These early studies were studiously ignored by the international scientific establishment. It wasn’t until the sexual liberation of the 1970s that the full glory of the bonobos’ sex life started to go public. The bonobos’ novel approach to harmony and hierarchy has been observed in the wild, as well as in the more artificial social situations afforded by zoos. Female bonobos in Congo’s LuiKotale forest have even been recorded using specialized gestures and pantomime to convey their desire for a bit of G-G.
