Today I learned that I don't understand the term "straight"

[Mandatorymongoose]

In response to the question "if you are non binary and only attracted to other non binary people, what is your sexuality?"
It was explained to me that straight does not mean as I always believed it to "attracted to people of the opposite sex" as implied by the term heterosexual but actually means attracted to people of the opposite binary gender. If you are attracted to people not of the opposite binary gender you are gay.
Which makes perfect sense given the erasure of Lesbianism and the insistence that "genital preferences" are nothing more than a fetish but I've honestly never heard it applied to heterosexuality before. It would be interesting to see how well straight men would accept this argument.

'"Squish", which is used as the platonic version of "crush", is another term to describe partners in queerplatonic relationships - even if the queerplatonic relationship has its own term "plush" as an alternative for "crush". Mostly used to describe the feeling of wanting to have a queerplatonic relationship with somebody, this term can also be used inside the relationship as an alternative to "zucchini". It can be used as a verb as well as a noun.'

......!!

'According to The Oxford English dictionary, the first registered examples of the meaning "Strange, odd, peculiar, eccentric, in appearance or character" for queer (1508) predate in more than four centuries a meaning that directly implies 'not heterosexual or cisgender' (1922). '

1922??

Yeah, I think they mean about twenty past seven.

Hang on, what's this about binary gender? I thought there were 76 (or 176, or 576, or a gazillion or whatever) genders? Who is claiming a gender binary? Aren't they denying some people's identity? Or something equally transphobic.

If you are a woman who isn't attracted to other women but has one or more good female friend, you may be in a 'queerplatonic' relationship and have the option of identifying as queer:

That’s my entire Women’s Institute group outed, then.

Important caveat: all women over the age of 30, especially if they are mothers, are straight, because .... well, they just are. Frumps, past it, killjoys etc etc.

Wait, what? I’m 34, that means I’m cool and down with the kids doesn’t it? I completely understood all of that stuff about being attracted to the non opposite non binary queer....fuck it. If thinking this nonsense is all a load of wank then I embrace old age! Bring on the vests and carpet slippers!

Surely it's pretty fucking normal for women to have female friends

Not only is it normal, it's one of the ways we're supposed to know that we're "cis". From the NHS Gender Dysphoria symptoms list:

"preferring to play with children of the opposite biological sex"

Not that GD has anything to do with being trans any more. So basically if you're in a "queerplatonic" relationship, you're probably not queer.

My partner and I went to town yesterday, I got a buzz cut and he bought a pink shirt and a flowery tie. Are we a queer couple?

'"Squish", which is used as the platonic version of "crush", is another term to describe partners in queerplatonic relationships - even if the queerplatonic relationship has its own term "plush" as an alternative for "crush". Mostly used to describe the feeling of wanting to have a queerplatonic relationship with somebody, this term can also be used inside the relationship as an alternative to "zucchini". It can be used as a verb as well as a noun.'

Hold your horses, isn’t ‘plush’ something else entirely, involving dressing up as teddy bears or what not ? And where did the zucchini come from ? What about identifying as a courgette ( respect my vegnouns) ?

Actually forget it, we're in our 30s with kids so obviously not.

It’s really very simple to work this all out
Non binary = blue hair

My son's ex gf was queer; polyamorous and pansexual.

It meant that she had pink/purple/blue hair; had male friends outside of her heterosexual relationship and dated men, not all of whom were always gender conforming.

So, normal teenager then.

"Queerplatonic"?

Is that just having a best friend?

I'm going to look at these lists one day and see hist what my 'identity' would be - if I gave a shit.

I'll just get another cat.

Is there an identity for having most of your daily physical mammalian contact be with cats? Asking for a friend obviously.

And what the fuck is a homo-romantic?

My 16 yr old ds at times can't keep up with the many titles that people on his SM are giving themselves.

Why do we have to identify as anything? We are what we are and people have always been gay/straight/curious/ throughout history without feeling the need to jump on the bandwagon and declare themselves as whatever they fancy on any given day.

Fair play to those who decide what they are and own it. It's those that change every other week that I don't get. So if I identify as a toaster do I have protected status? It's getting ridiculous now.

As you can tell from my rant I haven't got much of a clue about this. I am just genuinely baffled with it all. Ds has Aspergers and his best friend is gay, ds is straight. He sees things very "black and white" and I struggle to help him understand when I don't get it myself!

I preferred use of goth, punk, hippy and glam rock amongst other to signify this previously.

That's what this is... we used to group up according to musical taste. Nowadays, teenagers don't have distinct musical 'tribes', so they look to gender and sexual preference instead. Maybe.

My DH has a beard and did not care when some people thought he might be gay some years ago. I have a piercing and have watched obscure Eastern European dance in an underground bar while wearing black. I am told I think like a man (apparently this does not mean thinking about breasts a lot). People often think I'm lesbian.

Neither of us has blue hair though. DH has very little hair. Well, that's not strictly true, he has lots of hair but not much is on the top of his head.

Anyway, we are totally queer, right? Do we get a special flag and a letter?

What if I dyed my armpit hair blue? Would that make me more queer?

Re-reading the OP, I think I might be gay. If I identify as genderfree* and am attracted to genderfree men, does that make me gay? But where does genderfree sit on the gender binary anyway?

And why do I try to look for logic in this stuff? I know there isn't any.

*Although as a female over 30 I realise I am not allowed to choose my identity - but will be told it by others and mustn't argue.

Thing is it would all be just standard teen movement with parents thinking it's pointless silly etc if it wasn't for

Binders
Blockers
Surgery
Worry child protection stuff
Male rapists in womens prisons
And nowhere that women /girls are allowed to be away from males any more ever again
Etc

I'm getting more confused by the minute. I'm a (mostly) gender conforming female but I'm over 30 and I have pink / purple hair sometimes, I have a lesbian best friend and a DH who while very masculine looking does the majority of the housework and was a SAHD when the DC were little.
I don't even know who I am anymore.

I'd just say I'm me but that's probably not acceptable these days.

But it's just a fucking friendship!

Ah well, you, see, there's your error. There shouldn't be any fucking.

I didn’t get any of that
I honestly think I’d do better learning a second language from scratch than trying to understand this.