In this time of distress concerning the COVID-19 pandemic, we are reminded of Susan Sontag’s path-breaking 1978 book, Illness as Metaphor, which focuses on the common metaphor of disease as an enemy that we meet on the battlefield and against which those affected need to fight in order to triumph. In this context, someone who succumbs to a disease is implicitly characterized as not fighting hard or heroically enough. As we have proposed repeatedly, the heroic, militant model of leadership can be an over-simplified, less compassionate and complex representation of the dynamics, emotions, and empathy that human action and interaction involves. The war metaphor is widely prevalent in the midst of the current pandemic. Here is a recent argument–focusing on Chris Cuomo, a CNN journalist who has been infected with coronavirus–that calls this metaphor into question:

Chris Cuomo, Stay in Bed – Politico

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