“You are,” my good friend Kat has told me on more than one occasion, usually while we’re sharing a bottle of booze, clutching each other and sitting outside staring at the stars, “the worst lesbian in the world.”
Guess which one is the bisexual. Go on, guess. You’re wrong. It’s both.
She’s half right. I am pretty terrible at being a lesbian. The part where I have sex with men is probably my biggest point of failure. Ah yes, I think, as I crawl into bed with yet another reasonably nice bloke, this lesbian lark really doesn’t suit me. Except, of course, it does. It suits me roughly (very roughly, I don’t keep count) fifty percent of the time. The fifty percent of the time where I get the giggles trying to talk to the pretty lady who dispenses my monthly prescriptions, or when I get hit in the face for making a badly judged move on a woman in a club (complete misunderstanding, hastily rectified). Yeah, there’s definitely a part of me that’s gay. A part sizeable enough that I can’t suppress it without exploding into deranged stereotypes a few months down the line, so I’ve stopped trying.
Bisexuality. It’s a bit of a dirty word in all circles. The associations are enough to put anyone off. Promiscuous. Flighty. Fickle. Greedy. Indecisive. The L and G of the LGB community are about as welcoming to the B as those outside of the holy trinity (the T of the standard LGBT moniker is also royally shafted, but that’s an discussion for another day, and probably not one I should host.) They’re all too often seen as traitors, ready to jump ship and ‘make it straight’ the moment trouble beckons, the moment homophobia becomes a threat in the street or in the House of Commons. I could, after all, just swan off and marry a bloke and be perfectly happy and forget all about my desires for women, right? Well, no. Wrong. I can’t. It’s not as straightforward as that.
I have seen bisexuality described in various manners. There is of course the standard Kinsey scale, as found below:
The Kinsey Scale
Bisexual can encompass numbers one to five, with only zero, six and X excluding one or more of the genders. For some, ‘true’ bisexuality sits only at number three, a pure fifty-fifty split. Others describe a sort of ‘pendulum’ effect – veering wildly back and forth across the scale at the behest of an unknown force within the human body which demands that lust, love and all desires be sated with breasts, then penises, and then damn it, we’ll have both. Both is good. It’s complex, it’s unpredictable, and it’s different for pretty much everyone. It’s also undoubtedly, unequivocally real.
“Oh, so you like men now?” is not an appropriate response to someone you know who has previously dated women and is now dating a man. For a start, it’s not really any of your business – if someone is dating an individual, assume he or she likes (or loves) the individual and nothing more. I’ve known a woman to fall madly in love with another woman, but only that woman, and to not be attracted to the female gender as a whole. It happens to men, too. People can and will surprise you. Emotional and physical connections are intense and can spring up in what seem to be the most unlikely of places. Most importantly, someone dating a person of one gender does not mean they have suddenly given up on or stopped being attracted to the other. Even if they get married and plan to live monogamously with said partner, they can still identify as bisexual. You don’t suddenly become heterosexual or homosexual just because you settled down.
On that note, bisexuals can indeed settle down. The standard impression of promiscuous, ‘slutty’ individuals who either want attention or who just weren’t loved enough as children is bafflingly offensive because it simply isn’t true. There is nothing intrinsically damaging about bisexuality; it is not anti-family, or dangerous. I have every intention of pursuing a stable relationship to the conclusion of a home, of love, and of children. I am not, at the behest of my wild and unbridled desires, going to see out my life in the bottom of a ditch, rutting madly with fellow sexual miscreants (and even if I did, that’s my problem, not yours). Some bisexuals will engage in reckless sexual behaviour, and some won’t, much the same as heterosexual and homosexual individuals. Bisexuals are not a homogenous group who all adhere to the same code of sexual ethics, although I suspect that the majority of ‘us’ are a lot duller than the media likes to make out.
I googled ‘bisexuality’ and this was one of the top results. I cannot vouch for its accuracy.
In secondary school I recall ‘crazes’ of bisexuality among girls in my year, but this is part of growing up: experimentation, exploration. A good number of the girls I knew who claimed bisexuality were simply trying to learn something about themselves without committing to a sexual identity that they perceived as ‘other’, or even as wrong. They saw it as acceptable because they ‘liked boys too.’ And a lot of them ended up liking boys exclusively regardless, because teenagers are flighty and indecisive as a general rule. And that’s okay. That’s what happens when people are figuring out who they are. They are allowed to change their minds.
But regardless of this fact, if anyone, teen or adult, tells you in earnest that they are bisexual, take them as seriously as they ask of you. Don’t tell them that they’ll choose one day, that they’ll realise what they are and that they’ll find the gender that suits them. Both genders suit me. There are pros and cons on both sides. I’ve dated men for their scratchy beards and the thrill of PIV sex. I’ve dated women for their phenomenal breasts and the incomparable intimacy of sharing their beds. I’ve seen the best and worst of both genders and can confirm, without bias, that humans in general are just pretty ridiculous in every possible measure.
Do I sound haughty? Good. It’s a sore point, and one that I do not address often; so maligned have I found myself for not choosing one sexuality or the other that I tend to just stick to the gender of the person I’m seeing at the time to avoid questions. I’ve labeled myself as a lesbian on numerous occasions just to escape the derisive sneers that come with the word ‘bisexual’. I’ve let people assume without correcting them because they seem offended that I think it matters. But it’s my sexuality. It does matter. And so, well, here I am. I am Laura. I am bisexual. And I refuse to be ashamed of that any more.
Image credits:
Kinsey Scale from LuvandKiwi
Bisexuality from ManCrunch
Blog post originally appeared here on Laura’s to a fault blog
