to be "told" that I am bi-sexual?

[WheelsOnFire1]

First of all, I do NOT take being bi-sexual in itself as an insult. Absolutely not. What I object to is this label. I will explain..

My family and I moved 150 miles away in April with DH job. Since then we haven't met many people so have been making the effort to join various clubs, go to events etc to meet people. DH and I have been attending an evening class together since May and we decided to invite the group round for some drinks.

There was only 9 of us and the topic got onto sexuality. One lady very openly said she was bi-sexual. Another lady said "I'm not homophobic at all, but even the thought of kissing another woman..." then shuddered.
The conversation continued and I made the statement that I think sexuality is fluid. Gone are the days when one is straight, gay or bi-sexual. I don't see the need for labels. I said that I am fluid with my sexuality. I have never had a sexual relationship with a woman, but I can't say that I never will. I joked that if if Jennifer Aniston wanted to kiss me, but someone was there offering me £10,000 not to...I'd reject the money.

This woman who I've met just 3 times looked at me and said "so you're bisexual?" I said "well..I don't know. I'm not attracted to women in the same way I am to men." and I went on to say how back in the day I'd snog guys in nightclubs after a few drinks but wouldn't with a girl..unless I was really plastered! And she just said "yeah but you'd kiss Jennifer Aniston, a girl wanting to kiss a girl makes you bi." She kept saying it and was basically trying to force me to say "ok ok I'm bisexual." Everyone else looked a bit uncomfortable. All of them (apart from 2 or 3 who kept quiet) agreed that having to label yourself is dumb, but she basically believed that sexuality isn't fluid: that you are straight, you are gay, or you like both sexes. She is of course entitled to her opinion but when one of the guys chimed in and said he wouldn't kick David Beckham out of bed for making crumbs, she "told" him he was bi too and "joked" asking if his wife knows he's "into men" because they could have some amazing threesomes.. (oh and bare in mind these 2 had never met before. The guy wasn't in the evening class but a work colleague of DH)

Maybe I am bi-sexual. Maybe I'm not. But AIBU to find it irritating that this woman who I barely know was trying to force me to say I am one or the other?

I'm with the pp who said they cannot imagine how such a personal deep convo came about with a bunch of people you hardly know and who don't know each other. Blimey! what happened to making polite conversation!

I think you each should call yourself whatever you want, or by all means don't give yourself a label at all - but certainly don't start analysing and defining other people

sounds a bit like the beginnings of a swingers club to me!

YANBU. I've kissed lot's of girls when I was a drunken teen (for the benefit of the male population of parties normally) And back when me and my best friend could go out and get drunk (we both have children now) we'd sometimes have a friendly snog. It would have never gone any further and it would have never happened when we were sober either.

Labelling people is just daft imho.

She said she was straight - you told her you didn't think that was correct as you believe sexuality is fluid.
You said you had some very specific circumstances under which you might engage in sexual activity with a woman - she told you you're bisexual.

It sounds like you are both as guilty of trying to define each other's sexuality as each other. Unless this is a topic relevant to your evening course, it sounds like you should probably stick to topics which aren't likely to cause personal offence.

TBH I agree with her...I think claiming your sexuality is fluid is a way to go 'Wow, look at how hip and cool and bohemian I am'.

To my mind, if (as a woman for instance) you're sexually attracted to men, you're straight. If you're sexually attracted to women, you're gay. If you're sexually attracted to men AND women, you are, in fact, bi sexual.

All the 'numerous snogs' you've had with your female pals when aged 17 don't really count and from most of the pointless teenage girls I've seen do it for the sake of it it's usually to get a reaction from a nearby group of teenage boys

Neither does the 'well i'd sleep a woman for £1m' make you 'sexually fluid'. I'd sleep with the devil himself for £1m, doesn't make me a Satanist.

I've kissed lot's of girls when I was a drunken teen (for the benefit of the male population of parties normally)

Maybe that is what the woman thought the OP was doing. Verbally rather than in deed. Without the migtigating factor of being a teenager.

Perhaps causing the OP discomfort by pressing the bisexual point repeatedly was calculated. It's not unknown for straight people to "perform" bisexuality. To tittilate, to make themselves look cool, to show off, to get attention, to try and distance themselves to some degree from the "boringly conventional" connotations they fear their hetrosexuality bestows upon them, to sell more records...

If the woman thought the OP was doing something like the above and found it offensive/irritating/tedious ... pressing the bisexual point and causing the OP discomfort in the process might have been her way to get the OP to stop in the now, and think twice about doing it in the future.

If that was the case, I'd expect it to be a sucessful stratagy. I think the OP's group may well avoid the topic in the future.

I think that you can only count the behaviour that you indulge in when sober and you carry out when there is a sexual spark.

You don't go from being bi sexual, to heterosexual, just because you pick an individual from the opposite gender to settle down with. That is who you love, not who you are sexually attracted to.

If you are sexually attracted to the opposite and same gender, when sober, you are bi-sexual, unless you have been heavily affected by your experiences, social conditioning etc.

The young people who become gay prostitutes, in poverty stricken regions, are not necessarily gay, or bi-sexual. Their motive is survival.

Likewise some acts of paedophilia, that people in poverty stricken regions (and abusive situations) are forced into, does not make them Paedophiles.

People are too easily emotionally changed/damaged for a lay person to define the reasons for other peoples behaviour.

Generally YABU, if you are sexually attracted to both genders you are Bi-Sexual, all genders and you are Pan Sexual.

Having a particular woman you actually want to do sexual things with is totally being bisexual

I agree with you OP. I'm happily married, have never kissed a woman, but I can't say I never would.
There have been women I have found attractive, but not to the extent where I have wished to pursue the possibility of a relationship with.

My sexuality is not fluid, it's pretty solid. I did identify as lesbian for about 5 minutes when I was 13 but I've been bisexual ever since. YANBU for being irritated that she tried to force you to nail your colours to the mast but you defined her sexuality as fluid first. It is annoying when bisexuality is treated as if it doesn't exist, as if it flows away depending on the gender of whoever you are currently shagging.I think you may need to accept that the whole 'I'd snog Jennifer Aniston' version of sexual fluidity coupled with an insistence that people shouldn't label their own sexuality may have been more than a little irritating.

Thanks for the responses everyone. I knew I'd get a mixed bag of responses to appreciate reading all the opinions!

First of all, it's an Italian class. Both DH and I went a few times as children and have gone to Italy 6 times together and love it. We've been saying for ages that we'd like to know the language better so thought it was the right time to finally do it.

We got onto the topic because one lady is planning to move out there next year.(the openly bi-sexual lady.) She mentioned a particular town that she has visited a few times and loves but a friend of her's son who lives there came out as gay a few months ago and apparently he got some very hateful reactions, so she said that even though she doesn't intend on moving there and shouting from the rooftops that she is bi-sexual, she would feel quite uncomfortable living there.

Also I absolutely agree with those who have said the conversation wasn't at all mature. in my defence DH and I are 24/25. We started dating at 15/16, were apart for a couple of years when we both went off to uni but got back together at 20/21 and decided to take the plunge and get married last year and we have one DC together. I know even for 24/25 the tone of the conversation wasn't all that intellectual but we had had a few drinks .. I'm really not highly immature I promise!

Brittabot I appreciate what you are saying but people did honestly look a bit awkward. The conversation was very relaxed, in a fairly lighthearted ton and she pretty aggressively was saying "well no..you're bisexual. If you want to kiss a girl you ARE bisexual" and kept repeating it in the same harsh tone. She obviously had a very strong opinion which is fair enough but her tone definitely made us all a bit uneasy.

Also it was mentioned further up aboutabout snogging girls in nightclubs and the "faux" lesbian thing: I 100% agree that it's EXTREMELY irritating. In my post I wrote "but wouldn't with a girl..unless I was really plastered!"...I guess I should have been more clear. What I meant was that I never have actually been wasted enough to kiss a random girl in a night club and I absolutely never would just to get a reaction from the boys. My DH actually says I am a bit "vanilla" but it used to annoy me when I'd go out with friends and all the boys would be chanting at them to kiss each other and they would...the "faux lesbian" thing is definitely not something I have practised!

I suppose with me, I'm just not ruling anything out. You hear often about women and men who have been married for years, then meet someone and fall in love. They've never been in a same-sex relationship before but it just clicks etc. and I'm open minded to the fact that that could well happen. I'm really not trying to be hippy-dippy about my sexuality but I do sincerely believe it's not black and white.

Who knows..maybe this woman just has a very blunt way about her. I wasn't really offended by her and I'm not ruling out the chance of actually becoming friends with her. But just as I know not to discuss politics or religion with certain friends because we will 100% disagree, I know we will disagree about this so may be best to avoid it in future!

Oh and I forgot to say in response to those saying I defined her sexuality also..this is a very good and fair point. Ignorantly I hadn't really looked at it in that way. I understand now that by me saying I think sexuality is fluid, I was basically telling her she actually isn't straight and could well "hook up" with a girl at some point.
I do think that for some people their sexuality IS black and white, but not for everyone.

I'm not sure I see sexuality as fluid in my head, to me its more of a sliding scale.

So you get people at either end then you get people all the way along.

FWIW I don't feel the need/require to be labelled either!

YANBU. I do think sexuality can be an "iffy" topic to bring up especially amongst people you don't know too well- like politics/religion. But she definitely sounds a bit aggressive with her opinion.

I could say, I can never say never to...moving to Geneva. To deciding I want to live as a man and have a sex change op. To take to extreme body modification and have horns implanted on my head. I mean, who knows what the future holds right? I can't 100% rule those things out...what if my opinion on them changes in future?

Realistically though, I know the chances of any of those things happening is so minute it's negligible. And not worth mentioning.

Just because you say 'Well who knows, I can't rule it out' regarding a same sex encounter/relationship doesn't make you 'sexually fluid' IMO, not if you have no prior experiences or events that actually make it a realistic probability.

It makes you look like you simply don't want to be seen as conforming to the 'norm' for some reason. Which I can well imagine could be irritating in a conversation tbh.

I'm with you op, I've never felt like any of those boxes fit me or that I need one to.

I finally found a word that best describes my sexuality recently and although I rarely use it as I don't want to be labelled if I actually wanted to describe my sexuality this is the word I would use.

Homoflexible- interested in relationship with women and happy to have occasional relations with men

Also hetroflexible- interested primarily in men but not averse to occasional flings with women

To me there is a clear distinction from bisexuality, which to me implies that you would consider a relationship with either.

YADNBU

I've kissed a lot of girls, mostly in my teens/early 20s, and wouldn't mind doing so again but consider myself straight. What's in a kiss when that's as far as I would want to take it?

I really, really don't understand that Gove.

So were you sexually attracted to these women? If not, what's the point of kissing them?

I've given friends big smackers on the lips before. I also kiss my dc on the lips, and my sisters.

It's got bog all to do with my 'sexuality'

MN correct me if I'm worng about this:

Kinsey thought we are all on a scale from 1-6, one end is heteo, the other is gay, with 3/4 being bi. So you could be a 5 or 2, depending on how the scale works.

god, i agree with pps, what a ridiculous conversation! next week, talk about the weather!

The Kinsey scale is one way of describing sexuality, but is by no means definitive and it has been argued that there are several different aspects of one's gender and sexuality that need to be taken into account if one wishes to accurately define and describe orientation in a way that can apply to everyone.

While it's a bit rude for them to push a label onto you, some people don't want labels on themselves and that is fine and I agree that sexuality and gender are often fluid, but many people like labels because it makes communicating or talking to others about our perspectives and experiences or finding others with similar perspectives, or just the joy of finding there is a word, a qualifier for us exists and we're not alone and it's normal, a label can make so many things easier - and its nothing with wanting to put ourselves and others in a box.

Labelling my sexuality is no more confining to me than defining my gender or ethnicities or nationality or disabilities. They don't define me, they don't restrict me, they simply make talking to others easier, talking about myself easier, and having a word can help one find others which helps oneself feel normal when we can see other real people with it rather than relying on the current terrible media portrayal of people like us.

I think it's entirely up to you how you feel comfortable referring to your sexuality. I also think she was perhaps well-meaning but a bit sheltered, rather than trying actively to upset you.

That said, I found this a really interesting opinion piece on why the term 'fluid' can be over-used to describe women's sexuality: sarahditum.com/2014/06/07/female-sexuality-is-not-fluid/

I'm not sure I'm 100% with her because my experiences are different, but I see her point.

Thank you Dojo!

Interesting thread.

I think that being gay or straight, for some people, can be fixed, not fluid.

As for other people, if think sexuality comes on the sliding scale that pp have mentioned, so they might still identify as gay or straight, but have different boundaries.

In fact, in terms of labelling, I think the most fluid one (and one I would hesitate to label on behalf of others) is being bisexual.

FWIW, I have kissed women, I have slept with a woman for a while, and I am straight. Wouldn't be happy to be labelled otherwise.

Hmm. I guess the 'fluidity' could be deemed a negative opinion of her identifying as bisexual, hence the need to get you to understand that - by her definition - your 'fluidity' is just called bisexualism.

That said, I don't know what I'd identify as. I do agree, to an extent, on the fluid thing. I feel like a fraud to identify as bisexual when i have had no relationships with women, even though i will admit to fancying them and would definitely (apart from that im married!) have a relationship if i met the 'right' woman.