Being a Judge

I recently participated in a practice debate tournament where lots of judges were needed. We had a handful of parents and a number of willing alumni. But we also had many many even more willing competitors who didn't break and wanted to try their hand at judging. And what's weird is that they actually got to. I, however, felt myself totally unqualified to judge debate and timed my first round instead. I did a pretty good job. But my friends who were, for the first time ever, filling out debate ballots had a lot of fun too. Some of them actually chucked their biases out the window and voted against their friends, which is weird, but cool that they could do that. Except not cool for the friends.

One time, in a practice round, I was debating with a friend of mine and another one of my friends was judging us. He turned to the other team and said, "I'll try to be unbiased even though I like them better." We won fair and square.

Even though I'd make an awful debate judge, I really enjoy "judging" speech. You'll notice I put that in quotation marks. That's because it isn't really judging. It's critiquing and giving feedback and advice and suggestions. It's fun. I've learned who will actually consider my advice and who won't, so at least I'm not annoying. I hope.

So being a judge is fun, or at least that's what they tell me. The seniors always get excited to come back and judge once we kick them out of the league. They obviously know what's up.

You're homeschooled. Don't judge me.