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As someone who initially gloried in the apparent idiocy of Vito Barbieri and his tiny-camera question, I think it might be time for a second opinion: Vito was wronged.

Barbieri – whose political ship tacks right so hard that it goes in circles – was saying something ridiculous while questioning a doctor on a bill that would ban doctors from overseeing abortions by videoconference. But it is very, very unlikely that he does not know that a pill swallowed by mouth does not proceed to the vagina, and it is very, very likely that he was posing a rhetorical question, and not a literal one, however inartfully he did it.

The resulting brouhaha had as more to do with corrosive assumptions and sneering self-righteousness than biology. On this I plead guilty: I joined in the mockery of Barbieri on Monday, in full confidence and with little evidence.

Perhaps none of it matters much. Twitter is the home of the drive-by insult, and I am by no means swearing off irony, sarcasm or satire. But the viral taunting of Vito was the latest example of caricature politics, the tendency to depict political opponents as utter and complete idiots. These assumptions fly from the left and the right – it’s “libtards” versus “right-wing whackos” out there – with each side creating the dumbest, most easy-to-dismiss version of the other.

In the case of Vito and the tiny camera, two caustic assumptions helped turn the Ferris wheel of snark: 1) Anti-abortion Republican men are idiots. 2) Idahoans are idiots.

Now, it’s not as if there hasn’t been a parade of ignorance from anti-abortion lawmakers about women’s biology. There has been. A lot. And much of it has been very dumb, indeed, on fundamental questions of biology. And Idaho politics has surely provided the occasional fodder for comedians. Still, these assumptions – like all assumptions – flourish most in information-starved environments, where individual cases blossom into stereotypes.

If these “truths” were not considered so self-evident, would Vito’s question have raced around the globe? Perhaps. But it was clear that for many, Barbieri’s question slipped instantly into a pre-existing mold before it was slipped into any context. It was confirmation bias run amok.

The Huffington Post: “Anti-Abortion Lawmaker Clearly Doesn’t Understand the Female Anatomy.”

Jezebel: “Male Politician Clearly Thinks Your Vagina and Your Stomach are Connected.”

RawStory: “Listen to this Idaho Republican get absolutely schooled about vaginas.”

Schooled! Owned! Destroyed! The language of the online pile-on. Can you believe this guy doesn’t understand the most basic biological facts about pregnancy? Can you believe this guy who will vote on legislation influencing women’s health care – this guy who sits on the board of a crisis pregnancy center – is so dumb?

Wait a second. Can you believe that? Realistically? And if you can believe it, can you believe it based upon such equivocal evidence?

On Monday morning, Barbieri and other members of a House committee were hearing testimony on the legislation. Barbieri is pro-life in the extreme; he supports the measure, which would be an unnecessary intrusion into the health care of women in Idaho’s rural areas. He was questioning a doctor who opposed the bill when he asked her if a tiny camera could be swallowed by a woman and used to do a pregnancy exam. The doctor pointed out that swallowed pills do not end up in the vagina.

Their exchange went out on the Associated Press wire, and then viral. Barbieri later said the question was rhetorical and taken out of context. So often, this context complaint is an evasion, a sloughing-off of responsibility. But here’s a longer version of the conversation, as first reported by the S-R’s Betsy Russell. It was preceded by the doctor’s comparison of the safety of colonoscopy to chemical abortion:

Barbieri: “You mentioned the risk of colonoscopy, can that be done by drugs?”

Dr. Julie Madsen: “It cannot be done by drugs. It can, however, be done remotely where you swallow a pill and this pill has a little camera, and it makes its way through your intestines and those images are uploaded to a doctor who’s often thousands of miles away, who then interprets that.”

Barbieri: “Can this same procedure then be done in a pregnancy? Swallowing a camera and helping the doctor determine what the situation is?”

Madsen: “It cannot be done in pregnancy, simply because when you swallow a pill, it would not end up in the vagina.”

Barbieri: “Fascinating. That certainly makes sense, doctor.”

Barbieri has portrayed this as a kind of rhetorical triumph – he was, he says, trying to trap the doctor into acknowledging the falsity of her comparison between colonoscopies and abortion. It was clearly no Socratic triumph – it was baffling, and open to the doctor’s blunt, funny rejoinder – but it seems likely that the question was not posed literally.

Those who went after him as the latest Republican man who knows nothing about vaginas were, I think, wrong. Me, too. And the manner of our wrongness – the glee, the knee-jerk assumptions, the oversimplification, the self-righteous superiority, the insults – says a lot about why our politics can often be such a vapid, miserable place.