INTRODUCTION THS- This House Supports
Debate helps you to THO- This House Opposes
Logically organize thoughts
Speaking with a very small amount of time to prepare
Managing speech anxiety
Precision of language
Helps a ton in writing
What is a Debate?
A formal and competitive assessment of the validity
of a motion statement
Formal
Strict time limits for speeches
Have particular roles and expectations for such roles
Impersonal- speeches need not reflect the personal
views of speakers
Common formats- British Parliamentary, Asian
Parliamentary, Australasian format, World Schools
Competitive
There must be metrics for winning and losing
Systems for scoring, pairing, and qualifying further into
a tournament
Premium on fairness
o Topics for debating should be equally fair to
support and oppose
o Judges should offer a fair probability of
winning to all sides, systems should reflect
fairness and merit
Necessarily adversarial
o No ties
o Both sides of a debate cannot agree on all
things
Motion
The topic for debating that follows a particular format
A statement that declares a particular stance, it is non-
neutral
o E.g., THW ban guns
Fair to assess, defensible on both sides
May be accompanied by information or definitions
o E.g., THBT the Philippines should align itself
with the Quad
o The Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QSD), is
a strategic security dialogue between
Australia, India, Japan, and the United States
that is maintained by talks between member
country.
WHAT IS MOTION?
Simply, the topic to be debated
Often follow the following format:
o This House [motion verb] [specific action,
phenomenon, or idea to be supported or
opposed]
▪ This house would tax smoking
▪ This house supports the rise of
artificial intelligence
▪ This house regrets the premium
placed on a college education
o Pay particular attention to the motion verb
because that will tell you what is expected of
the debate that’s going to happen
Common Motion Shortcuts
THW- This House Would
THBT- This House Believes That
THR- This House Regrets
THP- This House Prefers
Three Motion Types
POLICY MOTIONS
Often of the form “This house would (THW) do X” e.g.,
THW ban alcohol
Unless otherwise stated, commonly the government of
a country is performing this action
To determine what country and which government, he
motion will operate in the bulk of the world states or
the majority of governments and countries that exist in
the world
There exists prop fiat
o This tells us that the motion will happen, but
not that it will be done well
o In policy motion, you have to enact a policy
and that would entail you explaining how this
policy works
o In every debate, whatever is asked for in the
motion, it will happen. Assume that it is going
to occur.
o It’s just a matter of will the way it will happen
be done well, will it be a good way in which
this occurs, is what is happening a good thing
at all?
o Prop fiat gives an amount of resources as well
as political will for the government side to
ensure that the motion will occur
o This also implies that opposition has opp fiat
o Opp could defend status quo but you also
have an equivalent amount of op fiat, which
means that whatever government does you
have an equal amount of resources to be able
to do so.
o You are both given that kind of power but also
limited by that kind of power.
o E.g., government wants to raid
establishments to cut off any imports of
alcohol. On opp, you could say any effort and
resources that gov will put into this, we will
instead put into maybe more strongly
regulating alcohol content or check for drunk
driving. In here, alcohol is still allowed, there
are just alternative ways to deal with the
problem that the government has
o Summary: Basically, you will do an action,
explain how the action will occur, assume the
action happens, and the other side could do
other actions with the same resources you’re
using to do your action or your policy
ANALYSIS MOTIONS
The following motions fall under analysis motions:
This house believes that (THBT) X
An assessment of the truth of a claim
o THBT social media has done more harm than
good
o There’s no action that is particularly indicated,
so, explain how social media works, what it
has done in the past, etc.
o No policy required
Also need a model in the instance an action to be
done is indicated
o THBT the US should sanction Saudi Arabia
o Explain what would these sanctions look like
 o You would still need to provide policy since
there is an action asking a certain act to do
which is sanctioning Saudi Arabia.
o Why not use THW? Because this household
refers to a very vague government in the
majority of the world states. With THBT, it
allows you to kind of specify which actor is
going to be doing this
This house supports/opposes (THS/THO) X
Requires proof of how it is likely to occur
o This is different from policy motions and some
THBT motions, where you have the ability to
specify you want it to be done
o You’re still going to assume that it’s going to
happen, it’s just a matter of you can no longer
control how it’s going to happen
o E.g., in the motion THS bans on alcohol, you
explain what is the likely kind of ban that will
occur.
o The control is no longer with you as a debater,
it’s now about proving that that’s likely to
happen
o How is it likely to occur, who is going to be
doing it, why are they going to do that in that
way rather than just saying we want to be
done this way
Must be supported/opposed in its totality
o E.g., THS the rise of esports
o In supports, for example, that isn’t to say that
the bad parts of it are good, but that the good
outweighs the bad
o Policy VS Supports/Opposes
• Policy: Everything you want
as long as it’s within the
resources of prop fiat, can
happen
• Supports/Opposes: You
have to say this is how it’s
likely to happen, prove it,
give reasons that people will
act in that manner
This house prefers (THP) X
THP X to Y
o The opposing team is forced to defend Y
o THP a subscription-based model for social
media to an ad-based model
THP X- compares to status quo
o THP a norm where children are raised in state
facilities
o Opp here would have to say, for example, that
the status quo is one where children are
raised within their own families.
THP a world- conceive a world with this from
beginning, not a change from status quo
o THP a world without the concept of private
property
o You can’t say that from now on, we’re going
to remove all private property and everyone
with private property will lose it. Instead,
defend the world from the beginning we just
never had this concept of private property, or
any large capitalistic structures
This house regrets (THR) X
Retrospective debate, looks at how thing actually
happened
o So, you cannot provide a prop nor say events
that have actually happened are out of the
debate
o Everything that has happened is free game
with the motion. You can argue it, use it as an
example, etc.
o You can’t say that things would have
happened otherwise. You have to take the
past and the facts as facts
o Also an expectation to say what would have
happened otherwise
▪ E.g., THR the election of Liz Truss as
Prime Minister of the UK
▪ On the gov, you might have to say if
Liz Truss had not been elected, in all
likelihood it would have been Rishi
Sunak, and here are all the reasons
we prefer Rishi Sunak.
▪ You have to compare not just why
the past might have been bad if you
regret it, but what would have
happened otherwise had this
particular motion not occurred
ACTOR MOTIONS
Of the form “TH, as X, …”
o You are taking on the particular perspective of
the person in question
o You think what is in their best interest is the
goal of the debate, not what is morally good
(Instead, you are looking at what do I as this
entity care about and that person could be a
morally good person, but you have to look at
the particular person in question)
▪ TH, as a new dictator in a post-
conflict state, would do…
▪ You have to be often times self-
interested.
▪ That isn’t to say that you can’t believe
in principles or can’t have morals
o You can argue why things achieve some kind
of principle but, you must explain why the
actor believes in these principles
▪ TH as an altruistic individual, would
pursue a corporate job rather than
one in public service
▪ In here, you might instead want to
look at as an altruistic person (what
do I care about?)