Terminology *Bisexual*
I've seen this a staggering number of times now, so I am writing a little post about it. When you are bisexual, it means that you are attracted on some level to both men and women. When you are in a relationship of any kind that is heterogeneous, that is a heterosexual relationship in which one person is str8 or bi, and the other is bi. If you are in a homogenous relationship of any kind, that is a homosexual relationship. One Gay man and one bi man are not having bi sex. It's gay sex. It may seem piddling, but we already have bi-curious, thinking about bi-curious, in the condo next to the train to I can't believe it's not bi-curious, all of which seek to help the user avoid the stigma of dude on dude sex. That's a luxury and one that I don't begrudge folks.
But when you are fully bi male and you share your weekly conquests of men as a man, and you call that bi sex, that's ridiculous. There is no woman there. No matter how many women you slept with before the man, the mansex is still gay sex. Have the cojones to support the dudes you had sex with by calling what it is.
In some people's minds, there's a stigma attached with dude on dude sex, and the stigma becomes greater calling it gay sex. This may stem from homophobia, such as evangelical teens not using condoms in dude on dude sex because they think condoms make it gay. It can also be that men don't relate to the label of gay as a lifestyle and subculture: the having a boyfriend, the flamboyance, listening to Cher and musicals, etc. This is all a stereotype, of course, but I' know one man who is so gay label averse that he proudly calls himself homosexual but not gay.
The prefixing of sexuality is a modern phenomenon which came out of the Industrial Revolution starting in the 1860's. We started seeing dude on dude sex as homosexuality, and dudes having sex with dudes as homosexuals. The concept was expanded to a lifestyle with the term "gay" after WWII. However, men have always been sexual, and sexuality has always included other men for both relationships and sexual outlets. The danger I see is defining people by their actions - as human doings - when the reality is more complex as human beings with complex relationships, values and motivations.
I see both feminism and the demographic identity of gayness as creating a false sexual binary for men. Both forces have brought about healthy societal change which all society benefits from, but they also have their shadow side which also needs to be seen. I see "bisexual", "bicurious", "heteroflexible" along with other such loosey-goosey terms as a reaction to this binary thinking.
I bought into the "one vagina for life" concept and supported my wife getting a masters. Then her feminist ideas of deserving a partner with equal or better pay made me something she hadn't signed up for and she filed for divorce, leaving me to pay her mortgage and live in a small apartment. As a single dad, I haven't had the time and money to be the boyfriend most women think they deserve. So for now, the bicurious label suits me well because my primary emotional relationship - intentionally separate from my sexual being - is neither with men or women, but my sons. Now that they are becoming more independent teens, that's also evolving.
I'm proud to have made difficult personal sacrifices as a father in the critical years my sons have needed me. I don't consider my identity, a daduality, but rather my best response to a complex reality. This path has followed neither a straight "no boners outside of marriage" nor the "dudes for dudes is gay" paradigms and I find myself the object of both admiration and disdain as a result. Rather than sexual prefixing, how can people better support one another as complex sexual beings. As a sexual man, how I best support myself and other men from day to day?
I think it's purely down to the individual as to how they describe their sexual exploits. There are a number of men who are sexually involved with other men, but don't want to call it gay sex - 'men who have sex with men' is the term used by the medical profession. And there's nothing wrong with that.Some people find it difficult to claim their sexuality; I did at first. Its a journey for them to explore their sexual feelings, and it's a more difficult journey for some down to loads of different factors.So if someone wants to describe their sexual encounters as 'bi' then that's their call, not anyone else's.
I specifically said that the issue is not those who have difficulty or who are new, nor do I call out individuals. I grew up in NB in the 1970's, I am not unfamiliar with the struggles of the closet. In fact, I dealt with them for many years.
This post isn't about the individual choices it's about specific rhetoric that performs erasure and the complete lack of necessity or linguistic basis for the repeated misuse of the term. I am very confused about the recent trend to claim self definition is inviolate and meaning doesn't matter. We have Dolezal's self ID as Black as a prime example.
I have no problem with the toto of the sexual encounters being termed Bi. But if you're calling sex with women Str8 and sex with men Bi, that's obviously about hiding m2m sex or in the venues we're discussing, gay sex with gay men. I'm well aware of the terminology in the literature. I am not using it deliberately.
I couldnt care less what peoples sexual preferences are. Its their business not any of mine.Its also got nothing to do with preferring to sunbathe without clothes.
This was not about the individual choices. It's about the way rhetoric is used on the site and the relative number of members dealing with questions about their identity. The word use is problematic. This is all. Funnily enough, clearer use of language might actually help with reducing the number of threads on the topic that you seem perturbed by.
I am also well aware that the topic isn't naturism. You're going to note that the site has several non naturist threads and subjects. The discussion is clinical not erotic. I will of course endeavor to render future prose even more drab.
In some people's minds, there's a stigma attached with dude on dude sex, and the stigma becomes greater calling it gay sex. This may stem from homophobia, such as evangelical teens not using condoms in dude on dude sex because they think condoms make it gay. It can also be that men don't relate to the label of gay as a lifestyle and subculture: the having a boyfriend, the flamboyance, listening to Cher and musicals, etc. This is all a stereotype, of course, but I' know one man who is so gay label averse that he proudly calls himself homosexual but not gay.The prefixing of sexuality is a modern phenomenon which came out of the Industrial Revolution starting in the 1860's. We started seeing dude on dude sex as homosexuality, and dudes having sex with dudes as homosexuals. The concept was expanded to a lifestyle with the term "gay" after WWII. However, men have always been sexual, and sexuality has always included other men for both relationships and sexual outlets. The danger I see is defining people by their actions - as human doings - when the reality is more complex as human beings with complex relationships, values and motivations.I see both feminism and the demographic identity of gayness as creating a false sexual binary for men. Both forces have brought about healthy societal change which all society benefits from, but they also have their shadow side which also needs to be seen. I see "bisexual", "bicurious", "heteroflexible" along with other such loosey-goosey terms as a reaction to this binary thinking.I bought into the "one vagina for life" concept and supported my wife getting a masters. Then her feminist ideas of deserving a partner with equal or better pay made me something she hadn't signed up for and she filed for divorce, leaving me to pay her mortgage and live in a small apartment. As a single dad, I haven't had the time and money to be the boyfriend most women think they deserve. So for now, the bicurious label suits me well because my primary emotional relationship - intentionally separate from my sexual being - is neither with men or women, but my sons. Now that they are becoming more independent teens, that's also evolving.I'm proud to have made difficult personal sacrifices as a father in the critical years my sons have needed me. I don't consider my identity, a daduality, but rather my best response to a complex reality. This path has followed neither a straight "no boners outside of marriage" nor the "dudes for dudes is gay" paradigms and I find myself the object of both admiration and disdain as a result. Rather than sexual prefixing, how can people better support one another as complex sexual beings. As a sexual man, how I best support myself and other men from day to day?
But the criticism is about deliberately erasing the same sex aspect of the activity, not that stigma exists (its a bit rich reminding someone who has experienced it in ways that most here haven't). Why is this an issue? Look at the number of threads that are about m2m sex and all kinds of social issues that in some cases are going on for years.
Lack of definition, stigma and the insistence that the first category that has to go is gay (we never seem to get to the others so much) with a thin argument that sexuality is a spectrum of ones, a purely linguistic concept that is not in any way tied to real people or biology is not helping. Calling one aspect of a bisexual relationship straight and the other bi is not helping. The criticism is really quite gentle. I could have mentioned the not so good homophobia that crops up and the homophobia that is killing LGBTQ2 people around the world.
We need more people to have the courage to move their goalposts, especially when they are being deliberately placed wrongly. I'm all for self discovery and growth. But some people are fighting and dying to preserve the rights and freedoms of those who are able to explore in safety while deliberately avoiding any connection to those they owe their freedoms to.
My beef is the convolutions of the prefixes used. There's no other terminology used here with this strange reworking. Whether or not we erase the use of prefixes is not the point, they are used. And here the argument for one element of one prefix where it's the only place where relativistic non logical definition is being advanced (the others are more or less fixed meaning definitions) cannot hold any water.
There's also a series of posts regarding basic knowledge and skills navigating the MSM world and of course the disastrous sexual health threads where factually incorrect information, bad assumptions and stigmatizing language coupled with advice offered with little to no actual lived experience or research and the elephant in the room is that the construction of an imaginary bisexual culture and locus separate from LGBTQ2 culture leads people to think that they are not part of LGBTQ2 culture or don't have to be, even though they are having MSM sex. The further assertion is that this space (which isn't real, it's the tunnel view of hookups had in various urban environments) is safer, less dangerous and a better place to meet for anonymous sex or a partner. It's also assumed to be a good way to avoid HIV.
In multiple cases I've had to correct misinformation and dangerous misinformation several times whilst folks who have no idea what they are on about assert false, harmful and incorrect information and advice. I know HIV, cruising, digital, bathhouse and club culture as well as the history and the public health strategies that are being used in public and private spaces LGBTQ2 identified. The knowledge is community specific. But the indulgence of the myth that there is a MSM or bi hookup network separate from LGBTQ2 institutions is causing false information to be held up as truth. What these spaces are is cruising or nebulous bathhouses, clubs that are promoting one thing on the surface but another in reality and internet chat. If all you're looking for is sex the risk is not great if you follow safer sex guidelines. But the myth is also that these spaces are more or less safe from HIV drugs crime etc. This is not true.
But the criticism is about deliberately erasing the same sex aspect of the activity, not that stigma exists (its a bit rich reminding someone who has experienced it in ways that most here haven't). Why is this an issue? Lack of definition, stigma and the insistence that the first category that has to go is gay (we never seem to get to the others so much) with a thin argument that sexuality is a spectrum of ones, a purely linguistic concept that is not in any way tied to real people or biology is not helping. Calling one aspect of a bisexual relationship straight and the other bi is not helping. The criticism is really quite gentle. I could have mentioned the not so good homophobia that crops up and the homophobia that is killing LGBTQ2 people around the world. We need more people to have the courage to move their goalposts, especially when they are being deliberately placed wrongly. My beef is the convolutions of the prefixes used. There's no other terminology used here with this strange reworking. Whether or not we erase the use of prefixes is not the point, they are used. And here the argument for one element of one prefix where it's the only place where relativistic non logical definition is being advanced (the others are more or less fixed meaning definitions) cannot hold any water.
I respect your views, but am not clear on where you're coming from. In a polarized world, I see bisexual as a category which people want to get rid of, not gay. I see that bi by definition includes both hetero and homosexual behavior. I'm not sure what you mean by moving goalposts, reworking prefixes or relativistic non logical definitions. I understand that homophobia endangers and kills people, and I imagine that by defining as bi, men can engage in the same homosexual activities, categorize it as something other than gay and jump on the gay bashing wagon. That's standard bigotry and hypocrisy, an equal opportunity hatred to protect the scorecard of anything deemed the "other".
One question: how do we better support each other as men, no sexual orientation strings attached?
I've always thought that "gay" described a lifestyle largely devoid of members of the opposite sex in your romantic life. Bi-sexual on the other hand, simply describes your enjoyment of engaging in sexual stimulation with another man or woman. Two completely different things in my book.
So if someone wants to describe their sexual encounters as 'bi' then that's their call, not anyone else's.
Exactly why should feel the need define someone elses sexual orientation or gender identity for them and why should it matter
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