Erased Again, Who's Fault Is It?

Well, its all over Face Book. The Disney Corp. has come out with “Pride Ears.” It’s a new version of the ever famous black Mickey Mouse ears, only this time the ears are round Pride Flags.  This is really frustrating to me, because most of the comments are talking about “Gay Pride,” not LGBTQ Pride, which is what that flag was and is supposed to mean.

Over the years, since the pride flag came out, it has come to represent Gay Pride only. The general public, or more specifically the young adult millennial, now believes the pride flag to be the “Gay” pride flag. As someone who was born before 1970, I know the pride flag was to be inclusive of the whole LGBTQ community which existed at the time of it’s creation. Never mind that Bisexuals represent 52% of the entire LGBTQ community. So when you break it down, there are more bisexuals than all the rest of the LGBTQ community combined.

If, like me, you immediately became enraged about this epic case of bi-erasure and you want to scream at the top of your lungs, “what about us?” I suggest you stop and wait a minute. Take some time and think about whose fault is it, and why do we live in a society that thinks this way in the first place?

After a while I realized, if I was looking to place blame on anyone I needed to look no further than my bathroom mirror. Furthermore, I suggest you do the same because we bisexuals have no one to blame but ourselves. Before you get your torches and pitchforks to hunt me down, hear me out.

After Stonewall, when the LGBT movement was born, the community banned together to make ourselves heard. Brenda Howard, a bisexual who is considered the “Mother of Pride,” was instrumental in starting what would eventually become as the Gay Pride Parade, and actually coined the term Pride, So, bisexuals were actually present in the very beginning, what happened?   

I’m no expert on the history of bisexuality or bi activism, nor have I been a part of the LGBTQ community or out for very long. However, the one thing I have discovered and believe to be the root cause of the biphobia and bi-erasure we experience today is this; as a general rule bisexuals find it easier to blend in and hide from society and a large majority of us do it for that very reason.

Right before I came out, I was trying to find any bisexual resources I could in my major metro area. I thought, “This won’t be big deal, I’ll just Google it.” Boy was I wrong! I went to Google and tried searching “Bisexual Support Groups,” I got pages and pages of results but they were all for gay, lesbian, and transgender groups.  If it said, LGBTQ, I got excited until I clicked and started reading, then my heart sank because I found the LGBTQ really means gay and lesbian, and trans if you are lucky. Each time I changed my search criteria the results I got were the internet’s version of crickets chirping.

As Individuals we need not be too hard on ourselves about blending into the wood work. I totally get wanting to be invisible. I mean, I grew up in a religious family who taught me that homosexuality was a sin punishable by death. It was also the 70’s and 80’s when gay men were being accused of causing the AIDs epidemic, and society treated them like infectious dregs. Even though the 70’s and 80’s were terrible times for gays and lesbians, they stood up for themselves. They made their voices heard. They became tireless activist pushing what became known as “The Gay Agenda.” Did they stop pushing in the 90’s or after the turn of the century? HELL NO! They pushed and pushed and pushed until they couldn’t push any longer and then they pushed some more.

Meanwhile, not all, but most bisexuals sat by and watched in their heteronormative, straight passing relationships. The got married and started families. I can’t speak for all bisexuals, but I for one didn’t even know bisexual was a thing I could even be. I had no idea these people represented a community I was also a part of, so I too sat and watched their struggle.

The gay and lesbian community, while small in number, were able to effect powerful and permanent changes in the United States and the world. They finally had enough and wouldn’t stand to be mistreated any longer.  Because of those changes people are coming to realize that gay and lesbian people come in all shapes, sizes, skin colors, religions, personality types, and more. Come to find out the majority of them are not stereotypical at all. I was surprised the first time I attended the gay men’s social group I am now a member of. There wasn’t one man that fit the stereotypical mold of what society told me a gay man in the 70’s and 80’s was like. If I had walked passed them not knowing they were gay, I might have thought it was a group bible study. When I have been in attendance, only once did I ever see anyone give the group a second glance.

So, what does all of this mean for us as bisexuals today? You guessed it, It’s time we got off our collective asses and did something about it! It’s time for us to step outside of our heteronormative straight passing relationships to be heard and counted. It’s time to let our friends, neighbors, and coworkers that we are Bisexual and Proud of it! It’s time we replace the gay agenda with the BI-AGENDA!” It’s time we educate everyone, in public, in our churches synagogues, and mosques, in our schools, and strangers we meet, that bisexuality isn’t wrong or a sin, but that we are everywhere, and that we aren’t slutty, promiscuous, confused, cheaters who will leave you for another sex, or a plaything for your bedroom threesomes.

It also means, the only way anyone of us has the right to complain about biphobia, bi-erasure, unfair treatment in healthcare, and how we are unfairly viewed by religious groups is if we get up off our own ass and do something, anything big or small, about it. Wear a T-shirt proclaiming how proud you are to be bisexual. Don’t back down when someone says nasty things to you about being bisexual. Educate them in a respectful way so they might actually have a change of heart one day. Start a bisexual support group in your town, or a bisexual YouTube channel. Make your bisexuality know on social media.

DON’T BE AFRAID! DON’T HIDE! BE STRONG! BE OUT! BE PROUD!

The only way we will ever be able to make a collective difference and lead the world on a path form tolerance to acceptance is to get off our individual asses making small differences in our own world every day until we don’t need to any longer.