I'm Breaking My Neutrality

In defense of real debate

Dear Friends,

You know me as the person who doesn’t take sides when I’m in the moderator’s seat. That’s my role: to be the ref who makes sure the debaters get a fair shake.

But today, on Giving Tuesday, I’m breaking that neutrality. Not about an issue. About something more fundamental: the practice of debate itself. I’m taking a stand in defense of real debate and asking you to join me by giving today.

Here’s what I’ve watched happen over the 20 years as a moderator: the space for genuine disagreement keeps shrinking. The capacity to engage ideas you don’t like without treating them as dangerous—that’s becoming rare. The willingness to change your mind when evidence demands it? That’s almost extinct.

Real debate is not simply disappearing—it’s being systematically replaced by discourse that rewards emotional intensity over intellectual rigor.

From the moderator’s chair, I get to see something most people don’t: what happens when smart people from opposite sides actually listen to each other. When they engage evidence instead of just trading talking points. It doesn’t always change minds. But it changes the quality of the conversation when disagreement is treated as an opportunity rather than a threat.

That’s what Open to Debate does. And that’s worth fighting for.

So yes, I’m breaking my neutrality. I’m taking a stand in defense of real debate. For the idea that we can disagree without being enemies. That evidence should matter more than emotion. That civil discourse isn’t just nice to have—it’s essential to everything else we care about.

This Giving Tuesday, I’m asking you to take that stand with me. Support Open to Debate.

Thank you,

John Donvan
Moderator in Chief, Open to Debate