The professor who taught African American history at George Washington University has been suspended following a confession on social media that she had been pretending to be black most of her life.
Jessica Krug will not teach any courses this semester while school authorities investigate her social media post confessing the truth about her race. Krug had tried to pass as black despite being white and Jewish.
The administrators at George Washington want everyone to know they feel their student’s pain.
“Many of you understandably have many questions in the wake of the Medium post by GW faculty member Jessica Krug,” read an announcement from M. Brian Blake, the provost and executive vice president for academic affairs, and Paul Wahlbeck, dean of the Columbian College of Arts and Sciences. “While the university reviews this situation, Dr. Krug will not be teaching her classes this semester. We want to acknowledge the pain this situation has caused for many in our community and recognize that many students, faculty, staff and alumni are hurting.”
The school said it will develop alternatives for students enrolled in Krug’s classes.
The controversy began last Thursday when Krug posted on the social media site Medium a confession and mea culpa.
On Thursday, Krug wrote a blog post on Medium titled: “The Truth, and the Anti-Black Violence of My Lies” where she revealed her ethnicity.
“To an escalating degree over my adult life, I have eschewed my lived experience as a white Jewish child in suburban Kansas City under various assumed identities within a Blackness that I had no right to claim: first North African Blackness, then U.S. rooted Blackness, then Caribbean rooted Bronx Blackness,” Krug’s blog post reads.
She said she’s been dealing with mental health issues since childhood.
For once, the faculty of a well-known university isn’t giving an accused professor an out.
The members of the faculty of The George Washington University Department of History are shocked and appalled by Dr. Jessica Krug’s admission on September 3, 2020 that she has lied about her identity for her entire career. With what she has termed her “audaciously deceptive” appropriation of an Afro-Caribbean identity, she has betrayed the trust of countless current and former students, fellow scholars of Africana Studies, colleagues in our department and throughout the historical discipline, as well as community activists in New York City and beyond. The discipline of history is concerned with truth telling about the past. With her conduct, Dr. Krug has raised questions about the veracity of her own research and teaching. Accordingly, the department calls upon Dr. Krug to resign from her position as associate professor of History at GW. Failing that, the department recommends the rescinding of her tenure and the termination of her appointment.
Apparently, a white person can’t teach black history — or, at least, someone who pretends to be black. But in all the years of Krug’s deception, not one single person could see that she actually had a white perspective on her scholarship. Because the perception was that her work was from a black woman’s perspective, no one could figure out she was actually a white suburban kid from Kansas City.
I think that destroyed the whole notion of “critical race theory” right there. “Point of view” might still be determined in some aspects by race. But there apparently is little difference between how a white person views black history and a black one. The idea that only a black person can represent blacks in Congress or only a black judge can judge a black defendant has been debunked.
I’d be interested to know if Krug got any advantages through an affirmative action program. Did she receive any grants based on her “race”? At the very least, she should be forced to pay the money back.
I can’t wait for Congress to pass a slavery reparations bill. There are going to be a lot more Jessica Krugs coming out of the woodwork.
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