Paula C. Rodriguez Rust/Mediakit
A few months ago, when the whole “Lesbian Mafia” controversy happened, I decided I wanted to learn more about the lesbian/bisexual divide, and I started looking for an academic book on the subject. I ran across the book “Bisexuality and the Challenge to Lesbian Politics: Sex, Loyalty, and Revolution (The Cutting Edge : Lesbian Life and Literature Series.”
The author of the book, Paula C. Rodriguez Rust, is someone who has experienced the lesbian/bisexual divide first hand; she had come out as a lesbian and considered herself one until she got involved with a man. She then experienced first hand the rejection several women in the lesbian community face—if they engage in bisexual behavior. She still considered herself a lesbian, but she began to think more about bisexuality, about bisexual women, and about her own attitudes towards bisexuality. Even though her relationship [ended], she still was interested in bisexuality and decided to do a study of people’s attitudes and perceptions of it, in both the lesbian and bisexual communities. Although, she still considers herself a lesbian indentified female sociologist, she also now thinks of sexuality as a continuum.
The book starts by talking about how bisexuality is and has been viewed and covered in the lesbian and gay press; at first it was barely mentioned, or treated as a joke, but since the late 80’s, it began to be mentioned more, with both positive and negative results. Some readers of the publications wrote in and said they didn’t have a problem with it, but it seemed more did, and they felt that it wasn’t something that should be discussed in a gay or lesbian magazine. The author then went on to discuss how the political interests of the lesbian community had developed since the Stonewall riots. The actual study—both lesbians and bisexual women were asked questions at pride events, and some were also recruited to fill out questionnaires that asked questions such as “does bisexuality exist?” “What do you think of bisexuals?” and “how does bisexuality affect gay and lesbian politics?”
What the author found was that lesbians of different races, educational levels, and social classes seemed to share the same ranges of attitudes about bisexual women. These attitudes ranged from “it doesn’t exist.” “It’s a cop-out.” “Bisexuals are really gay and can’t admit it,” [or "everyone is bisexual to some degree" and “I feel bisexual women have to put up with a lot.” What I found most interesting was that a majority of the lesbians interviewed, including the ones who believed bisexuality exists and were sympathetic and or welcoming of bisexual women. [They said] that they had a hard time relating to bisexual women and imagining themselves in their place. Lesbians who had once identified as bisexual themselves indicated that they had a bit of an easier time, but it was difficult for many of them as well. Eighty percent of lesbians interviewed, felt that lesbians experience [is] much more discriminatory than bisexual women; and only twenty percent felt that bisexuals experienced a great deal of prejudice.
The findings were both interesting and startling, when it came to the attitudes of bisexual women. While many of course believed bisexuality existed, there were some that didn’t, and indicated that they felt confused and also thought most bisexuals were confused—even though they identified as bisexual. Many also stated that being bisexual was harder than being straight or gay, and that they felt invisible and that because of this, they chose to identify as lesbians.
As the author interviewed more bisexual women, she found that 1 in 3 of them [lesbian] believed bisexuality was the norm and most people were bisexual to some degree. Yet 84 percent had identified as lesbians at some point in their lives, and 51 percent agreed with the statement that “it is more acceptable to be bisexual.” Some people who are really lesbians say they are bisexual and 44 percent indicated that they believed bisexuality could be a transitional identity, and felt that they identified more with the lesbian community than the bisexual one. Only 14 percent said they felt like they identified with the bisexual community. As the author stated at the end of the study, the two most striking findings were the extent to which bisexual women’s attitudes towards bisexuality resembled those of the lesbians, and the extent to which bisexual women felt a lack of their own community and their own political interests.
The good news is that as this study was done in 1995, both the attitudes of many lesbians and many bisexual women have changed significantly, and there is now much more of a bisexual community, more tolerance in the gay and lesbian communities (though we still have a long way to go), and more voices that speak for the political interests of the bisexual community. However, I have noticed that there are still a significant number of bisexuals who don’t feel connected to their community; or don’t want to use the term “bisexual.” That really struck me as something that hasn’t changed enough since the book was written. What this book made me wonder was “how can we who are active in the bisexual community, reach out to more bisexual people (especially young people) so that [bisexuals] feel they have a community to identify with—and aren’t afraid of the “b” word?
Overall I found the book very interesting and well written, and I do recommend it. The main drawback is that the study [was written in 1995]. I would be very interested to see a current follow up—I’m sure it would answer a lot of questions.
About MariaM
Well it seems, to me and this is my little opinion, that we are basing most of our perception of us on the ones that are most common. These are, and continue to be, portrayed in the dimmest lights at best, the worst ranging all the way to the repugnant and this is from both sides of the equation. From Cheech and Chong’s Corsican Brothers making a comment of Trysexual, all the way to one that hit me so hard it took me a year to shake the revulsion I felt for the person who said it to me:
“Hey Sean, what is with all these pedophiles on TV? After all, you’re bisexual and that’s the same thing, so maybe you can help me understand.”
Primarily, as I see it, we have to feel that we are something worth belonging to. We’re fed a steady and ever-growing diet as we age and gain exposure to both sides eccentric views of us. Fence-sitters, traitors, confused, greedy, disease-spreaders…. The list is extensive and painful. How, why, would anyone want to connect to that? We’re fledgling by comparison in the scheme of things and the work in getting positive exposure is more than 20 years behind in the GLBT community. We’re trailing in understanding because we’re NOT understood. So long as the first labels that come to mind are ones that make us feel disgust with our own drives and desires, how will we ever feel pride and acceptance of ourselves.
At work today a man came in wearing a shirt that said “Legalize Gay” and I chortled. Bold, brassy and something a Bisexual would not be able to get away with as easily. It would be like painting a target to your chest and asking for a cheap shot from either side. Would I be able to do the same thing? Not outside a Pride event I couldn’t. Though I am not broadcasting, I do not hide myself. I’ve been asked what my Bi-Pride bracelet and bi-pride thumbring mean, and I’ve unblinkingly said my peace. Only twice was it taken well, the rest were a tidal-wave of stereotypes that did not seem to end or accusations from the Gay community. Heck, some of the standard gay rhetoric has been swallowed by the straights now.
We’re on the outside looking in, feeling our way past labels of loathing, being pressed by either side to shoe-horn ourselves into the shoes they want us to wear to make them able to accept/understand and/or stop fearing. Our blood is not accepted if we identify as bisexual, but if you are gay or straight it is with the Red Cross. If we marry either gender we are lost behind the labels listed there. We are defined by the relationship which others find most offensive. Counted on when needed and tossed out when they remember to dislike us. Our role-models are captured and rewritten to suit them.
For many years of my life I hid away from myself, fitting as cleanly as I could into a role so I could gain the most acceptance from life and all the while hating myself and avoiding the hard questions and answers of who I was. Soul searching and forgiveness to those who injured me was all I could muster and then turning to a friend and we came out to one another as Bisexual. With smiles and tears we compared notes and did our best to embrace ourselves as we truly are and not every vile thing we’d been forced to think.
A community has to have a stable base, one that will not shift and shudder beneath our feet. Without that very thing we cannot have a thriving community, a band of brothers and sisters with a commonality of blindness to gender and an X-ray vision to the heart of love. So long as the first thing we think of when we think “Bisexual” is this fractured and damaged group that turns on itself often because of the words and actions of those who fear us, we have no easy way to get the younger ones to come to us and let warm embraces and kind words smother the stings of ignorant words.
That leads me to my final thoughts, and in them a possible solution. If I were able to go and talk to myself as a boy it would be to say,”You are special, it’s ok to feel as you do and no one has the right to tell you differently.”
If this is what little Sean, having George Takei(Hikaru Sulu) and Nichelle Nicols(Niota Uhura) as first crushes in his life, needed to hear to feel better then perhaps something like it needs to be readily at hand for the rest of the worlds’ newly born and growing Bisexuals.