Watch: Teen scraps graduation speech to call out 'dehumanizing' abortion law
Watch: Teen scraps graduation speech to call out 'dehumanizing' abortion law
You don't have to wait to change the world.
Graduating high school senior Paxton Smith appears to know that well: The class valedictorian didn't waste time or mince words when giving her commencement speech in Texas on Sunday. Instead of delivering a pre-approved speech on teen media use, D Magazine reported, she used her platform to decry a bill Texas Gov. Greg Abbott recently signed that bans abortion in the state at six weeks, a time when most people don't know they're pregnant.
While her voice shakes at first in the video above, Smith gains confidence as she goes on. (The speech starts at the 4:30 mark.)
"Starting in September, there will be a ban on abortions that take place after six weeks of pregnancy, regardless of whether the pregnancy was a result of rape or incest. Six weeks. That's all women get," Smith said.
Then she made the ramifications of the law personal:
"I have dreams, and hopes, and ambitions. Every girl graduating today does," she said. "And we have spent our entire lives working towards our future, and without our input, and without our consent, our control over that future has been stripped away from us."
At that point, the crowd broke out in cheers. Smith continued:
"I am terrified that if my contraceptives fail, I'm terrified that if I’m raped, then my hopes and efforts and dreams and efforts for my future will no longer matter. I hope you can feel how gut-wrenching that is, I hope you can feel how dehumanizing it is, to have the autonomy over your own body taken from away you."
She ended with a call to action:
"I cannot give up this platform to promote complacency and peace, when there is a war on my body and a war on my rights. A war on the rights of your mothers, a war on the rights of your sisters, a war on the rights of your daughters.
"We cannot stay silent."
Her address has reverberated far beyond the Dallas community where, as D Magazine reported, administrators threatened that her diploma could be withheld (according to Smith, it hasn't). On Twitter, it's been viewed more than 600,000 times and more than 210,000 times on TikTok, Vice reported.
Since her speech, Smith says she's received an outpouring of overwhelmingly positive reactions — something she didn't expect.
That didn't include the school administration.
“What the student did was unexpected and not supported by LHHS or RISD," RISD School Board President Karen Clardy told Advocate Magazine of Lake Highlands, a suburb northeast of Dallas where Smith went to school. "We are going to review student speech protocols in advance of next year’s graduations to prevent something like this from happening again.”
Smith, for her part, says she understands the school's position, but she's not going to stop speaking out.
"When I feel very strongly about something and when I feel what is right is right," she says, "then I don't get scared...to express what I'm thinking."
UPDATE: June 3, 2021, 4:46 p.m. EDT This post has been updated to include comments and input from Smith.
How terribly terribly sad that this young lady has been brought up with the erroneous notion that having a baby will ruin her "dreams, hopes, and ambitions." Guess she's not that smart after all :(
ReplyDeleteBravo, clap. our future is in good hands
ReplyDeleteGood for her!!! Need more people like her.
ReplyDeleteAnother person, who uses the opportunity for some selfish act. Although she's right, but that forum wasn't the right place.
ReplyDeleteIt's not a selfish act. It impacts thousands. People wouldn't need to use their platforms to raise such issues if their basic human rights weren't being stripped away from them.
DeleteHer planning and execution was good and she clearly got cut through to international media and over 600,000 people, so fair play to her. She’s trying to do more for women than most. I guess we could ask what is the right forum?
DeleteWhen is the right moment? She had a captive audience and laws like these can severely impact a woman's chance for success in life. Isn't pursuing success a big part of Valedictorian speeches? It took courage for her to take a stand. I am sure some of the religious "right to life" parents were horrified, but it isn't right that young women are punished and their lives possibly ruined while boys and young men are encouraged to sew their oats without taking responsibility.
DeleteWell behaved women rarely make history.
DeleteIf not now, when? If not her, who?
that took courage
DeleteId say it was definitely the right place.
DeleteWhen it comes to human rights, any forum is the right forum
DeleteA female didn't do what you think she should so she's selfish. Got it.
DeleteAbsolutely, and hopefully it encourages more girls and women to be courageous.
DeleteEducated by the news media
ReplyDeleteIt was her. Classmates celebration of 14 years not the place
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ReplyDeletehttps://media1.tenor.co/images/674f58331801bfd25db7344ff825f03c/tenor.gif?itemid=14834371
ReplyDeleteWhat do you call the Selective Services and circumcision?
ReplyDeleteGood
ReplyDeletehttps://media1.tenor.co/images/60e079b9a7414919f8f77e2dbbe7a0a7/tenor.gif?itemid=16057647&t=AAXD5OmLW4oKpK8LdwhrxA
ReplyDelete