A vs. A Judging

[Elendil3119]

This is the thread for deciding who won the debate between Anamatar and Ancalagon.
The judges are: Nenya Evenstar, Dengen-Goroth, and myself.
The poll is for those who wish to vote. Hopefully, I will post my judgement tomorrow or Wednesday. :) Let the judging begin!

[Ancalagon]

Many thanks to Anamatar for a well presented and tough debate. Thanks also to the judges and members for giving up their time to read through the debate and reach a verdict. Good luck Anamatar:)

The debate can be read here. (http://www.thetolkienforum.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=10961)

[Nóm]

I have to say Anamatar, that you should get an award for the funniest line ever in a debate, and thank you to Ancalagon for repeating it:
You have yet to address this point, Ancalagon:

Hiding the Ring and locking it behind stone and steel does not exclude valiant acts. Say after hiding the Ring Denethor burns himself. He can take a back seat now.

Nothing like laughing as a maniac at 3:30 am when the house is quiet. :D


This debate was fun to read because of the style as well as the arguements.

Anamatar could not come close to convincing me that Denethor's plan was good, but he put up a good fight and had a more difficult side to argue. I had a different way of looking at it. If Denethor's plan were good it was because Frodo's success was no more likely than whooping Sauron in battle (I never did buy that stuff about Sauron being able to defeat Rivendell ;)), but if both failed which would leave the worst to come? :) Frodo's failure would.

[Elendil3119]

I'm sorry this has taken me so long...:o

Anamatar, despite your position, you really did a great job in holding your ground. I've never seen someone argue that well with a position like that. However, Ancalagon's arguments were stronger, and I have to hand the debate to him. Thus, my vote goes to Ancalagon. :)

Great debate guys! Thank you both for participating. It was a pleasure to read and to judge. :) Hopefully, the other two judges will get their judging in soon. ;)

P.S. - I second the proposal of Nóm that Anamatar get an award for "the funniest line ever in a debate". That was hilarious! :D

[Nenya Evenstar]

Well, so it took me a week . . . not too bad considering my procrastinating ways. ;) Regardless, sorry about the wait (especially to Anc).

First of all, I did enjoy reading the debate! It was definitely interesting to think about this topic . . . not one I've ever thought about before.

The topic of the debate was: Was Denethor's plan for the Ring good.

I felt that Anamatar's argument that the "plan" was good in the eyes of Denethor and Gondor was not sufficient to support the topic of the debate. First of all, Ancalagon showed that the plan was flawed by showing how Denethor's plans were affected by pride, despair, and basically Sauron's influence. He also brought out the fact that the plan was doomed from its very beginning because Denethor would never have been able to put the Ring away. I did not feel that Anamatar could find a good rebuttle to these arguments.

The main point is, however, that Anamatar only could convince me that the plan was good in Denethor's mind. Ancalagon was able to show how the plan would not be good for anyone because the plan was flawed from the very beginning and undoubtedly wouldn't even work. Thus I choose Ancalagon as the winner. :)

Thanks for the read guys! I hope this is intelligable . . . it's 1:30 in the morning. *runs away from Anc* ;)

EDIT: How weird! I never voted on the poll and yet is says I did. :confused: That's computers for you. :rolleyes:

[Dengen-Goroth]

My apologies for the protracted delay. I felt it was necessary to read through the debate some four or five times before I could reach a proper decision (and feel secure in it). Before I say what I have decided I want to congratulat Ancalagon and Anamatar on a superb job! I was taken aback by the depth of the debate, and feel it an honor to have been able to read it, much less judge it. You both did an excellent job in attempting to drive home your points, and in most cases did so.

The debate was lively, and the points were many. I enjoyed Ancalagon's references and especially his demonstration of exactly how powerful the influence of Sauron was over Denethor (especially the post concerning the mindset and practices of Sauron GREAT stuff!). There were, however, a few points that Anamatar brought out that could have been (in my mind) rebuked which were not. Just the same as some of Anc's points were not sufficiently countered by Anamatar. But anyway, Anamatar seemed to present the view that the plan, to hide the ring for as long as possible, was the best option for Gondor. I believe this was succesfully countered by Anacalagon through his demonstrating the effect of pride and despair on Denethor, and also in describing just how Sauron's deceptions worked (again, GREAT stuff!). So I must say, after having read through the marvelously crafted debate numerous times, that my vote goes to Ancalagon.

The debate was superb, and again I want to congratulate Anc and Anamatar on a job very well done!

[Anamatar IV]

Thanks to the judges for giving their time to reading our oh so flowery and funny debate.;)

Congradulations, Anc.:)