Free Republic

Assuming the ridiculous gushing over a Cambridge conman was not a national Monty Python sketch arranged for tourists, the Jason Arday affair reminded me of one of the most peculiar things about Britain: They’re more woke than the U.S. Which is weird, because the Mother Country still has a monarchy that rules over tens of millions of white subjects. The closest we have to that in America is the NAACP. According to the 2021 census, the U.K. is 2.5% black, but more than half of all its TV advertisements feature black people. (That’s even more lopsided than their representation...

Jason Arday’s memoir will be released in the UK as planned, his publisher has confirmed. Simon & Schuster announced that Great And Unfortunate Things would be published on Thursday, two weeks after the academic was found dead at his home in south London. Mr Arday had resigned as professor of sociology of education at the University of Cambridge on Aug 5 after allegations of plagiarism and questions about elements of his life story emerged. He was the youngest black professor in Cambridge’s history.

If poor Jason Arday killed himself, it will be necessary to work out why. To do so, it will help to know why he resigned his professorship. It seems highly unlikely he resigned if Cambridge University did not want him to. It had defended him in public throughout, after all. Yet if he had been confident of Cambridge’s continuing support, why did he sacrifice the benefit of its protection? If Cambridge suggested to him that its protection would, for whatever reason, shortly cease, what caused its change of mind? What a terrible shock for him if the institution which had...

Nathan Cofnas, the U.S. academic who raised plagiarism concerns over the late Cambridge professor Jason Arday, said on Thursday he had been suspended by Belgium’s Ghent University and was under investigation for discrimination. Arday, once hailed as Cambridge’s youngest Black professor, was found dead, aged 41, in London last Friday, days after resigning from his post. Arday had denied the allegation of plagiarism but acknowledged making mistakes. “I was just suspended by Ghent University. They will almost certainly fire me,” Cofnas wrote on his X account. In a post a few hours earlier he said he was “under investigation by...

An academic who made plagiarism allegations against Professor Jason Arday before his death has been suspended by a university. Professor Arday resigned from his role at the University of Cambridge this month after he faced intense scrutiny over accusations of plagiarism initially made by fellow academic Nathan Cofnas. Mr Cofnas, who has advocated for 'race realism', is currently a postdoctoral researcher at Ghent University's department of philosophy and moral sciences, according to his website. In a post on X on Thursday, he said: 'I am under investigation by my university for discriminating against Arday.' In a separate post, Mr Cofnas...

Earlier this year, shortly after it was announced that the publisher Simon & Schuster had bought the rights to Jason Arday’s memoir, the then professor of sociology of education at Cambridge University gave an interview to The Bookseller. “I always wanted to be a person who flew close to the sun,” Arday mused. “But sometimes I wonder: did I fly too close?” On the evidence of his book – due to be published in the UK on August 27 – and all that has emerged about Arday in recent weeks, the answer is probably yes. Titled Great and Unfortunate Things,...

Simon Baron-Cohen, the distinguished Cambridge autism specialist, has been speaking movingly about his friend, Jason Arday, in a BBC radio interview. Baron-Cohen said the last contact he had with Arday was hours before he was found dead at an address in south London yesterday afternoon: “He really wasn’t coping. He was being subjected to relentless scrutiny…ridicule, discrediting every detail of his life… He wasn’t coping with the loss of his career, the loss of his reputation. He felt he couldn’t go on.” Baron-Cohen went on to talk about him as “an incredibly kind and gentle and caring and generous man”....

Cambridge University is England’s second-best university, but it’s now bottom of the class. As the case of Jason Arday confirms, no one does dumb like the smart people. In 2023, Cambridge made Arday a professor. He became the professorial chair of sociology and education. These fields produce politicized gibberish and call it scientific research.

The high-flying academic at the centre of a Cambridge University plagiarism row has been found dead. Professor Jason Arday was found unresponsive at a London address shortly after 3pm on Friday. It comes after a tumultuous few weeks in which fellow dons had questioned if the 41-year-old academic’s work was original. It had also prompted an examination of his previous academic posts. As questions mounted from academics, journalists and broadcasters, Arday resigned his prestigious role. He had been Cambridge University’s youngest ever black professor, having been appointed a professor of sociology of education in March 2023. But after a succession...

Jason Arday, the former University of Cambridge professor, has been found dead. Mr Arday was found “unresponsive” at an address in Battersea, south London, on Friday afternoon. He was later pronounced dead at the scene. A spokesman for the Metropolitan Police said officers were called by the London Ambulance Service at 3.12pm on Friday. He said: “Sadly, a 41-year-old man was pronounced dead at the scene. His next-of-kin have been informed and are being supported by officers. “At this time his death is being treated as unexpected, but is not believed to be suspicious. The case is being investigated by...

Jason Arday is no longer a professor at Britain’s prestigious Cambridge University, but that august institution is going to need some time to recover from the damage he has done. Indeed, the entire academic world, and the DEI industry as well, are reeling from Arday’s sudden and shocking unmasking and downfall. They had so very much invested in him as a living symbol of the success of their analysis, and of the correctness of their worldview, that now they are due for some serious soul-searching and reevaluation of their entire approach. Will they engage in that thorough and honest self-examination...