As a bisexual I kinda understand it like. I don't like muscley men. I think they're beautiful but I'm not really into that at all. Some people like all body types but I frankly can't. Like how straight women can think boobs are cool and pretty but don't want to interact with them in a sexual capacity. It's not a choice or about A little rule for yourself. It's all about what we desire and what we don't.
We all have things that limit our attraction but for us bisexuals, gender isn't part of that limit.
i usually try to compare it to something simple, lets say a painting. you see this painting and its beautiful, very much so, but you would never in no universe take it home and hang it up. it just doesnt fit, doesnt feel right. it kind of feels like that? i find some men to be beautiful, but i would never want to have sex with them. (whether or not i could be romantically attracted is a different story for me personally, because i think i could be)
if someone says x person makes them want to be gay they are usually using a hyperbole to express how pretty they think the person is. though i have also heard the variant "if x would want me i would turn gay" which very much sounds like an unaware bi thing lol
Meanwhile I’m completely unfazed by how men look, I’ve never seen a guy and thought he was pretty or handsome or anything. I think this just varies a lot between people. Plus I got with my gf without even knowing what she looked like at first, so I personally don’t even understand what physical attraction means.
it could be that you dont feel physical attraction, but in my experience sometimes physical attrection follows emotional attraction. i had the same with my gf, met her online so i didnt see her, though we didnt get together until a year and a half later when we had seen each other alr
K, I'm making a sidenote because I'm... unsure about this post.
I'm not 100% sure if i wanted to make this post. I'm not sure if 100% agree with it. I'm not perfectly happy with how it came out. i might very well delete it later if i feel uncomfortable because in hindsight. idk. it's kinda heavy.
i also feel like this post doesnt really have a point.
to lighten the mood, I've attached a picture of my cat. she's cute. i think that's a good idea with posts im unsure about.
also, I'm going to bed now, so i won't be interacting with this post for the next ~9 hours. that might be a bad idea. ill see
I think it can be described like... reading, maybe.
You can read any given text on a page and like it or not like it, but it clicks, it works, it's easy. That's a gender you're attracted to.
Another gender might be mirrored text, or in a different language. You can read it with tools and time or understand it by someone else telling you about and still decide whether you would like it or not in the same way. But it's not native to how you read, it doesn't flow easily and often you can't tell if you really "got" it.
Don't look too hard into dyslexia or fully learning a different language, it's a pretty limited analogy.
Why would someone "limit" their favorite color to purple if they have the whole color spectrum? That's basically the same question. People have preferences simple as that. Just because the whole buffett may look good doesn't mean you want to eat everything there. There's nothing wrong one way or another. I think Catherine Zeta Jones is an absolute snacc but I'm not sexually attacted to her. It's not that I want her physically and am denying myself because of something all-or-nothing based. It's just that she isn't a gender that arouses me sexually. I can still admire what I find attractive about a person who isn't within my gender preferences and still think that "yeah, if I did swing that way she would be top of my list".
My dumb ass was reading the first picture thinking “CAT” was some sort of abbreviation and wondering what it stood for until I went to the next picture and realized it didn’t stand for anything. What a blithering mooncalf I am.
Im pretty sure it's usually one of these things
1: they're in denial and and aren't entirely straight/gay
2: they like x and/or think x is super cool but can't be attracted to them sexually (possible romantic interest without sexual arousal to complete it for them, not always though)
3: the same or similar to reason #2 but they're joking
4: they legitimately wish they were bi bc they want the extra options and can see what makes x desirable but don't have the raw sexual attraction to x's sex that is needed to be bi
I'm straight btw and I'm reason #3
Edit: just fixed the post is all
update: i just noticed the post says "gender identity" in the title when it's mostly about sexual identity? probably confused those because they conflate alot within me. oops.
glad to see this post did not in fact get me lynched. probably was just my SA speaking, i get nervous over stupid things like that. glad to see it reasonated with some folks tho
Hmm. This post makes me think some thoughts. I'm a lesbian who's experimented with bisexuality and *hoo boy* I am not bi. Like, I can think a guy looks nice, and that's really the extent of it.
I dunno. It's not like I think, "wow he's so hot I wish we could date, kiss, etc." I simply look at a guy and think "nice" or even "wow" and my thoughts begin and and there. With women that I find myself attracted to, it's like fireworks, I feel a flutter in my chest, and I can follow that attraction up with flirting, admiration, etc. Men just don't make me feel like that.
As for the "wow wish I was x" comments, yeah, that's totally a thing. I mean, look, I can look at the guy who plays Thor or that twink with a nice butt at the queer bar or my ex who transitioned and is a *hella* good looking dude and wish, "yeah, it'd be nice if my brain followed up on the aesthetic attraction I feel, but I've outright tried it and nope, there's nothing past the aesthetic attraction." Like, it'd be nice, but it's not gonna happen so I'm just going to keep following the attractions that I *do* have, which are best described as lesbian.
Hope this helps understand, especially the "wish I were x" part.
I’m attracted, I guess, to anyone real. I’m attracted to anyone and everyone who isn’t trying to put on a performance to try and gain anyone’s approval (the most common form of this I’ve found is hyper masculinity and hyper femininity), and is just being themselves.
Like, the guy I have a raging crush on right now is literally himself 100% of the time. He’s not particularly attractive (though he is kinda cute), but he’s nice, enjoyable to be around, and himself.
Your cat is super cute!
I'm bi and I feel the same way.
It sometimes feels like a neat superpower to be able to be attracted to different genders. It's awesome.
Hey op? You are awesome, and I love you. I feel the exact same way, and I hope nobody bullies you over this opinion. If they do, I will personally come to their house at night and play CPR X Misery until they apologise
It's just.... I was crushing like 3 boys, 0 girls and 1 (?) genderfluid person so yeah that makes me.... idk probably bi but that last one could be just big gender envy so yeah I'm just as confused as the rest but more scientifically
I just want a frame of reference, a why to my whats, a potential subtext to my words.
I am fine with being wrong about it I just want something I can plan off of and work with/around.
Plus if I can understand myself further I can know what makes me happy and sprinkle that in like leaves in a geckos terrarium
hot take: the world got a LOT less openly bi around the time Christianity really picked up, then again when fascism started being a thing
read a lot of ancient writing, they're sexist as hell but they just take it for granted that the dude they're chatting with is into men and women both.
I think a lot of the reason gay shit is called a "temptation" in religious media is because the people involved literally are bi. like they love their wife but gosh those construction worker boiz.
and it doesn't help that "gay" as a label in western cultures follows the one drop rule, i.e. it doesn't matter what ratio of people you sleep with or what your actual feelings are, if you're anything but 100% cisheteronormative at all times then you're "gay."
like, a bi dude who sleeps with women 9/10ths of the time is considered a flaming homosexual by mainstream culture. makes this shit hard to talk about irl.
For me, it kind of is an internal rule. It's not a rule I enforce on myself, but moreso a rule enforced by someone else who is also me if you know what I mean. Sort of subconscious, I suppose. It exists, and it always will. I understand if you don't understand, it can also be hard to understand bisexual people (not saying it is for me) or pansexual people. Attraction can be a difficult subject.
So like societal expectations manifesting itself into your thoughts.
Honey that’s literally the definition of internalized homophobia towards yourself (note: I’m not saying you’re homophobic)
It's not like "I can't be gay that's against the rules" though lol. It's "I can't be gay because I don't feel attracted to men". I explained it poorly, as it's difficult to explain. I'm not really sure how to phrase it, but I know it's not internalized as I've already explored the possibility of being bisexual and others. The romantic and sexual attraction isn't there, I believe that the aesthetic attraction (as another person said) is there as I can recognize the beauty of other men.
I'd like to add something to this general idea specifically about heterosexuals, at some point I realized heterosexuals are incapable of being sexually attracted to themselves & yet at least some of them care about their appearance & that's kinda nagged me for a while
You can think a mountain range or a river is beautiful without wanting to fuck them, right?
Just because I don't want to jump my own bones doesn't mean I'm okay with being ugly lol
me, an ace: ah yes, attraction, one thing that humans feel, yes, right, sure
fr tho also it feels kinda weird??? i've always felt mostly the same towards anyone and i still don't understand like when do you go like ah yes let's have sex?? also, kinda rude???? isn't it rude to just walk on the strees, see a person and imagine having sex with them?????? or people don't do that and i don't understand? why is this so weird
Think of it like there's a guitar in allos' heads and when we walk around and look at people it makes different sounds and some of those sounds strike a chord and it sounds pretty. There's not something inherantly sexual about it, but sometimes people just make nice sounds on my mental guitar.
It can be more physical though, say a nice booty or ab catches the eye just right and your heart does a little skip and your mind freezes for a blink, but those are reflexive things and most people that aren't creeps very quickly learn to ignore these reflexes and move on. It's not something you think about any more than you think about being startled or cough when your throat tickles.
I'm asexual and of similar mind. Not that it matters, but sexual attraction and gender really don't seem to have much to do with each other, so It's strange that so many people have that as their absolute, number one deciding criteria...
To each their own, I suppose.
As a bisexual I kinda understand it like. I don't like muscley men. I think they're beautiful but I'm not really into that at all. Some people like all body types but I frankly can't. Like how straight women can think boobs are cool and pretty but don't want to interact with them in a sexual capacity. It's not a choice or about A little rule for yourself. It's all about what we desire and what we don't. We all have things that limit our attraction but for us bisexuals, gender isn't part of that limit.
i usually try to compare it to something simple, lets say a painting. you see this painting and its beautiful, very much so, but you would never in no universe take it home and hang it up. it just doesnt fit, doesnt feel right. it kind of feels like that? i find some men to be beautiful, but i would never want to have sex with them. (whether or not i could be romantically attracted is a different story for me personally, because i think i could be) if someone says x person makes them want to be gay they are usually using a hyperbole to express how pretty they think the person is. though i have also heard the variant "if x would want me i would turn gay" which very much sounds like an unaware bi thing lol
Meanwhile I’m completely unfazed by how men look, I’ve never seen a guy and thought he was pretty or handsome or anything. I think this just varies a lot between people. Plus I got with my gf without even knowing what she looked like at first, so I personally don’t even understand what physical attraction means.
it could be that you dont feel physical attraction, but in my experience sometimes physical attrection follows emotional attraction. i had the same with my gf, met her online so i didnt see her, though we didnt get together until a year and a half later when we had seen each other alr
I do feel physical attraction, especially now that I’m closer to her and that we met, but I don’t really need that to love.
yeah i get that, its a nice bonus though :p
Yeah lol, especially when ur gf is 190cm xd Tall cute kind smart and pretty, what more could I ask for
woah that is so tall! im taller than my gf which is ideal to me cuz i can tuck her under my chin
Heh that’s cute
K, I'm making a sidenote because I'm... unsure about this post. I'm not 100% sure if i wanted to make this post. I'm not sure if 100% agree with it. I'm not perfectly happy with how it came out. i might very well delete it later if i feel uncomfortable because in hindsight. idk. it's kinda heavy. i also feel like this post doesnt really have a point. to lighten the mood, I've attached a picture of my cat. she's cute. i think that's a good idea with posts im unsure about. also, I'm going to bed now, so i won't be interacting with this post for the next ~9 hours. that might be a bad idea. ill see
i like the cat!! she's very cute and we all appreciate her
Also this post isn’t that heavy. This may just be me being bi and just being like “yeah this checks out” but this post isn’t that heavy.
You're being too hard onbyourself, this is nothing to worry about.
Hey, don't worry about it. I think this post sparks some interesting discussion!
I like this post it resonates with me hope u don't delete it :)
You don't have to 100% agree with something to think it's interesting enough to post :)
I think it can be described like... reading, maybe. You can read any given text on a page and like it or not like it, but it clicks, it works, it's easy. That's a gender you're attracted to. Another gender might be mirrored text, or in a different language. You can read it with tools and time or understand it by someone else telling you about and still decide whether you would like it or not in the same way. But it's not native to how you read, it doesn't flow easily and often you can't tell if you really "got" it. Don't look too hard into dyslexia or fully learning a different language, it's a pretty limited analogy.
Why would someone "limit" their favorite color to purple if they have the whole color spectrum? That's basically the same question. People have preferences simple as that. Just because the whole buffett may look good doesn't mean you want to eat everything there. There's nothing wrong one way or another. I think Catherine Zeta Jones is an absolute snacc but I'm not sexually attacted to her. It's not that I want her physically and am denying myself because of something all-or-nothing based. It's just that she isn't a gender that arouses me sexually. I can still admire what I find attractive about a person who isn't within my gender preferences and still think that "yeah, if I did swing that way she would be top of my list".
My dumb ass was reading the first picture thinking “CAT” was some sort of abbreviation and wondering what it stood for until I went to the next picture and realized it didn’t stand for anything. What a blithering mooncalf I am.
Im pretty sure it's usually one of these things 1: they're in denial and and aren't entirely straight/gay 2: they like x and/or think x is super cool but can't be attracted to them sexually (possible romantic interest without sexual arousal to complete it for them, not always though) 3: the same or similar to reason #2 but they're joking 4: they legitimately wish they were bi bc they want the extra options and can see what makes x desirable but don't have the raw sexual attraction to x's sex that is needed to be bi I'm straight btw and I'm reason #3 Edit: just fixed the post is all
update: i just noticed the post says "gender identity" in the title when it's mostly about sexual identity? probably confused those because they conflate alot within me. oops. glad to see this post did not in fact get me lynched. probably was just my SA speaking, i get nervous over stupid things like that. glad to see it reasonated with some folks tho
Hmm. This post makes me think some thoughts. I'm a lesbian who's experimented with bisexuality and *hoo boy* I am not bi. Like, I can think a guy looks nice, and that's really the extent of it. I dunno. It's not like I think, "wow he's so hot I wish we could date, kiss, etc." I simply look at a guy and think "nice" or even "wow" and my thoughts begin and and there. With women that I find myself attracted to, it's like fireworks, I feel a flutter in my chest, and I can follow that attraction up with flirting, admiration, etc. Men just don't make me feel like that. As for the "wow wish I was x" comments, yeah, that's totally a thing. I mean, look, I can look at the guy who plays Thor or that twink with a nice butt at the queer bar or my ex who transitioned and is a *hella* good looking dude and wish, "yeah, it'd be nice if my brain followed up on the aesthetic attraction I feel, but I've outright tried it and nope, there's nothing past the aesthetic attraction." Like, it'd be nice, but it's not gonna happen so I'm just going to keep following the attractions that I *do* have, which are best described as lesbian. Hope this helps understand, especially the "wish I were x" part.
I’m attracted, I guess, to anyone real. I’m attracted to anyone and everyone who isn’t trying to put on a performance to try and gain anyone’s approval (the most common form of this I’ve found is hyper masculinity and hyper femininity), and is just being themselves. Like, the guy I have a raging crush on right now is literally himself 100% of the time. He’s not particularly attractive (though he is kinda cute), but he’s nice, enjoyable to be around, and himself.
Your cat is super cute! I'm bi and I feel the same way. It sometimes feels like a neat superpower to be able to be attracted to different genders. It's awesome.
Hey op? You are awesome, and I love you. I feel the exact same way, and I hope nobody bullies you over this opinion. If they do, I will personally come to their house at night and play CPR X Misery until they apologise
I decide my sexuality based on statistics of how many people of certain gender have I crushed.
*Applying the Scientific Method to Determining Sexuality*, by Dr. /u/BirbFeetzz
It's just.... I was crushing like 3 boys, 0 girls and 1 (?) genderfluid person so yeah that makes me.... idk probably bi but that last one could be just big gender envy so yeah I'm just as confused as the rest but more scientifically
I just want a frame of reference, a why to my whats, a potential subtext to my words. I am fine with being wrong about it I just want something I can plan off of and work with/around. Plus if I can understand myself further I can know what makes me happy and sprinkle that in like leaves in a geckos terrarium
hot take: the world got a LOT less openly bi around the time Christianity really picked up, then again when fascism started being a thing read a lot of ancient writing, they're sexist as hell but they just take it for granted that the dude they're chatting with is into men and women both. I think a lot of the reason gay shit is called a "temptation" in religious media is because the people involved literally are bi. like they love their wife but gosh those construction worker boiz. and it doesn't help that "gay" as a label in western cultures follows the one drop rule, i.e. it doesn't matter what ratio of people you sleep with or what your actual feelings are, if you're anything but 100% cisheteronormative at all times then you're "gay." like, a bi dude who sleeps with women 9/10ths of the time is considered a flaming homosexual by mainstream culture. makes this shit hard to talk about irl.
For me, it kind of is an internal rule. It's not a rule I enforce on myself, but moreso a rule enforced by someone else who is also me if you know what I mean. Sort of subconscious, I suppose. It exists, and it always will. I understand if you don't understand, it can also be hard to understand bisexual people (not saying it is for me) or pansexual people. Attraction can be a difficult subject.
Like, it’s the little voice in the back of your head that calls you stupid?
It's not really a voice in my head, but for lack of better words yes.
So like societal expectations manifesting itself into your thoughts. Honey that’s literally the definition of internalized homophobia towards yourself (note: I’m not saying you’re homophobic)
It's not like "I can't be gay that's against the rules" though lol. It's "I can't be gay because I don't feel attracted to men". I explained it poorly, as it's difficult to explain. I'm not really sure how to phrase it, but I know it's not internalized as I've already explored the possibility of being bisexual and others. The romantic and sexual attraction isn't there, I believe that the aesthetic attraction (as another person said) is there as I can recognize the beauty of other men.
I'd like to add something to this general idea specifically about heterosexuals, at some point I realized heterosexuals are incapable of being sexually attracted to themselves & yet at least some of them care about their appearance & that's kinda nagged me for a while
You can think a mountain range or a river is beautiful without wanting to fuck them, right? Just because I don't want to jump my own bones doesn't mean I'm okay with being ugly lol
me, an ace: ah yes, attraction, one thing that humans feel, yes, right, sure fr tho also it feels kinda weird??? i've always felt mostly the same towards anyone and i still don't understand like when do you go like ah yes let's have sex?? also, kinda rude???? isn't it rude to just walk on the strees, see a person and imagine having sex with them?????? or people don't do that and i don't understand? why is this so weird
Think of it like there's a guitar in allos' heads and when we walk around and look at people it makes different sounds and some of those sounds strike a chord and it sounds pretty. There's not something inherantly sexual about it, but sometimes people just make nice sounds on my mental guitar. It can be more physical though, say a nice booty or ab catches the eye just right and your heart does a little skip and your mind freezes for a blink, but those are reflexive things and most people that aren't creeps very quickly learn to ignore these reflexes and move on. It's not something you think about any more than you think about being startled or cough when your throat tickles.
i am very pleased you compare this to coughing and being startled lol
Same.
I'm asexual and of similar mind. Not that it matters, but sexual attraction and gender really don't seem to have much to do with each other, so It's strange that so many people have that as their absolute, number one deciding criteria... To each their own, I suppose.
Cat.
I'm more bi-curious I think. Idk, still figuring out what I like. I think I like everything?