Book Review: Dr. Strangeape,or How to Learn to Stop Worrying and Love the Bonobo

Following on the heels of Sex at Dawn (Ryan and Jethá, 2010) comes another effort to place bonobos on center stage in the study of human nature. Sex therapist and talk show host Susan Block has written a self-help book that offers to improve our lives through the “alternative great ape paradigm” (p. 55) of peace, love, and sexual liberation represented by the bonobo. In The Bonobo Way, Block advises that recognizing and tuning in to our “inner bonobo” can bring positive consequences such as improvement in one's sex life, interpersonal relationships, and mental health. While not a scholarly book by any measure, it demands some treatment, for, like Sex at Dawn, it bears on the public's understanding of bonobos, humans, and the science that informs this understanding. Being interested in the application of nonhuman primates to analyses of human behavior, I managed to get through this muddled book, and feel that there are important lessons to be learned from it, although the lessons to be learned are not the advice offered by Block.

In the opening chapter of the book, Block urges that the time is ripe to “learn as much as we can from [bonobos] about our noblest and kinkiest characteristics, our capacity for peace (even world peace) through pleasure, more satisfying relationships, better communication, hotter sex and deeper love” (p. 10). This statement would seem to make sense only if it is assumed that 1) bonobos and humans are sufficiently similar for one species to hold useful lessons for the other; and/or 2) that bonobos surpass humans in the aforementioned qualities. Block holds both assumptions, and the phrase “inner bonobo” is used as shorthand for this position. The phrase “inner bonobo” is not merely metaphorical, for Block argues that humans and bonobos really are more similar than generally acknowledged. The first 15 chapters of the book are dedicated to convincing the reader of what she sees as the essential nature shared by humans and bonobos.

The case for the supposed affinity between humans and bonobos is built on a foundation that commingles personal intuition, extrapolation from first and secondhand observations of apes, and censored, biased presentation of primatological knowledge of bonobo sexuality and behavior. Block makes no secret about her affection for this particular ape (she is especially keen on empathizing with their sexual activities), and this fondness freely colors her own, as well as others' descriptions of bonobo behavior, all the while imparting to the species a remarkably humanlike psychology. The identification of tenuous similarities between bonobo and human behavior are made to seem more significant and substantial than they might be through the employment of what are typically human-centric descriptors. Several anecdotes and a modicum of observational and experimental studies are mentioned to support Block's description of bonobos as “compassionate,” “loving,” “sensuous,” “empathetic,” “humane” (to name just a few terms), and their sexual activity as “extremely passionate and deeply intimate” (p. 17). Readers who have observed bonobo behavior can decide for themselves whether they concur with the suitability of these adjectives, but they appear to be strategically employed by the author to portray bonobos as more ideally human at the same time that other discussions elsewhere in the book depict humans as more bonoboesque, at least ideally. This anthropomorphization reaches the heights of absurdity when, describing Taoist, Daoist, and tantric sex practices, we are told that “[t]hough these techniques tend to be quite challenging for humans, it's stuff that most bonobos do pretty naturally” (p. 68).

Block acknowledges the problems inherent in her anthropomorphizing, but contends it is less problematic than “anthropodenial” (pp. 60–61), which she considers to be rejection of “the scientific evidence that we humans are great apes closely related to other great apes” (p. 61). Watching bonobos, she opines, is a good antidote for those in denial of their apehood, as this exercise “tends to crack the false veneer of anthropodenial, revealing the inner core of our deep evolutionary connection” (p. 62). The close evolutionary relatedness and genetic similarity between humans and other apes is brought up repeatedly as if it constituted evidence for the claim that we humans are harbingers of an “inner bonobo.” Recognition of our relationship to other apes doesn't necessitate that we are like them in any particular respect. Phylogenetic distance alone does not provide sufficient grounds for arguing that species are similar for any trait; nor that they should be dissimilar on some trait in question. The utility of comparative genomics and phylogenetics in biology depends upon our comprehension of evolutionary processes, and they do not lend themselves easily to facile postulations of expected phenotypic similarities based solely on genetic similitude.

The exploitation of “our deep evolutionary connection” to bonobos finds its most direct application in the book's description of human sexuality. In so doing, Block's technique of argumentation includes the use of examples of minority sexual practices and preferences to make sweeping claims about universal sexual psychology. Likening human swingers to bonobos, she writes that participation in “the Lifestyle [swinging] fulfills a very natural desire that bonobos and humans share: the need to partake in erotic, orgasmic experiences with multiple friends, loved ones and attractive strangers” (pp. 62–63). Indeed, she contends that this need is nothing new. Paraphrasing the authors of Sex at Dawn (Ryan and Jethá, 2010), Block relates that “prehistoric humans participated in various forms of bonoboesque ‘free love,’ group sex and multi-partner arrangements … for tens of thousands of years before the advent of farming and our current ownership-oriented, property based, paternity-obsessed society” (p. 63). As do Ryan and Jethá, Block points the finger at agriculture as the source of stultification of our bonobolike sexuality, especially for women, but maintains that modern society masks, but has not changed, our promiscuous nature. Remarking on the (unspecified) rates of infidelity, divorce, pornography consumption, and (quite curiously) sexual attraction to one's affinal kin, she argues that these phenomena are indicators of humans' natural promiscuity: “it seems that a human's sexual desire is as promiscuous as a bonobo's” (p. 64). As for those humans who are monogamous, it is Block's opinion that “[s]ome of us can keep our natural desires for erotic novelty, variety and community under control more easily than others and live happily in monogamous marriages” (ibid). This characterization of human sexuality suffers from the same evidentiary and theoretical shortcomings as Sex at Dawn (see Ellsworth, 2011, 2012; Saxon, 2012).

Sex differences in promiscuous impulses are minimized in Block's account. But where they are acknowledged, disparities in sexual desire between men and women are attributed, in part, to the repressive influences of modern society (e.g., p. 122), and also to women's abilities to better hide their true desires, “especially when there are babies to burp or reputations to uphold” (p. 64). Block refers to babies to care for, and reputations to protect, but does not seems to understand the significance of these two things for understanding human sex differences in sexual desire. Perhaps she privately does, but to acknowledge the significance of these forces on the evolution of human sexuality would severely compromise her arguments, as it demands recognition of the fact that women are not expected to have desires for sexual variety and quantity identical to men. To argue that females are as interested as males in sexual variety is to buy into a sexist worldview wherein the male is the typical specimen of the species by which to compare females (Saxon, 2012). Although ostensibly parading under the guise of liberation, such a position is no less sexist or anti-feminist than is the oppression of women's sexuality.

Male-female differences in sexuality are a ubiquitous feature of sexually reproducing organisms. And, contrary to Block's assertions, sex is never egalitarian, not even for the bonobo. A few brief statements acknowledge the political dimension of sexual activity in bonobos, but the issue is not pursued further in any depth. Instead, bonobo sexual behavior is largely portrayed as recreational and playful—as if it has only a vague connection to reproduction. The competitive and political aspects must be overlooked to maintain the image of bonobo sex as carefree and communal. If Block had examined the political side of sex, it would have become clear that among bonobos sex is a mechanism of achieving and maintaining status, and a means of social manipulation wielded mainly by females. Most noncopulatory sexual behavior in bonobos takes the form of genito-genital rubbing between adult females, with subordinate females using their sexual receptivity to curry favor from higher-ranking females, most often in the context of feeding. Note that selection pressures for variety and quantity of reproductive partners are not the same as those for nonconceptive sexual activity such as genito-genital rubbing, as female bonobos display discriminative mate choice around the time of ovulation (see summary in Saxon, 2012). Studies of wild chimpanzees and bonobos have demonstrated that bonobo males and females copulate at a lower rate than chimpanzee males and females, and that like chimps, the majority of copulations take place during the time of maximal sexual swelling of females (see Stanford, 1998). For bonobo males, sexual activity drops off sharply during adolescence due to exclusion from access to reproductive females by the dominant males of a group (de Waal and Lanting, 1997). So bonobo males do not have a free pass to sexual amusements, as Block would have her reader believe. In fact, studies of genes involved in sperm production on the Y chromosome of great apes suggest that bonobos, in comparison to chimpanzees, are characterized by less sperm competition than chimps, and in this respect are closer to gorillas and humans in terms of limitation of male sexual opportunities by females and other males (Schaller et al., 2010). Thus, maybe in some respects bonobos are similar to humans in sexual behavior, but not in the ways that Block intends to convey, and the differences are far greater than the similarities. If we do wish to focus on similarities, the most apparent and basic of all is that in both species sexual behavior is not a public good, but a commodity.

Throughout the book, the reader is repeatedly confronted with two glaring errors in logic: 1) the equating of “natural” with good, or desirable (the converse is that if something is bad, or undesirable, then it is unnatural); and 2) that nonhuman animal behavior is a guide for identifying ‘natural’ human behavior. Obviously, Block's instrument for assessing the naturalness of some human trait is the bonobo. ¹ If a trait found in bonobos is also found among humans, then that trait is argued to be natural. By the same reasoning, if humans exhibit a trait that is not also found in bonobos, then that trait is unnatural—the product of some distorting force on pristine human nature. This misguided logic is most explicit in her discussion of bisexuality and homosexuality (pp. 66–67). Remarking on the occurrence of bisexual and homosexual behavior among bonobos, Block writes that, “[w]atching bonobos show us that … our sexual diversity is utterly organic and natural, adding to the richness of our individual lives and the ecology of our society” (p. 67). Block also applies this reasoning to human sexual fetishes after describing an instance when she observed a female bonobo rubbing a rubber ball against her genitals (p. 69).

Block apparently sees diversity in sexual practices such as swinging, orgies, fetishes, BDSM, bisexuality, and homosexuality as good and desirable, and therefore interprets tenuous similarities in bonobo behavior as evidence enough that these things are natural and typical (but for the restraint that some humans can exercise over their true desires). However, whether or not one sees diversity in sexual orientations or activities as good or desirable is an entirely separate issue from whether or not they are “natural.” Further, whether or not any particular sexual feelings or behaviors are natural or unnatural, normal or abnormal, observing bonobos certainly cannot answer this question (although it might, as Block suggests, help some people feel “empowered” or “at ease” (p. 67) with their sexuality—but again, this is an altogether separate issue). It is egregiously naïve to conclude that, “bonobos reveal that an incredible range of sexual diversity is normal for animals like us” (p. 99, emphasis in original).

A naturalistic understanding of our species does not necessitate restricting analyses to perceived commonalities with other animals. Our species possesses numerous unique traits that are the result of the same process of evolution by natural selection that has shaped the traits of other organisms. Block seems to portray bonobos as a reflection of human nature stripped bare of the fancy trappings of modernity. But to claim that humans have an “inner bonobo” at the heart of our natures, or that reflections of primal humanity are glimpsed in bonobo behavior is to make the implicit assumption that bonobos represent some ancestral form of humanity, relics of our evolutionary past, and to ignore 6 million years of divergence that carried our lineage along paths quite different from that of chimpanzees and bonobos.

What the study of bonobos primarily reveals about being human is how our species differs psychologically, sexually, and socially from bonobos and other nonhuman primates. Aside from the intrinsic value of knowledge gained from nonhuman primate studies, the great importance of such research is in understanding of the origin and mechanisms of human uniqueness. Humans have biparental care, concealed estrus, menopause, bilateral kinship, paternal investment, bisexual dispersal and philopatry, between-group alliances based on kinship and marriage, to name a handful of traits that humans do not share with Pan (see, e.g., Alexander, 1990; Chapais, 2008; Rodseth, Wrangham, Harrigan, and Smuts, 1991). These are fundamental differences with far-reaching consequences for our sociality and sexuality, rendering any similarities far less significant than the differences. Only by ignoring the fundamental differences in social structure and patterns of social and sexual behavior while inflating often-dubious similarities between humans and bonobos can Block uphold them as the paragons of human virtue.

The first half of The Bonobo Way is a tortuous combination of evolutionary illiteracy, gross anthropomorphizing, and a thick web of naturalistic and moralistic fallacies to prove humanity's often-neglected affinity to bonobos. Indeed, it is a veritable treasure trove of misguided argument. This no less true of the second half, wherein Block lays out a 12-step guide to releasing our “inner bonobo” that will improve the personal and social lives of its human disciples.

The advice offered in the 12 steps are banal at best, and bewilderingly convoluted at worst, with enough tangents to make the reader forget the point of many of the steps. Nevertheless, I have attempted a summary of the advice offered, and it goes thusly: watch bonobos; imagine yourself as a bonobo; engage in sexual fantasy; incorporate your sexual fantasies into your sexual behavior with your partner; engage in frequent, non-penetrative sexual or romantic behavior; incorporate food into sexual activity; refrain from prescription anti-depressants; women become more sexually assertive; women foster solidarity with other women; men become more in touch with their feminine side; engage in sexual or romantic activity after conflict with a partner; exercise empathy, deference, and moral responsibility; consider or engage in sexual activity with friends or close acquaintances; use your sex appeal for social influence; consider casual sexual activity; consider group sexual activity; attempt to be more resilient in adverse situations; engage in bonobo conservation efforts.

It is interesting that much of the sex advice offered is about improving sexual and relationship satisfaction within long-term monogamous pair-bonds. Even the bits about engaging in casual and group sex activities are versed in terms of establishing or strengthening romantic pair-bonds. It is as if Dr. Block has a better knowledge of human sexuality than she lets on in her descriptions of humans' natural promiscuity (i.e., that humans are not particularly promiscuous, and not really all that bonobolike, after all). Indeed, very little of the advice given in the book has anything to do with bonobos per se, other than being a reference word for sex-positive philosophy, gender equality, resilience in the face of misfortune, and increased tolerance and compassion toward others. All of these things are human values, yet the bonobo is held up as a beacon illuminating the path to their attainment.

This raises the question: Why do human value systems need nonhuman role models? Why do we need to substantiate them as natural via the identification of animal analogues? Why should how we ought to behave be dictated by the nonhuman world? Group sex, polyamory, and fetishistic masturbation may be viewed as good and highly desirable, but their desirability does not need to be justified through seeking out their occurrence in other species. At the same time, sexual inequality, war, and environmental degradation are largely viewed as undesirable and bad, but there is no need to justify their condemnation by portraying them as unnatural aberrations.

The evils of human society are not likely to be remedied by pretending we are another species. We must face up to what we are if we are going to do anything about our problems.