March 9, 2021

To: Mr. Charles M. Blow, The New York Times.

To address, from the frozen tundra of Canadian journalism, one so long encamped on the very upper slopes of journalism’s Mount Olympus, might be seen as a presumptive folly. But if a cat may look at a king, then I surely may rely on the largesse of your lofty station to attend to a few observations regarding your recent and extremely tendentious reading of the affair of Monsieur Pepé Le Pew, a member of the skunk class.

You gratuitously singled out M. Le Pew, a most endearing skunk — witness his many fans over the years — as a progenitor of rape culture. A monstrous accusation. You backed up this dark assertion on Twitter, where, with merciless briskness, you stated your position — I quote:

“Let’s see. 1. He (this would be Monsieur Le Pew) grabs/kisses a girl/stranger, repeatedly, w/o consent and against her will. 2. She struggles mightily to get away from him, but he won’t release her 3. He locks a door to prevent her from escaping.”

I suppose the first thing to state is that the cartoon was not a 60 Minutes exposé. Neither the protagonist, Pepé Le Pew, the romantic skunk, nor his reluctant amour, the cat, were, or were meant to be seen as, human beings.

Here are the facts, Mr. Blow. Dear Pepé identifies as a proud skunk, not to be confused with Homo sapiens, and it is not for you to deride his species.

There is another bitter flaw in your column — the implication that all skunks are sex-mad. You, Mr. Blow, are conflating the skunk community with the explosively carnal mink, or the equally randy rabbit class. Have you no shame?

Now to the other business, that of Monsieur Le Pew’s association, as you assert falsely in your column, with the deplorable phenomenon of rape culture.

I have seen the names of Harvey Weinstein, Charlie Rose, Matt Lauer and others being called out under the banner of #MeToo.

None of them is a skunk of the true animal variety, Mr. Blow. Nor, I should note, are they French. None of them as far as I know was bent on romancing a cat under the misapprehension the cat in question was a skunk. So you see, there is no Le Pew factor here.

They are human males of high power and liberal mindset. To call up Pepé, a cartoon character born 76 years ago, and desecrate his legacy by associating him with the behaviour of these present-day goons is despicable.

A further observation. You adverted in your Twitter diatribe that Pepé “locks a door to prevent her from escaping.” So many assertions in that phrase and no evidence whatsoever. Is this a male or a female cat? The poor puss in question was given no determinative signature of sexual identity. Why then Mr. Blow, do you presume it’s a “her?”

Moreover, where do you get these wild ideas and careless slanders of the skunk community? Do you have a special cable channel none of the rest of us knows about? Skunks Gone Wild?

Your column, Sir, is a haystack, a pyramid of straw, of prejudicial assumptions. It is replete with anti-skunkicity, and a deplorable misreading of the feline class. Cats are friends of the lonely and the old, and skunks are the most marginalized of the marginalized of all woodland citizens. In short, Mr. Blow, you should be ashamed of yourself.

What’s next, I wonder. A hit job on Marge Simpson? I wouldn’t be surprised.

Well put , as usual Rex …