It's only a harmless bunny!

The unbearable mind of the "truly intelligent." If Pharyngula didn't exist, you'd have to.. well, you know.

So here PZ posts a comic designed to show how stupid the religious are. Alas, poor PZ, who's been slipping of late, did not properly vet the cartoon. He should have run it by Greta or Ophelia or one of the few other souls enlightened enough to examine anything, anything at all, for blatant, latent, or vestigial sexism. You see, the cartoon has two bunnies. The smart, rational bunny is a boy. (Danger Will Robinson, danger!) The dumb, religious bunny is a girl. Uh-oh. You don't have to be Fellini to figure that one out!

Predictably, the monster PZ has created reared its ugly head—no longer in the control of its maker. PZ enabled an atmosphere on his blog wherein Richard Dawkins becomes a "sexist pig" for using man and female in the same sentence. PZ nurtured and encouraged this hideous insanity, one that painted even mildly non-conformists as gender-traitors (if they were women) and rape-enablers (if they were men.)

So much so that now on Pharyngula a comment from a man often comes with a preemptive strike. The supplicant first acknowledges and apologizes for his unspeakable male privilege, doubly so if he is white, triply so if heterosexual. He announces, like a good re-educant, that he has learned a lot from the gurus and their moderated-by-intimidation discussions. He is, oh joy, much more sensitive to his own cluelessness. While he will still make mistakes (he is, after all, still a man--his bad) he stands ready to be corrected by the thought police. After all that self-flagellation he is tentatively and humbly prepared to offer a comment—but he'll "keep his finger on it" like kids do to a valuable piece when playing chess. If he gets the slightest whiff that it was a bad move, if he has disturbed the web and the spider is heading toward him ready to devour, he can still withdraw. Mulligan!

Poor PZ. You can almost feel sorry for him. He had this great cartoon bashing the religious as bumpkins (how original!) and instead of basking in its reflected glory he finds himself—PZ of all people!—at the heart of yet another sexism pogrom. On his blog! With PZ himself, P freakin’ Z, partially to blame for not seeing the evilness of this cartoon! Unthinkable!

So PZ starts a new thread, saying a bunny is sometimes just a bunny and that you can't judge from a sample size of one. This in spite of the fact that PZ has turned judging from a sample size of one into something of an art form.

Of course, trying to maintain his feminista street creds while at the same time refusing to acknowledge his error is not easy, and it is not surprising that PZ becomes relatively incoherent. The "Yes, but..." defense will eventually wear anyone out. So he writes mystical woo like:

Equality does not mean that the smart bunny in the dialog will always be the one in the dress.
It does mean that the bunny in the dress isn’t always the dumb one.
There is a difference between those two sentences, you know.

Oh, PZ, surely you know that's not good enough! (And it isn't, read the comments.)

The über-rational. They sure know how to throw a party.