"To the several Times readers who objected to my offhanded description of the French philosopher Michel Foucault as 'creepy,' a point of clarification. Foucault was indeed an influential thinker. His ruminations on power have launched thousands of undergraduate term papers, and my heart goes out to the professors who have to read them. The adjective in question was meant to refer specifically to his enthusiasm for the theory and practice of sadomasochism. According to James Miller’s adoring biography, Foucault himself wrote of his delight in 'the overwhelming, the unspeakable…the stupefying, the ecstatic' – and 'the creepy,'" – Bill Keller.

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