Embark on a journey into the heart of critical thinking with James Fishback, the passionate founder of Incubate Debate, as he joins us to illuminate the transformative power of robust debate in education. We're not just talking about any debate; we're talking about the kind that shapes future leaders, fosters American pride, and breaks the chains of echo chambers. James shares his personal evolution through the world of debate and his vision for Incubate Debate, a sanctuary for students of all political leanings to engage in spirited yet respectful discourse, without the dark cloud of retribution for their beliefs.
This episode is a rallying cry for the revival of the revered Lincoln-Douglas debate style, which once set the standard for intellectual rigor and depth in American education. Here, we dissect the anatomy of effective debate, where opposing viewpoints are not just heard but understood, and where students can stand confident in their oratory skills. It’s a classroom where echoes are replaced by original voices, and where the ripple effects of debate skills extend beyond the podium into all areas of learning. As we unpack the significance of open debate, the discussion turns to the role of informed patriotism and the respectful clash of ideas – the bedrock of the great American tradition of discourse.
Finally, we cast a light on the path forward, where Incubate Debate's mission to infuse open debate into education takes flight. James reveals how parents and community members can lead the charge by setting up local chapters, fostering a generation of thinkers unafraid to challenge and be challenged. Tune in and become part of the movement to empower our youth with the gift of true discourse.
Links:
Website: IncubateDebate.org
Email: James@IncubateDebate.org
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Mr. Webb (00:00):
Have you ever wondered how healthy debate can shape
our students' perspectives andencourage American pride?
Are you curious about thetransformative power of open
debate in breaking the echochambers in our schools, looking
for ways to engage young mindsin critical thinking and
respectful discourse?
Welcome to The ConservativeClassroom, where we're teaching
(00:26):
the truth and preserving ourvalues.
I'm your host, Mr.
Webb, and I'm glad you're here.
This podcast is a haven forconservative educators, parents
and patriots like you, whobelieve in the importance of
free speech, traditional valuesand education without
indoctrination.
Each week, we dive into issuesthat are plaguing our education
(00:50):
system and keeping you up atnight.
In each episode, we offercommon sense ideas to improve
education in our classrooms andcommunities.
You may feel like you're thelast conservative educator or
parent, but I want you to knowthat you are not alone.
By the way, if you like whatyou hear today, please share
(01:12):
this podcast with a like-mindededucator, parent or patriot.
Together, we can teach thetruth and preserve our values.
In today's episode, we diveinto the transformative role of
open debate in fosteringcritical thinking, civil
discourse and a renewed sense ofAmerican pride, with James
(01:33):
Fishback, founder of IncubateDebate.
Now let's get started.
Today, I'm excited to welcome aspecial guest to The
Conservative Classroom, JamesFishback.
James is the founder ofIncubate Debate, America's
fastest- growing debate league.
He's here to share theimportance of healthy debate in
(01:57):
the classroom.
James has also served as anexternal advisor for Vivek
Ramaswamy, former presidentialcandidate.
James, thank you so much forjoining us.
That's my pleasure, joey.
I appreciate it.
To start, can you tell us a bitabout yourself, your background
, and what led you to foundingIncubate Debate?
James Fishback (02:21):
Well, I grew up in South Florida, went to public
high school and the first yearof class I didn't have an
elective, so they threw me inthis little thing called debate.
I'd always had a penchant forpolitics and economics.
I had a really bad stuttergrowing up, but I was in this
debate class and I was tellingthe truth.
It was kind of weirded out alittle bit, but I went to my
(02:43):
first tournament.
I fell in love with thisactivity and for the next four
years I was an active member ofmy debate team.
I served as captain.
I went on to win a nationalchampionship.
Needless to say, high schooldebate changed my life.
It made me a more confidentpublic speaker.
It allowed me to understand andappreciate the other side of
(03:05):
controversial issues, and ittaught me to be a good speaker,
yes, but it also taught me to bewhat I think I am, which is a
good listener, and so I can'tspeak highly enough about debate
, even though, as I'm sure we'lltalk about Joey, high school
debate is no longer what it usedto be, and Incubate Debate is
trying to fix that.
We are now America's fastestgrowing debate league, serving
(03:27):
not just high school studentsbut middle school students.
We are no cost.
We are nonpartisan.
Our job is to simply be aplatform for young Americans
from all walks of life to cometogether and to exchange their
views on some of the mostimportant issues facing the
country.
Mr. Webb (03:44):
So nonpartisan.
And you're on The ConservativeClassroom, so just let that.
I guess the listener sink in.
This is nonpartisan, so youguys welcome everybody.
It doesn't matter, you're notlooking for conservative
students, you're looking foranybody.
James Fishback (04:01):
We do.
That's right, and it's kind ofcrazy that I even have to say
nonpartisan when I talk about ahigh school debate league,
because that wasn't the case 15years ago.
I came back to high schooldebate in 2017, where I coached
a team of an underprivilegedhigh school in Miami, not too
far from where I grew up, andthe high school debate that I
came back to just four yearslater after being a competitor,
(04:23):
it was a shell of its formerself.
I'll never forget that firstdebate tournament that I went to
Joey at, a young black student,very bright free thinker, and
he was told after the debate bythis judge that he would have
won the debate had he notcriticized the Black Lives
Matter organization for beingMarxist.
And so, wait, hold on a secondyou had a young man who, by
(04:48):
every other measure, had won thedebate in front of him but was
told by his judge you know whatI didn't like that you said bad
things about BLM, even thoughthey are a self-avowed Marxist
organization, and therefore youlose.
And so, looking back on this,this was the beginning of a
really awful trend in highschool debate.
(05:08):
I wrote in the Free Press lastMay in an article entitled that
high school debates.
Debate is no longer allowedbecause truly it's no longer
allowed.
You have one judge who wasactually the 2019 national
debate champion, tellingstudents and I'm quoting here
before anything else, includingbeing a debate judge, I am a
Marxist, Leninist, Maoist.
I will no longer evaluate andthus ever vote for rightist,
(05:33):
capitalist, imperialistpositions, example of which
include defending the UScapitalism good, normalizing
Israel or policing good.
And so, Joey, when I saynonpartisan, what I'm talking
about is we are a debate league,unlike the national speech and
debate association, which iswhere this judge judges for or
(05:55):
like the one that criticized myyoung student for criticizing
BLM.
We are not like them.
We are nonpartisan.
I'm an unlogetic conservative.
As you mentioned, I was honoredto serve as an advisor to Vivek
Ramaswamy's campaign, butnonpartisan means nonpartisan.
Our job is to simply be thatplatform where kids come
together and have good faithdebates.
Mr. Webb (06:16):
And I think that's great.
As a teacher, obviously I'mconservative enough that I
started a podcast called TheConservative Classroom.
My students don't have a cluethat I have a podcast.
They don't have a clue whetherI'm conservative or liberal.
I keep politics completely outof the classroom and so in that
(06:37):
sense I'm nonpartisan.
I suppose so is that whatsparked you starting Incubate
Debate?
James Fishback (06:46):
What happened to that student?
Mr. Webb (06:47):
Which by the way is amazing that, instead of judging
that student on his debateskills, they decided or at least
one judge, if I understand youcorrectly, decided no, I don't
agree, so no, exactly.
James Fishback (07:05):
And there's just so many other examples.
I'll read you one more.
And this is a judge who saysquote if you are discussing
immigrants in a round anddescribe that immigrant as
illegal, I will immediately stopthe round, give you the loss
and give you a stern lecture andthen talk to your coach.
I will not have you making thedebate space unsafe.
(07:29):
And so here we go, joey, wehave an adult, a grown adult,
who's supposed to be educatingstudents as a high school debate
judge, telling kids they willautomatically lose and then be
publicly humiliated for using aterm illegal immigrant.
That's ubiquitous in our mediaand politics and is also, by the
way, completely accurate If youare in this country illegally,
(07:52):
you are an illegal immigrant.
That's just a fact.
And so this type of snowflakebabying that says that certain
words and certain arguments areoff limits and will result in
instant disqualification.
This means that high schooldebate, as I knew it, as so many
young people knew it 10, 15, 20, 30 years ago, is no longer
(08:13):
what it is.
This is why I started incubatedebate, because young Americans
deserve to be able to speaktheir convictions, to have
debates, to be able to growwithout this type of humiliation
and punishment from adults whohave an ideological agenda and,
by the way, I'm a conservative.
You are too, but I'll tell you,if someone was telling kids, I
(08:35):
am a MAGA Republican, and if yousay anything about defunding
the police or having an openborder, you will automatically
lose and I will give you a sternlecture.
It would be just asunacceptable.
And so I speak, I'd like tothink, from a position of
wanting free speech, wantingfree expression, and, yes, I'm a
conservative.
(08:55):
Yes, the victims of this brokensystem are also conservative
students.
But if this were happening tothe other side, I would be just
as upset.
Mr. Webb (09:04):
You mentioned the judge saying using the word
unsafe, so I kind of wrote thatdown.
So this is where the speech isviolence thing, excuse me.
So if you can convince yourselfthat speech you don't like is
violence, then that kind ofgives you the moral authority to
(09:26):
say, no, we're not going toallow that because it's violence
.
James Fishback (09:32):
That's exactly right and that that is a
slippery slope.
When people start talking abouthate speech and calling speech
violence and saying thatEssentially what you say can
actually harm people, then thatcreates, that, opens the door
for being able to say Well,illegal immigrant, that's, of
course, violence.
Capitalism, that's violence.
(09:53):
One judge says that if youargue that Israel has a right to
defend itself, that is violence, and so any conservative
position, heck, even anycenter-right, centrist position
like capitalism can reducepoverty Effectively, becomes
something that is makes you as astudent, persona non grata, and
that's why incubate debate.
(10:13):
I believe is necessary forthese young Americans to have
that platform.
Mr. Webb (10:18):
So tell us more about Incubate Debate, the mission and
exactly what it is.
James Fishback (10:28):
Well i t's a nonprofit organization.
Our mission actually isn't tohost high school debate
tournaments or to host freedebate camps, even though that's
what we do, and we do itproudly.
Our mission is in our name.
Our job is to incubate debate,to expose, to bring open debate,
civil debate, to youngAmericans wherever they are, and
so for the first five years ofour organization, we've done
(10:50):
that almost exclusively throughour debate tournaments, which
happened roughly 25 per year.
The season culminates in anannual national championship,
which is next month inJacksonville.
Students earn scholarships.
They debate topics from isthere a climate emergency?
To Should colleges abolish DEIprograms?
We don't.
(11:10):
We don't take anything off thetable.
Anything and everything shouldbe debated and up for debate.
But what we're increasinglydoing Joey and I was actually
just in a place called HendryCounty, Florida, last week,
working with 50 middle and highschool social studies teachers
on how they can bring Opendebate into their classroom in a
(11:31):
way that is coded to standards,that is set for benchmarks and
that is enriching and engagingfor their students.
And so what incubate debatestands for is not just debates
on a Saturday at a high schoolor 150 kids get together.
No, it's about reaching kidswherever they are, whether
that's in their Civics class,world history class,
(11:51):
environmental science class.
How can we infuse debate in theclassroom?
I'll tell you one way we did itat that workshop was we
actually had some studentsparticipate in a debate for the
teachers, and it was about whowas right in those
constitutional debates in thelate 1780s Was it the
federalists or was it theanti-federalists?
And so you actually assignsides to students, students who
(12:11):
represented each position, andthey had an open, roundtable
debate, which is a format that'sexclusive to incubate.
It's a free-form debate 10 to20 minutes.
Students sit in a semi circle,seven to eight of them, and
there's only three rules youcan't stand up, you can't use
notes and you have to alwaysobserve the golden rule treat
others the way you want to betreated.
And so here, right before oureyes, what you see, Joey, is
(12:35):
people, young people, having adebate about the Bill of Rights,
about this idea of federalism,this idea of states rights
versus federal rights, thedelegation of powers, the 10th
amendment, all of that in real-time.
And so there's an old BenFranklin quote, which is you
know, show me and somethingalong the lines of "Show me and
(13:00):
I'll get it, but involve me andI'll understand it.
And and that's what we're reallytrying to do here is to involve
kids in Education, and doingthat through debate is an
excellent, excellent way, andthat's the next part of our.
Our mission here is goingbeyond those debate tournaments
that we host for the select fewstudents who are able to
participate in a Saturday debate, who want to invest Call it
(13:22):
five, six hours a week and thenbring the power of open debate
to any student.
Use the power of the captiveaudience in the classroom To say
, hey, this is AP environmentalscience, but we're gonna have a
debate about nuclear versusgeothermal, about solar versus
wind.
Put your Textbooks away, let'sdiscuss what you guys have been
learning for three weeks.
Let's put it to the testbecause ultimately, if you can
(13:45):
defend your position, if you canunderstand your position well
enough to Defend it in front ofa group of your peers, then you
truly have excelled at thatsubject matter.
Mr. Webb (13:56):
That's great.
So it's not.
It's not them preparing aspeech, it's.
You know, let's sit down, nonotes, have at it.
That's, that's interesting.
James Fishback (14:09):
Yeah, that's what we're doing and that's.
You know, part of one of mymany gripes with debate was the
fact that it seemed awfullyrigid and inorganic and
Inauthentic, and so most debates.
You and I probably have debatesevery single day, but they
don't happen in a structured way.
(14:30):
You have two minutes, I havethree minutes to respond.
We have a questioning, we havea cross examination.
We know most debates happenaround the dinner table.
Most debates happen inboardrooms.
Most debates happen in teacherplanning, when you're getting
together with your colleaguesand talking about how we're
gonna Do a certain thing or notdo a certain thing.
And so I think about that.
Ben Franklin quote "Tell me andI forget, teach me and I may
(14:51):
remember.
Involve me and I learn.
What better way to get youngpeople to learn than to engage
with the content at such a highlevel?
They're actually defendingAnti-federalists like George
Clinton or federalists likeAlexander Hamilton in a live,
open debate.
It's like the view, with theexception that there's actually
(15:12):
multiple views and descent istolerated.
It's like the view they're allseated around a round table,
they're having an opendiscussion and anything goes.
They have to be civil, theyhave to be respectful, but it's.
It's a really magicalexperience for the kids.
Mr. Webb (15:26):
So how do you see open debate?
You talked a little about howthat in the educational setting,
but to me I see that asdeveloping some critical
thinking skills and, excuse me,kind of thinking on the fly.
James Fishback (15:42):
I'm not sure what the the term is for that I
Would say, thinking on the flyis the term for it and and you'd
be right.
Right, because in the realworld you don't get to go to a
inner a job interview and haveprepared notes and pull out a
note card, or in the real world,you have to just kind of sit
there and apt and respond andthink on your feet.
(16:03):
And so you're absolutely right.
Critical thinking, the abilityto think for yourself.
We teach students that you haveto understand all sides of an
issue right To be able toactually effectively argue your
side of the issue.
And so, apart from somethingthat is completely tied to the
standards and completely tied toyour curriculum in the
classroom, you're actuallyteaching your students how to do
(16:25):
something that is gonna beimmensely valuable, which is
being confident, answeringquestions, maintaining eye
contact, cravitas poise.
I'll tell you, young peopletoday and I don't need I'm
preaching to the choir when Isay this to you, but young
people today, this is the mostdisconnected generation,
precisely because they are themost quote, unquote connected
generation when it comes totechnology.
(16:47):
And so you walk into arestaurant, you see a bunch of
kids are 15, 16 year oldshanging out.
They're all on their phones andinstead what they should be
doing is having an openconversation.
That's how they actually get tosome semblance of real world
skills.
And so when teachers are doingthis, when they're having open
debates and this can be this hasboth elements that are
formative and summative this canbe the replacement for a quiz.
(17:08):
It can be what's used toprepare for the AP exam.
It could be what's used afterthe AP exam to keep your kids
engaged.
Whatever it is, and I'll tellyou this, one of my proudest
moments when doing this is whena teacher emailed me and said I
use this on my regular students,on my honor students and on my
AP students, and they all didwell, but the ones who really
(17:31):
stood out, who punched abovetheir weight, who knocked my
socks off, were those kids inthe regular history class.
And so this is something thatcan be applied to all students
of all abilities, that they canactually participate in.
Mr. Webb (17:46):
I would imagine that you witness a fire start within
some of the students that maybedidn't really care that much
about education before, have you?
James Fishback (17:58):
seen that we do, yeah, we do.
There's an old adage, I'm sureyou've heard it Kids speak
better than they write.
They speak better than theywrite.
And so what better way?
Because there's not really anyother way.
We don't see oral exams, maybein some of those foreign
language classes, but we don'treally see oral examination.
(18:18):
This is the highest form of oralexamination because it's
actually a debate, and so youhave students in the back of the
class who might be fullyengaged with the content smart
kids, they punch above theirweight, but there's so much
inertia that goes into sittingdown and writing that short
essay that you end up losingthem.
And so what this ends up beingis a powerful tool to engage any
(18:42):
and all students, because, yeah, the kids who are extroverts
are gonna do especially well atit.
But it's also the students whoare at the back of the room who
you've only heard their voiceonce or twice the entire school
year.
They're the ones who have themost to gain because they're
gonna blossom, and what we'veheard from teachers is that they
had a debate in one class andthen they had their colleague in
(19:06):
another class tell them why isNick all of a sudden more vocal?
I all of a sudden notice himengaging with the content more
and speaking up more and askingquestions and being more
attentive.
So there's really big dividendshere.
And it just doesn't apply tothose students who are in that
particular class.
It carries over to other preps,to other courses of the
students who are involved andengages them across all of them.
Mr. Webb (19:31):
So here's a basic question, but for someone like
myself that wasn't a debater.
What makes for a good debate?
James Fishback (19:43):
What a great question.
I'll tell you what doesn't makefor a good debate, which is
those presidential debates thatwe see every four years.
They're like a dueling pressconference.
Right, there's a debate.
Let's just define that word,because we take it for granted.
A debate is defined by clash.
Clash is opposing viewpointsthat are addressing one another.
(20:05):
And so if you and I are havinga debate about what is the
better fruit, and you saystrawberry and I say mango, but
I just keep saying mango and youjust keep saying strawberry and
I'm not addressing your pointand you're not addressing my
point, then we're not having adebate, we're just talking past
one another.
A debate is where our argumentsare actively clashing, when
(20:29):
you're saying things like well,yeah, but a mango doesn't offer
you the same antioxidantbenefits as a strawberry does.
And then I say, well, but amango can be served like the XYZ
, and so a debate actually hasto clash.
And so why do thosepresidential debates fall short
of this definition Is becausePresident Trump will say XYZ,
(20:51):
and then President Biden willjust have some ad hominem attack
accusing him of being some kindof a Putin sympathizer, and so
he doesn't actually address theargument in front of them.
And I gotta say Republicans arealso guilty of this They'll
tell you that Ukraine is gonnafall in 30 days if you don't
send them more money, and then,if you provide a well-reasoned,
substantive rebuttal of that,they then call you a Putin
(21:13):
sympathizer.
And so debates are largely freeof ad hominem attacks.
The arguments have to be aboutthe substance, not the
individuals making thosearguments, and there has to be
clash.
There has to be this back andforth where it says okay, you
said this, but what about this,and how do you address that in
the context of this?
That is what a true debate isTalking, not past one another,
(21:37):
but talking with one another.
Mr. Webb (21:40):
When you mentioned presidential debate, I laughed,
because the first thing that Ithought of and this is what
drives me nuts about thepresidential debates the
moderator becomes part of thedebate, and that's right.
I don't know much aboutdebating, but I know that the
moderator is supposed tomoderate and not supposed to
become part of the debate.
And the fact that they have aokay, here's the topic, you have
(22:06):
three minutes or whatever, andthen okay, no, no, we're gonna
move on to the next topic.
We're gonna move on to the nexttopic and I would like to see
whether it's two people or three, or, excuse me, in the primary
debates where it was half adozen people on stage.
Just let them go at it, letthem get it all out.
(22:26):
Let's see if we can get theminvolved and get them past their
talking points and see somereal debate.
So I'm glad you brought that up.
James Fishback (22:37):
Yes, and you're absolutely right that moderator.
We've seen it, especially inthat 2020 debate is actively
playing a role.
Whether it was Chris Wallacefact-checking President Trump
about the vaccines and sayingthey would never come out by the
end of the year, even thoughthey came out a week after the
election and then ended up beinga disaster in itself, which is
(22:59):
a whole separate debate.
Whether it was Anderson Cooperfact-checking Mitt Romney in the
2012 debate and essentiallysiding with Obama and kind of
coming in as his partner thereabout that question on Benghazi.
What I wanna get back to, whatwe need to get back to as a
country, is those politicaldebates that a man by the name
(23:20):
of Abraham Lincoln and StephenDouglas participated in in the
1850s, and here's how theyworked.
Each debate lasted three hours.
Lincoln would speak for 60minutes, douglas would have 90
minutes to respond and to makehis own arguments, and then
Lincoln would be given a final30 minute rejoinder, and so what
(23:41):
you had there was eachindividual in that debate had an
hour and a half, but it wasstaggered and that's brilliant.
No, moderator, nobody's saying,well, we don't want to talk
about China now.
We don't want to talk aboutfentanyl now.
No, nobody's saying well, thesetopics, what we care about.
The reality of the situation isin those primary debates.
There were so many issues inthe public in primary debates
(24:04):
that the average public andprimary voter would have ranked
probably around 20 or 30 ontheir list of issues.
And so most Republicans careabout what's happening with the
border, or inflation, if thosegot the same attention as Russia
, or supposedly what happened onJanuary 6, or so on and so
forth.
And so what these types ofLincoln-Douglas debates did is
(24:25):
they allowed the candidates tobe in charge, not the moderators
, who have consistently hadtheir thumb on the scale and
done it in a way.
That's really a disservice,joey, to the American people,
who need to listen to thesedebates to make up their mind
about which candidate to support.
Mr. Webb (24:43):
And one more thing on the presidential debates Vivek
Rameswamy, he is such awonderful debater and I could I
just.
I so enjoyed watching him go atit, and you are a master
debater.
So is there a connection there?
(25:04):
Is that how you guys know eachother through that, or is that
just a total coincidence?
James Fishback (25:14):
Vivek is.
I think his debating skillswere off the charts because he
didn't come to those debates,Joey, as a debater.
He came there as someone whowanted to speak truth and speak
conviction.
He didn't treat them like somegame where you score points by
using some canned one-lineragainst Ron DeSantis or Nikki
(25:36):
Haley.
He came there with a mission,which was to speak truth to the
American people.
And I'll tell you, I was at thatfirst debate in Milwaukee and a
lot of the people in theaudience didn't like what he had
to say at times.
But remember, those people inthe audience were not
representative of the primaryvoting electorate.
They were largely friends ofthe Republican National
Committee, friends of candidatesand donors and so on.
(25:57):
And so what Vivek didparticularly well is he was
concise.
He spoke about what peoplewanted to hear and he did it in
a way that was engaging and thatleft people wanting more from
him.
And that wasn't a debate trickor a tactic.
It's not something that hecould have picked up in a debate
(26:20):
prep session.
It's something he lived andthat's just who he is.
He's someone who is going tospeak his convictions, speak
truth and communicate thoseideas, not as some professor,
not trying to lecture the people, but as someone who is treating
them as equals and as a part ofthis very special thing we call
(26:41):
the United States of America.
Mr. Webb (26:44):
One of the things that I loved that he was pushing for
is us getting back to Americanpride, and I know that's one
thing your organization.
What role does American prideplay in Incubate Debate.
James Fishback (27:04):
It plays a really important one.
Now I want to be clear that anytype of forced ideology on young
people is wrong.
It's wrong when a teacher wantsto lecture kids with critical
race theory and preach abouttransgenderism, and it's wrong
when some conservatives want toforce some pro-American message
(27:25):
down young people's throats.
What we believe is whatPresident Reagan believes, which
is informed patriotism.
We believe that if you lay allthe facts out there the good,
bad and the ugly about thiscountry's history that young
people left to their own deviceswill understand and recognize
that this is the most specialcountry, the greatest country
(27:48):
that has ever existed and thatwill ever exist.
And so we are all aboutinformed patriotism.
We do that a number of ways.
We do that by providing aresearch packet to our students
that presents both sides of theissue.
We do that by bringing inveterans and first responders
and active service members tocome out and evaluate students
(28:08):
as debate judges.
And we do that by startingevery debate with the pledge of
allegiance.
This country was built on freespeech and open debate, and so
what better way to start ourdebates than by honoring the
country that really started itall and making debate part of
the very fabric of our country,through and through.
Mr. Webb (28:32):
And civility and free expression I know are core
values of Incubate Debate andtoday, you know, the climate is
so polarized.
How do you encourage studentsto maintain those values during
debates and do you have somestudents who don't want to
maintain civility and freeexpression?
James Fishback (28:58):
There are, and those are learning opportunities
for those students.
They walk away better for itand they come back better and
more civil.
What our message is is twofold.
One, this is not a competition.
This is not a debate tournament.
This is not a game.
We are here to partake in thegreat American tradition of open
debate, the open debates thatdecided whether or not we were
(29:21):
going to declare independence.
The open debates between folkslike the Federalist and the
Anti-Federalist that gave usdocuments like the Bill of
Rights, that gave us theConstitution.
Debates in the 1960s that gaveus important civil rights
legislation to right the wrongsof the past.
And so, when we think aboutcivility, the first thing we
(29:41):
have to do is this is not acompetition.
This is not something whereyou're going to compete against
someone.
You're going to compete withthem.
You can attack their argument,but don't attack them as a
person.
Recognize that good people candiffer, that great ideas are a
byproduct of opposing ideasclashing.
Hence why debate in all of itsforms is essential.
(30:01):
And that young people most ofthe time, they hold those views
about Republicans or MAGA Trumpsupporters because they've never
actually interacted with peopleon the other side.
And so what I'm really proud ofis how much our team has reached
out to rural communities andtribal communities and brought
(30:23):
in students from all walks oflife, from all political
persuasions.
I can go up there and preachcivility and viewpoint diversity
all day long, but unless webring together a young
progressive who is acard-carrying member of the
Democrat Party, and unless webring together a young
conservative who considersthemselves America first and
have them have a conversationabout the border, about Ukraine,
(30:45):
about NATO, about asylum, thenwe can't actually do anything.
And so incubate debate hasthose young people.
We've made it our mission tobring people from all walks of
life.
We've done that in large partby being no cost.
We've done that by doingworkshops.
We were in Hamilton County,florida today, a very rural
community in a city calledJasper, doing this work.
(31:08):
So when we say that we've gotpeople from all diverse
perspectives, we're not talkingabout shades of melanin, we're
talking about people whorepresent all parts of this
country, and so I think that'show we do it.
More than anything.
We can talk about civility, wecan have catchy taglines and
good empowering speeches tostart our tournaments, but if
(31:29):
you don't actually bring peoplewho represent the widest range
of viewpoints in this countrytogether.
That is actually the way youteach civility.
Is that a young person talkingto a kid from an agricultural
community recognizing hey,you're not all that different?
For me, you're not the personthat Joe Biden says is a MAGA
extremist.
We may not agree on everything,but remember, good people can
(31:51):
differ and debate is not a bug.
Debate is a feature of ourconstitutional republic.
Our disagreement is exactlyprecisely why America is so
great.
It's how we produce the bestideas that have propelled us
forward.
Mr. Webb (32:10):
Now a little bit that you brought up viewpoint
diversity, because nowadays whenyou hear diversity it is many
times it's everybody thinks thesame way, they just all look
different, and that's really notdiversity.
James Fishback (32:25):
No, it's not.
Ibram X Kendi is black,Ta-Nehisi Coates is black, but
having them on a panel does notmake the panel any more diverse.
They hold the exact same fewpoints about race, systemic
racism, structural, all of that.
(32:45):
And so what actually makesdiversity is diverse opinions.
I mean, diversity is not whatmade this country great, I'm
sorry to say.
It was the diversity ofviewpoints that made this
country great.
Now that does map with thetraditional physical
characteristics of diversity,which is to say that people from
(33:07):
lower income communities,people from higher income
communities, they may havedifferent shades of melanin, but
what actually produces greatoutcomes is not different shades
of melanin or different genders, but it's people holding
different viewpoints.
Someone from an agriculturalcommunity having a discussion
with someone from the city,someone from the West having a
discussion with someone from theEast, someone from this
(33:29):
particular school of economicshaving a discussion with someone
who's more of a free marketthinker that's what produces
good outcomes.
And so diversity for diversity'ssake isn't going to do anybody
any good.
It's actually going to activelyharm people.
Because you're saying you'rediverse, you're telling people
this is what diversity lookslike, but you're not actually
showing them what say the realdiversity in this country looks
(33:54):
like, and so to any panel outthere that says this is a
diverse panel or a diverseconference, we want to start off
with how many Trump supportersare in the audience.
Raise your hands, and if youdon't see a single hand, that's
a problem.
That's not diversity.
And I'd say the same thing tomy conservative friends that if
you're having a panel, you needto have a progressive on there.
You need to have someone todisagree with, because having 10
(34:16):
people in the room all sayingthe same things isn't going to
get us where we need to be.
Mr. Webb (34:22):
And my listeners are parents and teachers.
So to someone that might belistening and they really like
what they've heard and they wantto look into incubate debate,
what would be their next stepsand who is a good candidate for
Incubate Debate?
James Fishback (34:45):
It's a.
We would, first and foremost,be honored to have them as a
part of this movement.
And it really is a movement.
It's not a nonprofit.
It's a movement of parents, ofstudents, of teachers who
recognize the power and theenriching abilities of open and
civil debate.
And so there's two ways to beinvolved.
If you're a teacher, go toincubate debateorg.
(35:06):
Get in touch with us about ourincubate teachers toolkit, which
is what we discussed earlier.
How can you bring the power ofopen debate into your classroom
Again, in a way that iseducational, not just a fun
thing to debate XYZ, but toactually have debates on what is
expected of you and standards,what is in your curriculum to
(35:27):
get kids ready, to not just getthem ready for your curriculum,
but also to give them other realworld skills, like being able
to disagree agreeably and speakup and have confidence, and so
on.
So go to incubate debate.
If you're a teacher, we want tohear from you, we want to work
with you.
Again, everything we do is nocost.
And the second thing, Joey, isfor parents that are out there.
Right now, we're serving about5,000 kids in three states
(35:47):
Florida, georgia, south Carolinabut we are looking for parents
who want to step up and say Iwant to run an incubate chapter
of my own.
I want to host local incubatetournaments, even if it's for
just 15, 20, 30 kids.
I want to give these students aplatform to come together a
couple times in the school yearand to have debates.
I'm not interested in makingmoney off of this.
(36:08):
I'm just someone who cares alot about free expression and
the power of viewpoint,diversity and also, if that's
the case, go to incubate debate.
Reach out to us about ourincubate USA chapter chair
initiative and we want to workwith you.
We want to talk with you abouthow we can get you ready to be
hosting these tournaments.
And there's no tournamentthat's too small.
(36:28):
You got to start somewhere.
Any opportunity to have youngAmericans come together to
exchange ideas is going to be agood opportunity for not just
them, but for the country thatthey will soon inherit.
Mr. Webb (36:41):
So you said a chapter chair initiative on incubate.
I'll make sure and put links toyour website on the show notes
and I usually, towards the end,will ask, if you want to, you
know, to share out how folks canconnect with you.
But I'll go ahead and ask thatnow, since we brought up the
(37:03):
website, yeah, how can folksconnect with you or check out
other projects?
Basically, this is your time topromote anything you want to.
James Fishback (37:16):
Best way to get in touch is email James just how
it sounds, James@IncubateDebate.
org.
Send an email if you have anidea, if you want to talk any
about the teacher's toolkit orour chapter chair initiative,
we'd love to get in touch and goto IncubateDebateorg.
We have a newsletter.
Sign up for that newsletter.
(37:37):
We have thousands of people onit.
We want to share updates withyou.
So maybe you're not ready rightnow to engage with us, but
there may be a time where, ayear or two years down the line,
an opportunity presents itselfwhere you want to give students,
give your own kids, givewhomever, an opportunity to reap
the benefits and really to reapthe benefits of debate.
(37:58):
You know, debate is somethingthat everyone that I talked to,
who did it not recently becauseit's been totally hijacked, but
did it back in the day, you know, in 1982, it was Supreme Court
Justice Neil Gorsuch who won thenational debate champion.
People like Oprah Winfrey,Katanji Brown Jackson, Ted Cruz
credited their success withbeing a part of debate.
(38:20):
And so what incubate is doingand it's no easy task, it's not
going to be easy for us, butnothing worth doing is easy is
we are going to totallytransform debate and make it
something that you know.
We don't leave it up to thecreative writing club, joey, to
teach creative writing.
We also sign that to ourEnglish teachers.
(38:41):
We don't leave it up to thehistory club to teach kids about
World War II.
They learned that in their UShistory class.
We shouldn't leave it up to thedebate club to teach kids how
to disagree agreeably, how to beable to hold their own, how to
concede, how to be good speakers, but also how to be great
listeners.
And so what we are doing, morethan anything, is we are having
(39:01):
the eye on the target.
How can we bring open debate tostudents wherever they are?
Yes, at our tournaments.
Yes, for our chapter chairs,but also for the millions and
millions of kids, sixth gradethrough twelfth grade, who are
at school for seven, eight hoursa day.
They should be able to reap thebenefits of open debate as well
(39:21):
.
And for teachers out there.
If this even remotely interestsyou, please send us an email,
james@incubatedebate.
org.
We'd love to talk, we'd love tocompare notes and how we can
bring the power of open debateinto your classroom.
Mr. Webb (39:35):
And what's the one thing you want the listeners to
remember, if they don't rememberanything else about this
episode?
James Fishback (39:43):
I would say that debate made this country great.
Every turning point, every idea, every invention, every
innovation was the byproduct ofa rigorous discussion with
opposing viewpoints.
That is the definition ofdebate, even if at the time
people didn't think of it asdebate.
Everything went through thatprocess.
(40:04):
We can't stop now.
We have a country, I believe,to save, and one way we can do
that is by bringing young peopletogether.
Our country, our education,depends on it and, more than
anything, the path to truth runsthrough it.
It runs through open debate.
That's how we can really reallymake a difference for young
(40:27):
people and that's what I wouldleave your listeners with.
Mr. Webb (40:31):
That's great stuff, and you have a book coming out.
Is that correct?
James Fishback (40:37):
I do.
I'm working on it now.
It is entitled "Clash how OpenDebate Can Heal a Divided World
and it's about the things thatwe're talking about right now.
Debate has declined.
It used to be the case that youcould turn on CNN when I was a
kid, 15, 20 years ago, and you'dsee people like Tucker Carlson
and John Stuart just going at it.
That was a debate.
You could turn on Fox and therewouldn't just be people who
(40:58):
agreed with one another sayinghow great President Trump is.
There would actually be somedisagreement about particular
things.
You don't see that anymore, andso as a conservative, as a, I
put that second.
But I'm an American.
I believe in free speech, opendebate, free expression, and
what we need to see in oursociety to really kick up this
next wave of American growth iswe need to bring back debate.
(41:22):
Some would say we need to makedebate great again.
Mr. Webb (41:25):
Ooh, that is.
That's a good note to end onright there.
I appreciate you so much comingon today and when your book
comes out, send me an email, letme know and I'd love to have
you back on.
We'll promote that and I'll puta link to that in the show
notes where I think pick up acopy.
It's been a pleasure having youon the conservative classroom
(41:47):
and I know our listenersappreciate your insights on the
importance of healthy debatewith our young people of America
.
James Fishback (41:55):
So thank you so much.
Well, thank you, Joey, realpleasure to be here.
Mr. Webb (42:02):
That's it for today's episode of The Conservative
Classroom.
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(42:22):
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(42:43):
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Teaching the truth.
Preserving our values.
Have you ever wondered how healthy debate can shape
our students' perspectives andencourage American pride?
Are you curious about thetransformative power of open
debate in breaking the echochambers in our schools, looking
for ways to engage young mindsin critical thinking and
respectful discourse?
Welcome to The ConservativeClassroom, where we're teaching
(00:26):
the truth and preserving ourvalues.
I'm your host, Mr.
Webb, and I'm glad you're here.
This podcast is a haven forconservative educators, parents
and patriots like you, whobelieve in the importance of
free speech, traditional valuesand education without
indoctrination.
Each week, we dive into issuesthat are plaguing our education
(00:50):
system and keeping you up atnight.
In each episode, we offercommon sense ideas to improve
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(01:12):
this podcast with a like-mindededucator, parent or patriot.
Together, we can teach thetruth and preserve our values.
In today's episode, we diveinto the transformative role of
open debate in fosteringcritical thinking, civil
discourse and a renewed sense ofAmerican pride, with James
(01:33):
Fishback, founder of IncubateDebate.
Now let's get started.
Today, I'm excited to welcome aspecial guest to The
Conservative Classroom, JamesFishback.
James is the founder ofIncubate Debate, America's
fastest- growing debate league.
He's here to share theimportance of healthy debate in
(01:57):
the classroom.
James has also served as anexternal advisor for Vivek
Ramaswamy, former presidentialcandidate.
James, thank you so much forjoining us.
That's my pleasure, joey.
I appreciate it.
To start, can you tell us a bitabout yourself, your background
, and what led you to foundingIncubate Debate?
James Fishback (02:21):
Well, I grew up in South Florida, went to public
high school and the first yearof class I didn't have an
elective, so they threw me inthis little thing called debate.
I'd always had a penchant forpolitics and economics.
I had a really bad stuttergrowing up, but I was in this
debate class and I was tellingthe truth.
It was kind of weirded out alittle bit, but I went to my
(02:43):
first tournament.
I fell in love with thisactivity and for the next four
years I was an active member ofmy debate team.
I served as captain.
I went on to win a nationalchampionship.
Needless to say, high schooldebate changed my life.
It made me a more confidentpublic speaker.
It allowed me to understand andappreciate the other side of
(03:05):
controversial issues, and ittaught me to be a good speaker,
yes, but it also taught me to bewhat I think I am, which is a
good listener, and so I can'tspeak highly enough about debate
, even though, as I'm sure we'lltalk about Joey, high school
debate is no longer what it usedto be, and Incubate Debate is
trying to fix that.
We are now America's fastestgrowing debate league, serving
(03:27):
not just high school studentsbut middle school students.
We are no cost.
We are nonpartisan.
Our job is to simply be aplatform for young Americans
from all walks of life to cometogether and to exchange their
views on some of the mostimportant issues facing the
country.
Mr. Webb (03:44):
So nonpartisan.
And you're on The ConservativeClassroom, so just let that.
I guess the listener sink in.
This is nonpartisan, so youguys welcome everybody.
It doesn't matter, you're notlooking for conservative
students, you're looking foranybody.
James Fishback (04:01):
We do.
That's right, and it's kind ofcrazy that I even have to say
nonpartisan when I talk about ahigh school debate league,
because that wasn't the case 15years ago.
I came back to high schooldebate in 2017, where I coached
a team of an underprivilegedhigh school in Miami, not too
far from where I grew up, andthe high school debate that I
came back to just four yearslater after being a competitor,
(04:23):
it was a shell of its formerself.
I'll never forget that firstdebate tournament that I went to
Joey at, a young black student,very bright free thinker, and
he was told after the debate bythis judge that he would have
won the debate had he notcriticized the Black Lives
Matter organization for beingMarxist.
And so, wait, hold on a secondyou had a young man who, by
(04:48):
every other measure, had won thedebate in front of him but was
told by his judge you know whatI didn't like that you said bad
things about BLM, even thoughthey are a self-avowed Marxist
organization, and therefore youlose.
And so, looking back on this,this was the beginning of a
really awful trend in highschool debate.
(05:08):
I wrote in the Free Press lastMay in an article entitled that
high school debates.
Debate is no longer allowedbecause truly it's no longer
allowed.
You have one judge who wasactually the 2019 national
debate champion, tellingstudents and I'm quoting here
before anything else, includingbeing a debate judge, I am a
Marxist, Leninist, Maoist.
I will no longer evaluate andthus ever vote for rightist,
(05:33):
capitalist, imperialistpositions, example of which
include defending the UScapitalism good, normalizing
Israel or policing good.
And so, Joey, when I saynonpartisan, what I'm talking
about is we are a debate league,unlike the national speech and
debate association, which iswhere this judge judges for or
(05:55):
like the one that criticized myyoung student for criticizing
BLM.
We are not like them.
We are nonpartisan.
I'm an unlogetic conservative.
As you mentioned, I was honoredto serve as an advisor to Vivek
Ramaswamy's campaign, butnonpartisan means nonpartisan.
Our job is to simply be thatplatform where kids come
together and have good faithdebates.
Mr. Webb (06:16):
And I think that's great.
As a teacher, obviously I'mconservative enough that I
started a podcast called TheConservative Classroom.
My students don't have a cluethat I have a podcast.
They don't have a clue whetherI'm conservative or liberal.
I keep politics completely outof the classroom and so in that
(06:37):
sense I'm nonpartisan.
I suppose so is that whatsparked you starting Incubate
Debate?
James Fishback (06:46):
What happened to that student?
Mr. Webb (06:47):
Which by the way is amazing that, instead of judging
that student on his debateskills, they decided or at least
one judge, if I understand youcorrectly, decided no, I don't
agree, so no, exactly.
James Fishback (07:05):
And there's just so many other examples.
I'll read you one more.
And this is a judge who saysquote if you are discussing
immigrants in a round anddescribe that immigrant as
illegal, I will immediately stopthe round, give you the loss
and give you a stern lecture andthen talk to your coach.
I will not have you making thedebate space unsafe.
(07:29):
And so here we go, joey, wehave an adult, a grown adult,
who's supposed to be educatingstudents as a high school debate
judge, telling kids they willautomatically lose and then be
publicly humiliated for using aterm illegal immigrant.
That's ubiquitous in our mediaand politics and is also, by the
way, completely accurate If youare in this country illegally,
(07:52):
you are an illegal immigrant.
That's just a fact.
And so this type of snowflakebabying that says that certain
words and certain arguments areoff limits and will result in
instant disqualification.
This means that high schooldebate, as I knew it, as so many
young people knew it 10, 15, 20, 30 years ago, is no longer
(08:13):
what it is.
This is why I started incubatedebate, because young Americans
deserve to be able to speaktheir convictions, to have
debates, to be able to growwithout this type of humiliation
and punishment from adults whohave an ideological agenda and,
by the way, I'm a conservative.
You are too, but I'll tell you,if someone was telling kids, I
(08:35):
am a MAGA Republican, and if yousay anything about defunding
the police or having an openborder, you will automatically
lose and I will give you a sternlecture.
It would be just asunacceptable.
And so I speak, I'd like tothink, from a position of
wanting free speech, wantingfree expression, and, yes, I'm a
conservative.
(08:55):
Yes, the victims of this brokensystem are also conservative
students.
But if this were happening tothe other side, I would be just
as upset.
Mr. Webb (09:04):
You mentioned the judge saying using the word
unsafe, so I kind of wrote thatdown.
So this is where the speech isviolence thing, excuse me.
So if you can convince yourselfthat speech you don't like is
violence, then that kind ofgives you the moral authority to
(09:26):
say, no, we're not going toallow that because it's violence
.
James Fishback (09:32):
That's exactly right and that that is a
slippery slope.
When people start talking abouthate speech and calling speech
violence and saying thatEssentially what you say can
actually harm people, then thatcreates, that, opens the door
for being able to say Well,illegal immigrant, that's, of
course, violence.
Capitalism, that's violence.
(09:53):
One judge says that if youargue that Israel has a right to
defend itself, that is violence, and so any conservative
position, heck, even anycenter-right, centrist position
like capitalism can reducepoverty Effectively, becomes
something that is makes you as astudent, persona non grata, and
that's why incubate debate.
(10:13):
I believe is necessary forthese young Americans to have
that platform.
Mr. Webb (10:18):
So tell us more about Incubate Debate, the mission and
exactly what it is.
James Fishback (10:28):
Well i t's a nonprofit organization.
Our mission actually isn't tohost high school debate
tournaments or to host freedebate camps, even though that's
what we do, and we do itproudly.
Our mission is in our name.
Our job is to incubate debate,to expose, to bring open debate,
civil debate, to youngAmericans wherever they are, and
so for the first five years ofour organization, we've done
(10:50):
that almost exclusively throughour debate tournaments, which
happened roughly 25 per year.
The season culminates in anannual national championship,
which is next month inJacksonville.
Students earn scholarships.
They debate topics from isthere a climate emergency?
To Should colleges abolish DEIprograms?
We don't.
(11:10):
We don't take anything off thetable.
Anything and everything shouldbe debated and up for debate.
But what we're increasinglydoing Joey and I was actually
just in a place called HendryCounty, Florida, last week,
working with 50 middle and highschool social studies teachers
on how they can bring Opendebate into their classroom in a
(11:31):
way that is coded to standards,that is set for benchmarks and
that is enriching and engagingfor their students.
And so what incubate debatestands for is not just debates
on a Saturday at a high schoolor 150 kids get together.
No, it's about reaching kidswherever they are, whether
that's in their Civics class,world history class,
(11:51):
environmental science class.
How can we infuse debate in theclassroom?
I'll tell you one way we did itat that workshop was we
actually had some studentsparticipate in a debate for the
teachers, and it was about whowas right in those
constitutional debates in thelate 1780s Was it the
federalists or was it theanti-federalists?
And so you actually assignsides to students, students who
(12:11):
represented each position, andthey had an open, roundtable
debate, which is a format that'sexclusive to incubate.
It's a free-form debate 10 to20 minutes.
Students sit in a semi circle,seven to eight of them, and
there's only three rules youcan't stand up, you can't use
notes and you have to alwaysobserve the golden rule treat
others the way you want to betreated.
And so here, right before oureyes, what you see, Joey, is
(12:35):
people, young people, having adebate about the Bill of Rights,
about this idea of federalism,this idea of states rights
versus federal rights, thedelegation of powers, the 10th
amendment, all of that in real-time.
And so there's an old BenFranklin quote, which is you
know, show me and somethingalong the lines of "Show me and
(13:00):
I'll get it, but involve me andI'll understand it.
And and that's what we're reallytrying to do here is to involve
kids in Education, and doingthat through debate is an
excellent, excellent way, andthat's the next part of our.
Our mission here is goingbeyond those debate tournaments
that we host for the select fewstudents who are able to
participate in a Saturday debate, who want to invest Call it
(13:22):
five, six hours a week and thenbring the power of open debate
to any student.
Use the power of the captiveaudience in the classroom To say
, hey, this is AP environmentalscience, but we're gonna have a
debate about nuclear versusgeothermal, about solar versus
wind.
Put your Textbooks away, let'sdiscuss what you guys have been
learning for three weeks.
Let's put it to the testbecause ultimately, if you can
(13:45):
defend your position, if you canunderstand your position well
enough to Defend it in front ofa group of your peers, then you
truly have excelled at thatsubject matter.
Mr. Webb (13:56):
That's great.
So it's not.
It's not them preparing aspeech, it's.
You know, let's sit down, nonotes, have at it.
That's, that's interesting.
James Fishback (14:09):
Yeah, that's what we're doing and that's.
You know, part of one of mymany gripes with debate was the
fact that it seemed awfullyrigid and inorganic and
Inauthentic, and so most debates.
You and I probably have debatesevery single day, but they
don't happen in a structured way.
(14:30):
You have two minutes, I havethree minutes to respond.
We have a questioning, we havea cross examination.
We know most debates happenaround the dinner table.
Most debates happen inboardrooms.
Most debates happen in teacherplanning, when you're getting
together with your colleaguesand talking about how we're
gonna Do a certain thing or notdo a certain thing.
And so I think about that.
Ben Franklin quote "Tell me andI forget, teach me and I may
(14:51):
remember.
Involve me and I learn.
What better way to get youngpeople to learn than to engage
with the content at such a highlevel?
They're actually defendingAnti-federalists like George
Clinton or federalists likeAlexander Hamilton in a live,
open debate.
It's like the view, with theexception that there's actually
(15:12):
multiple views and descent istolerated.
It's like the view they're allseated around a round table,
they're having an opendiscussion and anything goes.
They have to be civil, theyhave to be respectful, but it's.
It's a really magicalexperience for the kids.
Mr. Webb (15:26):
So how do you see open debate?
You talked a little about howthat in the educational setting,
but to me I see that asdeveloping some critical
thinking skills and, excuse me,kind of thinking on the fly.
James Fishback (15:42):
I'm not sure what the the term is for that I
Would say, thinking on the flyis the term for it and and you'd
be right.
Right, because in the realworld you don't get to go to a
inner a job interview and haveprepared notes and pull out a
note card, or in the real world,you have to just kind of sit
there and apt and respond andthink on your feet.
(16:03):
And so you're absolutely right.
Critical thinking, the abilityto think for yourself.
We teach students that you haveto understand all sides of an
issue right To be able toactually effectively argue your
side of the issue.
And so, apart from somethingthat is completely tied to the
standards and completely tied toyour curriculum in the
classroom, you're actuallyteaching your students how to do
(16:25):
something that is gonna beimmensely valuable, which is
being confident, answeringquestions, maintaining eye
contact, cravitas poise.
I'll tell you, young peopletoday and I don't need I'm
preaching to the choir when Isay this to you, but young
people today, this is the mostdisconnected generation,
precisely because they are themost quote, unquote connected
generation when it comes totechnology.
(16:47):
And so you walk into arestaurant, you see a bunch of
kids are 15, 16 year oldshanging out.
They're all on their phones andinstead what they should be
doing is having an openconversation.
That's how they actually get tosome semblance of real world
skills.
And so when teachers are doingthis, when they're having open
debates and this can be this hasboth elements that are
formative and summative this canbe the replacement for a quiz.
(17:08):
It can be what's used toprepare for the AP exam.
It could be what's used afterthe AP exam to keep your kids
engaged.
Whatever it is, and I'll tellyou this, one of my proudest
moments when doing this is whena teacher emailed me and said I
use this on my regular students,on my honor students and on my
AP students, and they all didwell, but the ones who really
(17:31):
stood out, who punched abovetheir weight, who knocked my
socks off, were those kids inthe regular history class.
And so this is something thatcan be applied to all students
of all abilities, that they canactually participate in.
Mr. Webb (17:46):
I would imagine that you witness a fire start within
some of the students that maybedidn't really care that much
about education before, have you?
James Fishback (17:58):
seen that we do, yeah, we do.
There's an old adage, I'm sureyou've heard it Kids speak
better than they write.
They speak better than theywrite.
And so what better way?
Because there's not really anyother way.
We don't see oral exams, maybein some of those foreign
language classes, but we don'treally see oral examination.
(18:18):
This is the highest form of oralexamination because it's
actually a debate, and so youhave students in the back of the
class who might be fullyengaged with the content smart
kids, they punch above theirweight, but there's so much
inertia that goes into sittingdown and writing that short
essay that you end up losingthem.
And so what this ends up beingis a powerful tool to engage any
(18:42):
and all students, because, yeah, the kids who are extroverts
are gonna do especially well atit.
But it's also the students whoare at the back of the room who
you've only heard their voiceonce or twice the entire school
year.
They're the ones who have themost to gain because they're
gonna blossom, and what we'veheard from teachers is that they
had a debate in one class andthen they had their colleague in
(19:06):
another class tell them why isNick all of a sudden more vocal?
I all of a sudden notice himengaging with the content more
and speaking up more and askingquestions and being more
attentive.
So there's really big dividendshere.
And it just doesn't apply tothose students who are in that
particular class.
It carries over to other preps,to other courses of the
students who are involved andengages them across all of them.
Mr. Webb (19:31):
So here's a basic question, but for someone like
myself that wasn't a debater.
What makes for a good debate?
James Fishback (19:43):
What a great question.
I'll tell you what doesn't makefor a good debate, which is
those presidential debates thatwe see every four years.
They're like a dueling pressconference.
Right, there's a debate.
Let's just define that word,because we take it for granted.
A debate is defined by clash.
Clash is opposing viewpointsthat are addressing one another.
(20:05):
And so if you and I are havinga debate about what is the
better fruit, and you saystrawberry and I say mango, but
I just keep saying mango and youjust keep saying strawberry and
I'm not addressing your pointand you're not addressing my
point, then we're not having adebate, we're just talking past
one another.
A debate is where our argumentsare actively clashing, when
(20:29):
you're saying things like well,yeah, but a mango doesn't offer
you the same antioxidantbenefits as a strawberry does.
And then I say, well, but amango can be served like the XYZ
, and so a debate actually hasto clash.
And so why do thosepresidential debates fall short
of this definition Is becausePresident Trump will say XYZ,
(20:51):
and then President Biden willjust have some ad hominem attack
accusing him of being some kindof a Putin sympathizer, and so
he doesn't actually address theargument in front of them.
And I gotta say Republicans arealso guilty of this They'll
tell you that Ukraine is gonnafall in 30 days if you don't
send them more money, and then,if you provide a well-reasoned,
substantive rebuttal of that,they then call you a Putin
(21:13):
sympathizer.
And so debates are largely freeof ad hominem attacks.
The arguments have to be aboutthe substance, not the
individuals making thosearguments, and there has to be
clash.
There has to be this back andforth where it says okay, you
said this, but what about this,and how do you address that in
the context of this?
That is what a true debate isTalking, not past one another,
(21:37):
but talking with one another.
Mr. Webb (21:40):
When you mentioned presidential debate, I laughed,
because the first thing that Ithought of and this is what
drives me nuts about thepresidential debates the
moderator becomes part of thedebate, and that's right.
I don't know much aboutdebating, but I know that the
moderator is supposed tomoderate and not supposed to
become part of the debate.
And the fact that they have aokay, here's the topic, you have
(22:06):
three minutes or whatever, andthen okay, no, no, we're gonna
move on to the next topic.
We're gonna move on to the nexttopic and I would like to see
whether it's two people or three, or, excuse me, in the primary
debates where it was half adozen people on stage.
Just let them go at it, letthem get it all out.
(22:26):
Let's see if we can get theminvolved and get them past their
talking points and see somereal debate.
So I'm glad you brought that up.
James Fishback (22:37):
Yes, and you're absolutely right that moderator.
We've seen it, especially inthat 2020 debate is actively
playing a role.
Whether it was Chris Wallacefact-checking President Trump
about the vaccines and sayingthey would never come out by the
end of the year, even thoughthey came out a week after the
election and then ended up beinga disaster in itself, which is
(22:59):
a whole separate debate.
Whether it was Anderson Cooperfact-checking Mitt Romney in the
2012 debate and essentiallysiding with Obama and kind of
coming in as his partner thereabout that question on Benghazi.
What I wanna get back to, whatwe need to get back to as a
country, is those politicaldebates that a man by the name
(23:20):
of Abraham Lincoln and StephenDouglas participated in in the
1850s, and here's how theyworked.
Each debate lasted three hours.
Lincoln would speak for 60minutes, douglas would have 90
minutes to respond and to makehis own arguments, and then
Lincoln would be given a final30 minute rejoinder, and so what
(23:41):
you had there was eachindividual in that debate had an
hour and a half, but it wasstaggered and that's brilliant.
No, moderator, nobody's saying,well, we don't want to talk
about China now.
We don't want to talk aboutfentanyl now.
No, nobody's saying well, thesetopics, what we care about.
The reality of the situation isin those primary debates.
There were so many issues inthe public in primary debates
(24:04):
that the average public andprimary voter would have ranked
probably around 20 or 30 ontheir list of issues.
And so most Republicans careabout what's happening with the
border, or inflation, if thosegot the same attention as Russia
, or supposedly what happened onJanuary 6, or so on and so
forth.
And so what these types ofLincoln-Douglas debates did is
(24:25):
they allowed the candidates tobe in charge, not the moderators
, who have consistently hadtheir thumb on the scale and
done it in a way.
That's really a disservice,joey, to the American people,
who need to listen to thesedebates to make up their mind
about which candidate to support.
Mr. Webb (24:43):
And one more thing on the presidential debates Vivek
Rameswamy, he is such awonderful debater and I could I
just.
I so enjoyed watching him go atit, and you are a master
debater.
So is there a connection there?
(25:04):
Is that how you guys know eachother through that, or is that
just a total coincidence?
James Fishback (25:14):
Vivek is.
I think his debating skillswere off the charts because he
didn't come to those debates,Joey, as a debater.
He came there as someone whowanted to speak truth and speak
conviction.
He didn't treat them like somegame where you score points by
using some canned one-lineragainst Ron DeSantis or Nikki
(25:36):
Haley.
He came there with a mission,which was to speak truth to the
American people.
And I'll tell you, I was at thatfirst debate in Milwaukee and a
lot of the people in theaudience didn't like what he had
to say at times.
But remember, those people inthe audience were not
representative of the primaryvoting electorate.
They were largely friends ofthe Republican National
Committee, friends of candidatesand donors and so on.
(25:57):
And so what Vivek didparticularly well is he was
concise.
He spoke about what peoplewanted to hear and he did it in
a way that was engaging and thatleft people wanting more from
him.
And that wasn't a debate trickor a tactic.
It's not something that hecould have picked up in a debate
(26:20):
prep session.
It's something he lived andthat's just who he is.
He's someone who is going tospeak his convictions, speak
truth and communicate thoseideas, not as some professor,
not trying to lecture the people, but as someone who is treating
them as equals and as a part ofthis very special thing we call
(26:41):
the United States of America.
Mr. Webb (26:44):
One of the things that I loved that he was pushing for
is us getting back to Americanpride, and I know that's one
thing your organization.
What role does American prideplay in Incubate Debate.
James Fishback (27:04):
It plays a really important one.
Now I want to be clear that anytype of forced ideology on young
people is wrong.
It's wrong when a teacher wantsto lecture kids with critical
race theory and preach abouttransgenderism, and it's wrong
when some conservatives want toforce some pro-American message
(27:25):
down young people's throats.
What we believe is whatPresident Reagan believes, which
is informed patriotism.
We believe that if you lay allthe facts out there the good,
bad and the ugly about thiscountry's history that young
people left to their own deviceswill understand and recognize
that this is the most specialcountry, the greatest country
(27:48):
that has ever existed and thatwill ever exist.
And so we are all aboutinformed patriotism.
We do that a number of ways.
We do that by providing aresearch packet to our students
that presents both sides of theissue.
We do that by bringing inveterans and first responders
and active service members tocome out and evaluate students
(28:08):
as debate judges.
And we do that by startingevery debate with the pledge of
allegiance.
This country was built on freespeech and open debate, and so
what better way to start ourdebates than by honoring the
country that really started itall and making debate part of
the very fabric of our country,through and through.
Mr. Webb (28:32):
And civility and free expression I know are core
values of Incubate Debate andtoday, you know, the climate is
so polarized.
How do you encourage studentsto maintain those values during
debates and do you have somestudents who don't want to
maintain civility and freeexpression?
James Fishback (28:58):
There are, and those are learning opportunities
for those students.
They walk away better for itand they come back better and
more civil.
What our message is is twofold.
One, this is not a competition.
This is not a debate tournament.
This is not a game.
We are here to partake in thegreat American tradition of open
debate, the open debates thatdecided whether or not we were
(29:21):
going to declare independence.
The open debates between folkslike the Federalist and the
Anti-Federalist that gave usdocuments like the Bill of
Rights, that gave us theConstitution.
Debates in the 1960s that gaveus important civil rights
legislation to right the wrongsof the past.
And so, when we think aboutcivility, the first thing we
(29:41):
have to do is this is not acompetition.
This is not something whereyou're going to compete against
someone.
You're going to compete withthem.
You can attack their argument,but don't attack them as a
person.
Recognize that good people candiffer, that great ideas are a
byproduct of opposing ideasclashing.
Hence why debate in all of itsforms is essential.
(30:01):
And that young people most ofthe time, they hold those views
about Republicans or MAGA Trumpsupporters because they've never
actually interacted with peopleon the other side.
And so what I'm really proud ofis how much our team has reached
out to rural communities andtribal communities and brought
(30:23):
in students from all walks oflife, from all political
persuasions.
I can go up there and preachcivility and viewpoint diversity
all day long, but unless webring together a young
progressive who is acard-carrying member of the
Democrat Party, and unless webring together a young
conservative who considersthemselves America first and
have them have a conversationabout the border, about Ukraine,
(30:45):
about NATO, about asylum, thenwe can't actually do anything.
And so incubate debate hasthose young people.
We've made it our mission tobring people from all walks of
life.
We've done that in large partby being no cost.
We've done that by doingworkshops.
We were in Hamilton County,florida today, a very rural
community in a city calledJasper, doing this work.
(31:08):
So when we say that we've gotpeople from all diverse
perspectives, we're not talkingabout shades of melanin, we're
talking about people whorepresent all parts of this
country, and so I think that'show we do it.
More than anything.
We can talk about civility, wecan have catchy taglines and
good empowering speeches tostart our tournaments, but if
(31:29):
you don't actually bring peoplewho represent the widest range
of viewpoints in this countrytogether.
That is actually the way youteach civility.
Is that a young person talkingto a kid from an agricultural
community recognizing hey,you're not all that different?
For me, you're not the personthat Joe Biden says is a MAGA
extremist.
We may not agree on everything,but remember, good people can
(31:51):
differ and debate is not a bug.
Debate is a feature of ourconstitutional republic.
Our disagreement is exactlyprecisely why America is so
great.
It's how we produce the bestideas that have propelled us
forward.
Mr. Webb (32:10):
Now a little bit that you brought up viewpoint
diversity, because nowadays whenyou hear diversity it is many
times it's everybody thinks thesame way, they just all look
different, and that's really notdiversity.
James Fishback (32:25):
No, it's not.
Ibram X Kendi is black,Ta-Nehisi Coates is black, but
having them on a panel does notmake the panel any more diverse.
They hold the exact same fewpoints about race, systemic
racism, structural, all of that.
(32:45):
And so what actually makesdiversity is diverse opinions.
I mean, diversity is not whatmade this country great, I'm
sorry to say.
It was the diversity ofviewpoints that made this
country great.
Now that does map with thetraditional physical
characteristics of diversity,which is to say that people from
(33:07):
lower income communities,people from higher income
communities, they may havedifferent shades of melanin, but
what actually produces greatoutcomes is not different shades
of melanin or different genders, but it's people holding
different viewpoints.
Someone from an agriculturalcommunity having a discussion
with someone from the city,someone from the West having a
discussion with someone from theEast, someone from this
(33:29):
particular school of economicshaving a discussion with someone
who's more of a free marketthinker that's what produces
good outcomes.
And so diversity for diversity'ssake isn't going to do anybody
any good.
It's actually going to activelyharm people.
Because you're saying you'rediverse, you're telling people
this is what diversity lookslike, but you're not actually
showing them what say the realdiversity in this country looks
(33:54):
like, and so to any panel outthere that says this is a
diverse panel or a diverseconference, we want to start off
with how many Trump supportersare in the audience.
Raise your hands, and if youdon't see a single hand, that's
a problem.
That's not diversity.
And I'd say the same thing tomy conservative friends that if
you're having a panel, you needto have a progressive on there.
You need to have someone todisagree with, because having 10
(34:16):
people in the room all sayingthe same things isn't going to
get us where we need to be.
Mr. Webb (34:22):
And my listeners are parents and teachers.
So to someone that might belistening and they really like
what they've heard and they wantto look into incubate debate,
what would be their next stepsand who is a good candidate for
Incubate Debate?
James Fishback (34:45):
It's a.
We would, first and foremost,be honored to have them as a
part of this movement.
And it really is a movement.
It's not a nonprofit.
It's a movement of parents, ofstudents, of teachers who
recognize the power and theenriching abilities of open and
civil debate.
And so there's two ways to beinvolved.
If you're a teacher, go toincubate debateorg.
(35:06):
Get in touch with us about ourincubate teachers toolkit, which
is what we discussed earlier.
How can you bring the power ofopen debate into your classroom
Again, in a way that iseducational, not just a fun
thing to debate XYZ, but toactually have debates on what is
expected of you and standards,what is in your curriculum to
(35:27):
get kids ready, to not just getthem ready for your curriculum,
but also to give them other realworld skills, like being able
to disagree agreeably and speakup and have confidence, and so
on.
So go to incubate debate.
If you're a teacher, we want tohear from you, we want to work
with you.
Again, everything we do is nocost.
And the second thing, Joey, isfor parents that are out there.
Right now, we're serving about5,000 kids in three states
(35:47):
Florida, georgia, south Carolinabut we are looking for parents
who want to step up and say Iwant to run an incubate chapter
of my own.
I want to host local incubatetournaments, even if it's for
just 15, 20, 30 kids.
I want to give these students aplatform to come together a
couple times in the school yearand to have debates.
I'm not interested in makingmoney off of this.
(36:08):
I'm just someone who cares alot about free expression and
the power of viewpoint,diversity and also, if that's
the case, go to incubate debate.
Reach out to us about ourincubate USA chapter chair
initiative and we want to workwith you.
We want to talk with you abouthow we can get you ready to be
hosting these tournaments.
And there's no tournamentthat's too small.
(36:28):
You got to start somewhere.
Any opportunity to have youngAmericans come together to
exchange ideas is going to be agood opportunity for not just
them, but for the country thatthey will soon inherit.
Mr. Webb (36:41):
So you said a chapter chair initiative on incubate.
I'll make sure and put links toyour website on the show notes
and I usually, towards the end,will ask, if you want to, you
know, to share out how folks canconnect with you.
But I'll go ahead and ask thatnow, since we brought up the
(37:03):
website, yeah, how can folksconnect with you or check out
other projects?
Basically, this is your time topromote anything you want to.
James Fishback (37:16):
Best way to get in touch is email James just how
it sounds, James@IncubateDebate.
org.
Send an email if you have anidea, if you want to talk any
about the teacher's toolkit orour chapter chair initiative,
we'd love to get in touch and goto IncubateDebateorg.
We have a newsletter.
Sign up for that newsletter.
(37:37):
We have thousands of people onit.
We want to share updates withyou.
So maybe you're not ready rightnow to engage with us, but
there may be a time where, ayear or two years down the line,
an opportunity presents itselfwhere you want to give students,
give your own kids, givewhomever, an opportunity to reap
the benefits and really to reapthe benefits of debate.
(37:58):
You know, debate is somethingthat everyone that I talked to,
who did it not recently becauseit's been totally hijacked, but
did it back in the day, you know, in 1982, it was Supreme Court
Justice Neil Gorsuch who won thenational debate champion.
People like Oprah Winfrey,Katanji Brown Jackson, Ted Cruz
credited their success withbeing a part of debate.
(38:20):
And so what incubate is doingand it's no easy task, it's not
going to be easy for us, butnothing worth doing is easy is
we are going to totallytransform debate and make it
something that you know.
We don't leave it up to thecreative writing club, joey, to
teach creative writing.
We also sign that to ourEnglish teachers.
(38:41):
We don't leave it up to thehistory club to teach kids about
World War II.
They learned that in their UShistory class.
We shouldn't leave it up to thedebate club to teach kids how
to disagree agreeably, how to beable to hold their own, how to
concede, how to be good speakers, but also how to be great
listeners.
And so what we are doing, morethan anything, is we are having
(39:01):
the eye on the target.
How can we bring open debate tostudents wherever they are?
Yes, at our tournaments.
Yes, for our chapter chairs,but also for the millions and
millions of kids, sixth gradethrough twelfth grade, who are
at school for seven, eight hoursa day.
They should be able to reap thebenefits of open debate as well
(39:21):
.
And for teachers out there.
If this even remotely interestsyou, please send us an email,
james@incubatedebate.
org.
We'd love to talk, we'd love tocompare notes and how we can
bring the power of open debateinto your classroom.
Mr. Webb (39:35):
And what's the one thing you want the listeners to
remember, if they don't rememberanything else about this
episode?
James Fishback (39:43):
I would say that debate made this country great.
Every turning point, every idea, every invention, every
innovation was the byproduct ofa rigorous discussion with
opposing viewpoints.
That is the definition ofdebate, even if at the time
people didn't think of it asdebate.
Everything went through thatprocess.
(40:04):
We can't stop now.
We have a country, I believe,to save, and one way we can do
that is by bringing young peopletogether.
Our country, our education,depends on it and, more than
anything, the path to truth runsthrough it.
It runs through open debate.
That's how we can really reallymake a difference for young
(40:27):
people and that's what I wouldleave your listeners with.
Mr. Webb (40:31):
That's great stuff, and you have a book coming out.
Is that correct?
James Fishback (40:37):
I do.
I'm working on it now.
It is entitled "Clash how OpenDebate Can Heal a Divided World
and it's about the things thatwe're talking about right now.
Debate has declined.
It used to be the case that youcould turn on CNN when I was a
kid, 15, 20 years ago, and you'dsee people like Tucker Carlson
and John Stuart just going at it.
That was a debate.
You could turn on Fox and therewouldn't just be people who
(40:58):
agreed with one another sayinghow great President Trump is.
There would actually be somedisagreement about particular
things.
You don't see that anymore, andso as a conservative, as a, I
put that second.
But I'm an American.
I believe in free speech, opendebate, free expression, and
what we need to see in oursociety to really kick up this
next wave of American growth iswe need to bring back debate.
(41:22):
Some would say we need to makedebate great again.
Mr. Webb (41:25):
Ooh, that is.
That's a good note to end onright there.
I appreciate you so much comingon today and when your book
comes out, send me an email, letme know and I'd love to have
you back on.
We'll promote that and I'll puta link to that in the show
notes where I think pick up acopy.
It's been a pleasure having youon the conservative classroom
(41:47):
and I know our listenersappreciate your insights on the
importance of healthy debatewith our young people of America
.
James Fishback (41:55):
So thank you so much.
Well, thank you, Joey, realpleasure to be here.
Mr. Webb (42:02):
That's it for today's episode of The Conservative
Classroom.
Thank you for tuning in.
I hope you enjoyed it andlearned something.
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(42:43):
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Preserving our values.
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