Talk about some next-level corruption.
Since 1889, the Entomological Society of America has enjoyed a sterling reputation as the premiere organization for American entomologists to share information with each other and the world at large. Unfortunately, that reputation took a major blow this morning as their president, Dr. May R. Berenbaum, was forced to resign for keeping the best bug in a Tupperware container under her bed.
It’s going to take some major scrubbing to erase this black mark.
Just shy of completing her one-year term, Dr. Berenbaum faced intense pressure to step down from the organization’s board amid criticisms that she had been hogging the coolest bug to herself the whole time. Along with her resignation at ESA headquarters this morning, Dr. Berenbaum turned over a Tupperware where, among grass clippings and an apple core, resided a truly cool-as-fuck bug with double wings and everything.
While the awesome bug lived in Berenbaum’s makeshift terrarium, the American people were made out to be fools, unaware that the best, coolest-looking bug was being kept hidden from them by the very woman in charge of promoting bug awareness. It would have been scandal enough had the president of the ESA kept a pretty decent insect like a click beetle to herself, but Dr. Berenbaum had gone several steps beyond that, sequestering one of those cool Planet Earth bugs with crazy compound eyes underneath her bed with no intention of letting anyone else have a turn.
“I am deeply ashamed that I abused my power as president of the Entomological Society by stashing the raddest bug under my bed,” the scandalizing president said in a brief statement to the press. “I sincerely apologize that people weren’t able to look at this bug because of my selfish desire to take it out and feed it leaves that it chomps up with its crazy-looking pincer-mouth thing”
What a shame. It just goes to show that no organization is immune to corruption, no matter how reputable. The ESA has a long way to go before the public lets it off the hook for this one.
