OT........................................................
<<these are young boys making their own marks on the world, I think it is important to let them express their free flow of ideas. >> A day in my life and contentions of the boys..a nice read ..
hey dad,
i sent this off at 2am in the morning to City debating..if ur
interested in what happened, do read on although it is pretty long.
Rachel
Chan and Pete are presidents of the debating society. zain
Dear Rachel Chan,
My brother and I have returned from the Graveson
Championship held at Kings College, competing as City E. Rachel, I
write to
completely condemn the championship, which was entirely based, on
favouritism, nepotism and in my opinion pre-meditated decisions. This
is
pretty long so please take you’re time in reading it. Pete, I have also
included you in the email so that you are aware of what transpired.
I am not one to propound conspiracy theories but I assure you that I do
have
facts to prove my argument. City E, i.e. my brother and I, started off
extremely well with two independent adjudicators. We were pooled with
two
UCL teams and convincingly won the debate with first place. According
to
the judges, we had style, structure, excellent content, sharp rebuttals
and
all round was extremely good. Indeed, privately the adjudicator told us
that
if we keep debating as we had, getting to the final would was a mere
formality.
Proceeding on to the second round, once again we took the top spot
beating
out KCL and two City teams in another great display governed by
independent
adjudication. By this time, it was clear that City E was the main
forerunner
for the title and during lunch break it was naturally taken for granted
that
we were in the final.
Rachel, please note that I am not trying at all to be disparaging to
the
other teams, but for the sake of the truth, City E was the best team in
the
field by a wide margin. We structured our answers as you advised us,
peppered our speeches with humour and had excellent content. The other
City
teams in contention can confirm this and you only need to ask them for
their
opinion.
But upon returning from lunch and preparing for our third round, we
were
pooled up with LSE A. Immediately I became concerned, simply because
one of
the two adjudicators judging was the President of the LSE debating
society.
Although in a utopian world, this should not pose any difference, a
hint of
doubt did enter my mind.
However, true to word, we slumped to third criticized on every aspect
possible ranging from lack of content to structure. We took it in our
stride
convincing ourselves that perhaps we were at fault and trying not to
think
too much about it since we did not want to disrupt our 4th round
preparation.
Unfortunately, in the 4th round once again we were pooled with LSE A
with
the same adjudication panel. Here is where I must protest the
adjudication
and the unbelievable bias nature shown towards City teams. City E was
2nd
Opposition and this was a debate that was ours from the beginning to
end.
Permit me to explain.
The proposition (LSE A) debate talked about the UN bombing Iraq now
because
it might possess biological weapons. I POI’d one of the LSE speakers
questioning why the UN was not attacking N.Korea who recently admitted
possessing weapons of mass destruction!
His response was “ But N.Korea are a safe country with no history of
aggressive tendencies!” Rachel I cannot explain how this ultimate faux
pas
got past the adjudicators. I lambasted him on this point talking about
the
invasion of the south in the 50’s, the fact that the highest
concentration
of mines is located on the border! Basically I made him pay for this
gross
misjudgement.
LSE A also stated that dictators are “EVIL” and must be removed because
they
were not democratically elected which I then used to criticize them. I
brought Gen Musharraf as an example in my speech highlighting the
glaring
inaccuracies and misinformation presented by the 2nd Prop, i.e. LSE A.
In this debate Rachel, there was no question of who was better. There
were
two other City teams who were present, City A and City B, and both can
attest to that fact. In my speech I received ONLY 2 offers for POI’s
and
when I asked later (just after the debate) why I hadn’t received more,
the
only response was that my arguments were so firm, they couldn’t find an
argument
Lo and Behold, when the president of the LSE debating society announced
the
results, LSE A was again got the nod over City E. This was despite the
fact
that the adjudicators criticised the debate as awful due to the
proposition
not focusing the debate and allowing too broad a definition. As second
opp,
City E only had to summarise the debate, that we did, and our place in
the
debate meant we could not influence its development. Hence we did our
job
extremely well and cannot be blamed for the props problems in defining
the
debate motion.
We were dumbfounded. Actually the 3 City teams in the room were! We had
clearly the better style, structure, content, rebuttals and excellent
expressive techniques that really put LSE A to shame but we had lost
and
come in second.
Still we felt we had done enough to qualify. It was widely acknowledged
among the debaters and most of the adjudicators that we were by far the
best
debaters on the field and deserved to be in the final.
But 30 mins later as the contenders for the final were read, we were
not
included and in fact City D (Our partners in the MSc programme with
team
ranks of 4,3,2,2 in four rounds) got through along with LSE A, B and
UCL. A
huge gasp emanated from the audience as they realised we did not make
the
break. In fact so shocking was the fact that City D made it through,
that
one of their speakers asked from her seat whether the adjudicators had
made
a mistake in reading out the break teams and whether City D should be
City
E!
Rachel, you’re probably thinking that we’re complaining on a non-issue
BUT I
was approached by the one of the adjudicators (who judged us in the
first
round) who plainly said to me, that City E was by far the best team and
deserved to be in the final.
She also mentioned that during the selection for the final, she was
adamant
that we should be included in the final and was shocked when we did not
make
it through.
Her name is Hannah and her credentials in debating including winning
the
Cambridge open. She actually asked for my email address in order for
her to
find out what went wrong as something did happen and that she was sure
of
it.
Rachel I don’t know what to do but I felt it necessary to let you know.
I
had a quick look at the score sheets and we ended up 7th. By any
measure,
that simply is not true and please don’t just take my word for it. Ask
Devon
(sp), the City Adjudicator. He did not judge us at any time but word of
our
debating skills reached him as well. Ask ANY of the City teams and they
will
let you know that we were just too good and there was no way in hell,
we
could have come 7th!!!!
Rachel, something did go wrong. It was an unfair competition. Given
that
City E and LSE A were debating (The only teams to have won both their
opening rounds), the adjudication panel SHOULD have been neutral. It is
my
opinion and that of EVERY other City student that this championship was
pre-meditated for an LSE win.
I grant you LSE A were good but we were far better by every definition
in
the book. A great injustice has been committed and a travesty of the
highest
order! Rachel, if possible, this matter should not be allowed to rest.
There
was clearly a biased nature against City and this will be better
clarified
on Wednesday, if you are present. I do believe that City Debating
Society
should protest in this regard in order to safe-guard its integrity, its
honor and most of all because principle demands it.
Thank you for taking the time to read this. Best Zain Latif |
