Medicine
Lodge High School
Medicine
Lodge, Kansas
A Peace Effort
Teacher: Devra Parker
By
Kasey Swayden
12th
Grade
“The greatest waste in the world is the difference between what we are and what we could become.”
Ben Herbster
In the middle of
a dry and barren wasteland, there lies an enormous heap of rubbish.
This massive pile has an odor that is so repulsive that even the
desperate, hungry field mice will not gather at this isolated site.
Objects that were once valuable are now decomposed and rotten.
After visiting this horrible location, one feels filthy and quite eager
to become clean once again.
Perhaps this is the intensity Herbster was trying to portrait when he
used the word waste. Decay and rot are utilized
to connect the reader with the physical human waste---that area of limbo between
our reality and our potential---that we seem satisfied being.
We are all born with the capability to succeed and to achieve high goals.
However, one must put forth the effort and strive for perfection.
It is far more simple to just fall into the mainstream of society than to
exert oneself and achieve, as poet Robert Frost once said,
“Two road diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one
less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.”
So, as Americans wallow in the despair brought on by the war of September
11, each citizen must avoid wasting away in fear and remember to make a journey
for peace.
“Peace is rare: Less than 8% of the time since the
beginning of recorded time has the world been entirely at peace. In a total of
3,530 years, 286 have been warless. Eight thousand treaties have been broken in
this time.”
Unknown
To me, war is any struggle in which two or more large groups try to
destroy or conquer each other. Since
the dawn of history, many types of wars have existed.
Families have fought against families, tribes against tribes,
and
perchance the most detrimental, countries against countries.
Wars have always caused great suffering and
hardships.
Most people despise war, yet war is going on somewhere in the world
nearly all the time. As stated in
the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization
Constitution, “Since wars begin in the minds
of men, it is in the minds of men
that the defenses of peace must be constructed.”
Many countries take for granted
that peace is normal.
It is hard to determine where peace ends and war begins. Nations may be on unfriendly
terms for years, building up
military strength and seeking allies without any actual clash of armed forces.
These
countries might be considered to be merely observing a rest period,
and, in all actuality, planning to attack when it
would be least expected. War is not chosen if a nation or group can get what it wants
peacefully. However, war
seldom accomplishes the complete results any side has
hoped for. Dwight D. Eisenhower skillfully summed up the
act of warfare by
saying, “Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired
signifies in the final
sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed,
those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is
not spending money
along. It is spending the sweat of
its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its
children.
This is not a way of life at all in any sense. Under the clouds of war,
it is humanity hanging on a cross of
iron.”
“To preserve peace, we need weapons of smaller and
men of larger caliber.”
Unknown
As a nation is in a decayed and degraded state of sorrow, it is utterly
important that we take this opportunity to rebuild America. However, in order to fulfill this task, we must find peace
within ourselves and within others. Peace
will never truly be gained by war. War
affects not only combatants but non-military civilians as well.
As Frederick Moore Vinson once stated, “Wars are not acts of God.
They are caused by man, by man-made institutions, by the way in which man
has organized his society. What man
has made, man can change.” Peace will ultimately come when the worlds’
leaders rise up and put the well being of humanity above all other issues. By using diplomacy instead of weaponry, the world can
iniellate violence and hatred once and for all.
Its dark shadow can be replaced by understanding, wisdom, and
encouragement, traits that truly overcome evil.
Ben Herbster and the two unknown writers may have completely different
perspectives pertaining to why the world is constantly in a state of war and
crisis. Still, peace is one
distinct topic that ties everything together.
It constantly consumes the hearts and minds of those who stand true to
their patriotic and religious ideals. Perhaps
peace may never be achieved in my lifetime, or maybe it will never completely be
gained once again. Yet, it seems as
though it is continuously becoming less and less prevalent. As stated in the novel A Separate Peace by John
Knowles, “Hatred stems from an ignorance in the human heart.” In closing,
unless we break the barriers between mankind and fully begin to love and
understand one another, peace can never really be attained.