Professor who wished the Queen ‘excruciating’ pain defends herself after massive backlash

A professor who wished the Queen 'excruciating' pain during her death has defended her comments after a massive backlash.

Dr Uju Anya, associate professor of second language acquisition at Carnegie Mellon University, caused a stir on social media when news of the Queen's condition was announced.

Queen Elizabeth II died on 8 September at the age of 96, her death was announced in the evening and earlier in the day updates provided had said doctors were 'concerned' for her health.

As members of the Royal Family rushed to Balmoral Castle to be by her side, many people began to comprehend that they may be witnessing the final moments of a monarch who had reigned for 70 years.

@UjuAnya/Twitter

While many tributes to the Queen poured in from all over the world, not everybody was wishing her well and Dr Anya was one who criticised the Queen in her final moments, wishing her 'excruciating' pain as she died.

She tweeted: "I heard the chief monarch of a thieving raping genocidal empire is finally dying. May her pain be excruciating."

Since making her comments Professor Anya has received significant backlash, including some criticism from famous figures.

Twitter took down her tweet for violating their community guidelines, but before that happened Amazon founder Jeff Bezos slated her for her comments, responding to her tweet saying: "This is someone supposedly working to make the world better? I don’t think so. Wow."

PA Images / Alamy Stock Photo

Carnegie Mellon University, where Dr Anya works, said in a statement that they 'do not condone the offensive and objectionable messages'.

They said: "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."

Anyone hoping Dr Anya would make an apology or retract her comments will not be getting one, as she told The Cut her experience of the British state, of which the Queen was the head, was 'very painful' and 'shaped my entire life'.

She said: "There’s not going to be any apology from me. I stand by what I said."

Twitter/@UjuAnya

Dr Anya said that the first 10 years of her life spent living in Nigeria, where she was born in 1976, and that as the child of colonial subjects gave her the right to express her views of the Queen, the British monarchy and what it meant to her.

She said that in her tweets about wishing 'excruciating' pain upon the Queen she didn't wish for her death or for anyone to kill her, only that she wished for the Queen to experience some of the pain 'she caused for millions of people'.

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