My opponent is a better or at the very least equal debater with all factors combined.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Lately, I've come to notice how people in the comment section like (or at least attempt) to exploit the flaws of a debater's reasoning while the debate is still going on. This is unfair to both debaters, so I'd ask that you refrain from doing this until the debate is over. Thank you. :D And If you'd like, I'd be more than happy to clarify on this in the comments section. RE CX: #1 Yes #2 High School Lincoln Douglas Debate and High School Mock Trial . #3 LD: 1 year (depending on what you mean by 5/9, I may have done just as many tournaments). For Mock Trial, I've only done two official tournaments. #4 I got this particular phrasing from dictionary.com, but it sums up my definition of debate: A formal contest in which the affirmative and negative sides of a proposition are advocated by opposing speakers. #5 I consider debate as having two primary purposes; debate is used to find the truth or to persuade an audience to favor your position over your opponent's. #6 I believe there are many factors, but I don't believe factors such as one's profile picture are remotely relevant. Onto to my case: Ladies and Gentlemen: I've decided to retract my earlier statement concerning my advocacy. I intend to argue from a different advocacy during this debate. Since my opponent has not yet presented his case, this could not possibly be argued as being unfair. My position is simply a position that opposes the claim my opponent is in favor of. Observation: I want you to pay special attention to the resolution. It states "My opponent is a better debater or at very least equal debater with all factors combined." Upon reading this statement, one thing becomes clear; my opponent is conclusively advocating that I am a better or at very least an equal debater to him when all factors are combined. Since my opponent is urging something to be definite, I am free to counter his position by urging mere possibility. In other words, the CON's position can essentially be viewed as "I MIGHT POSSIBLY be a better debater or at very least an equal debater when all factors are combined." Therefore, my opponent's burden is to provide you with decisive evidence that proves that I am a better or equal debater when all factors are combined. In this debate, I find it unlikely that my opponent will be able to present decisive evidence for his case and will tell you why. Based on how we have officially competed, there is evidence to suggest that I am an inferior debater when it comes to a comparison with the level of my opponent. First, my opponent states that he was a Policy Debater. To show that there is evidence to suggest that he is a superior debater, I will explain this piece of information. I submit that Policy Debate is more beneficial than the forms of debate I had taken up for two reasons: 1) Spreading is used far more commonly in Policy (in fact, I've yet to see a policy debate where this wasn't used) than it is in LD (I have never encountered it during Mock Trial). Spreading is basically the act where debaters speed read their cases. For those who aren't familiar, this video demonstrates this tactic quite well: http://www.youtube.com... . This principle is highly beneficial when it comes to debating as it teaches debaters to think critically and strategically in a very short amount of time. Also, because of the practice of spreading being used so commonly, it encourages debaters to have excellent note taking skills, as debaters (for the most part) are essentially required to summarize their opponents' arguments. During my short LD debate career, I never relied on spreading. Against opponents who did, I'd merely clarify on their case during CX. 2) Policy Debate has far more of a demand on research as it deals with using reasoning with empirical data to prove your case. In LD, winning mostly boils down to how well one's reasoning sounds when in the eyes of most judges. In other words, you don't even have a deep factual understanding on the subject to win a round. As for Mock Trial, you're given your information in advance. Second, there is the matter of what we consider to be the definition of debates. I merely consider it to be an eloquent verbal battle between Pro and Con whereas my opponent considers it to be a game where the players use persuasion and argue reasonably. My problem lies with the last part of that definition. In official competitions, I was not always one who was above arguing "unreasonably" through means of using underhanded debate tactics. For me, one of the principles in a debate where the goal is to persuade an audience is to break all of the rules without getting caught. Before my debates even began, I'd ask the judge a few questions to determine whether or not he/she was a layman. If it turned out that my judge was a layman, I would gracefully resort to logical fallacies to make my opponent look like a moron and appeal to the judge's emotion. Granted, I don't ever intend to do this on debate.org, but there's still the fact that I didn't personally object to using these methods to get a win in real life. By my opponent's definition, this factor negatively influences my actual debate skills. Now to address the reasons as to why my opponent cannot win this debate: First, there is the matter of "all factors combined." It is these three words that will prove to be my opponent's downfall in this debate. As you can see in the results of our cross examination, my opponent advocates that "all factors combined" can range from my profile picture to high school debate; my opponent insinuates that anything that influences our debating skills is what "all of the factors" boils down to. In saying this, he is astronomically increasing his burden of proof as there are ideally a limitless number of factors which can influence one's debate skills. It is my opponent's job to show how all factors make me a better or equal debater. Since he cannot even OBSERVE all of the factors, he has no way of doing this. Second, the reason "possibility" is the most logical conclusion is because neither of us has an empirical means of determining who is superior or whether or not we're equal. As suggested above, there are many factors which can increase/decrease one's debate skills. My opponent has an extremely limited number of factors which he can observe due to the fact that he can only observe my performance on debate.org. Thus, his conclusions would merely be based on his own perception of my debate techniques used here as well as any information which I have provided about my debate background in my life offline. I now stand ready for my opponent's case.