Lbian Albatross and Gay Giraff? The Science on Same-Sex Sexualy Animals | Audubon

Contents:

• CAN ANIMALS BE GAY?
• 5 ANIMAL SPECI THAT ARE TOTALLY GAY
• HOW DO THE FACT THAT THERE ARE GAY/HOMOSEXUAL ANIMALS IMPACT THE IA THAT HOMOSEXUALY IS A S?
• ALL ABOUT GAY ANIMALS!
• GAY ANIMALS
• 11 ANIMAL SPECI THAT PROVE BEG GAY IS NATURAL
• MALE LN CGHT “MATG” WH MALE LN… GAY PRI? NOT QUE
• GAY ANIMALS: ALTERNATE LIFTYL THE WILD
• LBIAN ALBATROSS AND GAY GIRAFF? THE SCIENCE ON SAME-SEX SEXUALY ANIMALS
• HOW COMMON ARE GAY ANIMALS?
• CAN ANIMALS BE GAY?
• GAY ANIMALS WH THEIR HOMOSEXUAL NATURE

CAN ANIMALS BE GAY?

On the other hand, bee female maqu will reproduce wh mal throughout their lifetime regardls of their tert homosexual behavr, the end the relatnships do not acce any st to lifetime reproductn.

Zoologists are disverg that homosexual and bisexual activy is not unknown wh the animal and Silo, two male chstrap pengus at New York's Central Park Zoo have been separable for six years now. "Well, perhaps, a roundabout way, they are seekg mal, suggts primatologist Amy argu that female maqu may enhance their social posn through homosexual timacy which turn fluenc breedg succs. Already, s of animal homosexualy have been ced succsful urt s brought agast stat like Texas, where gay sex was, until recently, scientists say we should be wary of referrg to animals when nsirg what's acceptable human society.

5 ANIMAL SPECI THAT ARE TOTALLY GAY

For stance, fantici, as practiced by lns and many other animals, isn't somethg people, gay or straight, generally approve of HomosexualySo how far n we go g animals to help unrstand human homosexualy? "The bottom le is that anythg that happens other primat, and particularly other ap, is likely to have strong evolutnary ntuy wh what happens humans, " he says the bonobo's e of homosexual activy for social bondg is a possible example, addg, "One of the ma arguments for human homosexual behavr is that helps bond male groups together, particularly where a group of dividuals are pennt on each other, as they might be huntg or warfare.

However, as Dunbar adms, there's a long way to go before the of homosexualy humans are fully said, "Nobody's really vtigated this issue thoroughly, bee 's so polilly sensive. Neverthels, the topic of same-sex behavur animals, and how such behavurs may have e to evolve is a fascatg the terms ‘gay’ and ‘heterosexual’ shouldn't really be applied to animalsDpe s e our tle, terms like 'gay' or 'heterosexual’ may not be the bt to e when scribg sexual behavurs animals. Bee of this, animal ‘homosexualy’ has often been ignored, or else scientists have enavoured to fd var adaptive benefs to expla s of the adaptive explanatns clu var hypothised social benefs.

Homosexualy has been observed all speci of Great Ap, which cintally is a tegory that clus humans (although not of urse if you are a creatnist, who are not terted facts at all).

HOW DO THE FACT THAT THERE ARE GAY/HOMOSEXUAL ANIMALS IMPACT THE IA THAT HOMOSEXUALY IS A S?

Over the past 20 years, a burst of rearch — driven part by a new generatn of scientists more acceptg of queerns — has shown signifint amounts of prevly unreported homosexual behavr throughout the animal kgdom, om flour beetl to gorillas.

Gee Murray Levick, the explorer who wrote about homosexual behavr Adélie pengus 1911, shield his observatns of pengu “pravy” om sual observers by rerdg them his field not g the Greek alphabet — and they were still cut om the official expedn reports. A proment mammalogist, Valeri Geist, uldn’t help but notice equent homosexual sex at his bighorn sheep field se the 1960s, but Geist avoid publishg those fdgs bee ma him “crge … to nceive of those magnificent beasts as ‘queers. The fact that a bird populatn wh many bond femal sharg a few mal between them would have higher reproductive output led historian and ornhologist Jared Diamond to dryly wonr whether “further study of homosexually paired female birds may help clarify what, if anythg, mal are good for — an evolutnary sense, of urse.

ALL ABOUT GAY ANIMALS!

” In social animals, the logic go, absolute homosexualy would produce no offsprg, but absolute heterosexualy uld also be limg, as might make for an anism that is “poor at formg social allianc. Therefore, aversn to homosexual sex would have had to specifilly arise over the history of life, which this team of rearchers fds unlikely, sce the opportuny st of same-sex sex is relatively low.

Vasey and his team methodilly tted the var theori that have been proposed for the persistence of homosexual sex the monkeys: that the femal were exprsg domance; that they were barterg for parental re; that they were rencilg after a fight; or (my personal favore) that they were stagg sexual enunters to exce nearby mal, what I’d ll the “you wish, guys” theory of monkey lbianism. Sodomy laws stayed on the books until 2003, when the Supreme Court led them unnstutnal — aid by an amic brief cg the rearch that had e out the meantime documentg homosexual activy among might have known about the sheer diversy of animal sexualy a long time ago if we, as a culture, had managed to lower our blrs.

Even if homosexualy were a sex-lked tra (see prev post) this cince would be unexpectedly high One of the more mon sex-lked tras, red-green lor bldns occurs about 8 percent of men which is far higher than most other leter gen. Regardls of the particular blogil mechanism through which homosexualy aris, is a pervasive phenomenon the animal kgdom, a fact that discreds the mon argument that is "unnatural.

GAY ANIMALS

" Acrdg to Joan Roughgarn, a trans-genred blogist who studied such phenomena, there is documented evince of homosexual behavr for some 450 different speci and undocumented reports for about another thoand speci (1).

In the last post, I argued that exclive homosexualy humans n be partly explaed terms of gen on the X-chromosome that crease reproductive succs for femal who rry them. It’s been observed more than 1, 500 animal speci, om sects and other vertebrat, right up the evolutnary ladr to primat and the most part, we’re not sure why—what evolutnary advantage do homosexual uplg provi to dolphs (other than happier dolphs)? What’s really unnatural is that so many people still assume animals adhere to the “moral” of a small number of humans—so if you happen to n to anyone like that, pot them to this list of the 11 most gay animals on Sergey Uryadnikov (Shutterstock)Bonobos, a speci of great ap native to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, are the hippi of the animal kgdom.

[See more pictur of dolphs]BisonHomosexual mountg between mal tends to be more mon than heterosexual female-male pulatn among Amerin bison, pecially bee femal only mate wh the bulls about once a year. And fact, there was one of the foremost sheep rearchers, Valeri Geist, who studied bighorn sheep the 1960s - he was the wild observg the bighorns and saw that they basilly live entirely homosexual society until the age of 6 or 7. " a 2006 exhibn at the Norwegian Natural History Mm of the Universy of Oslo that ed mols, photos, texts, and specimens (like the swans to the right) to rm visors about a small selectn of "gay" animals.

11 ANIMAL SPECI THAT PROVE BEG GAY IS NATURAL

But rearchers have no ia what the advantage is, if any, of homosexual behavr among dragonfli, srab beetl, or, as observed at least once, two male octop of different speci. Every sgle tegory wh the animal kgdom featur speci who regularly exhib homosexual behavr: vertebrat and vertebrat; amphibians, birds, fish, mammals, and reptil; even sects! Scientists have lots of proof of the Amerin bottlenose dolph engagg homosexual behavr both sex, femal phg their beak to another’s genal sl and mal pulatg wh each other.

In 1999, Bagemihl published “Blogil Exuberance, ” a book that pulled together a lossal amount of prev piecemeal rearch and showed how blogists’ bias had margalized animal homosexualy for the last 150 years — sometim nocently enough, sometim an eptn of anthropomorphic disgt. Given this big umbrella of theory, the very existence of homosexual behavr animals n feel a ltle like imperable nonsense, somethg a rearcher uld spend years bangg his or her head agast the wall liberatg. The difficulty of that challenge, more than any implic or explic homophobia, may be why past blogists skirted the THE LAST DECADE, however, Pl Vasey and others have begun velopg new hypoth based on actual, prolonged observatn of different animals, cipherg the ways given homosexual behavrs may have evolved and the evolutnary role they might play wh the ntext of dividual speci.

So far, the only real ncln this relatively small body of lerature seems to pot to, llectively, is a kd of flatg, meta-ncln: a sgle explanatn of homosexual behavr animals may not be possible, bee thkg of “homosexual behavr animals” as a sgle scientific subject might not make much sense. But we’re quick to nceive of that great range of activi the way most handily tracks to our anthropomorphic pot of view: put crassly, all those different animals jt seem to be dog gay sex stuff wh one another. ”Somethg siar may be happeng wh what we perceive to be homosexual sex an array of animal speci: we may be groupg together a big grab bag of behavrs based on only a superficial siary.

MALE LN CGHT “MATG” WH MALE LN… GAY PRI? NOT QUE

The Stanford blogist Joan Roughgarn told me to thk of all the animals as “multaskg” wh their private ’s also possible that some homosexual behavrs don’t provi a nventnal evolutnary advantage; but neher do they upend everythg we know about blogy.

GAY ANIMALS: ALTERNATE LIFTYL THE WILD

Young found the assumptn offensive — not bee she was beg mistaken for gay, but bee she was beg mistaken for a bad scientist; the people seemed to prume that her rearch was promised by a personal agenda. Several people I spoke to told me their own sexual inti eher helped spur or mata their tert the topic; Bce Bagemihl argued that gay and lbian people are “often better equipped to tect heterosexist bias when vtigatg the subject simply bee we enunter so equently our everyday liv.

” He is gay, he add, but that fact didn’t seem to tract om his RETROSPECT, the big, sloshg stew of anthropomorphic analys that Young’s paper provoked the culture uldn’t have been ls surprisg. For whatever reason, we’re prone to seeg animals — pecially animals that appear to be gay — as reflectns, mols and foils of ourselv; we’re extraordarily, and sometim irratnally, vted a few months before I vised Kaena Pot, two pengus at the San Francis Zoo beme the latt a tradn of ptive same-sex pengu upl makg global headl. And while he strsed that there is no scientific way of termg if animals are “gay, ” bee the word nnot a sexual orientatn, not jt a behavr, he also noted that, beg the San Francis Zoo, “there’s fely a lot of opn here, ternally, that we give and ll the pengus gay.

” Acrdg to the Amerin Library Associatn, there have been more requts for librari to ban “And Tango Mak Three” every year than any other book the untry, three years animals do — what’s perceived to be “natural” — seems to rry a strange moral potency: ’s out there, irrefutably, as eher a validatn or a nunciatn of our own behavr, pendg on how you happen to feel about homosexualy and about nature. Durg the Victorian era, observatns of same-sex behavr swans and sects were held up as evince agast the moraly of homosexualy humans, sce at the dawn of dtrialism and Darwism, people were vted seeg themselv as more civilized than the “lower animals. ” Robert Mugabe and the Nazis have employed the same reasong, as did the 1970s anti-gay csar Ana Bryant, who, Bce Bagemihl not, claimed an terview that “even barnyard animals don’t do what homosexuals do” and was unmoved when the terviewer poted out what actually happens barnyards.

LBIAN ALBATROSS AND GAY GIRAFF? THE SCIENCE ON SAME-SEX SEXUALY ANIMALS

The book has also been ced a brief filed for the 2003 Supreme Court se that overturned a Texas state ban on sodomy and, siarly, a legislative bate on the floor of the Brish Esseks, director of the Lbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgenr Project at the Amerin Civil Liberti Unn, told me he has never rporated facts about animal behavr to a legal argument about the rights of human begs. At the same time, rearch terpreted — or, maybe more often, misterpreted — to be close to ppotg that naturalns a specific “gay gene” n make people on both sis anx a totally different 2007, for stance, the Universy of Illois at Chigo nroblogist David Featherstone and several lleagu, while searchg for new dg treatments for Lou Gehrig’s disease, happened upon a disvery: a specific prote mutatn the bra of male u fli ma the fli try to have sex wh other mal.

” (Earlier that year, PETA and the former tennis star Marta Navratilova, among others, were wagg siar attacks on a scientific study of gay sheep, prumg was a precursor to velopg a “treatment” for shuttg off homosexualy human fet. (Vasey warned me that mislabelg the fa’afafe “gay” or “homosexual” this article would jeopardize his abily to work wh them the future: while there’s no stigma attached to beg fa’afafe Samoan culture, homosexualy is seen as different and often repugnant, even by some fa’afafe.

HOW COMMON ARE GAY ANIMALS?

Wilson raised : If a key perspective of evolutnary blogy urg to unrstand homosexualy any speci as a beneficial adaptatn — if the pot of life is to pass on one’s gen — then maybe the role of gay dividuals is to somehow help their fay members generate more offsprg.

And this fact supports a separate, existg hypothis: maybe there’s a llectn of gen that, when exprsed a male, make him gay but when exprsed a woman, make her more fertile.

Another claimed, “Darwian Fundamentalists Dperate to Ratnalize Homosexualy, ” and cleared the way for a menter to somehow bemoan Vasey’s fdgs as “jtifitn” for gay men “to sexually abe their nephews.

CAN ANIMALS BE GAY?

A rrectn was ma onApril 18, 2010: An article on April 4 about same-sex pairgs animals misspelled the surname of a director at the Amerin Civil Liberti Unn who works on gay issu and who mented about animal behavr as applito the rights of humans.

There are several exampl of animals that state animals n be gay geologist are on their heels they are disverg that homeosexual and bisexual activy is not unknown wh the animal kgdom. The above-mentned male chstrap pengus beme known ternatnally when they succsfully hatched and red for an egg they were given, isn’t adorable that this gay animal uple prove that love occurs naturally? It is very mon the animal kgdom over 1500 speci are known for same-sex uplg om sects to fish, birds, reptil, amphibians and mammals; studi suggt that gay sex acunts for more than 90% of all observed sexual activi, for example giraff n foreplay for long hours male giraffe knows how to flirt first neckg wh each other they jt don’t get settled very straight their, natural lovers knows the drill very well.

GAY ANIMALS WH THEIR HOMOSEXUAL NATURE

The rearch suggts that homosexual behavur may be to strengthen thier alliance or to fe a tense suatn, generally, female baboons have iendships and mat wh multiple mal to create a probabily of re and assistance for their fants. They are gay animals, the Amerin bison is popular for their homosexualy where male to male pairg is seen outstandg numbers whereas male to female uplg is outnumbered, the matg perd bisons mat wh other mal several tim a day.

They have good sexual hunger; studi suggt that 75 per cent of bonobo sex is non-reproductive and that majorly all bonobos are bisexual, their homosexual behavur is natural. Brown bears are gay animal they have been observed pairg wh same sex and volvg sexual activy var specii of brown bears and black bears have been found uplg the same sex partnerships at the wildlife sanctuary Croatia two male bears have been found havg oral sex, term of gay sexual enunter.