Resigned: George Ciccariello-Maher, 38, has resigned from Drexel University due to harassment and death threats
A Pennsylvania college professor who received death threats after linking the Las Vegas and Texas massacres to ‘white supremacist patriarchy’ and ‘whiteness’ has resigned.
Associate professor George Ciccariello-Maher said in a statement that he was leaving Drexel University as his situation had become ‘unsustainable’ due to harassment and death threats.
Ciccariello-Maher, 38, said the threats had come from ‘right-wing, white supremacist media outlets and internet mobs’ in the wake of his tweets about the terror attacks.
Writing in a statement on his Facebook, The political science and global studies professor writes: ‘This is not a decision I take lightly.
‘After nearly a year of harassment by right-wing, white supremacist media outlets and internet mobs, after death threats and threats of violence directed against me and my family, my situation has become unsustainable.
‘Staying at Drexel in the eye of this storm has become detrimental to my own writing, speaking, and organizing.’
He also highlights the legitimization of white supremacy in the U.S. during the Trump presidency, saying ‘the forces of resurgent white supremacy have tasted blood and are howling for more.
He added: ‘In the face of aggression from the racist Right and impending global catastrophe, we must defend our universities, our students, and ourselves by defending the most vulnerable among us and by making our campuses unsafe spaces for white supremacists.’
Controversial: Ciccariello-Maher linked both the Las Vegas and Texas massacres to ‘whiteness’ and ‘white supremacist patriatchy’ and has partly blamed it on Trump
Ciccariello-Maher, was put on leave by Drexel in October, after a series of tweets about the Las Vegas massacre, which saw 58 people killed and 546 injured.
He posted a tweet reading, “It’s the white supremacist patriarchy, stupid.” That tweet was followed by a series of similar statements.
Writing in an op-ed for the Washington Post, he that threats had started coming in after conservative media outlets highlighted his tweets.
A few weeks later, when 26 people were shot and killed at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, he claimed in an interview that ‘white’ entitlement’ was a factor in the killings.
Speaking to Dailymail.com at the time, he further explained: ‘Many white males are raised with a double sense of entitlement, since being both white and male are structures of power and dominance over (non-white and female) others.
‘When that power is perceived to be threatened, as Donald Trump and other racist misogynists encourage people to believe, the results can be incredibly dangerous,’ he added.
The 38-year-old has found himself mired in controversy several times in recent years.
In 2016, he tweeted that all he wanted for Christmas was ‘White genocide.’
He was also heavily criticized after posting that he was ‘trying not to vomit or yell about Mosul’ when he witnessed someone relinquish their first-class seat on an airplane for a soldier earlier this year.
The incident occurred two days after American forces accidentally killed 200 civilians after bombing the Iraqi city.