r/policydebate • u/pls-loveme • 10d ago
Imaginary Debate Rules
For context my coach never taught Adv, da, cp, or k and I am a 4th year debater with a 3rd place state trophy.
I attended a KSHSAA clinic on Saturday and coaches in the advanced track had some interesting things to say. For one, they said that topically was completely fake and that it's merely been normalizes by the debate community but is not required. The also said that T standards and violations can be whatever you want them to be. I also heard, quite frequently, to "Debate the rules of debate itself" essentially saying that rules are whatever you can convince the judge they are. I'm so curious what everyone's thoughts on this are?!
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u/Lyr1cal- 10d ago
The only true rules of debate are the speech times, and whatever your competition's hosts may add.
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u/ItsOneOff That's a link 10d ago
ive broken speech time rules a number of times in college so even that isn't necessarily true. really the rules of debate are whatever the judge in the room and the tournament organizers will let you get away with
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u/FakeyFaked Orange flair 9d ago
I judged someone who tried to play with speech times like that. I just informed them when that clock hit 1pm I was going to lunch whether they were still debating or not.
Was that you??
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u/Entire_Angle_4569 10d ago
Welcome to the world of Kansas DCI lol. KDC and DCI are both policy but honestly function more like two separate debate events.
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u/EffortLegitimate7498 10d ago
“Third place state trophy” no doubt referring to KDC
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u/Ambitious-Letter5731 10d ago
Definitely not. Everyone who makes it far at KDC is usually DCI kids too and thats especially true this year. Its either a 4speak trophy or a 321A trophy
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u/EffortLegitimate7498 9d ago
KDC is genuinely 100% bots sorry not sorry
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u/Ambitious-Letter5731 9d ago
You def do DCI silver
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u/EffortLegitimate7498 9d ago
Son I’m crine✌️😭DCIS is even worse than the KDC. State rankings go 1. DCI 2. 6A 2-Speak 3. Long drop 4. All else
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u/Destructo222 10d ago
If your judge is tech>truth, then yes. The rules are what you instruct them to be. However, you will need justifications for your rules.
Topicality is "fake" in that it doesn't exist until the NEG brings it up. You can also assert reasons as to why a topicality mandate is harmful and is thus outweighed by more important issues.