WRITTEN TRANSCRIPTION OF THE PODCAST:

Hi and welcome to my podcast My Life and Other Funny Stories. My name is Dagmar Tomášková, I am an English tutor and coach and I created this podcast for English students who want to get better in their oral comprehension. As always you can find the transcription of this episode, comprehension quiz, and vocabulary list in the notes of the podcast.

If you listened to episode 21 about my star career in a call center, you might already guess how much I love convincing someone about something. Whether it is selling things or just presenting arguments about any topic, I am just not good at it.

Well, at one point in my life, I actually tried to do something about it. Because I really love when people are able to debate any topic and present their arguments so confidently that you believe them even if you were sure that you didn’t agree with them at the beginning of the conversation. I find it fascinating and I wanted to have this skill too.

So I started attending a debate club that is organized through Masaryk’s university. Imagine something that is extremely out of your comfort zone and you feel uneasy just thinking about it. Yeah, for me it was debating. When I tell you I went three thousand kilometers outside my comfort zone, I am not lying.

I will just quickly introduce the basics of debating structure so you know what debating is about even if you never tried it. The format that is followed is called „British parliamentary debate format“.

There are eight speakers in this format: two teams of two people on each side. Each speaker gives a speech of up to five minutes The speeches are given alternating between proposition and opposition, beginning with the first proposition team. So one person from one team goes, then one from the other team, then again from team one, then from team two, after that the first one from team three, and so on.

At the beginning of each debate, you get a topic that is usually quite controversial. For example: „We should ban testing on animals“ and you also are given a position that you need to defend. So it doesn’t matter what your own opinion of that topic is. It doesn’t matter whether you actually think that testing on animals should be banned. If you get the task of defending labs that are testing on animals, you better think of some arguments against your own beliefs.

That was truly challenging for me as I can hardly defend the opinions I have proof for and I believe in. So trying to come up with arguments that I don’t even believe in is just…horrendous for me. Horrendous means terrible.

But trust me, people who are very skilled in debating are amazing at presenting arguments so well that I am always in awe. To be in awe means to feel great respect for someone.

Before the debate starts, you get the topic and then 15 minutes to discuss with your partner what your arguments will be.

Now, when we have this off the table, let’s talk about how I improved my debating skills through this experience. In two words 

– not much. 

But it is entirely my fault. You just need years of experience to get better at it and train your brain to come up with good, bulletproof arguments.

My first debates were going sort of like this:

I got a topic and with my partner, we got 15 minutes to think of some arguments. We put together a very short list of arguments and with not a very firm ground to stand on, we went back to the room of debate. I sat there, listening to the opposing team bringing their arguments to the table and I already knew I am screwed because they were already destroying my speech before I even got the chance to have it. To be screwed means to be in a difficult or hopeless situation. So when it was my time to go to the little speech table, it went something like this:

For the first two minutes, I was just talking about the things I had written on my paper and focused on my rhetoric, trying to sound persuasive (I didn’t do a really good job). A persuasive person is someone who will make you want to do or believe a specific thing. 

Then I tried to destroy the arguments of the opposite team but usually, it stayed in the phase of trying, not that much of succeeding and in the last minute, there were a good 10 seconds of silence for me to think whether I wanted to say something new, usually, I didn’t think of anything, and then I said I am done.

When I say 10 seconds, it really doesn’t sound so bad, but let me show you. Imagine, you are standing in front of people who are watching and listening to you and you just stand there, thinking what to say for 10 seconds – . . . . . . . . .

Feels like forever, huh?

So that was awesome.

After a few weeks, my boyfriend, who was in the debating club as well by the way, and I decided to attend a tournament. Because, why not, am I right?

It was being held in Bratislava and I had never been to Bratislava before and the people from the debating club were really great so we just went as well.

It took the whole weekend as on Friday, there was a workshop to help you construct your arguments, on Saturday, we had the tournament and on Sunday there were the semifinals and final round.

We went to the workshop because, you know, I felt like I could use some help with constructing my arguments.

It was organized in one of those meeting rooms where there is a glass wall instead of the normal one. So you can see inside the meeting room even if you are standing outside.

Now, why I am saying this- and I am sorry, I tried not to say it but I just have to – when we were arriving, the glass wall was so clean that it looked like there was nothing at all and I kid you not (which means I’m being completely serious right now), my boyfriend just straight up walked into the wall and crushed into it because he thought there was no wall.

It is like 4 years since this happened and I still think about it almost every day and I cannot stop laughing. It is just so funny to me.

Anyway, back to the tournament. We got some nice pieces of advice on the workshop and then on Saturday, we went to the tournament. There were some good news and bad news for me:

Good news: We got a thesis going: Everyone should become a vegan. Or something along the lines that we should stop eating meat. Which is a very controversial topic. But since I was eating a plant-based diet for many years at this point, I had a huuge arsenal of arguments that I could use! I was so happy! I was so excited to see this topic and that I will debate this.

Bad news: I got assigned the position that should argue against vegetarianism and veganism. Perfect. Now I could only use the arguments that had been told to me for many years which I didn’t really like.

Just this position made me think that the debate would be one huge disaster. But you will never believe what happened in this tournament. Suddenly, I was able to debate with such ease and everything went so smoothly, that we won every debate and soon we got into the semifinals and then….nah, I am just kidding, we were finished after the first rounds of debates. But you almost believed me, didn’t you?

The tournament was fun anyway and I love watching the debates of people who actually know what they are doing. It is really funny because you always hear the arguments of one team and you are telling yourself: „yeah, that makes sense, they are definitely the winners“ and then the other team comes and presents even better arguments and you are telling yourself: „no, THEY are definitely the winners“. but it just goes on and on and at the end you have no idea how the judges can say who is better.

Long story short, the art of debating is still a bit of a mystery to me. But I love learning about it more and I hope that with life experience, I will also get better at it, at least a little.

And that brings us to the end of the episode. If you want help with your English, write me a message or follow me on Instagram, where I post a lot of useful information that will help you push your English level higher – you can find me under the name dagmar_tomaskova – but I will also link it to the notes.

Thank you so much for listening to this episode and don’t forget that you can find the transcription, vocabulary list, and comprehension quiz in the notes. Please give it a five-star rating if you liked it and…I will see you next time, bye-bye.