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Commence Commencing: Stewart, Ferrell, O'Brien
26 May 2004 by Matthew Linderman
Jon Stewart, a 1984 William & Mary graduate, speaks at the school’s commencement [via Stereogum]:
I wanted to bring this up to you earlier about the real world, and this is I guess as good a time as any. I dont really know to put this, so Ill be blunt. We broke it. Please dont be mad. I know we were supposed to bequeath to the next generation a world better than the one we were handed. So, sorry.
But heres the good news. You fix this thing, youre the next greatest generation, people. And even if you dont, youre not gonna have much trouble surpassing my generation. If you end up getting your picture taken next to a naked guy pile of enemy prisoners and dont give the thumbs up youve outdid us.
And let’s not forget some classic commencent day speeches from the past.
Like Will Ferrell’s at Harvard.
One of you, specifically John Lee, will spend most of your time just hanging out in your car eating nachos. You will all come back from time to time to this beautiful campus for reunions, and ask the question, “Does anyone ever know what happened to John Lee?” At that point, he will invariably pop out from the bushes and yell, “Nachos anyone?!” At first, it will scare the crap out of you. But then you’ll share a laugh with your classmates and ultimately look forward to John jumping out of the bushes as a yearly event.
Or Conan O’Brien’s great one (one of the first SvN posts ever), also at Harvard.
You see, you’re in for a lifetime of “And you went to Harvard?” Accidentally give the wrong amount of change in a transaction and it’s, “And you went to Harvard?” Ask the guy at the hardware store how these jumper cables work and hear, “And you went to Harvard?” Forget just once that your underwear goes inside your pants and it’s “and you went to Harvard.” Get your head stuck in your niece’s dollhouse because you wanted to see what it was like to be a giant and it’s “Uncle Conan, you went to Harvard!?”
10 comments so far (Post a Comment)
26 May 2004 | Chris said...
Guy Kawasaki's speech was at a high school graduation - but it is a good one too.
http://alumni.eecs.berkeley.edu/~rayning/kawasaki.html
26 May 2004 | RS said...
Great link, Chris.
26 May 2004 | CM Harrington said...
Kawasaki's speech was really quite good. Stewart's was funny, but I am not sure how appropriate it was. I'm a huge fan of his show, but I felt that his speech seemed to go off into left field without ever coming back to a point. It seemed very disjointed in comparison to Guy's.
26 May 2004 | pecky said...
O'Briens always cracks me up. One of my favorites is Kurt Vonnegut's speech for the class of 99 at Agnes Scott College (which I witnessed in person). The most bizarre had to be the mad ramblings of Ted Turner for UGA's class of 99 or 00. He concluded with "Anyways...congratulations..., I hope you don't have to go to Yugoslavia and die".
26 May 2004 | grumpy said...
This is proof that Jon Stewart is the funniest man alive. Perhaps ever...
26 May 2004 | Darrel said...
The ferrel link isn't working.
27 May 2004 | xavier said...
fer' real? hehe
27 May 2004 | ML said...
Ferrell link replaced (beware: red text).
28 May 2004 | Don Schenck said...
Just read Will Ferrell's speech. Too funny.
29 May 2004 | tomas said...
You can watch Ferrell's speech at this realvideo link:
http://video2.harvard.edu:8080/ramgen/pluto/ClassDay2003.rm
at around 1 hour 30 minutes.
