Good Law Project and Jason Arday

[Slightyamusedandsilly]

I appreciate this is a Marmite issue. But if you think the media's role in this poor man's death was unacceptable, would you sign this petition please? (I'm not the media, I'm just one regular MN user who finds this whole debacle disgusting.)

I understand not everyone sees this perspective.

https://surl.li/wfmdak

No.

GLP jumped on the bandwagon early to exploit this chaps' story while he was alive.

They can fuck off if they think they have any right to interfere further after the man's death.

Grifters gotta grift though, right?

Seconded

Thirded

The only press stories I saw on Jason Arday were about accusations of plagiarism and questioning the truth of several extraordinary claims he had made about his life. There were questions about whether identity politics had played a role in institutions and individuals being unwilling to question these stories earlier.

As distressing as this situation must have been for Jason, what I saw was an appropriate form of investigational journalism.

I won't be signing the petition.

I think a much more important message to get out into the world right now is that grace exists. No matter how bad things get, how badly you've messed up or how misunderstood you are by the masses, there is always hope for the future. A life can be rebuilt. Amends made. Truth can be cleansing. I'm so sad that Jason's life has been lost. For the next person caught in a public scandal, I'd want them to know that there is always hope and to hold on to their nearest loved ones.

For the wider society lesson: honesty and integrity from a score of people could have stopped this situation from snowballing. I believe Jason was failed more by his so-called allies, than he was by the whistle-blowers.

Signed thanks for sharing

Cambridge is supposed to be one of our best institutions which represents us on a global stage. This whole saga - and their prioritising of identity politics over academic merit - does us Britain a huge disservice. It was absolutely right to investigate his hiring and hold them to account.

I also wonder how many of the people handwringing about his suicide were the same people reading multiple articles about it - because views and clicks are what drives reporting more than anything else.

I would rather pour battery acid over my face than sign anything linked to the kimono wearing fox beater.

No - I’m so tired of people saying that this was to do with race. Look at the Salt Path grifters - they got the same, if not more, attention and rightly so.

Ardey lied repeatedly, stole an academic’s work, took a job that could have been someone else’s under false pretences, made ridiculous claims (including completely unsubstantiated claims about horrific racism against him) then got the police to investigate a journalist who dared to question him. He was a liar, a thief and a fantasist. The people eso enabled him are also to blame.

It’s a tragedy he’s dead, but it’s no one’s fault but his own and those who helped him. The signatories to that letter are a who’s who of idiots, apart from the amazingly named Deirdre LaBassiere (whoever she/he is)

I think several things can be true at once, and in this story multiple things are true, including that the GLP did not do enough checking before their original open letter, which certainly increased the visibility of the story. I find it amazing that they are not reflecting on that but instead launching off into another public campaign on the same story.

What would you like the media to do, not report on anyone that may become distressed by it, even if they were lying about their achievements and accomplishments?

How would you enforce it and don’t you think that it would be detrimental regarding the freedom of the press?

Katie Hopkins for instance said that she felt suicidal when she lost the liable case against her for defamation and she had to sell her house to pay for it, would you have censored reporting for that case too?

It’s not a public interest issue though. Cambridge should’ve been allowed to deal with it in peace.

this 👆

Of course it's a public interest issue.

Weaponising the police against journalism, exposing lies, poor behaviour in what I would consider a form of "high office" strike me as highly relevant to the NUJs definition for example, let alone my personal opinions.

https://www.nuj.org.uk/about-us/rules-and-guidance/code-of-conduct/public-interest.html

Cambridge University is a highly respected institution, with huge international influence and it's professors are considered to be experts in their fields.

Modern day scandals have a tendency to go viral, which is not in the control of the media.

This. The GLP also made the reducing support so visable as people started removing their signatures.

I've signed it. I don't need to agree with everything the GLP puts out and mostly I don't, but the way the media have responded to this story has been awful with social media warriors jumping on board to have their say and add to the collective fervour. It really has felt the modern equivalent of pitchforks out and burn the witch. What came out from the media could barely pass as investigative journalism. Speculation was simply picked up and repeated ad nauseum, and then click bait articles created as all and sundry decided to write opinion pieces about something that they didn't know anything about beyond what other people were reporting. It's not just the media though. Every fucker has to have an opinion for clicks and social brownie points. Nowadays public humiliation is a form of entertainment and people are getting their dopamine hits off the misfortune and misery of other people. People literally aren't happy until someone kills themselves, and even after the event everyone is clamouring to claim the moral high ground. The whole thing has been disgusting, disproportionate, and wholly disturbing to anyone that wants wishes deeply for a society that is measured, proportionate, accountable and wise. So I don't care if it's GLP, as long as it leads to at least some kind of change to avoid people being hounded to the death. I'm pretty sure the only reason the Salt Path couple are still alive is because there's two of them and they can stick together.

Nope, anything that the GLP are linked to can get to fuck.

No, it isn’t.

It was an internal matter. It’s now coming to light that things such as the 35 marathons were actually true.

The media has blood on its hands. It hounded this poor man.

It’s not an ‘internal matter’ at all - he was given a major role at our leading university on the basis of lies. He then weaponised the police against a reporter who investigated him.

Jolyon Maugham has already used Jason Arday once with the original open letter. Just like Cambridge, he wanted to burnish his own profile without checking the facts. As the terms of the letter were changed and high profile signatories began removing themselves it made Arday's exposure even more stark and public.

Maugham's second petition is just diverting attention from the part his first one played in this tragic situation.

So no, I won't be signing.

It absolutely was.

No as GLP also exploited Jason Arday for their own agenda and inflamed the press with their ridiculous video and open letter.

Yep.

A GLP wanting to harvest mnetters emails?? Never?! 😱

No evidence it was ‘an internal matter’ given. Well done! 👏🏻

Because there is no evidence needed.

It was a hiring mistake within an organisation. There is no public interest in that. Now a man is dead, because the press latched onto it.