My Obligation as a Human Being

Posted in WPSU’s This I Believe, 2010-02-11

I believe everyone has an obligation to act on behalf of the powerless.

Once, when I was in ninth grade, I was eating lunch in the school cafeteria. I was making jokes to impress my friends; hoping to make it through high school at least halfway cool. As I sat, something caught my eye. At a table opposite me, a lanky boy was all alone, eating a squishy peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Acne and glasses covered his face. Baggy sweatpants clashed with his wrinkled blue t-shirt. I felt bad for the lonely boy. I wondered if he had any friends. I thought about standing up. I thought about walking over and sitting with the stranger. I thought about telling him jokes. I thought about being his friend.

But I didn’t get up. I didn’t make him less lonely.

A bigger boy approached the table with his girlfriend. They were probably tenth graders. The boy cursed at the solitary boy. The girl didn’t flinch at her boyfriend’s rudeness. The lonely ninth grader grabbed his brown lunch bag, stood, and scurried off like a mouse eluding an elephant’s formidable foot. The bully and his girlfriend sat down and ate their lunch.
I was shocked. I felt sad. I felt glad it wasn’t me. I turned my head back to my friends and I continued to eat. I don’t remember who the boy was. I don’t remember where he went. I believe I was a coward.

After that, I tried to keep what happened in my head. I wanted to remember that moment and do better next time.
Then last spring an opportunity appeared, and I remembered the lonely boy. Maybe it wasn’t stopping a bully, but it was important. Last spring, I went with fellow youth group members from my church to Washington D.C. to learn about human trafficking. We met with representatives, and nervously voiced our opinions and hopes on behalf of people who couldn’t.

I didn’t do the right thing the first time. It can be hard to risk your own security to help someone else.

But it’s even harder to live with the knowledge that you could have done something to make things better and you didn’t.
I believe there is nothing worse in this world than seeing an injustice happen -- war, famine, slavery, even a bully getting his way -- and turning the other direction. As a moral citizen, I believe it’s my obligation to ACT. I’m doing what I can: Last summer I went to New Orleans to continue rebuilding efforts after Katrina. And I’m a part of a community service club at my high school.

I believe I must do something, maybe not everything, but something. And maybe, just maybe, with that small contribution, the world will be a little bit better. Maybe there will be one less lonely boy. Even if its just one, the world would be better. This I believe.

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