By Beth Mendenhall
• Introduction
• Why you should listen
• Please ask questions
• How to write the 1NC
• What is framework? Types of interpretations
• Standards/Voters/Impacts
• What to expect in the 2AC
• How to give the block
• How to win on framework
• A debate about the rules
• What are Affs allowed to advocate?
• What does the ballot signify?
• What counts as a reason to vote for you?
• A strategic tool
• Not an ideology or a lifestyle
• Not an entire 1NC
• What its NOT
• Telling someone to “get out of our activity”
• An opportunity to complain about particular teams
• The utilitarianism/consequences debate about how you weigh
advantages
• Resolved: The United States
federal government should
substantially increase its
transportation infrastructure
investment in the United States
• Like topicality, in that it uses the resolution to
prove that the 1AC was not a reason to vote
Aff
• Most people think its different from topicality
because it uses the whole resolution, or the
notion of a resolution, instead of particular
words
• I disagree
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Definition
Interpretation
Standards
Voters
• Should I include cards…?
• “The United States federal government”
• The AGENT of the Affirmative
• Roleplaying – you can’t be yourself, you have to pretend to be the
government
• “Resolved” and/or “Should”
• The SUBJECT of the Affirmative
• Policy action? Implementation?
• The Affirmative as advocating an action, not engaging in a thought
• “substantially increase”
• The OBJECT of the Affirmative
• Allows other actors to increase transportation infrastructure investment in
other ways
• Different standards apply more to different interpretations
• The WARRANTS for your CLAIM about what the debate should
be about
• The ADVANTAGES that the judge uses to weigh one
interpretation against another
• The LINKS to your ultimate impacts: education and fairness
• Highly inter-related – “limits are key to predictability is key to
ground…”
• That’s fine, but you have to link it to the IMPACTS: education and fairness
• The argument:
• our interpretation appropriately limits the number/type of Affs you can win
the ballot with
• their interpretation under-limits the number/type of Affs you can win the
ballot with – it allows too many
• The impacts:
• Allowing too many Aff arguments gives the Aff team a strategic advantage
• Places an overwhelming research burden on the Neg
• Allowing too many Aff arguments undermines education
• We would have less debates on the same Affs because Aff teams would
switch all the time to seek the element of surprise
• More debates on less Affs is better for education than a different Aff
every round
• The argument:
• Our interpretation ensures that any Aff that is run could have reasonably
been predicted by the neg
• Their interpretation allows Affs that the Neg probably won’t have any
research on, because they didn’t see it coming
• The impacts:
• Unpredictable Aff arguments gives the Aff team a strategic advantage –
they had “infinite prep” to prepare while the Neg has nothing
• This is bad for participation – no one wants to play a rigged game
• Unpredictable Aff arguments decrease clash – we’ll be forced to run
generics
• Targeted negatives are better for education on both sides, because
they force an in-depth discussion about the Aff
• The argument:
• Our interpretation only allows Aff arguments that give the Neg a
sufficient set of responses
• Their interpretation allows Affs that the negative does/will not have
sufficient responses to
• The impacts:
• Constraining the relative amount of arguments the Neg can make
compared to the Aff gives the Aff team a strategic advantage
• Makes all Neg arguments predictable for the Aff
• Lack of Neg arguments decreases education
• Doesn’t allow the Aff to be tested in multiple ways
• Limits the amount of arguments the Neg could present at all
• An important impact to focus on because its likely to be one of the
Aff’s sources of offense
• Specifically – TOPIC education
• Every debate is educational to some degree – why is education about the
resolution better than education about anything else?
• It changes – forces us to learn about more things
• Its democratic – the topic process allows us to choose what we learn about
as a community
• This topic is uniquely good – why do we need to learn about
transportation infrastructure?
• Emphasize – resolution-focused debate has two types of educational
advantages over the Aff interpretation
• It has a better LINK to education – promotes clash that enhances education for
all participants – not just the ones that wrote the 1AC
• It has a bigger education IMPACT – promotes a uniquely important TYPE of
education
• An important impact, but one you should be careful about
• Notions of “fairness” are more likely to link to the Affs offense – fair for
whom? Who determines what’s “fair”?
• Fairness is hard to quantify – how fair is fair enough, and how fair is too
fair?
• Links to fairness:
• Anything that gives the Aff a strategic advantage over the negative,
giving them a higher chance of winning JUST BECAUSE they are Aff
• Why is fairness important?
• Participation – no one plays a rigged game
• Anything else?? Self-evident importance isn’t good enough…
• Links to USFG interpretation – you must pretend to be the
government
• Offers unique impacts
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Benefit: participatory democracy on the part of citizens
Benefit: education about government policies
Benefit: teaches us to be future policy-makers
Impact: totalitarianism?
• Links to Aff exclusion/knowledge production arguments
• Look to the 1AC
• We meet
• Usually a stretch, but must be answered
• Depending on which interpretation they claim to meet, it might be
strategic to concede
• Counter-interpretation
• Make sure to figure out exactly what this is- use CX
• Almost always more expansive than yours
• DEFENSE
• OFFENSE
• Predictability is non-unique – new Affs, new Add-Ons
• Your answer: those things COULD have been predicted based on the
resolution, but weren’t. Your Aff COULD NOT have been predicted at all
• Our Aff was on the Wiki
• Your answer: that doesn’t resolve ALL of our standards, not everyone
(novices, small schools) knows about/uses the wiki, and your interpretation
justifies new Affs that AREN’T on the Wiki
• “You could’ve said…”
• Your answer: ground is not the same as PREDICTABLE ground – just
because we could theoretically have an answer doesn’t mean we should
be practically expected to
• Exclusion – you decide who is worthy/able to participate, assigning
value to certain groups and no value to others
• Excludes those who the government excludes – they can’t role-play
• Identity Politics and Performance Affs
• Links to limits arguments
• Knowledge production – you recreate/reinforce bad ideas about
reality
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The government is the only relevant actor
Plans/policies/choices should be determined by consequences
Life experience is irrelevant
Links to topic education arguments
• Discipline/Rules
• Exploitative power relations
• Links to fairness/jurisdiction arguments
• Other impacts from the Aff
• Start with a description of your interpretation – what
Affirmatives it includes and excludes
• Follow with a brief explanation of your best standards/voters
• Follow the line-by-line
• (1) AT – “we meet” and counter-interpretation
• Explain your standards backwards – “this is unpredictable bc…”
• (2) AT – their cards
• READ THEM
• Don’t ignore cross-applications
• Extend your offense
• (3) Read your cards
• ACCESS – even if they prove that theoretically their type of
education is better, does their interpretation allow everyone to
receive that education?
• PARTICIPATION – do they promote a type of debate that
encourages novices to stay and new programs to join? Or would
it be frustrating/confusing/un-rewarding for them
• THIS TOPIC – what is learning about USFG transportation
infrastructure investment important?
• Link it to their impacts – does the status quo USFG transportation system
do what they criticize?
• Read cards that every-day people need to learn about this topic or the
USFG will control the topic in a bad way
• DO IT ON THE NEGATIVE – solves your offense
• Why does your argument need to be presented on the Aff to solve its impacts?
• Especially persuasive if the Aff criticizes the notion of the resolution – what does it link
to? Better link on the Neg
• List DAs to doing it on the Aff
• Lack of Neg preparation = uneducational debate
• SWITCH-SIDE DEBATE– solves your offense
• Learning the other side is good – strengthens your argument
• Key to clash – clash key to education
• Dogmatism bad
• TOPICAL VERSION OF THE AFF – solves your offense
• Give multiple examples
• Un-predictability means we don’t have to answer your impact turns
• Winning an argument doesn’t mean the ballot should consider it – arguments you
shouldn’t get in the first place are irrelevant