Help Understanding Bisexuality Better
A conversation with Jen Winston, author of GREEDY
“Bisexual” is a label that, at the age of 34, I’ve only recently become comfortable using. Much of that is thanks to Jen Winston, author of Greedy: Notes From a Bisexual Who Wants Too Much. Their memoir, and our conversations since, have helped me understand what “bisexuality” actually means, my internalized bisexual imposter syndrome, bi-phobia, and so much more.
I spoke to Jen last year about these same themes, but I’ve come a long way since. So I wanted to have a new conversation with Jen this Pride Month on my new podcast Help Existing to delve into these topics further so that listeners, whether they’re bisexual themselves, questioning, or simply want to be better allies to bisexual friends, walk away with more understanding and compassion.
Below is the full episode, along with a condensed print version of our conversation, with some bonus multimedia elements.
Rachel Krantz: How would you define bisexuality?
Jen Winston: I actually had a really hard time finding one definition when I was writing my book. There are so many definitions, and a lot of them are very binary in nature, saying “bisexuality means being attracted to men and women.” And that was one of the reasons it took me so long to identify as bisexual: I felt like it was a gender-exclusive word that completely erased non-binary people [like me]. And I was like, I don’t want to be a part of anything or identify with something that does that. But in my heart of hearts, it still felt like the term “bisexual” was right.
So when I did more research, I was so pleasantly surprised to find that a lot of the bisexual movement, and especially bisexual politics and bisexual theory, talks about bisexuality as a broad kind of identity. Those definitions say that bisexuality means being attracted to the same gender that you identify as, and other genders as well. Or you could say, bisexuality means being attracted to more than one gender.
I’ve also heard a bunch of different explanations of what the “bi” in bisexual refers to. Julia Serrano is a bi writer and activist who wrote, “in other words, the ‘bi’ in bisexual does not merely refer to the types of people that I am sexual with, but to the facts that both the straight and queer worlds view me in two very different ways, depending on who I happen to be partnered with at any given moment.” Which I think is such an interesting way of reframing what that “bi” in bisexual could mean.
For me, what bisexuality has meant is an ability to exist in the state of in-between. Not necessarily belonging to straight culture, not necessarily belonging wholly to queer culture. I always say bisexuality to me is about “finding stability in a state of flux.” But that’s by no means the official definition.
RK: I know I had a lot of hesitance with the term bisexual too, because I felt like the word itself sounded so binary. So it’s counterintuitive that actually, the idea of bisexuality can be very non-binary. I’m wondering then, what’s the difference then between bisexuality and pansexuality?
JW: I also tried to find a definitive response around that, and really the takeaway that I found is that they’re kind of the same. Pansexuality falls under the bi+ umbrella. My personal definition of bisexuality is being attracted to all genders, which is something that many pansexual people would say is the definition of pansexual, and what others would say their definition of queer is. Or they might also have a different definition of those terms.
RK: You write in your book that, “bi people are oppressed by a binary system called monosexism, which suggests that everyone should be straight or gay.” And, “the reason people think bi women are just experimenting, and bi men are actually gay, is because monosexism and patriarchy want us to think that everyone is attracted to men.”
JW: Monosexism is actually very related to fear of non-monogamy because it’s very much rooted in the idea that you have to choose one commitment to one person. Monosexism privileges heterosexual and homosexual people. That’s not to say that there aren’t other issues that those people experience, and other challenges and other ways that those people are oppressed, but there are a lot of ways that monosexual people are not oppressed. And then the reason people think that bi women are just experimenting, and bi men are actually gay, is that patriarchy wants us to think everyone’s attracted to men.
RK: I want to delve into the idea of bi privilege, which you write “overlooks the serious issues bisexual people face.”
JW: For the beginning of my book, I needed to acknowledge the fact that no one thinks we need a book about bisexuality. And I needed to acknowledge the fact that I have so much straight privilege. Even now that I’m in a visibly queer relationship, I still had access to straight privilege for most of my life. But also, the whole time I was closeted. And the whole time, I didn’t know who I was. And those things really, really take a toll on you.
And I always thought it was my fault. I thought I was making a big deal out of stuff. But when I started looking into the concept of bi privilege, I found that there are a lot of really alarming statistics about bisexual people. For example, nearly half of bisexual women are sexual assault survivors, compared to 17% of straight women and 13% of lesbians. That’s more than double, which that was consistent with my personal experience. There’s also increased substance abuse in bisexual women.
Another stat that’s striking is that bisexual men earn an average of 15% less than straight men, while gay men earn roughly 5% less than straight men. So bisexual men on average earn less money than straight or gay men.
RK: And rates of mental illness for bi women are higher as well. Right?
JW: Yeah. Based on a survey done in 2013, which is when most of the bisexual research that I found for my book was done, which is its own problem. Especially because there are all these new reports now that are like “Gen Z doesn’t identify as straight. And a lot of them are bisexual.” And it’s like, okay, well then we need new research on bisexuality! But in 2013, only 28% of bisexual people said that they were out to most or all of the important people in their lives, compared with 77% of gay men and 71% of lesbians.
I mean, it’s never easy for anyone, but it indicates that it’s much more common for gay and lesbian people to come out than for bi people to.
RK: I didn’t know about these stats until I was researching my memoir and looked up the rates of sexual assault, substance abuse, eating disorders, and mental illness to contextualize my story. And then I found that the rates were higher in bisexual women across the board. I remember being really shocked by that.
And also, connecting the dots. My experience being violated was the week I slept with a woman for the first time— and it was not with her that I was assaulted. And afterward, I looked at myself in the mirror and said, You’re attracted to all genders, you’re polyamorous, you’re kinky — what’d you expect you greedy slut? And it’s not a direct cause and effect of, “I had sex with a woman, therefore I got assaulted a week later” — but the chain of events was certainly linked.
And I think that’s a hard thing to talk about. Because when you say these facts about bisexual women, it’s easy for the mind then stereotype: That’s because bisexual women are in these risky situations, they’re loose. They’re confused. They’re on drugs and therefore reckless. Or they have mental illness and therefore they’re attracted to everyone. And so I think it’s really hard to talk about. Because for me, bisexuality was not the direct reason I was having these issues — it was an unhealthy relationship with a straight man. But the fact that I was in certain situations, that I was drawn to sexual exploration? That did have to do with my bisexuality. And my polyamory and bisexuality are linked.
JW: I used to feel like I put myself in those situations [where I was assaulted]. Because I cared about sexual exploration, but also because I felt something was missing, and I thought that sex would help me figure it out. I just felt like, maybe if you have more sex, something will just click into place and you’ll get it. You’ll get yourself now.
Assault, or other words used to describe sexual assault, are hard to claim. It’s like the title of the Roxanne Gay anthology, Not That Bad — it feels like you always want to downplay it. And I think it’s very similar to claiming a bisexual identity. We don’t want to seem like we’re asking for attention.
The one thing that I feel like I learned after coming out, is that I didn’t know how good it would feel. I thought my life would go on as normal, which I was very wrong about — cause every single thing in my life changed, and then I wrote a book about it.
I really thought, whatever everyone’s bisexual — and that’s a really common thing that people say. And it has this effect of silencing you and making you think that if you talk about it bisexuality, you’re talking about something that nobody cares about.
That was kind of why I felt like I had to be self-aware in my book to be like, I get it, you think everyone’s bi. But that’s actually bad. And it really made it so I couldn’t come out for a while.
RK: You wrote about how we think bisexuality is a verb, rather than an identity. I related to that. For years, I was like, I haven’t lost my virginity yet with a woman. So even though these feelings have always been there and they seem to be getting stronger, I’m not really bisexual.
JW: I have been asking on my Instagram for bisexual people to share their stories. And I’ve asked, “if you are a bisexual person in a relationship that presents as straight, have you come out?”
And so many people say no, because they’re “not trying to act on it.” And that it is linked to this idea of bisexuality being a behavior — which the media is responsible for. Even when they thought they were showing bisexual representation, they were often just showing someone hooking up with multiple genders, and not using the word bisexual.
And that word was so important. It’s an identity, not a behavior.
RK: I think that where some of this biphobia within the queer community can come from is that sometimes maybe people are exploring their queer attractions, and decide that they veer more on the side of being attracted to the opposite sex. And so they might leave people feeling brokenhearted or used. And so when they see this pattern happening to them once, or more than once, I can understand why that biphobia arises.
I wonder how we can engage in conversations that don’t dismiss that this is a hurtful, real phenomenon— at the same time we can acknowledge that even if a woman went back to dating a man after you, that doesn’t necessarily mean they weren’t bi, or that it wasn’t real.
JW: Yes. And also, any relationship is an experimentation. Any time you’re in a relationship with someone, you’re just feeling it out. I think that a lot of times, bisexuality and bi people wind up as the scapegoat for a lot of these other issues that we face across sexism, across monogamy.
Another stat that I found really compelling is that 89% of bisexual women are in monogamous relationships. So if the fear is that you’re going to get cheated on, or that you’re going to have to be non-monogamous, that’s not actually consistent with the facts.
RK: And when I read that stat, I was like, I’m part of that other 11%. It’s kind of almost like a rebuttal of like, See, bi people are just like you! They’re not that bad, non-monogamous thing!
JW: Actually, I had not realized that until right now. So thank you for pointing that out. Citing that stat uses monogamy as a stepping stone to make bisexuality okay. Which is the opposite of the goal, because the fear of bisexuality is so tied up with the fear of non-monogamy. They are on the same team. Just as many oppressed identities are on the same team.
I learned so much about non-monogamy when I read your book, and something that really sticks with me is the conversation that one of your friends didn’t have at work — and couldn’t have — because it’s just very difficult to be out as non-monogamous, because that is explicitly sexual.
As [queer people] we don’t want to fall into homonormativity. Because assimilation is not the goal. Equality itself is not necessarily the goal. Re-invention is actually the goal, and that’s just much more difficult. So we set our sights on these very low bars. And then what happens is these other identities [like non-monogamous] get oppressed in the process.
RK: We’ve talked about how statistically, bi privilege is a fallacy. However, I do think there’s subtlety here that has to be untangled. My not “having” to come out as queer until later in life, or people assuming, because I am in a cohabitating partnership with a man, that I’m straight — while there are real psychological things that are harmful about then dismissing my own truth because of that, there are certain privileges I enjoy.
I can understand the resentment of more obviously queer people who have incurred discrimination because of not having that choice to pass as straight if they wanted to have any sort of outward-facing relationship. So I can understand the resentment of some queer people of, okay, so we’ve been fighting for all these rights, and now that it’s like safer for you to come out, suddenly all these people are bisexual? Suddenly this whole generation is queer? I can see why people start saying, well, then being queer doesn’t mean anything. I can see where the resentment would spring from.
And isn’t it possible that certain people are appropriating queerness? Or if not appropriating queerness, not checking their other privileges?
JW: I think that is very astute and empathetic. Because the lesbian and gay rights movements have fought so hard for their rights, it makes sense that a gatekeeping mentality could arise with it.
I think the real risk is that white, cis people will take up a ton of space. And I think that’s the work of the white cis queer community is to be like, whoa, you can be however you want to be. But here’s what our goals are, and how you can help. We need to kind of have those inter-communal conversations happening.
RK: Perhaps where identifying as bisexual or queer becomes appropriative is when you’re just trying to use it as a distinguisher to be like, “I’m also oppressed!” without also educating yourself about how the rest of the queer community is oppressed, or certain privileges that you might have that other queer people don’t.
We should all be actively working to make sure that everyone in our community feels safe. So perhaps part of the resentment from queer people towards some newly bi people would come from the identification, without the paying forward anything to the community, or any activism.
JW: Absolutely.
RK: Can you talk a little bit more about the concept of why “confusion,” and the label “greedy” can be reframed as good things?
JW: Before I came out as bi, I really didn’t want to be any of the bisexual stereotypes. I was having a lot of threesomes at the time, and I didn’t want all my coworkers to think that I was having threesomes all the time, because that’s actually what I was doing. And you know, promiscuity is a stereotype about bi people. I just felt like I fit a lot of these stereotypes, so I didn’t want to affirm them by coming out. It felt like that was bad for bisexual people, but also bad for me.
But when I did come out, I discovered the book, Bi: Notes For a Bisexual Revolution by Shiri Eisner, and that book is essentially all about the idea that these stereotypes about bi people are really things that culture at large is afraid of, like sex. So the idea of “greedy” being a bad thing in a sexual context is to be afraid of promiscuity. And so that’s why I named the book Greedy, because it felt like a way to reclaim both that stereotype, as well as my sexual agency and sexual history.
I’ve also since found a lot of liberation through the word confusion. Shiri Eisner wrote that “bisexual confusion can act as a destabilizing agent of social change.” Reading that quote was the first time I felt proud to be bi. Because it made me realize that actually, bi identity is about finding a space between binaries and recognizing that the two binary options you were given, in most cases, weren’t chosen by you, and were just kind of taken as fact.
And to me, bisexuality is about looking for that new space. Your confusion is a gift. To constantly be asking questions and checking in with yourself and figuring out who you are, and what you want to be. That’s an amazing thing that helps you see the world in a new way, and ask questions. Why is this that way? Do I have to do this? And I’m really grateful that bisexuality gave that to me.
RK: How do you think people who don’t identify as bi could be better allies to bi people?
JW: I mean, that’s a great question. Cause I feel like so few people are like, “I want to be a bisexual ally!”
I mean, I think just talking about bisexuality, using the word, is a radical act. Friends just using the word would have gone so far for me. Also, believing people when they say that they’re bi, asking questions if you don’t understand, asking what that means for them, and where they’re at right now. Not assuming when your friend tells you they’re dating someone new that it is one gender or the other. Having that kind of open-mindedness opens up the space to make that conversation easier.
RK: One of the reasons I was often afraid to be more explicit about my bisexuality with my female friends is that I didn’t want them to then think I was secretly in love with them. Then, coming out as non-monogamous and doing press around Open, I don’t want every man in a monogamous relationship to think I’m secretly trying to steal them. So yeah, either way, there’s this weird thing of like, I’m not a predator!
JW: Being non-monogamous doesn’t make you sexually accessible to anyone — just like being bisexual or queer doesn’t make you attracted to everyone. It’s just the same way that straight attraction works! You know, the same way that any type of attraction works.
RK: What would be your advice to people who want to come out as bisexual or queer, but also want to be mindful of taking up too much space?
JW: Um, that you’re not taking up too much space, and you are bisexual enough. If you think you’re bisexual, you probably are. It’s that simple, actually. If it’s crossed your mind a lot, then you probably are bi. And the world needs more queer people. But just also remember your respective privileges, and be cognizant of that.
And remember that bisexuality is a full identity, and you are valid.
RK: I feel like I periodically need reminders of this from you. I’ve made great strides, but I still have a lot of internalized shit. And if there is some sort of causal relationship between bisexuality and higher rates of mental illness, I would guess that a lot of it has to do with other people telling you you don’t exist or aren’t real. And you telling yourself that you’re not real, or that your feelings are not valid, and therefore shutting down a huge part of yourself.
And that is very psychologically harmful because you’re basically continually undermining your own reality.
JW: Yes, one-hundred percent.
