A Times Online writer attempts to prove the popularity of Doctor Who is symptomatic of our cultural infantilisation in a shockingly badly written comment piece.

I apologise in advance for this. I didn't want my first NTS post to be a whinge, but by crikey, this article has really wound me up.

I HAVE ALWAYS regarded any adult Star Trek enthusiast as a sad individual who makes up for the mundanity of his real life by inhabiting an imaginary one. For me, the stereotypical Trekkie is a local authority filing clerk who likes to pretend he is a muscle-bound Captain Kirk, defeating aliens and casting lascivious glances at his mini-skirted, knee-length booted assistant, Lieutenant Uhura.

Okay, so we're starting from the apparently radical notion that Star Trek fans use the series as a form of escapism, as if this idea had never occured to anyone before. The descriptive detail here suggests the writer has spent a little too much time thinking about Uhura's knee-length boots

For years we in Britain had our own home-grown, humble version of Star Trek, in the form of the faintly absurd Dr Who, which was, thank goodness, taken off the air in 1989 after almost three decades. It had its pathetic band of adult followers who got together at conventions to discuss time travel or Daleks.

Because obviously those kind of things are never spoken of by REAL people in the REAL WORLD, only those filthy Dr Who-watching deviants.

Yet, after a reassuring absence of 16 years, Dr Who returned to our screens in 2005

Well, actually it was nine years if you count the 1996 TV Movie, but let's not let facts get in the way, eh?

Yet as far as I can see, nothing has changed. Dr Who remains a cartoon time traveller with a glamorous assistant, fighting alien enemies.

Oh come on, is that really the best you can do? Has this writer even bothered to watch an episode? It's such a vague critique he could be talking about anything. Also, I'm not entirely certain what is so wrong with the idea of glamorous assistants and aliens. Or cartoons, for that matter.

There is nothing wrong with science fiction. H. G. Wells and Ray Bradbury provided thought-provoking commentaries on the nature of mankind or terrifying visions of the future.

And Doctor Who has never done this? Are you sure of that? Also note the mechanical way he invokes the names of Wells and Bradbury, as if he's been told that the kind of sci-fi it's acceptable(or at least literary enough) to like. Somehow I doubt he's read either of them.

Deep breath. Okay. So this writer has offered a hopelessly insubstantial critique of the series, taken a few cheap shots at the fans and claimed the popularity of Who(as well as the highbrow critic's favourite punching bag, Harry Potter) is a symptom of the infantilisation of British culture, but offers absolutely no evidence for this, other than "David Beckham likes it".

What a load of vindictive, elitist nonsense.