Following the death of the Academy Award winning actor and comedian Robin Williams on August 11, the world mourned all over social media sites. Pictures and tributes to Williams continued to grow as the news of his death spread, shocking people all over the nation.

Two of the most common photos to surface were the Genie from Disney’s “Aladdin” and the students from “Dead Poets Society” standing on their desks. Though both of these movies are totally different in their creation, they were both made great by Robin Williams himself.

Many movies we have watched that Williams is known for giving amazing performances in have been there from start to finish. As kids, “Aladdin” taught us to laugh and “RV” taught us to love our families. “August Rush” taught us to have passion. As we grew older, “Good Will Hunting” taught us about love, and “Dead Poets Society” taught us all about life and death.

Though numbers of these movies have been around before we were, they are still here. They were there when we needed them, whether what we needed was a good laugh or a good cry. And these movies will continue to be there as we evolve, waiting for us to learn new things and be new people.

Robin Williams was and is so much more than any of us ever realized him to be. He was an inspiration, a comic, and an eye-opener, and his death should not end that. He left us with so much to cherish, and so cherish we should.

As the world moves forward after the loss of such an inspirational figure, we should not move on from all he left behind. To the man who made us laugh up until his final days, we stand on our desks in salute.

By Stephanie Sorich