Our friends at the Good Law Project

unfortunately me! I have this recurring one where I just haven't gone to university for my final year and I've completely 100% fucked it and I've let everybody down. I've had it so many times that I sometimes have to sit for a second and reassure myself that I did in fact finish my degree etc (and even if I didn't, I'm 51 not 21 now so meh).

Really sorry - but I suggest you actually do a bit of research and not rely on ‘your good people on socials’ - who likely have done as little research as you, are not grappling with Autism/autistic children [in the higher education system] and know nothing about academia.

Until then, your comment is ill informed.

… and yes, we all feel for Arday’s family (note spelling) but we have also wondered where they were for the last five years or so when he clearly needed an intervention and psychological or psychiatric support.

Interesting piece by Matthew Syed, who feels personally responsible in that his sister knew Arday and wanted him to defend him. Key quote:
"I truly believe this young man paid the ultimate price for a system in which he became its most visible excess." I think Syed goes too far - we have to leave Arday responsibility for his own choices, and in fact not to do so in itself risks being racist. Can you imagine how this would have played out if, say, a white Etonian had told the same lies, somehow getting away with it through system failures, and been found out and killed himself? Indeed I don't think the sympathy would have the same quality if Arday had been female. Still, I recommend reading the piece.

https://www.thetimes.com/article/aadd8f6e-a50f-4c97-86fd-0024db6e1fc7?shareToken=3d5fc473bcaeecf7c829db478bfc03cc

I fear there is some serious ableism underlying much of this narrative - he had autism so could not understand the plagiarism, he was autistic so could not be expected to understand the impact of his lies, should not be held responsible for the decisions he made, the £1.4m advance he procured for his book, should not be held to the same performance standards as other lecturers/ tutors/ professors… even bloody Baron-Cohen’s comments fuel this.

I am, personally, deeply offended by this and also deeply concerned at the inferences that people will make about my academic achievements and those of my DC going forward.

He was either deeply cognitively impaired - in which case he bloody well should not have been promoted into his position [or even allowed out of the house alone] or he wasn’t and was the talented, inspirational educator his supporters claim. Both things cannot be true.

There are already people who were in touch with JA, touting themselves around the media, talking about their text messages... disgusting.

Which bit is ill informed? The bit where he says 'that's not what I am seeing on here'?

Yeah ok I can take a telling

What is wrong with these people? They are completely self-obsessed.

A man who leveraged societal influence based on the lies he told was found out and fatally and tragically attempted suicide- and this guy makes it about him because his sister had a "connection".

What makes this person think we need to hear his point of view?

The Syed article, it's good to read something positive about Arday. I'm left with the impression he'd have made a good coach and/or PE teacher. The rest seemed a bit me, me, me. I don't know what his sister getting help has to do with Arday. She was seen struggling by someone who helped her realise her potential. She wasn't instantly overpromoted then left to twist, unsupported, in the public eye.

I think his point - especially after delicately pointing at how he himself has benefited from "positive discrimination" - is that we should be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Arday somehow escaped scrutiny and had excuses made for him by people who were trying to increase diversity, by people who were bending over backwards to see the good in him. In Arday's case they clearly went too far, and in combination with Arday's own lies, the result was disastrous. I think Syed's point is that sometimes the impulse that led multiple people to do that is a good one, and we shouldn't just revert to saying that everyone should be left to sink or swim on the same terms (because that gets us back to the cartoon of the people standing on boxes and being able or not being able to see over the fence).

Having pointed at the article as interesting I obviously disagree with 2021x but I'm sorry to anyone who clicked and wished they hadn't! I take AnonyMumAuDHD 's point that this is about (dis)ability as well as about race.

I think this article was written before the death and had to be hastily rewritten after the news of the suicide.

It is too soon for the tone of the article, using the extremely tenuous tragedy of a man killing himself as a point of reflection for the writer 48 hours later, which is particularly grim and self-serving and gives the feeling of vulture-like behaviour.

Some of the narrative about Arday is perverse. We hear a lot from his defenders about his autism (which apparently made him "vulnerable") but Syed paints a picture of a man who was socially gregarious. Which is, let's say, unusual in someone with autism.

There is also a lot of minimisation of the plagiarism - because Liverpool John Moores had investigated the allegations of plagiarism and found that they didn't stand up. All that tells you is that someone should be investigating Liverpool John Moores. It was quite obvious from later analysis by other academics that large chunks of Arday's PhD thesis were plagiarised.

We also keep being told that other academics have been guilty of plagiarism but haven't been treated as badly as Arday. Doesn't that tell you something about the utterly woeful state of academia?

I heard Lord Woolley, head of Homerton College, on Radio 4's Broadcasting House this morning, and again, there was a lot of minimisation of what Arday had done, a lot about him being "vulnerable" and a lot about him being hounded to death by the evil media. But if he was so vulnerable, why did Cambridge University keep thrusting him into the spotlight by getting stories into the media about how he was the university's youngest ever black professor? If he was so vulnerable, why agree a book deal with a major publisher and a promotional tour in the UK and the US?

I also want to point out this. Several months ago, a THE journalist was going to write up a news story about Arday's alleged plagiarism. Arday used the most feared, and probably the most expensive, law firm in the country to silence that journalist - as well as reporting him to the police. That doesn't smack of vulnerability to me. That smacks of someone who knows exactly what he is doing. And if the THE journalist had been able to go ahead and publish, maybe Arday could have resigned quietly and none of this would have happened. It was his decision to silence the journalist that led to the story being broken by a racist blogger just ahead of publication of Arday's memoir at a time of year when newspapers are looking around for news stories. The resulting media storm was entirely the result of his own actions.

The people that did that to Arday were nothing like the person who helped his sister. That person invested their own time and energy in her with no expectation of any return. Arday's promoters put him up their only to polish their own halos and egos. Not the same baby, not the same bathwater. Like the difference between using your hard earned limited cash to buy food for someone starving or stealing the food, thrusting it into the arms of someone who was only peckish then running away (leaving them holding it) as the police arrived.

I'd agree with his wider point but the comparison with his sister was stupid.

Agree. I find it utterly bizarre how people are desperate to point out they might have had a chance to do something to stop him. Firstly, if it was me and it was a friend of mine I’d be utterly embarrassed and ashamed to admit I missed a possible chance to stop them.

Second, with all suicide everyone massively over-inflates their own ego, thinking they could have been the one to stop someone who is determined to commit suicide because of how persuasive and caring they are, obviously way better than everyone else 🙄.

It’s pretty condescending to all the loved ones, families and friends of people who do commit suicide, as if to say “if only the right person had connected with them at the right time, they wouldn’t have done it.” Bollocks. If it was that easy, suicide wouldn’t happen at all.

You’re not that special Matthew, or SBC, you weren’t “the difference”. It’s normal to feel like you wish you’d done more, it’s just not normal to make a column out of it.

I like Matthew Syed a lot but I'm not convinced this article was wise, at the very least if feels too early and I wonder how he'll feel about it in a few weeks time.

I agree. This is the awful situation of two truths at once.

There is ample evidence to show that Jason Arday was a practised fantasist who was able to escape the consequences for a long time. I do not believe his actions genuinely harmed anyone else in the long run. I think there should still be an independent review of the plagiarism accusations at the university, and I also think Cambridge was well aware he did not meet their academic standards and simply took a risk based on his popularity at the time. I also agree that his behaviour was clearly aggressive and overly defensive for something so easily defendable.

I also think that it would be incredibly stressful for JA in the last week. Even if he has a pathology that would include lying and glory-seeking, this would have been a terrible time for him, and he would have been very vulnerable at this point, even if he is not classed as a "Vulnerable Person" normally.

I still maintain it is completely wrong that people are making money/reputation off of claiming a distant relationship with him and discussing private texts, and ideally we as a society should become less comfortable with that type of behaviour. It's like when a celebrity dies, and all the other celebrities rush to post a picture they had with them.

My feelings perfectly articulated thank you.

Let's hope he quietly removes it out of respect for JA's family and doesn't give us another long article about why he wrote it, further making a terrible tragedy about himself.

Second, with all suicide everyone massively over-inflates their own ego, thinking they could have been the one to stop someone who is determined to commit suicide because of how persuasive and caring they are, obviously way better than everyone else.

That's a good point. I mentioned in my previous post that I'd heard Lord Woolley talking about Arday this morning on R4. It was clear from what he said that there were friends supporting him - including himself (Woolley) and Diane Abbott. As we know, Arday had also been in touch with Baron Cohen. So it's not as if he was abandoned by his friends. But he nonetheless decided there was only one way out.

Yes, I think he needs to stand back. This is not about him.

MS's article has already 2.1K comments and there are another 14 people currently typing. That's an enormous number of comments in the Times.

There is ample evidence to show that Jason Arday was a practised fantasist who was able to escape the consequences for a long time. I do not believe his actions genuinely harmed anyone else in the long run.

I would disagree that his actions were harmless. Whilst some of the consequences were fairly transient, they have had enormous opportunity costs for those students whose educations were harmed by his teaching (and who were labelled as racists for complaining) or those academics who missed out on rare appointments due to selection boards choosing Arday instead.

Liverpool John Moores had investigated the allegations of plagiarism and found that they didn't stand up. All that tells you is that someone should be investigating Liverpool John Moores. It was quite obvious from later analysis by other academics that large chunks of Arday's PhD thesis were plagiarised.

On X earlier there was a post about the Liverpool university and who supervised JA's PhD, Phillip Vickerman. Vickerman seems to have his own issues.

The whole sector is turning out to be a stinking can of worms.

x.com/profnfenton/status/2088580288901210555

The GLP petition was such a bad idea. It drew more media attention initially then as people withdrew signitatures that withdrawal of support was so public.

On the vulnerability point I wonder about both Cambridge and his publishers. When students complained about Ardays teaching, did they think we have a vulnerable and high profile professor we need to check on. His publisher, when they got the draft copy of the book which included accounts widely different from the proposal, did they think to check on the facts and the vulnerable author?

Or did both just stay quiet because they benefitted from Arday? I guess only they know the truth.

It was clear from what he said that there were friends supporting him - including himself (Woolley) and Diane Abbott. As we know, Arday had also been in touch with Baron Cohen.

According to Lord Wooley he arranged a meeting of Jason's friends including Diane Abbott who took Jason's hand & reassured him that he would get through it. She has been monstered by the media 1000x more than Arday ever was.