3 ms·

In the wake of Arday's death, Nathan Cofnas (who led the X mob against him) states his motivation. Beyond whistleblowing, he states that after a 'revolution' re

by tpm 2mo ago

In the wake of Arday's death, Nathan Cofnas (who led the X mob against him) states his motivation. Beyond whistleblowing, he states that after a 'revolution' removes professors like Arday, it will open opportunities for him to become 'head of the department of eugenics and race science at Harvard'. https://bsky.app/profile/kohngregory.bsky.social/post/3mt3ci7e3gs2b https://bsky.app/profile/kohngregory.bsky.social/post/3mt3ci...

amiga386 2mo ago
I can't read this post, but you need to go to the source it's quoting: https://youtu.be/9ZDTBqb8Juo?t=1611 https://youtu.be/9ZDTBqb8Juo?t=1611 -- Cofnas is joking with the interviewer. He doesn't think such a position exists or would ever exist, it's a joke and/or outrage bait for clipping up. His actual views, the ones that got him fired, are ugly enough. His actual motivation is completely straightforward: R E V E N G E He got sacked from Emmanuel College (part of University of Cambridge) in 2024 due to the public uproar against his published blog posts, and in particular the college's reasoning was that his blogpost was a "rejection of diversity, equity, and inclusion". That's right, Emmanuel College explicitly requires you accept DEI or they'll sack you. So Cofnas's motivation is to: 1) get back at the University of Cambridge for sacking him 2) bring DEI into disrepute and get everyone to reject it You then have to ask the more pertinent question. Why did Cofnas know to look for plagiarism in Arday's work? SOMEONE AT CAMBRIDGE TOLD HIM TO. The anonymous member of faculty did so because they knew all about Arday's dubious academic output and did not like that the university had brushed it under the carpet. Both Arday and his employer had numerous opportunities to be honest and open about it, but they suppressed it and called the police and lawyers on good-faith academics and journalists. So what's Cambridge University's motivation for doing that? Simple: they wanted to protect their "star professor" who appears so often on TV, radio and in the press, to hide the fact that only 75 out of the 6180 academics at Cambridge are black, and they are actually a bastion of white upper-class privilege. Even though they know he's a plagiarist and a fabulist, and if everyone learned that truth, it'd bring all academics and universities into disrepute. This tragedy was entirely of their own making. I look forward to seeing Cambridge University properly investigated over this.
- caminante 2mo ago
  > He got sacked from Emmanuel College This sounds worse than reality. That was an unpaid research affiliation, while he was holding a separate, paid research fellow position at Cambridge. Cambridge didn't fire him from his paid job, which was a terminal, three-year fellowship. [0] [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Cofnas#Academic_career https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Cofnas#Academic_career
- JuniperMesos 2mo ago
  Cofnas is completely justified in wanting to get back at the University of Cambridge for (de-facto) sacking him, and for wanting to bring DEI into disrepute, including by naming and shaming specific black people who are incompetent or fraudulent DEI hires. Of course Cofnas is not the only person who wants to do this, nor the only person who has some kind of personal grievance related to affirmative action hiring.
- tpm 2mo ago
  > Emmanuel College explicitly requires you accept DEI or they'll sack you I don't really see anything wrong with that. But then I'm not an nazi, so what do I know. > I look forward to seeing Cambridge University properly investigated over this. Of course that won't happen, once an institution is rotten there is no saving it. But also we shouldn't allow nazis hunting people they don't like for whatever reason.
  - amiga386 2mo ago
    I'm not a Nazi either, but you should not accept EDI/DEI unconditionally, nor accept that what your employer is doing in pursuit of those aims is legal. For example, the RAF unlawfully discriminated against white male candidates: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66060490 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66060490 Imagine a world where anyone who made a criticism of this illegal discrimination was sacked instead of being listened to, and the illegal discrimination just continued. Nonetheless, I'm very much against what Cofnas has to say, and I don't believe there is a genetic basis for success at university. There is IQ variation no matter how you group people, but to me it seems much more the case that cultures which value education have parents that push their children to succeed, and those that don't, don't. Sometimes you get children who enter academia despite their parents' views, but you get more people from families where their parents encourage that type of career. You also get more people entering academia if they can afford to, and aren't sidetracked into having to get a unskilled job immediately, or enter into caring for family immediately, because the family is poor. To fix this, we not only need to change the attitudes of children and their families and encourage them towards a career in higher education, and also fund those whose families can't afford higher education (grants not loans!), so they're on an equal footing with affluent families, and we also need to break the gatekeeping of academic incumbents who prefer to select people who look like them, have a similar cultural background to them, and/or agree with them.

by tpm 2mo ago

amiga386 2mo ago

I can't read this post, but you need to go to the source it's quoting: https://youtu.be/9ZDTBqb8Juo?t=1611 https://youtu.be/9ZDTBqb8Juo?t=1611 -- Cofnas is joking with the interviewer. He doesn't think such a position exists or would ever exist, it's a joke and/or outrage bait for clipping up. His actual views, the ones that got him fired, are ugly enough. His actual motivation is completely straightforward: R E V E N G E He got sacked from Emmanuel College (part of University of Cambridge) in 2024 due to the public uproar against his published blog posts, and in particular the college's reasoning was that his blogpost was a "rejection of diversity, equity, and inclusion". That's right, Emmanuel College explicitly requires you accept DEI or they'll sack you. So Cofnas's motivation is to: 1) get back at the University of Cambridge for sacking him 2) bring DEI into disrepute and get everyone to reject it You then have to ask the more pertinent question. Why did Cofnas know to look for plagiarism in Arday's work? SOMEONE AT CAMBRIDGE TOLD HIM TO. The anonymous member of faculty did so because they knew all about Arday's dubious academic output and did not like that the university had brushed it under the carpet. Both Arday and his employer had numerous opportunities to be honest and open about it, but they suppressed it and called the police and lawyers on good-faith academics and journalists. So what's Cambridge University's motivation for doing that? Simple: they wanted to protect their "star professor" who appears so often on TV, radio and in the press, to hide the fact that only 75 out of the 6180 academics at Cambridge are black, and they are actually a bastion of white upper-class privilege. Even though they know he's a plagiarist and a fabulist, and if everyone learned that truth, it'd bring all academics and universities into disrepute. This tragedy was entirely of their own making. I look forward to seeing Cambridge University properly investigated over this.

caminante 2mo ago
> He got sacked from Emmanuel College This sounds worse than reality. That was an unpaid research affiliation, while he was holding a separate, paid research fellow position at Cambridge. Cambridge didn't fire him from his paid job, which was a terminal, three-year fellowship. [0] [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Cofnas#Academic_career https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Cofnas#Academic_career
JuniperMesos 2mo ago
Cofnas is completely justified in wanting to get back at the University of Cambridge for (de-facto) sacking him, and for wanting to bring DEI into disrepute, including by naming and shaming specific black people who are incompetent or fraudulent DEI hires. Of course Cofnas is not the only person who wants to do this, nor the only person who has some kind of personal grievance related to affirmative action hiring.
tpm 2mo ago
> Emmanuel College explicitly requires you accept DEI or they'll sack you I don't really see anything wrong with that. But then I'm not an nazi, so what do I know. > I look forward to seeing Cambridge University properly investigated over this. Of course that won't happen, once an institution is rotten there is no saving it. But also we shouldn't allow nazis hunting people they don't like for whatever reason.
- amiga386 2mo ago
  I'm not a Nazi either, but you should not accept EDI/DEI unconditionally, nor accept that what your employer is doing in pursuit of those aims is legal. For example, the RAF unlawfully discriminated against white male candidates: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66060490 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66060490 Imagine a world where anyone who made a criticism of this illegal discrimination was sacked instead of being listened to, and the illegal discrimination just continued. Nonetheless, I'm very much against what Cofnas has to say, and I don't believe there is a genetic basis for success at university. There is IQ variation no matter how you group people, but to me it seems much more the case that cultures which value education have parents that push their children to succeed, and those that don't, don't. Sometimes you get children who enter academia despite their parents' views, but you get more people from families where their parents encourage that type of career. You also get more people entering academia if they can afford to, and aren't sidetracked into having to get a unskilled job immediately, or enter into caring for family immediately, because the family is poor. To fix this, we not only need to change the attitudes of children and their families and encourage them towards a career in higher education, and also fund those whose families can't afford higher education (grants not loans!), so they're on an equal footing with affluent families, and we also need to break the gatekeeping of academic incumbents who prefer to select people who look like them, have a similar cultural background to them, and/or agree with them.