Feeling a bit of a rant on this but this past week I watched and heard a discussion blow up regarding how swingers, polyamorous, and LBGTQ all define, or are "attempting to redefine" the term "bisexual". This was the first I have ever heard of this but considering how many were involved and how deep the conversations were, I have a feeling that a storms brewing within the LBGTQ and polyamory groups on this.

Only read this bit if you are going to try and throw me into some anti-anything category. Before I go into details, I am a bisexual woman. I have been since I was about fourteen. I fell in love with a "girl" when I was 17, had my heart broken by her, and never went back on relationships involving love with another woman. I am a staunch supporter of the LBGTQ community and advocate for their rights fiercely. No one, not even those I disagree with on this particular subject doubt where my heart is...

The subject came up by a LBGTQ group I am part of. This group has about 10,000 members and is nationwide but I am active mostly in my local group of about 2,500. They do not know me as a swinger. They only know that my husband and I support them (advocating, volunteering, listening, etc.). They know I am bisexual but it's not something I really advertise or how I am. They know my husband and I had a girlfriend who lived with us who was also bisexual but they didn't know how or what her relationship was with us. For all they know she could have been a converting nun or she could have been a transwoman pornstar. Lol. In other words, they are free to think whatever they want about our situation but no one there really knows.

So someone posts a question about what "bisexual" means to them. I follow it but don't comment on it. Soon, the overwhelming majority of them, could have been all of them, are saying that "bisexual means that you are attracted to the same sex in a sexual way AND emotionally. To further this, they state that if it's not emotional, it's not that you are bisexual, but that you are just "sexually open" or "all about sex and it doesn't matter what gender is getting you off". A lot of the ones going after this were from the polyamory crowd but there was support from the LBGTQ crowds here too. A few swingers spoke up that it's not about emotions but enjoying the same sex, sexually. Duh. That kind of set the fireworks off and served as a good reminder not to engage but the point of it was that without emotions, you shouldn't call yourself bisexual.

I kind of wrote it off as maybe just some people with too much time on their hands but then this blew up with some friends at a vanilla party this weekend. Again, no one knows we are swingers. Again, I hear that "bisexual" means that emotions have to be there from the same two groups! Argh!!!

I admit, I am hurt by it all because I have been fine calling myself a "bisexual woman" for such a long time. Coming from a Mormon upbringing I feel I worked hard for the right to call myself whatever I want and in some ways, I do feel that these two groups are now trying to invalidate me... Two groups that should be supporting me, US here, are now trying to invalidate me... I hope that moving forward with them I can effectively and calmly remind them that bisexual is just that, bisexual.

Why can't we just fuck what turns us on without people trying to mess it up?