Our thanks to a former teacher of Suzanne’s, Bob Wiener,
for
providing the program and a copy of the speech below.
At that time, San Marcos
High did not name a valedictorian and salutatorian per se. The two student speeches were given by the
most outstanding students as chosen by the faculty. |
An
Address
Delivered
by Suzanne Rathz Commencement
Exercises San Marcos High School Santa Barbara, Calif. 14 June 1972
Friends
of San Marcos and Fellow Graduates: Gaps—ours is the era of gaps. Gaps between generations, credibility
gaps, gaps between the people and the politicians, and gaps in understanding
between minority groups and those in power—all of which are publicized and
all of which are lamented. But there is another gap, more
painful and more subtle, one that, although it has missed the newspaper
columns and TV situation comedies, affects this generation uniquely and
profoundly. It is the gap between our
expectations and our realizations—the distance between what we as eighth
graders expected out of high school and what we as twelfth graders have
received—and it is the distance between what we as twelfth graders have until
now expected out of life and what our lives are shaping up to be. It is that distance, that fulfillment gap
that makes our generation different from any other—unique, not only in what
we have had, but in what we have missed. On a small scale, that of the
distance between the eight grader and the graduation senior, the gap
manifests itself as an unfulfilled promise of homecoming dances, football
games, and clothes that we were, for so long, “too young” to wear. From Junior High, it was these things that
made high school, but when we got there, they were no longer important. On a far lager sale, we stand here
on the graduation speech cliche’ of the threshold of life, and we se still
more unfulfilled expectations. Where
six years ago, there were four years of college, the boy next door and 2.3 kids
as a foregone conclusion, there is now a question mark surrounded by a lot of
empty space, and women’s liberation, Paul Ehrlich, and a new definition of
fulfillment emphasizing individual freedom, It was through our own revised
perceptions of reality that change came.
We asked for relevancy and we got it, and now we have on one to
congratulate or blame but ourselves.
But that doesn’t erase the empty place inn us that is still waiting
for a set of priorities that will never materialize. We asked for, and received the chance to
establish our own priorities—and this privilege, like so many others, carries
a heavy responsibility that is just beginning to make itself felt—the
responsibility of independent decision. This is more than an identity
crisis because it involves more than identities. Rather it encompasses entire sets of expectations and values
made obsolete by our own demands for honest answers. The results of these unfulfilled
promises and expectations can be measured in something far more tangible than
emptiness,. Unfulfilled promises
breed a fear—a fear to hope, a fear to care—they give birth to the tragic
cliché’ of apathy,. If the rug is
pulled from under anyone often enough or powerfully enough, they will learn
to resist caring, and that above all is what we members of the class of 1972
are facing today—a resistance to caring. It is not really apathy when
nobody votes in class elections or when only the cheer-leaders cheer at pep
rallies. That is only a conflict
between a set of priorities that says such things are important and one that
does not. Apathy is the defeated cynicism
that prevents people from allowing themselves to care when they really want
to. It is the student who refuses to
work on a political campaign because nothing he could do would make a
difference anyway, who doesn’t run for an ASB office he really wants because
ASB government is a farce anyway, or who doesn’t try out for a team he wants
to be part of because, like any team, it could lose and, worse yet, he could
be the cause of that loss. During my years and San Marcos I
have heard these excuses time and time again—excuses that are, in reality,
cowardice fashionably masked as cynical apathy. And it is this apathy, this refusal to hope that will come
between this generation and fulfillment in a way that nothing else can. Why? It is the same principle that makes a frustrating tragedy out
of public forums when the public stays home—or out of letters to the editor
that go unwritten. It is tragic
because unless we go after what we want and have the courage to fight for it,
even when we stand a good chance of losing, we are dooming ourselves to the
permanent frustration of unachieved goals.
We felt the letdown of unfulfilled promises a product of our own
demands. We demanded the option of
deciding our own priorities, an now we are feeling the hurt of disorganized
goals—a hurt that will remain until we muster the courage to reorganize those
priorities and ad it the importance of specific goals. Apathy and fear are the culprits,
and the courage to care about and work for anything that we deep down want—be
it a political candidate or a material object—are the cures. Graduation
speeches traditionally acknowledge that the future lies ahead and that the
past has already happened. To that I
would add that the rest of our lives lines in that future and that it is the
responsibility of us, the graduating class of 1972, to bring to it the
courage to let that future be important and to mold it into one worth living
in. |
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