Sunday 20 May 2012

Full House

Yeah this is going to be one of THOSE posts where I stop the fun bus for a second and talk about something I think is important.
In this case, identity, biphobia and 3am epiphanies I guess (as a side note 3am Epiphany would make an awesome name for a band).

Picture the scene, it was 3am, I was browsing reddit because I couldn't sleep (no I was not going to just close my eyes because then I would have just lay there wide awake listening to Kev snore, I'd rather be doing something un-productive), when I saw a link to Erika Moen's new comic strip (NSFW).

It struck a chord with me because I have had some very similar experiences, and of late I have started to question if I CAN really keep labelling myself as bisexual, I've been feeling increasingly less comfortable with it lately.

When I first came out I chose to label myself as bisexual (and I would just like to stress that I choose the word not my sexuality, I can't choose my sexuality, I'm sure if I could life would be a lot easier) because I was under the assumption that gender was binary, you had "boys" and "girls" and I liked both so "TA DAH!" I must be bisexual, but over the years my understanding of thing has changed.

I no longer believe that gender is so binary, so I feel off about identifying as bisexual when I don't really believe there are just two sexes and I am attracted to more than two of them, I also don't really feel right about identifying as pansexual, I guess that's probably the best description of how I am but at the same time I really hate the word "pansexual", silly reason I know but as much as I like a good friend breakfast I like people not pans.

So I guess that queer is the best description for me, maybe not forever but for right now it is.

Onto the second thing, in one panel of the comic Erika points out that intolerance is a trait shared by both straight and gay people.
This is something I have noticed over the years too, and unfortunately I have found that personally I have heard more intolerance from within the gay community than from outside of it, and that kind of upsets me.

I'm willing to admit that as far as not hearing that many abusive things from straight people might be down to some kind of "boob owner privilege" or something (it seems to be that there is more acceptance for bisexual women, and people that pass as women than there is for bisexual men or people that pass for men), but some of the things I've heard from other queer folk can be pretty upsetting sometimes:

"Everybody knows you're just a lesbian in denial" (this was said when I was dating my ex boyfriend)
"I will be so disappointed if you end up with a man" (um what?)
"EWWWW YOU'VE BEEN WITH MEN? EWWWW!" 
"You're just greedy"
"Oh now that you're straight I guess I won't see you at Pride this year" (FFS I'm not straight...Just because I'm in a relationship with a man doesn't mean I suddenly stop being attracted to women)
"You're just a fake wannabe" 
"You're to young to know for sure"
"If you really were bi you'd have known long before this"
and the list goes on...

I wonder how we can ever expect straight people to accept us if we can't even accept each
other?
I just wish people would think before they speak sometimes.

[/weird ranty post]

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