Beaver? You mean vagina?

Neil Gaiman posted this little news item today, about which he comments, "[this] seems, somehow, to miss the point on a scale that's positively awesome."

It will never cease to amaze me that we live in a culture where people will take their children to a movie theater to watch a man being flayed and scourged for three hours, but manage to take offense at the public display of the word "VAGINA."

This is an actual word. It's in the dictionary and everything. Doctors and scientists use this word. It has no particular connotation. It is not, generally speaking, considered vulgar or obscene. If the play was called "The Cunt Monologues" or something, yeah, I can imagine being a bit miffed by it. But, clearly, it wasn't somebody who was offended by vulgar language who complained. It was somebody who was driving by with her niece in the car, and was, "offended I had to answer the question."

Bad enough that an idiot was offended by having to tell a young girl the proper name for a body part she owns one of, bad enough that she complained to the theater, but worst of all, the idiotic management of the theater, upon hearing the complaint, didn't immediately reply, "Lady, you're an idiot!" No, they said, "Okee dokee," and promptly put a stupid and meaningless replacement title - "The Hoohaa Monologues" - up on their marquee.

These are the kind of people who shouldn't be allowed to run a theater - if you're that unwilling to stand up for art, for free expression, you're in the wrong business. If you're willing to bow to a single complaint, what are you going to do when the Decency League decides to mount a boycott? What are you going to do when the government tries to shut you down on obscenity charges? If you aren't going to stand up for art at every turn, what's the point?