I did debate back in high school.
80% of the debaters are ultra liberals
15% are nazis-in-training
5% are comrades
Bay Area debate is filled with socialists. My partnership rejected the topic and argued for a dictatorship of the proletariat most rounds, and we were ranked 5th in the country.
There are a lot of radlibs, neoliberals, and fascists though.
omg you have to tell me more. please, i really wanna know how all the libs clutched their balls at "the death penalty? shut up, i want to guillotine bezos"
Often, instead of arguing about the topic, people will instead demonstrate their opponent's rhetoric as harmful (and then tell the judge to vote against them to discourage further harmful rhetoric). It's really easy to argue that the real world impacts of harmful rhetoric outweigh the importance of the actual debate topic.
This leads to people preparing and memorizing increasingly long (3-6 minutes if you read quickly) criticisms of certain types rhetoric. For example, I memorized a 4 long page, scathing critique of capitalism (where we would demonstrate it as the cause of the issue the debate is trying to solve). Each round, the only part we would have to change is how their rhetoric emboldens capitalism (for example, when they advocate for an inadequate solution to the climate crisis, they are masking the underlying issue, capitalism).
We would then contend that the judge should vote in our favor to endorse our message (usually an explicit call to the establishment of a dictatorship of the proletariat).
This next part sounds fake, but I promise it's true. We were debating the daughter of Sheryl Sandberg and she came to watch (this was in a classroom, and there were ~4 people watching as it was just a prelim round). The judge was an experienced debater (meaning they'll accept debate about the impacts of rhetoric). So we got to argue for 40 minutes in front of a famous billionaire that the only way to save the environment was, and I quote, "violent socialist revolution". The daughter claimed we were being hypocritical by asking my partner "Didn't you pay to enter this tournament?" He responded honestly that our team captain covered his entrance fee, as he was broke at the time. We won the round, and Sheryl Sandberg's daughter did not advance to elimination rounds.
Thats so fucking cool, you get to behead her in minecraft when her turn comes, ok?
I like acting/theater, but I never could participate during highschool, a- am I a theater chapo? Is that bad?
What is your opinion of musicals, specifically Les Misérables in relation to all other musicals?
I didn't watch it. I don't like musicals. I mean, yeah that's impressive and all I guess, but I really don't care about all the show you are making.
I don't like musicals.
that's because you've never seen Les Misérables, the only good musical
I will accept either "Les Misérables is the only good musical" (the more correct answer) or "There are no good musicals" (the only slightly less correct answer) as evidence of being a "theater chapo" and not a "theater kid". So yes, you are a "theater chapo".
One day more
Another day, another destiny
This never-ending road to Calvary
These men who seem to know my crime
Will surely come a second time
One day more
I think that the theater kid thing is something that you can only really get during high school/childhood just because so much of "theater kid" vibes is bound up in being a weird kid in school. I think you can basically get to full theater kid by just hanging out with a shitload of them even if you never do it.
that being said I was a technical theater kid and there's a whole union that goes with that that I had to join to get my weapons grade awkwardness.
I knew a conservative debate kid whose career goals was to work in the immigration processing part of an embassy. I didn't think much of it at the time cuz he was a nice enough guy, but he literally wants to filter who comes into our country.
In 7th grade, I once described the ACLU as a "juggernaut" in a class discussion (with negative connotations) because I had been listening to Michael Savage on the radio, and now I am here, so you never know what stupid ideas kids will grow out of.
stage crew was sweet. get high and chill in the rafters and play uno