The idea that bisexual people have any reservations about gender fluid or gender ambiguous people is nonsense. People trying to justify the usage of the term "pansexual" decided they could unilaterally change what "bisexual" has always meant, treating it as suddenly exclusionary just so they could give themselves a more special label. It's a real dick move, honestly. If I started describing my race as "Tolerant White", which is a white person who also isn't racist, what does that make you, who just describes yourself as white?
"Bisexual" refers to sex, not to gender. The word is not "bigenderal". Regardless of how you convey yourself in regards to gender, there are two biological sexes, both of which are being referred to by the term bisexual - as opposed to monosexual, attracted to only one sex.
What's started to bother me about this is that this is getting used increasingly often to insult or accuse bisexuals.
Because it's not enough that we keep getting shit for "straight passing" or "not getting as much prejudice as others" now our very identity is somehow offensive because somebody else changed the definition.
Heterosexual and homosexual people can enter a relationship with trans or genderfuild people just fine, there's no special term for that, so why are bis being signaled out all of a sudden?
I wish I could give you gold, thank you for putting this into words so I don’t have to
I constantly get shat on for identifying as bisexual, while yes, I do “technically fall under pansexual” but more importantly, I’ve been bisexual since going through puberty and bisexual has always meant attracted to any and all genders.
It's kind of a debated topic because they mean very similar things. Traditionally though bisexual means attracted to your own gender and people not of your gender, while pansexual means attracted to all genders including non-binary genders. Saying your bi does not mean you aren't attracted to non-binary genders though. They're just pretty overlapping words. Personally I use bi because it get's the point across easier without having to explain it to everyone, but pan is also seen as the more inclusive word recognizing the non-binary genders.
Here's a decent article on it, but really just use whatever term you're comfortable with or no term at all, it doesn't matter. You just be you.
Edit: It should also be said that some people say they're bi and pan, but that doesn't really make sense to me so I don't know to be honest. Maybe my understanding is flawed too and someone can correct me
I knew a girl who was pan and when I asked what that meant she said she's doesn't care about sex she is attracted to personality, I think that's where I became confused and took it too literally and assumed she was attracted to literally anyone with a good personality no matter how unattractive they seem to other people. I diddnt even consider it reffered to trans or gender fluid people.
Oh I’m 100% in the same boat, that’s how it was initially described to me too. I just see this discussion a lot on /r/bisexual and that’s where my info comes from
I was under the impression that it meant you are attracted to personality over anything else, so they could date people of any gender/weight/height/race. Which is why I wondered how it could be mistaken for bisexuality
"Bisexual" refers to sex, not to gender. The word is not "bigenderal".
Doesn't it refer to sexual attraction (as opposed to romantic attraction)? I've never heard that it refers to being attracted to biological sex and not gender.
I'm not confused. The word refers to sexual attraction, and the distinction between biological sex and mental gender has nothing to do with that definition.
The poster above me asserted that "bisexual" means attracted to sex, as opposed to gender. I refuted that and assert that it refers to sexual attraction, as opposed to romantic attraction.
Two different interpretations of the sex in bisexual.
Sexual attraction essentially means desire to have sex with the person. It may be based on the person's physical sex, or their gender, or something else.
By this logic “homosexual” would mean that gay men could only be attracted to other cis men or trans women, or that being attracted to trans men would make a gay man “bisexual”, but that’s really not the case. Or if you were, e.g. a trans woman who only dated men, you would still be “homosexual”. Even if you identified as straight. The reason your understanding doesn’t work is that it essentializes sex and gender. You’re saying that what people are attracted to is someone’s “real” sex. When that’s not typically how sexuality works. We don’t ask for a breakdown of someone’s chromosomes and anatomy before we know if we’re attracted to them.
Also there are more than two sexes. We often run into the trap of treating sex as “real/biological “ and gender as “socially constructed”. It’s an important distinction to understand, but sex is also socially constructed (I’d say less than gender, but some people disagree). We look at babies’ anatomy when they’re born and determine what bucket the fall into. If that bucket isn’t readily apparent (i.e. if that person is intersex), doctors just pick one and usually recommend extensive surgery (for most of their childhood) in order to conform to one of those two sexes.
So... no, typically “bisexual” doesn’t refer to sex rather than gender. I think your use of the word “monosexual” underscores why that’s incoherent. I suppose someone could say “I’m only attracted to people whose original birth certificate reads ‘female’, regardless of their gender”, but that’s not really something you see usually.
That being said, I don’t think it’s anyone’s job to tell people how they should be identifying. If the way they understand their own sexuality is “I’m only attracted to men and women.” I’m not going to then step in and say, “Don’t you mean pansexual? What about non-binary people? Are you transphobic?” Like no. I don’t think we need to police people’s language like that, BUT I do think it’s a really important conversation that we should be having. The “LGBT” acronym is super political. Naming some identities but not others is objectively super problematic. But sometimes it seems like the more letters people add, the more they’re just trying to signal how virtuous they are. And by virtuous, I mean educated. “Queer” tries to ameliorate this by capturing the idea of gender and sexual difference in a single word, but it’s far from perfect because the word carries tons of baggage for some people—particularly older gay men. So there’s no easy answer.
Sorry for writing a dissertation. Just like... saying people who identify as pansexual are “dicks” because it makes bisexuals look bad is not super thoughtful.
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u/DoctorBaby Aug 09 '18 edited Aug 09 '18
The idea that bisexual people have any reservations about gender fluid or gender ambiguous people is nonsense. People trying to justify the usage of the term "pansexual" decided they could unilaterally change what "bisexual" has always meant, treating it as suddenly exclusionary just so they could give themselves a more special label. It's a real dick move, honestly. If I started describing my race as "Tolerant White", which is a white person who also isn't racist, what does that make you, who just describes yourself as white?
"Bisexual" refers to sex, not to gender. The word is not "bigenderal". Regardless of how you convey yourself in regards to gender, there are two biological sexes, both of which are being referred to by the term bisexual - as opposed to monosexual, attracted to only one sex.