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An unprovoked opinion


Hey all!  Okay...I've been reading through the posts the past few days
experiencing a wide range of emotions...sadness at seeing the goodbye
letters of those I both admire and respect, giggles at the on-going insult
wars between certain members (all in good fun, thank goodness), happiness
at the prospect of next year's competition, and finally, anger at some of
the comments being thrown about...so...what do I choose to act on...the
anger of course!  Isn't that always the way though?  

First of all I would like to preempt any responses by saying that I am an
average debater from an average sized and budgeted squad who sees what
probably is a below average number of "national" tournaments every year.
I am in my fourth year of competition...with one much anticipated semester
of competition left.  I have stated many times how much this activity, and
especially the people in it, mean to me...but I have a few problems with
not only our community, but I suppose society as a whole:

The judging conversation may be right or wrong...I don't know anything
about the Klemz/West round aforementioned, so I can't comment on that
directly.  I have been lucky enough to not have a whole lot of judging
problems in my 3 1/2 year career (maybe that's because my biggest problem
is usually not being able to talk fast enough for the "good" judges...),
but there have been moments of frustration and anger.  I can only imagine
that being greatly exaggerated at the National tournament....but I want to
focus on the way we deal with these National tournament outrounds:

I was lucky (or unlucky...depending on your point of view) to debate Eric
and Monte and Jen and Scott a number of times this year.  Throughout this
year (and last) I came to respect and admire those two teams emmensely.  I
felt they always showed Dave and I respect and we had some of our best
rounds against them.  That feeling of respect and admiration did not
disappear when they dropped in Octos.  I still felt exactly the same about
them as debaters.  In past years I was in awe of Paul and Kieren...and
my awe was not the least bit reduced by them dropping before the final
round...and of course, one of the biggest reasons I am here at Chico was
Matt and Pat, and their quarters performance was in no way diminishing of
my respect. I was sad to see Will and Ian go out in Semis, not because I
was in any way disappointed in them or their performance, but because I
would never get to see them debate again!  Sure, we ALL want to be
debating in the final round...but
every year there are only two teams who get that place.  Does that really
diminish the amount of respect or admiration we have for them?  No.  Does
the fact that they made it (like Jarvis said) through the first day of
outrounds without dropping mean a ton?  Yes!  

This whole conversation reminded me of the Summer Olympics media coverage
every year...being a former competitive swimmer, I am always in awe of the
swimmers who have worked as long and hard as they have to get to the
Olympics.  But, here in America that is not enough...Here in these United
States, our Silver medalists who have achieved something that perhaps .05%
of the entire swimming community in our country can ever HOPE to achieve
are asked "How are you handling the disappointment of not winning the
gold?"  It seems to me that the threads as of late are covertly asking
those same questions...Instead of saying congratulations on making it
farther than all but sixteen teams out of the 198 teams that were
competing...some of whom I'm sure worked their fingers to the bone all
year long and didn't even get to see an outround...we focus on the
"disappointment" at not being the top two.  

Maybe next year I'll feel differently...but, I was ECSTATIC to be
competing in a double-octos round this year...  I was happy to lose to
Josh and BJ in what I thought was one of our more enjoyable rounds in the 
tournament. I was ECSTATIC when I was
competing in a triple-octos round this year...and this is my third year at
CEDA nats, and I think of myself as a pretty hard worker.  But, the way I
see it...there were only 32 teams where I was on Sunday night...and all 32
of us should do two things:  (1)  take some time to enjoy the fact that we
were there, and (2)  take some time to realize that all those teams like
Klemz and West and Weber's Menzes and Shubert and alot of others that I
can't remember off the top of my head are just as good as they were before
the round they went out in the tournament...and I respect those teams just
as much.  

Sue Lowrie
Chico State Debate '96
"Demented and sad, but social."
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*   "Here we are, the dead of always,	*
*	dead again, but now to live."	*
*	--Subcomandante Marcos		*
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Archive created by Jonathan Stanton (jonathan@cs.jhu.edu)
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