Wang's Proudest Sober Moment
I'm not proud of much, or anything, but this is probably the greatest moment of my life:
Okay, so I'm not sure how familiar anybody is with Higschool Policy Debate. It's not as relaxed or argument-based as it sounds. It's highly structrued, highly specific, requires a sick level of organizational skill (both in preparing, and during the round), and the most important is arguably "being able to talk so fucking fast that nobody but the people in the room have any fucking idea what you're saying." The last one is usually the most disconcerting for newcomers, or people who casually step-in on rounds. Each 2-man team has to get SO much information into such a short period of time (8 minutes or 5 minutes) that the result resembles complete gobbledegook. You have to train yourself to speed through your evidence, and make yourself as clear as possible without sacrificing a single second of your clock.
Policy Debate teams are pretty starkly divided into Haves and Havenots. The amount of specific research that's necessary is mind-boggling.
The Haves send their charges to week-long and month-long summer Debate Camps where everyone competes, but eventually shares all the research they've been doing for 8 hours a day, 6 days a week.
The Havenots try to steal this evidence from their opponents. It's unethical, but I rationalize such behavior by telling myself that I'm a terrible person. I realize that's not much of a justification, but you have to understand that I gave up at a very early age.
The Haves have access to expensive research tools, like Lexis-Nexis and the like.
The Havenots read "The Flint Journal" and "USA Today" in the vain hope that SOMETHING on topic will come up. Otherwise, we make shit up and hope we don't get caught (<--- more effective than one would think).
Anyway, my squad was a Havenot squad. My senior year, I ponied up the dough and took my partner to MSU's renowned debate camp. I was a badass debater, but I was sick of having to rely on only sound logic. Basically, I had to force judges to vote for my team based on my acerbic wit, ruthless cross-examinations, and charisma. At some point, that's just not enough, skill advantages aside. So I bit the bullet, spent the CAISH, and went to NerdCamp. It paid off, and my partner and I qualified for the State Tournament for the first time in the history of the school. We had a decent run, but really couldn't compete with the hardcore schools. We didn't break to the elimination rounds, but the final round of Group Play was against the best squad in the state, and the eventual repeat State Champs.
We were getting blitzed. We couldn't keep up, didn't have enough text to effectively combat the waves and waves of evidence they threw at us. They were just mopping the floor with us. Until they got cocky and made a mistake. They tied almost their ENTIRE Negative position to how Warren Rehnquist would rule 4 years down the line on a Hypothetical Supreme Court case. (I told you policy debate is anal as fuck.)
During my 2AR (our team's final speech, and the 7th of 8 in the entire match), I stood up with no notes, and a single piece of evidence. It was pulled out of my ass, tracked down from my pathetically small filebox of bullshit. Here's my entire 2AR, in its entirety (with some technical jargon left out):
Wang: "We're getting killed in this round, and everyone here knows it. They're the best team in the state, and whether they take these ballots or not, they're probably going to end up winning the Tournament.
"But they can't win. Rehnquist is probably going to kick the bucket, and soon."
I then proceeded to read a selection from a random newspaper article I'd tagged and tossed into my evidence box two weeks prior. It detailed Rehnquist's increasingly troublesome health, and speculated on whether he'd step down.
"You see, their entire Counterplan- their ONLY remaining position, because they kicked out of everything else knowing we had no way to deal with it- depends on Rehnquist being alive in 4 years. He probably won't be. He's going to die, and even though they kicked our asses all round, you have no choice but to slide your ballots in our direction here, unless they have incredibly compelling evidence to the contrary.
"I know it sucks, and I know you want to vote for them because they're obviously the much superior team. But you can't. You're compelled. Because Rehnquist is going to be dead soon. I'm sorry for leaving you no choice but to justify your ballot based on the Chief Justice's impending death, but you have to. Otherwise you're both terrible judges. Thank you."
The entire 2AR, of a possible 5 minutes, lasted exactly 64 seconds. When I sat down, our opponents used their remaining prep time, and launched a massive counter-attack, reading scores of dense evidence, spouting theoretical arguments, and generally being very good at what they do.
But they didn't have a SINGLE piece of evidence that suggested Rehnquist WOULD be alive in 4 years.
When we got the ballots back, we'd stolen both. I was ranked 4th out of 4 speakers on each, and the scorekeeping methods Debate Judges used reflected their utter disgust with me. One judge wrote that she'd "never been more disgusted with a round, or a decision." She also said that my "ultimately winning argument was crass, disrespectful, but too compelling to ignore. I have never been more ashamed to vote for any team during my entire judging tenure."
The other judge simply wrote, "The round came down to whether or not the NEGs could prove Rehnquist would live another 4 years. They couldn't. 2ARs delivery was arrogant and incredibly unprofessional, but he's right and I have no choice. Round goes to the AFFs. Rehnquist is going to 'kick the bucket?' Real classy."
Like I said, we ended up eliminated from the tournament in the early stages, but I can proudly say I beat one of the best pairs of debaters in the entire country with the argument: "Supreme Court Justice Warren Rehnquist is going to kick the bucket, soon."
I still keep the ballots with me, and had them up on my wall for years.
"Real Classy."
...damn right, motherfucker.
Okay, so I'm not sure how familiar anybody is with Higschool Policy Debate. It's not as relaxed or argument-based as it sounds. It's highly structrued, highly specific, requires a sick level of organizational skill (both in preparing, and during the round), and the most important is arguably "being able to talk so fucking fast that nobody but the people in the room have any fucking idea what you're saying." The last one is usually the most disconcerting for newcomers, or people who casually step-in on rounds. Each 2-man team has to get SO much information into such a short period of time (8 minutes or 5 minutes) that the result resembles complete gobbledegook. You have to train yourself to speed through your evidence, and make yourself as clear as possible without sacrificing a single second of your clock.
Policy Debate teams are pretty starkly divided into Haves and Havenots. The amount of specific research that's necessary is mind-boggling.
The Haves send their charges to week-long and month-long summer Debate Camps where everyone competes, but eventually shares all the research they've been doing for 8 hours a day, 6 days a week.
The Havenots try to steal this evidence from their opponents. It's unethical, but I rationalize such behavior by telling myself that I'm a terrible person. I realize that's not much of a justification, but you have to understand that I gave up at a very early age.
The Haves have access to expensive research tools, like Lexis-Nexis and the like.
The Havenots read "The Flint Journal" and "USA Today" in the vain hope that SOMETHING on topic will come up. Otherwise, we make shit up and hope we don't get caught (<--- more effective than one would think).
Anyway, my squad was a Havenot squad. My senior year, I ponied up the dough and took my partner to MSU's renowned debate camp. I was a badass debater, but I was sick of having to rely on only sound logic. Basically, I had to force judges to vote for my team based on my acerbic wit, ruthless cross-examinations, and charisma. At some point, that's just not enough, skill advantages aside. So I bit the bullet, spent the CAISH, and went to NerdCamp. It paid off, and my partner and I qualified for the State Tournament for the first time in the history of the school. We had a decent run, but really couldn't compete with the hardcore schools. We didn't break to the elimination rounds, but the final round of Group Play was against the best squad in the state, and the eventual repeat State Champs.
We were getting blitzed. We couldn't keep up, didn't have enough text to effectively combat the waves and waves of evidence they threw at us. They were just mopping the floor with us. Until they got cocky and made a mistake. They tied almost their ENTIRE Negative position to how Warren Rehnquist would rule 4 years down the line on a Hypothetical Supreme Court case. (I told you policy debate is anal as fuck.)
During my 2AR (our team's final speech, and the 7th of 8 in the entire match), I stood up with no notes, and a single piece of evidence. It was pulled out of my ass, tracked down from my pathetically small filebox of bullshit. Here's my entire 2AR, in its entirety (with some technical jargon left out):
Wang: "We're getting killed in this round, and everyone here knows it. They're the best team in the state, and whether they take these ballots or not, they're probably going to end up winning the Tournament.
"But they can't win. Rehnquist is probably going to kick the bucket, and soon."
I then proceeded to read a selection from a random newspaper article I'd tagged and tossed into my evidence box two weeks prior. It detailed Rehnquist's increasingly troublesome health, and speculated on whether he'd step down.
"You see, their entire Counterplan- their ONLY remaining position, because they kicked out of everything else knowing we had no way to deal with it- depends on Rehnquist being alive in 4 years. He probably won't be. He's going to die, and even though they kicked our asses all round, you have no choice but to slide your ballots in our direction here, unless they have incredibly compelling evidence to the contrary.
"I know it sucks, and I know you want to vote for them because they're obviously the much superior team. But you can't. You're compelled. Because Rehnquist is going to be dead soon. I'm sorry for leaving you no choice but to justify your ballot based on the Chief Justice's impending death, but you have to. Otherwise you're both terrible judges. Thank you."
The entire 2AR, of a possible 5 minutes, lasted exactly 64 seconds. When I sat down, our opponents used their remaining prep time, and launched a massive counter-attack, reading scores of dense evidence, spouting theoretical arguments, and generally being very good at what they do.
But they didn't have a SINGLE piece of evidence that suggested Rehnquist WOULD be alive in 4 years.
When we got the ballots back, we'd stolen both. I was ranked 4th out of 4 speakers on each, and the scorekeeping methods Debate Judges used reflected their utter disgust with me. One judge wrote that she'd "never been more disgusted with a round, or a decision." She also said that my "ultimately winning argument was crass, disrespectful, but too compelling to ignore. I have never been more ashamed to vote for any team during my entire judging tenure."
The other judge simply wrote, "The round came down to whether or not the NEGs could prove Rehnquist would live another 4 years. They couldn't. 2ARs delivery was arrogant and incredibly unprofessional, but he's right and I have no choice. Round goes to the AFFs. Rehnquist is going to 'kick the bucket?' Real classy."
Like I said, we ended up eliminated from the tournament in the early stages, but I can proudly say I beat one of the best pairs of debaters in the entire country with the argument: "Supreme Court Justice Warren Rehnquist is going to kick the bucket, soon."
I still keep the ballots with me, and had them up on my wall for years.
"Real Classy."
...damn right, motherfucker.
posted by Derek at 7:31 AM
6 Comments:
That's an awesome story. I don't even care if it's true.
As James Hetfield would say, "Sad But True." When I got up this morning (230AM), I reflexively put on a pair of athletic shorts and a cutoff. The old t-shirt I happened to grab is the one I got for the 2000-2001 State Policy Debate Tournament, which reminded me of this story.
During the 2-day event, the four kids we brought stayed at a pretty nice hotel in Novi (I think). Debaters are supernerds, but I brought a whole fuckton of booze with me because (a) I was pretty good friends with the other 3 guys (b) our schedule called for us to finish the first day at 8PM and start the second day at 3PM, and (c) our coach was so reliant upon me to basically run the squad, that there was nothing she could feasibly do if she caught me; I'd just say "fine I quit, and the program is in complete shambles. Oh, and I'm going to tell everybody that you let me skip your class and go to McDonald's like every day."
Thank God it never came to that.
Anyway, everybody pussed out, so I just drank by myself. I mean, come on: who would pass up an opportunity to say, "Man, I got WRECKED at the State Debate Tournament!" Well, lots of people. Not me.
Around 1130, I was pretty drunk, hanging out being all hammered in the hotel room I shared with my partner, when our coach called a "strategy meeting" at the hotel pool/hottub. I took fifteen minutes to compose myself, and told everyone else that they had to make sure I didn't do anything too stupid. I had one man on "Volume Control," and he made sure I didn't talk too loud or too soft. I had a second on "RambleControl," and his job was to make sure I didn't start babbling on nonsensically. The final kid had the kill switch. If I was starting to head downhill, he was going to inform our coach that we had some "pretty important prep work to do" and that "we'll probably be up all night as it is."
Thankfully I'm a good drunk, and the only issue was volume, which was nearly disasterous. But it ended up not being an issue, because I just swam laps the entire time.
I'm pretty sure I should have drowned.
Napa Don once again. Hilarious blog entry followed by a classic "drunk on a school trip" comment reply. If you ever need a floor, well I could probably free up a couch, in Iowa give me a hollar and we'll get shit faced.
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Funny story. You should definately post pics of the judges votes. (Go FCP!)
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