public sphere: People have their favored view and then squeeze all incoming information to fit with it.

Most traditional debate formats can unfortunately fortify that kind of reasoning. In those competitions (Lincoln Douglas, Policy Debate, Public Forum, etc.) teams are randomly assigned positions–Team A, you’ll be arguing in the Affirmative, Team B, you’re arguing Negative—and their goal is to use reason to defend whatever conclusion they’ve been given.

It’s reasoning with an agenda.

Ethics Bowl is altogether different. Teams aren’t assigned positions; rather, they defend whatever they believe after they’ve thought long and honestly about it. Ethics Bowl is less about persuasion and rhetoric, and more about truth, inquiry, and intellectual honesty.

These are the things students say about the cases written each year by the National Organization.

Recent cases have concerned contraception, lying to help a friend out of a tough spot, racism, family disagreements, religious freedom, video games, gun control, and much more.

Here’s one example:

Is it morally permissible to listen to a musical artist whose music you love if you find out he holds strong racist beliefs?

The more engaging the cases, the more invested the students are, and the more deeply they develop critical abilities to think, reason, and communicate productively with others

Dissent and disagreement are hallmarks of democracy. What’s crucial though is how we disagree, how we converse and deliberate with those with whom we disagree.

But when we disagree is when we’re most likely to get irritated, hasty, even emotional—especially when the matter is ethical, political, or personal.

The more at stake in the conversation, the more difficult it is to remain poised, clear-headed, and ready to acknowledge fair points.

Disagreeing is a skill—one of the most difficult and important out there. And cultivating it is one of the paramount goals of the Ethics Bowl. The rules of Ethics Bowl are designed to reward the most productive kind of disagreement.

Here too Ethics Bowl provides a welcome alternative to other debate formats. For a great Radiolab episode on the National Debate Organization, listen to this podcast specifically the section starting at 10:42 and ending 11:05:

camaraderie, and collaboration. It’s welcoming and encouraging—not polarizing or antagonistic.

Maybe part of it is that students are explicitly encouraged to “dress in a way that makes them feel comfortable.” We like that.