Wrong kind of queer-

waiting to feel like I belong

It is the season of Pride once again. Originally the anniversary celebration of trans and gender non-conforming folx fighting back against the cops, Pride became a powerful celebration of queer joy and liberation. Pride then became a time for big corporations to rainbow wash their capitalism. It also became a season for sex shaming groups to preform “welcome.”¹ Pride is a season for queer folx to argue about the intersection of assless chaps and the presence of small children, it is a season to question who does and does not belong (cops, kids, churches). As a bi-woman Pride is also a season of complex grief and anxiety. What I am saying is that it has never been simple.

I don’t remember when I first realized I was bisexual. I do remember an art teacher when I was in maybe 4th or 5th grade that gave me big feels. She was Dutch and had short choppy blond hair. Starting when I was 13, I had problematic sexual and romantic relationships with men. I was completely in love for years with my straight best friend, and had one-time sex with most of my straight friends. When I was 16 I told my mom I was bisexual. She said, “Yeah, a lot of girls think that at your age.”

Bisexuality felt both true as an identity and also like failure of my feminism. I dated the president of a Gay and Lesbian group in college for a couple of months. I learned that I was not welcome in queer spaces. Her friends said a lot of really cruel stuff to me about being bi, and she seemed pretty bothered by it too. It felt like I was supposed to renounce my shameful past of having been attracted to men, and promise from this moment forward to only be into women.

I kept having sex with both men and women in my young slutty days, but wouldn’t pull off another legit girlfriend until I was in my 40’s. I was at a bar once and flirting with a really hot butch. While she was in the bathroom her friend asked if I was a real lesbian, or just some bi-girl. She told me her friend hated bi-girls, and I left the bar before she came back. I learned that women who are only into women are rarely interested in women who are not only interested in women. Statistically, bi folks are at least half of the queer population, but many are shamed into silence, or passing as monosexual depending on the relationship they are in. We are told we cannot possibly know ourselves and are then accused of abusing our invisibility as privilege.

When I was 24 I married a man and was super monogamous for 18 years. My bisexuality felt purely theoretical and irrelevant. When I took over Hip Mama magazine in 2008, the gay local newspaper reported that it was no longer under queer leadership. I was told by a church mentor that I shouldn’t mention my bisexuality in my materials for seeking ordination because it didn’t matter. I was told directly at an Integrity² event that I was not ‘Family’. I still told people that I was bi, but since I was married to a man I was never more than an ally.

Mental health outcomes for bi folx are pretty rough, because it turns out that being told you are not real isn't much of a privilege.³ There is also a really gendered component that reasons that bi-men are actually gay and bi- women are actually straight. In our ragingly misogynistic society assumes that everyone really wants to be with men, because they are clearly the superior gender. The result of this seems to be that women are more reluctant to date bisexuals of any gender.

Believing people about their own lived experience doesn’t seem like too big of an ask. I mean, I don’t fully understand the experience of monosexuality, or being attracted to only one gender. But I do believe people who tell me they are either straight or gay. If there is really only one gender expression or arrangement of body parts that is attractive to you, that is fine with me. I mostly would just like to be given the same courtesy. I have been told that I am in denial about my true orientation, or that I only believe in two genders. I have been told that I am untrustworthy.

I've also spent my time in the Unicorn fields. The first time I was 19 and back then consent and conversations before having sex were unheard of. Even in this more enlightened age, it is too easy to try and use a bisexual woman as a prop and a toy in a mixed gender pairing. Some people think that this is what being bisexual is for:

Pride has already begun in the wider world, the Portland Pride parade doesn’t happen until July because of conflicts with all of the other summer stuff that Portland tries to jam into a few months of sunshine. I don’t know yet if I will go downtown into the blazing heat and the heavy crowds next month. A few organizations I am a part of will be marching or tabling.⁴ I have this deep old fear that I will have to prove my belonging. But I also know who I am.

I know that my queerness is not the possession of the good gays or the gold star lesbians. I know what and who turns me on. I know that I enjoy romantic, sexual, and kinky connections with people both of similar and different genders than mine. I know that the way I live my life, and the people who I welcome into it are not a test to be graded. I will wear my leather jacket and my nose ring, I will sit weird in the chair but I am not confused.

I have made up my mind to be unapologetically myself.

And so my loves and my dear ones,
You are precious and beloved
you- the exact and particular you that you are
whoever you love
whoever gets your pulse thrumming
whoever makes you stupid and awkward.
You are glorious wherever you are
in this moment
on the spectrum / in the fractal
of identity and desire.
The Love who made you and this big lovely world
is even wilder and messier than you are
with Their love
and you are definitely Their type.
My Loves
My Dear Ones
we can whisper who we are in the dusk
or draw it in the sand
we can shout it in the morning
or draw it on our hands.
We don’t owe anyone an explanation
of the shape of our lust or our love.
If you knock on the door and tell us you are here
welcome
you can be my Family.
Happy Pride

---

If you want to sign up for my summer course- Anatomy of Faith. It will start in July and go through August asynchronously. We will explore embodied spirituality and have a good time doing it.

If you want to submit a question for my monthly advice column here’s the link:

1. The same month I was kicked out of the church for telling my bishop I was polyamorous, the presiding bishop made a special pride announcement where he said “I believe deep in my soul that God is always seeking to create a world and a society where all are loved, where justice is done, and where the God-given equality of us all is honored in our relationships, in our social arrangements, and in law.”

2. Integrity was a group that existed within the church from 1974-2002 to help gay Episcopalians gain acceptance within the church.

3. https://www.health.com/mind-body/lgbtq-health/bi-erasure

4. stomptown.org & oregonswc.org