I wrote this essay in preparation for the test on January 24th. It is my first essay written within the 25 minute time limit, so it is a bit sloppy and underdeveloped near the end. Could someone review it and give a grade out of 12? Your brutally honest opinion is appreciated. Thanks.
Is compromise always the best way to resolve a conflict?
The Compromise of 1850 ostensibly was a prudent solution to the issue of slavery in borderline states. However, it ultimately led to cataclysmic bloodshed and contributed to the United States' escalation into civil war. Compromise is not necessarily the best way to resolve a conflict because compromise can lead to prolonged feelings of acrimony and antipathy among opposing groups and eventually incur even greater conflict. For example, in D.J. MacHale's Rivers of Zadaa, the belligerent Batu and Rokador tribes experience resentment towards one another because of a tenuous treaty between the two. Likewise, in the T.V. series Gundam, conflicts between naturally born humans and genetically enhanced humans escalate into war despite the valiant efforts of others to appease them with compromise.
In The Rivers of Zadaa, compromise fails to prevent the Batu and Rokador tribes from resorting to armed conflict to settle their disputes. On the arid territory known as Zadaa, the two most eminent tries are the Batu, who are notorious for their elite and bellicose warriors, and the Rokador, a subterranean tribe that controls the water sources of Zadaa. Initially, the Batu and the Rokador are gregarious towards each other, consenting to a compact in which the Batu tribe defends the Rokador from alien belligerents and the Rokador share their water supply with the Batu. Although the agreement is honored by both tribes at first, the Batu and the Rokador quarrel often. The Batu, who must endure the excruciating tempurature above-ground, complain that the Rokador are withholding water from the tribe's warriors. Adamant that they are as altruistic as they can be, the Rokador refuse to acknowledge the Batu's request for more water. Consequently, hostility burgeons between the two, and all-out war becomes an inevitability. Tenuous compromise causes two eminent tribes to clash in perdition-like bedlam.
Just as the unstable compromise between the tribes leads to war in The Rivers of Zadaa, in Gundam, compromise fails to suppress the tension and resentment between naturally born humans and genetically altered "coordinators". When George Glenn, the first coordinator, receives great adulation and accolades for his prominent scientific work, people grow envious of his abilities and begin to genetically alter their own children to surpass others with Brobdingnagian strength and intelligence. A divide partitions the human race into proponents of genetic alterations and "naturals" who argue the morality of such procedures. Although they live in harmony at first, their resentment leads them to come to blows with each other, and consequently are plunged into war.
Compromise fosters resentment between people and can ultimately lead to even greater conflicts between them. If the issue of slavery in borderline states was settled with a partisan decision, perhaps the atrocious bloodshed that followed the Compromise of 1850 may have been avoided.