pareia:

bisexualmind:

bi-in-alberta: bisexualmind: Seems like whenever non-bisexuals talk about us… it’s always done in a negative manner. I think the worst is “I support bisexual people, but I HATE stupid fourteen year olds who only do it for attention!!1!” Personally, I think it would be awesome if young people could freely explore their sexual/gender identities without judgement. Yeah. Or how non-bisexuals discussing bisexual erasure always end up with “Passing privilege! Bisexuals are basically straight! You can’t use queer if you’re in a heterosexual relationship!”

It always seems like everyone is allowed an opinion on what words bisexuals are permitted to use…except bisexuals themselves.

Frankly, I don’t care much for the word queer. It doesn’t do anything for me. I’ve read through way too many fights between people that absolutely love the word and people that absolutely loathe it. Both sides have pretty much made me indifferent. Nevertheless, I still respect the fact that many individuals do see it as an important part of themselves. If a bisexual person wants to call themselves queer, they have every right to, even if they’re in a hetero relationship. The relationship may be “straight”, but the bi person is certainly not.

And yes, yes, this is where the whole “but bi people in hetero relationships are seen as straight and benefit from it” argument comes along. I completely agree that bi people in different-sex relationships will benefit from passing privilege and have much easier access to straight privilege. Yet, passing privilege isn’t always a field of daisies. It hurts to be invisible, to be seen as something that you are not, to constantly have to come out over and over again, to feel like you’re a traitor because you took the easy way out, to feel like you don’t have any right to have a connection to the LGBT community even though the ‘B’ is right there…. Erasure definitely has its benefits, but it also has its downsides.

By no means am I saying that erasure is worse than outright physical violence or verbal abuse. It isn’t worse than being beaten up, bullied, and/or kicked out of home. Of course it isn’t. But it still is a problem that deserves to be mentioned, especially since bisexual erasure does have negative consequences for bisexuals’ mental health. Just because something is not The Worst Thing Ever doesn’t mean that it should be completely cast aside.

Also, there are bisexuals out there that don’t have any passing privilege whatsoever. But you rarely see anyone mention that. Probably because bisexuals are still thought of as being “half hetero” and therefore, it might be shocking for some people to realize that not every bi person on the planet is currently in a monogamous heterosexual relationship or ever will be.

And lastly, perhaps this isn’t the politically correct thing to say, but it pisses me off when bisexuals can’t have discussions amongst themselves without someone barging in and ~kindly reminding us that we have straight-passing privilege. Yes there are some bisexuals that need to be called out if they refer to themselves as The Most Oppressed Ever, but I find it downright annoying that non-bisexuals think that bisexuals somehow magically forget that our identities are often determined by how others perceive us. Any bisexual person that has spent five minutes contemplating their identity probably is well aware that they will be seen as straight or gay depending on the gender of their partner.

(and whoa sorry for my rambling but I have a lot of thoughts and feelings about this topic)