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| Filmmaker Steven Spielberg (center) greets people while proceeding through Harvard Yard at the start of Harvard University commencement exercises on the school's campus, May 26, 2016, in Cambridge, Mass. Spielberg is scheduled to deliver the commencement speech Thursday at Harvard University. (AP Photo/Steven Senne) |
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — In a world full of villains, Harvard University graduates must become the heroes, filmmaker Steven Spielberg told the 2016 class during a commencement address Thursday.
Spielberg invoked stories from his films and his life as he encouraged the graduates to take on the world's woes.
"A hero needs a villain to vanquish, and you're all in luck," he said. "This world is full of monsters. There's racism, homophobia, ethnic hatred, class hatred. There's political hatred and there's religious hatred."
The answer, he told graduates, is to question voices of authority, to seek "defining character moments" in their own lives and to learn from the past.
"The way you create a better future is by studying the past," he said. "Atrocities are happening right now, and so we wonder not just, 'When will this hatred end?' but 'How did it begin?'"
He told how he was bullied as a child for being Jewish, and he warned that anti-Semitism and Islamophobia are on the rise. To combat them, he urged students to listen to others' stories and to share their own.
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| Sheryl Sandberg, chief operation officer of Facebook (center) greets people before Harvard University commencement exercises on the school's campus, May 26, 2016, in Cambridge, Mass. (AP Photo/Steven Senne) |
