ananova.com July 12, 2001

Scientists claim to have spotted gay dolphins

Brazilian biologists say they have found evidence of homosexual relationships between dolphins.

Scientists claim they have seen the animals engaging in oral sex and have watched some practise "lesbianism".

They say it proves sexual stimulation among dolphins can be "pleasure-driven".

The study was carried out at the Golfinho Rotador Centre on the island of Fernando de Noronha, 220 miles east of Brazil.

Jose Martins of the centre told the O'Globo newspaper: "We have observed 21 cases of homosexual relationships between dolphins, eight of them including oral sex.

"Observing male dolphins having sex with each other was simpler than observing women though, as they have much more evident sexual organs."

-- Lars (larsguy@yahoo.com), July 22, 2001

Answers

Hmmmmmm, I always thought that Flipper was a little minty.

-- Lars (larsguy@yahoo.com), July 22, 2001.

Lars,

I believe that dolphins are the only animals that have sex for pleasure, rather than solely for procreation. If this claim about homosexual activity in dolphins is true, than one can say that the only two species on the planet known to have sex for pleasure rather than solely for procreation, are also the only two species on the planet known to engage in homosexual activity.

Interesting situation, that.

-- J (Y2J@home.comm), July 22, 2001.

While humans and dolphins are discussed more, there seems to be some debate regarding whether these are the only two.

-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), July 22, 2001.

Sal on link

The FABULOUS kingdom of GAY animals

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - A BIOLOGIST OFFERS THE FIRST VISION OF A TANTALIZINGLY DIVERSE NATURAL WORLD: NOT ALL ANIMALS ARE STRAIGHT ARROWS.

BY SUSAN McCARTHY | The scientist gasps and drops the binoculars. A notebook falls from astonished hands. Graduate students mutter in alarm. Nobody wants to be the one to tell the granting agency what they're seeing.

A female ape wraps her legs around another female, "rubbing her own clitoris against her partner's while emitting screams of enjoyment." The researcher explains: It's a form of greeting behavior. Or reconciliation. Possibly food-exchange behavior. It's certainly not sex. Not lesbian sex. Not hot lesbian sex.

Six bighorn rams cluster, rubbing, nuzzling and mounting each other. "Aggressosexual behavior," the biologist explains. A way of establishing dominance.

A zoo penguin approaches another, bowing winsomely. The birds look identical and a zoogoer asks how to tell males and females apart. "We can tell by their behavior," a researcher explains. "Eric is courting Dora." A keeper arrives with news: Eric has laid an egg.

They've been keeping it from us: There are homosexual and bisexual animals, ranging from charismatic megafauna like mountain gorillas to cats, dogs and guinea pigs. There are transgendered animals, transvestite animals (who adopt the behavior of the other gender but don't have sex with their own), and animals who live in bisexual triads and quartets.

Bruce Bagemihl spent 10 years scouring the biological literature for data on alternative sexuality in animals to write "Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity," 768 pages about exactly what goes on at "South Park's" Big Gay Al's Big Gay Animal Sanctuary. The first section discusses animal sexuality in its many forms and the ways biologists have tried to explain it away. The second section, "A Wondrous Bestiary," describes unconventional sexuality in nearly 200 mammals and birds -- orangutans, whales, warthogs, fruit bats, chaffinches.

THE FABULOUS KINGDOM OF GAY ANIMALS | PAGE 1, 2, 3 - - - - - - - - - -

It's not just about hot sex. Bagemihl includes nonsexual bonds. Friendships. Female grizzlies sometimes form partnerships, traveling together, defending each other, raising cubs together and putting off hibernation in what seems to be an attempt to stay together longer.

Nor is it all cuddling and consensuality. Bagemihl chronicles homosexual incest (foxes), rape (albatrosses) and homophobia (white- tailed deer).

His favorites are beasts with "a special courtship pattern found only in homosexual interactions." Two percent of male ostriches ignore females and court males with a lively dance that involves running toward your chosen partner at 30 mph, skidding to a stop in front of him, pirouetting madly, then "kantling," which includes crouching, rocking, fluffing your feathers, puffing your throat in and out and twisting your neck like a corkscrew. A male ostrich courting a female omits the speedy approach, shortens the display, adds a booming song and may include symbolic feeding displays. Male ostriches have not been seen actually having sex, unlike male flamingo pairs, who mate, build nests and sometimes rear foster chicks.

Some homosexual animals have one-night stands and some have long marriages. Gay and lesbian geese stay together year after year. Bottlenose dolphins don't form male-female couples, but males often form lifelong pairs with other males. Some are interested only in males, but others are bisexual and happily indulge in beak-genital propulsion and more with male or female alike.

Male black swans court and form stable pairs. With two males, they are able to defend huge territories from other swan couples, which sounds like a double-income-no-kids situation except that they often manage to wangle some eggs from somewhere -- all right, they steal them -- and become model parents, twice as successful as straight parents.

There's a certain temptation to leaf through the book shouting "Caribou? Gay! Red-necked Wallaby? Gay! Golden Plover? GAY GAY GAY!" But of course it's not that simple.

All bonobos and 1 percent of ostriches participate in homosexual activities -- so within the animal kingdom there is tremendous diversity of sexualities. Moreover, the world is full of animals who are straight. But we know so little about the sex lives of most animals that we must be cautious in our assumptions. Many creatures have never been seen having sex of any kind. The black-rumped flameback has been observed in male-male mating, but never male- female mating. Yet presumably they don't buy baby flamebacks at the corner store.

As for why some animals are bisexual or homosexual, Bagemihl gives the subject brief, annoyed discussion: Obviously it involves both nature and nurture, both environment and biology. He notes that different groups of Japanese macaques have different levels and kinds of homosexual behavior -- which he interprets as a cultural difference.

Besides showing the prevalence of alternative sexuality, Bagemihl tells a fascinating story of the suppression of this vast body of information. "Zoology is a very conservative profession," and focusing on animal homosexuality is not the road to success. One researcher documented homosexuality in sheep, but didn't publish until she got tenure.

Surprisingly often, observers don't know what they're seeing. If males and females look alike, researchers assume that when they see animals mating, they are seeing a male and a female, and the one on top is the male. Thus, the penguin Eric, later renamed Erica. If they switch positions, no doubt it's just confusion.

Often, it's plain that animals are engaging in homosexual behavior -- short of wearing gay pride T-shirts, there's no way those walruses could be clearer -- but the observer can't fathom it.

One unusually candid biologist wrestled with the realization that the bighorn rams he studied frequently had sex with each other, and weren't just showing nice wholesome aggression. "To state that the males had evolved a homosexual society was emotionally beyond me. To conceive of those magnificent beasts as 'queers' -- Oh God!"

Bagemihl ridicules ingenious explanations researchers have given for why animals might appear not to be straight arrows. It's dominance. It's a contest of stamina. It's barter for food. It's aggression. It's appeasement. They're confused and don't realize that they're both the same sex. It's a way of reducing tension. They're just playing! And my favorite: It's a greeting.

Dominance is the most popular excuse, with animals portrayed as jockeying for status with the ferocity of assistant professors, when they're only fooling around. "At times, the very word dominance itself becomes simply code for 'homosexual mounting,' repeated mantralike until it finally loses what little meaning it had to begin with," Bagemihl writes.

Captive animals are subjected to the prison comparison: They're like prisoners in an unnatural situation, so that's not real homosexual activity in that cage. While some captive animals adopt an "if you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with" philosophy, others decline to have sex with animals they don't care for. When it comes to animals in the wild freely choosing to pirouette, or give the Really Big Greeting, this explanation collapses.

The idea that animals can't tell each other's gender and accidentally have sex or form homosexual pairs has the age-old appeal of making animals look really, really dumb, but doesn't hold up in the face of evidence that animals know quite well who they're hitting on.

Sometimes it just seems better not to bring it up. One researcher discovered homosexual mounting in white-tailed deer, yet when an 800- page book on white-tails was published, the researcher co-wrote the chapter on behavior with no mention of it.

A report on killer whale behavior that described homosexuality in male orcas was reissued as a government document for the U.S. Marine Mammal Commission with those passages -- and only those passages -- deleted.

Popular books by scientists often include material that doesn't make it into journals. The authors relax, drop the jargon, tell anecdotes, speculate. But, seeking sympathy for the animals they love, most scientists balk at describing bisexuality and homosexuality in the animals. Will people be less likely to save the gorilla if the gorilla has a gay lifestyle?

Bonobos are a partial exception. Recently a fair amount of information about bonobo sex lives has come out. Bonobos are new, bonobos are smart -- and it's hard to keep a camera on bonobos for longer than a minute without recording a sexual act of some kind. Yet popular books about the language capacities of bonobos, like Sue Savage-Rumbaugh's excellent "Kanzi: The Ape at the Brink of the Human Mind," leave the impression of a pure-minded primate egghead.

The lexigrams Kanzi and others are taught to use are not about sex. Yet see Page 67 for a thought-provoking diagram of hand gestures used during bonobo sex, ranging from "come here" to "move your genitals around." These signs, used by captive bonobos, were discovered by Savage-Rumbaugh and her colleagues. It's one of the classic errors in teaching animals language -- not letting them talk about what interests them. "Let's not discuss what you want to do with Panbanisha and Sherman. Let's talk about using the key to open the box and get some candy. No, actual candy."

As for the perennial issue of tool use, an entire category of tools has gone unmentioned -- tools animals make and use to masturbate. Dolphins and porcupines masturbate with objects, and primates regularly modify objects into suitable sex toys. A female orangutan bit pieces of liana to the right size, a male orangutan made an orifice in a large leaf, and a female macaque had five methods of making toys out of leaves and twigs. If an ape discovered electricity, but used it to power a vibrator, we'd be unlikely to hear about it.

Zoology adheres to a "folk model" of homosexuality as perverse, unnatural and bad, Bagemihl argues, and is far behind the humanities in recognizing it as a legitimate subject of inquiry.

Bagemihl formulates the charmingly named theory of biological exuberance, of which homosexuality is one manifestation. He wants to unlink biological analysis from the idea that reproduction -- and hence, heterosexuality -- is all. Biology must accept the apparent purposelessness of sexualities, he argues. Sexual pleasure is "inherently valuable" and "requires no further 'justification.'"

In support of this view, Bagemihl cites celibate animals, animals that exhibit shocking indifference to reproduction and species where sex is rare and difficult. He all but proves reproductive sex doesn't happen.

But of course reproduction does take place and must take place for natural selection to occur. (If creatures lived forever, they wouldn't need to reproduce, nor would they evolve.) The riddle is how a process driven by reproduction produces nonreproductive creatures, but it's not a very hard riddle, and indeed abundance, flexibility and exuberance are part of it.

Evolution is history. The forces of evolution operating in the past may have produced a creature that is fast, fierce or able to do calculus, but those forces don't direct a creature once it is born. Penguins who mated with other penguins of the opposite sex are the ones who left descendants, and every penguin is descended from penguins who committed at least one heterosexual act, but that doesn't mean this penguin, here and now, will commit only heterosexual acts. The capacity for pleasure that encouraged its ancestors to reproduce is available wherever the penguin chooses to direct it.

Successful life forms are characterized by diversity, so changing environments don't wipe them out. That diversity often extends to sexuality. Thus bisexuality and homosexuality are characteristics not of twisted nature, but of generous nature.

So what if animals are gay? Are people vindicated in our diverse sex lives by diversity in animals? If they put us on trial, can we bring as character witnesses lions who make the Sign of the Great Tawny Beast with same-sex lions? (And they do. Unless that's just a greeting.) No, not unless we would bring those same lions to testify that killing your new significant other's children is a useful way to free up their time for you and your future children. Animals do all kinds of things that we frown on for ourselves.

But we can bring the lions to testify that there's nothing unnatural about human sex lives, that bisexuality and homosexuality are not among those twisted human inventions, like income tax, or graduate school, or step aerobics, that have no close analog in the wild.

As Bagemihl says of this widely expressed idea, "What is remarkable about the entire debate about the naturalness of homosexuality is the frequent absence of any reference to concrete facts or accurate, comprehensive information about animal homosexuality."

There's no longer any excuse. At more than 750 pages of profusely illustrated, carefully referenced information, this is the ideal book to slam down on the fingers of anyone who says homosexuality isn't natural. SALON | March 15, 1999

To order the Bagemihl book

Bagemihl's dry style is obedient to the precepts of scientific writing. He explains why animals can be called homosexual or bisexual, but not gay, lesbian or queer, and he follows the rules -- though "homosexual" frightens some who prefer terms like male-only social interactions, multifemale associations, unisexuality, isosexuality or intrasexuality. (Fortunately, as a book reviewer, I am not bound by this rule. We're talking gay animals!) Yet the book is thrillingly dense with new ideas, and with scandalous animal anecdotes. In other words, an ideal bedside read.

-- Firemouse (someonetoldmeit'sallhappening@the.zoo), July 22, 2001.

"If this claim about homosexual activity in dolphins is true, than one can say that the only two species on the planet known to have sex for pleasure rather than solely for procreation, are also the only two species on the planet known to engage in homosexual activity."

Just a thought here -

These 'two species' are also the planet's most intelligent. Might homosexual activity be associated with intelligence?

-- Debra (Thisis@it.com), July 22, 2001.

off?

-- Debra (Thisis@it.com), July 22, 2001.

If you overcrowd rats in a small living area some of them quickly turn homosexual. It likely has no relationship with intelligence, but rather is an instinctive reaction to overcrowding and competition for limited resources.

-- Sage (of@Beaner.Vista), July 22, 2001.

Does Bagemihl document inter-species sex? For some humans, bestiality is the latest "in" thing.

-- Lars (larsguy@yahoo.com), July 22, 2001.

Oh my. I didn't know that. LOL

But the question about intelligence may still be valid though it needs to be asked in a different way.

Might the 'level of intelligence' of the species which engage in homosexual activity be associated with how 'natural' that activity is?

According to the above post animals with little perceivable intelligence engage in both heterosexuality and homosexuality. As the level of intelligence increases, this behavior does not change.

Two of the most intelligent species, humans and dolphins, engage in homosexual behavior.

Dolphins don't have 'religious doctrine' telling them it is an abomination. They are free of that. They are intelligent, they are loving, they are free AND they engage in homosexual activity.

The following is taken from a book I own-

"It is clear that dolphins have a rich inner life and an enormous range of feelings, thoughts and experiences. A dolphin's brain seems always to be busy: even when one hemisphere goes to sleep, the other remains wide awake and active. What myths and legends do they have, what visions and songs?

So far we have not been able to penetrate their world at all. All our attempts at communicating seem ineffectual. Perhaps it is because we assume that we are the ones that train other animals to do the tricks, never considering that they might be able to teach us a thing or two."

-- Debra (Thisis@it.com), July 22, 2001.

Bestiality is not so much the latest "in" thing, but is being talked up on the Internet in a way that was not possible when our illiterate peasant ancestors in the Old Country were nadgering the sheep.

-- Firemouse (whenshepherdswatchedtheirflocksbynight@theold.country), July 22, 2001.

I love Flipper and Namu. I want a menage a trois with these beauties.

-- (Willy, free@last.blow hole), July 22, 2001.

"It is clear that dolphins have a rich inner life and an enormous range of feelings, thoughts and experiences. A dolphin's brain seems always to be busy: even when one hemisphere goes to sleep, the other remains wide awake and active. What myths and legends do they have, what visions and songs?

So far we have not been able to penetrate their world at all. All our attempts at communicating seem ineffectual. Perhaps it is because we assume that we are the ones that train other animals to do the tricks, never considering that they might be able to teach us a thing or two."

Debra--

Interesting quote. I question how the author knows "it is clear that dolphins have a rich innner life". Do we know that brainwaves equal "thoughts". IMO, all we know is that brainwaves equal brain activity.

I don't see how any creatures can have thoughts (as opposed to feelings, as opposed to instinctual response to external stimulii) unless they have speech. It is speech that allows the organic computer (brain) to consciously think in abstractions.

Maybe dolhins do have speech. We know they communicate accoustically. But so do most animals. As far as I know, scientists have not yet deciphered a dolphin language so opinions on their "rich inner lives" are mere speculation.

-- Lars (larsguy@yahoo.com), July 22, 2001.

"I believe that dolphins are the only animals that have sex for pleasure, rather than solely for procreation."

LMAO!

Nice try Doctor Dolittle, but that statement only reinforces the fact that what you "believe" has no basis in reality.

-- (hermit-boy J is @ still. a virgin), July 22, 2001.

The last poster's response reminded me of a cartoon I'd seen recently. The 'toon showed a report on a T.V., with the reporter's "bubble" reading: "The latest study by gays finds that Republicans CAN change their orientation through counseling."

-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), July 22, 2001.

Debra: I don't think intelligence has anything to do with it. As noted, animals ranging from the most stupid to the most intelligent seem to engage in sexual behaviors that are both fun and profitable. Expanding on the latter, it seems that Bonobos engage in sex for profit [Give the guy sex and walk away with his sugar cane.] and conciliation [Let's kiss and make up, Honey.] It's also interesting to note that theirs is a female-dominated society.

The Bonobo life

-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), July 22, 2001.

For those men who enjoy submission, contact Bonobo Intros. Ask for Fifi.

-- (nemesis@awol.com), July 22, 2001.

anonymous coward,

Actually, if I had believed that any of my children would have turned out like you, then I would still be a virgin.

-- J (Y2J@home.comm), July 22, 2001.

Growing up on a farm you realize that almost all animals are homo's they derive pleasure from sex. They will hump each other lick and suck each other. But as animals they do not worry about it because it feels good. Nothing about having sex with anything makes you special or different. We are all born the same way,sex feels good. part of the appeal of being gay is that you are different or special;

your are not, you are lowing your self to an animal's mentality. It would be the same as saying when I see a attractive mate and am aroused I can't help myself I have to have sex with them just as if they were an animal in heat. There has always been laws concerning devient sex practices. Because it feels good does not make it ok. IE rape, SM, Sex with children, sex with animals, or sex with dead people. We as an intelligent being set rules concerning sex practices. No one is born any more gay than any one else, no one is born kinky, or bizzare. We become what we want and then try to blame something. We are in control of our lives, we can resist or stop any kind of behavior. It may be hard but we can. What we do behind closed doors is our own business, as long as we are old enough and are not hurting some one. But no one is special or born that way.

-- wayne johnson (cwj1180@kvalley.com), July 22, 2001.

Wayne:

your are not, you are lowing your self to an animal's mentality.

Since you don't consider yourself an animal, that doesn't leave many kingdoms. In common terms, you could be a plant, a fungus, or one of two of the prokaryotes. And you use a computer.

Very interesting.

Best Wishes,,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), July 22, 2001.

Dear Z1X4y7: You missed the point, we are animals but we have a brain. With that brain we set limits on what we can do. That is what laws are. They reflect how we view our enviroment, at one time we hung horse thief's then the laws changed. At one point in our past it probably was ok to bash in someone's brain if he took food away from your family (caveman days) but as we grow and become more intelligent our views change. We learn. Maybe some day your parents can give you a better name, I mean Z1X4Y7 is a bit much.

-- wayne johnson (cwj1180@kvalley.com), July 22, 2001.

Wayne:

Good to hear from you. Last time I looked all animals had brains. Limits: sure, but most are set based on our hard-wired search for order. It may or not exist.

What is your opinion.

By-the-by, Z was here as Z when you were in high school. You can go through the records and find the source of the name.

Best Wishes,,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), July 22, 2001.

J-boy is right. I don't hump the neighbor dog because I get pleasure from the orgasm, I just want to make sure that there will be plenty of dogs around in the future. LOL Yeah, when I see a bitch I'll go up to her and ask her if she is interested in procreating, then we'll go to a family planner to decide how big of a family we want. There is no pleasure at all, strictly business. LMAO

-- Mr. Dog (animals don't @ have. orgasms), July 22, 2001.

Firemouse, thank you for the best laugh I've had this month.

-- helen (homo@bono.sapiens), July 22, 2001.

"I believe that dolphins are the only animals that have sex for pleasure, rather than solely for procreation. If this claim about homosexual activity in dolphins is true, than one can say that the only two species on the planet known to have sex for pleasure rather than solely for procreation, are also the only two species on the planet known to engage in homosexual activity."

Pretty self-serving statement, that. Male frogs are happy enought to hump other male frogs during their springtime orgies. Just another case of testosterone poisoning. Pretty common, near as I can tel.

-- Who cares (what@who.me), July 24, 2001.

Glad to lighten up your day Helen, especially if it was a gravel- shovelling one.

About 15 years ago, my grand-daddy went back for the first time to visit The Old Country he'd emigrated from when he was a teen. He reported that the cousins he visited still had chickens and goats wandering into the kitchen during his visit (he decided not to take them up on their kind offer of lunch). I figure if there are goats in the kitchen, who knows what's in the bedroom?

Polish Nobility once posted a link that led to photos of a number of animals humping each other in various cross-species combinations, but I don't think I saved it, alas.

And as far as it being new, even way back in the early seventies in _Fear of Flying_, Isadora Wing and her husband had that discussion about why didn't she get a little dog...

-- Firemouse (U2,brute?@bono.sapiens), July 24, 2001.

Debra,

So far we have not been able to penetrate their world at all.

I think the above discussion on bestiality suggests that some keep trying, though.

-- Bemused (and_amazed@you.people), July 24, 2001.

On frogs: I'm not so sure they should be used as an example. Their eyes are fashioned so as to concentrate on movement rather than detail.

One of my Biology profs last fall was a herpetologist. During the course of his studies he was required to go on "hunts" for snakes. Oftentimes these "hunts" took place at night and required sloshing through water, wearing those hats with the light so one can see. He saw a male frog bleating out its mating call on the bank in front of him as he sloshed forward, and saw a snake swimming in the frog's direction. The frog could only discern the snake's head above the water and ASSUMED it was a female responding to his mating calls. He jumped on the snake's head and the snake promptly ate him.

-- Anita (Anita_S3@hotmail.com), July 24, 2001.

" I figure if there are goats in the kitchen, who knows what's in the bedroom? "

No comment.

-- helen (dont@sk.dont.tell), July 24, 2001.

Now....now....

Check out www.dolphins.org to get the real skinny on our closest kin in the chain.

Gay?? Hell, who knows.......seems to happen in all species.

One thing is fer sure. The dolphins are the only other 'group' on the planet that ENJOYS sex. In other words, they have sex for pleasure too.

How yall been??

Deano

-- Deano (deano@luvthebeach.com), July 26, 2001.

Deano,

You return to post on a thread about gay dolphins? Why does this not surprise me?

How was travel ball?

-- Jack Booted Thug (governmentconspiracy@NWO.com), July 27, 2001.

JBT

Hey, gay dolphons could happen.....don't mean I approve of it, but it could happen. Check out a dolphin fetus and a human fetus at 1.5-3.0 months and tell me who's who (kinda hard to tell, ain't it?). I believe they're a closer to us than we think.

Travel ball?? Uh........we looked pretty good right up until the district 5 championship game and lost 2-1. Looking to play a tourney in Orlando Labor Day weekend. We'd really like to keep these kids together and go to the next level but it takes a prett big commitment from mom'n'dad. Big team meeting in a couple weeks.

Hope your summer's going well...

Deano

-- Deano (deano@luvthebeach.com), July 28, 2001.

you know what..i think this is ridiculous.I think the gays are starting to think everything is gay. How do dolphins even know what anal sex is? and how did researchers KNOW it was anal sex? and personally why doesnt anyone say anything about the massively gay mating in zoo's? BECAUSE THERE IS NO SUCH THING U DUMBASSES

-- Jessica (HudaHudia9@hotmail.com), September 02, 2001.

Jessica: "why doesnt anyone say anything about the massively gay mating in zoo's? BECAUSE THERE IS NO SUCH THING..."

Cool! Are you a zookeeper in the monkey house? Oh boy, do I envy you! I always wanted to be one, but I couldn't pass the physical. Not enough hair.

-- Break out the cookies and milk (aimless@national_raffle_association.org), September 02, 2001.

sex is cool but gay animal sex is not, y do scientist want to watch gay dolphin sex anyway, when they can watch gay human sex, how does a dolphin have anal sex i didn't know they had a bum hole acessable by another dolphins penis. i also dont think they can oral sex cuz they have teeth and no control and would bit e it off thank you for reading

~sexman~

-- muhammad amu (ass_man@hotmail.com), September 10, 2001.

i think this sort of stuuf is very beautiful and nature!! i think dolphins are very precious and a love them love sarah JAckson

-- sarah Jackson (potnoodlechik@aol.com), October 03, 2001.