Add tradeoffs speech

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

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?
+