The King Parrot Mating Debate: A Study in Monogamy and Mayhem

 The Mating Debate: A Study in Monogamy and Mayhem

The IV drip had been replaced. Lady Gaga had been given a sandwich, which she was eating with the suspicious caution of someone who hadn't consumed a carb since 2013. Kevin the king parrot had been moved from his temporary cage to a slightly larger temporary cage, procured from the paediatric ward after a tearful negotiation with a six-year-old named Matilda, who had been promised a new hamster.

And the argument had shifted.

It started, as these things always did, with Alistair Finch saying something that no one had asked him to say.

"The fascinating thing about king parrots," he announced, "is not just their lifespan. It's their mating habits. They mate for life. For life, Benny. Do you understand the implications of that?"

Benny, who had been trying to sneak out of the room for the past ten minutes, stopped in his tracks. "Please don't—"

"They mate for life," Alistair repeated, louder this time. "A king parrot chooses a partner and stays with that partner until one of them dies. Sometimes longer. Sometimes they grieve themselves to death. That's commitment, Benny. That's devotion. That's—"

do king parrots mate for life?

"That's birds," Gladys interrupted. "Birds do that. It's not special. Lots of birds do that."

"But king parrots," Alistair pressed on, "do it with style. They preen each other. They share food. They defend each other. They don't cheat. They don't lie. They don't have secret second families in a different tree."

"Are you implying something?" Lady Gaga asked, lowering her sandwich.

"I'm implying nothing," Alistair said. "I'm stating a scientific fact. King parrots mate for life. Celebrities... do not."

The room went very quiet.

"Excuse me?" Lady Gaga said.

"I said—"

"I heard what you said," Lady Gaga interrupted. "I'm just giving you a chance to rephrase it."

"Celebrities do not mate for life," Alistair repeated, apparently choosing death. "Statistically speaking. The average celebrity marriage lasts approximately six years. The average king parrot partnership lasts thirty. That's a five-to-one ratio. The birds are winning."

Australian bird guide - Do king parrots mate for life?

"The birds are birds," Lady Gaga said. "They don't have to deal with paparazzi. They don't have to deal with tour schedules. They don't have to deal with—"

"With what?" Alistair challenged. "With temptation? With options? With the constant, unrelenting availability of new and interesting partners?"

"With life," Lady Gaga said. "Real life. Complicated life. The kind of life where you're not just following instinct. You're making choices."

"King parrots make choices too," Alistair said. "They choose to stay. Every day. For thirty years."

"Or they're just biologically programmed," Benny interjected. "It's not a choice. It's hormones. It's instinct. It's not love."

"Who says love isn't instinct?" Alistair shot back.

"Philosophers," Benny said. "Poets. Every romantic comedy ever made."

"Romantic comedies are not scientific sources," Alistair said.

"Neither are king parrots," Benny said.

"I'm going to need more fluids," Lady Gaga said, reaching for her IV again.

But the argument was already spiralling.

"Let's look at the evidence," Alistair said, pulling out his stack of papers. "Celebrity marriages. Elizabeth Taylor: eight marriages. Eight. Mickey Rooney: eight. Zsa Zsa Gabor: nine. These are not king parrot numbers."

"Those are also not modern examples," Lady Gaga pointed out. "Things have changed."

"Have they?" Alistair asked. "Jennifer Lopez: four marriages. Kim Kardashian: three. Pamela Anderson: five. The pattern holds."

"The pattern is that you're obsessed with celebrity marriages," Gladys said. "Which is deeply weird for a surgeon who claims to be squeamish about the human body."

"I'm not squeamish about marriage," Alistair said. "I'm squeamish about organs. There's a difference."

"There is no difference," Gladys said.

"The king parrot," Alistair continued, "doesn't care about prenuptial agreements. It doesn't care about publicity. It doesn't care about maintaining a brand. It just cares about its partner. That's purity. That's truth. That's—"

"That's anthropomorphising," Benny said. "You're projecting human values onto a bird."

"I'm elevating bird values onto humans," Alistair corrected. "There's a difference."

"There is no difference," Gladys said.

"Look," Lady Gaga said, setting down her sandwich with the air of someone about to deliver a sermon. "I've been married. Twice. And I've been in relationships that felt like marriages. And I've been in relationships that felt like wars. And the thing about being a celebrity — a real celebrity, not just someone who's famous for being famous — is that you're constantly being pulled in different directions. You're constantly being told who to be, what to wear, who to date. It's not easy to maintain a partnership when the whole world is watching."

"The king parrot," Alistair said, "has the whole world watching too. The whole forest. The whole sky. And it still stays."

"The king parrot doesn't have a publicist telling it to date someone more famous," Lady Gaga said.

"The king parrot doesn't have a publicist at all," Alistair said. "Which is probably why it's so well-adjusted."

"Are you saying I'm not well-adjusted?"

"I'm saying you're a celebrity. And celebrities don't mate for life. It's a statistical reality."

"I'm going to throw this sandwich at you," Lady Gaga said.

"Please don't," Benny said. "It's hospital property."

"I'll throw my own sandwich," Lady Gaga said.

"You don't have another sandwich," Benny pointed out.

"I'll get another sandwich. I'm Lady Gaga."

"I don't think that's how it works," Benny said.

"It's how it works for me," Lady Gaga said.

Dr. Timothy Pratt, who had been standing in the corner trying to be invisible, raised his hand.

"What?" Gladys snapped.

"I just wanted to say," Timothy said nervously, "that I once had a king parrot that mated for life. Well, not me. My neighbour. But I watched it. And it was... beautiful. They preened each other every morning. They shared seeds. They screamed at the postman together. It was the most functional relationship I've ever seen."

"Thank you, Timothy," Alistair said. "That's exactly my point."

"I'm not sure that was a compliment," Timothy said.

"It was," Alistair said. "You're finally contributing something useful."

"He fed a parrot a biscuit during surgery," Gladys said. "He's not contributing anything."

"I'm contributing an anecdote," Timothy said.

"An anecdote is not evidence," Gladys said.

"It's supporting evidence," Alistair said.

"It's anecdotal evidence," Benny said. "Which is the worst kind."

"All evidence is anecdotal if you think about it," Alistair said.

"That's not true," Benny said.

"It's true if you're a philosopher," Alistair said.

"You're not a philosopher," Benny said. "You're a surgeon who learned anatomy from Jean-Claude Van Damme movies."

"Those movies are educational," Alistair said.

"They are action films," Benny said.

"They're both," Alistair said.

"Can we get back to the king parrots?" Lady Gaga asked. "I was enjoying that part."

"The king parrot," Alistair said, "is a symbol of fidelity. Of loyalty. Of the kind of commitment that celebrities can only dream of. They're the anti-Kardashian. They're the anti-Taylor. They're the anti-Hollywood."

"Are you calling me a Kardashian?" Lady Gaga asked.

"I'm calling you a celebrity," Alistair said. "Which is worse."

"I'm not sure that's true," Lady Gaga said.

"It's true," Alistair said. "Celebrities are held to a higher standard. They're expected to be perfect. They're expected to be beautiful. They're expected to be thin. And they're expected to have relationships that last. But the statistics say they can't. The statistics say they won't. The statistics say—"

"The statistics can be wrong," Lady Gaga said.

"The statistics are never wrong," Alistair said.

"The statistics are based on averages," Lady Gaga said. "I'm not an average."

"Everyone thinks they're not an average," Alistair said.

"I'm Lady Gaga," she said. "I'm literally not an average."

"You're a person," Alistair said. "And people are complicated."

"King parrots are complicated too," Benny said. "They don't always mate for life. Sometimes they switch partners. Sometimes they cheat. There have been studies."

"There have not been studies," Alistair said.

"There have been observational studies," Benny said.

"Observational studies are not real studies," Alistair said.

"They're more real than Jean-Claude Van Damme movies," Benny said.

"Nothing is more real than Jean-Claude Van Damme movies," Alistair said.

"Are you two going to argue about this forever?" Gladys asked.

"Yes," they said in unison.

"Then I'm going to go check on the lorikeet situation in the cafeteria," Gladys said. "Apparently there are now twelve of them. They've learned to open the chip packets."

"That's incredible," Alistair said.

"That's a health code violation," Gladys said. "There's a difference."

"There is no difference," Alistair said.

Gladys left.

The room fell into an uneasy silence. Lady Gaga picked up her sandwich again. Kevin the king parrot preened his feathers. Timothy tried to edge towards the door.

"So," Lady Gaga said eventually. "King parrots mate for life."

"Yes," Alistair said.

"And celebrities don't."

"Statistically speaking."

"And you think that means something."

"I think it means everything."

Lady Gaga took a bite of her sandwich. She chewed slowly, thoughtfully, the way someone chews when they're considering the entire history of human relationships.

"I've been in love," she said finally. "Really in love. The kind of love that makes you write albums. The kind of love that makes you do stupid things. The kind of love that makes you forget to eat."

"That sounds like a king parrot," Alistair said.

"It didn't last," Lady Gaga said. "But it was real."

"That's the difference between you and a king parrot," Alistair said. "You can love and lose. A king parrot loves and keeps."

"Maybe the king parrot is just lucky," Lady Gaga said. "Maybe it finds the right partner on the first try. Maybe it doesn't have to date around. Maybe it doesn't have to make mistakes."

"Maybe," Alistair said. "Or maybe it's just better at commitment."

"Or maybe," Lady Gaga said, "it's just a bird. And we're just people. And we're doing our best."

"That," Alistair said, "is the most reasonable thing anyone has said all day."

"I'm full of surprises," Lady Gaga said.

"I'm full of fluids," Benny said, looking at his coffee. "And none of them are helping."

And in the corner, Kevin the king parrot looked at Lady Gaga with something that might have been understanding. Or might have been hunger. It was hard to tell with birds.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_king_parrot