Debaters, Mind Your Mouth

During a British Parliamentary semifinals with a motion on human smuggling, I watched in horror as one of the closing teams chose to run a case wholly contingent on immigrants being evil. 

Of course, the delivery was much more eloquent than how I’ve phrased it, but the flowery rhetoric and the word games played with ‘probability’ and ‘plausibility’ did not hide the fact that at its core, it was an incredibly racist and xenophobic claim. Many people in the room were from immigrant backgrounds, myself included. It was the most uncomfortable I’ve felt in a debate room. It was really more shocking than anything else, as to how someone could speak so openly and earnestly in favor of problematic stereotypes and ignorant rhetoric. 

The semi-finals ended. That closing team did not break, nor did they receive much criticism. I knew one of the speakers, and they went up to me afterward, looking vaguely embarrassed. 

“Oh my god that was such a weird round, I sounded so racist and that wasn’t my intention at all, but we had such a weird side to defend, what even was that motion?” They complained about the round for a bit, as we all do, but they were way more annoyed about not breaking than, let's say, calling immigrants thieves and sources of corruption, claims founded upon racist stereotypes. 

I try to bring the issue up, in a nice, calm way. I got an equally nice, calm answer back. 

“I’m sorry it came out weird, but I mean, we’ve all said problematic stupid stuff in debates. It’s just a speech, it’s fine, no one ever cares.” 

And that is exactly the problem. Subconscious problematic viewpoints built into debate are specifically excused, normalized, and collectively accepted to not be the ‘original intent’ and, therefore accepted as part of human flaw. They are for the most part penalized but lack sufficient criticism and self-reflection from debaters, who perhaps simply learn to repeat in a less overt way. 

Or, even worse, I’ve seen teams who managed to capitalize on their extreme characterizations and were actively rewarded with a win. 

I’m not saying that everyone who has ever said a stupid thing they regret, an opinion they don’t support, or just came off wrong is willfully malevolent. But too often, in the heat of the debate, debates tend to repeat harmful rhetoric echoed around in our greater social conditions, and we, ironically, don’t think before we speak. 

These repetitions and reinforcements of problematic things range from blatant borderline aggression, unbeknownst to the speaker like that BP semis, all the way down to poor mischaracterization, which is far more rampant and held to even less degrees of accountability.  

Do we all really know what economic reform would look like for LEDCs? Do we even know how to characterize an LEDC apart from being poor, uneducated, and behind? Feminist thought and the civil rights movement, all too easily become examples we throw around coupled with buzzwords like ‘incentive’ to explain in twenty seconds two hundred years of suffrage, oppression, and resistance. Nothing cannot be material for a case, and nothing ever requires a second thought from us.

At the end of the day, the problem needs to be addressed with definitive solutions. Starting from the sense of self-awareness, debaters need to be held more accountable for the things they say. They should be told when they’ve messed up, unconscious misperceptions and misconceptions clearly called out. Breaking the so-called bubble would be impossible without even knowing the bubble's existence.

Judges across the circuits also need to take better notice when they see things like such happen, and give due criticism as part of their obligation as judges. Please do not brush it off as “I know you didn’t intend to sound like that, but…” - and instead help competitors learn that the intention behind the speech is secondary when compared with the impact of the speech. 

These choices from our own systemic bias will bleed into how we as debaters view either side of the motion, how we choose characterisation of stakeholders, and ultimately how we influence other people who listen to us with these subconscious choices. To be seen and to be heard is a privilege, the words we say are powerful tools, so please, do use your words with care. 

Debaters, mind your mouth.