He could have been forgiven tears of joy for having engineered a scientific feat of almost unfathomable difficulty and unsurpassed brilliance.

Having successfully landed a robot probe which had travelled four billion miles onto the surface of a two-mile comet hurtling through space at 40,000 miles per hour, Dr Matt Taylor was certainly entitled to feel emotional.

But the world last week watched him become overwrought for another reason entirely.

The renowned scientist found himself making a tearful apology for his uber-kitsch dress sense style — namely, the Hawaiian shirt he sported during TV coverage of the event, one emblazoned with slightly risqué images of a Vargas Girl-type pin-up.

Social media briefly erupted with howls of outrage and a genuinely historic moment in space exploration was momentarily eclipsed by the chief scientist’s excruciatingly bad sartorial taste and even worse judgement.

“I have made a big mistake,” Dr Taylor announced brokenly at a hastily called European Space Agency press conference. “I have offended people and I am sorry about this.”

This mea culpa heard around the world has been described as something of an overreaction, entirely disproportionate to an offence which had only existed in the eyes of a relatively small number of beholders. Some have even labelled it as an exercise in political correctness gone mad.

But there could be no doubting Dr Taylor’s sincerity — or his awareness that women’s sensitivities should be both acknowledged and respected in the modern world.

Would that some of this enlightened attitude rubbed off on a number of Bermuda’s public figures.

Opposition Leader Marc Bean, never noted for feats of unsurpassed brilliance when it comes to matters of cultural and gender sensitivity, is very much a case in point.

Indeed, some of his previous outbursts, about gays in particular, have been characterised by all the subtlety and finesse of a fraternity house keg party.

Mr Bean appears to have outdone himself recently with what has been described as a protracted public rant aimed at a female One Bermuda Alliance member. The governing party has called his eruption at the Sandys South advance polling station “a 20-minute tirade” and a “misogynistic, hate-filled attack” and filed a police complaint about the matter.

The propriety of Mr Bean’s remarks is not the only matter to hand. So is the actual legality of his behaviour. Under Bermuda’s election laws anyone who “behaves in a violent, offensive or disorderly manner in or about or within 50 metres of the election room or improperly disturbs or impedes the proceedings … commits an offence.”

Any shading of the incident by the OBA for reasons of political advantage notwithstanding, it appears Mr Bean did indeed engage in the type of angry sexist invective more usually associated with crankier elements of the US Republican Party than any self-styled “progressive” movements.

In a recent radio interview with the Opposition Leader on the allegations no denial was forthcoming. No apology. No explanation. Not even a token attempt to rationalise or justify his comments.

Rather he simply doubled-down on the overblown rhetoric and overheated partisan animus which are becoming his twin political hallmarks.

His lengthy diatribe was equal parts shameful and shameless and could not help but detract from both the dignity of his office and the Bermudian political process.

He — and we — would have been far better off had the Opposition Leader simply taken his cue from Dr Matt Taylor, admitted his mistake, acknowledged he had offended people and said he was sorry.