A magazine with style, but no taste

“Go ahead, GQ, and mock my blue whale-emblemed Nantucket red pants. Laugh if you want at the loud argyles that I prefer to wear with my black suit, ’’ wrote Skotko. “… But whatever you do, do not mess with my sister.’’

Skotko then went on to explain from a very personal perspective “what Style Down Syndrome really is.’’

It’s “smiling when everyone prefers to frown. It’s spending three summers, in sheer determination, learning to ride a bike because you want the freedom to be like everyone else. It’s singing tunes from ‘Grease’ at the top of your lungs with your friends. It’s celebrating a third-place victory at a swim meet with as much gusto as a gold medalist. Style Down Syndrome is strong-willed, persevering, and forgiving - because it has to be.’’

Skotko said he is amazed by the response to his post, which has had more than 40,000 hits. “Parents, brothers and sisters and grandparents have said, ‘We will not take it anymore,’ ’’ he said. “I think the disability community has been insulted one too many times.’’ He also sent a letter to the editor to GQ, and received what he describes as a private apology.

GQ removed the offensive line from its website after complaints poured in. But it did not publicly apologize for it, nor explain why it was originally deemed fit for inclusion. Did no editor see the irony in allowing writer John B. Thompson to call out Boston as a “bad-taste storm sewer’’ when it comes to fashion, at the same time GQ let him lower the taste bar when it comes to fashion review?

A Condé Nast spokesman, responding via e-mail, said, “The author has personally responded to the people who reached out concerning this matter.’’