The Ardey affair just took an incredibly sad turn. I only wish peace upon Jason Arday, and, in particular, his family. I didn’t write anything about the affair — despite having knowledge of the inner workings of Cambridge, and how the appointment didn’t surprise me at all. For some reason, commenting on it didn’t sit right with me, and I can’t really articulate why. Clearly, Arday was a victim of our times. He was (most likely) brought to messiah-like status by people seeking virtue posturing. And he played along. That’s one side of the culture war. His downfall was instead celebrated, with quite some schadenfreude, by the other. And understandably so. Yet this is a tragedy. Can we please stop this now? Can academia return to what it once was. A place of diversity of thought, meritocracy, the place that challenged preconceived notions, not played along with them, and let us learn about the strange and wonderful world we live in. I don’t know why I even write this. I just find the whole affair so sad. Take care of each other.