Debating News: CAS Round 3

7A Debating Report

In the fourth round of the CAS debating season, of Trinity Grammar School against Barker College, the 7As were on the negative side on the topic “That we should ban children-based reality TV show competitions”. We were all eagerly anticipating this debate as Barker was known to have an extremely rigid debating program, so we knew that it was going to be a great challenge for us.

Barker opened the debate at first, by giving us a model and pointing out how there was currently a lot of abuse from big corporations over exploiting younger children. Trinity came back by providing a counter model that was going to (real quote) ‘fix the holes in a leaking dam instead of cutting off the water source’. Barker bounced back immediately by defending their model and slowly found issues in our own counter model. The second negative was able to continue explaining the benefits of the counter model, with the third affirmative closing off their team’s case. Our own third negative also strongly closed the negative side’s case.

We waited in anticipation for the adjudication to come out, we immediately noted down any feedback given by the adjudicator as it always helped to improve. Then came the results. Barker was able to take the first clash by showing how they were able to benefit the wellbeing of these children, with our team mitigating only a small minority of those arguments. Then came the last clash which was whether there was an alternate method of solving the problem or not. Barker was able to severely take down the arguments that we had tried to provide, ultimately resulting in a strong victory for the opponents. We would like to thank all the staff members, coaches, and opponents for a great and wonderful debating experience. We are sure to learn from this debate and look forward to our final round of debates against St. Aloysius’ College.

Qin (7 YO)

7B Debating Report

On Friday 12 August, the 7Bs CAS team debated against Barker College at Trinity. Our team consisted of A. Rabey (1st), O. Hannan (2nd), D. Lin (3rd) and J. Wong (4th). The theme for the week was “Ethical Issues” and we debated the topic” That kids should be banned from reality TV show competitions”. As Trinity, we were the affirmative team. The debate was a very difficult debate, and Barker is usually a very tough opposition, so we knew that we were in for a challenge.

While we were confident with our knowledge in this area, we were nervous, as these types of debates are often heavily weighted to one side. In the prep room, we concluded pretty quickly that our main argument should be about mental health, and the stark reality of the media pressure that comes from entering a reality TV show, and the distinct possibility of the children being subjected to bullying and mocking, thus damaging mental health. Additionally, we argued that very few people who go on these reality shows actually benefit, and, even if they do, they can still suffer negative consequences.

Having that extra 15 minutes in the prep room in the CAS season compared to FED and ISDA means we were able to really build our argument and form a strong case. Our opening argument presented by first speaker, was about how kids can be embarrassed on national TV and can become worldwide laughing stocks. We also argued that these families often don’t understand the risks of reality shows. The negative responded by saying that these were isolated and unlikely cases. They then stated that kids will see other kids on TV and look up to them, and that we’re giving these kids a platform to show their talents to the world. This is when we identified that in order to win this debate, we had to prove that there are better ways to express yourself than reality TV.

We came out and said in response that there are much better ways to express yourself and show your talents. For example, by starting a YouTube channel, you can post the content you want, and you can control what people see. Meaning that embarrassing moments won’t be shown. Meaning that you control the content that you create. This made the first negative speaker’s whole case invalid. Our second speaker then spoke about how kids can be framed in a bad way by producers. This is actually quite common to create drama and increase audience engagement. The negative rebutted this by saying that producers don’t have much to gain from this, and often try to work with kids fairly.

The second negative speaker pretty much just said the same things as their first speaker, but just elaborated more and added some key information. We then summed up our case with stating clashes and some final rebuttals, the third negative did the same. The adjudicator then took five minutes to review her notes. We were quite anxious because the negative actually had a strong case and debated quite well. However, in the end the adjudicator felt our case had more weight on the topic, and we were given the win! Thank you to Barker for such a challenging debate!

Rabey (7 He) and O. Hannan (7 Fo)

9B Debating Report

Last Friday, the Year 9 CAS Bs team, consisting of H. McLean as 1st speaker, A. Zhou as 2nd, J. Matthews as 3rd and R. Chowdhury as 4th, debated against Barker College on the topic “That schools should actively encourage children to question authority.” As the affirmative team, we brought out a model which suggests that we aren’t teaching children to rebel, we are teaching them to speak up and question in a respectful manner.

Our main argument was that we want children to become independent and creative. We would implement our model by introducing a well-being class for 20 minutes each week. Our first speaker, H. McLean (9 Yo), stated our stance and brought up the idea that people will be able to express their emotions better. We knew that it wasn’t just about expressing your emotions, but also controlling them. Our second speaker, A. Zhou (9 WJ), brought this out in his speech along with the idea of children becoming creative thinkers. Our third speaker, J. Matthews (9 Ke), summed up our case and provided clashes suggesting why we had already won the debate.  Barker’s arguments focused on how children would grow up to become disrespectful. They also said that this would teach them not to trust authority, even when they need help. Overall, each speaker did well, and it was a strong debate. We are glad to take home the victory. We hope for the best in the final round of the CAS competition.

Chowdhury (9 Fo)