Live // let live : stories about Dutch adult bisexuals

LIVE // LET

LIVE

Stories about Dutch adult bisexuals

Nora Bacily

Student Number: 10109420

Master program: Sociology: Gender, Sexuality and Society University of Amsterdam

First supervisor: Paul Mepschen Second supervisor: Mattijs van de Port Date: 08.2015

LIVE // LET

LIVE

Stories about Dutch adult bisexuals

ABSTRACT

LIVE // LET LIVE is a thesis that features a documentary about seven Dutch adult bisexuals. Through interviews, the film shows the benefits and biases being a bisexual of a certain age is all about. The similarities and differences between the participants become clear. Using intersectionality as a theory and method, the dominant discourse surrounding bisexuality is explained. Because of the little academic knowledge on adult bisexuals, this thesis is mostly preoccupied with the question who these people are and what the definition of bisexuality is. Theoretically, bisexual identities are constructed along the three axes of definition; desire, conduct and self-identification. This research will demonstrate that this also happens in real life, but will also show the complexity of this all. Gender is one of the concepts that displays this complexity and will be analysed. Most of all, this thesis is concerned with giving adult bisexuals a voice. With the research question “Who are these people, how do they live their bisexual lives and how does this label influence their lives?”, it touches the subject of giving shape to your sexuality. By carefully creating a text and a film that can be seen, read and understood by most people, this thesis is easily accessible. Not engaging too much in academic lingo, and having a documentary as a replacement for a part of the text, creates a thesis that everyone can enjoy. The seven extraordinary participants, with divers interpretations of their bisexuality, give an intimate glimpse into their lives.

THANKS

Maite, you are the best! We did everything, apart from the writing, together. You gave this project and me a lot of you precious time and skills. Even during your own holiday! You deserve a medal, or at least a nice bottle of wine. This whole project would not have happened without you. Thank you so much.

All the participants; Just, Helene, Jan, Nico, André, Pieterjan and Erwin, thank you for helping me out and sharing your very personal stories with me. You didn’t have to, but you did. Thank you all!

Jasper, thank you for your time and energy in helping with the editing! You made my day when you selected the first song for the docu, I still can’t get it out of my head.

Joey, you were a never ending source for our computer issues and requests. You saved me a lot of money, time and viruses. Thank you for making the time to help.

A lot of thanks also goes to the people in our “test panel”, who watched the documentary before anyone else, and who gave detailed comments that we could uses during the fine tuning. Your efforts were very much appreciated. Thank you for being honest, but not too honest.

CONTENTS

LIVE // LET LIVE P. 36 - 37 Reflection P. 38 - 50

Conclusion P. 51 - 55 Bibliography P. 56 - 59 Contact P. 60

‘Just pick one or the other.’ ’Bisexuality is not a real sexual orientation.’ ‘It is an excuse to not be monogamous.’ ‘Bisexuals are closeted gays’. These are some of the comments I heard and read over and over again when doing research on bisexuality during my anthropology Bachelor and this Master program. I have written about bisexuality multiple times and tried different approaches (Bacily 2012; 2013(a);1 2014), but I kept coming back to these kinds of comments. These ideas about bisexuals are mostly shaped by and focused on young

adolescent people who are “still discovering what they like”. Almost none of the literature and every-day comments centre around adults with steady (and maybe monogamous) lives and relationships.

This made me wonder, where are, and who are the adult bisexuals? And how are they different from young adolescent bisexual people?

For an essay in my Master program I took apart gender and age categories and made separate literature analyses for these groups of bisexuals to try and answer this question (Bacily 2014). Not shockingly I found that most of the literature on bisexuality focuses on these young adolescent bisexuals. It turns out that some bisexual “groups”, especially young bisexual women, are visible in research, everyday life and the media. Most of the time portrayed in a very stereotypical way. Older bisexuals, both men and women are not visible. I could only find one recent research in which a few pages were written on adult bisexuality in the workplace (Kuyper 2013). This means that when you apply an intersectional approach

(Crenshaw 1997; Davis 2008) and take apart categories of identity, you find that there is very little written about a particular “group” of bisexuals within the bisexual category, the adult bisexuals. This is a problem because it means that bisexuals that cross a certain age limit are not included in research and have no voice in academic literature. Because I use an

intersectional approach to shape my research for this thesis, I explain the meaning of intersectionality in the methodology chapter.

Besides the little amount of research done on adult bisexuals, bisexuality in general is also a sociological issue. Because the legitimacy of this sexual orientation is questioned (Storr 1999: 309)2 and at the same time looked down upon (Kroeze 2012), it is a very paradoxical and complex issue. Additionally, bisexuals are marginalized by all kinds of “queer communities” and by heteronormative society in general (Hayfield et al. 2013). Bisexuals are deemed ambiguous.

The lack of visibility of adult bisexuals results in a lack of academic knowledge and visual material on their lives. Storr points at this invisibility in the piece on Postmodern Bisexuality

1 _{Bacily, N., De Katy Perry-fase. Cursus: afstudeerpresentatie, BA culturele antropologie en}

ontwikkelingssociologie. UvA, 02-2014

2 _{In my thesis I choose to not refer to any of the authors first names to make it this thesis a bit more gender equal.}

(1999) and tells us that in the “modernist sexual tales” bisexuality has no place. Because bisexuality is still seen as a ‘refusal to tell one’s story’ rather than a part of ‘postmodern sexual story telling’ (Storr 1999: 313), it stays invisible to the public. Since bisexuals “refuse” to pick a sexuality that only desires one gender, there is no place for bisexuality in modern stories of romance.

The lack of visibility of bisexuals and in particular adult bisexuality in our society, is a good reason to investigate and visualize the lives and stories of adult bisexuals. Starting to close this gap with a research on adult bisexuals would be of great value. In order for me to find out who these adult bisexuals are and how they act in the midst of this dominant discourse that keeps them out of sight, it would be important to let them speak themselves. I have decided that showing these people in a film is the best way to get to know them and their stories. The film shows the issues of being bisexual, and displays the normal environment of the

interviewed bisexuals. The documentary replaces my data collection and data analysis chapter.

There is however, a lot written about the way (young) bisexuals are perceived by other members in society and about stereotypes and marginalization that follows from these ideas. It has also become clear that doing research on bisexuality is challenging due to the ever changing and blurred definition of bisexuality. Researchers often explain that the definition of bisexuality that you use, influences the outcomes of the study (Keuzenkamp 2012). This is why in the theory chapter I will discuss what definition I am using and why. If I wanted to, I could write a whole thesis, a whole book for that matter, about the definition of bisexuality. Instead, my research question focusses on the people behind the definition and not the box they might fit into.

In this thesis and film, I am trying to get closer to the daily reality of bisexual adults in a way that is understandable for most people. Therefore my research question is: Who are these people, how do they live their bisexual lives and how does this label influence their lives? In order to answer these questions we first need to find bisexual people, and in order to find them, we have to look at what we mean by bisexual identity and adult bisexuals. Who fits in this category? How do we define bisexuality? Therefore I will start with some theory to explain what a bisexual identity or bisexuality is, and how we can define this. In order to do this I look at the concept of gender, the concept of sexuality and different theories that have to do with bisexuality. After that, I am talking about methodology, the methods I use to do this research and make this thesis and why I chose them. I will clarify even more why I made a documentary instead of writing about these people, I talk about the collection of life histories, participant recruitment, and intersectionality as a method. I will end this theoretical

framework by explaining how society currently views bisexuals. I call this the dominant discourse on bisexuality. I will do this on the basis of eleven relentless stereotypes. In doing this, the intersectional approach is used again as differences between ideas surrounding female and male bisexuals will become clear, and a differences based on age will show. My own opinion on this topic will also become clear.

Bisexual identity

Bisexuality is a very complicated category of identity to define, because it is not a straight forward one. Pun intended. There is not a single definition that can always be used, as is often the case with identity categories. Defining any sexuality is tricky and is often done with three main defining characteristics; desire, conduct and self-identification. Yoshino calls this the three axes of definition, because along these axes bisexuality can be defined (Yoshino 2000: 8). Which ones are used or in which order of importance, is up to the person that is doing the defining. The way you choose to define bisexuality obviously influences your research, since you use this definition as an in- and excluding device. Here is a short explanation of these axes, how they are used in defining bisexuality and what their pitfalls are.

When saying someone is bisexual using the axe of desire, it assumes an attraction to multiple genders, not just one. With this axe it is not important if a person acts upon these desires or not (Yoshino 2000: 8-13). It is not even important if the desired gender belongs to a real person or an imaginary person (Kroeze 2012: 20). The second axe, conduct, is based on the sexual acts a person participates in. If you are only using this axe to define who is bisexual, a person who engages in sexual acts with people with different genders can be seen as bisexual (Yoshino 2000: 8-9). Both of these axes come with some problems. When it comes to desire, how can you know if someone desires two genders? This is important for a person doing research to know, in order to decide who can be counted as a bisexual. It is almost impossible to know this about a person upfront. And if there is a way to know, how do we define desire? Is it attraction? Is it fantasizing? Or is it something else? Conduct is also a problematic concept, because when does something count as sexual conduct? Again, researchers have to conceptualize this in order to know who they should and should not study. Does (French) kissing count as conduct? Or maybe penetration? If so, what about girl-on-girl sexual acts? Sexual conduct is a concept that is hard to box in. The third axe however, self-identification is the most uncomplicated for researchers. This means that the person has to identify zeself3 as a bisexual. Often political or activist agendas, the inclusion into the “group of bisexuals” and also exclusion from categories like homo- and heterosexuals are the reason for wanting to label yourself as a bisexual.

In 1948 Kinsey et al. were the first authors to interpret bisexuality as a continuum between homo-and heterosexuality. This meant that for the first time in academia different types of bisexuality were acknowledged. Before bisexuality was seen as what Garber calls true or real bisexuality. This is the exact middle of the Kinsey scale (Garber 1999; Kinsey et al. 1948). It refers to a person that is equally attracted to the opposite sex as well as to the same sex.. The Kinsey Scale runs from zero to six. Zero means the subject is exclusively heterosexual, one indicates that the subject only has incidental homosexual contacts, but usually heterosexual contacts. This scale gets more homosexual as the numbers go up, with exclusive

3 _{This gender “neutral” pronoun is used here to make clear that next to males and females, people who identify}

as another or no gender can also identify as bisexual. You could also use hirself which is a merging of him-and herself, but this could exclude people that are not male or female. Although I do acknowledge some people had to fight for their pronouns, I feel this is the most appropriate pronoun to use in this case.

homosexuality as the endpoint. On this scale all numbers from one to five can be seen as bisexuality (Kinsey et al. 1953: 471; Kinsey et al. 1948 :647). Kinsey’s scale is based on conduct and desire, not self-identification. Nowadays The Klein Sexual Orientation Grid is often used to label (bi)sexuality (Klein 1980). The end results are still placed on a continuum, from 21 to 147 points, which places you on a hetero-to-homosexual scale. This method uses more than the three mentioned axes to determine sexuality, and was designed ‘to measure a person’s sexual orientation as a dynamic multi-variable process’ (Klein et al. 1985: 38). Your score can be calculated on the basis of to whom you are sexually attracted, whom your sexual fantasies are about, what your emotional preference is, what your social preference is, what kind of lifestyle you live and how you identify yourself. But the Kinsey scale is still used as the guideline for answering these questions. You can answer from one to seven, going from exclusively heterosexual to exclusively homosexual. The Klein Sexual Orientation Grid also allows room for changes in the past, present and future, taking into account the changeable nature of sexuality. All sexualities can be seen as fluid, context dependent and changeable. With bisexuality this becomes more clear than with any mono-sexuality4, where a person is attracted to just one gender, like hetero-and homosexuality. This idea about sexualities is part of queer theory (Ritzer 2011: 634-640). There are numerous examples of sexuality changing over time, due to circumstances and contexts. One of the more extreme examples can be found in Garber’s book Vice versa: bisexuality and the eroticism of everyday life (1996). Garber distinguishes al lot of “types” of bisexuality in this book. One of these is ‘situational bisexuality’. This is bisexual behaviour where people have sex with people of the same sex. While they would normally not have same-sex relationships. This sexual behaviour is due to circumstances, the context of living in a one-sex environment for a longer period of time is very important here. In for example prison some men and women engage in same-sex sex, because this is the only “available” gender. But there are also numerous examples of changing sexuality in non “forced” or “involuntary” contexts. In “normal” lifespans this also happens, and the Klein Sexual Orientation Grid takes this into account. To make The Klein Grid more clear, below you can see what it looks like.

4

Mono-sexual means that you have a sexuality in which only one gender is desired, like for example our idea of traditional heterosexuality and traditional homosexuality.

This Grid has a more realistic view of what it is to be bisexual, but this view is also a very complex one. Now there are a lot of variables that have to be taken into account. Interpreting the end score is also difficult. Are you only mono-sexual if you score either 21 or 147 points, the lowest and highest possible scores? This would basically mean that more or less everyone is bisexual, which you can of course agree with or question. Yet this system of placing bisexuality on a scale in between homo- and hetero sexuality also has its flaws. It tells us that bisexual people can be placed on a continuum of being less or more bisexual than others. In this way it invites authority and hierarchy. It assumes you can express bisexuality in

percentages depending on how much percent you are of either sexuality.

These concerns might seem a bit extreme, but they are essential. Defining what I mean when I say bisexual, and thus the choice whose voices and experience will be included in this

research, will determine the outcome. Being sensitive to issues of authority, hierarchy, difference and equality is important here, and I do that as genuinely as I can in this research and thesis.

Attracted to two genders

Bisexuality is different from homo- and heterosexuality in the part that bisexuals are attracted/have sex with/desire two genders. It is a non mono-sexuality. This makes it even more difficult to define because it has to deal with the concept of gender. After studying gender for a few years it is safe to say that I belief that gender is not a matter of women versus men, or even something that you are born with. So in order to define bisexuality, we have to look at what gender means and how this influences the notion of bisexuality.

Gender can be seen as something you are born with, but in gender studies this is normally called someone’s sex (Nicholson 1994: 79-80). This refers to a more biological and bodily

For variables A to E: For variables F and G 1 = other sex only 1 = heterosexual only 2 = other sex mostly 2 = heterosexual mostly

3 = other sex somewhat more

3 = heterosexual somewhat more

4 = both sexes 4 = hetero/gay-lesbian equally 5 = same sex somewhat more 5 = gay/lesbian equally

6 = same sex mostly 6 = gay/lesbian mostly 7 = same sex only 7 = gay/lesbian only

way of perceiving a person. Assigning a sex is mostly done at birth and is determined on grounds of sex organs, hormones and chromosomes. Later on in life, hormones and secondary sex characteristics play a huge role in being acknowledged as a male or female (Fausto-Sterling 2004). This makes the male / female dichotomy feel natural and seem like something that has been forever. The diversity of genders that occur all around the world show us that this dichotomy is a cultural and historic construct, not a natural one. An example of this are persons we refer to as intersexed. This is a term used for a variety of “conditions” in which the biological bodies do not fit exactly in either the male or female category (Karkazis: 2008: 9; van Heesch: 2010). This occurs more than you might think, Kessler estimates that up to two percent of live births are intersexed children (Kessler 1998).

In my education, I have learned and read a lot about the difference between sex and gender. Even though a lot of people might not know or feel this difference and the terms are often used interchangeable. If you assume the explanation I just gave of sex is correct, you probably think that gender and sex are separated (Nicholson 1994). Gender is the doing of sex. The way you talk, dress, act and feel that makes you and others consider you to be part of a certain “gender-group”. Sometimes this gender and sex division goes unnoticed, for example when your self-identified gender is the same as your sex. So when you are a cis-gendered person, and thus your “biological” sex conforms with your gender. But now consider a trans* person5

. This might be someone who’s self-identified gender is different than the sex they got assigned at birth. For them this gender and sex distinction is very present.

Butler on the other hand, one of the most influential and difficult to understand gender/queer theorist, says that the body itself is also seen through social interpretation. So looking at sex organs and chromosomes to determine someone’s sex is a decision we made in medicine, in a certain historical and social context. Because of this we interpret the body in a specific way, which is the same we do when we look at gender. In this way gender and sex are not so different from each other. They are both social constructions. This means that the

interpretations that we have of someone’s biological sex (penis and XY chromosomes mean boy, vagina and XX chromosomes mean girl), are ideas people designed and invented. Butler adds to the concept of performativity to this. According to Butler masculinity and femininity are not a matter of being masculine or feminine. It is about the performance of cultural ideas of gender. Gender is a doing. However this does not take away from its realness. People can really feel they are male/female/something else and there are real consequences to be doing a certain gender. Nonetheless, this does not erase that gender is a socially constructed doing that most of the time tries to match up to our current ideas of normative males or females.

Although Butler says that “full” or “real” normative masculinity or femininity can never be accomplished, but both masculinity and femininity are built through being heterosexual. When you are homosexual you by definition are not a normative male or female but the

5 _{There are a lot of words describing people whose gender does not conform to their sex. I choose to say trans*}

person because this includes more of these persons than saying transgender or transsexual since these are words for a very specific group of people. I feel trans* person is more generally used and less offensive to most people I am trying to describe.

opposite (Butler 1993; Butler 2002). But if you look at it this way, where do bisexuals fit in? Bisexuals have achieved heterosexuality, but also homosexuality. Or you could say that they have not achieved either. So what is their place within this idea (Marshall 2009: 317-318)? These kind of questions need to be researched by looking at the experiences of bisexuals. But gender is more and more understood as a social construction that has to do with the male / female distinction. This includes ideas about female versus male bodies. With this view it is taken into consideration that ‘(…) society not only shapes personality and behaviour, it also shapes the ways in which the body appears’ (Nicholson 1994: 79). When the body is also seen as something where social norms apply to, you can say that a “coatrack view” is created. They body is a coatrack on which social norms and thus gender is hung. Only in this way the body gets meaning. In this view of gender you acknowledge that gender and sex are linked to each other, shape each other and are in relation with each other. For me the last view of gender, the coatrack idea, is one I can work with. But, a very important addition to this is that I will not assume a dichotomy in gender. I belief there are multiple gender variations that are all equally genuine and real.

Although we have now seen that the male / female binary is not a very realistic division for all people, it is a concept of gender that shapes our everyday life. Whether this is convenient for you because you are part of a more excepted gender or not, it is embedded in how most of us define ourselves, how we shape our daily actions and how society views us. We can see this in very simple things like when we are joining a sports team, when we have to choose to enter the male or female restroom, our pronouns or when I for example decide to put on a dress. But your gender is also prevalent in less obvious things. The way we shape our family lives, the activities we love doing and toys we like. Larger structures are also build on ideas about gender. Politics, belief systems and the jobs we qualify (ourselves) for are a good example of this. For most of us a world without the male / female dichotomy would be unimaginable (Haslanger 2000; Warnke 2001).

Since bisexuality culturally assumes an attraction to males and females, but linguistically assumes an attraction to two genders, we have to be clear what I mean when I say gender. The word bisexuality can be seen in two ways. The prefix ‘bi’ in bisexuality derives from the Latin prefix ‘bis’ and also originates from ‘di’, the Greek word for two6

. Bis means double, two, having two or doubly7. So bisexual means two- or doublesexual. This can either mean you are attracted to two gender, or that bisexuality is both homo- and hetero sexuality because it is a double sexuality. This double-sexuality assumes that bisexuals are in between heteros and homos. This does not take into account the variation in gender we just discussed. So I have decided to only uses people who are self-identified bisexuals for this thesis. This allows people that want to be included to be included, also if they like two genders that do not have a place in the male / female dichotomy or if they do not fit easily into a gender box themselves.

6

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numeral_prefix (15-03-2015)

7

In this way people who want to be excluded from this group can also be left out of it. I belief this is the most fair and ethical choice to make in this research because it makes the least assumptions regarding the meaning of gender and the meaning of bisexuality and it takes into account personal experiences and ideas.

Film

In order to answer my research questions, I am going to collect audio-visual data and oral history / life history / life stories of self-identified adult bisexuals. Instead of only writing about these people, I think it is more interesting to replace a part of my thesis with a short documentary. Making a documentary is different from the traditional anthropological8 work, an ethnography. Ethnography refers to the written results of an qualitative social science research in which the main focus are experiences and the every-day life of the participants. Through observation, participation, interviewing and talking, the anthropologist creates a “snapshot” of the of day-to-day lives of the participants (Ellis 2004: 9). The author uses this “snapshot” as ‘a medium for revealing sociological processes that might apply to other settings’ (Ellis 2004: 10), by establishing connections between the observed lives and theory. In regular ethnographic work the author is, nowadays, also very reflective on its own position in the research. The documentary I am making can be seen as a visual ethnography. An ethnographic film almost never consists of film alone, it is audio-visual data. Sound is a very important part of any documentary. A visual ethnography can be seen as ‘a medium through which ethnographic knowledge is created’ (Pink 2007: 97). By collecting audio-visual data on film it becomes visible how the participant carry themselves, represent themselves and what they have to say regarding bisexuality. This will create a benefit compered to sticking to only writing an ethnography about this subject, because it will allow me to look at performance, body language, spoken language and context all at the same time. This entails looking at non-discursive aspects of speaking about bisexuality that the film captures, like discomfort and confidence, shyness, nervousness and signs of pride. Also, this is a great opportunity to make an invisible group visible again. A film allows the researcher to show the viewers things that are extremely hard to capture in written text.

Using visual equipment can reveal some blind spots that are created in the process of trying to translate field experiences into an ethnographic academic text9. I will demonstrate how film can work around two blind sports. I will say something about the shortcomings of classic fieldwork notes and MacDougal’s meaning versus being.

When you are in the field doing research, using a tape recorder and making notes, things are bound to be left out. For one, as a human it is impossible to see everything. Second, when quickly trying to write down notes, only the seemingly most important things get written down. And third, when writing an academic text, even more things are left out. Although this is only logical - otherwise a simple description of the scenery would take up a whole book –

8 _{I use the words sociology and anthropology interchangeable here because at the University of Amsterdam,}

where I study, sociology and anthropology are very similar. I did an anthropology Bachelor , a Sociology Minor and now a sociology Master. There is a lot of overlap in the curriculum, it is normal when teachers and

professors teach anthropology and sociology courses. Also there used to be one location in which all the teachers had their offices, specifically for anthropologist and sociologist. Although I do know that in many other

universities, and especially in other parts of the world, the separation between anthropology and sociology is a lot bigger.

,we do know that even the slightest change in tone of voice, the surroundings or body language can change the meaning of what is being said and done (Geertz 1973). Unlike an academic text, a film can reveal these things. ‘[The academic world] fail[s] to include filming and insist on continuing the hopelessly inadequate note-taking of an earlier age, while the behaviour that film could have caught and preserved for centuries (…) disappears (….)’ (Mead 1995: 4-5). Of course a film has its own pitfalls. Capturing theory in a film is very difficult and there is the threat of disappearing as a filmmaker, simply because you are not caught on camera. This also goes for other things that fall outside the camera frame. A film makes it seem like THE truth, while it actually shows A truth. The philosopher Lacan calls this the difference between The Real and reality10. This is why I am taking the best of both worlds. I am making a film and writing about adult bisexuals.

Another advantage of a film is that the difference between Meaning and Being becomes clear for the viewer (MacDougal 2005). This difference is also known as Sein versus Dasein. These are words for two different “states” of being. Sein (or meaning) is when somebody is very consciously and actively doing something and being reflexive about this. This occurs for example, when a participants is consciously thinking about a question the researcher asks.

Dasein (or being) is a very unconscious state in which things are done automatically. A nice

example of this is pouring coffee into a cup. This can be done without giving it a conscious thought. You just pour it, like you do every morning. This is the Dasein state. But when you drop the mug the object is taken out of its normal context, and suddenly you have to think about what you are doing consciously. You get into a Sein state of mind. As an anthropologist or sociologist you are always trying to reflect consciously on what people are doing You try not to take actions for granted although they might be habits for the people who you are studying. As a researcher you are trying to show the habits that take place in the Dasein state of mind. MacDougal reminds us that images give the opportunity to show and get access to the Meaning (Dasein), because you can explicitly show the unconscious actions (MacDougal 2005).

On top of this, a film will make the acquired knowledge more accessible for everyone. This is very important because in this way almost anyone will be able to understand the research. This is also the reason why I am writing this thesis in a way that can be understood by people that have not studied gender, anthropology or sociology for years. I want my mother,

neighbours and most importantly the participants to be able to read and understand my work. By doing this, I am trying to make the academic field a bit more accessible and thus a bit more open to critique. When you do not understand something, it is impossible to critique. In this way the people whose story I tell are able to determine for themselves if they can relate to what I am saying about them. How can we write about people in words they would never uses themselves? Social scientist also try to avoid this when writing about other languages or cultures that use terms that are difficult to translate. They do this because in this translation certain meanings can get lost. So why not do this when writing about people in my own

language and culture? By making a film I can prevent this, since the viewers see the

participants talk themselves, instead of having a middleman, the sociologist, in between that tells you how to interpret what is being said.

Collaboration

Together with Maite Vanhellemont I made the documentary for this thesis, LIVE // LET LIVE. She graduated from the fotovakschool in Amsterdam last year. She did a four year education to become a photographer at this photography school. Right now she is in her first year of doing another four years of photography education at the art academy Hogeschool voor Kunsten Utrecht (HKU).

Maite and me became friends in high school and talked about doing a visual project together for a long time. She was always interested in the personal stories of people and how social science can help to contextualize these, while I was always very moved by the pure stories you can tell with photography and film. When I told her about my idea for this project, she was very excited and wanted to join the project immediately. I was very happy with her offer, since she knows a lot about the aesthetics of shooting visual material. She knows how all the technical stuff works and is very good in choosing beautiful frames that show the participants and/or setting in a spectacular way.

This resulted in an intense partnership. She went with me to the homes of all the participants to film them, while I asked the questions and was leading the interview. We went across The Netherlands to talk to all these interesting people, so we spend a lot of time together in trains, busses and trams. Because we can bounce ideas of each other and discuss them, we deepened the whole project. We also talked about how the participants might view us. We arrived in a duo, which means I did not have to set up and work with the camera. I could focus on the participant that was in front of me. We both feel this made the whole project look more professional to the participants. I was also always the one who got in touch with the participants and made the interview appointments.

Maite did not only join me in visiting and talking to the participants, we also did all the editing together. We even did all the editing at her place, because she has a bigger computer screen at home. And since two heads are better than one, we could create a more nuanced and at the same time exciting film than I could have done alone. Although I do have the final say in thing since it is my thesis, I have never used my “veto” and in this way the film truly is a partnership. We made it together entirely. Altogether, Maite is a great addition to the project. She makes the ideas we had for this project come to life, and with her skills insured that the end product is as aesthetically beautiful as its content is.

Life histories

In order to collect these life histories use semi-structured in-depth interviews (Hennink et al. 2011:108-132). I want to be led by what the participants think is important in their journey of sexual identity. However, I have an interview guide on which some essential questions and topical probes are formulated. I asked the participants to select a few photos from their

personal collection beforehand, to use in the conversation as starter, or to clarify somethings and to put emphasis on their histories.

When I am collecting and analysing these interview I have to keep in mind that people understand and remember their lives from the present (van Rooden 2004: 529). People will share with me how they remember their lives. This is not always how others remember it, or with the same sentiment as when it happened. They have gained life experiences over the years, and look back at their lives with new insights which they cannot turn off. Being interviewed by a younger person even increases the tendency of analysing your life in

hindsight (van Rooden 2004: 529). Because of this, distortions are not avoidable. Van Rooden tells us that in order to draw up memories of others, it is important to uses anecdotes and look at the way they are told. Something that film is very suitable for (van Rooden 2004).

Performance

In order to analyse what the participant mean when they say something, you can look at performance. This is necessary to, for example, determine if someone is being sarcastic or serious about something. Van Rooden for example does a great job analysing the oral history interviews by looking at jokes, contradictions, moments where people ridicule there younger selves and how the participants speak of their lives now. An overview of how religion was a part of peoples everyday lives is given by van Rooden, by focusing on religious coercion that is, or was, not always experienced as such. Van Rooden does this by only looking at what is said. I can add an extra dimension to this by looking at how people say this and how they act in front of the camera. By looking at gestures, such as rolling your eyes, telling stories with the use of your hands and all kinds of vocal gestures, me and the viewers are able to identify symbols and meaning. Film is a great way to try to “read between the lines” and also present this information to the viewers, without imposing my personal interpretation. In the reaction of the participants lies a lot of information that can normally not be used, because it gets written down instead of shown.

The participants and intersectionality

I have recruited participants through my personal network, through a key informant (Hennink et al. 2011:124) and through online social networks.

The first participant I found was through Maite. She told me her godfather, the man that helped raise her as a second dad, used to date both men and women. Maite contacted him and he told her that he was open to participating. He, Pieterjan, was the first participant we talked to.

Besides that, I e-mailed four Dutch organizations that are for bisexuals, posted three calls for participants on online fora, and contacted people who are openly bisexual on social media networks. Additionally I used my LinkedIn page, an online dating site for bisexuals, a website where expats in The Netherlands can form groups, and anything else I came across online to recruit participants. Next to that I also informed everyone I spoke to about what I was trying to do and asked them if they happened to know someone.

None of this worked. So far the only participant we had was still Pieterjan. I then decided to post a call for participants on my personal Facebook page and from there things started rolling. My friends and family were kind enough to share and like the post. As you can see in the picture below, 12 people shared my message, including the Facebook page of the LNBi, the Landelijk Netwerk Biseksualiteit11 and Ambigu Belgium, both organizations that connect bisexual people and try to increase the visibility of bisexuals.

Soon I got some messages from people who wanted to participate. I answered all of them and explained what I wanted to do. Some of them backed out anyway, due to doubts about being in front of a camera and making their sexuality “publicly” known. One women wanted to participate, but her children ended up not liking it, so she withdrew herself. Some of the people that contacted me never e-mailed me back, and some were too busy to fit me in. I managed to find seven people that were willing to share their story in front of the camera and through e-mail contact set dates to meet them in their own homes. After filming all seven of the participants I did get some e-mails of friends or acquaintances of them, who heard about the project and also wanted to participate. At that point, we already started editing and had hours and hours of material, so I declined their offers.

On the next two pages you can find a short introduction of the people that I did interview. The are shown in order of talking appearances in the film.

.

Pieterjan 61 years old

Pieterjan lives on a houseboat in

Amsterdam together with Marjetta. They have one son and Pietrjan is a shared guardian for two other children, Maite is one of them. He is a freelance philosophy teacher, has a parrot and a dog and loves the theatre.

Helene and Jan Both 45 years old

They live together in Heerde, have two dogs and have lots of friends running down the door. They compete

internationally with their horse and earn their money by giving physical therapy, erotic massages, hosting a website and polyamorous nights and by doing other gig’s related to sexuality.

Just

49 years old

Just is married, lives in Schiedam and has a 17 year old daughter. He is currently in-between jobs and would like to switch from working in IT to teaching math in high school. He loves model trains.

Nico

52 years old

Nico is a gender- and sexual diversity activist who lives in Arnhem. He loves biology, nature, psychology, philosophy, religion and everything that concerns human behaviour. Especially relations and sexuality.

André 52 years old

Andre is a GP in Noord-Holland. He is married to a women and has three

children. His GP practice is attached to his house, the interview took place there. He feels bisexuality should be more visible and he loves to do track running.

Erwin 50 years old

Erwin is the president of the LNBi, so he spends a lot of time dealing with issues surrounding bisexuality. He is a

sociologist and lives in Rotterdam together with his female partner and one of his children. He loves camping and jogging.

As you can see, out of the seven people that are in the documentary, only one is female. All participants are of a Dutch ethnicity and all have white skin, and are older than 45 years. Therefore, the documentary cannot take into account the differences in experiences that a diversity in ethnicity, gender, and age might cause. It might be the case that people of colour or of a different ethnicity experience their bisexuality differently than the people in my film. I chose to focus on adults only, but it would have been an even more interesting documentary if there was ethnic diversity between the participants and if I would have had more female or non-male bisexuals. In that case you might be able to see the role intersectionality plays in experiences.

Intersectionality is often used in gender- and feminist studies and theory. Intersectionality refers to the interaction between categories of difference (Davis 2009: 68). Categories of difference are things people are, and cannot change (easily), like race, gender, sexuality and age. Identity markers if you will. For example, I am a woman, I am 23 years old, I am abled-bodied12, I am of Dutch ethnicity and I am somewhat coloured. The short explanation Davis gives for the term intersectionality is ‘The interaction of multiple identities and experiences of exclusion and subordination’ (Davis 2009: 67). The longer explanation Davis gives takes into account that intersectionality is actually a very vague and open-ended concept. It can be a theory, methodology reading strategy or holistic device and it refers to interactions of these categories of difference and their outcomes. Intersectionality focusses on power relationships (Davis 2009). The interactions, and thus changes, occur when identity markers come together within one person. A person can never “just” be a woman. Your identity is always made up of multiple categories of difference. The intersection of these multiple categories is also

important, and should not be regarded as the “addition of”. By coming together a change happens. For example, I am not only a woman and Dutch and coloured. I am a (somewhat) coloured Dutch woman. This means I experience and am experienced differently than people with other combinations of identity markers.

Crenshaw introduced the term intersectionality in 1989 and used it to critique second wave feminism (Crenshaw 1997; Davis 2009: 68). She felt the feminist discourse was focussed on and produced by white women. Besides gender, other differences were not taken into account. Women were mostly reduced to one coherent group of people in western feminism. Crenshaw uses the example of black women who experienced domestic violence to make her point. These women did not fit into the exciting anti-racist discourse because they were women but they also did not fit into the feminist discourse because they were of colour (Crenshaw 1997; Davis 2009:68). They were, sometimes implicitly sometimes explicitly, excluded from both groups because they were black women. Crenshaw even tells us that when you look at the “group” of women facing domestic violence, the differences between these women were greater than some of the differences between males and females (Crenshaw 1997: 178). In the words of Davis: ‘”Intersectionality” refers to the interaction between gender, race, and other categories of difference in individual lives, social practices, institutional arrangements, and

Woman

Dutch Bisexual

Creoles in

Suriname

Women

Sex with

women

cultural ideologies and the outcomes of these interactions in terms of power’(Davis 2008: 68 quotation marks in original).

The Venn diagram below will help to explain

intersectionality and the outcomes of the interaction of categories of difference within one person.

The key to intersectionality is that when combining these divers categories, they are mixed together, not just added on. The meanings of the individual categories can change according to the mix of the used categories13. In the diagram you can see that a Dutch bisexual woman is not only Dutch, bisexual and a woman. They blue circle overlaps with the yellow circle and creates a green part. A green part is different from a blue and yellow part, it is mixed. The white bisexual circle creates a lighter

blue and yellow, and in the middle part a lighter green. All the identity categories blend together in one person and create an identity. With this light shade of green you experience your life. A different blend creates a different experience.

In order to clarify this idea, I will give a real life example: the Mati in Suriname. These Creoles women have sexual contacts with other women, usually next to relationships with men. In The Netherlands, we would identify these women as bisexuals or lesbians. However, in Suriname these women are not regarded as lesbians or bisexuals, despite their sexual interaction with women. Neither their surroundings nor the women themselves experience them as anything other than heterosexual women who have

sex with other women (Wekker 1999). Because one identity marker, the ethnicity of the women, changes, the outcome changes. In the diagram you can see the yellow circle is replaced by a red one and the middle part is now a light shade of purple instead of green. The concept of homosexual identity does not apply to these particular women, because they are Creoles women in Suriname. Being a Creoles women in Suriname changes the whole meaning and experience of having same-sex intercourse. Acknowledging these possible differ outcomes is the theoretical use of intersectionality. But using intersectionality as a method often comes

down to “asking the other question” (Matsuda, 1991:1189 in Davis 2009: 68). This means asking about other categories of differences than usual. You can try to see how it effects the research when you ask about categories of identity that would normally not be questioned in the research, like ethnicity, class, education, area of residence, being (dis)abled, lifestyle, political point of view etc. This could be an endless list, which is also the weakness of this concept. When using this method too enthusiastic you are at the “risk” of creating individual

categories, and end up at the individual level. This would deny people the opportunity to organize in or feel like they belong to (political) groups.

In this thesis I have already used intersectionality as a method. By asking how age would change the experience of bisexual people, my whole thesis has taken its shape. By asking the other question; what does age has to do with bisexuality my thesis got constructed around bisexual adults.

However, this is only one of the many “other questions” you can ask. And as said before, I did not speak to people with very divers identity markers. Yet, the participants all have very different personalities and deal with their bisexuality in different ways. This makes for a divers film and thesis after all.

In the next chapter on stereotypes I will also take intersectionality into consideration. For stereotypes this matters a lot, because the perception of bisexuals changes when other categories of differences change. Bisexuality is viewed differently when for example the gender or age of the person changes. I will clarify this in the next chapter.

BISEXUAL

In this chapter I am discussing views, stereotypes, ideas, attitudes and biases people have about bisexual persons and bisexuality. I will do this on the basis of eleven statements that are frequently heard and mentioned with regards to bisexuality. In this chapter I rely on academic literature, online blogs and articles, things the participants told me during the interviews and insights I got by talking to friends and family about this topic.

Let me start off by saying, I belief these statements are mostly untrue for the majority of bisexuals, and these statements are definitely untrue as a given for all bisexual people. That is why we call them stereotypes. The fact that I think the statements below are mostly untrue does influence how this whole thesis and especially this chapter is written. I want to make clear that my own ideas about bisexuality shape the way the bisexual participants are shown throughout the documentary and this written thesis. My attitudes also influence how I use the academic literature that is available to me. Of course I try to choose literature that shows a view that is closest to how I experience reality. I do this, while I keep in mind to use authoritarian authors and standard literature that is used in this specific academic field, to place myself as a researcher, and my thesis, inside this domain. I make sure my research is embedded in generally accepted literature to show that this whole research is not just based on my personal feelings or experiences, to show that I have read and indulged myself in

scientific research, to show that I know what I am writing about. While doing this, I select and highlight parts of the literature that correspond to or challenge what I am trying to convey to the readers. This is the case in all researches, especially in the social science field. The researcher can never be absent from the research and it would be dishonest to pretend that the collected data and end product is uninfluenced by the researcher and the very fact that there was a research done. However, this does not make the things I say less true. It just means that, like everyone else, I also have a personality, appearance and quest that influences the research field and participants, whilst personal opinions influence the research. And I want to be upfront about it.

In order to do this I want to share my personal point of view, so here it is:

To me the reason for showing that adult people can identify as bisexual is, that up till now, they were totally invisible to me.

Second, I belief that Dutch bisexual adults cannot be seen as one coherent group.

Differences between bisexuals can be greater than differences between bisexuals and members of other sexual orientation groups. By creating one group, you can easily lose sight of the fact that these are all individuals with individual stories and individual experiences. But I do acknowledge there are (political) reasons to construct a group based on sexual identity.

Third and last, bisexuality, for me, is about the ability to be attracted to people from two different genders. What people do with their attraction may be influenced by their bisexuality but not dictated by it.

However, I strongly feel that people should identify as whatever they want, regardless of my definition of the word.

Live and let live.

I had some opinions about bisexuality before starting this thesis, but after speaking to the participants I slightly changed my mind, and the ideas above are the result.

Surely I am not alone in this mind-set, although a lot of stereotypes are bases on assumptions about a group of people that share a similar sexual orientation. On the other hand, some stereotypes I am about to discuss, contradict each other because they are only aimed at a certain part of people within the bisexual “group”. Stereotypes tend to differ between men and women and between adolescents and adults. I do not think everyone sees bisexuality in the stereotypical ways describe below. It is however the dominant discourse14 that has developed around bisexuality. Because of the ambiguities that surround bisexuality and the lack of visibility in Dutch society, these ideas were able to be established and still characterize the way bisexuals are thought of (Kroeze 2012). These are very persistent ideas that are shaped by, and shape the way, we look at bisexuality in current day Dutch society. This is why it is important to address them. To make them recognizable, even if someone is not saying them out loud but is “just” thinking them.

As said, in a moment you will see that the ideas that people have about female bodied bisexual persons and their male-bodied parallels who identify or act as bisexuals, are very different. Also age is a very important category on which stereotypes of bisexuals are based. This means some stereotypes are thought of as true for all bisexuals and some only apply to a certain smaller group like male bisexuals or young female bisexuals. This is not as

complicated as it sounds. When we experience something (sexual) not only our sexual identity is important. Take your first kiss as an example. To be able to think about this

experience you first have to identify what a kiss is. That may be different for different people, depending on their upbringing and surroundings. Next, your experience of your first kiss is coloured by who you are. Sounds logical right? Who you are influence how you think about your first kiss, and how you thought of it at that moment. Meanwhile the moment itself also influences other (sexual) moments after that. Imagine that you are a boy that kisses for the first time. Now imagine you are a girl that kisses for the first time. That would be different right? Imagine your first kiss being with a boy. Now do the same for a kiss with a girl. It is again very different right? You can do the same with age. If you had your first kiss at ten it would probably be different than if you had it today. The same goes for other identity markers like sexuality, ethnicity and race, (dis)abled-bodyness15 and social and economic background. These difference are something we know because we feel and experience them, but they are often not made explicit. This not only applies to your own experiences, but also determine how you experience others when you notices these identity markers in them.

14 _{Hekma, G., 22-09-2014, Intersections of Culture, Gender and Sexuality}

As you will see, most statements below are not isolated ideas, they relate to other ideas in complex ways. Some are results of other statements, some are the cause, some overlap, some are underlying assumptions people are not likely to say out loud, and some are statements bisexuals get confronted with on a daily bases. The participants I spoke to also get confronted with these stereotypes. They are affected by them in very complex and divers ways. I did not discuss every stereotype with every participant, but all of them do say or hint at or embody a few stereotypes. I will also reference to this in the stereotypes described below.

So here we go!

1. Bisexuality is not a real sexual orientation

This is a very persistent idea in Dutch society (Keuzenkamp 2012: 88). This, and other related ideas keep coming back in the interviews for this project.I often heard that people assume you are either straight or gay. Both seems impossible. When a man and woman walk down the street hand in hand, not many people will consider the

possibility that one of them can also be attracted to their own gender. People,

including some of the participants, struggle to see bisexuality as a serious thing. In the documentary, Pieterjan tells us it was a journey for him to accept bisexuality as a serious part of his life. Current partners often dictate how society views your sexuality (Yoshino 2000: 37; Keuzenkamp 2012: 82). Erwin agrees with this, and jokingly declares that in order for people to belief you are bisexual, you have to have sex with a man and a woman simultaneously, in public. This disbelief creates invisibility for a bisexual sexual orientation. But even when people are pointed out to the fact that someone is bisexual, they might not belief it. This is especially true for bisexual boys ( Kroeze 2102: 5). When they have sexual conduct with men, others, and peers in particular, often assume they are homosexual. A lot of people seem to think that a male can either be a man or be gay (Keuzenkamp 2011: 81). In this way of thinking there is no room for bisexuality, since the division is so binary. Other options are not considered legitimate. Young bisexual males are rarely shown or talked about in popular culture or media. It is a taboo. Opening up about being a young male bisexual is generally criticized by other young people from the Netherlands (ibid.: 80-81). This, among others, results from the idea that bisexuality is a phase. It has to do with the dominant monogamous relationship model that we have in The Netherlands, and the idea that bisexuality does not fit into this model. On top of this, Nico explains

“mainstream” sexual groups, meaning hetero- and homosexual people, can sometimes feel threatened or abandoned by bisexual people. Pieterjan endorses this by

mentioning that ‘both sides had a problem with it when you positioned yourself somewhere in the middle’ (quote from film, own translation). Nico says the reason for this is the non-conforming nature of bisexuality. Bisexuality has the ability to stretch boundaries and question mono-sexuality, since bisexuals can be seen as being both straight and gay. This can be experienced as a thread to a carefully constructed sexual identity, especially by people who fought hard for recognition. Again, Pieterjan confirms this by explaining that his gay environment was very negative when he

decided to be a guardian for a child, something that was out of reach for most gay man.

2. Just pick one!

The idea that a bisexual can just pick either men or women and be done with it, is very harmful. Nico also recognizes this problem in his interview, he does not want to pick either a man or woman, and adds to this that he would also be interested in someone that is not explicitly male or female. Bisexuals are of course capable of living monogamously with one partner, but this does not mean they are not bisexual

anymore. The same goes for, for example, straight women. The fact that they are in a monogamous relationship does not mean they are no longer heterosexual. Although some bisexuals do choose to be in (sexual) relationships with multiple people at the same time, this does not mean every bisexual needs to be with more than one partner. It is exactly like some heterosexual or homosexual persons do. Some wish to have multiple relationships at once, others do not.

3. Bisexuality is just a phase.

As stated before, bisexuality is regularly seen as a phase, a whim, a temporary thing (Keuzenkamp 2011: 88). For some people it actually is, but for most it is not (Garber 1999). André for example, clearly states in his interview that his bisexuality is not a phase, although people have often assumed that it was. By saying bisexuality is a phase, you are dismissing the sexual identity of a lot of people16. The idea of

bisexuality as a phase has a lot to do with age and gender. There is a discourse among Dutch students that go out in clubs, that it is normal for two girls to be sexually

interested in each other. This is something that links bisexuality to partying and young females. It is considered to be something a lot of young women engage in, for fun, not because they are truly bi- or homosexual. For young females it is regarded perfectly normal to identify as bisexual for a short period of time. I belief this is also the reason why research and literature on adult bisexuals is so hard to come by compared to literature on bisexual youngsters. Because of the relationship to partying and going out, bisexuality is seen as a temporary phase, one for students out on the town at night. This “It is a phase”- idea also has to do a lot with the next statement:

4. Bisexuals are closeted gays.

Whereas some individuals do use bisexuality as a transition period into

homosexuality, most bisexuals do not. Both Pieterjan and Nico went from identifying as a homosexual to identifying as a bisexual. The dominant discourse in this idea, is that ‘Bisexuals are not as oppressed as lesbian, gay or transgendered individuals because they are “half-straight”’17

(Germon 2008: 255). This is thought to be the reason they use a bisexual identity as a gateway to homosexuality (Kroeze 2012: 1, 2). In this way of thinking, three assumptions can be tackled. First, only a very small number of people are actually going from one monosexuality to another and feel

16

http://www.wanderlyn.com/myths-and-stereotypes-about-bisexuals/

and/or say they are bisexual for a while (Klein 1980 in Kroeze 2012: 15). Second, being bisexual does not mean being half straight. It means being bisexual. Third, bisexuals are often as much or more troubled than lesbian or gay people, so it is certainly not “easier” to identify as bisexual. Keuzenkamp and Kuyper let us know that the attitude in The Netherlands towards bisexuals is a bit less positive compared to the attitude towards homosexuals (Keuzenkamp and Kuyper 2013: 30). In another article Kuyper shows that bisexual Dutch employees feel more targeted at work then their heterosexual or homosexual co-workers. They are reporting a lot more work-conflicts than colleagues with a different sexual orientation (Kuyper 2013: 47).

Bisexuals also face bullying at work more often (Kuyper 2013: 50). This alone should be enough proof that being bisexual is not necessarily more accepted than being homosexual, but this literature mostly focusses on adult bisexuals, not youngsters. The next statement deals with that:

5. Teenagers are just following a trend

In the online Huffpost –gay voices, Walkley tells us that ‘"LUG” and "GUG" are typical acronyms that many college-aged men and women hear(…)’18. These mean "Lesbian Until Graduation" and "Gay Until Graduation". Age and being in school is clearly relevant with this stereotype. In the Netherlands it might be slightly different for Dutch boys than this quote states, because it is referring to American teenagers. Studies show that boys in The Netherlands are not advertising their bisexuality at all. They feel more pressure to choose either the straight or gay “side” (Keuzenkamp 2011: 82). But for Dutch girls there is some truth to it. Being a “bi-curious” or bisexual women is encouraged by peers. While I feel everyone should do what they like, and experimenting with sexuality is great, this kind of fetishization of lesbian sexual acts, and these expectations can be harmful. The terms bi-curious, LUG and GUG indicate that the people to whom it applies ‘will ultimately adopt a strictly heterosexual identity’19.

6. Young women are doing it to get attention.

Females are applauded when they engage in sexual acts with other women in order to excite heterosexual males. They face commoditization (Kroeze 2012: 17-18).

Even though this happens, there are still a lot of people who do not “do it” for

attention. A lot of young women, and men for that matter, that identify as bisexual are not at all trying to please heterosexual males that are watching, or anyone else. They are just being who they are. Walkley puts this nicely: ‘For us, it's no fad, and we aren't participating in bisexual behaviour for the attention of others; it's our lives.’ 20

This idea is harmful to people who do identify as bisexual8, because when people,

18 _{http://www.huffingtonpost.com/aj-walkley/bisexual-in-a-gaystraight_b_1427355.html (04-2015)} 19 _{https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lesbian_until_graduation}

especially girls, do adopt a bisexual identity, this is often not taken seriously (Kroeze 2012: 18). It is seen as inauthentic (Germon 2008: 255).

7. Bisexuals are confused about what/who they want

This is one of the most persistent stereotypes that bisexual people face. The idea that they cannot make up their minds (Germon 2008: 255). ‘They are also regarded as immature and confused about what they want and who they are’ (Elia 2010: 455 in Kroeze 2012:17). Bisexuals are seen as indecisive21. There is nothing wrong with being confused about your sexuality, but most people who identify as bisexual are simply not confused. They know what they are: bisexual. If being heterosexual or homosexual is not a choice, why would being bisexual be a choice people are confused or indecisive about? The rationale behind this stereotype might be that because ‘others are often confused by us [bisexuals], there is no way that we could actually be sure about being [bisexual]’22.

8. It is just an excuse to not be monogamous / bisexuals can’t be monogamous.

This myth comes from the idea that in order to be happy, bisexuals need both a male and a female simultaneously. ‘One is not enough. These are such prevalent notions within our society that when I first revealed my sexual orientation to my mom she asked, “Is your boyfriend okay with you having a girlfriend?”’23

, says Lynsey in her blog. Being bisexual does not necessarily mean being polyamorous24 or being a cheater. Sometimes these things go hand in hand, but sometimes they don’t. Erwin for example, shares with us that he, and his bisexual girlfriend, are definitely not

constantly flirting with every one of the same or opposite sex. On top of this, there seems to be a fear that the bisexual person you are dating will leave you for the opposite sex. This can happen of course, but this does not happen because they are bisexual. A person’s sexual identity has nothing to do with what their relationships look like. A homosexual person can be polyamorous, so can a bisexual person. A heterosexual person can cheat, so can a bisexual person. Bisexuals are capable of having monogamous relationships with one person. ‘Just as being attracted to both blondes and brunettes doesn’t mean you need partners of both hair colors to be sexually and romantically satisfied, being attracted to more than one gender has nothing inherently to do with polyamory’25

. So, being bisexual does not automatically mean you want multiple partners of multiple genders at the same time.

21 _{http://www.wanderlyn.com/myths-and-stereotypes-about-bisexuals/} 22

http://everydayfeminism.com/2014/12/myths-non-binary-people/?utm_content=buffer531dc&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

23 _{http://www.wanderlyn.com/myths-and-stereotypes-about-bisexuals/}

24 _{Polyamorous means you have the ability to, and often want to, be in (sexual)relationships with multiple people}

at the same time.

9. All bisexuals love threesomes.

This is a stereotype that is rooted in adolescent life and revolves around especially female bisexuals. As said above, not all bisexuals want to have sex with people of both genders at the same time. ‘Sexual orientation does not dictate what we [bisexuals] enjoy doing in the bedroom, just who’26

. It is of course the case that some bisexuals do enjoy threesomes, just not all bisexuals. Assuming someone wants a threesome based on the fact that they are attracted to two genders is simply not

correct27. The assumption that bisexuals want to have sex with everybody all the time, is annoying and becomes a problem when people proposition threesomes to bisexual (women) as soon as they find out that person identifies as bisexual. It is rude, blunt and can be harmful to ones feelings of safety. The notion that bisexuals, particularly bisexual women, are promiscuous gives the idea that they must be more experimental and open in their sex lives28.

10. Bisexuals must be promiscuous.

This idea is strongly related to the LUGs and GUGs. These two things are linked to each other because people who are acting promiscuous in public, often refer to their bisexual identity, in words or acts. There is nothing wrong with being promiscuous, but it is untrue that all bisexuals are promiscuous. Bisexuals do not necessarily engage in sex with all the people they find attractive. This idea of promiscuity also has to do with the idea that bisexuals have double the amount of people to choose from. ‘Bisexual people aren’t lustfully attracted to just anyone that walks by’29

.’Bisexual people do have standards’30. They are attracted to people of more than one gender, but that does not necessarily mean they have more potential (sexual) partners to choose from. For example, a bisexual can be very picky and not be attracted to any of the 20 people in the room, whereas a heterosexual women could be attracted to all the blond males in that same room. Someone with a strong sex drive could be having sex with a lot more people than a bisexual with a low sex drive, or one that is in a monogamous relationship. ‘The old stereotype that being bisexual doubles your chances of a date on a Saturday night’31

, and the stereotype that they are promiscuous ‘should be put to rest’32

, because it trivializes the experience of being bisexual (Germon 2008: 255). The idea that bisexuals must be promiscuous also does not apply to adult people. Among others, Just tells us that he does not get a lot of satisfaction out of hasty and

26 _{http://www.wanderlyn.com/myths-and-stereotypes-about-bisexuals/} 27 http://www.cosmopolitan.com/sex-love/news/a40576/things-you-should-know-before-dating-a-bisexual-woman/ 28 http://everydayfeminism.com/2015/06/8-tired-questions-queer-women/ 29 _{http://everydayfeminism.com/2015/04/lies-about-dating-bisexuals/} 30 _{http://everydayfeminism.com/2015/04/lies-about-dating-bisexuals/} 31 _{http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lauren-michelle-kinsey/my-bisexual-} 32 _{http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lauren-michelle-kinsey/my-bisexual-}