THW go to debate training more often
Jun. 24th, 2015 10:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
schneefinkI went to debate training again today! I haven't debated in months because of a combination of feeling like I don't have the time and being sick at inopportune times. I was happy to find out that I can still debate :) I think my speech was good, though it could of course have used more analysis.
Things I (partially) forgot about debating:
- The importance of knowing your teammate. I didn't today, and I misunderstood him during prep time, so he came with arguments that were a) not good, some of them even simply wrong, and b) partially contradicted what I said (which he should have noticed, but whatever.)
- The frustration when your partner doesn't say what you think they should, even though you told them, and you're convinced your points would be far better
- The frustration when you have an excellent POI (point of information, a question you offer during the other side's speech) and the speaker doesn't accept your question
- "I don't know if they really believe X or if they just say that because they have to for their argument, I really hope it's the latter."
- The frequency of "there's the core of a really good argument there but wow the presentation is not good."
- "This is really wrong but the speaker is on my side of the house so I shouldn't wince too obviously."
- The mindset of following a debate and slotting arguments together in patterns, how nice it is if the pattern fits and is interesting and has a solid foundation
- How nice it is come out of a debate with an opinion based on solid arguments
We debated "The Southern States of the US should ban the use or display of the Confederate flag", I was the first opposition speaker. Closing government won: opening government had a huge missing link between "we ban the symbol and then racism will disappear", and closing made that link. Closing opposition was confused about Kanye West (tbh I think we could have come second if my partner had been better.) Unfortunately we didn't get as much into symbols and their meanings as I wanted to, but it was still interesting. (Also interesting was that almost nobody brought up freedom of speech and whether or not the state is allowed, I think that was partly because everybody in the room had some experience and could guess how that would go.)
I hope I'll have more time to debate in the near future :) It's almost the summer holidays so I don't even know how many trainings there will be in the near future, but I'm optimistic.
Things I (partially) forgot about debating:
- The importance of knowing your teammate. I didn't today, and I misunderstood him during prep time, so he came with arguments that were a) not good, some of them even simply wrong, and b) partially contradicted what I said (which he should have noticed, but whatever.)
- The frustration when your partner doesn't say what you think they should, even though you told them, and you're convinced your points would be far better
- The frustration when you have an excellent POI (point of information, a question you offer during the other side's speech) and the speaker doesn't accept your question
- "I don't know if they really believe X or if they just say that because they have to for their argument, I really hope it's the latter."
- The frequency of "there's the core of a really good argument there but wow the presentation is not good."
- "This is really wrong but the speaker is on my side of the house so I shouldn't wince too obviously."
- The mindset of following a debate and slotting arguments together in patterns, how nice it is if the pattern fits and is interesting and has a solid foundation
- How nice it is come out of a debate with an opinion based on solid arguments
We debated "The Southern States of the US should ban the use or display of the Confederate flag", I was the first opposition speaker. Closing government won: opening government had a huge missing link between "we ban the symbol and then racism will disappear", and closing made that link. Closing opposition was confused about Kanye West (tbh I think we could have come second if my partner had been better.) Unfortunately we didn't get as much into symbols and their meanings as I wanted to, but it was still interesting. (Also interesting was that almost nobody brought up freedom of speech and whether or not the state is allowed, I think that was partly because everybody in the room had some experience and could guess how that would go.)
I hope I'll have more time to debate in the near future :) It's almost the summer holidays so I don't even know how many trainings there will be in the near future, but I'm optimistic.
