Bisexuals: We’re here, We’re Queer + There are a lot of us

Says Lauren Michelle Kinsey (one half of the popular duo Bi the Bi: Two Bi Writers on Big Bi Issues) —

According to The Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law among adults who identify as LGB, bisexuals comprise a slight majority. I’ve attached a link to the research brief.

If you tell this bit of data to to lesbian and gay people, you will often get a shocked reaction. They might say something like, “But I don’t know any bisexuals.” This is because bisexual people are generally not as visible/recognizable as gays and lesbians. People generally assume that they can tell someone’s sexual orientation by who that person is in a relationship with. And if a bisexual person is single and they are involved in the LGBT community, people often assume that they are lesbian or gay. Sometimes that assumption persists even if a person makes an effort to let people know that they identify as bisexual, because people sometimes don’t see bisexual as a valid sexual orientation identity. If a bisexual person is single, and they are not involved in the LGBT community, most people assume they are heterosexual.

I suspect that many people who are willing to identify as bisexual on a survey would be unwilling to be fully out of the closet about their sexual orientation. I’ve met some bisexual people who, although they are supportive of LGBT rights, don’t feel a responsibility to be out to the people in their lives. They don’t seem to understand how being out will help the LGBT movement as a whole. Sometimes they even feel as if they would be doing something wrong by being out of the closet.

The main reason bisexual people are in the closet is because they know that if they are open about being bisexual they will have to live with negative assumptions being made about them by many people inside and outside of the LGBT community.

Kinsey's Scale Is So 1948

fliponymous:

For bisexuals, the Kinsey scale limits rather than frees us.

One of the charges frequently leveled at bisexuals (especially male-identified bisexuals) is that we don’t exist. I’ve seen Kinsey used in a couple of different ways to do this.

One is the idea that “bisexual” is a word that describes only an exact 50/50 attraction: “Everyone has a preference one way or another, so you’re either mostly straight or mostly gay.”

Another is rooted directly in the idea that we have to somehow “prove out” our bisexuality by having exactly the same number of sexual encounters with people both genders, or that “only behavior with both genders in the last month/year/decade counts” (leaving aside, for now, the fallacy that there are only two genders and that they are completely exclusive and opposite).

charlottewithac:

I’m currently starting to work on my research paper , I still have a lot of time before it’s due but I want it to be perfect. The topic is bisexuality. It’s a really personal topic for me. This paper is pretty much my baby, I’m literally gonna give it my all.

Here is a general list of Bisexual Academic/Queer Theory “stuff” for you to use (copied from posts in Bisexuals For Marriage Equality & BiNet USA)

Definitions of Bisexuality from several leading bisexual organizations
Academic Bi
BiUK
10 Must Read Classic Bisexual Books from Bi Magazine
Journal of Bisexuality
Bisexual/Queer Theory & Activism

Bisexuality does not reinforce the gender binary by Julia Serano (2010)
“Being Bisexual Means That You’re Only Attracted to Two Genders. Bi Means Two. Two Genders” by Somewhat of Something Other
Bi Radical by Shiri Eisner
Eponymous Fliponymous by Patrick RichardsFink

Bisexual Magazines

Research Reports

Bisexual health: An introduction and model practices for HIV/STI prevention programming (2007)
Bisexual Invisibility: Impacts and Recommendations (2011)
The Bisexuality Report: Bisexual inclusion in LGBT equality and diversity (2012)

BiReCon (The Bisexual Research Conference) Presentations (YouTube)

Research on LGBT Identities in Bisexuals, People of Color & Women

There is growing scholarly recognition of the experience and diversity of sexual orientation beyond “heterosexual,” “gay,” and “lesbian” identities, and this recognition has led to challenges to the traditional stage models of sexual orientation identity development.

Scholars have found that bisexuals experience identity processes differently from the way lesbians and gay men do (Fox, 1995; Klein, 1990, 1993). For example, some individuals may come to bisexual identity after self-labeling as lesbian or gay. Others may identify bisexual feelings from childhood onward. Still others may not become aware of bisexual feelings until after experiencing heterosexual relationships or marriages.

Further, stage models do not account for ways in which the boundaries between Eurocentric notions of culture, sexual orientation, and gender identity are blurred and reconstructed in non-Western contexts (Brown, 1997; Gonsiorek, 1995). One such example is the existence of “Two Spirit” identities that blend Western notions of gender identity and sexual orientation within Native American communities (Brown, 1997).

Across cultures, LGBT identities have different names and meanings. Researchers are providing new perspectives on the experience of multiple and intersecting identities related to race and ethnicity, nationality, and sexuality. Research regarding the ways race and culture interact with the experience of LGBT identities in the United States has expanded (Boykin, 1996, on African Americans; Diaz, 1997, and Espin, 1993, on Latinos; Manalansan, 1993, on Asian Americans; Crow, Brown, and Wright, 1997, and Wilson, 1996, on Native Americans). Beyond the United States, scholarship on the intersections of LGBT identities and nationality is expanding as well, particularly in reference to Africans, Latin Americans, Middle Easterners, and South and East Asians (Ben-Ari, 2001; Kapack, 1992; Kovac, 2002; McLelland, 2000).

Additional research addresses the influence of gender, socioeconomic class, ability, and spirituality on LGBT identity development. Regarding gender differences, women’s non-heterosexual identity processes have most often been presented as paralleling those of men, yet a number of scholars indicate that women may come out and have intimate same-gender experiences at somewhat later ages (Brown, 1995; Sears, 1989).

Recent research explores LGBT identities related to social class and class systems, posing questions about how non-heterosexual identities intersect with class privilege and oppression (Becker, 1997; Raffo, 1997; Vanderbosh, 1997). Scholarship is emerging that addresses ways that identities of people with disabilities are influenced by LGBT identity processes (Clare, 1999). DuMontier (2000) hypothesized interactions between sexual orientation and faith development, and other authors discuss specific religious traditions and sexual orientation identity (Love, 1998).

By expanding the theoretical bases for understanding LGBT identities beyond those represented by white, Western men in the foundational models of homosexual identity formation (such as Cass, 1979 and 1984, and Troiden, 1979), researchers provide a complex picture of non-heterosexual identity. They highlight the social context of non-heterosexual identities across cultures and draw attention to the diversity that exists within LGBT communities.

Again, one doesn’t have a right to define the label “bisexuality” for others regardless of your vast knowledge of Latin prefixes.

from “Way Beyond the Binary” by the Bisexual Resource Center (BRC)

What will it take for the gayristocracy to realize that bisexual, lesbian, transgender and gay people are in this together we can and will move the agenda forward.

But this will not happen until public recognition of our common issues is made, and a sincere effort to confront biphobia and transphobia is made by the established gay and lesbian leadership in this country.

Lani Ka’ahumanu, co-editor “Bi Any Other Name: Bisexual People Speak Out” (from her speech delivered at the 1993 March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation)

I think that for monosexuals , they may tend to view bisexuality as like ‘having two monosexualities’ hence they imagine a bi person can never be content with just one other person.

says LintLass, a very smart and thoughtful bisexual person

Words, binary and biphobia, or: why “bi” is binary but “FTM” is not

bialogue-group:

This is a long post. TAKEN FROM AND EVEN LONGER ESSAY THAT SHOULD BE READ In its ENTIRETY But trust me, it is good. Take your time in reading in, it will be worth it

Before I write – a disclaimer: this post contains criticism of the non-bisexual-identified transgender community and discourse. Please be aware that I am writing this criticism not as an outsider, but as a genderqueer person involved in transgender community, and activism. I hope this criticism is taken in the same spirit in which it was written – that of passion and solidarity.

It appears increasingly acceptable of late, in transgender/genderqueer communities and activist discourses, to portray bisexuality as a binary identity, and thus intrinsically transphobic. As the claim classically goes – since the word “bisexuality” has “bi” (literally: two) in it, then it is inherently gender-binary, pointing to only two genders/sexes as its sources of reference – thus erasing non-binary sexes and genders out of existence …

I think I know this song…The argument claiming bisexuality to be binary situates bisexuality as an oppressive identity perpetuating hegemonic ideology. Less academically – to say that bisexuality is binary is to say that bisexuality is an oppressive identity contributing to dominant social order. Now, where have I heard that before? …

Apparently the first people to make this binary claim were not at all trans people, but one gay male and one straight female (gay-male-identified) academics. I mean, of course, Eve Kosofski-Sedgewick and Lee Edelman (separately) …

To say that the stance on bisexuality as binary has been initiated, it appears, by an academic gay white cisman and an academic straight white ciswoman is to say that these people had a political and academic interest in the elimination of bisexuality from their theory and studies …

So what does this remind me of? Claims of bisexuality as an oppressive/privileged identity are not new. As anyone who wanders the world as bisexual knows, we are often accused of bearing heterosexual privilege – especially by, but not limited to, lesbian communities. These accusations – classical by now – rely on the presumption that bisexual people are, in fact, straight, and that by refusing to relinquish our “attachment” to male-identified people we are accepting and perpetuating heteropatriarchal hegemony (in plain English: heterosexual and sexist oppression of women and queers).

What else does this remind me of? The same arguments were (and in some cases, still are) used against transgender people, too.

A short summary, and suggested solutions

So, to summarize:

I’ve been writing this post for three hours now and I’m tired and want to sleep.

The allegations of bisexuality being binary are a load of bullshit.

The allegations draw not from actual transphobia within bisexual words, communities or bi-identified people, but from wide trends and long histories of biphobia within the gay and lesbian movements.

Transgender people have historically (and currently) suffer(ed) from similar allegations by the same sources.

Suggestion solutions:
Solidarity

Love

The revolution

Sleep

Shiri Eisner is a radical bisexual-genderqueer-feminist-anarchist activist and writer. She resides in Tel Aviv, Israel, where she runs the bisexual organization Panorama – Bi and Pansexual Feminist Community and participates in the struggle against the occupation, radical queer activism, feminist activism, transgender and genderqueer activism, animal rights activism, and many more. She hopes to incite the revolution very soon.

In addition to Bi radical, she keeps a Hebrew-language blog Bi dyke And she’s on tumblr, too (in English): Bi radical

bisexual-community:

bisexualmind:

Back in the day (that day being 1842 ) the German doctor Richard von Krafft-Ebing wrote this famous book Psychopathia Sexualis: eine Klinisch-Forensische Studie (pub 1886)

This book discussed heterosexuality, homosexuality and something else - something the doctor used a term from botany to describe. “Bisexuality”. Bisexual flowers contain androecium and gynoecium and are called androgynous or hermaphroditic. Examples of plants with bisexual flowers include the lily, the rose and most plants with large showy flowers.

Krafft-Ebing held the view that bisexual people were mentally androgynous/intersex, that their brains contained more than one gender. Bisexuals were considered to be androgynous/intersex like Hermaphroditus, their patron demi-god/ess from Greek mythology.

LOL, I just ♥ title The Bisexual Mind uses … Bisexuals: from plants to people

And that we have our own demi-god/ess! Who is genderqueer! Bisexual smash the gender binary and monosexism. Hermaphroditus rules yo!

That’s not my bi history! It needs us to tell it how it is – and how it was

Concerned? We are too! As Jen Yockney wrote in Bi Community News:

In 2010, I went to two events to mark LGBT History Month. Both of them left me thinking, ‘this is not my history’.

One was an event that promised to talk about bisexuality, but the presentation skipped most of the last 25 years worth of bisexual community activism. When I asked a question that referenced Bi Community News – one of the longest running bi projects in the country [ed note Great Brittan], after all – it got blank looks from the speaker.

So many theorists, activists, events, publications, erased from the record presented. And knowing that for other attendees, if I didn’t challenge what was being said, then it was likely they’d go away taking the history presented as fair and true.

In complete bewilderment we have watched the wholesale attempt to rewrite and redefine all of modern bisexual history to make us disappear. A trend that really started picking up steam in late 2005/early 2006 and it seems continues unabated.

One of the latest stunts being buzzed about in the Bisexual Community? A re-editing this past July 2012 of the meaning of the familiar rose lavender and blue gradient (the bisexual pride colours) that has been used since the 1970’s in the familiar “Bi-Angles” symbol and then later was adopted into the Bi Pride Flag. As was calmly noted someone changed the meaning specificially so as to give, “more detail on non-binary erasure in the flag”.

Why? What is the point? What is being gained by this? And by who?