Some call this meritocracy. I call it schadenfreude.

And as the successful ones celebrate our accomplishments, we will forget about, or justify, the ways in which Harvard fails so many of its students. We leave behind our classmates at school.

But even more, we leave behind those we left before we came here: high school classmates, old friends, neighbors, workers at local stores, folks who live in the “bad part of town.” We learn to see others’ struggles as proof of our own worthiness.

Wrapped up in our own achievements, we forget that our new employers make their money by buying out companies, destroying jobs and businesses or by manipulating markets and causing mass home foreclosures. We lose sight of the connection between our profits and others’ poverty. We forget the ones we left behind, and we push others further behind still.

But sometimes, something called empathy or friendship or love brings us back. Something compels us to see our classmates who are struggling to keep up with the work not as “lazy” but as facing a unique set of difficulties, to see workers on campus and in local fast food joints as just as worthy of a life of dignity and respect and security as we are.

As Emma Lazaurus once said, “None of us are free until all of us are free.”

Something compels us to organize for change, to fight for a world where no one is left behind.

Some call this socialism. I call it basic human decency.

Editor's Note: We made the decision to publish this op-ed anonymously due to the private and intensely personal nature of its content. It is our hope that this piece will bring to light issues that affect members of our community.

—John A. Griffin and Molly L. Roberts, Editorial Chairs

—Steven S. Lee, President