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  1. #1

    Taking Both Sides

    by Toko-pa Turner

    There are certain advantages to going unseen. You can slip in and out of rival camps without a trace. You can study the disharmony between them, collecting precious perspectives from each. You can, perhaps one day, even learn to hold the paradox of both within yourself.

    If you are bisexual, you are such a moving target. You are too slippery to be bound to fierce alliances. You don’t make the Either/Or choice that inherently leads to opposition. You are a chameleon who takes on the colour and climate of all sides, every shade as real as the last, on your changing skin.

    But what if all you’ve ever wanted was to be visible, to be one solid, neutral blend of both? What if you wish you could lend a shaking fist to the injustice of segregation, but the ‘side’ you’re on doesn’t even exist? What if it’s the fence itself you’d like to tear down, but everyone keeps accusing you of sitting on it? What if the very people whose oppression you identify with, turn and exact the same discrimination on you, and your shapeshifting kind?

    The bisexual movement is still very much in its infancy. Having only been born in the 1970’s, it still struggles to be acknowledged, have its issues made visible. It was only in 1990 that the first US national conference on bisexuality was held, and BiNet USA, an organization that does outreach and lobbying along with gay/lesbian groups, was formed.

    As with many oppressions before it, biphobia is gravely underestimated. In 1997, M.J. Eliason, a professor of Nursing and Psychology at the University of Iowa, did a survey1 of 229 heterosexual students. Of those surveyed, 40% found bisexuality less acceptable than homosexuality, with bisexual men being the least accepted (61% unacceptable).

    But what is perhaps more troubling than the implications of this study, is the degree to which the crisis of bisexual invisibility is reinforced within the LGBT community.

    Though we don’t like to admit it, a hierarchy of oppressions exists within the queer world, and bisexuality barely clings to its lower rungs. It is often felt that because bi’s can ‘pass’, vicariously benefiting from heterosexual privilege, the priority should remain with the more visible "lesbian and/or gay" issues. But as longtime queer activist and noted writer Suzanne Pharr points out, “Each [form of oppression], is terrible and destructive. To eliminate one oppression successfully, a movement has to include work to eliminate them all or success will always be limited and incomplete.2

    It isn’t surprising to us that a chasm exists between gay and straight communities, since their aims are so divergent, but for the queer collective to clash within itself, when the issues of discrimination are so common, we might have come to expect more.

    In the 1950’s, Alfred Kinsey taught us that sexual orientation should be seen as a continuum, that we all, to whatever degree, fall somewhere along the hetero/homo stratification. But this information, as corroborative as it is, isn’t nearly powerful enough to reform a deeply encultured “Us and Them” mentality.

    The fear of ambiguity is always the same, no matter the locus. We are a world culture infatuated with the binary model. We erect and uphold opposition in politics, religion, race, gender and perhaps most insidiously, in language itself. We teach that whatever category we are inside, it is superior to the other outside of us.

    Our entire socioeconomic system of power relies on factionary thinking. The great menace, according to this schema, lies in ambiguity. Ambiguity, or the lack of side-taking, is deeply unsettling because it answers the Either/Or question, with a strange, unchoosing Yes.

    The bisexual person represents a threat to that social certainty. He or she contains both the self and the other, housing the two sides in one body, bringing the very issue of sexual borders into question.

    One of the great untold stories of World War II is from 1943, in German-occupied Denmark, when the Danish people were told that all 7,500 Danish Jews were about to be rounded up and deported to German concentration camps.

    The legend says that when the Germans ordered the Jews to identify themselves by wearing armbands with yellow stars, King Christian X of Denmark donned one himself. As he made his daily horseback ride through the streets of Copenhagen, he explained to citizens that he wore the Star of David to demonstrate that all Danes are equal. Following his example, all non-Jewish Danes began wearing the armband as well, thus preventing the Germans from singling out the Jewish citizens and turning the order effectively on its ear.

    There’s something tremendous to be learned from King Christian’s story. By wearing the armband, he declared himself and his country indivisible. He embodied the solution to the problem Martin Luther King Jr. raised when he said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

    According to psychologist Gordon W. Allport, “... man has a propensity to prejudice. This propensity lies in his normal and natural tendency to form generalizations, concepts, and categories, whose content represents an oversimplification of his world of experience.3

    In other words, not only are we compelled to categorize all things, but we do their complexity further injustice by labeling them. Ultimately, we name things to reassure our insatiable need for definition. (This habit is exemplified in the queer community, with its fattening dictionary of delineation.) But the very act of naming something is a choice that inherently leads to the exclusion of some other, often more exigent, alternative.

    The implications of choice are brilliantly explored by an author named Malcolm Gladwell, who penned the wildly successful, The Tipping Point, and Blink. He examines the nature of choosing, and how frequently our choices originate in unconscious bias. So, not only is the convention of choosing questionable, but what informs that choice is equally dubious.

    Gladwell cites a compelling psychological study in which a group of students are given a choice between two art pieces; a poster depicting cuddly kittens, and an Impressionist painting. The first half of the group is simply told to choose, while the second half is told they’ll have to explain their choice afterwards.

    The first group almost invariably chooses the more complex Impressionist piece, while the second group favours the aesthetically one-dimensional kittens.

    It is not, upon closer study, because kittens are better liked, but because the test subjects feel intimidated by the prospect of having to explain their choice. Despite their desire to own the more complex piece, they unconsciously choose the one that is less challenging to the collective norm.

    As one gay man, a 38-year old participant of the “Unlearning Biphobia” workshop facilitated by Robin Ochs in the Fall of 1993, explains his choice4;

    Coming out as gay was the hardest and most painful thing I have ever done in my life. Now I’m finally at a place where I have a solid identity, a community, a place to call home. Bisexuals make me uncomfortable because their existence raises for me the possibility that I might be bisexual myself. And coming to terms with my identity was so hard for me the first time around, I cringe at the thought of having to go through such a long, hard, painful process a second time.

    For most bisexuals, coming out of the closet with one fell swoop is an impossible luxury. You do it once, shut the door behind you and that’s that. Such is not the case when you’re bi; it is more like an infinite hallway of swinging doors that hit you in the ass as you go through every one. Coming out must be repeated at every step, in every new environment, to every friend and of course, to each new lover.

    Every time a bisexual “changes sides”, he or she not only faces potential rejection by the new community, but will also have to navigate the sense of reproach, betrayal and confusion of the one that’s left behind. If that weren’t challenging enough, there are always the persistent feelings of fraudulence most bisexuals experience upon ‘switching’. Just as the outside world questions their loyalty, so too is this doubt parroted on the inside. Being bisexual, not unlike the word itself, is to be a fast expert of the crossroads.

    As Ruth Gibian, clinical therapist and author, states, “'Bi’ is two, implying a split, two parts and no whole”.5

    Here, in our language, begins the problem of invisibility. For how can something with no whole exist in a climate that worships certainty? In another example, the word ‘middling’ has been similarly bastardized. Though its roots are in the intermediary soil between extremes, its contemporary definition is synonymous with mediocrity.

    Perhaps it would be helpful if we began to look at bisexuality less like a fissure between gay and straight and more as a conduit through which both can flow. If we can learn something from the human rights movement, it is that biracial individuals embody the combined history of both sides. Their very existence erases the line of racial demarcation. If we learn to carry the experience of both, maybe the fence will evolve into a bridge between us.

    Like the heroic King Christian, whose gesture was, in its axis, a protest against delineation, maybe if we all stand up, then none of us will stand out.

    - - - - - - - - -

    Toko-pa is a freelance arts and culture writer from Toronto. She can be reached by email here: Toko-pa


    1 Eliason, M.J. (The Prevalence and Nature of Biphobia in Heterosexual Undergraduate Students, 1997)
    2 Pharr, Suzanne (Homophobia, 1988)
    3 Allport, Gordon W. (The Nature of prejudice, 1954)
    4 from “Unlearning Biphobia” workshop facilitated by Robin Ochs, Fall of 1993.
    5 Gibian, Ruth, (Refusing certainty: Toward a bisexuality of wholeness, 1992)
    Last edited by Drew; Mar 21, 2005 at 12:51 PM.

  2. #2

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    ...maybe if we all stand up, then none of us will stand out.
    What a great line and a great article! Thanks Toko-pa!

    - Drew

  3. #3

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    WOW! What you said!
    VEry well thoguht-out, researched, and applied!
    http://www.phillynorml.org/
    Legalize it now!

  4. #4

    Cool

    Hi everyone , i just want to say that the new site is amazing and really user friendly , i really like it ( even if there is not alot of person from my corner ) i hope that it will last.
    To everyone , have fun and be safe.
    Big kiss
    Sobra oxoxoxoxo

  5. #5

    I forgot..........: P

    Well what she wrote is really great....i mean it but i was so amaze about the new site that i just pass over was i was about to say. We are can adjust to all and every event and that is the reason i have always sais that been BI is the true way of mankind.
    Toko, like we say here in french: Je te lance mon chapeau ; ) love ya .
    Sobra

    P.S: really nice pic

  6. #6

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    Thanks all, for the great feedback. One day, it would be great to see gender blur in all its permutations such that segregation is impossible. A girl can dream, non?

  7. #7

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    Hello, Your article was very moving, In your 1st Paragraph you state ...there are certain advantages to going unseen!,I wish I knew your context. Paragraph 12 was intriuging. On paragraph 24 you mention that ''we" need to come out to new partners, this is something that I have reflected on, any advise would be apreciated and of course some peaple are ok about it. So many misconseptions just becouse I'm Bi' I sleep around behind peaples backs tut! that's got nothing to do with sexuality has it. I look and admire but I don't cheat.

    a gay bisexual male

  8. #8

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    Hello, Your article was very moving

    Thanks Macben! I thoroughly enjoyed writing and researching it, though it (as writing so often does) raised more questions than it answered.

    In your 1st Paragraph you state ...there are certain advantages to going unseen! I wish I knew your context.

    Well, someone who is 'visible' is much more likely to be targeted for discrimination and violence. But also, there is this sense that you don't have to fit yourself into the contexts of either side. That you can remain, as it were, unchoosing while you gather impressions.


    Paragraph 12 was intriuging.

    Hmmm...yes, that for me too is the most compelling question.

    On paragraph 24 you mention that ''we" need to come out to new partners, this is something that I have reflected on, any advise would be apreciated and of course some peaple are ok about it.

    I wish I had advice to give! I do think there is some truth to the worry that others have, at least from my own perspective, that "we" won't be entirely there, that we will be split. There is a sense of missing the other when I am with one. A man can no woman make and vis a vers, if you catch my drift. The answer may be some sort of polyamorous arrangement, but I'm not sure I have the constitution for it.
    Last edited by tokopa; Apr 21, 2005 at 11:21 AM.

  9. #9

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    love your thread im giving it to all my gay friends to READ...
    fuuny but MOST of the time i do not feel ailenated by the gay community and some times even sought out by gay men. this said on a 1 to 1 basis.
    but then in a gay group i am( in my mind) made to feel so small and out of place.
    im sure in a staight group if i was known as bi i would feel the same.
    so now in hindsite i think i might try to slip a copy of your great thread to some hetro friends too.
    great writing
    bigregory
    BIGREGORY
    BI and loving it

  10. #10

  11. #11

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    Thanks for your feedback, bigregory and 24play! I'm so pleased it's getting around

  12. #12

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    TOKOPA
    i love your pic.
    bigregory
    BIGREGORY
    BI and loving it

  13. #13

    Thumbs up Re: Taking Both Sides

    I am just now coming to terms with my identity. This is a wonderful article that allows me to feel that there are so many more like me, torturing ourselves over an identity that isn't really accepted by either "side".

    Thanks for this great perspective, and your voice in this peice was awesome... you'd made a fan with me!
    Last edited by senoj; May 8, 2005 at 11:37 PM.

  14. #14

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    Quote Originally Posted by senoj
    I am just now coming to terms with my identity. This is a wonderful article that allows me to feel that there are so many more like me, torturing ourselves over an identity that isn't really accepted by either "side".

    Thanks for this great perspective, and your voice in this peice was awesome... you'd made a fan with me!
    Thank you so kindly for your feedback, Senoj, indeed there are many of us struggling with identity here and everywhere! Just yesterday I sat on a patio with a gay man who called bisexuals 'fencesitters' - and it is still taken as a good joke to many.

  15. #15

    Smile Re: Taking Both Sides

    YOUR SO CUTE
    BIGREGORY
    BI and loving it

  16. #16

    Thumbs up Re: Taking Both Sides

    very well thought out and researched you can tell you work very hard on this and put your heart into it i support you alot!!
    great job!!

    courtney

  17. #17

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    What a fantastic article, made for great reading and opened my eyes further to the stigma's and problems we all face.
    Well done and Thank you.

  18. #18

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    Hello tokopa,

    I wanted to say thank you for your article, it was very thoughtful and thought provoking. I think humans generally need to understand that which cannot be explained, labelling and catagorizing helps us to cope with the unknown...and of course the unknown is often scary. I do not blame anyone for this, not the 'straight' or the 'gay' or anyone else, it is really just human nature.

    I think the key to harmony is in unconditional acceptance, which I'm sure you know is a difficult and elusive concept. Think of the wars that would be avoided if we accepted each other unconditionally, our religion, our race, our gender, our politics. Sadly, we are far away from this sort of enlightenment. But purhaps the bisexual community is actually one step closer

    I really love the way you think. I think I will read this again. Awesome!

    Bi-ten
    'The mind is open, the body is willing, and the heart is free to love all beings equally.'
    Bi-ten

  19. #19

    Smile Re: Taking Both Sides

    Excellent article!! Very well written with great insights! My second partner was a lesbian and even though she didn't understand my bisexuality, she did accept it ))

  20. #20

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    Very good article!

  21. #21

    Thumbs up Re: Taking Both Sides

    Tokopa, your article was amazing. Thank you for putting such a thoughtful piece out there.
    I cannot sleep in your presence. In your absence, tears prevent me. You watch me My Beloved on each sleepless night and only You can see the difference. ~~Rumi

  22. #22

    Thumbs up Re: Taking Both Sides

    Hello! I am new to this forum and just read this, excellent article! Kudos.

  23. #23

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    I find it easier to think about bisexuality as definite, even though it isn't. I guess I just like the idea there are people "like me" and I hope to part of a community. I've always been on the outside looking in.
    Great article. Very, very well written.

  24. #24

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    Dear Toko Pa,

    I liked your article a lot and think you raise some important issues that need to be addressed. I think there are good answers to all the problems you raise. I've copied your article and will devote some thought to it to come up with those answers. Perhaps you find that some issues are already addressed in a thread I just posted called: does anyone share these ideas on bisexuality?

    But basically what you're saying is that our position in society is bad and I agree. I've only just come out and I don't want to live in a society that rejects who I am, or that thinks I'm a pervert. I want society to accept us for who we are.
    I think your article is important and a step towards such a society.
    having the best of the bi world

  25. #25

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    I read this article again and this bit really hit me:
    "Every time a bisexual “changes sides”, he or she not only faces potential rejection by the new community, but will also have to navigate the sense of reproach, betrayal and confusion of the one that’s left behind. If that weren’t challenging enough, there are always the persistent feelings of fraudulence most bisexuals experience upon ‘switching’. Just as the outside world questions their loyalty, so too is this doubt parroted on the inside."

    That's the first time I've ever heard anyone else say exactly how I feel.
    thank you.

  26. #26

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    I realize this article is an older one, but I just found it.

    It is wonderful!

    It has helped me gain more insight into who I am and why I experience some of the emotions I feel in regards to my sexuality.

    Thank you for posting it.
    I believe that all mammals are inherently bisexual to one degree or another. Many of the greatest learned cultures in history accepted it. So... When did it suddenly become so wrong?


    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Midsouth_Bisexual_Guys_Support_Group/

  27. #27

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    Its really OT, but I just have to comment on the story about the Jews in 1943 Denmark.
    The Germans ordered that all Jews should wear the yellow star of David. King Christian said that if they should wear it, so would he. Therefore they withdrew the order, since they knew, that if the king wore it, so would the people, making it useless in pointing out the Jews.
    So he didn't actually wore it, but the effect was the same, as if he had done it.

    Later that year the Germans ordered all the Jews deported. Over a course of three days, with the help of thousands of people, the Jews were transported to the north east coast of Sjælland and in the dark of night sailed the short distance over to neutral Sweden.

    Why? They were and are just as much Danes are we are, and similarly (and more on topic), if the queer community is to include bisexuals, they have to stop seing "us and them", and realise what we have in common, in stead of what separates us. Together we are strong (sorry for sounding all 70'es).

    Shouldn't be that difficult really, you just have to accept the premise that different (from yourself) is not bad, just different....

  28. #28

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    1] thanx for the depth of expression in your article. i think we kind of all feel that way and many of us arent sure how to handle it without serious emotional trauma. [ fear of rejection, anyone? ]

    2 ] i think, byfluga, in answer to your question, that what we are looking at is the inately human " us or them" socialogical rejection factor as stated in the article.

    many times we've been asked here, " would you attend...XX at XXX? " or 'where can we all get together?" or other similar things. too often many of us, myself included, can't or wont make it . mostly due to time and money, but sometimes i think we are either scared of the unknown or scared that we'll be found out.

    isn't it any wonder , then, that we are called fence sitters by those who should really be our brothers and sisters??
    Rich
    "To each monkey, it's own swing.." - old Latino Provberb

  29. #29

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    Toko-pa,

    I found your article interesting. I think you identified many important issues, but I differ with you on some significant issues.

    To be bisexual does not make everyone self and other. Some of us at least are only ourselves. A bisexual man is not necessarily both man and woman. He may really be simply an individual man with his somewhat differentiating biochemistry and his own unique life experiences. He may be as he is due to his own analysis of life and his own imagination of what a completely free sexuality would be.

    As you point out, we do use concepts and classifications to help organize and manipulate our thoughts. But, we also have the obligation to remember that these are simply aids to thought and the entire point of thought is to learn more about our world. Our world is really composed of particulars. In particular, people come in the form of individuals of fantastic complexity and variety. It is wonderful that this is so.

    We should celebrate the many differences in people more based on their individuality than upon their grouping by some particular trait, such as race or sexuality. People think in different ways and this makes for a much more creative and productive society. People have different interests and this makes society much richer in its texture and tones. The complexity that individuality brings to a society is immensely enriching and simply fascinating. Bisexuals are a little more complex than most and are therefore a bit more enriching than most.

    Bisexuals are not widely accepted and this is an injustice. It is nice to be able to associate with others who share some aspects of one's own perspective and enjoy the comfort of such a community. It is nice not to always have to defend one's values. It is nice not to be thought immoral, when you know that you are moral. In fact, we at least know that we can appreciate another first for their character and make their sex a secondary issue. One can argue that bisexuals are the most moral because they can be the most just, though this is not something to make too much of.

    The pace of acceptance for bisexuality seems slow relative to the length of our lives. This is too bad, but the general trend is good. I think that a strong bisexual community will be developed and more and more people will eventually come to grips with the bisexuality within very many people. Now, many people feel comfortable with the idea of heterosexuals and homosexuals, because it says they are one or the other. There is no choice to be made, so there are no moral issues involved. Bisexuality gives people more choices with respect to actual relationships and that means that actual choices have to be made about the sex of a lover and re-made as you pointed out. This seems to mean that bisexuality is not just something that is, but you choose it. This makes bisexuals seem immoral by traditional ethics. This is not really the case, but many people are aware of bisexual thoughts and desires and they are afraid that they will be ethically condemned by the very ethics they subscribe to.

    Ethics should provide real people with the principles they need to live a happy and fulfilling life. The real battle for the widespread acceptance of the very natural bisexuality of many humans is this ethical battle.

    It is also very important that forums such as this exist, which make it clear that the person who is just beginning to get a glimpse of his or her bisexuality is not alone. It is helpful to know that many other people have learned enough about themselves that they have come to grips with being bisexual. It is also helpful to see that many of them are good and thoughtful people.

    Bisexuals need not be uncertain about who they are. You are you. I am me. We are capable of loving both men and women. We are different, as individuals always are, but we are also whole, as an individual. Perhaps we feel split because large groups in society would wish to split us in two, but why should we let them do that? We need not give in to these pressures with self-doubt. It is really only that self-doubt that splits an individual.

  30. #30

    Re: Taking Both Sides

    I view sexual politics and governmental politics the same way, disliking both, but I wonder whether the tendency to see all of something rather than the one side you choose for yourself isn't a balancing act on a natural toggle switch.

 

 

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