Oct 14, 2013 01:24 PM EDT By Russell Westerholm, UniversityHerald Reporter

Danielle N. Lee, Ph.D., a post-doctoral student at Oklahoma State University (OSU), did not want to publish her work for free, which a Biology-Online editor did not care for and insulted her without any provocation.

The Huffington Post reported Lee, already a science blogger for Scientific American, was offered a chance to post her blogging work on Biology-Online.org. After the editor, only identified as "Ofek," told her in their email correspondence that the site did not pay bloggers, she politely declined. To that, Ofek wrote, "Because we don't pay for blog entries? Are you an urban scientist or an urban whore?"

The reference was to her existing blogger persona, "the Urban Scientist," on Scientific American. Lee wrote about the incident on her blog the next day and also posted screenshots of the email correspondence (obtained by several blogs and websites).

CLICK HERE for the first email exchange, the second and the third and last.

"This is work. I am a professional. Professionals get paid. End of story," she wrote in her post after the fact. "Even if I decide to do it pro bono (because I support your mission or I know you, whatevs) - it is still worth something. I'm simply choosing to waive that fee."

As it turns out, Biology-Online is a partner of Scientific American and the academic science magazine ended up deleting Lee's blog entry detailing the incident. Afterwards, Editor-in-Chief Mariette DiChristina, explained in a tweet the entry was not academic in nature and did not belong on the website.

Re blog inquiry: @sciam is a publication for discovering science. The post was not appropriate for this area & was therefore removed.

— Mariette DiChristina (@mdichristina) October 12, 2013

"Unfortunately, we could not quickly verify the facts of [Lee's] blog post and consequently for legal reasons we had to remove the post," she later explained in a statement. "Although we regret that this was necessary, a publisher must be able to protect its interests and Scientific American bloggers are informed that we may remove their blog posts at any time when they agree to blog for us."

Biology-Online issued a public apology Monday morning and stated Ofek's actions were out of line and they lead to his immediate termination.

According to the Raw Story, several members of the scientific community, as well as her colleagues, stood up for her publically in sharing their outrage. No one, however, was quite as angry as the recipient of the insult.

"My initial reaction was not civil, I can assure you. I'm far from rah-rah, but the inner South Memphis in me was spoiling for a fight after this unprovoked insult," she wrote in the now removed blog post. "I felt like Hollywood Cole, pulling my A-line T-shirt off over my head, walking wide leg from corner to corner yelling, 'Aww hell nawl!' In my gut I felt so passionately: 'Ofek, don't let me catch you on these streets, homie!'"

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