Polar bear dispute

A lot of ignorant people are calling David Attenborough a hoaxer for using footage of zoo-dwelling polar bears in his latest nature programme. I bet these foolish hypocrites have enjoyed countless action movies in which stuntmen pretend to be Bruce Willis or Daniel Craig. What D.A. did was far more justified because: (i) there are no A-list actors in the polar bear community and (ii) all polar bears look the same to humans. Television viewers who want to see close-ups of real wild polar bears should piss off to the North Pole with a pair of binoculars. 

I have to be honest and declare a personal interest here. D.A. is a personal friend who has often asked me about gorilla etiquette. He once hired me as a consultant for a film shoot in the Congo. 

“Is it OK if I grunt and make eye-contact with the females?” he asked. 

“Not advisable with wild females, Davy,” I said. “They might think you were making a pass at them and end up sitting on your face. I suggest you shoot the scene at London Zoo. The female gorillas there are used to men flirting with them and know it’s just pussy-teasing.” 

Davy did as I suggested, and the BBC obtained some brilliant footage of him chatting up a female gorilla as she pouted and fluttered her eyelids. One of the most enthralling scenes ever filmed in a natural history show. 

Humans often ask me whether I approve of wildlife documentaries. It’s the sort of question that makes me want to lie on my back and scratch my chin with my toes. Like many things in life, they have their pros and cons. A positive feature is that the sex they contain is suitable for family audiences. Because let’s face it, most human parents are far too embarrassed to tell their children how babies are made. It’s much easier to let them watch animals do it and put two-and-two together. 

This is why documentary-makers should exercise discretion in the species they select for their hard-core scenes. Definitely not baboons. After watching them mate, boys might think that having sex involves drilling away for 10 seconds like a woodpecker and then running off to boast about it to their buddies. Elephants are not advisable either. The size and shape of a bull elephant’s appendage makes me clench my anus, so heaven knows how innocent girls would react. 

So much for the sex, but what about the violence? In my view, it gives modern humans the same kind of kicks that the Roman amphitheatre used to provide. Why are lions the most popular wildlife attraction? Because people want to see them chase down a zebra and bite chunks out of it. As a vegetarian gorilla, I find it pretty sickening, but at least lions don’t combine their violence with sex, like in a Tarentino movie. Can anyone explain why the black crime baron got raped by the white gimp-handler in Pulp Fiction? If that’s entertainment, I’m a duck-billed platypus.

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The erect posture

A professor from Utah is saying that man began walking upright to gain an advantage in fighting for females. A bipedal posture, he claims, makes it easier to punch your rival’s lights out and carry off his woman. To prove his point, he organised a few boxing matches between tall men and hunchbacks to see who could hit harder. 

The professor has my admiration for propounding his theory with a straight face and getting people to fund his slapstick experiments. It’s just as well no one thought of the obvious point that women also walk upright. If the sole purpose of posture were mating, they would squat on all fours like vixens in heat while the men slugged it out for the right to mount them. 

In reality, no sensible woman wants two men to fight over her. Being human, she is bound to prefer the good-looking one, so what would happen if he lost? The victorious Mr Goatface would come trotting over to claim his prize, not in a mood to take no for an answer. Even if Pretty Boy won, imagine the wear-and-tear he would be carrying from the recent battle. A broken nose? Missing teeth? Damage to the reproductive equipment if the fighting got dirty? In the light of these grievous perils, a woman’s best option is to elope with her favoured suitor, leaving his rival to run around holding his dick. 

I’m not saying that a woman should reject violence in all situations. Suppose, for example, that she and her fancy man were ambushed by an evil-looking ruffian intent on pillage and rapine. If you believe Hollywood, she has nothing better to do than watch from the sidelines while her beau and the ruffian fight to the death. The feminist in me rejects this portrayal of women as helpless sissies. What a resourceful woman would do is find a blunt instrument and circle the adversaries cagily until an opportunity arose to wallop the brigand on the back of the skull. As any female gorilla will tell you, there’s nothing unfeminine about sneaking up on a marauder and laying him out cold. 

Now the crux of the matter, of which the professor seems oblivious, is that humans are not built for unarmed combat. If Mother Nature had intended man to be a pugilist, she would have given him longer arms and a smaller nose. The last thing you need in a fist fight is an easy target in the middle of your face. 

The real reason why humans walk upright is well-known to students of African zoology: the erect posture intimidates carnivores like lions, who stupidly believe that anyone taller than them must be strong enough to kick their arses. Hence, a couple of audacious humans can drive an entire lion pride off its kill by walking up to them boldly and telling them to fuck off when they snarl. 

I should hasten to add that such bare-faced chicanery would never work with primates. You need cleverer tricks than walking tall to steal a monkey’s banana. 

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