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However, the accuracy of these comments, which are said to have originated from an unnamed European Commission official, are in dispute. Connie St Louis, head of the science journalism program at City University in London, said: "During Hunt’s outburst, the female Korean scientists and engineers were stunned and confused. However, they have now spoken. They were deeply offended and didn’t get Hunt’s “jokes”. Nobody was laughing. Hunt now claims he added the words “now seriously” before going on to praise the role of women in science and in Korean society. “The words ‘now seriously’ make it very clear that I was making a joke, albeit a very bad one, but they were not mentioned in the first reports and I was deluged with hate mail,” Hunt said. He did not say this, nor did he praise the role of women in science and in Korean society. I wish he had; things would have been so much better."<ref>http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jun/23/stop-defending-tim-hunt-brian-cox-richard-dawkins</ref>
A day later, 10 June, numerous media outlets reported the first half of Hunt's remarks and criticised them as "[[sexist]]".<ref name=Time-3915617>{{cite journal |last=Greenberg |first=Alissa |date=10 June 2015 |title=A Nobel Scientist Just Made a Breathtakingly Sexist Speech atp International Conference |url=http://time.com/3915617/women-science-tim-hunt-nobel-sexist/ |journal=[[Time (magazine)|Time]] |location=[[New York City, New York]] |publisher= |access-date=10 June 2015 }}</ref><ref name=Forbes_2015-06-10>{{cite journal |last=Tracy |first=Abigail |date=10 June 2015 |title=Nobel Laureate Tim Hunt Under Fire For Sexist Comments |url=http://www.forbes.com/sites/abigailtracy/2015/06/10/nobel-laureate-tim-hunt-sexist-comments-apology/ |journal=[[Forbes]] |location= |publisher= |access-date=10 June 2015 }}</ref> On 9 June, the [[Royal Society]] formally distanced itself from Hunt's comments and emphasised its commitment to equality in the sciences.<ref name=RoyalSoc_2015-06-09>{{cite web|url=https://royalsociety.org/news/2015/06/tim-hunt-comments/|title=Science needs women – Royal Society|accessdate=10 Jun 2015|date=9 Jun 2015}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|author=Anon|title=Sexism has no place in science|journal=Nature|volume=522|issue=7556|year=2015|pages=255–255|issn=0028-0836|doi=10.1038/522255a}}</ref>
Hunt said his comments were meant to be "ironic" and "jocular".<ref name=McKie>{{cite news|last1=McKie|first1=Robin|title=Tim Hunt: ‘I’ve been hung out to dry. They haven’t even bothered to ask for my side of affairs’|url=http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/jun/13/tim-hunt-hung-out-to-dry-interview-mary-collins|accessdate=14 June 2015|work=[[The Observer]]|via=The Guardian|date=13 June 2015}}</ref><ref name=Grierson>{{Cite news|url = http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/jun/10/tim-hunt-apologises-comments-trouble-female-scientists|title = Tim Hunt apologises for comments on his 'trouble' with female scientists|last = Grierson|first = Jamie|date = 10 June 2015|work = [[The Guardian]]|access-date = 10 June 2015}}</ref> Pulitzer Prize winning professor of journalism at the [[University of Wisconsin-Madison]], [[Deborah Blum]] disputed that Hunt's comments had been humour, saying: "Some media organizations have stepped in to defend Hunt’s comments, which he now claims were an attempt to be entertaining. As a co-panelist sitting next to him at the luncheon, I heard a different story. His speech, he told me, was rooted in "honesty," not humor... I wasn’t the only journalist attending the lunch. Others included Connie St. Louis, head of the science journalism program at City University in London; the medical writer, Ivan Oransky, co-founder of Retraction Watch; Curtis Brainard, blog editor of Scientific American; Rosie Mestel, chief magazine editor at Nature." The Korea Federation of Women’s Science and Technology Associations which had hosted the event published a letter saying: "Old prejudices are still well embedded in science cultures. On behalf of Korean female scientists, and all Koreans, we wish to express our great disappointment that these remarks were made at the event hosted by KOFWST. This unfortunate incident must not be portrayed as a private story told as a joke."<ref name=DebBlum>{{Cite news|url = http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/06/16/sexist-scientist-i-was-being-honest.html|title = Sexist Scientist: I Was Being ‘Honest’ |last = Blum|first = Deborah|date = 16 June 2015|work = [[The Daily Beast]]|access-date = 25 June 2015}}</ref>
On 10 June, [[University College London]] announced that Hunt had resigned from his position as Honorary Professor with the UCL Faculty of Life Sciences.<ref name=UCL_2015-06-10>{{cite news | archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20150616001155/http://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-articles/0615/100615-tim-hunt/|archivedate=2015-06-16|url = http://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-articles/0615/100615-tim-hunt | title = Sir Tim Hunt FRS and UCL | date = 10 June 2015 | quote = UCL was the first university in England to admit women students on equal terms to men, and the university believes that this outcome is compatible with our commitment to gender equality. | publisher = [[University College London|UCL]] }}</ref> On the same day, he also resigned from the Royal Society's Biological Sciences Awards Committee.<ref>{{cite web|last1=Jump|first1=Paul|last2=Else|first2=Holly|title=Sir Tim Hunt resigns from two posts|url=https://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/news/sir-tim-hunt-resigns-two-posts|work=[[Times Higher Education]]|accessdate=12 June 2015}}</ref> His wife [[Mary Collins (immunologist)|Mary Collins]], UCL Professor of immunology, said she "was told by a senior [at UCL] that Tim had to resign immediately or be sacked".<ref name=McKie /> Hunt said the [[European Research Council]] (ERC) had also forced him to resign.
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