Study finds that many primates engage in same-sex behavior, to reduce social conflict

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Originally published at: Study finds that many primates engage in same-sex behavior, to reduce social conflict | Boing Boing

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Fuck don’t fight has always been my motto. I’ve seen far more guys I’d rather engage in bed than a battle field, it’s so simple even a monkey can understand it.

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Bonobos: Try same-sex sexual behavior! It reduces conflict!

Me: (looking at latest anti-gay ranting from far-right hatemongers) I wish, bonobos, I wish.

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Not only reducing conflict. So many other benefits.

Not that same-sex behaviour needs justifying. But here’s an interesting example of the subtler benefits:

Not all parents survive. In such sad cases, it’s ideal if you have a few adults around who aren’t already preoccupied raising young of their own. IIRC, studies in penguins show this is exactly what happens; a gay “uncle” or “aunt” penguin takes over raising chicks when a set of parents die.

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They mostly still live in the trees, too. Arguably, leaving the trees was our first mistake…

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Incredibly ironic that an article about same-sex sexual behavior tries to not use the word “sexual” at all costs.

Same-sex behavior? Like, does this not strike you as a euphemism? Dude, it’s sexual behavior. “Same sex behavior” is, like, all interactions that happen between two individuals of the same gender, and not all of that is banging.

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Thanks for breaking your ten-year silence with a complaint, dude :+1:

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To be fair, in the case of bonobos, most of it is.

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I’m trying imagine a confrontation, say outside a bar… where the very large and angry brute is about to crush you into dust… and you say “Wait… let’s make love instead”… good on you for trying at least, offered an option.

It would be the very rare hair-trigger no-neck that accepts, otherwise can’t see humans and our complexities going along with the idea.

WWE/WCW would certainly become more interesting to watch though.

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It’s quoting a scientific study. That’s the technical verbiage they used in the journal article. Why is that such a problem?

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Somebody’s always gotta complain about something; it’s how they get attention.

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It’s known that backstage conflicts, at least for a time, were handled in some sort of wrestlers court. Maybe an alternative would be to work out their ruthless aggression in another kind of grappling.

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On the contrary, the journal article uses the phrase ‘same-sex sexual behaviour’ throughout. The NYT seem to have favoured ‘same-sex behaviour’ for their headline.

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My bad! I only went as far as the NYT article, since I thought the criticism was of the BB article.

This is a good reminder for me: never trust the Times!

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