*Jessica Krug, the white history professor who admitted in a Medium blog post that she has been pretending to be Black throughout her adult life, has quit her job at George Washington University.
The GWU stated in a tweet that Krug’s classes for the current semester will be led by other faculty members.
The resignation comes less than a week after Krug went viral over a Medium essay in which she explained why she has devoted her life to being a poser.
Krug noted in the blog that “every move” she has made in her adult life “has been rooted in the napalm toxic soil of lies.”
“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 US rooted Blackness, then Caribbean rooted Bronx Blackness,” Krug wrote.
The only reason Jessica Krug finally admitted to this lie is bec on Aug 26th one very brave very BLACK Latina junior scholar approached two senior Black Latina scholars & trusted them enough to do the research & back her up. Those two scholars made phone calls & reached out to…
— Dr. YoFiggy (@DrYoFiggy) September 3, 2020
“I have not only claimed these identities as my own when I had absolutely no right to do so — when doing so is the very epitome of violence, of thievery and appropriation, of the myriad ways in which non-Black people continue to use and abuse Black identities and cultures — but I have formed intimate relationships with loving, compassionate people who have trusted and cared for me when I have deserved neither trust nor caring,” she continued.
Krug—a white Jewish woman—was an associate professor who taught courses on Latin American and African history. In the blog post, she admits she was “not a culture vulture,” but rather “a culture leech.”
One Twitter user who claims to be connection to this situation through mutual friends explained in a series of tweets that “The only reason Jessica Krug finally admitted to this lie is bec on Aug 26th one very brave very BLACK Latina junior scholar approached two senior Black Latina scholars & trusted them enough to do the research & back her up,” wrote @DrYoFiggy.
Adding, “Those two scholars made phone calls & reached out to other senior scholars & institutions with proof. There was no witch hunt, but there was a need to draw the line. Krug got ahead of the story because she was caught & she knew the clock was ticking bec folks started to confront her & ask questions. DO NOT BELIEVE FOR ONE SECOND.”
In her post, Krug claims she’s been “battling some unaddressed mental health demons for my entire life.”
“But mental health issues can never, will never, neither explain nor justify, neither condone nor excuse, that, in spite of knowing and regularly critiquing any and every non-Black person who appropriates from Black people, my false identity was crafted entirely from the fabric of Black lives,” she wrote.
“That I claimed belonging with living people and ancestors to whom and for whom my being is always a threat at best and a death sentence at worst,” continued Krug.
You can read her full Medium post here.
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