A professor who wished Queen Elizabeth II "excruciating" pain prior to her death will not be fired after firm support from her university, she says.
Dr. Uju Anya, a professor of race and linguistics at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, set Twitter ablaze after posting a seething tweet about the late Queen - who died one week ago - upon hearing she was seriously ill.
Dr. Anya's original tweet, which has since been deleted for violating Twitter's community guidelines, reads: "I heard the chief monarch of a thieving raping genocidal empire is finally dying. May her pain be excruciating."
Shortly afterwards, the professor posted another tweet in an attempt to justify her words, writing: "If anyone expects me to express anything but disdain for the monarch who supervised a government that sponsored the genocide that massacred and displaced half my family and the consequences of which those alive today are still trying to overcome, you can keep wishing upon a star."
As previously reported, Dr. Anya's Tweet was met with some support. One user replied with: "Don't mind the hypocrites! I still remember in my secondary school years my dad sat me down and told me the story of what Britain and Nigeria did to Biafrans! I looked at my tall, strong powerfully built dad cry as he narrated the story of the genocide against Biafrans, ahhhh [sic]."
Overall, however, Dr. Anya was subject to intense backlash - with Amazon founder, Jeff Bezos even replying: "This is someone supposedly working to make the world better? I don't think so. Wow."
Many other users shared their opinions underneath Dr. Anya's tweet, with one person commenting: "If after more than six decades, your family and all those alive today are yet to overcome the past, then it's certainly not the fault of the queen. Perhaps it's time you took a critical look within your own selves."
While someone else added: "Nobody expected you to express anything. But you could have the decency of respecting our pain and mourning. Millions of people are hurting and you seem to be enjoying that. That says a lot."
In response to the wide media coverage Dr. Anya's tweets received, Carnegie Mellon University posted a statement on their own Twitter account, stating: "We do not condone the offensive and objectionable messages posted by Uju Anya today on her personal social media account. Free expression is core to the mission of higher education, however, the views she shared absolutely do not represent the values of the institution, nor the standards of discourse we seek to foster."
Since then, Dr. Anya spoke to The Cut, where she detailed her "painful" experiences of British colonialism, saying that she would not be apologizing for any offence caused: "In my tweet, I did not wish her death. I did not tell anyone to kill her. I said nothing except wishing her the pain in death that she caused for millions of people. There's not going to be any apology from me. I stand by what I said."
Despite calls for her dismissal, Dr. Anya has now announced that - while her university didn't approve of her words - she will be keeping her position and would not be fired.
Once again taking to Twitter, the professor wrote in two separate tweets: "I am not in a battle with Carnegie Mellon University. As the letters of support from the students, faculty, staff, and others in my university community clearly show, I am wanted and I belong here."
"From what I've been told, there is no plan to sanction or fire me, and my job is not in jeopardy. My university leadership showed very clearly they did not approve of my speech; however, they stand in firm support of my freedom of expression on my own personal social media," she added in a further tweet.
Regardless of the mixed opinions surrounding Queen Elizabeth II's passing, her death has undeniably impacted all of us - whether positively or negatively. Her funeral on Monday (September 19) is expected to be streamed to over four billion people and is slated to be the most viewed live event in TV history.