Dr. Benjamin’s “Who Owns the Future?”

 

Dr. Ruha Benjamin’s talk “Who Owns the Future?” challenged me to think critically about innovation, justice, and who gets to define “progress.” She spoke about how society praises ideas that generate profit while dismissing those that seek to confront inequality. Her point that some of the most needed ideas are often labeled “too ambitious”  really stuck with me as I reflected on how the government is more concerned with colonizing Mars than fixing world hunger, how there are new forms of AI emerging everyday yet we have a literacy crisis in our children, How they are making flying cars but funding help for immigration matters is “too difficult”. It reminded me that most people in high power are not concerned with the masses so why deem them worthy of attention let alone money?

The floral exhibit dedicated to Breonna Taylor was also very powerful. The garden offering  a space for beauty, remembrance, and sorrow not just in remembrance to Breonna but to any person lost. In my FYE class we were just discussing if memory needed a home/a set space and I feel that this is a beautiful example of a place to hold memory and engage in the quiet. Just imagining standing there, I can see memorialization being somewhat revolutionary, honoring those who society has dehumanized much like Breonna. This experience tied into ethical discernment, encouraging me to question what kind of future I want to build as a future physician. Determining that when I have more societal power what will I do with it? I know I want to challenge and reform the systems plaguing the world but how will I do it? What can I do to make those changes now? Although addressing these issues is important it means nothing without after thought and action. Benjamin’s talk reminded me that to own the future is to own our responsibility to make it just.

- Giavonni Whitener