Who gets to speak first in the debate?
In a criminal trial, the accused is considered innocent when the trial begins. Thats why the prosecution gets to speak first to establish a charge against the defendant. The same idea carries over to debate: if the debate were never held, the Negative would win in theory, because the present way of doing things is presumed to be reasonably good. This benefit of the Negative team is know as presumption, since its equivalent to the legal presumption of innocence before a criminal trial. At the start of the debate, we presume that the present way of doing things the status quo (STAT-uhs KWOH) is reasonably effective, that its flaws are minor, and that changing from the present system would be risky. The Affirmative thus gets to speak first, in order to point out the severe problems in the status quo and to suggest ways that these problems can be removed. This is the Affirmative burden of proof their duty to attack the present system. We will talk more about this later. Which Affirmative s
