here - College of Arts & Sciences - Bethel University

Speeches should be clear and you should moderate speed. I am not a fast flow so if you
are depending on me getting all of your arguments you better adapt. The point of writing
this philosophy is so that you can adapt to me. Speakers adapt to audiences, audiences
should not have to adapt to the speaker. Similarly, debaters adapt to the critic, the critic
should not have to adapt to the debater. Don’t be rude. Don’t be abusive with points of
order. Speech time begins immediately. Thank whoever you want, but its coming out of
your time.
Cheesewright, Kyle
CSU-Long Beach
Parli Rounds judged this year: a lot
Non-parli rounds judged this year: far less (hs/college policy, ld)
Years judging debate: 3
Years debated: 8
School debated at: colorado sate
Case Arguments: i had my time in debate. it was a time of glory, beauty, and wonder that
will never be paralleled (because i was in debate!). now i am just a simple judge, looking
to render decisions on the basis of the arguments that are made inround. while i have
many specific beliefs about debate, i recognize that they are only my beliefs, and i don’t
really have the authority for foist my beliefs on anyone as universal debate truth. and, as
sweet as it would be, intervention makes me feel dirty . . . and not dirty good; dirty bad.
keeping that in mind, i have yet to see a round that was labeled as “fact/value” that was a
well articulated reason to support the resolution. it seems to me that those labels are
mostly created to allow debaters to engage in shoddy theoretical practices and avoid
taking argumentative responsibility for their advocacies. seeing as i am firm believer in
saying something and supporting it in debate rounds, i am not appreciative of people
trying to use poor outdated theoretical justifications so that they don’t really have to
defend anything, “’cause it’s a fact, you know.” clarity of advocacies is something that
is important. i don’t really know why saying an advocacy near the end of your speech
makes it less clear, nor do i know why saying an advocacy near the beginning of your
speech makes it more clear. if you have something to say about either of those issues, i
will copy them down onto paper like the trained monkey i am, and evaluate those claims
like i would any others. impacts are also good. i like them and i think that they
generally make debate rounds more interesting to watch, and easier to adjudicate. even
more than good impacts, i like clear articulation of how and why i should evaluate those
impacts. some fairly vacuous words that often lend to the project of clarifying impacts:
timeframe, magnitude, reversibility, systemic, probability . . . they’re a party, and
everyone’s invited! beyond that i am pretty open to the structure and form and content
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