Were We That Clueless When We Were Young?

debateshtLast weekend, I had the unenviable chore of being a parent volunteer judge at the high school’s debate tournament.

I loved debate. I debated through high school and college. I consider it one of those character building experiences for young people; one of those rare high school classes that actually PREPARE you for the real world. When my attendings in medical school were making the students around me cry under their steely gazes and rapid-fire questions, I knew how to stand my ground.

All of my kids have been required to at least dip a toe into the debate world. Yes, I’m that kind of mother.

So, every year, I drag myself up to the tournament, pop a dozen Advil, and listen to team after team deliver the same tired arguments for eight hours straight.

And, usually, I don’t complain. Really, I don’t.

But this year—

I was judging public forum, a cross-ex style format that revolves around public policy. The topic, unfortunately, was ECONOMICS (for those two of you who are interested, Resolved: That the rise of Brazil, Russia, India and China has had, on balance, a positive impact on the United States.)

Economics is complicated. Economists don’t agree with each other, about anything. So what chance does a high schooler have to really understand an issue as complex as globalization and third world economy?

Still, when I was debating (back when we had to walk to the tournaments, uphill, both ways in the snow, we didn’t have laptop computers in the rounds, and we had to do our research in libraries, not cyberspace), we at least TRIED to understand the topic. (We did. We did. We did.)

One team couldn’t pronounce any of the words in it’s OWN pre-fabbed case. Both teams in that round consistently pronounced ‘deficit’ as ‘deficient.’

One team tried to convince me that it was a GOOD thing that China was stockpiling the US dollar and buying up all our debts.

But the all-time winner was a lovely young girl who tried to wheedle her way out of a topicality issue by explaining that scientists are quite sure that time folds, and that the past and the future are really the same thing.

HUH?

In thirty-five years of debating and judging, I have never heard the time machine argument before.

I’ve been thinking back to my own experience. We had an economic topic one year. I think I understood it.

But maybe I’m just using my own personal time machine. Time folds, you know.

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92 Comments

Nah. When I was young I knew absolutely everything. NOW I’m clueless.

So, can I jump off into some other year that’s folding over me or something?

[Reply]

themother Replies:

Oh, wouldn’t that be great? I’m thinking 2007, in time to sell all my stocks at the market high. Or at least cut down the $%** tree that fell on my roof during IKE.

[Reply]

Maybe so, but since we cannot ,at this point in time, access the dimension in which the future resides, you will be held accountable for your ridiculousness right here, in the present.

Although I’d love to say “Hey – time folds!” anytime I am accused of slacking off. As a matter of fact, I think I will.

Liz’s last blog post..A New Way To Schedule

[Reply]

themother Replies:

My kids are constantly reminding me that the arrow of time runs both ways. That’s how they can put off their homework. They also tell me that their rooms are messy because entropy is winning.

I think I homeschooled myself into a logical corner.

[Reply]

I loved debate. But I hear a lot has changed in the high school forensics world. I saw a documentary on HBO about it and the kids were basically speed talking. They talked so fast you couldn’t understand them — and all the kids did this. You could hear them gasping for breath. Very odd. Were the kids you judged doing this rapid-talk thing, too?

The Lawyer Mom’s last blog post..Middle-age Spread is Screwing with my Head

[Reply]

themother Replies:

Some of them, yes. But we were pretty fast all those years ago, too.

Mostly, though, I was stuck in the novice rounds, ’cause no one trusts a MOM to actually know how to judge a REAL debate.

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