I ended up calling out my GSA, most of whom were friends. In both moments, the event and the call out, I felt a depth of discomfort that I haven't felt in years, possibly ever. I remember instances of being asked, ‘are you attracted to anyone in this room?’ – the stereotype about bisexuality being that I am automatically attracted to everyone. Recently, in the park with a friend, we overheard a conversation along the lines of ‘if you date girls, you’re a lesbian and nothing else’. I sometimes feel that around every corner, people erase my existence.

Mereish, E.H., Katz-Wise, S.L. and Woulfe, J. (2017) ‘Bisexual-specific minority stressors, psychological distress, and suicidality in bisexual individuals: The mediating role of loneliness’, Prevention science, 18(6), pp. 716-725. According to Stonewall’s statistics, when looking at LGB people, bisexual people are more likely to experience anxiety, self-harm and suicidal thoughts when compared to their gay and lesbian counterparts. In every category, bisexual women were worse off by a fair margin. And these findings are replicated in numerous other studies in other countries, too. An accessible encyclopaedia of bi+ issues, this important book amplifies the voices and experiences of those on the multi-gender attracted spectrum who are too often overlooked or erased.I was in college when I experienced bisexual erasure for the first time. I was part of a GSA (Gay-Straight Alliance), and many of my friends were members. At the time, I had a boyfriend, and my friends asked me: ‘So Tom, now that you have a boyfriend, does that mean you’re gay now?’. At the time, I didn't realise that what had been said was an act of bisexual erasure – I knew nothing about it. To them, it was just a joke, but to me, it was painful and upsetting, although I couldn't quite put my finger on why. Here is a paper (referenced in the above paper) that basically says the defensible version of what this paper shows: that patterns of arousal vary between monosexual and bisexual men, but there is a lot of variance among bisexual men. It does not claim to validate or provide evidence for the existence of bisexuality. If these particular patterns are of interest to you then that’s fine. It’s what’s being measured. He is obviously pissed that researchers have taken it upon themselves to explore bisexuality using methods apart from just asking people how they identify themselves.

I have very little to say here, except to let you all know that the venerable PNAS has today published a paper (edited by Steven Pinker) letting use know that male bisexuality exists.I have been loath to deviate from house style, but if you’re willing I would happily remove or edit (with commentaries on top and a notated removal of the worst content) future posts on here. I would certainly never have posted this if I’d expected it to garner transphobic comments. I just scanned the comments and didn’t see this stuff – I was looking for good jokes etc.

Koh, A.S. and Ross, L.K., 2006. Mental health issues: A comparison of lesbian, bisexual and heterosexual women. Journal of homosexuality, 51(1), pp. 33-57. Bisexual Men Exist is available from Five Leaves Bookshop or any other good bookstore. Vaneet will also be talking about his new book at Five Leaves on Sunday 19 February People who are purely straight or purely gay can tend to generalize their own experience and think all other people must be just one or the other," added John Sylla, one of the 13 authors of the latest study and president of the American Institute of Bisexuality. "But the Kinsey Scale is valid, and there are bisexually aroused men and women, even if for different reasons they choose to pass as just straight or gay." It’s possible to read that second sentence with contrastive stress, so that it would mean the authors believe that self-reports aren’t valid, but in the natural reading of the sentence, it would imply that the authors believe self-reports are valid and that their study is an attempt to find additional valid measures to satisfy critics who challenge self reports as being unreliable. (the statement about “empirical verification” can also be read in multiple ways, however, so maybe I am just assuming too much about their intentions. Before you go, please joint me one more time in singing the male bisexual national anthem Do Flowers Exist At Night.Van, E.E.D., Mereish, E.H., Woulfe, J.M. and Katz-Wise, S.L. (2019) ‘Perceived discrimination, coping mechanisms, and effects on health in bisexual and other non-monosexual adults’ Archives of Sexual Behavior, 48(1), pp.159-174. Male bisexuality has sometimes been challenged, based on a popular assumption that men are either straight or gay, with nothing in between.But that’s not true, according to the new study, in which scientists from Essex and the USA combined all available and previously published data. Specifically, they were able to reanalyse over 400 men’s penile responses to erotic videos of men and women. Rieger says that for most homosexual and heterosexual men, these three aspects of sexuality are the same. That's not the case for men who say they are bisexual — even if they have sex with both men and women. I don’t agree with you here. I don’t think this blog is a place for racism, antisemitism, homophobia, or transphobia. And I’m extremely aware of just how marginalized and oppressed trans people are both in the US and around the world. So I don’t think it’s neutral to leave these posts for other people to comment on.