Switch-side debate
In competitive debate, students arrive at a tournament prepared to argue either side of the resolution. Over a season they argue for a proposition in one round and against it in the next. Among debaters this is simply table stakes: if you are going to advocate a position, you should be able to articulate the others.
Arguing both sides is not a way of having no convictions. It is the habit of earning them. A person who has argued both sides holds their final view with more understanding and less fear, because they know what it answers and what it costs.
Steelmanning
The companion discipline is steelmanning: stating an opposing argument in its strongest and most charitable form before responding to it. A straw man weakens the other side so it can be knocked down easily. A steelman builds it up, because defeating a weak argument proves nothing and engaging a strong one teaches you something.
For our debaters, this means describing an opponent's case in terms the opponent would accept, using cross-examination to clarify rather than to trap, and answering what was actually argued.
Two positions, not two enemies
A debate does not require the two speakers to disagree personally. Sometimes a debater represents a position they understand deeply but do not fully hold. Sometimes two people who largely agree take opposite sides because the question deserves a fair hearing. In our debate on public stadium financing, both economists agreed on most of the underlying economics and debated anyway, to bring out exactly where the hard choices lie.
What matters is that both positions arrive onstage at their best, so the audience sees a true contest of ideas rather than a mismatch.
Why this matters beyond the stage
This is the part of debate culture most missing from public life: the understanding that it serves you to know the other side well enough to argue it, even if you never adopt it. The habit makes people better colleagues, neighbors and citizens. It lowers the temperature of disagreement without dissolving it, because it replaces caricature with comprehension. It is also one of the quiet pleasures of a curious mind, the moment when a view you had dismissed suddenly makes sense.