Diane Rosenfeld - The Bonobo Sisterhood: Revolution Through Female Alliance

THE BONOBO SISTERHOOD . Copyright 2022 by Diane L. Rosenfeld. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

FIRST EDITION

Self-portrait illustration of Chrystul Kizer used with permission.

Photo credit: John R. Boehm Photography

Cover illustration and design by Shepard Fairey

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Rosenfeld, Diane L., author.

Title: The bonobo sisterhood : revolution through female alliance / Diane L. Rosenfeld.

Description: First edition. | New York : Harper Wave, [2022] | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2022026165 (print) | LCCN 2022026166 (ebook) | ISBN 9780063085077 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780063085091 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: WomenViolence against. | WomenSocial conditions. | WomenSocial networks. | BonoboSocial aspects.

Classification: LCC HV6250.4.W65 R67 2022 (print) | LCC HV6250.4.W65 (ebook) | DDC 362.88082dc23/eng/20220708

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022026165

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022026166

Digital Edition SEPTEMBER 2022 ISBN: 978-0-06-308509-1

Version 08092022

Print ISBN: 978-0-06-308507-7

To my mother, Phyllis Ellis Rosenfeld, Esq.,

whose maternal energy is the river that flows through these pages;

to Kitty, my North Star; and

to Terry, for everything.

This book you are holding offers a vibrant vision and a detailed plan for uniting yourself with femalekind in revolutionary coalitions such as those characterized by the least known of the great apes, the bonobos. The promise of bonobos, with whom we share 98.7 percent of our DNA, is to end male sexual violence. Professor Rosenfeld understands that all women experience male-perpetuated sexual violence in our distinct locations of oppressions uniquely and imagines, powerfully and convincingly, that we women cant ignore each others suffering anymore. Instead, we may learn from our closest living relatives, the bonobos, to form sustainable female-to-female alliances that not only disrupt individual acts of male aggression but render obsolete oppressive patriarchal systems.

The Bonobo Sisterhood offers a jaw-dropping social and legal investigation into the catalysts and custodians of sexual violence, anchored in and informed by Professor Rosenfelds decades of searing work on the subject. Hers has been both expert and painful work, a public service she has fought to sustain amidst the most twisted and sordid moments of patriarchal oppression. Bolstered by her knowledge that the sexual violencefree bonobos exist and have something to offer us, Professor Rosenfeld has created an arguable and achievable vision for a world in which women are finally liberated from the violence of men.

What could that vision be?

Bonobo society is egalitarian. All females live free from sexual coercion and harassment by all males. Period.

Sit with that.

How, evolutionarily speaking, did a little-heralded species arrive at this radically different outcome, when, for example, 100 percent of female chimpanzees, their closest primate relatives, are severely beaten and sexually coerced? We humans are, too, very close cousins of bonobos (closer than gorillas), and yet, like chimpanzees, we suffer from male aggression and patriarchy.

What have bonobos done to arrive at their singular, male violencefree model? The more important question is, might it be possible for us to look to them for traces of, or even guidance on, how to ameliorate human violence? This exciting book offers a resounding Yes!

Without being irresponsible or fanciful with the science, or wishfully extrapolating and overlaying bonobo society onto Homo sapiens, we can nonetheless take fact and inspiration from decades of fieldwork by evolutionary biologists, primatologists, and anthropologists who follow and study wild bonobos in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the only place in the world bonobos exist.

Strong female coalitions undergird bonobos stable, peaceful societies. Dig this: female bonobos coalesce without kinship ties. They come together, help each other, share food, groom, cooperate, protect each other, (1) whether or not they are related, (2) whether or not they even know each other, and (3) whether or not they even like each other (as observable and measured by time spent playing, hanging out, grooming, and sharing valuable resources).

Additionally, when a female reaches reproductive age and is ready to migrate out of her natal group to a new community, she forms an alliance with an older female to help her integrate into her new home. Males gain their status in their communities through the presence of a dominant mother, who helps ensure his reproductive success. In short, females are essential to stable flourishing, fundamentally expressed through coalitions between other females.

Perhaps we women can do what they do. We can build coalitions and issue a bonobo call for each other. Whether or not we are related, know each other, or particularly like each other.

Wow.

I have seized the bonobo call for myself. I originally met bonobos in 2008 during my first trip to the Congo doing sexual and gender-based violence work through a grassroots public health focus. Encountering the trauma caused by the extensive violence against women and children during that first stay in the Congo nearly shattered my soul. Bonobos at the Lola ya Bonobo reserve near Kinshasa loved me back to life. Shortly after, I met my partner, who runs one of only three bonobo research camps in the world. With him, I began spending time in the rain forest to follow the bonobos in their Congolese rain forest basin habitat.

Being with bonobos in the wild has been the honor of a lifetime. I am moved to the depths of my soul when I sit on the fecund earth under the trees in which they have built their night nests and watch as they first begin to stir while the equatorial sun rises. I watch while that first lazy arm dangles out of the nest, or a baby peeks over, or a hungry juvenile slowly brachiates toward its first piece of fruit of the morning. It often makes me weep. When they come down from their nests, we follow them throughout the day, observing their behaviors, feeding, grooming, copulating, sharing, playing, laughing, antics, and highjinks. And notably, wonderfully, we observe a complete lack of sexual coercion, no beating of females, no violence of any kind, no infanticide, no homicide, no harm. We watch as females express choice as to when to copulate and with whom. I have personally witnessed, over and over again, what seems like thoughtful consideration by a female as she is approached and solicited by a male, and how she decides whether or not she wants to take him up on the offer of sex. If she agrees, she chooses the place, somewhere along a high tree branch or perhaps over yonder on a grooming log. When she does not reciprocate interest, he simply wanders off and leaves her be. What we could learn from this! In the rare instances where a male does aggress, the reaction from the nearby females is extraordinary: they stunningly rush together, shriek and bellow, gesture and posture intimidatingly, flinging their arms about and jumping wildly, while all other males scatter hither and yon. They let their brother suffer the terrifying consequences of his misguided social behavior as the females shake him down. The other males do not interfere, but rather observe from a safe distance in fear of the females coalition.