Though graduates of an elite college like Harvard are probably less likely to number among the 70 percent without a passport, the problem of parochialism is one that they, too, must confront. One way to start might be to redefine our understanding of parochialism. Breadth of education and the accumulation of airline mileage points are not indicators of worldliness, and, conversely, their absence is not a symptom of narrow-mindedness. Even through study and travel, many stick to the comfortable goal of “knowing of” other people and nations. They confine themselves to an endless gap year of detached observation.

In Plato’s “Crito,” Socrates claims that anyone who “stands his ground” in residence in a state consents to the reach of its laws and institutions. In other words, residence is the starting point of our obligations to the nation. I argue that we need a more refined view of our duty as citizens. We owe an obligation, not merely to submit to the government of the country in which we choose to live, but to enhance our country’s functions through the knowledge we gain when we journey elsewhere. Fulfilling such a duty requires us to look beyond the borders of our country in travel, study, and thought and to genuinely engage with the world around us.

Having spent a semester comping the Harvard Crimson, I am still not entirely sure what Flyby exists to do. But I do hope that the Roving Reporter continues to rove, asking questions about faraway lands. The answers they find will be a weathervane for our outlook. And just perhaps, more people will know the capital of Mexico.

Bo Seo ’17 is a Crimson editorial writer in Straus Hall.