buzzards & cows

Ah, party chat.
If you could switch lives with anyone, who would you pick?
If you ruled the world for a day, what would you do?
If you were an animal, which would you be?
Okay, let's take a stab at that last one.
Most people give an answer that's at least mildly flattering. Not many toads, for example. But with apologies to all you leopards, hawks, and koalas, i may have a better line on this hypothetical. And it breaks down by gender, sadly. Despite our continuing march toward equality, the basic personality differences between men and women are still pretty sizable.
And let me also interject a rejection of the premise of the phrase "if you were an animal". It takes a mildly moronic brain to even let a thought like that escape the lips. We ARE animals, idiot. Ahab's leg, Flava Flav's teeth, and Kenny Rogers' face notwithstanding, we aren't mineral. Kardashian evidence aside, we're not vegetable either. That leaves animal. The notion that humans are somehow separate from the animal kingdom is perhaps the most misleading, destructive idea ever cooked up in the brain of a naked ape. Nowhere is the breathtaking scope of man's arrogance more baldly obvious. The paths of insensitivity and self-delusion this conceit has led to are so enormous, a comprehensive study of the subject would be all the human history one would need to read.
The idea that the most conspicuously base and brutal among us are only reverting to their animal cruelty, and that morality is the triumph of nobility over nature, is poppycock. The essential truth is that humanity will never heal and move forward until we fully understand and embrace our animal selves. We have strayed into baseness and brutality precisely because we have neglected and rejected our humanity.
But back to the party! No, good sir, i propose that your "animal" equivalent is perhaps not the gazelle. So what creature is man most akin to? A dog, always looking for a bone? No, dogs are too loyal. A shark, gliding through life with relentless single-mindedness? Indeed no, we're way too chickenshit. A chicken, then? No, they mind their own business. A bonobo? Genetically, we're virtually indistinguishable from our sexy ape cousin...but morally we come up far short of the revolting little pacifists. No no no and no, if you were to distill the essence of contemporary manhood into the personality of one wild creature, you would come up with...
A buzzard.
I'm sorry if that doesn't make you feel superior, but you've got reality TV for that. A buzzard is dull and unoriginal. A buzzard is opportunistic, but only under incredibly safe circumstances. Buzzards and men trample each other to pounce on the safest of all quarry - the kind with no pulse. With all apologies to the mildly clever among us, men seek out ideas that have been trotted out a million times before...and think that if they put a sparkly hat on it, people won't notice it's the same old shit.
No, not many NBA stars with buzzard tattoos...yet.
What, you wouldn't watch a game played by the Brooklyn Buzzards? I think you would. The breath of honesty is irresistible.
Then again, you'd also watch a game played by the Brooklyn Bastards. Proving that alliteration is as alluring as honesty.
And the women? What of the women? What is their spiritual animal mirror? The cat? Combine women's catty tendencies with an identity still overwhelmingly defined by sexuality, and what better doppelganger could one find than an adorable little pussy? No, sorry. Cats are ridiculously independent - check back with us in a hundred years, gals. The dog then, ever eager to please? Nope, dogs are too free of neuroses. The bonobo, the females of whom guide their societies by quietly fostering cooperative relationships (aided by indiscriminate doses of sexual healing)? Sorry again...the naturally open sexuality of women has been nullified by thousands of years of sexual terrorization. No, with all apologies to de Beauvoir, Steinem, and Pink, the essence of the world's average woman is best captured in the personality of...
The cow.
Stray from the handful of metropolitan hubs in this world, and it wouldn't be startling to hear all the women speaking in gentle, low moos. Even in cities, most women still play the dairy-beast-of-burden game, waiting for their own Farmer Bob (or Abu, or Rajneesh, or Dong) to ride in on a donkey, claim their uterus, and define their lives.
Buteo buteo.
Bos primigenius.
Go hug one today.