Amazingly, I haven't posted a single thing about debate, yet somewhow it wormed itself to the first word on my blog's name. So I thought I ought to post something debate-related. Last night at club, we discussed Counter plans. (My abv. for them will be CP) Being the person I am, I'm going to talk about CPs!!
Here are the things a Negative team must do in order to properly run a counter plan.
1. The negative team must be non-topical
2. They must solve the harms of the Affirmative team's case
3. They will have prima facie, or the burden of proof
4. It cannot co-exist with the Affirmative team's plan
5. Must have the same Inherency
6. Have a different plan accomplishing the same goal
When you are going Affirmative against a case you....
1. Prove the Negative team is topical
2. Prove that they are co-existing
3. Prove you are solving the harms better than the Negative team is
After our coach had stuffed us full with all of this delightful information, we had practice rounds; each team had a chance to go write a CP against another team and a chance to defend a counter plan against their case. My conclusion about CPs? I will most likely never run one, however interesting they appear.
Ooh-- fun! Questions: Why must neg solve aff harms? Why must it not coexist? What does it mean to "have the same inherency"? Why must it accomplish the same goal?
ReplyDeleteI ask these questions for a reason: Suppose aff plan is to graduate Russia from Jackson-Vanik. Neg says: "We should not graduate Russia from JV. Instead, we should amend JVA to make the purpose upholding freedom.". Technically, you could do both. Technically, you could graduate Russia from JV even if you amended it. But it wouldn't make any sense to do so.
No, the goal of the neg is not the same as the aff, either. You wouldn't get the benefit from having PNTR. You wouldn't enjoy better relations with Russia. But at the same time, it wouldn't be logical to do both, so the judge is presented with a clear choice: aff plan or neg CP. Thoughts?
Great questions! I didn't really expect any comments on this. I think when you are running a CP the Negative team takes the Aff's goal and main points of their plan, and then switches it around to make it non-topical and prove that a CP is solving the harms better than the Aff plan. To address your example, I believe the Negative team would have different advantages.
ReplyDeleteWoW.....I can never understand debate....guess I'll wait till next year. :P
ReplyDeleteThe reason you don't understand, sister dear, is because you haven't taken debate classes!
ReplyDeleteSame here, Haley.
ReplyDelete