Prof. blasted whites on social media, in dissertation

Boston University has already been under pressure to fire incoming sociology professor Saida Grundy for inflammatory racial comments on social media.

Grundy first came under fire earlier this year for a series of tweets in which she disparaged white males.

“White masculinity isn’t a problem for America’s colleges, white masculinity is THE problem for America’s colleges,” Grundy tweeted in March.

In January Grundy tweeted: “Every MLK week I commit myself to not spending a dime in white-owned businesses. and every year i find it nearly impossible.”

In yet another tweet, Grundy labeled college-aged white males—who she’s somehow expected to teach and grade impartially—a “problem population.”

“Why is white America so reluctant to identify white college males as a problem population?” Grundy tweeted.

Grundy’s tweets were not the first time Now, however, Campus Reform has obtained a copy of her Ph.D dissertation, in which she showed the same racial animus and hostility towards young white males.

Upon examining Grundy’s Ph.D dissertation at the University of Michigan, Campus Reform found several remarks disparaging white men in the document. Specifically, Grundy showed disdain both for the intelligence of white male students and for the “self-assurance that white boys are handed undeservingly.”

Grundy also credits her undergraduate professors at Spelman College in Atlanta, Ga., with shaping her views towards white men.

“Spelman College is a magical place, where the embryonic minds of Black feminist thinkers and activists are incubated by feminist scholars,” Grundy stated.

“These Scholar-Feminists also packed my survival kit with just the thing I needed to see my way through Michigan—the intense and convicted knowledge that there was never going to be a room in which I was present where a white boy was going to be smarter than me,” she continued.

Grundy also criticized former-President George W. Bush in the acknowledgements to her dissertation, crediting his presidency to his race.

“I was simply prepared to think in ways my classmates had to come to grad school to learn. Far from arrogance, it was the self-assurance that white boys are handed undeservingly every day It was the stuff that allows c-student/flunkie G.W. Bush to think ‘Why not me as president?’ It was the kind of stuff that anyone invested in equipping thinking Black women for a racist, sexist, patriarchal world that mocks and despises them is required to implant in their students,” she wrote in 2014.

After news of Grundy’s tweets became public, BU President Robert Brown wrote an open letter addressing the issue.

“Boston University does not condone racism or bigotry in any form, and we are committed to maintaining an educational environment that is free from bias, fully inclusive, and open to wide-ranging discussions,” Brown wrote in the letter.

Brown, himself a white male, nevertheless defended Grundy saying, “[a]t Boston University, we acknowledge Dr. Grundy’s right to hold and express her opinions.”

“I understand there is a broader context to Dr. Grundy’s tweets and that, as a scholar, she has the right to pursue her research, formulate her views, and challenge the rest of us to think differently about race relations,” he continued.

The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) gave Boston BU a “ red light” speech code rating, the worst possible rating a school’s free speech codes can receive.

“I regret that my personal passion about issues surrounding these events led me to speak about them indelicately,” Grundy said in an apologetic statement after the incident.

Boston University’s student population is just over 56 percent white. Male students are a minority at BU comprising just 40.5 percent of the student population.

“As a person of learning and an educator, [faculty members] should remember that the public may judge the profession and institution by his or her utterances,” BU’s faculty handbook states. Hence the faculty member should be at all times accurate, should exercise appropriate restraint, should show respect for the opinions of others.”

Elsewhere, the handbook states “all members of the University community are responsible for promoting the highest ethical principles in each academic discipline.”

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