Jesse Bering Decides To Suck The Poison Out Of His Life, Cady Heron Style

Last week, Jesse Bering took a swipe at our commenters, dismissing them as the Regina Georges of the internet. In response, they posted 382 funny and/or thoughtful comments, and Jesse Bering, impressed, decided to apologize.

Jesse admits he was not expecting the response his article received (perhaps another clue that he doesn’t read the site very often) and that he based his catty bitches reference on the fact that one of his articles for Scientific American was ripped apart by Dodai last month. It’s a bit of a backhanded apology, as he does call you all humorless and refers to Dodai as “serpent-tongued,” but in the end, he seems to genuinely like you guys, kinda sorta.

“Perhaps-just perhaps-I made a slight gaffe in directing readers to the Jezebel.com Web site in order to illustrate social aggression in reproductive aged females. It was a bit of a tongue-in-cheek rub at that Web site, I must admit, precipitated by a rather nasty editorial there on an earlier article of mine. But I didn’t anticipate a humorless mob of “Jezebelers” commenting angrily in defense of their own tight-knit online community.

Until now, my only experience with Jezebel reflected exactly such maliciousness and cruelty-courtesy of the particularly vituperative and serpent-tongued editor who wrote the aforementioned piece about me. Having now read through some of the commentary threads on Jezebel.com, however, there is indeed a certain wit and clever sensibility permeating there that has gained my newfound respect. I apologize for painting the women (and men) of Jezebel with too broad a brush. I admire the site’s incisively liberal bent; as a science writer with my own biases in this direction and one with little patience for bigotry, I suspect we’re on the same page.

It’s okay, Jesse. We’re cool. Just be sure to wear pink on Wednesdays, and all will be forgiven.

Women Really Are More Socially Aggressive Than Men (With Apologies To Jezebel.com) [Scientific American]
Earlier: The Bitch Evolved: Why Girls Are So Cruel To Each Other
Science Scribe Writes Masturbatory Missive About Human Penises