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" The first time occurred when a powerful alpha male, Yeroen, was in the midst of an intimidation display with all of his hair on end. This is nothing to make fun of. All other apes watch with trepidation, knowing that a male in this testosterone-filled state is keen to make his point: He is the boss. Anyone who gets in the way risks a serious beating. Moving like a furry steam locomotive that would flatten everybody and everything, Yeroen went with heavy steps up a leaning tree trunk that he often stamped on in a steady rhythm until the whole thing would shake and creak to amplify his message of strength and stamina. Every alpha male comes up with his own special effects. It had rained, however, and the trunk was slippery, which explains why at the peak of this spectacle the mighty leader slipped and fell. He held on to the trunk for a second, then dropped to the grass, where he sat looking around, disoriented. With a “the show must go on” attitude, he then wrapped up his performance by running straight at a group of onlookers, scattering them amid screams of fear.

Even though Yeroen’s plunge made me laugh out loud, as far as I could tell none of the chimps saw anything remotely comical. They kept their eyes on him as if this was all part of the same show, even though, clearly, it was not how Yeroen had intended things to go. A similar incident happened in a different colony, when the alpha male picked up a hard plastic ball during his display. He often threw this ball up in the air with as much force as possible—the higher the better—after which it would come down somewhere with a loud thud. This time, however, he threw the ball up and checked around with a puzzled expression because the ball had miraculously disappeared. He didn’t know that it was returning to earth by the same trajectory he had launched it on, landing with a smack on his own back. This startled him, and he broke off his display. Again, I found this a rather amusing sight, but none of the chimps showed any reaction that I could tell. Had they been human, they’d have been rolling around, holding their bellies with laughter, or—if fear kept them from doing so—they’d have been pinching one another, turning purple in an attempt to control themselves. "

― Frans de Waal , The Age of Empathy: Nature's Lessons for a Kinder Society

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Frans de Waal quote : The first time occurred when a powerful alpha male, Yeroen, was in the midst of an intimidation display with all of his hair on end. This is nothing to make fun of. All other apes watch with trepidation, knowing that a male in this testosterone-filled state is keen to make his point: He is the boss. Anyone who gets in the way risks a serious beating. Moving like a furry steam locomotive that would flatten everybody and everything, Yeroen went with heavy steps up a leaning tree trunk that he often stamped on in a steady rhythm until the whole thing would shake and creak to amplify his message of strength and stamina. Every alpha male comes up with his own special effects. It had rained, however, and the trunk was slippery, which explains why at the peak of this spectacle the mighty leader slipped and fell. He held on to the trunk for a second, then dropped to the grass, where he sat looking around, disoriented. With a “the show must go on” attitude, he then wrapped up his performance by running straight at a group of onlookers, scattering them amid screams of fear.<br /><br />Even though Yeroen’s plunge made me laugh out loud, as far as I could tell none of the chimps saw anything remotely comical. They kept their eyes on him as if this was all part of the same show, even though, clearly, it was not how Yeroen had intended things to go. A similar incident happened in a different colony, when the alpha male picked up a hard plastic ball during his display. He often threw this ball up in the air with as much force as possible—the higher the better—after which it would come down somewhere with a loud thud. This time, however, he threw the ball up and checked around with a puzzled expression because the ball had miraculously disappeared. He didn’t know that it was returning to earth by the same trajectory he had launched it on, landing with a smack on his own back. This startled him, and he broke off his display. Again, I found this a rather amusing sight, but none of the chimps showed any reaction that I could tell. Had they been human, they’d have been rolling around, holding their bellies with laughter, or—if fear kept them from doing so—they’d have been pinching one another, turning purple in an attempt to control themselves.
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