Coggins Should Have Focused on Alaska

In her comment on Nov. 6, Jessica C. Coggins (“Don’t Mess With Texas”) sent a good message about cultural openness. But she used it as a vehicle for unrelated and divisive shameless self-promotion of the second biggest state.

Basically no one has a problem with a Southern accent around Harvard. Many people even fake it just to be sexier. Furthermore, there are a ton of Texans at Harvard; they fill up the Southern demographic. I just don’t see how Texans are discriminated against as dumber, or what Texas has to do with making Harvard students more cosmopolitan.

As such we’d like to pose a counterargument.

Alaska has a lot of wilderness, which is unsurprising since it’s the westernmost, easternmost, and northernmost state. (We would be the southernmost state, but we’re worried about the implications of this on our language skills.) Given its vast northern wild lands, Alaska also has a lot of glaciers. These help a globally warming Earth to stay cool.

Everyone wants to help the environment. And Alaska has a lot of environment to give. In the face of deforestation, global warming, and acid rain, we need to stand strong to protect our wilderness heritage. We must unite for the environment—unite around Alaska!

Alaska doesn’t have everything. We don’t have a lot of people, and can’t brag about the urban sprawl that Houston can. We can’t boast a current President of the United States and all the good deeds he does.

But we do have many glaciers! And they must be protected. Will you stand with us to protect these glaciers? Will you stay strong to keep our beautiful forests pristine? Will you recognize Alaska as the greatest state in the Union that it is? Because in doing so we’ll all become more “cosmopolitan, tolerant, and open-minded individuals.”


KEN W. MCKINLEY ’08
JACK GAGE ’09
Cambridge, MA
November 7, 2007

The writers are presidents of the Alaska Klub.