Does The Gay Movement Want Bisexuals Back In The Closet?

At last! The Civil Partnership Bill has been passed, and at this year’s Dublin Pride Festival Irish people – excuse the pun – came out in force to support members of the LGBT community. Though major issues still need to be addressed, it seems that this country is making serious strides in terms of doing away with discrimination against members of the LGBT community.

But is the LGBT community doing the same for those within its own ranks that might be identified as ‘others’? With reports of bisexuals being told to “pick a side”, transsexuals being labelled as “traitors” and gay women being told to “butch up”, it seems that, for some in the wider gay community, acceptance comes with terms and conditions.
“Most gay guys just point blank refuse to believe that someone can be bisexual,” proffers James Grannell, a UCD student from Wexford. “They fundamentally fail to understand the feelings of a bisexual person. The idea that I can feel the same about men and women doesn’t sit well with them. So I’m often branded a coward – it’s suggested that I’m ashamed of being gay, that I label myself as bisexual because that’s more acceptable to the straight community.
“I’ve been told that I’m really just gay and can’t accept it,” James continues, “or that I’m going through a phase. It’s difficult, being told that you can’t possibly be what you know you are, and that your feelings aren’t real.”
Surely that’s the very attitude that LGBT people historically railed against? James agrees. He is all too aware of the hypocrisy at play here.
“If I went up to a gay man or woman and told them that they were only going through a phase and it’ll pass, and that they can’t really be gay because no one can actually feel like that, I’d be labelled intolerant and ignorant. But that’s what bisexuals get told all the time – and it seems to be totally acceptable among gays.”
James is adamant that biphobia is a big issue in the LGBT community.
“My straight friends have fewer issues with my bisexuality than my gay friends,” he says. “I think that says enough, in many ways, about tolerance in the LGBT community towards bisexuals. There has always been a big ‘L’, a big ‘G’ and a small ‘b’ and ‘t’. The bottom line, it seems, is that refusing to live in a fully straight or a fully gay world pisses off a lot of people.”
The small ‘t’ syndrome has been felt by 20-year-old student Darrin Matthews. A ‘trans’ man (female to male transsexual), Darrin has been living as a man for two years, and is currently undergoing testosterone treatment to further his transition, which has generally been a positive one.
“My mother is amazingly supportive and introduces me as her son. She helped me shave my head, bought me new clothes and even bought me a chest binder. My brother and sister have also come to accept me as their little brother. Even though I may have a deeper voice and some facial hair now, that doesn’t change who I am and doesn’t take away the memories we have.”
However, he too has experienced intolerance from his LGBT peers.
“When I’d tell others that I was a trans man I would get mixed reactions from people, mainly in the lesbian community. Many older lesbians, who would have gone through a lot with equality for women, saw it as me leaving them to become a man – that I was turning my back on women and saying that they weren’t good enough. I remember one particular older lesbian getting quite angry with me, and I found myself apologising. After that bad experience I became a lot more wary of telling older lesbians that I was trans. People assumed I was a butch lesbian and if I didn’t feel comfortable in a certain situation I wouldn’t correct that assumption. It took a long time to feel comfortable with older lesbians, which was a shame, but after that I promised never apologise for who I was again.”
And even if you fit the criteria of being “fully gay’, according to some disaffected gays, unless you dress the part you’ll be targeted. Áine Richards, 25, is originally from Seattle but is now living in Dublin. Openly gay, she was the president of her college’s LGBT society during her undergrad in the U.S., where the attitude was wonderfully supportive. However, when she moved to Ireland she noticed that peer pressure was a major issue in LGBT groups here.
“It’s possibly because my group of friends became bigger and more diverse. I began to notice how much of an issue aesthetics were among my lesbian friends, a lot of whom would identify as ‘butch.’ I’m quite femme, and so would get a lot of only half-joking comments about not being ’gay enough’. Women who dress the part feel they have more of a claim to the label.”
In gay bars, this teasing would often turn into something more hostile.
“If you’re in a gay club, you get a lot of ‘fag hag’ comments from lesbians who assume you’re straight because you’re not butch. It’s almost like it’s necessary to represent your sexuality through your wardrobe.”
Heather Corinna is the founder of Scarleteen.com, a sex and gender education website for young adults. She has seen many young people facing intolerance from their LGBT peers, and feeling deeply disheartened as a result.
“It can be incredibly frustrating,” she says, “to enter into communities where, by definition, ‘the rules’ have already been broken in some way – such as by being queer – only to discover there are still ‘rules’ in some people’s heads, that any one given area or group of nonconformity can still insist on other ways of conforming.”
For young LGBT people struggling with our hetero-centric society, having a supportive peer group is incredibly important.
“The thing is, you automatically assume that LGBT people will be more accepting than they are, because they tend not to have been accepted by society in the past,” muses James. “It’s sad that we mirror most of the bad things in the straight community. In fact, very often, I think we exaggerate them even more.”