If I were to rely entirely on the readership of people whom I have said nice things about, the VCA would be even tinier than it already is. Nonetheless, it is nice to see Mr. Palmer among that number, at least for the time being. No doubt we can shake him off the next time I decide I want to comment on post-neo-gothic-classical-revival pre-cambrian architecture in Dubai. Or at the point when I somehow manage to peg him as the second biggest piker in the northeast (with the understanding that Noah has pretty much sewn up first place). Either one is bound to happen before long.
As I thought, O’C says it really was his comment that a league should be a league. There’s no question that, when I’ve been in Massachusetts, the tournaments have felt as if they were a part of a bigger thing, even when they weren’t. That is, Lexington Winter would exist exactly as it does absent the MFL, but its membership in the MFL allows it to fall under a set of uniform rules, and allows the members of the MFL to see that the tournament is there, and available. The membership concept works even better for something like Little Lex, or other small events. It’s nice to see all the available events in one place online, where you can get the details, sign up, note the qualifications, see the results, etc. Not bad.
My discussions with NFL back in the Fall included things along these lines. When I complained about being a Red Light District, one of the problems I posed was that, in our region, we already have an active set of local leagues, the MHL and CFL, filling up every available weekend with forensics contests. Some folks, like the Remarkably Most Holy Rev B.A., conduct their local league under the titular auspices of the NFL, and that makes sense if there’s nothing there already. Our local problem is that there is no gap for the NFL to fill, hence we don’t fill it. Or something like that. (I was arguing, essentially, that we were already doing the most that we could, and that it was, in fact, quite a bit, which was why there was no incentive for NFL membership in the region.)
Still, that leaves the big issue of a state organization, and I’m with O’C on this. As Chris says in his comment yesterday, size is a factor. New York is large, with what seems to me to be 4 distinct regions: Long Island, Manhattan, Hudson Valley, Upstate. Their distinction is not so much geography as rough balance in size, with geography merely a side (but eminently important) issue. But why aren’t the regions and their tournaments coordinated under the NYSFL? Why don’t they operate under the same rules? Why don’t they publicize on one single site? Chris already makes the tabroom.com software available to the league, so it’s merely a matter of extension. All the NYSFL does is the one tournament each year. I wish it at least did that tournament better. But a bigger vision wouldn’t hurt either.
New York does seem to have forensic programs directed almost entirely at the States tournament. Which is almost entirely directed back at those programs. I won’t disparage those programs, because I like any program that pushes forensics, and who am I to criticize anyone else’s hard work? And I strongly believe in the good intentions of the individuals involved in the State organization, who work hard and, to my knowledge, do so as volunteers. But as I say, there is little question that the State organization exists entirely to run a tournament, and it runs that tournament in a vacuum, or at best only in a spiritual congruence with those programs that reflectively aim only at States. This penalizes programs that are not of this number, whereas a good system would penalize no one. The lack of good qualification process vis-à-vis elimination rounds is a perfect example of this (and the recent clarification of this process, limiting it even further, is baffling, given the small size of the varsity division in one of the country’s most active LD states). The inclination to run PF according to a process that will make tabbing easier, rather than to follow NFL rules and simply do a better job of tabbing, is another indication. (The CFL screwed that up in their version of PF; we didn’t need to echo their error, hamstringing a new activity with multiple conflicting rules. If the CFL was against PF, then they shouldn't have done it. That’s a better choice than baptizing it against its will and making it attend a church with different rites—how's that for a metaphor?)
But I will admit that the bottom line for me may be sour grapes. I officially complained about the way the organization was being run after complaining unofficially and getting no satisfaction. I suggested that the membership of the league be allowed to vote on issues. This was seen as an attack on the directors’ integrity, rather than a suggestion that the directors needed to consult their constituencies. I tried to play nice, but I know that I have been vilified by the organization, which ought to have something better to do than complain about me. Hell, I paid my $30 dues. I’m entitled to my opinion. You took the $30. You’re forced to listen to it.
The best action is action itself. Therefore, after much cogitation, I have decided not to send any debaters to States this year. I might have, if they had promised 5 real rounds, which is merely one of my beefs, but not even that is in the cards. In fact, in my grand list of beefs, a veritable cow load of complaining, not one change has been made. Not one indication of interest in change has been made, aside from a comment that there might have been five rounds if they had gotten the college venue. It’s a shame, really. When the state championship is widely perceived as being a poor tournament, and people only attend out of pro forma obligation and general inertia, and when your best students, having been burned once, refuse to attend a second time, then you know there’s a problem. When people with ideas for change don’t even bother to offer their services to effect those changes, you know the problem is entrenched beyond much hope. What changes I wish to bring about in forensics, I will do in arenas where change is possible. The NYSFL, unfortunately, does not seem to be one of those places.
Sigh…
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