Dear Grist Magazine:

My compliments on a very fine article by Erik Ness ("Sin County Almanac: Sex Sells But Can It Save the Planet?"/ 9.30.99), well-written, thoughtful, stimulating, highly original, and, as regards my point of view, astonishingly accurate. I’m impressed at how succinctly Mr. Ness has rendered the Byzantine threads of controversy that weave back and forth between me and my fellow bonobo lovers in academia.

I appreciated reading what Dr. Gay Reinhartz and Dr. Tony Rose had to say about the urgent predicament of the bonobos. I’ve long been a supporter of Dr. Reinhartz’s efforts, but Mr. Ness made me aware of Dr. Rose. In fact, I just invited Dr. Rose to be on my show, and he has accepted. I adore Professor Richard Wrangham, of course, and his brilliant book "Demonic Males," and I’m pleased to read his enthusiastic comments about my interview with him. I wish I had more guests like him, erudite, witty, experienced in the field, with an down-to-earth appreciation for the intense sexuality of these creatures, and a wonderful, sexy voice. I’m appalled to hear that a Harvard administrator told him to stop showing my video to his classes or he could be accused of sexual harassment. Who is this Ivy League apparatchik and what is his/her agenda?

I found Dr. de Waal’s comments about me to be quite curious. I’ve made no secret of my admiration for his writings on bonobos over the years. I’ve invited him to be a guest on my program twice, and twice he has refused. He says in Mr. Ness’ article that he doesn’t "know how serious her operation is, and I’m not sure what motivates her either." Well, at least he acknowledges that he doesn’t know what I’m about. So maybe, since I’m not going away, he should find out. Maybe he should read my book. Maybe he should look at my website that costs me thousands of dollars to put up and maintain and earns me nothing. Maybe he should give my motivations the benefit of the doubt and accept my invitation to be a guest on my show by phone like Dr. Wrangham, or in person like Sally Coxe and Natalie Angier, two other well-regarded bonobo specialists, the latter a Pulitzer Prize winner.

But I am perplexed by his statement: "to have a credible conservation effort, you need to be doing more than sitting in California and having a website. You need people on the ground, working in the country." Sounds like some sort of Maoist dictate: "All decadent capitalist hedonists must kick off their stiletto heels, abandon their cushy computers and broadcast studios, roll up their sleeves and work in the fields!"

Seriously, with all due respect to Dr. de Waal, I don’t pretend to be a primatologist, or a paratrooper. I’m not even a researcher. I’m a layperson (pun intended), a gentlewoman conservationist, a sex therapist, an entertainer, a storyteller. Some call me a pornographer. Some call me a healer. I call myself an educator. I’m not a bonobo expert, I’m a bonobo booster. Now, if somebody offers to send me and my TV crew out to the Congo, I’ll consider it. In the meantime, I have to make a living and, as you know, I don’t do that through the bonobos.

What I do have is a big, avid audience via my various websites and my HBO specials that consists of millions of "eyeballs" interested in sexuality, most of whom don’t know a bonobo from a bonbon. I do my best to teach them what I know, to give them basic information that I think will interest and excite them. I also urge them to support organizations like the Bonobo Protection Fund and to buy books like de Waal’s The Forgotten Ape. Why? Not because I get a kick out of helping people who scorn me (I’m no masochist)! But because I love the bonobos. Because I want people to know about them and love them like I do. Because I want to arouse people to action to help save our kissin’ cousins from extinction.

Why do I love the bonobos so much? Because they inspire me. Because, as Mr. Ness points out, what I call "The Bonobo Way" invigorates my philosophy of "Ethical Hedonism." Because my first sights of bonobos, initially on PBS, and then at the San Diego Zoo, were, in the poetic words of Dr. Tony Rose, "profound interspecies events."

And yet Dr. Sue Savage-Rumbaugh--another bonobo specialist whose work I have often praised and whose site I link to, bringing her thousands of visitors a week, whose Bonobo Protection Fund I have urged people to give money to--refuses to speak about me.

I ask you: Is this any way to encourage conservation activism from folks like me who are outside of academia? Is this any way to mobilize those of us who aren’t working "on the ground" or "in the country," but who are inspired by bonobo sexuality and peacefulness and want to help save this highly endangered species from extinction?

And how dare her organization publish an extended essay excoriating "The Bonobo Way" that no one has the nerve to admit to writing? I wish the author would stand up for him or herself and debate me on the obviously complex subject of bonobo vs. human sexuality, instead of biting the link that feeds it and then slinking off into the shadows.

And who is this trash-talking, anonymous "spokesperson for Georgia State University"? I respect and try to help the BPF because they are the only US organization that I know of that uses contributions to directly help bonobos, but I must say the folks that run it are more jumpy about their true identities than a bunch of porn actors.

By the way, they’re just posturing when they say they have "made efforts to have the link removed." What efforts? The simplest way to get my link to their site removed would be to e-mail or call me, and they have done neither over the past three years that I have had the link up. Of course, I’m not saying I’ll take it down if they call me at this point. For the sake of helping bonobos, I wish to keep the link up until I find a friendlier organization that will use monetary contributions to directly protect bonobos from the grave endangerment they face.

But what is it that makes me so unspeakable anyhow ? Have I ripped a bonobo baby from his mother’s breast as some zoos have done? No. Have I made fun of the bonobos as so many other broadcasters, journalists and cartoonists have done? No. Have I had sexual relations with bonobos, as some of these high and mighty researchers have done? No. Have I used the bonobos to increase my sex therapy business? No (that wouldn’t work, even if I tried). So what is it then? Is it my bra? My vulva puppet? My Technicolor fingernails? My titillating sense of humor?

I wonder what the bonobos would think of all this nasty name-calling and refusing to speak over a push-up bra and a few sex toys. Oops, there I go, anthropomorphizing. Except that time is running out, and bonobo lives are at stake.

A little anthropomorphizing never hurt Flipper’s drive for conservation. And let’s face it: BONOBOS ARE VERY SEXUAL CREATURES. We can’t—and shouldn’t--hide that. Not at the Zoo. Not on the Internet. So we’d best learn to deal with it, to see it as an asset. Since bonobos are so sexual, they are bound to upset certain people and organizations who typically support other conservation efforts. But they will also attract the attention of people like myself, folks who are interested in helping the bonobos precisely because of their intense sexuality. Shouldn’t serious bonobo conservationists like Dr. de Waal and Dr. Savage-Rumbaugh be taking the extended hand, Technicolor fingernails and all, of someone who is offering to help them in their obvious state of emergency, rather than vainly attempting to swat that hand away?

Shouldn’t these experts who make their livings off their work with bonobos be capitalizing on my audience instead of trying to pretend we don’t exist, like some old Victorian covering the table legs? Shouldn’t they work with us instead of against us? Shouldn’t we have "Save the Bonobos" benefits, shows, art events and concerts? Shouldn’t we do for the bonobos what conservationists have done for the American Eagle; that is, save it because we love it, because it inspires us, because it reminds us of a better, more exciting, and yes, even titillating part of ourselves?

In closing, I’d like to answer the question of Mr. Ness’ subtitle, "Sex sells, but can it save the planet?" with a resounding YES. If sex can be used to successfully sell cars, perfume, art, smoking, quitting smoking, recycling, political candidates, you name it, then there I no doubt it can be used to "sell" saving our sexy kissin’ cousins, the bonobos, to the public. And saving the bonobos will certainly go a long way towards helping us to save ourselves.

Sincerely,

Susan Block, Ph.D.

drsuzyb@blockbooks.com

www.blockbonobofoundation.org

213.749.1330

AN URGENT POSTSCRIPT: It’s not about the color of our fingernails or erotic anthropomorphism or academic bestiality or human envy. It’s about saving a species from extinction. Not just any species, but an animal who is as close to human as any nonhuman can be, a species who can communicate with us via computer as well as sign language, a creature whose active, relatively nonviolent sexuality is only part of its tremendous appeal and importance, a highly endangered primate from whom we could learn so much about ourselves if only we can save it from annihilation. This is an emergency situation that goes far beyond petty scholastic squabbles. I urge all my readers and viewers, whether you have a dollar or $1,000,000.00, to send it to the Bonobo Protection Fund now.