What happens during a NFA-LD debate round? Pt 2 of 2

Posted by Danny

December 4, 2008

If you are new to NFA-LD you may be wondering what does a NFA-LD debate round ‘look like?’ In an earlier post here, I discussed the constructive speeches and cross examination periods. This post will now cover the rebuttals:

This is a really important speech in the round. It is hard for me to imagine an affirmative debater winning a debate round without a good first rebuttal. Since your final speech is a mere 3 minute blip your substantive answers should be in this speech.

However, with the design and time limits of NFA-LD, you must learn to be strategic in this speech. You only have six minutes to answer the seven minute negative constructive. One of the best things you can do is to use your first affirmative constructive to answer as much of the first negative constructive that you can. Try to use specific pieces of evidence to show how “I’ve already addressed this point with card x.” That way you can avoid introducing new information into the debate which takes a lot of time.

Bill Sparks, Director at Cerritos, always liked to say that going fast in no way shows that one is a good debater – and I’d have to agree with him. I think the very best debaters can win a debate round, even within time constraints, by being smart and answering the arguments in the strongest way possible rather than just with “a lot of ink” (aka, a lot of arguments). So rather than answer a disadvantage with 15 arguments, 10 of which are junk and probably do not apply, spend time answering the disadvantage with the 5 quality arguments you have.

However, as with all rebutal speeches, make sure not to drop any position. By this, I mean, while you may have to gloss over specific individual arguments, make sure to address each specific position distinctly. This is where signposting, or telling the judge where you are in the debate, comes in handy. Making sure to tell the judge “next, let’s turn to disadvantage 2 – the economy” will make sure they know you are addressing each specific point.

At the end of this speech the momentum should have switched over to the affirmative side. The judge should be seeing the strenght of your first affirmative constructive and begin to understand why you introduced the case as you did in the first place.

Even more so than with the first affirmative rebuttal, every negative debater I’ve ever voted for had a good first negative rebuttal. That’s because it’s the negative’s only rebuttal. If you followed my advice from the earlier post you went from solid positions in the 1NC and now have to try to sell the story on why you’ve won.

Remember that NFA-LD is supposed to be a stock issues debate. That means that the negative only has to win one stock issue to win:

The negative may attack any of these [stock] issues, but need only win one to win the debate. The negative may also challenge the jurisdiction (topicality) of the affirmative proposal or argue that disadvantages to the proposal outweigh its benefits. From the rules.

A good negative rebuttal will explain why the disadvantages outweigh the advantages, why the topicality is important and why you won, why the counter plan is preferable to the plan, or why the on-case attacks mean a stock issue was not met.

In all rebuttal speeches, try to think like the judge – not a debater. At this point almost all judges are still undecided. Both debaters have presented good arguments – who should win? The debater who tells the best story and more importantly writes the best ballot in their speech. The easiest rounds for me to judge are ones where the debater gives me the language I will need to write on the ballot. For example, a good rebuttalist may say:

The affirmative’s answers on the disadvantage are insufficient. Their attacks on my impact scenario are merely mitigation saying the civil war in Cuba will not be ‘that bad.’ This means the civil war will happen and when compared to the case this disadvantage outweighs because real people’s lives will be lost and there is a chance Venezuela will get drawn into the conflict.

Try to say the things you want the judge to write on the ballot.

This is one of the hardest speeches to give. Hopefully you’ll be able to use the arguments you made in the 1AR to mitigate the issues the 1NR identified. Again, know your case and know where your strengths are in the debate.

All great rebuttals weave refutation with voting issues – you want to try both to refute any arguments left on the table while explaining why the issues mean you win. Usually you want to sell your solvency story.

You only have three minutes – be careful with ‘speeding up’ during this speech. Since it is so short there may be a tendency to start talking faster – but that’s not always helpful. Rather than saying ‘more’ but talking faster, say ‘more’ by making better arguments. Focus on the key issues.

After the round

After every round I would recommend going up and shaking the debater’s hand for a good debate. This is polite and shows that even though you just spent 45 minutes disagreeing with each you can still have respect for the debater.

Make sure to give back any files that you requested from the other side and grab any of your files that you lent to the opposing debater. If you make an extra copy of your files and put it on colored paper that will make this process go smoother.

You’ll then want to file away all your briefs correctly! Take a few minutes and make sure to put the files back in the right folder. That way you can make sure to be able to find it during the next round.

Head back to postings to get the information about the next round – Congrats – you are done!

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