Live again, every Saturday at 11am IST

A neutral platform for civil public discourse.

The Debate Club is a community for anyone who wants to participate in open, civil debate, not just consume it. We meet on Zoom every Saturday at 11am IST for a live voice debate on community-suggested, member-voted topics. Every session is recorded and posted to our YouTube channel.

The community picks the topics. Anyone can submit one. We run polls in WhatsApp, and the winners get scheduled.

When
Saturdays · 11am IST
Where
Zoom · link via Meetup
Cost
Free · open to all
About

Bi-directional public discourse, by design.

Most of today's public conversation runs through a broadcaster-and-consumer model, where a publisher pushes out a narrative and the rest of us consume it without a way to shape it. The Debate Club exists to flip that. We're a neutral facilitator where people from any perspective get a real seat at the table to shape the conversation.

Why we exist

Public narrative is being shaped by fewer and fewer voices, and most people have no avenue to participate in shaping it, only to react. We believe a healthy society needs democratized access to that conversation: anyone, on any side of a topic, should be able to contribute their perspective in good faith and have it actually heard.

The Debate Club is our small, persistent attempt at that: a weekly room where civil public discourse actually happens.

What we do

We're an online community anchored on WhatsApp. Every Saturday at 11am IST we run a live voice debate on a topic the community has chosen. The day-to-day chat (topic suggestions, polls, announcements) happens in our WhatsApp Community. The live Saturday session itself runs on Zoom; the Zoom link for each upcoming debate is posted on the corresponding event on our Meetup page.

Every session is recorded. The full archive is on our YouTube channel, so even if you can't make a Saturday, you can catch up on what was said and pick up where the community left off.

How it works

  1. 01
    Anyone suggests a topic
    Members fill out our topic-suggestion form to propose what they'd like the community to debate next.
  2. 02
    The community votes
    We periodically post polls in the WhatsApp group. Members vote, and the topics with the most support move forward.
  3. 03
    We schedule on Meetup
    Winning topics are scheduled as upcoming Saturday sessions on our Meetup page so anyone can RSVP and prepare.
  4. 04
    Live debate, every Saturday
    We meet on Zoom at 11am IST. The Zoom link for each session is published on the Meetup event page. All perspectives welcome. Listen, speak, or both.

Have an idea? Suggest a topic →

Code of conduct

All perspectives welcome
We are a neutral platform. No side of any topic is endorsed; every viewpoint is heard on its own merits.
Civility over heat
We disagree with ideas, not people. Personal attacks, slurs, and bad-faith argument have no place here.
Listen first, then speak
The point of a debate is to understand the strongest version of the other side, not just to win.

Disclaimer. The views expressed in our sessions are those of individual participants and do not represent the views of The Debate Club as a platform. We facilitate the conversation; we do not endorse any side of it.

Contact

Get involved.

The single best way to join is to drop into our WhatsApp community. That's where everything happens. Sessions are on Zoom (link via Meetup), and recordings live on YouTube.

Suggest a topic

Propose what we should debate next

Anyone can propose a topic. We collect suggestions, post community polls, and schedule the highest-voted topics on Meetup.

Open the suggestion form →
Volunteer

Help us run the community

Want to moderate sessions, help with scheduling, or pitch in on outreach? We'd love your help.

Open the volunteer form →