As I settle back into my chair, I review the names and numbers of some of those remaining in Peaceful, Civilized Society. Eastern Europe will be totally Peaceful soon, though unfortunately it will take a bit of reeducation to align the West. I’m not worried about that. Space in the campsites is flexible. Asia has all but conformed. Africa and South America will continue to welcome Peace. They know better than us the dangers of clinging to liberty too tightly.
Ping! An email news alert for my name. I’ve been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. Who’s real now, Mr. Cartwright?
I feel my face stretching and my throat convulsing. It feels good. I’m laughing. World Peace is coming and I’m laughing.
DECEMBER 10, 2030
OSLO, NORWAY
Good afternoon.
Our race has spent its entire lifespan solving its problems with war. If a king wants to beat another king, he forces guiltless men to kill guiltless men. Until these men raise a hand in violence, they are guilty of nothing more than listening to the wrong person. And what devastating effects this always brings.
If a king demands war, the response should not be to march into another territory and kill the people who live there, people who have done us no harm. War is a tool of rich, lazy men who pay others to commit their sins for them. War is a last resort at which we arrive too quickly. Why do we submit to war and suspect peace? If a king demands war, the only logical response is to remove the king. War cannot be the solution if war is the problem.
The way we live is not sustainable. As easy as technology has made it for us to help each other, it has made it sinfully easy for us to tear each other apart, whether it’s with thoughtless words broadcasted over the Internet or with a nuclear missile. We must stand together to eliminate those who would divide us. Does it matter which team wins a game? No. Does it matter what language you speak, what your skin color is, which god you follow? No. Our primary responsibility is not to a deity, and not to ourselves, but to each other. You are perfectly free to worship Jehovah, Jesus, Satan, Buddha, Shiva, Allah, Mohammed, Gaia, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster. But do not let an Unpeaceful text dictate how you will live your life, or it will lead you to infringe your Unpeacefulness on others. If you do that, you will be stopped.
The results of Unpeace are grim. Millions of deaths. Families torn apart. Oppression. Unhappiness. Cities destroyed, economies annihilated, art fractured, starvation, illness, slavery – because small groups of evil men wished it. We have finally reached a solution to this ultimate problem: to stand up to Unpeace and say no.
Peace or Unpeace. These are our only options. Which do you prefer?
Acknowledgements
There are people who support me every day by listening to me talk and pretending to laugh at my jokes, but these folks were my first readers. At Write Brothers: Ryan Hash, Brian McGough, Aaron Elias, and Henali Kuit. At Seoul Writers’ Collective: In-jee Lee, Chris van Niekirk, Kent Dickerson, Tony Spadafora, Jammy Se, Mark Anderson, JT Harrell, and Steve Cheung. My hand-picked first readers: Jeremy Mace, Todd Arado Bruns, Jeff Ferguson, Erin Wylie, Colin Lagasse, and Alisha Nash.
My blurb writer: Daniel Kennedy.
Two people who always put in a good word upon introducing me: Barri Tsarvaris and Jeff Sinclair.
Those who were involved in my book launch: Jill Baker, Jonathan Burrello, Steve Syme, Jake Hanus, Justin Ivie, Adam Palmeter, and Camarata Music Studio.
My illustrator: the indomitable Liz Laribee.
Finally, my final draft typo editor and eternal cheerleader: Becky Wink.
About the Author
GRETA C. WINK has been writing about dictators and uprisings since an age that would surprise anyone but her parents. Like Mr. Cartwright, she values honesty, efficiency, and the metric system. In addition to her day job teaching kindergarten, Greta serves as a judge for the Nantucket Film Festival, New York Midnight, and the Korea Expat Film Festival. She is the current organizer of the Seoul Writers’ Collective, where she facilitates workshops to help aspiring authors develop their work. Her first book was MILTON RECOMMENDS, available on Kindle. Her next project is BEFORE I MELT AWAY, a collection of Christmassy short stories. She is also developing TIGHTS, a web series about superheroes. She enjoys drinking tea, baking muffins, and buying books. She lives in Seoul, South Korea.
http://www.gretacwink.com
http://www.facebook.com/gretacwinkthewriter
About the Illustrator
LIZ LARIBEE is a self-taught illustrator and entrepreneur. In addition to helping establish numerous community projects and organizations centered on arts advocacy, she has exhibited work in a vast range of regional galleries as well as in national and international print media. She likes to work for a healthy creative ecosystem, and she likes to make art from what other people throw away. She has taught creative writing, found poetry and reuse methods of art-making in classrooms on the University level, public and private schools, and in after-school programs. She lives in Harrisburg, happily.
Learn more at:
http://www.lizlaribee.com
https://the-makespace.squarespace.com/
Mr. Cartwright and the Final Solution Page 9