It is hard to imagine the anguish Jason Adey must have suffered over plagiarism allegations after being appointed the youngest Black professor at the University of Cambridge. The controversy began in July when Nathan Cofnas, a researcher at Ghent University in Belgium, used his newsletter to allege widespread plagiarism in Adey's academic work. Cofnas also questioned Adey's account of his life, in which he said autism left him unable to speak until age 11 and unable to read until 18.
Cofnas has defended "race realism," the claim that genetic differences between racial groups affect traits including intelligence. Cambridge initially treated his allegations as a malicious smear. On social media, however, Adey emerged as a symbol of the problems created by diversity, equity and inclusion policies in academia. Press reporting later confirmed several of the allegations, including indications that Cambridge had been aware of problems in Adey's research as early as 2023 and had let them pass. Adey had also said he survived a brain tumor and testicular cancer and an attack by a mentally ill assailant wielding a weapon, but parts of that account turned out to be unverified or exaggerated as well.
Adey resigned his professorship on the 5th of this month, the day Cambridge announced it was opening an investigation. British police said on the 14th that he had been found dead at his home in London. They did not disclose a cause of death but said there was no indication of foul play.
Attempts to assign blame for Adey's death followed. Many faulted Cambridge, not only for Adey's lies but for overlooking obvious problems and placing him in a position that made scrutiny inevitable. Others blamed the press for what they saw as excessive attention to the case and called for restraint in coverage. Mourning Adey's death as a tragedy is only natural.
But it is wrong to rebuke journalists for reporting facts that were true and important. Adey's academic misconduct has been amply documented. To say that such scrutiny does not matter is to say it is acceptable for one of the world's most prestigious universities to be unable to distinguish truth from fiction, or scholarship from plagiarism. If the academics defending Adey believe that, then we should be paying even closer attention to what goes on at Cambridge.
For a time, Adey managed to keep the truth hidden. According to The New York Times, a British magazine obtained extensive material on Adey but was blocked from publishing by a prominent British libel firm. The result was that the story eventually broke through newsletter platforms and social media in the worst possible way, amplifying the negative attention.
Those calling for limits on journalism act as if they are stuck in the mindset of 2020, or living in the era before the internet. Thirty years ago, burying a story entirely was difficult but not impossible. Feminists persuaded American newspapers not to publish the names of rape victims. Britain's contempt of court law in the 1980s long restricted reporting that might improperly influence a case until a trial had concluded. Before the internet, it was hard for the public to learn facts the press would not report.
Social justice activists who in the 2010s pressed news organizations and social media companies to place an ever-wider range of subjects off limits behaved as though the press still held that kind of power. But the internet finds ways around censorship. The name of "Jackie," the accuser in the fabricated 2014 University of Virginia sexual assault case, went unpublished by major news organizations, yet anyone determined to find it could. In the internet age, suppressing a story requires the kind of control exercised by the Chinese government. Anything short of that only increases the demand for saying what is forbidden, and the rewards for doing so.
In the end, the internet filled up with podcasts, newsletters, startup outlets and alternative social media platforms that grew by challenging established conventions. "Woke 1.0," the culture of defending the rights of people of color, sexual minorities and others, did not produce a new social justice but ended instead in deepening distrust of the institutions that embraced it and a decline in their influence. In the internet age, the truth always wins, and the public will settle for nothing less. That is the lesson for Cambridge and for those who argue for restrictions on the press.
