The Objective Observer

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Gay and Lesbian Interest

• Of Meerkats and Men
• Gays - A Final Word
• The Science of Gay
• I Don't Care That You're Gay
• Homosexuals and Housing
• Gay Travel
• Gay Superheroes
• Of Queers and Men

Animal Planet has, or had, I have not watched that channel in quite some time, a program called “Meerkat Manor”. In addition to being rather fascinating and the little baby Meerkats being super cute, I believe “Meerkat Manor” has something profound and significant to say about modern human society. Specifically, I believe that the program demonstrates how everyone is STILL missing the boat when it comes to the issue of homosexuality and, even more specifically, the issue of homosexual marriage. Trust me, as non sequitur as that may sound, it will all make sense in a few paragraphs.

For those of you that don’t have children, grand children or nieces and nephews who have watched the Lion King like eight bajillion times, meerkats are small, cute little critters that live on the edge of the Kalahari Desert alongside equally cute, cuddly and excessively flatulent warthogs. Over the last ten years or so, Oxford Scientific Films has followed one particular group of meerkats, the “Whiskers”, around roughly three square miles of scrub, filming their every move.

Feminists will be happy to learn that a group of meerkats is matriarchal, led by a dominant female. As it turns out, this dominant female is the only meerkat that is allowed to breed. Any other female that breeds runs the risk of the dominant female viciously beating and exiling the offender or, worse, killing the babies, or killing the babies in addition to beating and exiling the offender or even killing the babies, beating and exiling the offender, drawing and quartering the offender and finally burning the offender’s entrails.

Side note, this is why my wife has refused to watch “Meerkat Manor”, because she cannot stand to see the little babies suffer and die. Honestly, that is a pretty terrible thing to watch, made exponentially worse when you realize that there are actual human beings, and I use that term loosely, watching the small babies suffer terribly and die in the interests of “science”. I mean, they suffer agonizing deaths from dehydration and exposure, which is not a particularly pleasant way to go. It’s one thing that this occurs in the wild but if you are actually out in the wild and in a position to save an animal from death by dehydration and exposure at no risk to yourself, please do not be inhuman scum like the film crews of “Meerkat Manor” and instead save the poor thing. And, just to finish this side rant, don’t even give me the excuse of being “scientific” or not altering the gene pool or any of those other cop-outs, it’s not like the film crews are not ALREADY changing the environment by their very presence. The least they could do is save the poor thing and ship it off to a zoo somewhere, or euthanize it. I’m no card carrying member of PETA but, come on, at least be HUMAN people.

So, anyway, back to the issue at hand. Killing babies may seem like strange behavior but then, you don’t live on the edge of a desert and subsist on a limited supply of beetles, worms and giant millipedes that you dig from the ground. Oh wait, this is America where abortion is legal so scratch that, I’m certain you can relate. So anyway, the reason for this rather complex social behavior is quite simple…survival. Pack too many meerkats into too small a space and it may spell death from starvation for all. OK, we are back to where the abortion crowd may find the behavior strange since meerkat infanticide is actually done for a purpose other than “female empowerment”.

Now, this theme is pretty common throughout the natural world; overpopulate and over consume resources and die. In fact, pack too many of just about any living organism into too small a space and bad things happen. Just ask Paul Ehrlich, he’ll tell it to you straight. This is something that is instinctively understood by meerkats and just about every other living organism except, of course, civil engineers. Let’s face it, even dung beetles “get” this concept, yet it is apparently too difficult a concept for humans who instead seek to pack themselves into cities as densely as possible. In fact, city planners and despicable civil “engineers”, and I use that word loosely, actively PROMOTE high population densities because it makes delivering government services less expensive. Never mind promoting an acre of land and self sufficiency, oh no, it is much better to pack people in like sardines. Brilliant. For you fact checkers out there, the United States has roughly 2.4 billion acres of land and water and only about 304 million people. Civil engineers, psssh, a better term would be “morons”.

So, here then is how this all comes back to the homosexuality debate in this country and specifically homosexual marriage. Everyone is focused on the wrong thing. Instead of debating whether or not people are “born that way” or whether same sex marriage should be legal, we should all be trying to figure out the root cause of homosexuality. Homosexuality is a symptom of a PROBLEM, regardless of whether or not homosexuals are born that way, there has to be a REASON why they exhibit a predilection for something that does not promote the species and the survival of their own genes. Homosexuality certainly does no good in preserving the species; or does it?

Look at it this way, if simpler organisms, such as meerkats, have instinctual, utilitarian survival mechanisms related to overpopulation that can kick in automatically, then why WOULDN’T we expect that we humans ALSO have the same kinds of survival mechanisms built into our biology as well? Survival mechanisms we may not fully understand or even realize we have. Think of a pool of primordial ooze where the first single cell organisms are quickly consuming all available resources. If they continue, they will all perish and so adaptation and evolution steps in and throws a biological switch on some percentage of these organisms that essentially says “don’t reproduce”. Perhaps there is an as yet unknown biochemical mechanism which occurs during pregnancy or during early childhood development when the body senses stress brought about by overpopulation and overcrowding that manifests itself as homosexuality. In meerkats, this same stress might manifest itself as a predisposition towards infanticide.

Remember, we supposedly evolved on the same wide open plains and grasslands as those meerkats. Our bodies may therefore react to the pressures and environment of modern human society in ways we may not otherwise predict. We need to listen to ourselves because our bodies are trying to tell us something, something important. It is a message that has been whispered throughout the ages and only now rises to a deafening crescendo…

“Civil engineers are idiots.”