Coggins' Critique Is Not Coherent

Although Jessica Coggins’ “Where Narcissism Rules” (Oct. 3, oped) paints her as a proponent of “reasoned debate,” the columnist failed to formulate one coherent critique of the campaigns she implied were self-promotional. Coggins’ editorial insinuated that last year’s hunger strike, part of the Stand for Security campaign, should be classified as narcissism, not true activism, a categorization she borrowed from Bill Maher. Coggins fairly paraphrased the TV host, but provided an obscured description of her classmates’ actions.

Coggins contrasted a campaign that was, in every sense of the word, effective, with the recent “HIV Positive” stunt, praising those behind the latter for resisting the “inflated sense of self.” A hunger striker is many things, but self-indulgent isn’t one of them. Most Harvard students would be hard pressed to name three of the 11 strike participants. And the most visible strikers hardly received unqualified support. If Coggins truly believes that unconventional forms of activism are the way to get elected prom queen, she ought to take a closer look at this campus.

Coggins also assumed that the goal of activism is to initiate dialogue amongst Harvard students. What a wonderful world it would be if all progress were the result of Crimson op-eds (or better yet, truly rational discourse). Unfortunately, sometimes it takes concrete action to achieve actual results. Yet to Coggins, the opinions of her and her peers, not the wages of Harvard workers or funds raised to combat deadly infections, form the barometer by which success is measured. Narcissism, anyone?



SILPA KOVVALI ’10

Cambridge, MA

October 4, 2007