We’re not looking all the bad novice-wise after all. Last night we had seven or eight, and most of them are signed up or almost signed up for the Yahoo group, so we’re a little above average for the year, which is very good. What I’ve noticed about this group of punks yesterday is that they seemed to disagree with everything I said, which is always a good sign. It’s not as if I know what I’m talking about all of the time; this happens just some of the time, usually when the moon is in Scorpio, Jupiter aligns with Mars, and Stephen Sondheim doesn’t have a new show in workshop mode (no doubt struggling with a problematic Act Two).
So what don’t I know that I’m talking about this time? According to “Good Old ‘Alli’,” the negative can demur from taking a position on Sept-Oct by claiming that since there is no agent of action specified, one cannot make a moral determination. Very clever. (And rather ignorant of a rather large body of ethical philosophy, but that’s beside the point.) It would seem to me that the Aff has three options. First, concede the round, because the negative has found the perfect critique of the resolution, and there you are, nothing can be done, let’s all go to the cafeteria and play Spades. The second option is to contend contrarily that the agent of action doesn’t matter in moral determinations, thus moving the debate to the negative’s ground, which, even if it’s a reasonable position, seems like less than a great strategy to me simply because that means the affirmative gives up the natural advantage it has of setting all the parameters of the debate. This is the problem with negative critiques, from the aff’s point of view: there’s that switch of control of the narrative from Aff to Neg. One would imagine that the Aff would avoid this at all costs, although if something comes out of left field (and throwing balls out of left field is the admitted purpose of critiques in the first place) you’re sort of up a tree. The third option is, if this is a common critique that is run often, to preempt it with analysis that clearly provides an agent of action or an explanation of the role (or lack thereof) of an agent of action. At the very least this keeps the debate about the content of the resolution, and not about whether the resolution is debatable in the first place. And it certainly won’t hurt if the neg doesn’t run that particular critique.
Silly me, wanting to debate the resolution. Will I never get over this? But that relates to the aff’s biggest advantage, and in today’s environment, I think, aff’s biggest weakness. Affs, who are, after all, on the other side running neg arguments half the time, many of those arguments being of this critical nature, for some reason now think the the neg has an intrinsic edge in all rounds, presumably because of neg’s ability to run critiques. But as I say, it is the first speaker who outlines the parameters of the subsequent discussion. It is the first speaker who defines the terms, and sets the stage for what happens. At the point where the Aff cedes control of these parameters, the aff is giving the round away. Aff gets the first word and the last word, yet people seem to think that neg has the advantage. Amazing. An aff who keeps the arguments on his or her side of the flow is way more likely to win than an aff who concentrates on the negative side of the flow. If, lately, the flow action has indeed been moving to the negative, then that’s why negatives are winning. The strategy—if not necessarily the tactics—of the aff ought to be clear at this point. Easier said than done, of course, but that’s the gist of it. Control the narrative. Control the flow. They who control, win.
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