The J-Man Chronicles: In Search of the Elusive Snake Clitoris

1. The Elusive Snake Clitoris

Let's start by examining my use of the term "elusive." Although the word doesn't actually appear in a rather odd New York Times article, "Scientists Overlooked the Snake Clitoris, Until Now," I'm at least partly justified because the author, Alex Fox, used the word "overlooked" in the title. 

Overlooked or elusive? Clearly, this discovery doesn't measure up to, let's say, the long-time quest for nuclear fusion. That has been elusive by any measure (1). On the other hand, snakes have been on Earth for 128 million years, and their clitorides (2) have been known for a mere month. So, I guess it's fair to say that "potentially interesting" is more accurate because "elusive" would only be technically correct had someone been feverishly looking for the damn thing in the first place.

Highlights from the Times article 

Fox writes: "In a paper published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, scientists provide the first proper scientific description of the hemiclitores, or a bifurcated clitoris in female snakes."

And you're about to read the first decidedly improper scientific description. 

Quickly, it gets woke. Sexual bias was emphasized in the Times article as well as by the four women who published the study. Men have, presumably because of a "gender-based lack of interest" in the topic, did not discover the hemiclitoris. I kid you not...

"The study also challenges a longstanding bias in biology — linked to cultural attitudes and a dearth of women in the field — that has left female sexual anatomy woefully understudied in many species." 

As if any man could find either. (3)

"The cantil viper [has] the largest hemiclitores at 1.2 inches long and 0.7 inches wide and the Guatemalan milk snake at just 0.1 inches long and 0.06 inches wide."

A good icebreaker, if ever there were one. And you never know when this information might come in handy...

“This discovery could really change how we understand mating in snakes...and it just shows how much we’ve been missing by largely ignoring female anatomy.”

As a man, I must strenuously object! Ask any guy on the beach. We do not ignore female anatomy—quite the opposite. And we pay the price for our studious attention to it. The current price is a beach chair over the head.

Let's close with an old but still amusing joke.

Q: What's the difference between Alaska and a clitoris?

A: Men can find Alaska.

NOTES:

(1) Scientists have been studying nuclear fusion for a century as a possibly unlimited source of energy. There has been a recent mini-discovery.

(2) Both clitorides and clitorises are grammatically correct. See that? You learned something.

(3) Asking a man to find, let alone discover, a clitoris is like asking women to explain the infield fly rule. There are certain things that we are just incapable of.