MONKEY SEE, MONKEY DO

I’m working on a speech I am supposed to give in a week or so. The audience is a large group of high school students and their families; and the occasion is an academic honors ceremony. I have decided to speak on the topic of supermodels. Why not? Who doesn’t love supermodels? I mean, what’s not to like? Consider the following wisdom from some of today’s top models.

"I love the confidence that makeup gives me." (Tyra Banks)

"I would rather exercise than read a newspaper." (Kim Alexis)

"Everyone should have enough money to get plastic surgery." (Beverly Johnson)

"I can do anything you want me to do so long as I don't have to speak." (Linda Evangelista)

"When I model I pretty much go blank. You can't think too much or it doesn't work." (Paulina Porizkova)

I am not going to limit my comments to the women actually posing for cameras. I am exploring the need we have to identify a model for everything (business success, healthy relationships, hard bodies, academic achievement, worship styles, writing, etc.). It’s as though we are all searching for the Secret Keys to the Seven Habits of Purpose-Driven Bodies for Life.

Obviously, models can be useful. I’m following the Handy Dandy Guide to Smart-Ass Blogging at this very moment. Is it useful? You be the judge.

But what I really want to talk about is monkeys. Supermodels and monkeys in the same post (yippee).


Duke University neurobiologists recently conducted an experiment with a group of rhesus macaque monkeys. They deprived the monkeys of their favorite drink, then offered them the choice of looking at pictures of “celebrity” (high-status) monkeys, or having a drink of Juicy Juice.

VS.

The seduction of celebrity was stronger than dehydration. Even celebrity monkeys chose to look at other celebrities rather than slake their thirst. But when they were shown pictures of common monkeys that don’t swing as high on the vine, all of them opted for a little sip-sip.



The conclusions suggest that we, like monkeys, have a primitive urge to observe the members of our tribe who have risen to positions of power and attention. We may not even like them, but something about them fascinates us. For instance, I think Jerry Falwell is a punk. There is virtually nothing about him that I could imagine wanting to emulate. But I have this sick fascination with him, every time he shows his face in public.

Perhaps by watching those of high status we are learning how to move on up to the eastside, finally getting our piece of the sky. But even if we arrive at the top, we continue to monitor our peers: always afraid someone’s going to take a slice of our pie.



What are we so afraid of? Is this in our DNA? Do we have to chase models? Have we followed the blueprint, the script, the directions for so long that we’ve lost any sense of who we are? Have we created gods that fit into our PDAs? Are we sitting at the closed door, when there’s a perfectly good window overhead? Have we enjoyed going with the flow for so long that we’ve forgotten that dead things go downstream?

One could argue that history is made by the outlaws who don’t follow models. How do we respond to that?

In the Duke study, all the male monkeys also gave up drinks to look at pictures of female monkeys’ hindquarters. Some might use that as a neurobiological justification for porn. I think I’ll leave that discussion to someone else.

For now, I have to go. There’s something on TV about Michael Jackson and McCauley Culkin. Wait, I’m thirsty. What to do. What to do.