Relax (Don’t do it)

Some bonkers choreography with Heather Parisi, from the 80s Italian variety show Fantastico. Firstly, Frankie Goes to Hollywood never seemed so… confusing? It looks a bit like a toned down, bowdlerised high school production of Cruising. Still molto gay, though. If Heather’s dance partner is thinking about relaxing, doing it or coming, I very much doubt it involves her. Put some trousers on Heather, love. You’ll catch your death of cold.

Even better, here’s Heather again doing some way-ahead-of-their-time Gangnam Style ridiculous dressage pony moves and gurning to Tullio De Piscopo’s nail in Italo Disco’s coffin, Stop Bajon (Primavera). The smoke in these bubbles must be what the choreographer was inhaling when they came up with this number.

Watch out for a random, drunken, camp fellow enjoying his big acting break at 11:48, a bit of very irresponsible chiropraxy at 12.49, some very unsexy from 13.35, and– saints preserve us!– pierrots throughout.

 

 

Marry yourself

Merry War (Christmas is Over (If you want it))… or something!

Apparently there’s some kind of public holiday going on. But sod that, how about some proper “me time”? Why don’t you start the new year by having a solo wedding with yourself in Kyoto?

You are single and you don’t know if you would be able to get married and have a wedding ceremony in the near future, but you would like to have some pictures of yourself in a wedding gown or in a gorgeous bridal kimono now, when you are young and beautiful..

..or you even believe that you don’t really have to get engaged to be able to wear a bridal outfit..

..or you are already married, but didn’t have a proper ceremony with a beautiful dress and you find this fact to be quite regretful..

..or you did wear a dress, but it was so long time ago that you would like to experience it again, or you were too busy with the wedding preparations to enjoy yourself fully during your special day and you are looking for a second chance..

Offer yourself an opportunity to experience the feeling of being a princess in a beautiful and charming city of Kyoto!

I was lukewarm towards the whole thing until the part about being a princess in a beautiful and charming city of Kyoto. I’ve probably already missed the boat on being young and beautiful, but I’m definitely a fucking princess. For prices starting at ¥300,000 (about €2.000, £1,650 or $2,500) you can get a wedding dress or kimono, professional photos, flowers and whatnot. The previous sentence ending in “whatnot” perhaps gives you a clue that I’m not particularly au fait with weddings, but even I know it’s exciting that you can additionally hire a “Japanese man for image partner during the photo shoot… from ¥54,000 (clothing included).” I like them specifying that it’s a Japanese man. No way of knowing if he just happens to be the fellow who’s willing and available, or if they know their market and even the Russians or the English speakers want to pretend-marry a Japanese man.

In any case, just paying the Japanese man and sending him home is a great idea. His clothes are included. What more could you want? Much better than all the tedious stuff that comes after a real wedding, like having to live with him for years and years, and all that domestic shit. Ooh, your husband looks so handsome in the wedding photos. WHAT, WHO? NO, I DON’T EVEN KNOW THAT GUY. It might be worth the money and the effort just to mess with the heads of those smug couple-type people who never stop boring the shit out of you by talking about whatever banal thing their horrible kids have done recently. Pro tip: nobody cares, especially not other parents because they all just want to blather about their own children.

Incidentally, I’ve been to Kyoto and it really is beautiful and charming, at least in places. Not so much around the train station, but that’s true of most cities. Would it be out of order for me to set up a Kickstarter page so I can go back to Kyoto in 2015 and fulfil my dream of being a princess in a gorgeous bridal kimono?

I know I’m making fun of this thing, and it is (delightfully) daft. It’s probably not as daft as the aforementioned smugly coupled people might think, though. By 2015 33% of Japanese households will consist of a single person. The same more or less holds true throughout the developed world and has done for some time, although one wouldn’t think so based upon the relentless nuclear family or couple-orientation of everything around us: hotels and holidays, consumer products, insurance and financial products, film and television, advertising, government policy, societal attitudes and the thoughtless comments and ill-founded assumptions people make, the unaffordability and unavailability of homes for one person, the deprioritisation of homeless or vulnerably housed single people, ad infinitum. In 2012, 29% of the UK’s households consisted of a single person. According to the charity Age UK, about one million elderly people in Britain regularly go for at least a month without talking to another human being in any significant way, if at all. A recent BBC study showed that 7% of its respondents similarly expected to spend the winter holiday period completely alone, rising to 10% for over 65s. 28% of all the adults said they were lonely.

Of course not everyone who lives alone is lonely or doesn’t have a partner, because obviously you can be with somebody and not marry them or live with them. To suggest so is just another part of the whole outdated framework of assumptions that makes some people feel so desperately lonely at those times when there’s overwhelming pressure to be (or pretend to be) part of society’s groupthink. We could call it the Eleanor Rigby Fallacy, that an introverted or single person is ergo a lonely person. Thanks for another blot on the collective psyche, McCartney.

Likewise, you can also not be with anybody, not get married, not get partnered or raise a family in any way and still be perfectly happy; if that’s what a person wants then it’s nobody else’s business and nobody needs to make comments, conjectures or insinuations about it. Especially during the darkest part of the winter and the new year/Christmas holidays, it would still be nice if people who aren’t alone had a bit more consideration – or indeed any consideration whatsoever– for those who are. If a person either by choice or circumstance is single but wants to do things that couples or families do, then why shouldn’t they? In short: fuck it, marry yourself if you want and good luck to you. Offer yourself an opportunity.

Shunga? I hardly even know her!

Erotic Japanese prints at The British Museum

See I WONDER IF THEY’LL BE HUMANS OR VEGETABLES? for an explanation of this image, at least in so far as any explanation is possible.

Last week I had the chance to visit the British Museum’s exhibition of shunga, which translates as the rather euphemistic “Spring paintings”: Japanese erotic prints and books from the medieval period up to the turn of the twentieth century. So it’s Spring as in sap rising, if you know what I mean.

Given the enduring popularity at this blog of James Joyce’s bum letters and the number of people who come here trying to find out (in English) what the octopus is saying in Hokusai’s Dream of the Fisherman’s Wife, I thought some of you perverts scholars may be interested to hear a bit about the exhibition. It’s worth a visit if you can get to London and you’re into Japanese culture and/or smutty pictures; therein lies one of the unintentionally funny things about it. Yes, every single day at the British Museum hundreds of respectable middle class people are spending a hour or more scrutinising vintage porn with no holds barred depictions of what goes where. I suspect many of them would say (like the complacent wife in Airplane!) that Jim never looks at porn when he’s at home, and many of them are Telegraph readers or Guardianistas who’d probably assert that pornography is demeaning and sordid. Yet here they are, earnestly checking out pictures of famous actors’ penises… albeit famous actors’ penises from over a century ago. It’s all strangely un-arousing anyway, at least to me.

There are also some inadvertently amusing pseudo-scholarly captions such as “the unusually large size of the colour print serves to accomodate the orgy”. Er, yes… it does. The print in question (circa 1785) shows a travelling salesman being set upon by six housewives who in true pornographic style are all absolutely gagging for it, proving that where (heterosexual/heteronormative male) sexual fantasies are concerned, plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.

Complaints about pornography being unrealistic and damaging to the body images of “real” people are also nothing new. In 1254 a chap called Tachibana no Narisue wrote that “the old [shunga] masters depict the size of the thing far too large … If it were depicted actual size there would be nothing of interest. For that reason, don’t we say art is fantasy?”

If you’re on the front page this post has some rather explicit images and text after the “continue reading” link, so NSFW unless you work at a Japanese vendor of sexy prints during the Edo era, OK?

Gay Pride March of the Penguins

The final post inspired by Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity by Bruce Bagemihl. Penguins and their gayness hardly need an introduction given the ubiquity of “on the lighter side” news reports about male Penguin couples in zoos. Wild Humboldt Penguins live in groups of 10-60 individuals, but King Penguin communities can consist of up to 300,000 pairs. Lifelong homosexual pair bonds develop between male Humboldts. They usually live together in a nest they’ve built. They also both take part in the magnificently named “ecstatic display” in which the male stretches out his head and neck, flapping his flippers and emitting a loud braying sound.

Males in heterosexual pairs also sometimes court and copulate with other heterosexually paired males and with females other than their own mate. In zoo populations of Humboldts, at least 5% of all pairs are exclusively homosexual. Other males are bisexual, pairing with males after losing a female partner.

Homosexual relationships between King Penguins are less durable, often ending in divorce after about a year. Like Humboldts, some King Penguins never show any interest in heterosexual relationships.

There are other variations on the monogamous pair and the nuclear family. About a quarter of heterosexual pairings end in divorce, often with the female leaving the male. About 6% of chicks are raised by single parents. Like the Hooded Warblers mentioned last time, Penguins occasionally (about 5% of the time) form trios. Non breeding females may join a breeding pair as a kind of nanny. Kidnap of eggs or chicks by chickless penguins occurs sometimes. It’s like a Penguin soap opera. 

Humboldt Penguin (Spheniscus humboldti)

King Penguin (Aptenodytes patagonicus)

Homosexuality: Female & Male Behaviours: Courtship, Affectionate, Sexual, Pair-bonding, Parenting Ranking: Moderate Observed: Wild, Captivity

(See It’s Gay Animal Fortnight for an explanation of this box.)

Next time… something not about gay animals!

Original Penguin image from Wikipedia Commons.

Songbird divorces

More from Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity by Bruce Bagemihl. Hooded Warblers are small yellow, green and black songbirds who spend the summer in North America and winters in Mexico and Central America.

These birds take part in all manner of homosexual and alternate-heterosexual family arrangements. Heterosexual pairs rarely build nests, but when two males get together they build one together. Sometimes they raise eggs that have been parasitically laid in their nest by a Cowbird. Male pairs also adopt eggs that have been abandoned by a female Warbler, or they shack up with another male after the female leaves; up to 50% of heterosexual pairings lead to this kind of “divorce”. There are also three-way partnerships in addition to pairs, but despite this superficial monogamy (or binogamy) over a third of Hooded Warbler young were fathered by males playing away from their partners. Single parenting is also common.

Plumage transvestism (i.e. females having some degree of male plumage and therefore a transgendered appearance) is also very frequent. This ranges from having a few black feathers on the head like a male to being visually indistinguishable from a male. In this species males are mostly the only ones who sing, but some of the transvestite females are able to sing as well.

Hooded Warbler (Wilsonia citrina)

Homosexuality: Male Transgender: Transvestism Behaviours: Pair-bonding, Parenting Ranking: Moderate Observed: Wild

(See It’s Gay Animal Fortnight for an explanation of this box.)

Next time on Gay Animal Fortnight… gay pride march of the Penguins

Original Hooded Warbler image from Wikipedia Commons.

You catch more Flycatchers with honey…

More from Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity by Bruce Bagemihl. Ocher-Bellied Flycatchers are small, long-tailed, olive green birds who live in lowland forests between Mexico and the Amazon.

These Flycatchers have a complex social organisation and three distinct types of male. About 42% are territorial, defending “courts” in the foliage within which they perform courtship displays. Sometimes groups of these territorials form an area of several nearby display courts, also known as a lek. 10% of males are satellites who associate with territorials but do not display. This could be regarded as a form of apprenticeship, since they often inherit the territory when the owner retires. 48% of males are itinerant and have no territory either of their own or in waiting.

The aim of the male leks is to attract a female mate, but territorial males will also court other males who visit. These visiting males will adopt the behaviour of females in every detail and be courted as if they really were female. Most interestingly of all, it appears that the courting males only realise that their mate is male when they reach the point of mating with them. At this point they will usually chase away the behaviourally “transvestite” male. The itinerant males, conversely, must be well aware that they are being courted by another male. There have been observations of apparently bisexual territorial males who court females in their own territory, but then go as a visitor in search of same-sex action in the territories of other males.

Ocher-Bellied Flycatcher (Mionectes oleagineus dyscola)

Homosexuality: Male Transgender: Transvestism Behaviours: Courtship Ranking: Incidental Observed: Wild

(See It’s Gay Animal Fortnight for an explanation of this box.)

Next time on Gay Animal Fortnight… more tiny avian transvestites!

No sex please, we’re Proboscis Monkeys

More from Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity by Bruce Bagemihl. The Proboscis Monkey and its extraordinary nose lives in Borneo. The species is regarded as vulnerable, one stage away from being endangered.

Proboscis groups are centred around a polygamous male with several adult female mates, although males have little say in the group’s social life or decision making. Female relationships hold the group together and most friendly or aggressive interactions take place between females. You could possibly conceptualise it from a less patriarchal and heteronormative viewpoint as a group of females who maintain a single male partner that they agree to share. Sometimes the “excess” males band together in all-male troops.

Both males and females take part in homosexual activity, although neither heterosexual and homosexual advances are always welcomed and the aggressor will try to force them. But sexual activity of any orientation is fairly rare. In one study, there were only 12 mountings in a whole year, two of which (17%) were same-sex. 28% of all adult males never have heterosexual relations because they live in all-male groups. Proboscis Monkeys will even try to stop others having sex. Attempted heterosexual copulations gather audiences who try to disrupt the mating pair by climbing on them, pulling the male’s nose, making noises, or making distracting movements. It’s like a mashup of monkey porn and Mystery Science Theater 3000.

Proboscis Monkey (Nasalis larvatus)

Homosexuality: Female & Male Behaviours: Affectionate, Sexual, Pair-bonding Ranking: Incidental Observed: Wild, Captivity

(See It’s Gay Animal Fortnight for an explanation of this box.)

Next time on Gay Animal Fortnight… Boy Flycatchers who like Boy Flycatchers who act like Girl Flycatchers.

Original Proboscis Monkey image from Wikipedia Commons.

The gay marriages of Swans

More from Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity by Bruce Bagemihl. Mute (European and temperate Asian) Swans are already quite well known for forming same sex partnerships, if only because newspapers and local news TV stations never seem to tire of reporting them as “amusing” filler items, as if there was something inherently absurd or comedic about them. By now you should be getting the idea that there’s nothing aberrant about it. Pairs of males, pairs of females, pairs who mate heterosexually only so one of them can get an egg of their own (i.e. what would be called among humans surrogate parenthood), and parents fostering cygnets to whom they have no biological connection: all of these are relatively common, naturally occurring and well-documented family arrangements for Swans. About 20-25% of successful (meaning in this case raising one or more cygnets to adulthood) Swan families have homosexual parents.

Mute Swan (Cygnus olor)

Homosexuality: Female & Male Behaviours: Courtship, Sexual, Pair-bonding, Parenting Ranking: Primary Observed: Wild, Semiwild, Captivity

(See It’s Gay Animal Fortnight for an explanation of this box.)

In addition to same-sex parenthood, some Swans appear to be “exclusively” homosexual. Female pairs may sit on unfertilised eggs because they’ve never mated with a male, and male pairs sometimes build nests together but never show any interest in acquiring eggs or cygnets. Moreover, up to 89% of individuals (and rarely less than 50%) in any given Swan population are barely reproductive, or they’re asexual and never attempt to breed at all. Many birds may only nest once or twice in a lifetime of 15-20 years. Male swans sometimes shack up with homosexual birds of other species, including other types of swans, or geese.

Next time on Gay Animal Fortnight… big nose means big everything? Or you’re a Proboscis Monkey.

Original Swan image from Wikipedia Commons.

I love you *VOMITS BLOOD*

More from Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity by Bruce Bagemihl. The Common Vampire Bat is a small flying mammal that lives in central America. Obviously their most famous trait is their thirst for blood. Vampire colonies usually have between 20-100 members, though there can be up to 2,000. The main social unit is the female group of 8-12 related bats. Males sometimes have “bachelor” groups that roost in the same places as the females.

Females often mate with several males, although a vaginal plug forms after the first mating so only one of them is likely to inseminate her. When not in heat the females refuse to mate at all, and they’ll defend their refusal with as much violence as is necessary. They also exercise their prerogative to refuse males whose approaches they deem too aggressive.

Vampire Bat (Desmodus rotundus)

Homosexuality: Female & Male Behaviours: Affectionate, Sexual, Pair-bonding Ranking: Moderate Observed: Wild, Captivity

(See It’s Gay Animal Fortnight for an explanation of this box.)

Elephants and the S-shaped configuration

More from Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity by Bruce Bagemihl. Elephants hardly need any introduction and since they weigh up to 7½ tons they definitely don’t need an introduction when you stand next to one. Sadly both the African Elephant and the Asiatic Elephant are endangered species. African Elephants live in Sub-Saharan parts of the continent; both sexes have tusks. Asiatic Elephants range from India through southeast Asia to China. They are slightly smaller in general, with smaller ears and tusks only on the male.

Elephants are matriarchal and have complex social lives. Females live in matriarchal herds, while bulls generally live alone or in smaller male-only herds. The sexes are mostly segregated and antagonistic towards each other. Females show solidarity towards one another and care for the group’s calves collectively. Unlike animals like the Manatee or the Walrus, female Elephants actively fight back against male abuse. Females charge and chase offending males, and they will intervene to forbid males from mating with juveniles of either sex.

African Elephant (Loxodonta africana)

Homosexuality: Female & Male Behaviours: Affectionate, Sexual, Pair-bonding Ranking: Moderate Observed: Wild

(See It’s Gay Animal Fortnight for an explanation of this box.)