I follow a lot of random crap on twitter. One of them is @WTFSexFacts which tweets bits of sexual culture oddities like the world's first vibrator and other assorted bits of humorous paraphernalia, as well as random sex related quirks like how many nerves are in each of the body's erogenous zones.
Earlier this evening, this was tweeted:
So, my boyfriend just told me he is bisexual. Should I (A) Dump him now? (B) Use him for warmth through winter? (C) Replace and then dump?
Now, it's nicely packaged in a vague attempt at humour, but I really shouldn't need to point out to any of you the horrific prejudice against bisexuals contained in this comment. Twitter sure did. I told them to get over themselves. They obviously liked this person enough to consider them their boyfriend beforehand, whilst it might throw up some issues - for example I can understand there might be some things to talk about if this happened 3 months into the relationship, rather than after 2 weeks - the simple fact of the guy's sexuality shouldn't determine the future of the relationship. I'm not saying this sort of admission doesn't cause problems, but to determine if someone is 'dateable' on the basis of whether they're potentially attracted to 50% or 100% of the population is plain ignorant.
Firstly, I'd like to give some kudos to the boyfriend in the circumstances. Coming out to your family and your friends isn't an entirely comfortable experience for almost everybody. You can never be 100% sure of the reaction you'll get, even from those who know you inside out otherwise, and have known you since childhood or before. Coming out to your partner is a delicious awkwardness reserved for bisexuals alone. Well and transsexuals I suppose. This is the person that either is, or you hope will be, one of the closest, most important, and most intimate people in your life. It's a lot to risk, and it's a lot to expose yourself to, because if the reaction is negative, it's going to cause a lot MORE problems than just a bit of discomfort or a lost friend.
The next tweet to come from @WTFSexFacts was:
I have nothing against bisexuals. I just don't date them. I have many as friends though. Lonely people
Oh gee great, because that's so much better. Frankly, to me, that kind of comment is reminiscent of the same logic that says 'gays can do my hair and be my interior designer, but they're not allowed to marry, I don't want them living on my street, and I'm scared for my children being within a 50 mile radius of them'. Apparently, we bisexuals are have some weird leprous facet to our personalities that makes us undesirable in the dating world. And as a result we are all lonely miserable, and can never land/keep a partner and are always desperate to cheat on them with the other sex so we can feel fulfilled and happy and content for a good 5 minutes. Or something like that as I understand it.
Slowly however, things become clearer:
I dated a bisexual in my teens once. He dumped me for a girl. Dumped her for another boy. And so on and so on.
It emerges that the good @WTFSexFacts has obviously had a bad experience in the past, and is thus lambasting everyone with the same paint brush, so to speak. And we all now how stable and reasoned the relationships we form as teenagers are.
Having been called on such points, the response was:
Well, why did he need to tell me? I call that softening somebody up for the blow. If he planned on monogamy, I'd have been none the wiser.
Now as stated, I have a lot of respect for the boyfriend for being brave enough to come out with this, but I'll grant you I'm biased. And yes, depending on the exact circumstances this was communicated, and how long into the relationship it was, there's no doubt a lot more to it than some mere tweet reports can offer us, but all that aside, most people I know don't like to be lied to by their partner. They don't like to find out from a friend of a friend, or 10 years down the line. The monogamy point, is mute. Assuming the best intentions in the boyfriend in revealing this, then it was to be honest, to share, and to head off the minor potential of a lifetime's worth of frustration exploding into an affair, by knowing that the subject can be discussed in the relationship, and often that's all a lot of things meed to stop them from ever actually becoming a problem. That's not a relationship thing, that's a human social interaction thing. Every damned one of you reading this has felt the need to rant about something at some point, and having done that, you feel calmer and better about it and it no longer bothers you. A 5 minute bitch every so often and you're good. I also severely dislike the implication that an admission of bisexuality is just a way to get out of a relationship.
This goes back and forth back and forth on twitter for a good while, in fact it's still going on. @WTFSexFacts seems to continuously voice/confuse the opinion that bisexuals have some sort of uncontrollable compulsion to be sexually active with both sexes, and that they are by nature unfaithful, quoting his authority as a sex fact researcher, but no actual statistical sources, along with the misguided personal perception that there is no way he will be able to fulfil a bisexual's needs and make them happy.
Finally, about an hour ago, this comes out:
Let us just say I date him and 10 years down the line his other needs surface and he finds a girlfriend. I'll want those 10 years back.
Whereas of course, if @WTFSexFacts was with a completely gay individual, the chances of that individual turning round in 10 years and saying they'd met another guy are in fact non-existent. It's a little known fact about gays that they are in fact perfectly faithful, whilst straights are getting divorced and bisexuals get distracted mid-fuck they're so promiscuous.
I can't be bothered to post all the other idiotic, depressing, offensive, and bigoted tweets that have come out of this feed this evening. Go look them up if you're that bothered. @WTFSexTweets seems to think that biseuxality is a choice. And that you're just undecided. Of course I never really understand how this argument works when you accept that gay and straight sexualities are not choices, but just a fact of nature. Unless you're expected to be like gay christians - you can be a gay christian, you're just expected not to have sex? Others involves in the back and forth suggested that @WTF should go get tested immediately, because apparently bisexuals are full of diseases. The gay agenda gets talked about all the time, but none of you probably knew about the bi agenda. Item one is the usurping of the gay superAIDS, with biAIDS, which kills you instantly.
What's most depressing about this is that even though the account often delivers tweets with a level of tongue in cheek sarcasm, it does claim to be a factual account, and so to voice someone's personal prejudices on it, to 50,000 odd followers, some of which are not all wordly wise, and ask the account questions precisely because they don't know anything, gives off a very bad representation, and on top of this the amount of times @WTF's tweets were being re-tweeted in a positive fashion. Finally, the guy tweeting from @WTF, is a gay gay. This isn't some idiot republican midwest "there are no gays in my town" making these tweets. It's a UK based gay guy. If that's the level of intolerance and judgement coming towards bisexuals from those who have the best chance of understanding what a burden sexuality can be, how in the hell do you stand a chance of educating the more ignorant masses?!
To be honest, you have it hard as a bisexual. The straights mistrust and are confused by you at best, and at worst lump you in with the gays for eternal damnation or civil rights issues. And you're not better off amongst the gays either; most of them think you're in denial, supporting a prejudice that gay is something to be avoided, greedy, or just plain indecisive. To paraphrase @WTF's words, 'if you can't decide what gender you're attracted to, how are you going to decide on a person?' (I shouldn't need to explain to you how this is ALL kinds of wrong). You can't really do bisexual orientated events, beyond a social mixer perhaps; they simply don't work, and end up just being stunted or forced versions of their gay/straight counterparts.
People out there, even fairly reasonable people, seem to have this irrational paranoia that you're going to inevitably cheat on them with someone of whatever gender they're not, because you have no willpower or self control, and they simply can't compete and offer you what you need. Frankly, Chris doesn't provide me breasts, but then he doesn't provide me with an athletic jock build either. These are not things I need. These are ideals. We all have them. And we all have to throw most of them out of the window when it comes down to who we actually end up falling in love with by sheer chance of the universe. Your gay or straight partner stands no more or less chance of doing any of these things based on sexuality alone than anyone else.
Get over yourselves people. @WTFSexFacts pissed me off today, and disappointed me, and made me physically ill at several points. But that's just representative. I'm not trying to say bi's have it worse than any other minority group out there, but a little support from the LGBTQQI groupings who would be a really good and well deserved start. We have a lot in common, we face a lot of the same trials and hardships, we've experienced a lot of the same suffering, prejudice and oppression. Why, do the bullied, end up just bullying others even weaker than them in life? Bisexuals are people, Just like everyone else. Just like your gay best friend. Just like your parents. They make mistakes, they have flaws, but no more than everyone else. One person might not be right for you, but that's because of them as a person, not because of who they might, potentially, find attractive.
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