Research

I’ve noticed that talking about doing research is a much less effective debate tool than actually doing research. Unless by some great good fortune a topic happens to fall into your area of expertise, there is probably a need to go out and learn something about that topic, often from the ground up. But, of course, life is short, and research is work, and sometimes it’s easier to watch TV and sleep late and generally find other ways to spend one’s time. As a result, you will lose your debate rounds, usually to people who did do the research. The initial determination of whether to embrace a work ethic or a goofball ethic is entirely a student’s own choice. The goofball ethic is fairly unrewarding, though, and given that most people who are initially attracted to debate have some belief in their own inherent intelligence and want to exercise it a bit, the choice of the goofball ethic is a little hard to fathom. Why would people want to lose, as they inevitably will if they don’t do the background work? I suspect that chief among the reasons people drop from the activity after a year or two is that you can just lose so much, and while everything under the sun will be blamed for these losses other than their own lack of preparedness, it’s ultimately the goofball ethic that results in another forensician biting the dust. On the bright side, of course, as juniors and seniors they have nothing to interfere with their attempts to memorize every nuance of “The Office.” What else do they have to do with their spare time?

In Policy and Extemp, where research is the backbone of the event, and it’s pretty obvious from the getgo that endless research is de rigeur, there’s probably not much of a problem understanding the need to do it (and, for that matter, the need to hit the road if you don’t intend to do it; you won’t last for more than a week or two, I would venture, if you’re not up to the task). In LD I think it may be a little harder for people to perceive how important it is to do research. Take the preemptive strike against nuclear proliferation resolution, for example. You could conceivably concentrate your energy entirely on the justice side of the argumentation, and never learn much more about the actual subject than the card you borrowed from a teammate on the effects of nuclear bombs. And this is despite the fact that the topic area is important, current, complex and fascinating. To wit, the US has been in what you might call the resolutional position since 1943, when the Soviet weapons program was inaugurated. Lines of argumentation for both sides of the rez come from Russia, Korea, India, Pakistan, Iraq (tonight’s desert? Yellowcake!), Israel, South Africa, Libya, China, Japan (yeah, I know, but there’s solid content in their antinuke position), and maybe even France and England. But you’ve got to know their stories. You’ve got to find out about them and derive the lessons these stories tell. You’ve got to do the research. Or maybe not. Maybe writing a case that is 75% framework and 25% theory is good enough. That way you can avoid meaningful argumentation altogether about a subject that may be among the most important facing the contemporary world. Sounds like a good educational choice to me, coach! No wonder so many debaters don’t want to be judged by seriously competent “lay” judges (i.e., lawyers, executives, federal court judges, etc.). Who, given the choice, would want to be evaluated by a seriously intelligent adjudicator on a subject of high interest when they are running a case bearing no relationship to that subject? Ah, digressive debate…

In Pfffft, the situation is clearer. No research, no victory. The activity, at least at the moment, has no body of digression or theory or malarkey to hide the fact that you are presented with a proposition of current political merit that you must either negate or affirm, and you don’t have much time to do it, so you’d better grab it by the horns and have at it or you’re dead in the water. Not arguing the resolution is not an option. And the resolution is announced one day, then maybe 28 days later you’re debating it. Zip, zap, zoom. But the problem is, at least at the moment for some of us, that we are coming out of an LD mentality into the Pfffft world. I believe (at least for now) that it makes some sense for students to first spend a year learning basic debate principles in the forge of LD before doing PF. That just seems to make sense to me. And of course, since Pfffft is still in its youth, most of the coaches still come from some other background, probably more often LD than speech (but I detect changes in that). In any case, the Pffffters don’t necessarily yet have the discipline or training or mindset to grasp the research needs of the activity until it’s too late, after they’ve lost to someone who has gotten that discipline or training or mindset. As students, and as coaches, we need to learn how to do the research, both individually and systemically. That is, given the fact that the starting gun goes off and we’re tossed into the thick of it almost immediately, while debating in the thick of last month’s rez, we’ve got to master the balancing act and get the job done, and we’ve got to do it fast and efficiently.

Some thoughts on how next time up. Maybe others have already addressed this elsewhere. Point me to it if that’s the case.