Making Generalizations In Debate

Aiden Buchanan | 3 min read

In every single debate event, whether it be PF, LD, Worlds, Congress, CX, or any other event, we have time limits, whether they are short like a 2AR in LD or long like an eight-minute Worlds speech. We have time limits. When we realize that we may not have enough time to get through all of the content we want to in a speech, there are often cuts we need to make, nuances that we have to omit, and content that just cannot be said. Sadly, the first thing to go is often the nuances that we discuss while talking about certain people, groups, or cultures. We generalize people first. We homogenize ideas to make it easier for us to understand and portray them in our speeches. This is particularly prevalent in my main event: world schools. These generalizations simplify the vast differences of people all over the world and often make their stories matter less, whilst objectifying their life experience in order to simply save time in a debate. The example that I’m going to be using throughout this post is a round I participated in last year; in this round, my opponent made the claim that everyone in Africa is poor and living in poverty. When called out on it, they doubled down. I believe issues like these are solvable. Before I show you how, we must get to the cause of these generalizations in the first place.

The root issue here is twofold: first, the time constraints in our speeches, and second, our own lack of understanding about the people groups we talk about. The former is, on the surface, unsolvable—realistically, we aren’t going to make speeches longer—but the latter is. Both of these together lead to a lot of simplification and generalization, which is not a good thing. How do we solve it, though? 

First, we have to know what we are talking about. Being informed, reading the news, learning about history, and getting an international perspective (not just one from the US) are all important steps for us to take. Also, most of the time we actually do know most of the stuff; for example, my opponents likely knew that not every single person in Africa is poor, but to make their argument easier and hit harder, they decided to make a false generalization. This frames the second way we can work to solve this issue: take your time. Sometimes we get so caught up in winning a debate that we don’t think about what we are saying. Slow down; it’s ok to take a couple extra seconds to give a correct statistic or to even use a different adjective. My opponents could have said, "There is an epidemic of poverty in many countries in Africa that causes many to live in said poverty," instead of simply saying, "Everyone lives in poverty." This nuanced difference gives credence to the people you are talking about and the lives they are living. 

This also benefits you in debate. This benefit stems from you looking more reasonable; to say that every single person in Africa is in poverty makes you sound crazy and destroys your ethos for the rest of the arguments you are making. It also makes you sound smarter when you give proper context. It shows the judge you know what you are talking about and makes them more likely to believe your argument—and boosts your speaker points. 

All this to say, we should all make an effort to remember the nuances of humans. So I ask you to take a second in your next speech to explain, give context, do your research and stay updated on the news so that you can know what you are talking about. Your opponents deserve it, your judges deserve it, and the people that you are talking about absolutely deserve it.