Message.

I would like to start by introducing myself. I am not a “prawn,” as you may have been told, but a “Poleepkwa,” an “Outlander.” These are the proper terms for us. We are not simply “non-humans,” not a group sorely defined by its exclusion from your species, but a proud race with achievements all its own.

But all classifications aside, my name is Olo, Olo Lamna, and I am here on my own, to speak with you as an equal—and an individual. I’m not here to represent every Poleepkwa on this planet and beyond the stars…the honor and responsibility is too great for someone such as me. All I have are my own experiences and beliefs, and the drive to tell you what is going on in this world. That is all I have—I pray that you will listen to me and take what you hear to heart.

All of you have heard of District 9 and the illegal genetic experimentation that was revealed late last August. Perhaps not all of you have heard of MNU’s continued solution of the “prawn problem,” a horrible place called District 10 where hopes and thoughts are not only crushed, but discouraged from ever developing.

Very few of you are aware of what may be an evil on par with D-10, if not greater: the black-market egg trade. Our children are sold, snatched away from their mothers and stolen away, never to be seen again. They become guards, servants, prostitutes, test subjects. Back and forth we are traded, from owner to owner, all will and pride beaten out of us with pipes and words and blood-money. Each customer teaches us what the Poleepkwa trade is all about, and the lessons are painful beyond all description.

This happens to your own children, your fellow humans as well—humans are bartered and sold for monetary gain alongside us. In our shared misery, we are the same…this is not the way equality should be achieved. We must not be equals because we are both in the mud; we must not be equals because we are similarly wretched and desperate. No, we must—and can!—be equal in our drive to better ourselves. We both can accomplish so much on our own…we can be proud of that, but always we can look forward to better things and reach for them.

Leave this “speciesism” and fear behind; look past our radically different exteriors and realize that the same blood runs through our veins. The appearances may be different, but my heart still beats the same as yours do. I have a heart, and all Poleepkwa do.

It freezes when we fear for our lives—the same as you!

It warms when we are near the ones we love, our siblings, friends, and family—the same as you!

It beats in anguish when we gaze upon the injustices of the world and sinks in indescribable misery when we see our loved ones hurt, killed and stolen from us—the same as you!

We are the same! Can you not see that? Can you not see that we share so much, our mindsets and emotions so alike that it is only the outside, the shells—figurative and literal—that keep us separate. We are not trash, mindless bottom-feeders without intention or emotion, but neither are we a chosen race. We are not perfect…but then again humans are not perfect. One day we can both be greater then what we are now. The potential is in us all…someday, I believe, we will work together and our capabilities for achievement and greatness will be unfathomable. But that will never happen unless we decide, as two kinds sharing one cause, to stop lying down in the mud and stand upright.

Thank you for your time.