Think horizontally, act vertically

Today is sexually-complicated day in Bracketology Land. You’ll see what I mean when you give it a try.

TOC is winding up. One of the most common reports from first-time attendees is that, when all is said and done, it’s just another debate tournament. Precisely. One does wish that all debate tournaments were so lush, however: no rounds at night, plenty of classrooms, lunch restaurants within walking distance, enough experienced judges that most of them complain that they’ve got nothing to do. Quite a contrast to the usual locked-down high school with piped in debate ziti and one judge less than you really need to run the thing and it ends at three in the morning and then you’ve got a bus ride home in the middle of a blizzard. Actually, TOC Monday is a bit of a stretch on the lush-o-meter. First, there’s the Breakfast of Champions (price not included in the registration fee), which goes on for a couple of hours and there’s a lot of backslapping among people you don’t really know, and speeches over a sound system that only broadcasts every other word, and everybody is packed into the banquet room with just enough space to slurp your grits if you’re really careful and provided no one is left-handed on your side. Then there’s the distribution of the trophies, followed by the announcement of the breaks, which are in the bedrooms of people staying at the tournament hotel. I so love judging in bed; it’s my number two horizontal activity, right after ducking when Tik pronounced teek takes a flying leap at my head from the top of the bureau at three in the morning. When you’re not judging breaks, you’re hanging around waiting for your plane. TOC doesn’t really end, it just fades away, person by person. That’s why there’s such a brouhaha over final-round judges, not because of a desire to pick a great panel (although that desire is there) but because of a need to have any panel. When there’s no hired judges, and everybody has got a plane to catch, you need to isolate early on those whose planes are leaving late. It’s a strange situation.

Since I am not in the position this year to experience TOC firsthand, and have nothing in their place but the endless ravings of O’C, who spends almost all of his time at tournaments trying to figure out people’s records or, in situations like CatNats where it’s all in code, people’s names, I have put the bonus time to good use reading Foucault. Or bad use. Madness and Civilization will not be appearing on my reading list any time soon. It is not relevant to debate (unless, perhaps, you read the unabridged French version, where all the useful stuff is). It is exactly what it says it is, a history of madness. Near the end it does allude to the power of the doctors residing in their general wisdom and perception of having knowledge/power, and if you’re interested in the birth of Freudianism there’s relevant material on one-on-one philosophy, but how this gets applied to LD is beyond me. I mean, if the topic were, Resolved, the insane should be put in leper colonies, then maybe. Or for that matter, the $ircuit should be put in leper colonies, then I’m with you all the way. Still, I do love the idea of the Narrenschiff, the ship of fools, which has been replaced in modern times by the Disney cruise lines, if I’m not mistaken. And no doubt there is other Foucault reading that would address the issues with which I associate him, but life is short, and that new Chabon novel is just waving at me, saying, Come on, I’m yours for the asking. Chabon vs Foucault. Chabon, Foucault. Chab, Fou. No contest. Sorry, Paul-Michel. Fou-eee.