I have read both of these essays with a combination of sadness, dismay and gratitude. Sadness, because an extra curricular activity that was most formative in my, and other high school debaters' careers seems gone. Dismay that an organization like NSDA--National Forensic League when I was debating--would allow--never mind encourage--judg…
I have read both of these essays with a combination of sadness, dismay and gratitude. Sadness, because an extra curricular activity that was most formative in my, and other high school debaters' careers seems gone. Dismay that an organization like NSDA--National Forensic League when I was debating--would allow--never mind encourage--judges to decide debates based on individually designed, poorly defined, subjective and arbitrary criteria and not on the logic, skill, research ability and merit of the individual debaters. The only important role of the NSDA is to sponsor debate meets where aspiring speakers are encouraged to openly, freely and honestly debate both sides of a topic. Now, NSDA's conduct plainly discourages competitive debate.
And I am grateful that my high school and college debate career was in the late 1960's and 1970's is well behind me. In those years we had plenty of social unrest and upheaval related to civil rights, inflation and the Vietnam War. While those subjects became our debate topics, nobody was required to self-police their speech so as not to disturb the fragile sensitivities of the debate judge--literally the only "adult" in the room. For that I am grateful and for the fact that competitive debate taught me skills I continue to use every day, more than 50 years later.
I have read both of these essays with a combination of sadness, dismay and gratitude. Sadness, because an extra curricular activity that was most formative in my, and other high school debaters' careers seems gone. Dismay that an organization like NSDA--National Forensic League when I was debating--would allow--never mind encourage--judges to decide debates based on individually designed, poorly defined, subjective and arbitrary criteria and not on the logic, skill, research ability and merit of the individual debaters. The only important role of the NSDA is to sponsor debate meets where aspiring speakers are encouraged to openly, freely and honestly debate both sides of a topic. Now, NSDA's conduct plainly discourages competitive debate.
And I am grateful that my high school and college debate career was in the late 1960's and 1970's is well behind me. In those years we had plenty of social unrest and upheaval related to civil rights, inflation and the Vietnam War. While those subjects became our debate topics, nobody was required to self-police their speech so as not to disturb the fragile sensitivities of the debate judge--literally the only "adult" in the room. For that I am grateful and for the fact that competitive debate taught me skills I continue to use every day, more than 50 years later.