Happy Birthday Carl!
Carl Linnaeus, the oft-considered grandfather of biological taxonomy would be turning 301 years old today had he been a superhero, or a demon, or a Redwood. If he were alive today and had he just written System Naturae, I would have sent him the following birthday card.
Front Picture: Bobo the clown’s head
Front Inscription: Bobo the clown always has time for a fan!
Inside Picture: Bobo’s head is revealed to be attached to an overweight body sitting on the can, sullied drawers at its ankles, flies circling overhead, and an emptied can of shaving cream filling the cracked sink nearby.
My Inscription: Happy Birthday Carl, you slick bastard! You did it! Go eat some cake and get wasted!
Hey palsy, I just wanted to wish you a wicked day, and perhaps quieten a rumor you’ve no doubt heard concerning your most recent publication. Sure, no one likes a racist, I get it – they don’t make great dinner party invitees and they are bursting at the seems with unbridled, unfounded hatred. Wait, don’t get me wrong here buddy. Sure, you may have been a little racist, but who wasn’t in the 18th century? Liars, that’s who Carl. Liars and assholes.
I don’t particularly see any problem with classifying humans into groups based on their physical prowess and mental astuteness – this seems pretty natural, and you are a naturalist after all. Proof positive: I’ve suffered through five paperboys of different nationalities this past year alone, and without exception they have all been total numbskulls – how hard is it for an 8 year old to make change for a fifty? Sheesh.
However, to be on the safe side, you might consider changing your Monstrosus family to something a little more, well, innocuous. You see, Monstrosus sounds conspicuously like mongrel, and mongrel brings up the whole eugenics thing, and no one wants to relive that scientific debacle.
Oh, that reminds me. Jim Watson and I are playing badminton this weekend at my Dad’s gym – feel free to drop by if you’re into eating birdies for lunch, sucka!
