What Other Dogs Hump

In response to a letter to the editor in the Index, the campus weekly newspaper:

I have a dog named Rudy, and he is a boy dog. He goes out and finds a pillow, stuffed animal, or a person's legs, and he falls in love. Then he humps it. Does this make my dog leg-sexual? No, it makes him a dog that likes to hump things.

The argument that homosexuality is “abnormal” or “unnatural” is poorly reasoned. First, “normality” is a construct of society, based on what the majority finds acceptable. There is no set standard for normal, and if there were, no one would fit the mold, because everyone is different in some way.

Furthermore, what is considered normal changes? What is considered abnormal one year might not cause such a fuss the next year. One hundred years ago a woman who was thirty years old, single, and held a job would definitely been considered abnormal (or more likely a prostitute). Today, that same woman could walk down the street without anyone even noticing or caring. In fact, people today balk at how ridiculously and ludicrously oppressed women of that time were. How do think people one hundred years from now will think about the current social oppression of homosexuals?

Second, as far a homosexuality being “unnatural,” there is overwhelming documentation of homosexuality in all types and species of animals, from beloved canines like Buffy and Rudy to gorillas in the wild. One of the most famous cases in the U.S. is that of the two homosexual male penguins, Roy and Silo, in New York's Central Park Zoo. The couple was together for eight years – seven years longer than any of their heterosexual zoomates – and built nests, ate, socialized, and lived relatively normal penguin lives.

In his book Biological Exuberance: Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity, Bruce Bagemihl examines scientific documentation from the past century that includes the homosexual, bisexual, and transgender behavior of many different species of animal (mostly birds and mammals, considered the most highly evolved). So, are these animals unnatural when they have sex with others f the same sex? Does this make them “gay” geese and “lesbian” orangutans?

The thing that seems most unnatural to me about homosexuality is how it is treated in our society. For hundreds of years homosexuality had been accepted by some cultures, revered by others, or at least ignored by most. But now many in our current culture are trying to eliminate homosexuality for seemingly no reason at all, using the pathetically weak arguments that “it's unnatural” or “God doesn't like it.” When was the last time you heard a penguin refused the right to mate with whomever it chose or a gorilla killed simply because enjoyed having sexual relations with other female gorillas?

Your dog Buffy probably doesn't particularly care who or what other dogs hump. Why should you care who any other human being humps?

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