To compare and contrast coverage and outcome of the Jason Arday scandal with that of Cambridge plagiarist William O'Reilly

[OneArtfulUmberSquid]

Partly due to being an academic, the slow news season and the sensationalism, like many people I've been following the Jason Arday story and have been appalled by the scale of the fabulation and the abysmal lack of due diligence by Cambridge when they appointed him - I've also been appalled by how he was presented by the University when he was hired in terms of the emphasis on his back story and what he represented rather than his scholarship.

It's interesting to compare/contrast with the case of William O'Reilly - who was caught plagiarising his own undergrad students' essays and was then found to have plagiarised other scholars' work a number of times before...see https://www.varsity.co.uk/news/27433

He also threatened to sue student journalists for exposing him - not as bad as Arday calling the police, but still pretty risible
https://www.varsity.co.uk/news/26105

A further issue relates to his witness for the accused in a rape case despite being involved in the investigation.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/feb/22/cambridge-university-sexual-misconduct-cases
https://www.varsity.co.uk/news/18747

I'd be interested to know what anyone else thinks of the two cases in terms of academic misconduct and outcomes, particularly anyone who works in Cambridge. O'Reilly claimed that the scrutinising of his work was due to homophobia.

More here but behind a paywall
https://www.ft.com/content/ae7f16ae-95ab-4aae-a676-0748e3e61b6d?shareType=nongift&syn-25a6b1a6=1

How many "white dudes" had his level of fame? If Prof Brian Cox was found to have told as many lies about his background it would definitely receive the same attention. If his PhD was plagiarised we would know about it.

What made this story run and run and receive global coverage was the constant and sensational revelations, first the plagiarism but each day there were new and even more outrageous claims that were disproved. Arday made up the stories and wrote them down or talked about them which is why the scrutiny was so intense. He laid out the evidence for people to disapprove.

His high profile in the media, and earning power was because Cambridge had validated and promoted him. Other academic plagiarists didn't have the same level of profile. Cambridge need to take responsibility. They could have stopped this much earlier - it must have been obvious something wasn't right. Why they didn't intervene is the question?

I doubt they would have supported a female to the same level.

I cant quote stats like that, true, but I heard someone with credibility on TV the other day saying something abput representation that would seriously challenge what you are saying. Black professors are almost non existant there.

Of course.

He was charismatic, had a literally incredible back story and most importantly, flattered people and made them feel good.

That's what con men excel at and is precisely why they're able to con people.

And virtue narcissism due to his race and alleged ND made that particularly attractive in modern society. But modern society also made it very difficult for others to raise concerns because of fears of being accused of racism or ableism.

Which Jason and his supporters used to their advantage. To the point they were reporting critics to the Police and engaging legal teams to shut people down.

Well, if it was a Youtube video by a psychologist, it must be true😂😂😂

But you must see how the fantastical life story (and let's not forget his autobiography was supposed to be coming out this month) fueled interest. There was also the way JA and Cambridge behaved when they found out that a journalist had started investigating after tip offs from other academics- hiring a law firm to warn him off and then reporting him to the police.

Then, when the story became too big to silence, both JA and Cambridge doubled down. Cambridge initially refused to investigate at all. People were accused of racism if they thought there might be a problem at Cambridge.And so the interest and criticisms continued to grow.

It blew up out of control, but it was unnecessary. It was handled appallingly by Cambridge senior leadership, and JA was not a hapless, innocent victim in the whole thing.

I think it's very rarely appropriate to blame someone's suicide on other people anyway, but for people to say it was caused by the media (sorry, not addressing this at you but just generally) is wrong and unfair. It's also dangerous because the media need to be able to investigate claims of wrongdoing

I’m not sure that’s evidence of race-based discrimination.

About 3% of AAA students are black (vs 6% of age-adjusted pop).The standard for being an Oxford professor is (should be) significantly above AAA.

The maths of distributions means that even small differences tend to show up as very large differences at the far tail, which is where Oxford professors are found.

And it’s necessary to guard against racism and ableism which are rife in our society. This case is inevitably about race but I think it’s more about a failure of scrutiny and process, and a desire to be famous and well regarded, both on the part of Dr Arday and the University. I think I can more readily forgive an individual than an institution, which can only do this conspiratorially.

Of course it's racism. Picked up by a right wing press who are desperate to stop any semblance of what they name DEI in universities. And notable which outlets and media figures are now blaming DEI rather than their own witch hunt.
For anyone who wants to complain about the disgusting press hounding of Jason Arday there is an easy way to do it through Newscord newscord.org/action/jason-arday-pile-on

But if you see "someone with credibility" talking about something on the telly, that's a totally different matter

You can’t really be saying Jason Arday and Brian Cox had equivalent levels of fame? Cox was famous before he entered academia, he has shows on mainstream TV. Most people only heard of Arday when this story broke. There was no reason for this to be such a big story, or for every snippet of his work or every appearance (the handshake!) to be pored over the way it was.

I think an element is that Jason Arday was obviously not that bright, if you just listened to him speak for 5 minutes. The work that was plagiarised was poor, even if it had really been his (so much of it is a summary of interviews or of his own life experience, which is closer to journalism than scholarship)

We think Cambridge professors should be bright. There's an emperor's new clothes effect where any layperson watching him thinks "how can he possibly be a senior academic at Cambridge."

I don't know about O'Reilly. He obviously sounds like a bad guy, and I've never heard him speak. But I suppose its possible for a smart academic to also be dishonest and lazy, where you don't get that emperor's new clothes effect. IDK if this applies to him.

Yes, agree with this. I hope the end result of this sad case is that we can get to a place of appointing people on merit, away from the old boys network and also away from hiring someone on the basis of DEI.

Agree. I left academia because I couldn’t bear the things I saw any longer. Professors engaging in sexual relationships with students was starting to die out, but more than a few were not above stealing the work of a PhD student, or having them conduct work on their grant as part of their ‘supervision’. Thankfully my own supervisors were not like that but it’s not a friendly environment.

Fascinating isn’t it though that no-one has ever been brought down by the press for being recruited via the old boys network?

To me this scenario reminds me a bit about the Jack Monroe story.

The need for adulation and acknowledgement, fabricated back stories, use of protected characteristics to evade challenges, resorting to legal threats, claiming victimisation when confronted with hard evidence.

Monroe’s motivation seemed to be more financial and Arday’s was fame - although I don’t know exactly what pecuniary benefits he would have gained from his appointment, but both clearly enjoyed being feted by the media, followers hanging on their every word and their moment in the sun whilst they were flavour of the month.

It's not the review by a Psychologist.

I personally hate the pop and armchair Psychology which is so prevalent these days.

It was the fact that she was holding his hand for a long time, seeming bedazzled and grateful to be in his presence or wanting to convey some kind of love or appreciation that he was even there.

That poster is not wrong thinking that was extremely strange and would be considered as such in most jobs.

It was weird and would be seen as inappropriate in most employments.

Even given all.that, are you SURE intake is properly reflected on percentage professors

I think the BBC might just inch out youtube

He did not have a role in Glasgow Uni -more bullshit

According to Wikipedia from January 2022 to March 2023, Arday was Professor of Sociology of Education at the University of Glasgow. Glasgow Uni seem to agree as they are reviewing his appointment.

https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/26447080.glasgow-university-probe-jason-arday-appointment/

I mean, that's not true. JA's appointment and achievements were widely publicised. He made TV appearances and was a guest presenter on the Today show on the BBC. His autobiography was supposed to be published this month (for which he had been reportedly paid an advance of over a million pounds, although I don't think this has been verified). He appeared at conferences and charity events talking about his challenges and achievements. You may not have heard of him, and he may not have been as well known as Brian Cox, but he was very much a public figure

Unlike Brian Cox, he built his reputation on lies. Lies which were eventually unsustainable, and it all collapsed around him

Yes, agree. JA reported a Times journalist to the police for harassment when that journalist was only doing his job. The police spent 4 months investigating the journalist before they decided there was no case against him.
JA also hired a team of expensive lawyers to shut down any scrutiny of his work and achievements.

It's very sad that he's passed away. I hope academia will learn from this and will recruit people based on merit only in future.

Will you explain please? In articles I read, Glasgow was involved as was Roehampton. I remembered Glasgow because it is a real Uni not like Leeds Poly or JMLU.

188 articles about him in 9 days?

he absolutely was hounded to his death. No question.

It’s simply false to compare him to Brian Cox. He was not well known in the mainstream, despite some media appearances. Plenty of academics have appeared on Today (myself included 💅🏻) and we’ve all spoken ant conferences one way or another, but the idea that his public slaughtering is warranted because of his profile is just not accurate.

I not exactly sure what this post means, but if you're suggesting that the proportion of professors should be exactly the same as the proportion of undergraduate intake, you should remember that academic careers develop over decades. Today's professors are mostly from cohorts starting university decades ago, when student proportional intake by race (and sex) was completely different.

Unfortunately, representative discrepancies cannot be fixed overnight - trying to do so is one of the reasons behind the whole JA situation at Cambridge