Merged Arday life and death

[Emily's Cat]

I admit I subscribe to a rather archaic and idealized view of the academic degrees.

An associate's degree means you have some basic association with the material.

A bachelor's degree means you know enough to support yourself in the field.

A master's degree means you have mastered the current state of the art.

A Philosophy Doctor's degree means that you have progressed beyond mastery of the current state of the art, and you are extending that with new discoveries and proven ideas.

For Arday to have received a PhD says to me that he was either a thought leader in the field of education, or that he had been propped up as a symbol, regardless of his lack of qualifications.

@Vixen, what would you say is Arday's most important addition, to the existing body of knowledge about education?

That's more or less what I took the degrees to imply.

 

[theprestige]

I find this whole 'DEI hire' thing so weird to begin with. I mean, I don't, I understand it's a dog whistle for wanting workplaces and positions of power to be only for straight white men, and it's a thin veneer for saying white straight men are automatically best at any given job (even though we know diverse workplaces work far better --reality, liberal bias, etc.)...

...But it's not as if the GOP and their various hangers-on are way more obsessed with race, gender, and all the other scary ways humans can be diverse than the centre and left will ever be. Can't you make a just as strict checklist for the Drumpf circles? White, white parents, white name, Christian, cis (of course they won't say cis because the word frightens them, but still), straight (although closeted, self-hating non-straight will do), and the list goes on. Allow a few women and Undesirables in as tokens --to be spent when you don't need them anymore.

I can find the same anecdotal extreme cases of people hired solely for their gender, skin colour, etc. In right/far right circles, too, of course --invariably someone with the right private parts, heritage, and preferences regarding sex partners get hired over way more qualified women or people of colour. In fact in the GOP it seems to happen all the time.

Every accusation...

Why do you think Liverpool John Moores University made Jason Arday a doctor of the Philosophy of Education? It's obviously not because he was qualified to advance humanity's understanding of that subject.

Why do you think Cambridge made Arday a professor at their school? Why do you think they celebrated him as the youngest black professor ever at the university? Again, it's obviously not because he was qualified - unless his skin color was supposed to be the qualification. What did Cambridge mean by this?

Arday is dead in part because when institutions focus on qualifications, a lot of people start saying things like, "it's a dog whistle for wanting workplaces and positions of power to be only for straight white men, and it's a thin veneer for saying white straight men are automatically best at any given job". So they go to absurd - and often toxic lengths - to appease the race-mongers.

Arday's dead because he was promoted and celebrated for the color of his skin, and the best you can do is signal that in spite of this completely avoidable own goal tragedy, your faith in the virtues of Correct Thought is unshaken. You want more Ardays, is your takeaway from this.

 

[Emily's Cat]

The main problem with the supposed "code" and "dog whistles" these days is that by now there are supposedly several DOZENS of them. And you can add whatever to the list. Just anything you'd rather call a dog whistle instead of addressing will do just fine. Like, even someone in support of teaching maths will do, since that was called racist before. Sure, go for it.

I doubt that even the most die-hard racist even heard of even half of them, much less be able to recognise them in some text or video. Which kinda defeats the whole purpose. The whole reason why an actual dog whistle exists is that dogs CAN hear them. If you have to train your dog to even recognise one, it's no different from teaching them to respond to verbal commands.

Whether it's intentional or inadvertent, I think it's more insidious than that.

By labeling disagreement on political or ideological views as "dog whistles" or similar terms, it limits our ability to discuss topics - especially complex topics. When words become taboo simply because someone has claimed that those same words are used by "bad people" to express "unacceptable thoughts", then it forces adoption of conformational language. It makes it impossible to argue against irrational and harmful ideologies, because the words needed to express them have been made verboten. Therefore, anyone who uses those words or phrases is considered to be bad, and can be ignored.

It's the most nefarious well-poisoning and guilt-by-association I've observed.

ETA: It's been going on for a long time, and it's been getting worse. I remember years ago when the internet was new, that writing (((Hans))) meant that I was sending you a virtual hug. Then at some point, someone decided it was anti-Semitic, because it vaguely resembles a menorah. And a whole bunch of innocent people who had used that for years in a friendly way were essentially told "you can't do that anymore, or someone will think you're anti-Semitic". The same thing happened with the "okay" hand symbol, where someone decided that it was a white nationalist symbol and you can't use it anymore or people will think you're a racist. Those were innocuous compared to what's happened since. It's now a sledgehammer that terminates thought and makes discussion nearly impossible.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Firstly, I want to be clear about what I mean by a DEI hire... its when a woman, a person of color, or a person with same sex attraction, or a transgender person, or a person with disabilities, is hired ahead of another candidate who is better qualified for the job, and is hired/appointed precisely because of those aforementioned attributes.

Now you can bleat all you like about it being illegal but you and I both it makes no difference. Its not a myth, it happens, and if you think it doesn't, then you have been walking around with your eyes shut for the last decade.

Secondly, why would they have chosen one of the others, when Arday appeared to tick all those DEI wokeness boxes

Young

Black

Neurodivergent

Apparently self-made

Apparently overcame a difficult upbringing

To Cambridge University, Jason Arday must have looked like a wokester's unilateral wet dream.

You left off disabled, what with the epilepsy claim.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Reality has a liberal bias.

This is the third (?) time someone has made this remark in this thread. What does this mean? What leads you to say this?

 

[d4m10n]

This is the third (?) time someone has made this remark in this thread. What does this mean?

For an example, look at public opinion polling on man-made climate change or vaccine safety broken out in the crosstabs by political ideology.

 

[Ziggurat]

This is the third (?) time someone has made this remark in this thread. What does this mean? What leads you to say this?

It's a decades-old trope used to justify a person's own liberal biases.

 

[Vixen]

Firstly, I want to be clear about what I mean by a DEI hire... its when a woman, a person of color, or a person with same sex attraction, or a transgender person, or a person with disabilities, is hired ahead of another candidate who is better qualified for the job, and is hired/appointed precisely because of those aforementioned attributes.

Now you can bleat all you like about it being illegal but you and I both it makes no difference. Its not a myth, it happens, and if you think it doesn't, then you have been walking around with your eyes shut for the last decade.

Secondly, why would they have chosen one of the others, when Arday appeared to tick all those DEI wokeness boxes

Young

Black

Neurodivergent

Apparently self-made

Apparently overcame a difficult upbringing

To Cambridge University, Jason Arday must have looked like a wokester's unilateral wet dream.

I expect he ticked the following boxes:

met the minimum qualifications

met the person specifications

had a strong CV

high achiever; for example, his PRO-NE concept and initiative at (current) Durham Uni

secured social funding of £2.5m

indefatigable charity running and fundraising

motivating, articulate and engaging

he was agreed by a panel to have been the best candidate for the job.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Whether it's intentional or inadvertent, I think it's more insidious than that.

By labeling disagreement on political or ideological views as "dog whistles" or similar terms, it limits our ability to discuss topics - especially complex topics. When words become taboo simply because someone has claimed that those same words are used by "bad people" to express "unacceptable thoughts", then it forces adoption of conformational language. It makes it impossible to argue against irrational and harmful ideologies, because the words needed to express them have been made verboten. Therefore, anyone who uses those words or phrases is considered to be bad, and can be ignored..

Kinda my point.

 

[d4m10n]

secured social funding of £2.5m

Big if true.

 

[Vixen]

Big if true.

From Wikipedia:

In 2019, Arday became a senior teaching fellow in the Centre for Education Studies at the University of Warwick.[31] He subsequently became an associate professor of sociology at Durham University.[29] At Durham, Arday conceived and developed Pro:NE, a project to run events, training and workshops to encourage people of colour to enter academia across North East England. Operating in collaboration with five other universities in the region, it secured £2.5 million of funding.[32]

 

[Ziggurat]

I expect he ticked the following boxes:

met the minimum qualifications

Which are what, exactly?

met the person specifications

Which are what, exactly?

had a strong CV

Based on what?

high achiever; for example, his PRO-NE concept and initiative at (current) Durham Uni

He got a grant. In academia, this actually counts for something, because universities make a lot of money on grants. So I'll give you this as being a relevant qualification.

But this is also one of the problems with modern academia: the fixation on grants as the central purpose for their existence. That's not Arday's fault, but it doesn't exactly endear me to Cambridge either. And from the start my position has been that the primary problem is Cambridge (and the wider academic establishment), not Arday.

secured social funding of £2.5m

That's the grant for the PRO:NE program you mentioned above. And note the metric you're using: the size of the grant, not its actual impact. Which goes to my above point about systematic problems within academia.

indefatigable charity running and fundraising

His claims in this regard are... suspect.

motivating, articulate and engaging

Subjective and disputed.

he was agreed by a panel to have been the best candidate for the job.

If we're arguing about whether or not that panel made a good choice, saying that they made this choice doesn't constitute evidence that it was a good choice. You do understand that, right?

 

[Emily's Cat]

even though we know diverse workplaces work far better

Mmm... I'm going to push back a little bit on this, because I think this concept has become distorted.

A naturally occuring diversity of viewpoint and background tends to work very well. It brings to the table ideas that otherwise wouldn't have been considered or even conceived of. Very simple example, I come from a pretty low income, blue-collar sort of a background and family, and our humor tends toward gallows (thanks military) and middle-school. So when Finance decided to name their new system "Electronic Financial System", and then abbreviated that to e-Fin. The first time I looked at it I laughed, because obviously "e-Fin" is going to get said as "effin", so now they had given us all some "Effin' software!" That take on it had never once occurred to them.

Now, all of that rests upon it being a naturally occuring diversity. Something that happens organically, when the people involved genuinely don't care about race or sex or orientation, but we all have a shared vision.

That's not what happens when people read research that says diversity functions better than homogeny, and then proceed to force diversity into being. Then you end up prioritizing characteristics that have nothing at all to do with the work. Then you end up with friction, because the objectives of the team and cohesion are no longer the goal, but ticking some box for diversity is. And it has, on more than one occasion, led to extremely strict ideological conformity that has no tolerance for viewpoint diversity at all.

In summary - workplaces where race, sex, orientation, etc. are not important to anyone involved function very well; workplaces that use race, sex, orientation, etc. as goals in and of themselves cause friction and dissatisfaction and they limit viewpoint diversity.

 

[Emily's Cat]

Tell that to the people who seem only to be able to view the events through their prism of "DEI"/political correctness gone mad. (We will be seeing the stories about Baa Baa Black Sheep being replaced with a woke version soon!)

So far there is zero evidence that he was employed on anything bar merit. Now we know that his qualifications were suspect but I doubt there is a university in the world that goes and examines the PhD thesis of the people they are selecting for a job and check it for plagiarism, we can use hindsight to criticise his hiring but at the time it seems he would have been an ideal candidate - if he had been the academic he portrayed himself to be.

Now as to after he was hired - well yes it is obvious Cambridge didn't give two hoots about whether he could do his job and they did not do anything once complaints and the like started to come to light.

Interestingly Cambridge will be able to reexamine their hiring of him as in the UK all notes about interviews, emails and so on should be kept so they will be able to see why he was chosen from the possible candidates.

I agree that it's unreasonable to think that Cambridge should have checked Arday's PhD thesis for plagiarism during their interview process. I assume it's common practice to assume that upstream entities did their jobs appropriate.

Where I think some scrutiny is merited is around the various non-academic claims that Arday made, and which it's entirely reasonable to think influenced Cambridge's choice to hire them. I think that it's entirely irrational to think that Arday's claims to have overcome astonishing barriers did not play into their decision. Especially when it's relatively well established that Cambridge was facing scrutiny to increase diversity. So here in one package is a person who is black, autistic, epileptic, and has flourished despite innumerable obstacles at a young age.

Is finding someone who has overcome a lot of obstacles to succeed a bad thing? No, of course not. But when the constellation of claims in their non-academic backstory are so extraordinary, it seems as though a reasonable hiring committee would have exercised some scepticism and considered whether it was real. When that oversight is paired with the relatively unimpressive nature of Arday's academic and professional publications... Well, it suggests (but does not prove) that Cambridge was prioritizing political and ideological window dressing over competence and education.

 

[Emily's Cat]

For an example, look at public opinion polling on man-made climate change or vaccine safety broken out in the crosstabs by political ideology.

Explain more. Don't just say "look at this thing over there" and expect me to magically put together the puzzle peices that currently form no pattern in my mind.

I think reality has no bias whatsoever. Reality simply is. So when people say "reality has a liberal bias", I don't know what they think that is supposed to mean. It's words, but to me they're devoid of concrete meaning. I want someone who uses that phrase to explain what it means to them.

 

[jimbob]

I find this whole 'DEI hire' thing so weird to begin with. I mean, I don't, I understand it's a dog whistle for wanting workplaces and positions of power to be only for straight white men, and it's a thin veneer for saying white straight men are automatically best at any given job (even though we know diverse workplaces work far better --reality, liberal bias, etc.)...

...But it's not as if the GOP and their various hangers-on are way more obsessed with race, gender, and all the other scary ways humans can be diverse than the centre and left will ever be. Can't you make a just as strict checklist for the Drumpf circles? White, white parents, white name, Christian, cis (of course they won't say cis because the word frightens them, but still), straight (although closeted, self-hating non-straight will do), and the list goes on. Allow a few women and Undesirables in as tokens --to be spent when you don't need them anymore.

I can find the same anecdotal extreme cases of people hired solely for their gender, skin colour, etc. In right/far right circles, too, of course --invariably someone with the right private parts, heritage, and preferences regarding sex partners get hired over way more qualified women or people of colour. In fact in the GOP it seems to happen all the time.

Every accusation...

Well said

 

[Ziggurat]

Explain more. Don't just say "look at this thing over there" and expect me to magically put together the puzzle peices that currently form no pattern in my mind.

But that's exactly the point of the statement. You aren't supposed to actually examine it rigorously. You're supposed to take anecdotes as proof.

So when people say "reality has a liberal bias", I don't know what they think that is supposed to mean.

Liberals are right and conservatives are wrong. That's what it means. It isn't deep.

 

[theprestige]

Well said

Well said how? It's garbage.

Jason Arday's elevation in academia really happened. It really was a debacle. Crying "racism" doesn't un-ring that bell.

I'm open to the possibility that Oxbridge is full of no-talent assclowns, fabulists and plagiarists. I'm open to the possibility that most of them don't get persecuted, because they are white.

But here's the thing. Nothing stops someone who believes this from going after a white professor the same way Arday was went after. It's all the same public sources of information. It's all the same lack of cooperation from the university. It's all the same legal threats. If Arday's plagiarism and fabulism can be uncovered on that basis, than so can the plagiarism and fabulism and overall comical lack of qualifications of his white colleagues.

If you or Safe-Keeper believed that Oxbridge is full of these types, and that Arday only got singled out because he was black (nevermind that Oxbridge singled him out because he was black), then level the playing field. Use your freedom of the press to level the playing field.

 

[Rolfe]

Tell that to the people who seem only to be able to view the events through their prism of "DEI"/political correctness gone mad. (We will be seeing the stories about Baa Baa Black Sheep being replaced with a woke version soon!)

So far there is zero evidence that he was employed on anything bar merit. Now we know that his qualifications were suspect but I doubt there is a university in the world that goes and examines the PhD thesis of the people they are selecting for a job and check it for plagiarism, we can use hindsight to criticise his hiring but at the time it seems he would have been an ideal candidate - if he had been the academic he portrayed himself to be.

Now as to after he was hired - well yes it is obvious Cambridge didn't give two hoots about whether he could do his job and they did not do anything once complaints and the like started to come to light.

Interestingly Cambridge will be able to reexamine their hiring of him as in the UK all notes about interviews, emails and so on should be kept so they will be able to see why he was chosen from the possible candidates.

I agree that it would be unusual to look at the thesis of an application for a professorial chair, not least because a PhD is (as I was often told) simply a training in research and the very first step on to the academic career ladder. By the time you're in line for a chair you would normally have an extensive CV of heavyweight published work, leading (if it's a Cambridge chair you're after) to an international reputation in your field. That track record supersedes the PhD.

Jason Arday didn't have that. He had appointments, at Durham and Glasgow, but articles discussing the affair are littered with people saying that they were very surprised by his appointment at the time because his publication record was very thin and other academic credentials were not what would be expected in someone aspiring to that sort of position.



Jason Arday was a fabulist and a chancer who got away with weaving an ever-changing skein of lies for many years apparently because nobody really challenged the improbability of much of it. When serious questions started to be asked he responded by reporting his critics to the police and setting a well-known (and expensive) firm of reputational management lawyers on them.

That Cambridge university (and indeed the others) fell for this is quite astonishing, but it says more about their standards and the pervasive influence of meaningless drivel in his chosen area of "expertise" than it does about him. Nobody would get away with this for five seconds in a subject that requires genuine academic rigour, in the arts or the sciences.

 

[theprestige]

The more we look into this, the more I'm inclined to think that the entire field of "sociology of education" is a hoax.