Kicking an Argument

Kicking an argument is a strategic move in competitive debate—most commonly in American policy (CX) and Lincoln-Douglas formats—where a debater voluntarily drops a position they previously introduced. Rather than continuing to defend the argument, the debater tells the judge to disregard it, which collapses the flow on that issue and prevents the opponent from leveraging their answers to it later in the round.

Kicking is most often used by the negative team to manage a large number of off-case positions. A negative might read several disadvantages, counterplans, and kritiks in the 1NC, then in the 2NR (the final negative speech) "kick" all but one or two, concentrating the debate on the strongest remaining option. This is sometimes called collapsing to a position.

Several tactical considerations apply:

• Conditionality: Whether a debater may kick an argument depends on whether it was introduced conditionally, dispositionally, or unconditionally. Conditional arguments can typically be kicked freely; unconditional ones cannot.
• No-link turns and offense: A debater generally cannot kick out of an argument if the opponent has generated offense against it (e.g., a turn that independently wins them the round). Doing so anyway is often called a "straight turn" trap.
• Judge instruction: Effective kicking requires explicit language—"we're going for the politics DA and kicking the CP"—rather than silent abandonment, which judges may treat as a concession rather than a strategic drop.
• Theory implications: Opponents frequently run condo bad theory arguments claiming that the ability to kick multiple positions is abusive and skews time allocation.

In British Parliamentary and World Schools formats, formal "kicking" is less codified because there is no flow-based collapse mechanic, but speakers may still de-emphasize weaker claims in later speeches to focus the bench on stronger ground.