Learn About Debate
Styles of Debate Offered by Ziggy
Lincoln-Douglas Debate (LD)
“Lincoln Douglas” (LD) is a one vs one debate about a philosophical topic (examples include “Competition is superior to cooperation as a means of achieving excellence” and “Governments have a moral obligation to assist other nations in need.”) See the current topics here.
A typical LD round takes around 45 minutes from start to finish.
LD is all about getting debaters to engage with philosophical ideas and to ask what the implications of those ideas would be in real-world scenarios. What does it mean to “value” one human right “more” than another? What does that look like? And how do we know which is more important, and why? These are important kinds of questions that LDers tackle.
The Affirmative should try to convince the judge that the topic is true (it will usually be phrased in a positive value statement, like “X is better than Y”), while the Negative should try to convince the judge that the topic is false (such as “X is not better than Y”).
Team Policy Debate (TP)
“Team Policy” (TP) is a team of two vs two debating about a change to some government policy matter (examples include “The United States should significantly reform its criminal justice system,” and “The United States federal government should significantly reform its policy toward India.”). See the current topics here.
Teams read evidence (such as news articles, opinion pieces, studies, official government documents, and more) to try to prove either that some new policy should be enacted (the Affirmative team), or that the Affirmative team’s policy proposal is not a good idea for some reason (the Negative team).
Obviously, the debate is fictional—the Affirmative team’s policy won’t happen if you vote Affirmative—but you should judge the round as if it would. The Affirmative should therefore convince the judge that their policy is relevant, important, workable, and beneficial. The Negative should convince the judge that one or more of those things are not true—by showing that the Affirmative policy idea is irrelevant/not needed, insignificant, not going to succeed, or more harmful than helpful.
Team Parliamentary Debate (Team Parli)
“Team parliamentary debate” (Team Parli) is a team of two vs two debating about a current event topic that is given to them 20 minutes before the round starts.
Judges get access to a special password protected Parli Topics page that only they have access to. 20 minutes before the round, the judge will email the topic listed on that page to BOTH teams. The teams will then start prep time, and the debate round will start 20 minutes after that.
All Team Parli topics are hand-crafted by decorated NCFCA and Stoa veteran Isaac Sommers, who graduated with his J.D. from Harvard Law School and two Bachelor degrees from Howard Payne University.
Sample topics could be “Privacy is less necessary than convenience in the twenty-first century,” or “This House should abolish NATO,” or “When in conflict, This House believes that property should be valued above liberty.”
Terms like “this House” are intentionally ambiguous—it is up to the debaters to determine (and to argue about) what organization, country, group, or even individual makes the most sense.
The goal of Parli is to get debaters engaged with current event topics in ways that challenge them to look at issues from many perspectives.
One unique thing about Parli is the absence of traditional Cross Examination. Instead, debaters may interrupt the opposing team at certain times to “raise their hand” to ask a question. The speaking team has the right to either take the question, or to ignore the question and continue with their speech.
Ziggy Parli is open to ALL debaters from any high school league (NCFCA, Stoa, UIL, NFL, and others), as well as collegiate parliamentary debaters. Normal Ziggy Rules apply, except where we have some additional special rules for Parli.
Example video used with permission.
Individual Parliamentary Debate (IPD)
“Individual parliamentary debate” (IPD or Individual Parli) is a one vs one debate about a current event topic that is provided to the debaters 20 minutes before the round starts.
Judges get access to a special password protected Parli Topics page that only they have access to. 20 minutes before the round, the judge will email the topic listed on that page to BOTH teams. The debaters will start prep time, and the debate round will start 20 minutes after that.
All IPD topics are hand-crafted by decorated NCFCA and Stoa veteran Isaac Sommers, who graduated with his J.D. from Harvard Law School and two Bachelor degrees from Howard Payne University.
Sample topics could be “Privacy is less necessary than convenience in the twenty-first century,” or “This House should abolish NATO,” or “When in conflict, This House believes that property should be valued above liberty.”
Terms like “this House” are intentionally ambiguous—it is up to the debaters to determine (and to argue about) what organization, country, group, or even individual makes the most sense.
The goal of Parli is to get debaters engaged with current event topics in ways that challenge them to look at issues from many perspectives.
Unlike Team Parli, IPD does have Cross Examination. This makes it more similar to LD in terms of the length and format, but the topics are always a mix of policy, fact, value, and scenario based on current events or relevant philosophical controversies.
Ziggy IPD is open to ALL debaters from any high school league (NCFCA, Stoa, UIL, NFL, and others), as well as collegiate debaters. Normal Ziggy Rules apply.
Moot Court
Moot Court is a team of two vs two arguing as if before the Supreme Court of the United States, advocating for or against a judicial ruling that overturns or upholds the ruling of a lower court.
Moot Court typically involves constitutional problems, such as the right of students to speak at school, the rights of prisoners to be free from cruel and unusual punishment, and the rights of individuals to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures.
These questions are not clear cut: what constitutes being “at school” in an age of the internet? What types of punishments are “cruel,” and what constitutes “unusualness”? And who decides what a “reasonable” search is? These questions and others like them are what Moot Court debaters tackle.
The most unique aspect of Moot Court is that it requires active judge participation—in the form of questions. Just like in real life, judges ask attorneys questions about their arguments. The judge performs the same role here.
Ziggy provides suggested questions and a summary of the current NCFCA Moot Court topic on our website. Full access to the NCFCA Moot Court problem is not the property of Ziggy Online Debate and must be acquired from NCFCA.
We encourage debaters to keep video ON while speaking, and for the judge to keep video ON as well so that debaters can know when the judge is about to ask a question.
Read the Moot Court Orientation here (for both debaters and students).