The Trinity term card: eight weeks, eight motions

The term card is out. Eight Thursdays, eight motions, difficulty roughly ascending — the convenors' notes below say why each one earned its slot.

Week 1 — This House would make voting compulsory. The classic opener: everyone has an instinct, nobody has a settled view, and it rewards mechanism over knowledge. Perfect for first-timers.

Week 2 — This House believes that social media platforms should be liable for user-generated content. A policy debate with a genuinely hard Opposition — the room that thinks this is easy for Prop hasn't thought about it yet.

Week 3 — This House regrets the decline of the local newspaper. Our first "regrets" motion of term. Regrets debates reward counterfactual discipline: you must argue about the world, not the vibe.

Week 4 — This House would bring back grammar schools. UK-specific, deliberately. Half the room went to one kind of school and will discover their anecdotes are not, in fact, evidence.

Week 5 — This House would legalise assassination markets for war criminals. The silly-serious slot. It sounds like a joke motion; it is actually a very pointed debate about international law's enforcement gap.

Week 6 — This House believes that the environmental movement should embrace nuclear energy. Knowledge-heavier, and we're running a ten-minute primer beforehand so the debate is about trade-offs rather than trivia.

Week 7 — This House, as a young artist, would refuse patronage from morally compromised institutions. Actor motions are the hardest format we run: you argue from inside a persona's interests, not from the state's.

Week 8 — This House believes that this House has been good for you. The traditional closer, argued over drinks, judged by heckle. Attendance mysteriously excellent every year.

Doors at 7.30pm as ever, motion confirmed on the night, first-timers paired with an old hand. Bring someone who thinks debating isn't for them; that's how most of us got here.