National HS Debate Championship 2008 1st Opp

[SazVlogs]

I love this.

"Sir."

he ignores her.

"Sir."

he ignores her.

"BUT SIR!"

He ignores her.

She feels like exploding, he ignores her.

I half expected her to be like "JUST LISTEN TO ME!!!!!!!!!!"

[mrschacecrawford100]

what is up with this guy's australian lisp?

[smokenfly514]

Also how much time do they have to prepare?

[smokenfly514]

How old are these students?

[1205anam]

it is great to use it as a learning tool

[sixstring1991]

i like this brit ish one; he's comprehensible

[malfoycodex]

you want to express your ideas by using gestures specifically "Body Language" to support the details of your speech..

[JeannieJang]

isn't he doing too much gestures makes me dizzy x_x

[ChristianTarsney]

Crappy/nonexistent argumentation, displaced by obviously contrived, horribly stilted attempts at persuasive appeal, delivered at a mind-numbingly slow pace without any serious attempt at strategic case construction, frameworking, preclusion, etc? Watch any of the NDT or TOC (LD or policy) videos online from the last four or five years by way of contrast and it'll be pretty obvious what I mean.

[heronumba0]

I have to disagree with you - the mind-numblingly slow pace you speak of allows people to ACTUALLY UNDERSTAND WHAT HE IS SAYING

Debate is more than speed reading!

[ChristianTarsney]

Trust me, it's possible to speak quite a bit faster than that and still be perfectly comprehensible. Obviously "debate is more than speed reading," but speed is still a big part of good debate.

[heronumba0]

Again, I beg to differ. You need to keep a good pace in order to be effective. The way you say something is just as important as what you say.

The pace he was going at was perfectly acceptable. As if you were talking to him. Most people are not accustomed to people speaking extremely fast. The judges at these tournaments are parents. They understand their audience.

[masterdebatercanada]

What sort of things do you consider "persuasive appeal"? Increasing pace when you have something important to say? The dreaded "topicality"? Avoiding the heart of a debate? Or, as an American national team member once told me, the "highest level" of American debate, the personal attack? True, this round was perhaps not the best round any of the four debaters has been involved in, but all the big ideas and most of the relevant analysis came forward.

[masterdebatercanada]

"Strategic case construction" is often a euphemism for trying to model the big issues or relevant material of the other team out of the debate. Something Americans are good at. Before you criticize other styles of debate, ask where your style has gotten American debaters in international competition.

[ChristianTarsney]

Aaannddd ask yourself when was the last time a top-twenty American debater, either LD or policy, showed up for an "international competition" or even thought about taking one seriously. The debaters who do go don't debate anything like their normal style, because the judging is such shit that two thirds of the judges would drop them just as a matter of ideological, stylistic hackery if they tried to. And you're right, American debaters (well, a few, anyway) are good at preclusion and framing the

[ChristianTarsney]

round to their advantage, which I don't think is anything that has to be euphemized about--it's part of debate, and if it's something no one in an entire country can do, then debate in that country kinda sorta sucks. Also, if you actually want a legitimate test of styles, come down to Glenbrooks or Greenhill where the judges don't drop people for how they debate and instead listen to and vote on arguments (slow or fast) and see how y'all do.

[ChristianTarsney]

Wow...Canadian debate is really that bad?

[DriverError]

How exactly is this bad?

[masterdebatercanada]

And American debate is amazing? Why are they the only English Speaking country that does not break at the World Championships? No other country in the world practices American debate styles. Why? Because American debate is rejected everywhere else as ignoring real argumentation in favour of speaking at a pace so fast that the audience can't understand how bad your arguments are.