A gay whale used as a political metaphor

In fact, these whales were his mom and siblings. As this species is deep diving, we as humans only get to observe this species for the brief moments they are at the surface, meaning there could be a lot more going on between these besties than meets the eye.

We, however, have a lot more in common than we think. Others body politic: a political community conceived as a physical body. While the Spice Girls may have coined the term Girl Power in the late s, whales have been living this slogan since time immemorial.

Killer whales typically stay with their moms their whole lives, but sometimes, male whales are seen outside of their immediate family group. I argue that at this time in history, literature is the most definitive authority on the multifarious nature of whales.

Dolphins, however, are not alone in this. Back when Northern Resident killer whale C1 Namu was accidentally captured in nets in British Columbia in the s, and subsequently transported to Seattle aquarium in a floating sea pen, the media considered the whales following Namu to be his wife and children.

Cetaceans i. Female humpback whales have previously been recorded singing usually a trait exclusive to male whales during the breeding season. Wu Tsang’s MOBY DICK; or, The Whale revisits the Great American Novel as political allegory, queer romance and sci-fi fantasia Moby-Dick is one of those books that many people vaguely know even if they haven’t read it.

In western Australia, male bottlenose dolphins regularly take part in sexual contact with other males to strengthen long-term alliances and maintain social structure. Bottlenose dolphins off western UK waters have also been reported to exhibit similar behavior.

The first time that sex between two humpback whales was photographed and it happened to be between two male whales. Herman Melville’s novel about a whaling ship setting sail from. Some of the first people to study killer whales also thought that pods were led by the largest male in the group i.

Because of their both terrifying and awe-inducing nature, whales are sublime. Females however are not alone in this. Which leads to the question — what can whales tell us about human queer identities? Whether these whales are together through circumstance i.

Whilst we can only attribute physical sexual observations to whales due to the limitations of field research and our understanding, it is possible that whales exhibit more than sexually-driven attraction for the same-sex.

Gay As a Whale

This group of species are considered more emotionally intelligent than humanssuggesting that their thoughts and emotions are more complex and developed than our own. Similarly, female sperm whales are considered to form life-long friendships with other females.

A Whale of a Tale: Activists Turned a Fascinating Discovery Into Political Propaganda How activist scientists exploited a rare discovery about a whale to push an agenda intended to ‘queer’ basic biological facts.

While our culture has historically had a negative attitude towards homosexuality, for over 1, species of animalhomosexual behavior is natural. Humpback whales were in the news recently for exhibiting the same behavior off the coast of Hawaii.

bread and circuses: satisfaction of shallow or immediate desires of the populace at the expense of good policy; also, the erosion of civic duty and the public life in a populace. Homosexual behaviors are more commonly observed between male whales maybe because it is more obvious….

As a result, the very social divisiveness that is both the cause and the effect of the metaphor coexists alongside an apparent cultural consen sus about the political meaning of Ahab's pursuit of the white whale. Whales are a powerful metaphor for politics on land, sexual predation, tyranny, and godliness.

A lot of the time, we humans like to consider ourselves unique, evolved, and somewhat separate from our animal cousins. This human bias also translates to the underwater world of whales. Whale families are more akin to human family structures led by single moms, lesbian moms, or moms raising their kids with a village of family and friends.