[ WP ] `` Before we allow humankind to live among us in the stars , tell us the faults of your kind . ''

The hologram looms before me. I dab some sweat off my brow, clear my throat, and begin: 
 
 `` We are a paradox.'' 
 
 `` We are capable of both great good and great evil. We can eradicate a disease with the intent of saving millions of lives, and then we spend those lives fighting a purposeless war. We build rehabilitation centers and drug dens; hospitals and prisons. We say that you can accomplish anything, yet are content with accomplishing nothing. We pride ourselves as people of freedom, yet support corporations and governments that believe in the opposite. We have places of intense beauty, yet pave over it to build a museum. We claim to honor the past, yet we bulldoze buildings to build condominiums. We claim to be rational and smart, yet constantly argue over things based off a millennia-old book. But, here is our history.'' 
 
 I take a sip of water from the bottle next to me, and continue. `` Billions of years ago, this planet had no life whatsoever. Yet somehow, through some natural'accident,' life emerged. It grew; it evolved; it eventually managed to become a race known as humanity. One of the first things humanity was recorded as doing was annihilate a slightly less-advanced species of hominids. We formed tribes, then communities, then city-states, then countries. One of the first things these city-states did when they came in contact was to go to war. Our hypocrisy was still evident back then. The ancient people of Athens prided themselves on their'democratic' government, yet kept slaves and prevented women from voting. The Romans oppressed millions of people, forced slaves to fight to the death as entertainment, and brutally kept the'peace.' When the Roman Empire eventually fell, her lands became hosts to hundreds of squabbling states, who were only united ( in the loosest sense of the world ) by a religion that preached peace and love, and used that religion to wage several barbaric was in a futile attempt to capture a single city. Several centuries later, men conquered an entire continent for the sake of conquering, killing more than 40 million people. Several centuries after *that*, a group of men, motivated not by discovery, but by greed, set out to discover the'new world.' They found it, took it from the natives, and enslaved and slaughtered them. For the next several hundred years, we have abused them, with little recompense. We have fought wars over whether or not it should be moral for people to be property. Revolutions overthrow corrupt regimes, only to instill an even worse one. A man who pinned a nation's hatred onto a race led to a war that killed hundreds of millions of people. Even today, we think we are'better,' but we are not. We are convinced that people of a certain nationality are all out to kill us. We believe that men can not marry men because of an ancient book. Our governments spy on their people in order to stop perceived'threats.''' 
 
 I stop for a moment to catch my breath. Goddamn, this is tiring. `` As you can see, we are a paradox. We are the most hypocritical, violent, and idiotic paradox in the history of our universe. But sometimes, even a paradox can have an answer.'' 
 
 The hologram flickers slightly from the long-distance transmission. `` Hmmm...'' The entirety of humanity is watching, waiting for an answer. Our entire future hangs in the balance. If only, if only he says the words... 
 
 `` We're sorry, but no. Have a nice day!'' The hologram switches off.
