diff --git a/lists/DC_Workshop_House_2024.list b/lists/DC_Workshop_House_2024.list new file mode 100644 index 00000000..f716d14d --- /dev/null +++ b/lists/DC_Workshop_House_2024.list @@ -0,0 +1,17 @@ +# Dusk +Welcome +Time_Wrote_the_Rocks +Sound_of_Silence + +# Night +Bold_Orion +Bitter_Wind_Blown +Tradeoffs +Next_Right_Thing + +# Dawn +Brighter_Than_Today +500_Million_But_Not_A_Single_One_More +Hymn_to_the_Breaking_Strain +Pale_Blue_Dot +Hard_Times_Come_Again_No_More diff --git a/speeches/Tradeoffs.md b/speeches/Tradeoffs.md new file mode 100644 index 00000000..804cd894 --- /dev/null +++ b/speeches/Tradeoffs.md @@ -0,0 +1,43 @@ +# Tradeoffs +## By Lincoln Quirk + +Well we're here. It's cold. It's dark. And it's the longest night of the year. +We don't know what many of our ancestors thought about the Solstice. Were they +afraid of the harshness of winter to come? Did they let their eyes adjust to +the dark, start to face their truths, like, Is enough grain stored this winter? +Or did they look away, and light a candle, and sing songs, and pray? + +Probably both. Tonight, for just a couple of minutes, let's first try to look +at what we'd rather ignore. + +Human history is, far too often, a story of suffering *we caused*. Occasionally +we were evil. But usually we thought we were making necessary tradeoffs. We +burned witches alive! Communities, watching mothers and daughters get dragged +from their homes and strapped to the pyre, to save our souls. Young boys, in +the mines breathing glass dust, chipping out black gold, for the good of the +family and nation. And do you know how ancient armies were fed on the move? +Tens of thousands of hungry teenagers, showing up on your doorstep, friend or +foe, leaving only a trail of famine. + +And now? + +[long pause.] + +What necessary tradeoffs are we making today? What are the stories we tell ourselves? + +Is it right to keep the desperate out at the border just because they weren't born here? + +What of our homeless, our elders, and our mentally ill? Are the existing +institutions the best we can do? Or are we making the choices which allow us to +stop thinking about their suffering? + +Do billions of hens really have to be stacked in windowless sheds? We +immobilize mother pigs their whole lives. Is it worth that suffering? + +These choices are *ours*. + +Here in the dark, maybe we can see a bit more of suffering in the world, if we +choose to look. And yes, the world is vast, and change is hard, and we are +small. But. The darkness will end. The sun will rise. And when it does, are we +still happy with our trade-offs? +