Can animals be gay? | Disver Wildlife

Contents:

• FLIPPER CLEARED! DOLPHS ARE NOT GAY OR BISEXUAL RAPISTS AFTER ALL
• MORE GAY DOLPHS OBSERVED OFF COAST OF WTERN ATRALIA
• 11 ANIMAL SPECI THAT PROVE BEG GAY IS NATURAL
• CAN ANIMALS BE GAY?
• CAN ANIMALS BE GAY?

FLIPPER CLEARED! DOLPHS ARE NOT GAY OR BISEXUAL RAPISTS AFTER ALL

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.

” 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.

MORE GAY DOLPHS OBSERVED OFF COAST OF WTERN ATRALIA

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.

11 ANIMAL SPECI THAT PROVE BEG GAY IS NATURAL

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. Zoologists are disverg that homosexual and bisexual activy is not unknown wh the animal kgdom.Roy and Silo, two male chstrap pengus at New York's Central Park Zoo have been separable for six years now.

CAN ANIMALS BE GAY?

There are male ostrich that only urt their own genr, and pairs of male flamgos that mate, build nts, and even raise foster chicks.Filmmakers recently went search of homosexual wild animals as part of a Natnal Geographic Ultimate Explorer documentary about the female's role the matg game. ET, 5 p.m PT on MSNBC TV.)The team ught female Japane maqu engaged timate acts which, if observed humans, would be the X-rated tegory."The homosexual behavr that go on is pletely bafflg and trigug," says Natnal Geographic Ultimate Explorer rrponnt, Mireya Mayor.

CAN ANIMALS BE GAY?

"You would have thought femal that want to be mated, pecially over their fertile perd, would be seekg out mal."Well, perhaps, a roundabout way, they are seekg mal, suggts primatologist Amy Parish.She argu that female maqu may enhance their social posn through homosexual timacy which turn fluenc breedg succs. The fact that homosexualy do, after all, exist the natural world is bound to be ed agast people who sist such behavr is unnatural.In the U.S., particular, the moral bate over this issue rag on. And only this month, Print Bh vowed to ntue his bid to ban gay marriag after the Senate blocked the proposal.Already, s of animal homosexualy have been ced succsful urt s brought agast stat like Texas, where gay sex was, until recently, illegal.Yet scientists say we should be wary of referrg to animals when nsirg what's acceptable human society.