The Jason Arday scandal

And we haven’t even begun to dissect the lies in his ‘auto-biography’.. they make the cv and plagiarism look lightweight.

Charges of plagiarism are happening all the time in universities. Which other ones have made the headlines in last 20 years?

One thing this whole scandal has taught me is some White people are loving this just to put one over Black people. Your racism is showing loud and clear! I won't be surprised if some White people are popping champagne over Arday being a fraud.

Regarding George Abaraonye, he did get into Oxford with ABB. But if you actually do your research, you would find out that it is common for Oxbridge to let in candidates who didn't meet their grade requirements for reasons such as them performing extremely well in the interview or tests they set. This doesn't necessarily mean that Abaraonye got in because of DEI, as much as White people want to claim. A white boy in my sixth form got into Cambridge with A*BB because he did extremely well in the interview.

I work with people from Cambridge uni. Arday's academic abilities, or total lack of them, were an open secret. As I said in a much more previous post, most people are just not prepared to risk their livelihood or reputation to take a stand, it's simply not worth it. The self righteous Hilary Cremins of academia can be very aggressive in subduing criticism.

I didn’t say JA’s work was comparable to Brian Cox’s, I said his ability to speak clearly and break down difficult theories were similar.

You seem very upset. There is no need. I have a theory about what’s happened here and you have a different one. There’s no need to be rude.

This guy might be the biggest charlatan ever to walk the hallowed corridors of academia or he might be the victim of a smear campaign. We don’t know and maybe we won’t ever fully know.

but what I find extraordinary is that he either worked or studied at least 9 universities including:
Queen Mary’s
John Moores
Institute of Education - London University
Ravensboune
Durham
Cambridge

And they didn’t spot anything untoward. Well in fact John Moore investigated a claim of plagiarism on his PhD but dismissed it as minor and took no further action.

Then he comes under the scrutiny of an academic who appears to believe that Black people can’t progress in academia without positive discrimination.

Then the Telegraph et al go for him with such unfettered delight it’s obscene.

Then he has to resign. Meanwhile, a white professor at Cambridge, similarly accused keeps his job - and the complaint was upheld (William O’ Reilly, historian)

It seems very, very odd to me.

I have not been able to find reliable evidence on the other claims of benign brain tumours and marathons etc. Note I said reliable, not misinformation.

As I say, maybe he’s a charlatan but if so, a great many establishment institutions have failed to notice. Joke is on them!

Here's a video of him claiming to have a masters in psychodynamic practices from Birkbeck. https://x.com/ripx4nutmeg/status/2084889820678004923?s=61&t=U9XrcF693-JpMxeIueYG7g

Birkbeck is not on your list because he doesn't have a masters in psychodynamic practices from Birkbeck.

Why do you think he lied here?

I live in the US there are huge class differences. We pretend to be living in a meritocracy, but that’s not true. However, in the time I spent in England it was clear that class was a much, much bigger issue there.

I don’t go on X or whatever it’s called. You’ve heard of deep fakes yeah?

How can these clever people be so stupid?

I wish someone would ask all the people who interviewed him such as Krishnan Guru Murphy, or those on the BBC programme in which Arday said 70% of Britons were below the poverty line and abolishing the royal family would address this, why none of them smelt a rat.

The fact that you replied to me means I touched a nerve!
Arday is clearly a fraud and what he did was wrong. However, nobody has died. I am astounded that this has made front page news. If he was White, nobody would even care, he would have just resigned silently.

He's not young by any stretch of the imagination - he's 41.

Are you arguing charges of plagerism are common amongst Cambridge professors and routinely ignored by the press? I can only think of Dr William O’Reilly which was most certainly covered by the media though the circumstances were dramatically different to Arday's.

Arday's case isn't an isolated charge of off plagiarism. He's an out and out fantasist. Whose lies

Further those who attempted to question his claims or the quality of his research or found him wanting as a supervisor was accused of racism. Jack Gove , the educational reporter, was reported to and warned off by the police for investigating him. They were silenced.

You seem to forget there are real victims in this. Arday’s appointment came at a price - the opportunity cost of not appointing a scholar with an unimpeachable research history and impeccable credentials. Scholars who've worked for decades and produced important, original work, while watching a colleague promoted to aposition for which they were less qualified - in the name of diversity.

You can certainly argue the real villains are those who, in appointing him, turned a blind eye to his unsuitability, lack of scholarship and the incredible nature of his claims . That it is a travesty those that needed him to be more than an 'academic', to be a PR 'symbol' of a wider narrative about institutional diversity and inclusion get to remain in their jobs, when he does not. I would not disagree.

But you don't get to dismiss Array's culpability out of hand and to minimise his lies as a right wing smear. Having resigned I think he should be able to retire quietly from public life and be left alone - but if he goes ahead with the publication of his book he deserves all the further opprobrium that will be heaped upon him.

That was the worst part of this story for me. Arday has a memoir coming out next week, I believe, and it seems to be full of the most egregious nonsense that can't possibly be true.

Academic plagiarism is something that you can pin on almost any academic if you do enough digging and the person who found evidence of plagiarism in Arday's work has a history of supporting white supremacist ideas so I'm not sure what to think about that. His memoir and life story more generally, however, seem to be full of lies and nonsense e.g. that he ran 300 miles in 3 days, that he was almost beaten to death and in a coma for 3 months and then had to re-learn how to walk and talk again and when the assault case went to trial, he asked the judge to let his assailants go free... it all reads like fantasy. I can't believe he got a publishing deal. Do they just not employ fact-checkers anymore?

The US magazine, The Atlantic, has all the details here: https://www.theatlantic.com/books/2026/08/jason-arday-cambridge-academic-memoir-resignation/688206/?gift=v4kJggWosqBjpiekiNUJ3e4a36xuIAys79Dvfo8qV9w&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share

Exactly! Whatever he’s done / not done he isn’t that bad.

He just tried too hard I think. Maybe he’s felt under massive pressure to excel?

I spent too much time looking at his story online last night. The only VERIFIED stuff I could find was that his phd had been investigated for minor plagiarism. All the rest came from sources I wouldn’t trust to tell me the date.

I did find a really vile daily telegraph video with Jacob Reece Mogg in which him and the presenter smugly took the piss of JA likening him to Professor Snape in the new Harry Potter series.

Then JRM proceeded to tell an “amusing” story of how his favourite uni professor used to get so drunk he fell onto tables of food. All with Margaret Thatcher watching fondly 🤮.

The absolute glee on display because ONE Black academic may have done something wrong shows these people’s true colours.

On the question of what grades people have to get into Cambridge: The King - just a C and a B to get into Trinity and his brother, Edward, C, D, D to get into Jesus.

And people talk of JA taking the place of better qualified candidates because of DEI?

@SevenYellowHammers ’All the rest came from sources I wouldn’t trust to tell me the date.’

The allegedly more reliable sources are keeping quiet. They don’t want to be accused of piling in on the top bullshitter, who obviously only got to Cambridge because he was black.

Bless him? He's a fraudster, who lied his way through his career and then used racism to silence people. Well done for falling for it.

@SevenYellowHammersWhat about Arday reporting the educational journalist for the Times Higher Education Supplement to the police for contacting him by email with a number of questions relating to his PHD? The police investigated the journalist for four months. Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley later admitted the force "dropped the ball" and should not have investigated legitimate journalistic inquiries or warned Grove to cease contact. Arday also used a firm of top lawyers to scare off anyone who asked him embarrassing questions.
Do you think it is right that high profile celebrities like Arday use their fame to manipulate the police into doing their bidding?

There speaks one with no idea how crap some other Oxbridge academics are.

I'm sure Cambridge will survive but it does make the people who appointed him seem as if they valued diversity over academic rigour which isn't a good look at such a prestigious institution.

I’m an academic and understand how racist, sexist and classist the world of academia is firsthand. Regional accents can be enough for some academics to make you feel like you don’t belong at the table, even though your credentials are every bit as impressive as theirs. It’s honestly a brutal place at times and you need a thick skin.

Within the upper echelons of Oxbridge it’s even worse. Noticed LJM have denied his PhD was plagiarised and to be frank, I’d be amazed if anyone’s thesis made it through the rigorous checks without someone picking up on that. His main lies seem to be prior teaching positions and publications. To be frank, I’m astonished Cambridge didn’t check his references.