Who’s Going to Tell Michael Medved?

by Henry Farrell on September 13, 2005

Turns out that some of those “Godfearing, family values penguins”:http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/13/science/13peng.html?ex=1284264000&en=36efde9c1de3fa22&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss may be “playing for the other team”:http://www.jrn.columbia.edu/studentwork/cns/2002-06-10/591.asp.

(via “Max”:http://maxspeak.org/mt/archives/001605.html).

{ 1 trackback }

The Sixth International
09.14.05 at 5:49 am

{ 19 comments }

1

Steve 09.13.05 at 3:50 pm

Maybe they should also tell him that although they have one mate per mating season. Both females and males will have 2-3 mates over their lifetime.

2

Cryptic Ned 09.13.05 at 3:51 pm

Um, I believe the penguins in the movie were Emperor Penguins, in other words penguins that value tradition and small-town values. The rootless cosmopolitan penguins in your linked article are clearly smaller, and have complicated, trendy black-and-white patterns à la the typical New Yorker, as opposed to the simple, God-fearing attire of the Emperor penguin (complete with subtle yet welcoming orange accents).

I think the contrast between big-city metrosexual penguins and the silent majority of rural penguins (could Antarctica be a red state? Is that why FDR was afraid to annex it?) couldn’t be starker.

3

bh 09.13.05 at 4:15 pm

There is even a children’s picture book written about Silo and Roy and the penguin they raised from an egg.

4

Jake 09.13.05 at 4:59 pm

I’m tickled to see that Cass and Wendell even
conform to a classic hyperbutch/effeminate model.

As I recall, Bagemihl concluded that on average about 5% of the animals of any given population are gay. Inasmuch as the better research suggests numbers lower than that for humans, I wonder if that’s in fact owing to closeting.

5

Barry 09.13.05 at 5:47 pm

It’s obviously due to the influence of Evul Librul Scientists and their Evilooshunary ways. What other humans do the penguins see down in Antarctica? Not some God-Fearing, Traditional Americans from the (close to God) Red State Heartland.

From what I’ve heard, there’s a large number of **forun** scientists down there, as well. Maybe even more of them than of Americans, which is unnatural.

6

Cornhuskerblogger (CHB) 09.13.05 at 5:47 pm

[comment spam]

7

Cornhuskerblogger (CHB) 09.13.05 at 5:49 pm

[comment spam]

8

Steve LaBonne 09.13.05 at 7:04 pm

Both females and males will have 2-3 mates over their lifetime.
That won’t worry them since much the same is true of red-state Christian conservatives.

9

fyreflye 09.13.05 at 7:37 pm

Did the Intelligent Designer design gay penguins?

10

Aidan Maconachy 09.13.05 at 8:29 pm

Does anything these days escape political interpretation? Attempts to exrapolate human truths from animal behaviour, have always struck me as being a stretch. The researcher always seems to end up with a thesis that bolsters his/her inherent beliefs. What next … the bisexual, multicultural world of progressive midges?

11

Tom Doyle 09.13.05 at 8:48 pm

Speaking of religion, “penguin” is, or was a slang term for Catholic (my sect) nuns. It’s now outdated, at least in the US, because most orders of nuns have dropped the distinctive regalia that resembled penguin plumage. Now most wear civvies. What’s the situation in Ireland? The UK? COE has(had?) nuns did it not? Were they called penguins?

Idly curious

12

yabonn 09.14.05 at 3:16 am

– So your penguins are good god fearing penguins right?
– Well you know it wasn’t reall..
– And the global warming pinko propaganda is absent from your movie, right?
– Well it was not my po…
– And they don’t go fucking around like some welfare dependant sub-population, right?
– … Mais qu’est ce qu’il raconte, ce con?
– And it’s obvious that god made it all, isn’t it?
– Je reve.
– Thankyouverymuch.

Hilarious. I hope Jaquet had a micro camera on for his promo in the u.s. : material for a future documentary (The Flight of the Loon?).

13

clone12 09.14.05 at 3:46 am

14

Louis Proyect 09.14.05 at 8:22 am

Actually, Max got this from me. I had posted the items to the PEN-L mailing. Too bad he didn’t credit me.

15

Chris Bertram 09.14.05 at 8:28 am

Discussion would not be complete without a link to “this item from the BBC”:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4264913.stm (last year):

bq. Gay rights activists have protested at a north German zoo’s plans to test the sexual orientation of six male penguins which have displayed homosexual traits. Bremerhaven’s Zoo am Meer said it would introduce four extra female penguins from Sweden to the group to see if the males really were gay.

16

JC 09.14.05 at 11:29 pm

“Five Reasons Why March of the Penguins Isn’t A Conservative Film” at http://www.footballfansfortruth.us/archives/001193.html

17

Nick 09.15.05 at 4:26 pm

18

Chris Corrigan 09.15.05 at 4:37 pm

Re: #9:

“what immortal hand or eye hath framed thy fearful symmetry?”

19

Tokyo Tom 09.16.05 at 5:23 am

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