Sunday 26 January 2014

The Phil



This Friday and Saturday, Juliette and I competed in the PhilSpeaks Senior Schools Mace Debate competition in Trinity College. The competition (commonly known as 'The Phil' ), is an unprepared debating competition with 5 rounds where teams accumulate points and the top 8 teams break to the semi-finals (I think I wrote about this in an earlier post, read it here).
  The weekend started off on an uncertain note, as when I got off the bus into Dublin City Centre, I felt the onset of a migraine. Juliette and I quickly headed for a pharmacy to try and pick up some neurofen to try and delay the migraine, and luckily, despite a pounding headache and some blurred vision, I recovered quickly enough and was able to compete! What a relief that was!
  My teammate and I prepared motions such as 'Homeschooling Should Be Banned' and 'This House Believes All Catholics Should Elect the Pope'. Over the course of the 5 rounds, we came 1st, 1st, 2nd, 1st, and 3rd, which meant that we broke as the 3rd team to the semi-finals.
  We were given an extremely tricky motion for the semi: 'This House Would Take A Pill That Stops You From Falling In Love', and we have to oppose this motion. After a great debate and a close call, we unfortunately didn't make the final, but nonetheless we had a great weekend.
  The competition was so well-run and organised, and I really had a fantastic time. Between silly games, eating popcorn and candyfloss, meeting new people and of course, debating, the weekend was jam-packed with fun activities and the society running the competition really made a huge effort so that it ran smoothly.
  One further highlight of the competition, was that I came overall 6th on the speaker tab, and as a relatively inexperience debater, I was so delighted with that outcome!

  To anyone that is thinking of taking up debating, I would highly recommend it - it is an extremely valuable skill to have, and aside from it helping so much with English and other subjects, it's just so much fun!!!
  Until next time, as someone once said; 
"Keep Calm and Think Critically"

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