RedHanded - FROM THE VAULT: ShortHand: How a NASA Experiment Ended in Dolphin Sex

Episode Date: September 23, 2024

ShortHand is available exclusively for Amazon Music and Wondery+ subscribers.Rumours about NASA scientists trying to teach dolphins to talk and getting frisky in the process have long been internet lore. But what really happened when Margaret Howe took on the task of training a sexed-up sea mammal to speak? And how on earth did they get it funded?See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Red Handed early and ad-free. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Hello.

Hello. Did you know that Hannah and I do a whole other podcast together? It's called Shorthand, which is a very clever name, and we release a brand new episode every single Tuesday. It's usually only available to Amazon Music and Wondery Plus subscribers, but today we have a treat for you. A dolphin wanking treat. This episode that you're about to hear is about a NASA-funded programme that ended

in a scientist wanking off a dolphin. But it's not all dolphin wanking over on Shorthand. We've released over 100 episodes on everything from rabies, celebrities who've got away with murder, lethal Victorian homes, the Mandela Effect, the Megalodon, lobotomies, celebrities who've got away with murder, lethal Victorian homes, the Mandela effect, the Megalodon, lobotomy,

medieval torture, and the Nazis' obsession with the occult. And loads, loads, loads, loads more. So have a listen. And then, if you're a member of Amazon Prime, Amazon Music, or Amazon Music Unlimited, and you live in the UK, US, Canada, Ireland, or Australia,

plus a load more other countries we can't be bothered to list right now, go listen to the entire back catalogue right this minute. Just download the Amazon Music app to see if you're eligible. You can also subscribe on Apple Podcasts or get a Wondery Plus subscription on the Wondery app for ad-free access to all of our red-handed and shorthand episodes, plus the entire Wondery catalogue as well. And enjoy. all of our red-handed and shorthand episodes, plus the entire Wondery catalogue as well.

And enjoy. Hello everyone. Hello. Welcome back to another episode. Well, episode two. Episode two. Of Red Handed Shorthand. Proving to you and to ourselves that we are going to keep doing this. Absolutely we are. And if this episode is anything to go by, this is exactly why I will continue to do shorthand. Because I've wanted to do this story for a very long time. As everybody at Red-Handed HQ can attest to. Prepare yourself, because it's about to get fucking bananas. Dolphin fucking bananas. That is the variety of bananas that we are talking about today. But before we get to all of that, Hannah, how smart exactly are dolphins?

Well, my understanding, as someone who has watched Blackfish and the Cove on a loop for much more than I should have. Oh, God. I don't think that, well, for a start, orcas are dolphins. They're not whales. And like the term killer whale just is a mistranslation from Spanish of whale killer. So that's where we get that term from. So orcas are dolphins. And you can see from the shape of them, they are dolphins.

And they actually experience emotional relationships in a way that humans cannot understand. They have a whole other section of their brain that we do not possess so the way they relate to each other is completely different like we can't even fathom it. So there are some aspects of existence in which dolphins are more intelligent than we are. Well possibly. So there we go we'll talk about it though. So dolphins are incredibly smart. I think that's what you need to take away from this section one of this particular episode. Dolphins are actually one of the smartest animals on earth. And the brains of modern dolphins are apparently so large that their EQ, which is their encephalation quotient, which basically means like

a creature's brain to body mass ratio is second only to humans tim minchin has an amazing joke that's like oh everyone says that dolphins are smarter than humans but if that were true wouldn't they be saying that yeah exactly that's why i'm like they're not smarter than humans guys they're not smarter than humans they are really smart but they're not smarter than humans dolphins brains are capable of echolocation and incredibly complex social relationships. I think that's something no they're not smarter than humans but they can do things we can't do. Dolphins cooperate with each other, they greet other dolphins, they work together to hunt and raise their babies, also kidnap other baby dolphins

and rape them and they've also been shown to plan and communicate within a group to achieve specific goals. So a study group essentially, a group project, a project management situation and all of those things are indicative of very high levels of thinking. A group of dolphins in Australia have even been recorded using sponges to cover their noses while hunting. Yeah because apparently they like hunt about in the coral and the coral's really sharp and it was cutting up their faces. So they started putting sponges on the end of their noses so they could still look about in the coral. Isn't that cool? That's really cool.

And what's even cooler than that is the sponge dolphins taught their baby dolphins how to not get cut up by the rocks. So there is intergenerational knowledge being passed on. And also dolphins are using tools be scared it's like the simpsons episode we saw a monkey using tools in bali we did we did but you expect it from them yeah they've got potable thumbs yeah and primate they're like i'm like yeah all right primate come on that don't impress me much stupid cousin yeah fucking it was but it was also banging something that was empty or something

it was grinding a leaf it was grinding a leaf that's what I was like so what are you trying to achieve there come back to me when you know

what a water and pestle is idiot and it's like excuse me I'm making some pesto over here for my bananas but it doesn't end there

coming back to dolphins because dolphins can actually learn and comprehend words and basically this is done through like a use of whistles and hand gestures and flags like when people are training them and what's super fascinating is and this is the bit that i did not know what's super fascinating about dolphins is they can

actually understand words but they also understand the fact that the order of the words in a sentence matters unlike dogs unlike dogs exactly this is the thing that i did not know and it's so fascinating because not only do they understand the idea that like symbols represent objects or actions kind of like being able to read or communicate they also understand another key component of human language they understand syntax which is huge and dolphins also have metacognition which means that they understand their own thoughts and i think that that is the agency is such a key thing in consciousness right and like how we identify intelligence full stop the fact that they know that they are thinking it brings them into a completely new level. And if you still need convincing that these animals are absolutely incredible

I've got something else for you. They also have physical self-awareness. They are one of the few animals that can pass the mirror test. So when they're looking in a mirror they know that they are looking at themselves. I learned something about mirrors that I was going to say for under the duvet, but I have no self-control, so I'm going to tell you now.

So obviously, vampire lore is that vampires have no reflections. That is because mirrors used to have silver-lined backs. Ah, yes. Which obviously, silver is a pure metal, so it can fuck up vampires, werewolves, etc. However, now, mirrors are not backed with silver. They're backed with aluminium.

So these days, vampires will have reflections. Oh, phew. So yeah, just in case you're wondering. So when you have that horrible thought when you're in the bathroom and you're going to see something in the mirror behind you, you could see the vampire. Great, good, good, good. Guaranteed. Not in maybe all my haunted mirrors in my house because they're all really old and timey. Well, you brought that on one. I did. So coming back to dolphins, apart from all of these incredible things that we've told you already, like Hannah said, they are highly social, highly emotional creatures. They have empathy, they show altruism, and they show attachment. There are hundreds, if not maybe thousands of examples of dolphins like

saving humans who are caught in trouble at sea like injured people they'll like pull them up to the surface or try get them back to their boat that is showing a level of understanding that not only do they have empathy that they understand that something is wrong with you they also show altruism by helping you going out of their way in order to support you in order to save you and that's incredible yeah they'll also bring your phone back if you drop it. I saw it on TikTok. Well, there you go. And like, yeah, people may like dogs can do that.

Absolutely, for sure. But they spend a lot of time with us. Dolphins do not. So that sort of innate empathy and altruism in an untrained form in wild animals like that is what makes the dolphin so remarkable. I also just have infinite respect for an air-breathing animal that lives in the water.

How does that work? Well, we'll go on to find out because it's actually quite a key part of the story later on. True. Yes. Sorry. So dolphins are also, like we said, incredibly sensitive creatures who have deep social bonds because they even mourn their dead. And this is the time I wish we'd brought the soundboard from downstairs. Because dolphins, very smart, very emotional, also very sexual creatures. Ouch.

Thank you. You're welcome. You're a walking soundboard. I am a walking soundboard. Aside from humans, dolphins are the only other animal on the planet that have sex for pleasure. Which is interesting because pigs apparently orgasm last 30 minutes. Also, I'm sure bonobo monkeys, they fuck about everything. This is what I read.

Oh no, I believe you. Somebody, I mean, please, I'm very happy to be corrected on this. What I've read, what I've come across is that dolphins, I mean, obviously all animals have sex for like an innate biological drive to procreate, but apparently dolphins are the only, I'm guessing what they're saying is if dolphins could have contraception, they would. Because they're not only interested in the offspring creation, they're just interested in the banging part. Just going to the little dolphin pharmacy. So it's no surprise given all of that, that dolphins have long been an animal of interest for scientists, human scientists, and maybe dolphin scientists, the world over.

And one of these scientists was bopping about in 1961. He was a man named John C. Lilly. And if you look him up, he's a man of many talents because he is described as an American physician, neuroscientist, psychoanalyst, psychonaut, whatever that is, a philosopher, writer, and inventor. Also, he was described as being part of a movement of, like, counterculture scientists back in the day. And he is very much that, as we will go on to discuss. Because in 1961, John C. Lilly wrote a book called The Man and the Dolphin, in which he wonders if we can teach dolphins to speak English.

That's basically the whole book. Harvard is the oldest and richest university in America. But when a social media-fueled fight over Harvard and its new president broke out last fall, that was no protection. Claudian Gay is now gone. We've exposed the DEI regime, and there's much more to come. This is The Harvard Plan, a special series from the Boston Globe and WNYC's On the Media. To listen, subscribe to On the Media wherever you get your podcasts. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart.

But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. When TV producer Roy Radin was found dead in a canyon near LA in 1983, there were many questions surrounding his death. The last person seen with him was Lainey Jacobs, a seductive cocaine dealer who desperately wanted to be part of the Hollywood elite. Together, they were trying to break into the movie industry. But things took a dark turn when a million dollars worth of cocaine and cash went missing. From Wondery comes a new season of the hit show Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder.

Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of The Cotton Club Murder early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus. And this is the thing that sort of separates John C. Lilly for me from other scientists in this space. Because he wasn't just like, can we teach dolphins to speak English for our own gain, to train them to do things for us, etc. He wants to teach dolphins to speak English so that he could talk to them about life the world and existence yeah john c lily's on one dolphins are a big part of hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy that's so long and thanks for all the fish yeah yeah yes i think the dolphin experience has long been a human obsession maybe that's fair to say even there's all those stories from back in the

day when sailors were like seeing sirens or falling in love with mermaids that they were actually just dolphins or manatees i've heard manatees and like manatees i can kind of understand because they've got these massive eyes yes like there are features of their face that could look quite human if you hadn't had sex in two years but as we will also go on to find out, a lot of people be thirsty for dolphins. Because that is the main part of this episode today. So not John C. Lilly. He's not about that. He's just like wants to chat to the dolphins. That's his whole vibe.

And it does sound nuts, right? But one man thought that it might have some legs. And that man was Carl Sagan. Carl Sagan, that name probably sounds familiar to most people because he was an incredibly famous American astronomer. He was one of the founding fathers of the American space program. And at this point in the 60s, he was also a consultant at NASA. And that's when he heard about John C. Reilly's dolphin ideas. And he was fucking in.

Why? Well, Carl Sagan theorized, if we can learn to talk to dolphins, maybe we can learn to talk to aliens. Which sounds ridiculous, but I do understand it. Yeah, stranger things have happened. Precisely. Like if you watch the film Arrival, that's a very good film.

I love an alien invasion film. I thought it was one of the more well-tuned ones, very well thought about. It wasn't just like, let's blow them up. It was like, how do we communicate with this race of creatures that we have nothing in common with and they have to basically figure out how to communicate with them and so i understand where carl sagan is going with this and nasa agreed because in 1964 carl sagan secured nasa funding for the communications research institute in the

caribbean and you can find loads of videos of these experiments on the deepest, darkest internet. I'm lying, it's just on YouTube. Like this one. Today is August 18. This is the morning lesson with Peter. Hello. Hello. Hello.

Clearly Peter. What's wrong with the little bit of that? Come on. As you just heard on that clip that we ripped from the internet completely legally, the dolphins seem to be able to mimic the speech pattern and inflection of human language yeah they just do this again and again and they're just like blah blah blah blah blah and then the dolphin just like says it back they're like oh my god it's doing it which i think is an interesting art because i read a i love coco the gorilla the gorilla that

can do asl and was like best friends with robin williams and she cried when he died and she's like signing like coco sad i read an article by some fucking little bitch that was like coco's not speaking she's performing for reward isn't that how human babies learn to speak isn't performing for reward and mimicking how humans learn to speak like what is the difference well i guess that the next step in a baby just mimicking for reward would be that it actually understands what it's saying right no sure yeah like and humans have more developed brains than Coco so obviously there are more stages but I think where I I'm on the fence with the argument is that like if Coco the gorilla or a dolphin understands that they will get something from asking for a specific

thing because Coco makes specific requests for specific things how different is that from a baby who also wants the reward who will ask for a specific thing I mean I don't know enough about this to make any sort of educated answer but I think it's like the comprehension part of like what they're actually saying I suppose like with the dolphins coming back to the syntax like you say with the dog it will you'll throw a ball or you'll be like go get the green octopus and a dog might do it because it's just learned to like associate that word with that particular item but with the dolphin for example it's like a step above in that if they said bring the hoop to the ball or bring the ball to the hoop the dolphin understood the difference between those

two things so it shows a step up again like don't know, and I'm assuming the scientific community probably also can't tell to that extent yet the difference between those things. But obviously, there is a clear distinction between some animals that can understand and can comprehend versus others that can't. With the dolphins, they are incredibly intelligent. But even after this extensive level of research, it seemed like people still didn't really know what was going on with them. And to be clear, the whole point of this experiment was to train dolphins to speak English through their blowhole. Yes, that's what we have to be really clear about. This whole experiment that was funded by NASA through the Communications Research Institute in 1964 wasn't

to get them to just mimic words, wasn't to even just get them to be like, we understand the difference between a ball and a hoop and we understand syntax. They already knew that dolphins could do that. What they were trying to do here, and I cannot like stress this enough, was get the dolphins to speak English.

So they wanted to be like, do you like pizza? And not for the dolphin to be like, to get the dolphin to be like, yes, I do. Can I get a pizza with extra anchovies on? Like, that's what they wanted it to be able to do. Which you have to understand, like the audaciousness of this research trial. But also understand some of the things that happen later, I think. Yes, no, totally.

But fucking nothing compared to MKUltra. So let's move on. And we're moving on to a key member of not only this dolphin research team, but today's episode. And she was a part of the Dolphin Dream team and her name was Margaret Howe Lovett. Margaret wasn't actually a linguist or an animal communication expert. She was just a volunteer. But she had a talent. The scientists on the team spotted that Margaret had an innate ability to connect with the dolphins. So they hired her. And in the experiment, there were three dolphins, Sissy, Pamela and Peter. Sissy was a female dolphin and she was the biggest. She was also quite pushy and loud and people described her as being sort of overly cocky.

She's definitely the alpha of the group. Then there was Pamela. Pamela was very timid. And then, finally, there was Peter. Peter was the youngest dolphin. He was a bit naughty, but he seemed the most keen to learn. So Margaret picked Peter to be her dolphin. And given how audacious the sort of like end result was of this research,

like what they wanted to achieve, things were absolutely intense. Margaret spent hours with Peter and all of it was spent trying to get this dolphin to speak. There are so many videos and photos of her out there with like thick white face paint smeared all over the bottom half of her face so like all the way like covering her nose all the way down to like her jaw like and spread out so almost like a clown's right smile makeup all over the bottom half of her face and then there would just be a thick black outline around her lips and i was like why is she doing that but she'd be looking at the dolphins and like enunciating the words.

Do you like pizza? And then the point was of this face painted situation was to try to get the dolphins to see her mouth as her blowhole. Oh my God. And emulate the movements that she was making with their blowholes. But I don't know how much like flexibility a dolphin's blowhole has. As much as, like, our mouths have for oral posture. I think probably not. I don't think dolphins are on, like, dolphin YouTube watching elocution videos.

So yes, unsurprisingly, the results weren't exactly blowing anybody away. So Margaret came up with a new plan. She suggested that perhaps it would help if she started staying with Peter overnight. By moving a bed and a desk into the middle of the pool on a platform. And that meant she could spend 24 hours a day with Peter the Dolphin six days a week. And NASA were like, sure, Margaret, go fucking nuts. This is the thing.

Would you like an ergonomic keyboard? It all sounds crazy. And it is. It is crazy. But I do think that I think it might have been a case of like use it or lose it with the funding. Right. And NASA were like, right, we've just got to put some money somewhere. We've got to be using it.

Otherwise, we're going to get cut off. they're like right fine let's sink some more money into this and carl sagan was a very highly respected person too because and john lilly was as well so i think they're like if anybody can do it these guys can do it and i also think that margaret's sort of pushing to take this next step is because they have a limited amount of time they also know like any scientific experiment, if at some point you're not showing any sort of results, you're going to get shot down. So she's like, last ditch attempt, let's give it everything we've got. But soon, Margaret began to get frustrated again.

Peter was a young male dolphin and he was coming into his sexuality more and more as the days passed. He constantly got distracted from his lessons by his raging dolphin boner. So every time the team had to hoist him down in a specially made water lift into a pool with two other female dolphins so that he could get it all out of his system and into their dolphin vaginas. Because if they didn't let him do that, he just would not focus on his blowhole English. And this was annoying for Margaret because she's given up six days of her week to teach this dolphin English even though she's not a scientist or a linguist but she was still annoyed by this because it took

so long to get Peter down to the other lady dolphins and then bring him back up to the classroom bedroom sleepover study desk situation Margaret felt like these dolphin dick appointments were just interfering far too much with her lessons and her schedule. So, and they do this at SeaWorld, Margaret decided that she would just start providing Peter with sexual relief herself. They do this at SeaWorld? How do you think they harvest semen? Oh, yeah. Like, orca semen is fucking big bucks, big business.

So if they want to harvest it they have to wank off the dolphin themselves it's in blackfish you can see it their penises look like wrapping paper like kind of like curled round it's very bizarre but yeah if you want to see an orca jizz you can see that blackfish so what she would do rather than going straight for the wank off is that she would let peter hump her legs or her feet in the beginning. But it wasn't too long before Margaret started using her hands. She said she didn't mind it that much, as long as Peter wasn't too rough. And in interviews since, she said that she knew it was sexual for Peter,

but for her it was just sensual. This is the thing. In fact, you know what? Let's insert the clip of Margaret saying this so you can hear it from her mouth herself. It was just easier to incorporate that and let it happen. It was very precious. It was very gentle. Peter was right there. He knew that I was right there. Again, it was sexual on his part. It was not sexual on mine. Sensuous, perhaps. We've just become part of what was going on, like an itch. Just get rid of that. We'll scratch it and we'll be done. Move on. And that's really all it was. I was there to get to know Peter. That was part of Peter. Okay, so this is the thing.

It's because she says, for Peter, she knew it was sexual, and then she says, for me, it wasn't sexual, it was just sensual. I think she should have said, it wasn't sexual or sensual, it was scientific. Like, the fact that she says sensual, I'm like, ooh. Yeah, you're getting something out of this, Margaret. I don't like that. But essentially, Margaret's reasoning was that it was like Peter had an itch. And once it was scratched, they could just move on and get back to work.

So Margaret was in there with Peter for six months, 24 hours a day. Because remember, she's sleeping in there with him six days a week. I don't know. Did she feel frustrated at the constant sex breaks that Peter needed and figured, if I just keep him focused and I do teach him to talk, and then if this works, if I can teach this fucking dolphin to speak English through his blowhole, it will be such a massive scientific breakthrough that none of this dolphin wanking will matter in the end? That's the only logic that makes sense to me apart from the fact that she was enjoying it.

Yeah. But whatever her logic was, the experiment just wasn't getting anywhere. And then someone leaked the story of Margaret and Peter to Hustler. And Hustler printed a big old article about it that went old and timey viral, which I assume is people cutting out the page of the magazine, posting it to their friend. You don't believe in ghosts? I get it. Lots of people don't. I didn't either until I came face to face with them. Ever since that moment,

hauntings, spirits, and the unexplained have consumed my entire life. I'm Nadine Bailey. I've been a ghost tour guide for the past 20 years. I've taken people along with me into the shadows, uncovering the macabre tales that linger in the darkness.

And inside some of the most haunted houses, hospitals, prisons, and more. Join me every week on my podcast, Haunted Canada, as we journey through terrifying and bone-chilling stories of the unexplained. Search for Haunted Canada on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you find your favorite podcasts. I'm Jake Warren and in our first season of Finding, I set out on a very personal quest to find the woman who saved my mum's life. You can listen to Finding Natasha right now exclusively on Wondery Plus. In season two, I found myself caught up in a new journey to help someone I've never even met.

But a couple of years ago, I came across a social media post by a person named Loti. It read in part, Three years ago today that I attempted to jump off this bridge, but this wasn't my time to go. A gentleman named Andy saved my life. I still haven't found him. This is a story that I came across purely by chance, but it instantly moved me,

and it's taken me to a place where I've had to consider some deeper issues around mental health. This is season two of Finding, and this time, if all goes to plan, we'll be finding Andy. You can listen to Finding Andy and Finding Natasha exclusively and ad-free on Wondery+. Join Wondery in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. They even included illustrations. Because presumably Margaret wasn't going to let them take a picture.

NASA was humiliated on a global scale. And they shut the experiment down. By this point, John Lilly had moved on to experimenting using LSD and wasn't that bothered about dolphins or their blowholes anymore. But he had given LSD to dolphins, but he claimed that it didn't really have any effect on them. Which is interesting because apparently, and I did do a bit of reading about it, not a huge amount, maybe we'll do it in another shorthand one day, but like apparently if you give like ketamine to like quite a small, or if you give like horse tranquilizer that can obviously bring down a horse,

like a smaller animal with just a different like biological makeup, it does nothing. Like that's fucking nuts. I went to a really amazing, the Wellcome Museum is one of my favorite museums and they have the permanent exhibition, which is just like rich old white man collects novelties. But then they have an exhibition downstairs,

which changes all the time. The best one I've ever been to was called High Society and it was just like the effect of drugs not only on humans but on animals. And they had these pictures of spider swabs after a spider had been given different types of drugs. It's really interesting and it fucks spiders up. Wow. So after the dolphin house experiment was closed down,

Peter was sent to another lab. And tragically, after just a week, Peter ended up killing himself. So coming back to dolphins being air breathers who live in the sea, dolphins, unlike humans, have to breathe manually. It's not automatic for them like it is for us. Presumably this is because if a dolphin passes out and then it carries on breathing automatically in the sea, it's going to drown. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So they have to make a conscious decision to come to the surface and breathe air in. So one day, it seems that Peter simply decided not to breathe anymore.

And he drowned. And I think obviously there is a lot of speculation here, like, as to why this happened. So some people are like, Margaret having that closer connection with him spending so long six days a week with him 24 hours a day he wasn't with the other dolphins he only had one date with the other two dolphins did she become like his world and she's also fucking wanking him off now so there's like another relationship building there and again you could argue like when people have to do it to bulls i I assume they use machines rather than their hands. I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know. Young Farmers Association, somebody tell us. Invite us to the bull. Actually, please don't. Again, it's like, I guess you could argue that's a different type of thing because do cows and bulls have the same level of complex social emotions and relationship building that dolphins do? So if we are saying that they are that smart they have that complex social relationships and then you've been wanking it off and then peter is removed from you completely and sent off to a completely new lab with strangers and strange other dolphins and whatever did he commit suicide

because he was heartbroken like it does seem really fucking like those two things are connected i completely agree i also think that i, coming back to Blackfish again, a big reason that Tilikum went into psychosis is that they're supposed to be living in the ocean and he was in a swimming pool his whole life. So I think living in a lab is also going to have mental effects on such an intelligent creature and then also being moved from one to the other

and you don't know where you are. No one's explaining anything to you because you haven't learned blowhole English. That would be an upheaval for a human. Absolutely and you know this is the reason why no aquarium anywhere in the world has great white sharks because as soon as you put a great white shark into captivity it dies which I think is remarkably terrifying. So this story is kind of where we were going to end it because it is very bizarre it's very strange it's kind of got everything covered that you need in a shorthand episode but I did fall down a little bit of a rabbit hole and discover

that it is not the weirdest story out there and then she forced me down that rabbit hole as well it's a blowhole what differentiates Margaret and Peter from the next story we're going to tell you is that we do think that Margaret saw wanking Peter off as a chore to clear the deck so she could get back to work. We're not convinced that she was sexually attracted to Peter the dolphin. And it's weird and it does seem unethical, but perhaps not as sexual as some of the articles would have you believe. But there is a story out there that we discovered of a man and a dolphin named Dolly that is most certainly sexual in every gross way possible.

The man, whose name is Malcolm Brenner, even wrote a whole book about his aquatic love affair called Wet Goddess. I hate it. So if you don't want to read that book, there is a 15-minute documentary out there that I will leave the link for in the episode description and this is the documentary that I made Hannah watch

over one very grisly lunchtime. And I do have to say about this documentary it has surprisingly high production value for such a weird story it does I was expecting it to be just like some sort of fucking shit little thing shot on a phone or whatever but it's actually quite well made very slick so go watch it I don't know it's horrible basically the story is that Malcolm Brenner he's a photographer he's like a real deal photographer And one day he visited a theme park called Florida Land in the 70s. And there he fell in love with Dolly the dolphin. Then one day he had penetrative sex slash raped her. I don't know. I don't know. Like he says it wasn't rape. He says it was consensual loving sex. He says that they'd been like courting and hanging out for ages again like can animals consent like I really don't want to get into this into this conversation

in the documentary he also talks a lot about vaginal waterproofing valves that female dolphins have in their genital slits and I don't know it's all horrible and he makes the argument that it couldn't have been rape because Dolly could have obviously just swam away from him and he wouldn't have had any chance of catching her. I absolutely think like sheep and dogs and stuff can't consent to having sex with humans. But like, again, can dolphins? I don't know. I don't know. I'm not an expert. It really is. I'm not saying it's okay to have sex with animals. but I'm saying I don't understand what's going on here. And I do feel sorry for Malcolm. When you watch the documentary, he clearly has a very troubled childhood. I would say that having sex with animals is probably not indicative that everything is a-okay with you as a person, probably. And this is a little snippet of the documentary

where Malcolm talks about when he was first attracted to animals. Because it wasn't Dolly. Dolly wasn't his first. I first realized I was sexually attracted to animals when my father took me to see a Walt Disney movie called The Shaggy Dog. And strangely enough, I found myself getting an erection at five years old. After that, I was aware that there was something different about my sexuality. Zoophilia is Greek for lover of animals. A zoophile is someone in contrast to a bestialist who might just have sex with an animal and walk away.

A zoophile is somebody who has tender or caring emotions for their animal partner. My first sexual encounter with an animal came when I was about 11 or 12. I tried to have sex with the family dog, which was a miniature poodle named Miss Clavel. The dog was in heat, so I naively assumed that since she was having sex with a stud dog, she would be willing to have sex with me. Which she wasn't. It was an embarrassing incident.

It was not very romantic. After that, I felt basically unclean. I felt like I wanted to take a bath. I wondered what was wrong with me. So yeah, that was quite grim. But I think the worst bit of the documentary for me was to listen to Malcolm, who seems like a very normal man. He really does.

Considering the subject matter. Listening to him compare his animal fancying to interracial relationships. Yeah, yeah, that bit's not... Not the best. Not great. No. Because he's really an advocate

for people changing their sort of stiff opinions about this kind of thing. And being like, people could just love whoever they want. Yeah. But like, yeah, it's animal abuse, isn't it? Yeah. I mean, also, Dolly also kills herself. Oh, yes. Yes.

Dolly also does kill herself after Florida Land is shut down and she gets moved somewhere else. And Malcolm stops seeing her. Within a week, she kills herself. And Flipper killed himself, too. So maybe we should just leave the dolphins alone I think we should probably leave the dolphins alone again some people are like she killed herself because he raped her but some people like she killed herself because he had spent so much time with her developed that bond and then abandoned her yeah when Florida land shut down so don't have one night stands with dolphins because they will kill themselves. Oh my God.

I know, man. That is fucking depressing. So there you go, guys. That is the story of Margaret Howe, the woman who loved a dolphin. It is not as sexual as people will make out,

but it is pretty fucking weird. And if you want to, go check out the documentary that we will leave a link for below. I don't know. It's a weird one. Don't go to SeaWorld.

Don't give them your money. Don't do it. And we'll be back next week with another shorthand. Hooray. one yeah don't go to seaworld don't give them your money don't do it and we'll be back next week with another shorthand how was that fulfill all your dolphin ranking needs i hope so that was in fact episode one or two i believe of shorthand our exclusive other podcast so if you want to go listen to it go listen now if you're a member of Amazon Prime, Amazon Music, or Amazon Music Unlimited, just download the Amazon Music app and see if you're eligible. He was hip-hop's biggest mogul, the man who redefined fame, fortune, and the music industry.

The first male rapper to be honored on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Sean Diddy Cone. Diddy built an empire and lived a life most people only dream about. Everybody know ain't no party like a Diddy party, so. Yeah, that's what's up. But just as quickly as his empire rose, it came crashing down. Today I'm announcing the unsealing of a three-count indictment, charging Sean Combs with racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, interstate

transportation for prostitution. I was f***ed up. I hit rock bottom, but I made no excuses. I'm disgusted. I'm so sorry. Until you're wearing an orange jumpsuit, it's not real. Now it's real. From his meteoric rise to his shocking fall from grace, from law and crime, this is the rise and fall of Diddy. Listen to the rise and fall of Diddy exclusively with Wondery Plus. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondery Show American Scandal. We bring to light some of the biggest controversies in U.S. history. Presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our latest series, NASA embarks on an ambitious program to reinvent space exploration with the launch of its first reusable vehicle, the Space Shuttle. And in 1985, they announced

they're sending teacher Krista McAuliffe into space aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger, along with six other astronauts. But less than two minutes after liftoff, the Challenger explodes. And in the tragedy's aftermath, investigators uncover a series of preventable failures by NASA and its contractors that led to the disaster. Follow American Scandal on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Experience all episodes ad-free and be the first to binge the newest season only on Wondery+. You can join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Start your free trial today.