Today we’re excited to bring you something special – our first real interview! Shiri Eisner, author of Bi: Notes for a Bisexual Revolution, was kind enough to answer our questions from the other side of the globe through the magic of the internet.

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Bisexual Books: What prompted you to write Bi: Notes for a Bisexual Revolution?



Shiri Eisner : I went through a really long process which ended up with the decision to write the book. For years and years, I knew I wanted to be a writer. When I was younger, I thought I might want to be a novelist. But to be honest, my skills as a fiction writer are poor. I guess you can call that the first stage of my process - a general feeling that some day I would write a book. The second stage came about a few years ago, when I realized that there was such a thing as bisexual studies and bisexual theory, and I decided that, at some point in my life, I wanted to write a book about bisexual history in the US (This idea was relatively short-lived - I’m not a historian).

These two stages were very far in between (lasting years), but starting around 2010, many things started happening in succession. I opened two blogs about bisexuality (one in Hebrew , and one in English ), I went to the International BiCon in London, I began receiving international recognition for my politics and writings. While all this was happening, I was also reading anything I could get my hands on relating to bisexuality, including academic bisexual theory. I started realizing that I had both unique views and unique knowledge about bisexuality. Things that other people in other bi communities have literally never thought about (or had the chance to know). I also started realizing that blogging was hardly enough in order to explain these things, it seemed that no matter how much I wrote, all my arguments were partial at best. Finally, I realized that I had a book in my head. I felt that way for months and months, and kept assuming that maybe I’ll write it at some other point in life. Then came a week in which several people encouraged me to start writing it (most credit here rests with my girlfriend, and some more with Lisa Millbank ), and so I did.

BB: Can you tell us about the process of writing this book?





SE: It was both hard and wonderful. In my good moments, I felt like I was seriously smart and that everyone ever should read my book. In my bad moments, I felt like I didn’t know what the hell I was talking about and that it was all pointless. I had two moments of breaking down and crying before I could finish a chapter, because the contents were so hard for me to deal with: Once in chapter 4, after the whole section about sexual violence against bi women, and once in chapter 7, after writing about the Israeli government’s kidnapping of Yemenite children and coercive human subject testing on Mizrahi children

As the writing progressed, it became harder, because I needed to keep with the deadlines established by my publisher, which meant I needed to increase my writing pace. I also had to cut some parts out in order to comply with my word limit, which was also hard. Finishing the book, editing and re-editing was a lot of hard work in a very short amount of time. And of course, it’s also hard looking at the printed book and seeing all those things I would have liked to change or re-write… So all in all, it was hard, but definitely rewarding!



BB: While the focus of the book is bisexuality, you also identify as genderqueer. How has your experience as a genderqueer person shaped your bisexual politics?





SE: I started doing bisexual activism because I didn’t feel welcome as bisexual (and as a cis-passing genderqueer person) in my local trans* community, and so really my local bisexual community (which I founded) grew out of the trans* community. My bisexual politics are deeply linked to trans* politics and informed by it, to the extent that I see the two as inseparable. My bi community here, and especially the spaces I organize, isn’t just a bi community, but also a trans* and genderqueer community.

I think my location as both bi and trans* has in many ways enabled me to see the gaps in both of these communities - namely, biphobia in trans* communities and transphobia in bi communities. Everything bi-related that I do, whether it’s writing or organizing, is deeply informed by that location and is part of an attempt to carve out a space for myself and people like me.



BB: Neither of us has ever seen a printed book that has trigger warnings before. What made you decide to put trigger warnings in this book, and how did Seal Press react to that?





SE: I put the trigger warnings in the book because one of the most important things for me while writing was to make it accessible to as many people as possible. I hate the way that books - whether academic, political or fiction - just drop terrible things on you without warning. This is a thing that can seriously damage someone emotionally, and it forces us into a constant suspicion and wariness of the things we read, which takes a toll on us in terms of emotional and mental energy. As a survivor of sexual violence and various other traumas, I deeply understand the need to create safe spaces for ourselves, where we can rest and recharge a bit, and trigger warnings are part of that. They’re about acknowledging the validity of our emotional responses and the importance of being attentive and caring towards ourselves and others.





I’m happy to say that Seal Press didn’t have any problem with the trigger warnings. In general - they gave me a very free hand both in terms of content and in terms of design.



BB: You have a chapter about the parallels between being Mizrahi and bisexual. In the US, there is a lot of appropriation of racial Civil Rights narratives by white gay rights activists. How does that impact you as a bisexual person of color?





SE: I think that in the US, as well as Israel/Occupied Palestine, there’s a cultural equation between LGBTQ and whiteness. These two groups are not only considered as separate and distinct, but also as mutually exclusive. It seems like in many cases, you can’t be both LGBTQ and a person of color, because those two things seemingly contradict each other. This whole situation invisibilizes queer and trans* people of color, it erases our existence, our circumstances and our oppression, and allows society to go on assuming that we don’t exist and that it needn’t pay heed to us. This is doubly relevant for bisexual people of color, because we’re not only erased in those ways, but are also erased from dialogues specifically about queer and trans* people of color. For me, one of the most painful things is reading texts about queer and trans* people of color that read as though this term only means gay, lesbian and transgender.









BB: What are three goals you think the bisexual movement should focus on in the next ten years?



As far as white people appropriating racial civil rights narratives - I think this is a part of this mechanism of erasing the oppression working against people of color in the here and now. Both in the US and in Israel/Occupied Palestine, racism is often considered a thing of the past, something which no longer exists, or has already been solved, which makes it “okay” to analogize. This type of thinking maintains itself directly on the backs on people of color. And not only that, but also continues the effect I described above, making LGBTQ and people of color into two separate and mutually exclusive groups.





SE: I always try to think about my activism in the long term, and so ten years really seems like a beginning. And beginnings are important - I’ve learned that from my own activism, when I started a bisexual community going from nothing onto full capacity, which left me drained and exhausted. So, while I have much larger goals for bisexual movements, I think the next few years need to be spent in building the grassroots: starting groups and communities, reaching out to people, setting up the infrastructure to build a home for ourselves. This means building supportive communities that can give strength to bi people, that people can learn though- and from- on both a personal and political level, and to constantly work on improving our welcome towards diverse groups of bi people, and on countering various forms of oppression. Building communities means that more people are able to become involved in activism, and this creates a potential for expansion. In turn, this also works externally, as people write more, speak out more, organize more and create more visibility and more necessary dialogues about bisexuality and bi people. I also think that community building is absolutely vital in terms of creating healing spaces for ourselves. I think that social isolation is one of the most severe forms of oppression that bi people are forced to deal with. It creates depression, low health and suicidality, to name just a few things. Which is why I think that directly countering this via community building can literally save lives.

So, I guess, instead of running around trying to join the GGGG (Gay, Gay, Gay and Gay) movement, bi communities need to start focusing on our own. Instead of trying to join in on the fight for “equal marriage”, adoption rights, legislation, etc. - all representing the interests of specific privileged GGGG groups - we need to rethink our positions and realign ourselves so that our ideology is compatible to our circumstances.





Lots more on that in my next book, which I plan to write as a bi activist guide!



BB: What has been the best part of about seeing your book in print?





SE: It is completely surreal. I’m still getting used to the fact that it’s out there. When I first saw the printed copies, I felt like I must be hallucinating. And it’s still kind of weird to hold a book in my hands and realize that I wrote what’s in it! It’s like, OMG!



I guess, if there’s a good part about it, it’s knowing that I wrote something that made a difference for people out there. Helping others understand things and feel empowered is really why I write, and getting responses from people telling me about how my writing helped them, really makes everything worth it.



Also, there’s the ego boost. It’s nice to feel smart and important, like when my book gets mentioned at the white house, or nominated for awards (even though it’s only been out a few months!). This bit is hard for me to deal with, but is also incredibly important, because, being a non-American, genderqueer, person of color, writing about bisexuality, sets up so many barriers for me, that not acknowledging how successful I am would almost be an insult to myself.