Age: Hard to say. Around about three years.

Appearance: An army of mostly imaginary Sarah Palin clones.

Who are they? An internet-based religious campaign group known for their opposition to South Park, Ellen DeGeneres and anything that acknowledges that some men love each other.

Oh dear. They sound dreadful. What are they campaigning against at the moment? Fictional gay people with superpowers.

Are there a lot of those about? Not a huge number, no, but there are two in the news at the moment, and that's two too many, apparently. The latest issue of Marvel's Astonishing X-Men features superhuman mutant Northstar marrying his long-term boyfriend Kyle, and DC Comics has plans to "out" one of its characters later this month.

And this has One Million Moms riled? It has them absolutely livid. So livid, they have organised an e-mail campaign urging the comic book publishers to reverse their decisions.

Because? They think children who read those comics might go on to make fundamental decisions about their sexual identity based on them. In their words: "Can you imagine little boys saying, 'I want a boyfriend or husband like X-Men?'"

Oh, I see. That would be poor grammar. It's not the grammar that bothers them.

They think kids will grow up to become gay? Yep.

Are they also worried their kids might become, say, unstoppable green rage monsters? No, that's cool with them. The Bible's pretty neutral about yelling "Hulk Smash!"

So who are these one million moms? Well, they're not actually moms, for one. The site is run by anti-gay group the American Family Association, whose 11-strong board contains exactly zero women.

And for two? There's a lot less than a million of them: the AFA claims to have only 500,000 supporters, while OMM has around 40,000. On Facebook.

So the comic book companies aren't worried? If anything, they're delighted. Last time OMM decided to campaign against a comic they just succeeded in ensuring it sold out.

Do say: "Think of the children! Will somebody please think of the children?!"

Don't say: "If they're so into representing society, how come none of their superheroes are bigoted idiots?"