The fascinating complexity of high school debate gives way to a portrait of the equally complex racial and class bias of | dG1fNHctLUpRczBjaDg
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00:00 Number one fear in America? Public speaking. Number two is death.
00:04 [Music]
00:09 The lesson for this debate is that you cannot go for impact or issue critique and not answer the other team's framework.
00:13 [Multiple voices]
00:21 We have a population where debate is not necessarily cool.
00:25 Automatically off the top, I would think nerd.
00:27 Skills that you gain from debate really are helpful in tons of aspects of life.
00:31 Everything goes back to speech and debate.
00:35 At the school I went to, it was pretty cool to be a part of this debate program.
00:38 So you'd have these pretty geeky, nerdy guys who were pretty cool.
00:43 Matt's a genius.
00:45 We call him "The Boy" because he's a sophomore.
00:48 Mostly people throw me a flock because they basically like me.
00:54 [Music]
01:00 Samuel is much better at debate than he is at life.
01:03 Like, I tried homework for a while. That didn't exactly work.
01:07 He's in the top one half of one percent of all debaters in the country.
01:11 And if you looked at his grades, he'd probably be in the bottom 50th percentile of his own high school.
01:15 [Music]
01:17 I think people don't expect kids from the inner city to want to participate in an academic activity like debate.
01:23 You can't tell me that Martin Luther King is soft on racism and all the shit I go through every day.
01:27 Debate for me, honestly, was a way out.
01:30 I was looking for something to keep my head straight and keep me out of the streets.
01:35 But in this room we do have power.
01:37 The power to change your mind is what is going to outweigh everything in this room.
01:41 We can come here to win a trophy.
01:43 The fact that me and Richard are the first and second place speakers is nice.
01:45 How about me and Richard come here to debate to create change.
01:48 Debate kind of gave Louis this venue, you know, for a cause.
01:52 Like the stuff that you assume is just accessible to everyone is just not true.
01:56 [Music]
01:58 We're arguing that debate needs to be like an actual debate.
02:01 Let's not have a competition on who can say what the fast.
02:04 What they're doing is a 180.
02:06 I've never seen another team who cares more about the argument.
02:09 Because we're confronting an issue that is the harsh reality of the debate society that we teach in.
02:13 They're participating in the system, saying that the system is oppressive.
02:17 They may think that they're revolutionaries and if they are, they may change the court process.
02:22 Every Hollywood movie ever is about the long shot.
02:24 You know, the kids from the wrong side of the tracks that nobody thinks can win.
02:27 And they get the one in the million jackpot.
02:29 And at the end of it, you never know if these guys are going to be the ones who do hit that jackpot.
02:34 But they have a chance.
02:36 They might.
02:38 [Music]