In seven thousands seven hundred words (plus or minus a few, depending on how your pirated copy of MS Office counts words), the Times‘s Jon Mooallem explores whether animals, aside from humans, can be gay. It is a doozy! But on the up side, if you know anything about albatrosses, penguins, or whales, you know the answer is a resounding Yes, but also, Things Are Not Always What They Appear.
Cam
The fact that in the article it states that even though for years scientists had been seeing two eggs in the next of these bird couples that only were supposed to lay one egg, and that their response was not to investigate, but rather to say that the eggs must have just rolled in, shows that they weren’t very interested in the truth. These are people who spend their lives investigating, a bit shocking that they never bothered to investigate large discrepencies. Additionally, the fact that when the researchers found out that 1/3 of this one bird colony were same sex, and she stated that they had to be very careful in the wording of their report…shows that there is still pressure to not report these types of discoveries. Would they have had to be careful in wording a report if they’d discovered that 1/3 of the birds ate their own eggs, didn’t know how to fly, turned orange after they drank salt water etc…?
Daniel
Anyone that has ever worked on a farm knows that animals can undoubtedly be gay. I’ve seen more gay pigs than I can count
Ogre Magi
There are also a lot of bay bears
Ogre Magi
I mean gay bears, sorry!
Adam
there’s a lot in the bay area too though, so you weren’t too far off.
Yuki
Unfortunately, this won’t change anything. The same people who insist “it’s not natural!” insist “we’re not animals!” when you show them the evidence.
Chip
Joe Quirk’s rollicking book, “It’s not you, it’s biology” has a great survey of gay times in the animal kingdom. It’s even got footnotes. A great read.
Tina
http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/the_gay_animal_kingdom/
Try that article. As a lesbian I’ve struggled with this, since I’m also a wildlife management & evolutionary/genetic scientist…this article is VERY well written and offers so me additional caveats and suggestions to the theory of evolution and Kin Selection.
Cam
The funny thing is, first the nut-jobs said that homosexuality was an evil human invention and since animals didn’t engage in it, it couldn’t be biological. NOW they are saying that SINCE animals engge in it, it is wrong. Gotta Love consitincy.