Nature is shocking!

At least, according to the New York Times, nature shocks people when the subject is natural homosexuality. So goes this discussion of homosexual behavior in a pair of penguins named Roy and Silo:

Roy and Silo are hardly unusual. Milou and Squawk, two young males, are also beginning to exhibit courtship behavior, hanging out with each other, billing and bowing. Before them, the Central Park Zoo had Georgey and Mickey, two female Gentoo penguins who tried to incubate eggs together. And Wendell and Cass, a devoted male African penguin pair, live at the New York Aquarium in Coney Island. Indeed, scientists have found homosexual behavior throughout the animal world.

This growing body of science has been increasingly drawn into charged debates about homosexuality in American society, on subjects from gay marriage to sodomy laws, despite reluctance from experts in the field to extrapolate from animals to humans. Gay groups argue that if homosexual behavior occurs in animals, it is natural, and therefore the rights of homosexuals should be protected. On the other hand, some conservative religious groups have condemned the same practices in the past, calling them "animalistic."

But if homosexuality occurs among animals, does that necessarily mean that it is natural for humans, too? And that raises a familiar question: if homosexuality is not a choice, but a result of natural forces that cannot be controlled, can it be immoral?

The open discussion of homosexual behavior in animals is relatively new. "There has been a certain cultural shyness about admitting it," said Frans de Waal, whose 1997 book, "Bonobo: The Forgotten Ape" (University of California Press), unleashed a torrent of discussion about animal sexuality. Bonobos, apes closely related to humans, are wildly energetic sexually. Studies show that whether observed in the wild or in captivity, nearly all are bisexual, and nearly half their sexual interactions are with the same sex. Female bonobos have been observed to engage in homosexual activity almost hourly.

Before his own book, "American scientists who investigated bonobos never discussed sex at all," said Mr. de Waal, director of the Living Links Center of the Yerkes Primate Center at Emory University in Atlanta.

I am not sure that morality is the issue here, so much as honesty.

Depending on who does the defining, nature may well be said to be "immoral", but it can hardly be said to be "unnatural."

What has not been documented among animals is prejudice against homosexuality. Is it known to occur in nature?

I guess that depends on who gets to define "nature."

I take back everything I said! These animals must be made aware of natural law! Someone, quick! Get to work fast to stop depravity in our nation's zoos. These animals are acting in clear defiance of "God's warnings." They are committing crimes against nature!

Don't they know that they are in clear violation of the "laws of nature and of nature's god"?

Isn't there a way to educate them about what nature commands?

Maybe Fred Phelps can put up one of his plaques in front of the penguin exhibit.

I guess that in the days of ancient Greece and Rome, nature hadn't been invented yet. Where were Phelps and his buddies when civilization needed them?

(Link to penguin story courtesy of a friend whose business is hotter than Hell.)

UPDATE: Eugene Volokh (via Glenn Reynolds) offers a serious answer to Jerry Falwell's (and others') nonsense argument that the immorality of homosexuality is proven by its nonexistence in animals:

...[S]ince people have made the "animals don't do it, so it's unnatural, and so it's evil" argument -- and, to my knowledge, continue doing so -- it seems quite right to point out that the argument is wrong not just in one way, but in two. First, as the reader writes, what animals do or do not do is no guide for how humans should act. But second, as a factual matter, homosexuality isn't something done only by man, who fell in the Garden of Eden -- it's something that other animals do, too.

MORE: Justin Case has called my attention to a book titled Biological Exuberance which explores such animal behavior in detail. Haven't searched Amazon.com for it yet, so I don't know the publisher.

Penguin Classic, perhaps?

(I certainly hope Linux fans will take no offense....)