August 16, 2026

W.E.B DuBois rightly reminds us that when something bad is done by a Black person, "righteousness of the indignation sweeps the world".

As Jason Arday's family tells us, since he accepted the role of professor at Cambridge, there were many who would leave no stone unturned in their quest to undermine him. Then when something was found, as it would be for anyone under such intense scrutiny, those who profit from racism jumped into the fray to feed the hate of their followers.

Was he guilty of plagiarism? At some level I am sure everyone in academia has failed at one time or another to properly document the origin of their ideas. Hell, I probably do it every day in these emails. The bottom line is that "we all know that it was blackness that was condemned and not his" plagiarism. No white cis male would ever come under this level of international scrutiny just for being guilty of plagiarism.