I hadn't visited Andrew Sullivan's blog since late last year, when he soaked my screen with tears following the 2004 anti-gay marriage referendum outcomes. He is a smart guy and good writer, though, even if everything he sees is tainted with his pink-colored glasses. He posted a rejoinder to moral conservatives who have been praising March of the Penguins. I don't know if his facts are accurate, but they probably are. We are, after all, dealing with animals:
I'm writing a column on penguins and the culture wars. Here's a factual nugget that I found interesting. Some on the religious right have hailed the new - and wonderful - movie, "The March of the Penguins" as a socially conservative morality tale. Michael Medved even went so far as to argue that the penguin documentary "passionately affirms traditional norms like monogamy, sacrifice and child rearing." Well, not quite. It turns out that monogamy varies a lot among birds and even among penguin species. The emperor penguins featured in the movie have a very low monogamy habit. From year to year, only 15 percent of the blokes mate with the same, er, chick. Imagine humans with an 85 percent annual divorce rate. That's the model that some on the religious right are now touting. Maybe they should re-think. When they're not gay, these birds have as many spouses as Larry King. Even Liz Taylor beats them on the marriage front, I think.
Link.
