Future Leaders of America?

Tuesday’s assembly came with a clear message: fix what is wrong with the system. The speaker, Hedrick Smith, began by asking the audience why Americans even celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day. A few students answered with a few seemingly apparent reasons, such as the fact that he freed an oppressed group of people and brought social justice to America. The purpose of Smith’s question seemed to revolve around his point that the South called Martin Luther King Jr. an “agitator.” According to the speaker, “While we had many of these agitators in the ‘60s and ‘70s, those who label our generation as the apathetic and narcissistic youth deem them an endangered species.”When Smith brought up Martin Luther King Jr., I was immediately reminded of the workshops that were hosted by the Academy on the Friday preceding the holiday. After attending the “Hair Me Out” workshop, where Derrick Gay discussed how racism and stereotyping are even found in hairstyles, I headed to lunch expecting my friends to be inspired and enlightened. Instead, I was surprised to find that most of them disagreed with the speaker. They were very much concerned that the speaker did not discuss the problems that white people face and were confused as to why it is the fault of white people that other races strive to be like them. They questioned why a white-straight alliance does not exist at this school. A girl went so far as to ask, “Why don’t they [the other races] just deal with it [social injustice]?” At a school that takes pride in its diversity, I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. But it gets worse.I headed off to my second workshop with the hope that perhaps my friends were just an anomaly within the school population. This time, the speaker Paul Gorski, discussed the widening gap between the rich and the poor. He argued that the heads of large corporations have the money to improve the pitiful wages of their workers, but choose not to in order to keep more profits for themselves. Again, to my surprise, at the end of his speech, the speaker faced hostility from the audience. They bombarded him with questions and seemed to believed that corporations should have the sole purpose of creating the most profit possible. This is why, when Hedrick Smith called us Exonians the “future leaders of America,” I was a little scared.Granted, much of Exeter’s population would probably not agree with this ignorance. Clubs like Feminist Union, Gay/Straight Alliance and Amnesty International fight for equality and rights. They are the “agitators” that Smith spoke of, people who are actively working to change the world.Then again, Smith pointed out that many of our generation’s activists are subdued and don’t achieve the level of organization and mass support that they did forty years ago. Many Exonians seem to meet social change with hostility. Whether it be my friends trying to put down the speaker of the “Hair Me Out” assembly or fellow students ridiculing the “Why So Gendered?” campaign at the beginning of the school year, Exonians do not seem to like change.Perhaps it is because PEA prides itself on having the best and the smartest students. Students believe they deserve this title and all of the rewarding opportunities that they have received in life. When someone like Derrick Gay, the “Hair Me Out” speaker, steps into the equation, some students might feel threatened that they perhaps are not where they are because of their talents, but because of the privilege with which they were born.Throughout his speech, Smith stressed how America has been taking a turn for the worse. He listed horrifying facts about the increasing gap between the richest one percent and the poor, as well as the corrupt political system that is fueled by greed and money. Exeter produces an elite group of individuals that will probably be a part of the upper-class and the very political system that Smith discussed. Some of us Exonians may become the future leaders of America, but it is also crucial that we become the future leaders of change.