My thoughts on Bird Porn

Among the protests at the DNC there was an interesting group that caught the attention of such crack reporters as Dave Barry and James Lileks.

The group was advocating banning bird watching because of its negative effect on bird populations.  The basics of their argument (which is in no way based on scientific fact) is that birds are aware they are being watched so they are not breeding and populations have thus declined, and also that bird watchers are voyeuristic pervs.

Just the sort of pervy thing bird watchers like

I feel that I can speak profoundly on this issue because I received my bachelors degree in salamander pornography. Well, technically the degree says zoology but my research project consisted of making salamander porn videos and observing courtship in person.  The courtship behavior is biologically important for understanding the relatedness of different species, but that's another story all together.  Basically, I would spend many hours a day reviewing video tape and noting interesting behavior, it was all very scientific and a little boring.  

"Bitch stop staring at me!"

Now back to the issue of bird porn.  I would first like to point out that like salamanders, birds lack external genitalia and because of this the sex part of mating lasts a few seconds and does not resemble mammalian sex in many ways (unless you are a very unlucky mammal, but that's a different issue all together.)  So what we are really observing by in large is courtship or foreplay.  

Frigate bird foreplay

Now that we've straightened that out I can get to the main problem I have with their argument.  They are making one very important and very miss-guided assumption:

Birds are self conscious about sex

I don't believe that for a second!  My argument against this assumption is also really not based on scientific fact but instead my own observations.  Since I have in-fact studied animal behavior extensively in the past I feel comfortable with this basis.  

I have seen my own pets act ashamed or guilty when they behave badly, but I have never seen such behavior in a wild animal.  Even with the captive wild birds who have spent their whole adult lives working with humans are simply not ashamed or shy about their sexuality.  And to get back to domestic animals, nearly every day I see my own pet birds masturbate quite shamelessly, ringing bells and whistling at themselves during and just after the act.  When my dogs have made a mess or chewed on something they shouldn't have they feel guilty and it's quite obvious from their behavior.  But they never feel that way about sexual gratification, even if we tell them to knock it off.  They are quite content to ignore us and anyone else in their presence.  

Are all the animals I've spent time with in my life merely exhibitionists?  I certainly hope not because I think that may reflect on my own personality in some disparaging way.  Regardless of that, I have a bit of advice for the wackaloons at stopbirdporn.org, you want to save the worlds declining bird populations?  Put the time, money and effort you are wasting on your current cause into conserving and creating bird habitat.