Hi VIPers … I hope you're not yet sick of hearing about former Cambridge professor Jason Arday, who committed suicide last week. According to his thousands of supporters, he was hounded to death by racist, right-wing media, who had it out for the golden boy, the youngest black professor at Cambridge.
I reported earlier today that the professor who originally exposed Arday's rampant plagiarism has been suspended by the transgender rector of his university after a five-minute investigation. So the authentic biology professor who exposed the fraud is the one who gets suspended, while the fraud gets a book deal to tell his (mostly made-up) memoir. He claimed to have been on a TV series that began in 1964; he was born in 1985. He claimed to have run 30 marathons in 35 days (for charity, of course). He claimed to have been in a weeks-long coma as a child, with doctors recommending he be pulled off life support before a miraculous recovery. And on and on. All of these things were so easy to check, but as I said, he got a book deal out of his life story.
Who's to blame for his suicide? Well, he is, first and foremost. He's not the first person to have fabricated his past and retained their position (looking at you, Dick Blumenthal and Tim Walz).
If I'm blaming anybody, it's this chick who hired him at Cambridge. Listen to this:
Hilary Cremin was Jason Arday's boss at Cambridge. She was so excited to hire him that she invited in the BBC to cover his first day at work, where she told him, "We are so lucky to have you. You are the best in the world."
— Jared Taylor (@RealJarTaylor) August 18, 2026
Has this woman learned anything ?! pic.twitter.com/MeJKFchDvG
She is far more responsible for this mess than any journalist who wrote about it. We're long past the time where people do the honourable thing but if she had any respect for her seat she would resign. https://t.co/COK3rMtyoF
— Eli Braille (@megawhelmed) August 19, 2026
"You are the best in the world."
I also blame people like Dawn Butler, a member of Parliament.
The tragic death of Professor Jason Arday forces us to confront the impossible standards placed on Black people and their devastating consequences.
— Dawn Butler ✊🏾💙 (@DawnButlerBrent) August 20, 2026
She got a Community Note for that one.
Readers added context they thought people might want to know
The Telegraph identified more than 100 examples of identical or near-identical wording between a Paula Zwozdiak-Myers thesis and Jason Arday's thesis. Avoiding plagiarism is a minimum standard, not an impossible standard, for academics.
It is time to question structures and supposed protections, defend the humanity of Black people, challenge racism wherever it appears and be an anti-racist.
— Dawn Butler ✊🏾💙 (@DawnButlerBrent) August 20, 2026
Read here 👇🏾https://t.co/hmgwQDwnP5
Just maybe those "impossible standards" were lowered because Arday was black. DEI kills everything it touches. Literally, in this case.
Are you suggesting that western standards of honesty, meritocracy and integrity are impossible for black people? That’s a bit racist, Dawn. Have a word with yourself.
— Flashman (@Flashman351822) August 20, 2026
Impossible standards?
— XBradTC (@xbradtc) August 20, 2026
Arday never met a single standard in his entire life, lying and bluffing his entire way through life, mining sympathy like some mine bitcoin.
And he failed to meet the most basic standard of all- don't quit.
Impossible standards like telling the truth? Are you saying that this is an impossible standard for black people?
— Yorks2Pagan (@yorks2pagan) August 20, 2026
Wow, this is quite a dichotomy. 🤔
This is a parody account, right? Right?
— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) August 20, 2026
You’re the problem. You.
— Mulder’s Long Fight for Account Reinstatement (@proteinwisdom) August 20, 2026
Exactly. As I said in an earlier post, Richard Dawkins, also a biology professor, said:
Jason himself was widely regarded as an unfortunate victim of foolish promotion way beyond his ability to cope. In appointing him to a professorship for which he was manifestly unqualified – in ludicrously describing him as “the best in the world” – certain senior members of the university showed a level of patronising condescension towards black people that could fairly be described as racism, while at the same time making him tragically vulnerable to such attacks as came his way.
Race certainly did play a role in this whole tragedy, but not the way Arday's supporters think it did.
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