Beginner’s Guide to

DEBATING
Summarised by PEDC’69

1. What’s in debating?
a. Motion​ → the topic being debated; what sets the debate ‘in motion’
i. TH: This House (dewan ini…)
ii. THW: This House Would (dewan ini akan…)
iii. THR: This House Regrets (dewan ini menyesali...)
iv. THBT: This House Believes That (dewan ini percaya bahwa…)
b. Teams
i. Government: positive/affirmative
ii. Opposition: negative/against
c. Speakers
i. 1st Speaker: Prime Minister
ii. 2nd Speaker: Deputy Prime Minister
iii. 3rd Speaker: Whip
iv. Reply Speaker
d. Others
i. Adjudicator: The person who judges the debate; neutral
ii. Chairperson: The person who reads the rules as well as announcing
the speakers’ names
iii. Timekeeper: The person who takes note on the time a speaker took
for speaking
2. Speakers’ Roles
a. 1st Speaker
i. Introduces the debate through Set Up
ii. Brings core arguments
b. 2nd Speaker
i. Rebuts the previous speaker of the opposing team’s arguments
ii. Brings extension (smaller arguments; extending the 1st speaker’s
case)
c. 3rd Speaker
i. Rebuts the previous speaker of the opposing team’s arguments
ii. Summarises the debate through clashes
iii. Concludes
3. What’s in the speech?
THW ban abortion as example
a. Set Up (1 minute)
i. Definition
Defining the keywords from the motion. E.g. Abortion is the act to
intentionally miscarriage an embryo.
 ii. Status Quo
The current situation regarding the motion. E.g. Currently, there have
been many cases of unwanted pregnancy due to unprotected sex and
rape.
iii. Status Quo Problem
The problem with the current situation. E.g. Because abortion is not
legal/provided by the state, these women have no safe option to end
their pregnancy. Their other options are unsafe and could harm their
life.
iv. Stance
Team’s position; supports or against? E.g. In this house we support
the legalising of abortion.
v. Goal
What the team wants to achieve. E.g. We’re aiming to provide a safe
option for women who want to end their pregnancy so that their safety
is guaranteed.
vi. Mechanism
How the goal will be achieved. E.g. We’ll do this by providing doctors
that specialised in abortion in local hospitals.
b. Argument (3 minutes)
i. Assertion
The title of the argument; main point. What will the argument address
and discuss? Can be in the form of a question. E.g. Why is it justified
to let these women abort their pregnancy?
ii. Reasoning
Reasons to support the assertion. E.g. It’s justified to allow these
women to do this because they don’t want this child in the very first
place. Therefore, once the baby is born, they are likely to mistreat the
child through emotional or physical abuse.
iii. Example (previous case/analogy)
To make the argument more concrete. E.g This is a common case
where the mother would yell, ‘you shouldn’t have been born,’ to their
children simply because they are unwanted.
iv. Link back
Re-state the assertion. E.g. That’s why we should allow women to
choose to end their pregnancy.
c. Rebuttal
i. A-
Directly negates the previous speaker’s assertion/main point. E.g. the
opp said that women should be allowed to end their pregnancy as if
that is the mother’s right. However we believe that it isn’t true because
the child’s life is their own and not their mom’s. Therefore their
existences are separated.
ii. Even if
Even if ​this is true​, why is it still bad. E.g. Even if the mother should be
able to choose, the government should not force the medics to
 kill/remove the embryo because it is morally unethical and is against
the values of medics (to save people’s lives).
iii. Exactly because…
Agrees to what the opposing team said and why it’s actually bad. E.g.
Exactly because the womb is a part of the mother instead of its own
existence, their own life is being risked through the procedure. So they
should not be able to make such decision that could harm them in the
process.
d. Clashes
Clashing points throughout the debate.
4. Types of Core Arguments
a. Urgency
i. Ideally, how should the status quo be?
ii. Why does it have to be ideal like this?
iii. Why the status quo is not ideal?
iv. What are the harms due to the unideal status quo?
v. How can our mechanism make this status quo ideal?
vi. Link back to goal.
b. Justification
i. What are the harms that will happen if we apply this mechanism?
ii. Why is this okay, normal, and not long-term?
c. Principle
i. The basis on why this is okay to do.
ii. Talk about human rights, principle of economy, etc