I've sometimes heard this statement - that most people are somewhat bisexual. Is there any validity to it?
Well, there is the Kinsey Scale where people's sexualities are ranked from 0 to 6 (0 being exclusively heterosexual and 6 being exclusively homosexual). Generally, it seems to be the thought that people tend to be somewhere between and that not much people are 100% heterosexual or 100% homosexual. That said, I don't think that most are actually bisexual. I've never had any interest in women at all so that statement would certainly not be valid in my case.
If someone has an interest, even somewhat sleight, to the point of desiring sexual/romantic interaction with both genders woukdnt that make them bisexual by definition? According to that scale, then, aren't the vast majority of folk bi?
Labels are inexact, and orientation is a spectrum rather than a binary or trinary. From Kinsey's work, we know that only about 10% of the population are at the far end of the spectrum and everyone else is somewhere on the spectrum. However, many people choose labels of convenience. If I am primarily attracted to men, and almost never (but more often than never) attracted to women, I would probably refer to myself as 'gay' rather than 'bi', even though 'bi' is technically correct. The label, if it's to have any value, should really represent something that tells the person we're communicating with something about ourselves that's relatively accurate, rather than being something that meets a literal definition. When we lose the intent of labeling as a function of language, we lose its descriptive value in helping others understand us.
I definitely agree with what Chip said above. For a lot of my middle school and some of high school I struggled with whether I was gay or bi. The struggle had to do with understanding the difference between finding a woman attractive and actually being attracted to that woman. I easily find many women attractive, but there's no party of me that would want any sort of physical relationship with them. I have a lot of female friends that I love and I'm super affectionate with. We've done the "romantic" aspects of relationships with dinner dates and cuddling and hugging a lot, but I could never have sex with any of them. So, while I can find a woman attractive, I'm gay.
And then there's the opposite, like me, who banged the bejesus out of anyone female with an interest in me, but felt very awkward and out of place doing the romantic things and going on dates. So... things don't ever make sense I guess.
Sort of like me. I'm into guys sexually but have no interest in dating one or having a romantic relationship with a man. Women I could date and sleep with and have no issue.
I actually disagree. I think life would be better without the labels, if we stopped using labels for sexual orientation, they were recently invented anyway, and we all could see falling in love with someone no matter the gender as something we do rather than a part of who we are as a person. Interested to read your opinion on this.
What I seem to be getting from the above posts is: A) the label 'gay' is most often used as a shorthand 'best fit' descriptor rather than a technically/literally accurate one, but that actually most gay folk are sometimes attracted to some degree to women, and that which label is bestused might well depend upon context (casual chat or a focus on accuracy) B) most straight people likewise use the label 'straight' as a label of general utility without it being 'fully' accurate - though I do wonder if they even know they are doing that? C) that yes, in the full sense most people are bisexual D) therefore (somewhat amusingly to me) straight people are a small sexual minority E) there does seem to be a use for separating out sexual and romantic attraction (so someone could be accurately labelled homosexual biromantic, etc). Interesting stuff!
@Lexa The older I get, the more I speak to people of all kinds of orientations and listen to their life experiences, the more I'm coming round to this way of thinking. I dunno. Labels might be useful for some contexts and for figuring oneself out at some stages in life, but it really seems that human sexuality is so massively varied and complex that the labels on offer are all so inexact, fuzzy, changeable and imprecise that either we allow everyone to just sincerely self-determine whatever labels best fit them (without gate-keeping or rejection of some labels) or else just abandon labelling all together. I suspect this is partly why we're seeing a huge proliferation of labels and micro-labels in the attempt to be ever more precise about the ever messy landscape of individual sexuality. I don't know.
Not really, I mean all of the people who've responded and had the identity of "gay" have spoken to the fact that they're not attracted to women. Just because I could go on "dates" and cuddle and whatnot with female friends doesn't make me biromantic, that's just stereotypical romantic stuff that I'm doing with a female friend who I sometimes find attractive. Not attracted to, just identifying objective attractive qualities. There's really no point in trying to break someone apart even further into a sexual and romantic identity. Just because the "technical" definition of bisexual means attraction to men and women, that's not always what actually makes sense. For example, I find some women attractive, but I'm very, very gay...I'm not attracted to them. A straight guy may objectively recognize that another guy is attractive, but that doesn't magically make him bi. Focus less on the technical definition and more on how people identify, that's what actually matters not "Technically most people are bi."
My brother often says it can be determined by the number of people you've slept with by their genders. For example, I've had sex with one woman and three men. So, according to my brother's logic, because I've had sex with more men than women, I'm a homosexual.
According to Prof Diamond heterosexuals are the majority, but bisexuality is more common than either gay or lesbian:
Lisa DIamond's work is the bane of the existence of most credible people in the profession. However, on this particular point, she's likely correct, at least using Kinsey's scale as a guide. But this, again, is kind of splitting gnat hairs, as a Kinsey 5 is technically bisexual, but most poeple who are Kinsey 5s would consider themselves gay, just as Kinsey 1s would consider themselves straight.
@Chip I note that she has a decent track record amongst her peers, including being honoured by the APA (including for her work on sexual fluidity). So what is it that makes her somewhat separate from the 'credible' people in her profession? I didn't even see a 'controversy' section in her wiki bio. Confused?
Yes and no. Most people don't identify as bisexual, as we're told you're either on one side or the other. But its not as "black and white" as those on the extreme ends make it seem (seen as threatening)
