PENGUINS RULE!

On a quiet Sunday afternoon in July, I watched the sweet March of the Penguins. The movie is indeed very charming; no wonder it has had so much success.

Recently, I noticed a few commentaries, shamelessly anthropomorphic in nature, praising the penguin's monogamous behavior. According to people like Michael Medved and others, the penguins are a symbol of conservative family values! Others go further and declare that the penguins' life is a clear evidence of intelligent design... These people - for them, even a nice little movie about cute penguins is political fodder.

In any case, I have a few basic questions:

1. What is so conservative about penguins changing partners every year? In other words, Emperor Penguins are not really monogamous - they are serially monogamous. Once the chick is up and running and their job as a parenting couple is done, they bid their goodbyes and off they go, in search of this year's mate. And if I recall, the male penguin is the first to take off. By the way: if something happens to the egg during the male's watch and the chick dies, the male can just leave - and he does.

2. Do these conservatives know that Emperor Penguins have shown plenty of evidence of homosexual and bisexual behavior? Now that is very interesting.

3. Did the intelligent designer really intend for the poor penguins to breed and tend to their eggs and feed their chicks in Antartica, probably one of the harshest environments on the planet? This intelligent designer doesn't seem very nice, let alone intelligent.

It is amazing that this French movie about birds - beautiful, incredibly interesting birds - is being turned into a new testament for the conservative right. Meanwhile, the issues that really could be taken out of the movie, such as global warming and the deterioration of their natural habitat, do not make the news.

Another thing the zealots seem to be ignoring is the fact that the penguins' marital bliss involves shared responsibilities in a not-so-conventional way: the father stays "home" with the egg; he waits, and is on the verge of starvation when the mother returns with food for the chick at the end of a little over two months. As soon as she approaches, he leaves - hey, a man needs to eat! In all, the penguin couple spends very time little together, maybe two months. It is the ultimate commuter family!!