The 13th Generation by Stephen Sonneveld

A political and inspirational speech given to college students at the appropriately named Turning Point Cafe on April 30, 1995, concerning Generation Xs responsibility to tackle and make right the sins previous generations have left and are continuing to heap on us.

I wish this speech were a curiosity piece and not a clarion call. I wish I could say it had no relevance, but thanks to the diplomatic, environmental and economic calamity the Bush years have plunged the world into, our generations will be untying knots for quite some years to come.

And we will, through honest passion about service, integrity in our every dealing, and reason and truth above the wild whims of emotionally based ideologies.

This is not our destiny - this is our responsibility. Destiny is for mythic heroes. We are men and women. As Lincoln was a man. As Jane Addams of Hull House was a woman. Let us leave fate to the tortured figures in the Greek classics, and instead write our own story in the unfolding American narrative.

These are not hollow words. We can do better. We must do better. Let us strive together in noble pursuit.

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