I am writing from the Binghamton debate tournament. It blows. I have judged every debate the whole tournament, including all 5 that occurred yesterday. Not to mention that each of those rounds was scheduled for like 3 hours, which meant that I literally left my fifth debate at 10:05 pm. That doesn't even account for the fact that 1) my last round was JV and 2) I get my shit started and finished on time. We didn't leave the school until about 10:45. It sucked ballz and sucked them very aggressively. Yesterday was a bad day all around. I officially have it off my chest and absent something more shitty occuring over the course of awards, sems, and finals, I will make no further mention of it. Leaving it there.
What follows is a literal transcription of a phone message I received the other day from the mobile telephone of APK:
"Penisssssss, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis. No dude, we should, uhh, watch Lost first. Penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis. Can we watch Lost first...(trailing off, phone handed to Sanjay)
Penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis penis...(2 second break)...penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis. (to Andy) You wanna do some penis? (phone handed back to Andy)
Penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis.
(Sanjay in background) I wanna do some penis. Lets do some penis. (phone handed to Sanjay) Penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis, penis.
(handed back to Andy) Penis, penis, penis, penis, penis. Penisssss!"
Its up there among the best messages I have ever been left. It doesn't really top the genital version of "Auld Lang Syne" or Kevin's series of computer speak raps. But its a high quality message none the less.
I am in one of the weirdest debates that could possibly exist. If you know anything about debate I've probably told you my general feelings towards performancey args. While I have voted for them before and will do so again (unfortunately) I don't find them really interesting. The thing that really doesn't make sense to me is that this is a novice debate and at this here Binghamton tournament, the novice debates are supposed to be (and I think mostly are) true novices, in their first or second debate tournament. While I certainly am not intending to imply that as a result they don't know anything or aren't capable of sophisticated argument, but what they certainly are not capable of are arguments about the way "debate is always done" or the way "debate traditionally deals with the concept of history." Not because they are stupid, but simply because they don't have any experience with policy debate. It doesn't seem genuine and its not a convincing personal advocacy when the audience knows for a fact that its no more a personal advocacy than any other team that has had their 1ac handed them by their coach. I think that would be a good argument, but its irrelevant for the purpose of this debate.
If you want to fuck with traditional debate, thats cool. You can debate however you want in the time allotted to you, don't get me wrong. That doesn't necessarily mean you win, it doesn't necessarily mean you don't. The way you win performance debates is by being such a quality debater that you can overcome the general stupidiy of your arguments.I think thats alot easier to do if you've learned the basics of the activity, the way to most efficiently phrase and articulate arguments. Its alot easier to mess with something when you understand it then it is to screw with it from the outset. I should also note that during the 1ar we were about as close as its possible to get to a repeat of the dot's NDT performance without public indecency ( I don't know if bras count or not).
Last comment about the debate I am judging. One of the dude's from Army has a distinctly non-American accent, seems to be Eastern European, I'm not smart enough to place it more specific than that. Anyway, the dude from Bard spent a fair amount of time juggling and the Army folks caught on this really quickly and it was their specific example of the ridiculousness of the aff. This resulted in both the 2nc and 2nr noting that he did not come "to learn about juggling balls." Thats funny in anyone's book.
I would normally add something to this, since I wrote it yesterday and am posting it today. However, it is Valentine's day, and hence the day Katie and I got engaged 2 years ago, so I'm going to spend my time with her.
Peace,
MB-K
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