Costa junior Anthony Padnos spoke at the TEDx Manhattan Beach event, where he gave a presentation on open dialogue and free speech.
Padnos is a member of Costa Model United Nations (MUN) in which he has learned and developed critical thinking skills, global and international relation skills. Padnos also leads the Manhattan Beach Middle School (MBMS) MUN club. However, according to Padnos, in the modern social climate, we have culturally lost the notion of free speech and open dialogue.
“I wanted to speak at TEDx because I love the idea of taking an idea you believe is worth sharing, refining it, and spreading that idea with a large group of people,” said Padnos. “I think a Ted Talk is a great way to make a positive impact on a topic you really care about.”
Padnos also uses social media to share his love for art. His posts on “AnthArt” has over 200,000 followers on different social media platforms. He creates sharable art to inspire others. Padnos is President of Art Venture Club at Costa where he teaches art to disadvantaged youth in downtown Los Angeles. Companies that support “AnthArt” provide him with supplies to take to those shelters.
“With free speech being a pillar of what our country was built on, a future with widespread censorship scares me.” Padnos said. “I wanted to do something I thought would offer a solution to the issues we’re having with modern free speech.”
According to Padnos, his experience in Model UN has greatly influenced his views on free speech and issues of censorship in the United States. He believes that as time passes, Americans lose touch more and more with the values on which our country was founded.
“I’m a part of Model UN, a program which emphasizes, debate, respectful disagreements, and thoughtful arguments,” said Padnos. “However, in our modern social culture, we have culturally lost the notion of free speech and open dialogue.”
Padnos received an invitation to speak at TEDx in March of 2023 and he immediately knew what he wanted to speak about. From there, Padnos outlined his ideas, wrote a speech, memorized it and even worked with a public speaking coach to make sure his presentation was adequate.
“I learned from this process how important it is to have other perspectives when working on a project,” Padnos said. “When I started writing my speech, I went off on a completely different tangent than what I had originally planned. I worked a lot with the TED organizers to refine my overcomplicated speech into a clear, presentable idea.”
After presenting his speech, Padnos hopes that through speaking about free speech and equitable discourse, he will give the people who see his presentation the tools to communicate better with others.
“Trough the conversation tools and debate structure that I shared, people can better communicate with each other and have fewer chaotic disagreements,” Padnos said. “The organizers of the event couldn’t have been nicer to me or helped me anymore than they did.”
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