition to kids competing on various local circuits around the country and those who do well at medium and small TOC tournaments. However, there are occasional times in which I think some of the posts people make in threads or articles posted on the main page that go beyond what I believe to be a healthy recognition of excellence and ends up potentially perpetuating our natural inclination toward worshiping competitively successful debaters. My intention had merely been to a) contextualize my claim that we do in fact have a community culture that struggles with this problem and b) to make a criticism of the occasional posts I’ve described above.

The inclusion of “curriculum director” in my post was a very poor choice–a mistake made b/c I posted in a hurry and simply didn’t notice the enormous ambiguity it would create. For that lack of editing, I apologize.

My most profound concern right now is that this thread has exhibited zero of the thirteen characteristics of a VBD thread that I postulated some months ago. Where have we gone wrong?

We are donating a trophy because the old trophy was broken in pieces when we won it and because it was considerably smaller than the policy trophy. Given the size of the LD tournament and the condition of the award (and my own professed love of traveling trophies), and given my elation that Bronx Science had won the LD tournament for the first time ever, I decided to invest in presenting a new trophy to the tournament. We also won the policy tournament this year and it was important to me that the trophies look the same, not simply for aesthetic purposes, but because I think it’s important that the two events be treated equally. I made the offer to Dallas Perkins and Sherry Hall, and they agreed.

The policy trophy carries a name, and so Dallas and Sherry offered me the opportunity to name the trophy, particularly given the price of the particular design. For the sake of full disclosure, they suggested naming it for Richard B. Sodikow, the founder of the Bronx Science program, but his name already graces the first place LD award at our own tournament and he never coached a champion at the Harvard tournament nor had any particular connection to the tournament. I had also floated the idea of naming it for a particular coach who had a great deal of success at the tournament historically (and who had helped to run it for many years) but was told that said individual didn’t want his name on the trophy. At this point, as several other ideas were bandied about, I grew concerned that donating a nameless trophy might result in the award being named after someone other than a person that represents the best qualities of the community. And so, I decided to be proactive in choosing a name.

So, like a number of other tournaments, I — after discussing this with some Bronx Science debaters, including Matt Dunay, who won the tournament this year — felt it would be nice to commemorate the achievements of a debater who not only dominated this particular tournament but also, to me and my students at least, displayed tact and care and humility. While I agree that “hero worship” is often a problem, I will be candid and say that it was indeed my intention to commemorate both Jake’s incredible talent and success (and incredible humility in light of that talent and success) by naming the trophy for him.

In fairness to Jake, he did not know about this naming proposal until after I had made it to Dallas and Sherry. He wasn’t part of it, and he certainly did not suggest that the trophy be named after him. (No one here has claimed that, but I want to address any lingering doubts in case they exist among those who didn’t post.) The few individuals I confidentially discussed it with all thought it was cool.

I am not going to deny that the “recency” issue is a valid concern, though I am not entirely sure how naming an award after someone would “[insulate] the arguments and styles of successful debaters & coaches from critical evaluation” by the vast majority of competitors who have probably rarely/never seen Jake or Trinity Prep debate personally. In fact, with all due respect to Kris, who knows I like him a great deal, I think that concern displays a very “national circuit” mindset, where we assume that we all know the style in which every single person debates because, thanks to the size of the national circuit, it is conceivable that we have actually seen every person debate. While I really like the way Jake debates, the real thing I wanted to recognize — other than, obviously, his unparalleled final round appearances at Harvard — was not his style of debate but the way in which he carries himself as a competitor in the light of such success. Any speech that would have accompanied the presentation of the trophy would have emphasized that, and not his in-round argumentative practices.

So, to summarize, I do think “hero worship” is bad (and I don’t endorse a Facebook group deifying a debater), but I also think that commemorating a debater’s achievements (and humility in the face of those achievements) after he is finished debating is a good thing. I certainly intended for it to be a good thing.

However — and while I am thankful that Kris, Ken, Ernie, and Michael have expressed their concerns with such tact — I do not want Jake to become a target for people who are perhaps less tactful. I also respect the concerns being outlined here (and now being expressed to me by others), even if I have some reservations about those concerns. (I include that not to be argumentative, but to be honest.) I do not want what was intended to be a nice gesture to be misinterpreted or to hurt anyone in the community, especially the person it was meant to honor.

Accordingly, having discussed this matter with Jake, I will inform the Harvard tournament that we will still endow the new traveling trophy but will request that it remain unnamed until after Jake graduates from college.

but, doesnt it make sense to name trophies after people who have made some particularly significant contribution to a tournament or debate generally? i realize that jake’s run at harvard was incredible from a competitive point of view, but i dont think winning a lot really contributes much to the tournament or the community. there are those among us who frame the reputation of people in our community in the most simplistic result-oriented form, “person x (coached someone to)/(got to) round y at tournament z,” because they don’t understand what’s actually going on at lower levels of abstraction. this is not to say that jake wont be a great coach and important contributor to our community for years to come, but i think the hero worship problem is largely a function people framing debate tradition in terms of competitive success. the sense of accomplishment and the hardware seem like praise enough for winning; they dont need to rename the trophy for you 4 months later.

I think this facebook group, “Jake Nebel is God,” demonstrates his point fairly well:

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/group.php?gid=46386172297&ref=search

So my problem is not with who gets the honor of being immortalized on the trophy, but rather that Jon and the Harvard Tournament directors have chosen to immortalize a debater less than a year after he graduated from high school. This community already suffers from extreme hero worship of successful debaters and coaches that goes well beyond the limits of a healthy level of respect. It frequently reaches extreme and insane proportions, where coaches and especially young debaters all lose the ability to critically evaluate that debater as a debater and as a person.

I am not contending that in the case of Jake we’re all overlooking someone who is evil or dumb—once again, the kid is smart and in every single encounter I’ve personally had with him has been delightful. No matter who the person is, I’d still be quite worried at the msg we send young debaters, the effect we have on insulating the arguments and styles of successful debaters & coaches from critical evaluation, and perpetuate the extreme levels of hero worship that turns young debaters from respectful admirers to NSYNC-crazy-stalkers with heroin-level addiction to their obsessions. I believe that a bit of humility and a care for education requires that we recognize that that level of hero worship is not conducive to the values of a community of educators.

I think when we are dealing with immortalizing someone with tremendous competitive success, we should be very concerned about adding to the already inevitable hero worship that that person’s success produced. The success that, in my opinion, undeniably justify naming this trophy after him are still too vivid in the minds of the community for this not to add to the problems I’ve already outlined.

I would like to propose that Jon and the Harvard tournament directors wait three years from now to give Jake the honor that I, and many others, believe he is due. I say this at the risk associated with diving into a touchy subject because I believe the discussion is important and the decision about when to name a trophy after someone is one that has tremendous effects on the culture of our activity.

I haven’t seen a post by Jake about his thoughts on having a trophy named after him so so very soon after the end of his career. Given the importance of this discussion and the potential impact of the decision reached, I think Jake’s input would be particularly valuable. And if he’s as educationally responsible as I believe him to be, I truly hope that he enters this discussion to express his view and rationale, no matter whether that view happens to match my own.

With much love for Jake,

–kris wright

I also applaud Harvard’s debate council for the improvements to the tournament. Managing anything inside a giant university bureaucracy is a beast — but I still want to wish them good luck in finding better quarters than LD had last year.

Driving? I was hoping someone would suggest they move it to a warmer month….NFLs in Birmingham in June and Harvard in February. Anyone else bothered by the mismatch?

props to jcruz and his love of traveling trophies

Actually, several people won the tournament twice. This includes Matt Shields, one of my all-time favorite debaters, but also includes Liz Rogers (now Liz Brannen, one of the LD directors at Harvard) and David Browne, both of whom debated before my time. Adwait Parker, another one of my favorite debaters, also appeared in finals twice. But only one person has appeared in finals thrice (four times, if you include the JV win).

Anyway, Bronx Science had the naming rights, since we are paying for the trophy. Sorry that we didn’t name it after you.

can you taste the haterade?

i motion to rename the toc “tournament of chris theis.” i’d like stanford to be called the daniel moerner invitational. av ought to be renamed the ben holguin-apple classic. great success!

While the post mentions space for judges–space for competitors (and the coaches who hang with them to prep) is important too.

Still, great set of changes, esp for such a large tournament.