Longtime Savage Love fanboy with a bit of a conundrumâand itâs your fault! Iâm a bi man in my 30s. To use Charles M. Blowâs word, my bisexuality is âlopsided.â This means that I fall in love with women exclusively, but I love to have sex with men occasionally. My current girlfriend not only approves, she likes to join in. We have a great kinky sex life, and at times we invite a hot bi dude to join us. You keep saying that to counter bisexual erasure, it is the duty of every bisexual to come out of the closet. If I were a âproperâ bisexual, i.e., romantically interested in men also, that would be no problemâmy family and work and social circles are extremely liberal. However, your advice to us kinksters and people in open relationships is that we probably shouldnât come out to our parents or colleagues, since...
Bisexual Leaning Out Warily
Thereâs nothing improper about your bisexuality, BLOWâor Charles M. Blowâs bisexuality, or the bisexuality of other âlopsidedâ bisexuals. While the idea that bisexuals are equally attracted to men and women sexually and romantically used to be pushed by a lot of bi activists (âI fall in love with people, not genitals!â), it didnât reflect the lived/fucked/sucked experience of most bisexuals. Like you and Blow (hetero-romantic bisexuals), many bisexuals have a strong preference for either women or men as romantic partners. My recently âgay marriedâ bisexual friend Eric, however, is one of those bi-romantic bisexuals.
This popular misconceptionâthat bisexuals are indifferent to gender (and more highly evolved than all those genital-obsessed monosexuals)âleft many people who were having sex with men and women feeling as if they didnât have an identity. Not straight, not gay, and disqualified from bi. But thanks to bisexuals like Blow coming out and owning their bisexuality and their lopsidedness, a more nuanced and inclusive understanding of bisexuality has taken root. That nuance is reflected in bisexual activist Robyn Ochsâ definition of bisexuality: âI call myself bisexual,â Ochs says, âbecause I acknowledge that I have in myself the potential to be attractedâromantically and/or sexuallyâto people of more than one sex and/or gender, not necessarily at the same time, not necessarily in the same way, and not necessarily to the same degree.â
Lopsided or not, BLOW, youâre a proper bisexual, and if youâre in a position to come out to your family and friends, you should. And rest assured, telling people youâre bi doesnât mean youâre divulging details about your sex life. Youâre disclosing your sexual orientation, not detailing your sexual practices. You can tell someone youâre attracted to men and womenâat the same time, in your case, if not in the same wayâwithout telling them about the hot bi dudes you and the girlfriend bed together. And if you and the girlfriend are perceived to be monogamous, and you want to keep it that way, you can allow people to continue to make that assumption.
Finally, BLOW, most gay men are aware that bi guys usually arenât romantically interested in other men. And thatâs fineâso long as hetero-romantic bi guys donât mislead us, most gay men are down to fuck. (And gay men who wonât date homo-romantic or bi-romantic men? You guys are missing out. My friend Eric was a hot, hung, adventurous catch. Congrats, Christian!) And since youâre partnered and presumed to be monogamous, youâre also presumed to be unavailable. But if youâre worried a gay friend might hire a hit man to off the girlfriend so he can have a shot at your heart, come out to him as hetero-romantic at the same time you come out to him as bi.
Bi married man here. I was always out to my wife, but two months ago, I came out to our tight circle of friends. Everyone has been supportive, and Iâm glad I took this step. But on three different occasions, my wifeâs best friend has loudly asked me whose cock I would most like to suck out of all the other guys at the party. My birthday is coming up, and I donât want her there. My wife doesnât want to offend her oldest friend, and she makes excuses like âShe was drunkâ or âShe was only joking.â I told my wife that I wouldnât be coming to my own birthday party if her friend was invited, but she invited her anyway âby accident.â (She sent the invite via group text.) She doesnât want to confront or disinvite her friend because that would be awkward. What do we do?
Her Unthinking Buddy Bad Yucks
Hereâs what youâre going to do, HUBBY: Youâre going to ask your wife how she would feel if a friend of yours was sexually harassing her and you made excuses for that friend (âHe was drunk!â) and then âaccidentallyâ invited that asshole to her birthday party. Then if she wonât call her friend and retract the invitation, you do it. It will be awkward, thatâs for sure, but your wifeâs friend shouldnât be spared that awkwardness. Lord knows she made things awkward for youâdonât hesitate to return the favor.
I am a 23-year-old bisexual woman and I have two questions for you: (1) Is it possible to fall in love differently with women than with men? I think I am bisexual because I have been in love with some women, despite never getting past a kiss. What I find strange is that whereas with men I feel immediate attraction, with women the attraction rises after a deep friendship is formed. (2) Is it possible that I was in love with two different people at the same time? I always thought that I could be in love with only one person at a time, but during that short span, I was in love with both a guy who made me suffer and my best friend, a woman, who helped me with that guy. After I found a new boyfriend, I stopped thinking about anyone else because our relationship is closed. But I donât know if thatâs just because I avoid thinking about others or because I wasnât really in love with the two people (despite my surprisingly real heartbreak).
Bisexual In Need And Inquiring Finally
1. See my response to BLOW, above.
2. A person can love more than one parent, more than one child, more than one sibling, more than one set of tit clamps, and more than one romantic partner. Telling people they can feel romantic love for only one person at a time isnât just stupid, itâs harmful. Letâs say Bill is partnered with Ted, and Bill believes romantic attraction/love is a one-at-a-time phenomenon because thatâs what he was told. Now letâs say Bill develops a crush on Sandra. If Bill doesnât question the one-at-a-time bullshit he was taught to believe about romantic love, Bill is highly likely to think, âWell, I must not be in love with Ted anymore, otherwise I couldnât feel this way about Sandra,â and then he may dump tried-and-true Ted for shiny-and-new Sandra.
Iâm not arguing that everyone should be polyâmost people want only one partner at a time, and thatâs fine. But telling people they canât experience romantic attraction or romantic love for more than one person at a time sets long-term relationships up for failure. Because while stable, lasting love feels amazing, itâs less intoxicating than shiny, new, cum-drunk love. And while almost all stable, lasting loves were shiny, new, cum-drunk loves early on, very few new loves become lasting loves. If we donât want people tossing lasting love overboard every time they develop feelings for someone new, people need to know that, yes, you can be in love with two different people at the same time.