Which equation?

With regards to the You_Fool issue, although neither of us can make a guarantee regarding mod action against any flamer (because f-mods don't have that power to determine blocks, and if you were hoping for retaliation within this competition, I, as a competitor, have absolutely no jurisdiction in that regards, as I could otherwise really abuse that power), the moderators have very clearly stated recently in their Announcements that they are taking a more stringent stance in fighting flaming in the forums... and, with the current judging pool consisting of two moderators and one forum moderator, it's nearly impossible that any instance of flaming would go unnoticed by the moderators.  Thus, the only variable in the equation would be whether the moderators consider what is cited as flaming to be justifiably considered flaming.

Translation: Behave, You_Fool! 

@Zarf: why do you have to be so mean?

To be fair I can't remember last time I actually tried to troll, I mean in a inflammatory way... as opposed to talking sense to see if Flint will respond kind of way.... What is annoying now is i am looking forward to this debate structure.... but I have to wait.... and by the time it happens I will probably be interested in something else....

Is there a list of people signed up?

What no Yell, no Xeno... i totally call those guys out! 

Arfeh too, he is so a frenchie if he doesn't sign up! IA and Genesis should sign up too, realpolitik is just fine for this shit.... means you can argue either side well...

Where is Little Paul too....

So disspaointed...

> [TI] Primo wrote:

> of the closet?

hahahahaha

@you fool:
I don't want to engage as I lack the time and don't want to destroy the debate by not responding or bad posts.

Take a beer Einstein, and stay off drugs

Debates on this forum?  Yikes.  I'm out - not only don't I have time, nor do I have the inclination after that Sopa / Pipa thread fiasco.  Partisan politics trumping objective academic discussion here 100% of the time.

Xeno: In the case of this board being partisan, the setup of this debate competition means that people have to be able to debate either side of an issue, which means more likelyhood of  better debate, and the requirement of credible references that won't be ripped to shreds

I'm not signing up for several reasons:

a) I'd probably lose
b) I'm not political enough
c) Arguing on the internet solves nothing and I can predict now that everyone will go away with the same opinions they hold at the start.
d) People take it too personally and name calling is almost certainly a certainty.

I had an idea earlier as I was getting ready for work, and since I am at work I can't go into chat to talk about it there, I shall post here and discussion can follow.

I have quite enjoyed what we have had of the debates we have had so far, and also had some good discussions about them with Zarf and Wormstrum (of the more over-riding structure and objectives of the debates rather than the individual topics or posts.) I was thinking that we could turn this into a league type structure, which would include Wormstrum so he could debate as well. The idea would be that 2 people that have signed up to the league and are available would be chosen at random and a topic assigned (either by a third party such as a mod or by Worm or Zarf.) The topic should be something that is interesting and current-ish, my suggestion would be to pick something that was recently a big topic in this forum, or a major world event. The two debaters would debate and the remaining members would act as judges, though I would suggest that one of them is assigned as official judge who rules on points of order and gives the final judgement on who won, and the rest are merely an appeals panel if a debater feels that the judge was unfair in some way.   After the debate is over (keeping to the structure above, or reducing to 2 posts each depending on how people feel about the current structure after the debates are finished,) then 2 new debaters are chosen from the people not in the current debate (and available.) A cool down period could be used as well, i.e. next debate isn't set up until a week after the previous debate.

From this a league table could be kept detailing wins, losses & concessions/withdrawals (A loss is better than a Concession/Withdrawal) and if we can agree to a scoring structure then we can also have points for each debate. Also I would expect that each member of the league would uphold a respectable level of courteousness to other politics members (even non-league people.) Zarf's constitution would be a good start for the way people in the league should act.

Also the original members (who I currently count as the people who are in the current debates + wormstrum) would be a league council type structure which would oversee members applications (maybe including a right to veto) as well as judiciary reviews of members conduct if necessary. Also the council would be able to elect other members to the council if/when required.

I realise to start with this may only be 4 or 5 people, but I would hope as we have more fun we can get more people involved and we can have more fun things like a team debate or a free-for-all type debate (and thus more like a normal politics thread but with better debaters.) The idea of the league would be to learn and grow our debating skills, and as such it should be expected that members help each other with helpful comments about how they thought each member did in any specific debate/post (only after the entire debate is over)