Debate etiquette

Debate is all about trying to prove to the judge that your cause is right while the opposing team is wrong. Because of the sheer competitive nature of debate, a lot of emotions can boil over, and if debaters are not careful, may hurt others or themselves in the form of emotional damage, decreased score, or even in rare cases to be disqualified immediately. As such, it is important to keep a proper debate etiquette, some of which will be listed below.

1. Never insult or attack the debater, rather attack their arguments. In a debate you might get angry trying to prove them wrong, and as such instinctively will try to attack them at a personal level. In an official debate setting, this will almost guarantee a penalty. Instead, debaters should attack the arguments themselves, showing the judge that the arguments presented by the opposing team is not constructed well, lacks evidence, or is worse that your arguments.
2. Provide trigger warnings. Debates could go in a wild number of directions, and difficult debates may be emotionally triggering. The mention of domestic violence, sexual assaults, abuse, or other traumas of a similar nature may accidentally trigger someone, so it is important to provide trigger warnings before the start of each speech to avoid a member of the debate to be triggered.
3. Finally, timing your debates is important. In some debate settings, time keepers will keep track of the time elapsed by your speech, but in most you have to keep track of your own time. Going over time is not only a negative to your score, it is also preventing other debaters to present their speech, and it simply drags the debate longer than it should have.