Saida Grundy - Inconceivable

Boston University has apparently made an ill-considered and perhaps poorly researched new hire, Saida Grundy. The saga erupted a couple of weeks ago when it emerged that Grundy was in the habit of making racist comments on her twitter account. According to the Huffington Post,

Black sociology professor Saida Grundy, who completed her doctorate at the University of Michigan last year, had declared on her now-private Twitter account that "white masculinity is THE problem for America's colleges."

In other recent tweets, she said, "Deal with your white (expletive), white people. slavery is a (asterisk)YALL(asterisk) thing," and "Every MLK week I commit myself to not spending a dime in white-owned businesses. And every year I find it nearly impossible."

Grundy's apology was your standard non-apology.

"I regret that my personal passion about issues surrounding these events led me to speak about them indelicately," she said in a statement. "I deprived them of the nuance and complexity that such subjects always deserve."

Nuance - I don't think that word means what you think that word means.



Then it emerged that Grundy told a white rape survivor, in a Facebook exchange, to "go cry somewhere." In fact, the exchange involved extended abusive language on the part of Grundy.

Then another group turned up a long list of factually wrong twitter statements made by Grundy making it appear that she lacked any comprehension of history. Oh, and further racist commentary as well.

Now, today, there is the revelation that she also has a criminal history as a cyber bully.

Grundy used the identity of a Virginia woman in a jealous fit over a man in late 2007 to create online accounts in the woman’s name, including one on an adult website for people looking for trysts, according to a police report obtained by the Herald under a Freedom of Information Act request.

Grundy got one year of probation after pleading guilty to malicious use of telecommunication services, a misdemeanor, according to online court records and Dan Dwyer, the court administrator at Washtenaw County Trial Court in Michigan. Two felony charges, identity theft and using a computer to commit a crime, were dismissed.

The cyber harassment took place in December 2007 when Grundy was at the University of Michigan, where she earned a master’s degree in sociology and a doctorate of philosophy in sociology and women’s studies in 2014.

The victim told police in Charlottesville, Va., that someone was creating accounts in her name and posting her personal information online, according to the police report.

So Boston University appears, after a careful selection process, to have hired an ignorant, racist, emotionally erratic cyber bully. What was their process exactly?

BU’s African American Studies faculty posted an online message welcoming Grundy, saying she had been hired after a nationwide search and chosen from over 100 applicants.

She was the best pick out of 100 applicants? There were 100 candidates with flaws greater than being an ignorant, racist, emotionally erratic cyber bully? Inconceivable. Oh, yeah.