Gavin Mortimer Gavin Mortimer

Peter Rabbit, will you repent?

First they came for Georgy Pyatakov and then it was Peter Rabbit. Admittedly there have been 81 years between the Soviet purging of Pyatakov and the cultural Marxists’ denunciation of Beatrix Potter’s mischievous bunny, but there are similarities. Pyatakov faced his accusers in January 1937, a broken and wretched shell of a man, telling the court:

‘I stand before you in filth, crushed by own crimes, bereft of everything through my own fault.’

Peter Rabbit also feels crushed by his crime, which in his case entailed throwing blackberries at Thomas (Mr McGregor’s nephew) in the hope it might trigger a food allergy. Nathalie Newman, writing in the Guardian, accused him of ‘allergy bullying’:

To me, this scene sounds tantamount to allergy-bullying, which can be very serious. Last year, there was an awful story of a child who died after he was exposed to cheese at school. Allergies can be fatal.

Social media was outraged at the subversiveness of the scene, so too, the pressure group, Kids with Food Allergies, which issued a statement on Facebook, declaring:

‘It is unnecessary for a film to show the characters intentionally attacking another with his food allergen to trigger anaphylaxis’.

Peter Rabbit was unavailable for comment but speaking on his behalf, Sony Pictures, said they ‘sincerely regret not being more aware and sensitive to this issue, and we truly apologise’.

Kenneth Mendez, the president and CEO of the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, also discredited Peter Rabbit and his Sony friends, ordering them in an open letter to ‘examine your portrayal of bullying in your films geared toward a young audience’.

Bullying? Oh, the irony. The whole pathetic furore would be funny were it not for the fact that these bullies are getting more brazen in who they target. Barely a week goes by without the cultural Marxists banging on the door, for the moment, metaphorically, of some hapless soul or organisation who’s acted or spoken out of turn.

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