One of the frustrating things about being bi is that, as soon as you make it known that you are attracted to more than one gender, everyone feels like they have the right to weigh in on the political symbolism of your attractions and why/how you are personally doing sexual attraction wrong. This is, I think, part of the whole “bi vs pan” “debate”: setting aside the fact that the idea that bi people aren’t attracted to non-binary people (or, in an older version of this bullshit, trans people) is… not true, people feel entitled to criticize bisexuals for this alleged omission because people feel entitled to criticize bisexual attractions, full stop.
But it’s not just the question of whether or not bisexuals are attracted to non-binary people — a question which, I have to admit, I will always find bizarre given that “non-binary” is an umbrella category with virtually no aesthetic cohesion amongst its members. If you’re a feminine bi woman who’s attracted to other feminine women, you’re clearly just courting straight men’s fantasies; if you’re attracted to masculine women, you’re just playacting at heterosexuality in queer drag (I saw someone on Twitter use the term “bihetism” to police bi women’s romantic choices and… whew! What a term!).
It feels, at times, like once you open the door to being attracted to multiple genders, you’re suddenly not allowed to have any discernment or preferences at all — even as monosexuals themselves see no issue with not merely only being attracted to a single, solitary gender, but having “types” within that gender that further discriminate. I’m admittedly sensitive to this point because a much younger me was abused by someone who expected me to be sexually available to all manner of people at the drop of a hat. But I don’t think that it’s just my trauma speaking here. It does feel like there is an increased pressure on bisexuals to “prove” our bisexuality by being attracted to, well, everyone.
I cannot offer an explanation for why people feel so entitled to critique the dating choices of bisexuals (aside from the obvious “they don’t believe bisexuality is real and pick apart our dating choices to ‘prove’ that”), but I can tell you what it feels like. For years I would panic any time I had an unsatisfactory sexual encounter with a woman, worried that my failure meant I was not actually queer. I’m sure some of that fear was informed by my OCD, but it was also informed by the cultural messaging I received at large: if I wasn’t attracted to women as a whole, if I rejected the affections of a woman who was attracted to me, how could I actually claim to be bi? Wouldn’t a real bi woman say yes — and if I didn’t want to, didn’t that mean I was just a straight girl lying for cred?
And look, I hope that you, dear reader, are more confident in your tastes, more confident in your boundaries, than I was as a younger woman. But on the chance that you are similarly insecure, I just want to offer that — so long as you are respectful of and decent to people regardless of your level of attraction to them — there is no way for you to do sexual attraction “wrong.” You can be attracted to all men and four women or all women and non-binary people and one man or all non-binary people and two women or whatever unique combination of numbers and genders you are attracted to and … you’re bi. Because bi is just a slapdash label loosely gesturing at a space that exists beyond monosexuality. And because your sexual and romantic attractions are about you and your desires and not some nosey busybodies with too much time on their hands.
The B+ Squad is attracted to all men, all women, and all non-binary people.
I’m surprised the term “bihet” is new to you 😭 it’s a Thing amongst biphobic lgbtq ppl, radfems & terfs
Love this! I've known I was Bi since I was 13, almost 25 years ago at this point and I still need this kind of reminder on the regular.